Posts tagged with 'border control'
Weekly Diaspora: Immigrants Abused, Denied Social Services in Broken Immigration System
Filed under: 
by Catherine A. Traywick, Media Consortium blogger
After decades of misguided policies and patchwork practices, the high human costs of our disordered immigration system are only starting to emerge. Stricter immigration policies and overcrowded detention centers aren’t making our streets safer or our social services more accessible.
Instead, mounting evidence shows that our immigration policies are just creating a space for immigrants to be brutalized—socially, financially and physically. From reports of sexual abuse inside of detention centers to news of legal residents being denied social services, the ineffectiveness of the prevailing system has never been more apparent, nor the need for reform so great.
Women and children sexually assaulted in detention centers
As Michelle Chen writes at Colorlines, allegations of sexual abuse within a Texas detention center have sparked investigations by the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch. According to reports, a guard at the T. Don Hutto Residential Center sexually assaulted several women while transporting them prior to their release. (more…)
Weekly Diaspora: Will $600 Million Border Security Bill Target Innocents?
by Catherine A. Traywick, Media Consortium blogger
Anti-immigrant forces have adeptly shaped the ongoing immigration debate into an issue of crime and punishment. Now, the pending passage of a $600 million border security bill could breathe new life into the narrative of the criminal immigrant – despite the increasing safety of our border communities.
The sentiment is familiar, if false: Crime in Mexico fuels migration, which breeds violence on the border, which must then be combated within our cities. The undocumented must be punished for stealing our jobs, stealing our services and ruining our neighborhoods. In Arizona, lawmakers like state senator Russell Pearce (who claims that his ring finger was shot off by a Latino gang member) used just that rhetoric to justify the passage of SB 1070 and other anti-immigrant laws.
The reality is far different. Not only do Mexicans and immigrants experience the worst of drug-related border violence, immigration enforcement programs have shifted their resources from combating trafficking to deporting non-criminal immigrants. (more…)
Weekly Immigration Wire: White House Meeting a First Step to Reform
by Nezua, TMC MediaWire Blogger
After postponing twice, President Obama finally met with a bipartisan group of lawmakers on June 25 to discuss moving immigration reform legislation forward. The meeting was applauded by activists and advocates for immigration reform, as the issue seemed to have stalled, and the acrimonious tone of the debate has proven deadly.
All parties emerged from the meeting with positive feelings about the prospect for progress, as I heard on last Friday’s White House debriefing conference call. A confluence of positive factors are contributing to the momentum: Major labor leaders are united for reform, Democrats are leading much of Washington, and voters in the U.S. clearly want to see reform passed. President Obama made his intention to pass reform very clear and the White House predicts the process will begin late this year or early 2010.
New America Media calls the meeting a hopeful beginning, but makes it clear that nothing is guaranteed this year—despite the pressing need. And we can’t wait too long for reform to begin. 2010 is the beginning of the 2012 Presidential election cycle and the issue could be “too easily politicized” at that time.
Wiretap Mag’s M. Junaid Levesque-Alam writes that, while Obama complimented Senator John McCain for taking risks, he seemed averse to boldly stating what he hoped to see or would stand behind; that “nothing [Obama] said indicated significant political movement” on the issue. But, Levesque-Alam hypothesizes that Obama’s caution is related to tension caused by “core contradictions not simply between but within the political parties.” The immigration issue is contentious, even among members of the same party.
GritTV and The Nation teamed up to present a panel asking Is Immigration Reform Dead or Alive? (video). The panelists discuss a potential future in which immigration reform does not pass. Their predictions make a grim scene, centered around the horrors of a growing detention industry. Children are incarcerated in these facilities. Over 90 people have died in detention and they are damaging families. Guest Ravi Ragbir, now a member of Families for Freedom, spent two years in a detention center. Ragbir’s young daughter was so disturbed by the sight of her father in shackles that Ragbir requested she no longer visit while he was detained.
A Truthdig article titled America’s ICE Backwards Approach to Immigration details the broken legal system that further clouds the immigration process. Over 200,000 immigration cases are backlogged and the number of government attorneys who argue for deportation has risen by 35%, stressing the court system accordingly. Add a declining number of judges and a sharp increase in the number of border guards and the result is a setting where “the equivalent of death penalty cases” are heard “in a traffic court setting,” according to Judge Dana Leigh Marks, the president of the National Association of Immigration Judges.
New America Media also explores the results of a study that finds a low rate of crimes are committed by the undocumented, which is a stark contrast to the accusations of right-wing pundits. The undocumented population in Utah grew from 70,000 to 110,000 in the last four years, according to a new study released by the Sutherland Instituate, but the number of incarcerated undocumented increased by only 28. That’s 28 people, not percent. In fact, the crime rate for undocumented immigrants in Utah is only 3.9% and dropping.
Finally, RaceWire’s Michelle Chen reports on the impact of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative on Mexican Americans who want to deliver children using a midwife. The Initiative, which went into effect yesterday, “requires Americans passing across the Canadian and Mexican borders to have a valid U.S. passport or passport card.” Previously, only a valid driver’s license was required. This is yet another policy that refuses to recognize the long pattern of movement over the border area, and is culturally antagonistic to Mexican Americans.
Law indicates humankind’s attempt to be just; it is an extension of a civilization’s morality. Immigration reform must come soon; it is a moral duty. It must pass not just for the benefit of the undocumented community, but so we can live up to our national ideals, and also, to decisively stave off a destructive energy made possible by the lack of humane law.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about immigration. Visit Immigration.NewsLadder.net for a complete list of articles on immigration, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy and health issues, check out Economy.NewsLadder.net and Healthcare.NewsLadder.net. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of 50 leading independent media outlets, and was created by NewsLadder.