Posts tagged with 'colorado independent'
Weekly Diaspora: ICE Perpetuating Human Rights Abuses
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By Nezua, Media Consortium Blogger
Ed. Note: This week’s Diaspora is short due to the holidays. We’ll be back to full-length next week.
Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE), an arm of the Department of Homeland Security, apparently isn’t beholden to US or international law. In The Nation, Jacqueline Stevens reveals the “clandestine operations, akin to extraordinary renditions” carried out by ICE.
Beyond the department’s public list of detention facilities—many of which are already sites of alleged abuse—ICE is also “confining people in 186 unlisted and unmarked subfield offices” around the nation. According to Alison Parker, deputy director of Human Rights Watch, these secret detention centers may violate the UN’s Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which the United States is a signatory.
But what’s most appalling is ICE’s assertion that the department is some sort of super-police with powers of rendition. James Pendergraph, former executive director of ICE’s Office of State and Local Coordination, said in late 2008 that “if you don’t have enough evidence to charge someone criminally, but you think he’s illegal, we can make him disappear.” The boldness with which a law official would state such an idea is confounding; the confession, if true, is criminal.
Last week, The Diaspora wrote about the introduction of the CIR ASAP immigration bill by Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL). Freshman Congressman Ben Ray Luján (D-NM) is a recent addition to the list of 87 cosponsors on the bill, as The Colorado Independent reported last Wednesday. This is a positive step forward. The bill will most likely be sponsored in the senate by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY). CIR ASAP establishes a basic layout of progressive immigration reform, but the final bill will probably become more focused on enforcement in Schumer’s hands.
Finally, David Moberg reports on the Obama administration’s controversial use of “audits” to purge employment payrolls of undocumented workers for In These Times. While the audit method is much quieter and less likely to make headlines, it is also ineffective. Not only do audits rely upon “flawed federal databases” to judge who is documented, they also purge immigrants who are “legal.”
As the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Executive Vice-President Eliseo Medina explains, workers fired as a result of ICE probes or audits do find other, lower-paying jobs that offer even less protection to the worker. Ultimately the number of undocumented workers in the US remains the same, and the entire exercise but “a losing game of musical chairs.” Medina stresses that SEIU is not suggesting the law shouldn’t be enforced, simply that it be enforced in a way that works.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about immigration by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Diaspora for a complete list of articles on immigration issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, and health care issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, and The Pulse . This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.
Weekly Diaspora: Legislating Hate
By Nezua, Media Consortium Blogger
Anti-immigration groups and pundits cling to phrases like “Illegal Alien” because they only focus on foreignness and danger. These extreme factions are all about casting immigrants as what ails our society, conjuring up demons upon which to focus national ire, and perpetuating a subhuman category of being. It’s a convenient distraction from things that are actually endangering our nation. A new web-only series from ColorLines called “Torn Apart by Deportation“ is the perfect antidote to people like CNN’s Lou Dobbs. (more…)
The Weekly Diaspora: We Can Prosper Together
By Nezua, Media Consortium Blogger
For the most part, it’s been a good week for immigration reform. The Senate approved a measure that will end the “Widow Penalty,” which rescinded applications for U.S. residency if one’s spouse of two years or less years dies, and on Tuesday, as RaceWire reports, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed legislation that restores the right of due process to immigrant youth.
Now for the not-so good news: The U.S. Department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has decided to modify, not cancel, its many 287(g) agreements, as the Colorado Independent reports. Cause for celebration on this change may not yet be warranted. The proposed modification does not address the problems inherent to the provision.
According to ICE data, 55 jurisdictions have signed “new standardized agreements” with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). 12 others are pending agreement. ICE now requires police officers who turn in undocumented immigrants to follow through on “All criminal charges that originally caused the offender to be taken into custody.” But what measures has ICE taken to eradicate the racial profiling that has tainted the reputation of the 287(g) provision? The ACLU does not feel the modification is enough. And it’s hard to see how it could be. Under the modifications, the police would still be perceived by the immigrant community as prosecutors and potential border guards, not protectors to work with for the good of a neighborhood.
