After decades fighting ‘to win’ for immigrants, advocate hangs up the gloves

Joshua Hoyt has spent his career fighting the good fight as one of the best community organizers in Chicago, a city that has long cultivated some of the top practitioners of that underappreciated profession.

SHARE After decades fighting ‘to win’ for immigrants, advocate hangs up the gloves
Joshua Hoyt is arrested outside the U.S. Capitol during a 2013 protest over a lack of action on immigration reform. He’s retiring as executive director of the National Partnership for New Americans.

Joshua Hoyt is arrested outside the U.S. Capitol during a 2013 protest over a lack of action on immigration reform. He’s retiring as executive director of the National Partnership for New Americans.

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Joshua Hoyt says he’s retiring, and I’m not quite sure I believe him.

I keep thinking he’s like one of those boxers who announces his retirement, only to make a comeback when the next opponent comes into view.

Pugnacious though he may be, Hoyt is no boxer. But he’s spent his career fighting the good fight as one of the best community organizers in Chicago, a city that has long cultivated some of the top practitioners of that underappreciated profession.

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One of the problems with fighting the good fight is it’s never over. There are always more injustices to be addressed, more wrongs to be righted.

I’m hardly the only person questioning what retirement holds for Hoyt, knowing his dedication to the cause of social justice, for immigrants in particular.

“I know you’re not done making trouble,” Roberta Rakove, a lawyer and activist, has told him.

Making trouble is one of Hoyt’s specialties, especially for politicians, always in the interest of afflicting the comfortable and comforting the afflicted.

Hoyt, 65, helped build the Illinois Coalition of Immigrant and Refugee Rights into a major force before moving to the national scene seven years ago to run the National Partnership for New Americans, a coalition of other regional organizations such as ICIRR.

Over the past six years, the national group has helped 5.3 million immigrants become citizens — the first step in registering them to vote and asserting their political power. 

“Organizing is about building power and forcing a reaction,” Hoyt says.

As for his reputation for playing hardball, he says mischievously: “If you’re going to be in a fight, you might as well fight to win.”

Hoyt is stepping down as NPNA’s executive director nearly 43 years to the day since he started his organizing career. 

He has employed a people-power strategy to win more than his fair share of battles, helping make Illinois one of the nation’s most immigrant-friendly states.

Hoyt has been a force behind important campaigns, like convincing state leaders to provide health care for the working poor and driver’s licenses for undocumented immigrants.

John Rowe, Exelon’s chairman emeritus and one of Hoyt’s friends and frequent collaborators, says undocumented immigrants especially owe their gratitude to Hoyt for “whatever hope they have for a decent life in this country.”

Despite his leftward leanings, Hoyt has made it a priority to work in a bipartisan manner, taking a carrot-and-stick approach to both sides of the political aisle. 

Though Hoyt is better known for his brutal treatment of two Republicans — former U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk and then-candidate Jim Oberweis — over their views on immigration, it remains a point of pride for him that two ostensible allies, President Barack Obama and U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, complained bitterly after he turned up the heat on them to do more. 

Josh Hoyt at a protest of U.S. Rep. Daniel Lipinski.

Josh Hoyt at a protest of U.S. Rep. Daniel Lipinski.

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Yet his big goal, of winning comprehensive immigration reform, remains elusive. President Donald Trump has forced immigration organizers such as Hoyt to play defense the past four years. Now, others will have to lead that fight.

Happily, Hoyt has mentored a next generation of organizers and leaders who will be shaping public policy for decades to come.

One of them, Rebecca Shi, executive director of the American Business Immigration Council, credits Hoyt with advancing the organizing careers of women and people of color. 

“Josh has been my role model,” says Shi, who has her own team of crack, young organizers forging ties between business and immigrant communities.

Abdelnasser Rashid, a political organizer who just lost an election for Cook County Board of Review but seems to have a bright future, credits Hoyt with always turning to Muslim and Asian groups, in addition to Latinos, to consult on policy matters because he understood the immigrant coalition’s strength is in its diversity. 

Juan Salgado, chancellor of the City Colleges of Chicago, and Dr. Zaher Sahloul, a physician who operates an international disaster relief agency, credit their associations with Hoyt for helping their own personal development.

“He got me out of my comfort zone,” says Salgado, ICIRR’s former board president.

I can certainly say it was Hoyt who stiffened my backbone on support for immigration issues.

Hoyt has earned his retirement. But I’d be disappointed if, years from now, he isn’t still causing trouble.

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