Arizona’s Sheriff Joe Arpaio is a perfect example of why the White House needs to cease all 287(g) agreements. Reporting for AlterNet, Isabel Macdonald chronicles the bizarre antics and mindset of the rogue lawman. Arpaio’s 287(g) agreement with the Federal government was recently downgraded. He can no longer perform his “over broad” sweeps, but Macdonald makes clear that this change is mostly symbolic. Arpaio is simply “An official who has come to expect total impunity.”
Another small, but meaningful step happened recently Milwaukee, as Leticia Miranda reports for RaceWire. Matt Nelson, a Milwaukee small business owner and spokesman for the Milwaukee Police Accountability Coalition, was harassed by police and threatened when he refused to reveal his Social Security Number (SSN) to an officer. Incensed, Nelson “pursued litigation of the officer filing a formal complaint against him,” appealing to the Milwaukee Fire and Commission, who oversees the Milwaukee Police Department.
The commission ruled that the officer was acting without any legal authority and issued guidelines for departments to clarify the issue [PDF memo]. While the Milwaukee ruling is definitely a victory, we must look closer at the many police departments that operate under the 287(g) provision to monitor any “less formal ‘agreements’ to find and arrest people who ‘look’ undocumented.”
Going back to San Francisco’s fight to adopt a measure restoring due process to undocumented youth: Mayor Gavin Newsom passed a law last summer that directs police who arrest undocumented youth to report them to ICE before any trial, leading to the deportation of undocumented youth for any perceived offense that leads them into police custody. The measure to restore due process was passed, and with enough margin to override a possible veto by the Mayor. Mayor Newsom has proclaimed he will disregard the ruling entirely, much like a certain Sheriff.
Writing for Salon, Joe Conason makes a good case for reframing the health care discussion as it pertains to immigrants. He points to the perverse “moral perspective of the nativists and politicians” that leap up to assure everyone that the undocumented will most certainly not be allowed to buy into health insurance. But what about families with undocumented parents and citizen children? It should never be “permissible to let the ‘illegals’ and their children suffer from illness and even die prematurely, so long as their condition poses no threat to the rest of us,” as Conason writes.
Finally, “a new joint U.S.-Mexico” study on children of Mexican parents finds that this demographic is already “one of the most vulnerable sectors in America’s health care system,” as New America Media reports. 86 percent of those studied were U.S. citizens. New America Media’s Odette Keeley questions Yurina Rico, public health editor for La Opinion, as to why these children are so often uninsured. According to Rico, these communities are often isolated from proper information on health care. Rico goes on to say that unfortunately, these disparities in health care are not being factored into health care policy discussions.
The U.S. has long way to go before it acts on the premise that—as lofty as it might sound—we really are one large human family. As Sojourner’s reminds us, even Americans of European origin have immigrant roots.
The sooner our laws and health care and safety reflect the importance of all members of this large human family, the healthier this nation will be.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about immigration by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Diaspora for a complete list of articles on immigration issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, and health care issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, The Pulse and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.
Weekly Pulse: Pelosi Champions Public Option
By Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium Blogger
A plan to reform health care that includes a robust public option would actually cut the deficit, according to preliminary estimates by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). For the purposes of this analysis, a robust public option was defined as one that reimburses doctors at Medicare rates plus five percent. The latest CBO estimate is critical for Democrats because President Barack Obama said he wouldn’t sign a health care bill that adds to the deficit. (There’s a double standard at work. Health care has to pay for itself or save money. But as Jo Comerford notes for Democracy Now!, the president has no compunction about bloating the budget with defense spending.) (more…)
Weekly Immigration Wire: It’s a Multicultural World, After All
by Nezua, TMC MediaWire Blogger
In the 1970s and 1980s, it was common to hear the phrase “melting pot.” Many people said our nation’s greatest strength could be found in its multitude of cultures, languages and histories. This sentiment has been lost, as right-wing pundits and politicians increasingly espouse a dread of anything different and a fear of the Other.
This retrogressive, inflexible mindset reduces complex arguments to one thing: Us vs. Them. But the world never has been that way, and approaching it as such could be disastrous. Everything is connected: Our food systems, economies, and cultures. Large corporations no longer belong to any one nation, but are global in scope. In an increasingly connected world, our immigration policy is impacts the health and well-being of many peoples and economies.
As covered in last week’s Wire, the U.S. and Cuba are resuming immigration talks that stalled in 2003. But, as AlterNet made clear, things aren’t too promising. Discussions will be constricted to immigration issues alone, according to at least one international policy expert. Wayne Smith, a Cuba expert at the Center for International Policy in Washington, says that holding these talks without broadening them to related issues is dishonest and should cease “until the Cuban people are able to exercise their fundamental human rights and civil liberties, and until the conditions in U.S. law are fully met.”
This is an interesting point, and could also be applied to U.S.-Mexico relations. For example, in 2008, the Mérida Initiative was signed into law under the Bush administration. The Mérida Initiative’s legislation enables the U.S. to aid Mexico’s Drug War. The aid includes training for police and military, equipment including surveillance technology, and intelligence assistance. But the militarized assault on Mexico’s thriving drug economy has claimed an unacceptable number of lives—over 12,000 since it began in December of 2006.
Is this much death and displacement acceptable, given the scope of this complex social issue? According to a recent mid-term vote in Mexico, no. The vote, which favored the opposition party, was largely seen as a rejection of the Mexican president’s violent model of engagement. The U.S. should take a stand against the many human rights abuses that our taxpayer dollars are essentially funding.
New America Media has video on the drug war’s impact on citizens, which contains footage of Mexican troops attempting to take their cities back “street by street.” Thousands of military troops now occupy their own country, patrolling the towns and highways, acting as police and creating an aura of fear and tension in a newly-instituted and potentially lethal “semi-war zone.”
Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio is a modern-day master of ignoring the larger picture. Currently under investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice for racial profiling and violating civil rights, Arpaio is currently crusading against Latino/as and immigrants. Feministing’s Ann Friedman writes that Arpaio “functions as a conduit for the worst impulses in our society.”
If Arpaio were to take a broader view of immigrants, even the undocumented, he might realize that his stunt-centric stances on immigration are harming everyone.
Food production is also closely related to U.S. immigration policy. RaceWire gets to the meat of the issue in Food Inc. Shines a Light on the Immigrant Labor That Makes That 99c Patty Melt Possible. Julianne Hing breaks it down:
“For people who can’t stand the presence of immigrants in their neighborhood, but spring for the $0.79 per pound holiday ham, news flash! A largely invisible workforce works for severely depressed wages to make that ham so cheap for you.”
In related news, the Colorado Independent features a new documentary on the Swift & Co. raids and “its effects on both the people involved and the larger local community” of Greeley, Colorado.
Former Colorado Rep. Tom Tancredo is definitely in need of a more generous view on immigration, if not a wider lens through which to see it. Last weekend, Tancredo opined that young conservatives ought be invested in halting all immigration. A young audience member critiqued Tancredo’s viewpoint as “narrow-minded,” as “We’re really strapped [for] nurses, we don’t have enough teachers, we don’t have enough OB-GYNs.” Perhaps there is hope for the future of Conservativism after all!
Perhaps no one can be credited with promoting a wide-angle view of society more than Ronald Tanaki, who is often called the “father of multicultural studies.” New America Media commemorates Takaki’s life and work. From 1967 to 1987, Takaki’s contributions to the academic world and larger society were numerous. He taught the very first African American history course at UCLA and helped organize UCLA’S first Black Student Union, to start. Takiki studied, wrote, and taught about what he called “the hopeful ties that bind” us all together here in this nation. The comparative multicultural course he started at UCLA grew as he taught it over the years, eventually focusing on seven groups: Americans from China, Japan, Africa, Mexico and Ireland, as well as Native Americans and Jews from Russia. Takaki’s life and work made clear the always changing nature of our society, what role immigration has played in it, and that we still ought not fear these things.
A final positive note from the Iowa Independent: Officials from the Center for Disease Control and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services are considering lifting a two-decade-old ban on HIV-positive immigrants. As Dr. Martin Cetron, director of the CDC’s Division of Global Migration and Quarantine told MSNBC, this will end “the discriminatory practice for a disease that doesn’t warrant exclusion for coming into this country.” And it seems a healthy move. These people are carrying two potential stigmas upon entering the U.S. Let’s afford them a bit more opportunity, if we can. In the long run and in the bigger picture, helping those in need benefits us all.
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.
Weekly Immigration Wire: Why Are Hate Crimes on the Rise?
by Nezua, TMC MediaWire Blogger
On May 30, 29-year-old Raul Flores and his 9-year-old daughter Brisenia Flores were shot to death, purportedly by a group of far-right anti-immigrant activists who broke into the Flores home by posing as police officers. On Friday, Shawna Forde, anti-immigrant activist and Executive Director of the Minutemen American Defense, (MAD) along with accomplices Jason Eugene Bush and Albert Robert Gaxiola were arrested on two counts of first-degree murder and burglary charges related to the Flores murders.
Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo notes that the MAD website denounces the murders, but wryly adds that the distancing is “a tad belied by headlines down the page,” like “Subhuman Mexicans (God’s Children?) Prey on Countrymen.” The Flores murders are part of a palpable political and social climate of hostility and revulsion toward Latin American immigrants that is running amok in our nation.
As Democracy Now reports, the FBI has noted a rise in hate crimes against Latinos, which isn’t difficult to verify anecdotally. And, according to Laura Flanders at GritTV, “economics, racial panic, immigration, [and] right wing rhetoric” all play a crucial role. If our government continues to spend resources that help portray people as both predatory and “subhuman,” it will continue to foster a perception that violence against this class can be committed in good conscience.
This national, anti-immigrant fervor has resulted in a courts system in which “countless immigrants are subjected to harassing or denigrating treatment” and “have no assistance in navigating the byzantine court process,” writes Mary Giovagnoli at AlterNet. She reports that “misguided deportation-only strategies have led to a breakdown in our immigration court system.” The system is overloaded, backlogged, and not operating effectively or humanely.
The U.S. immigration process is in disrepair due to neglect and improper stopgap measures (like agreement 287(g)), just as broken bones will fuse in any manner if not set correctly. We are mired in an interim period and tensions will continue rising until we take on the challenge as a nation. In any part of the process, from application to arrest to detention to deportation, there are glaring problems. RaceWire touches briefly on the lack of accountability in the detention system.
Is the increasing absorption of virulently racist mentalities into mainstream groups a terrible confluence of unrelated factors, or a predictable reaction to the “browning” of this country? At the same time the U.S. military has relaxed its rules on accepting recruits with ties to white supremacist movements, so have circumstances allowed for “a new crop of anti-immigrant groups to enter the mainstream dialogue, even though many have ties to hate groups with violent records,” as Miriam Zoila Pérez writes for Feministing.
The video above depicts Shawna Forde as a spokesman for one of these hate groups, the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). FAIR made news on Tuesday for disingenuously presenting statistics that demonize immigrants as a strain to the economy. At AlterNet, Walter Ewing exposes the tortured logic FAIR employs and makes the case that “once … inconvenient truths are taken into account, FAIR’s ‘cost’ evaporates.”
It wasn’t long ago that we reported on how many anti-immigrant pundits were using the Swine Flu to create a toxic anti-immigrant/anti-Latino climate. And sadly, none of those people understand how hate speech leads directly to violence. Talking Points Memo makes the alleged murderers’ ties to the anti-immigration movement clear.
When the government build walls to stave off fears, it is, ironically, reinforcing that same emotion of fear. When hostile and punitive legislation is enacted, fear of the Other is mixed with aggression. When a fearful and aggressively rigid mindset is applied to social fluctuations that require flexibility and change, the result is an increase in the return of that negative energy.
And yet, hope will live on. And sometimes that hope will lead to historic change. Which is why we must keep writing and talking, keep pushing, and keep challenging all the injustice we find.
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.
Weekly Immigration Wire: Women Central to Immigration Story
by Nezua, TMC MediaWire Blogger
Celebrated stories of early American pioneers, explorers, and immigrants typically center around men of fortitude and bravery. Depictions of modern-day migrants are still very male-centric, and this cultural lens is a default in most cases. But women play a central and overlooked role in today’s immigration story. Even when not directly highlighted, women often bear the weight of keeping families together and helping them grow stronger.
New America Media has just released the results of a poll titled “Women Immigrants: Stewards of the 21st Century.” NAM surveyed 1,002 female immigrants from Latin American, Asian, African, and Arab countries. According to Sandy Close and Richard Rodriguez, “The story that has not been told is the story of the woman immigrant. This poll is an effort to capture her narrative, and what becomes clear in the responses–many to questions that seemed on their face to have nothing to do with family per se–is that the gold thread giving meaning to her life is family stewardship.”
The poll reveals that the typical model of migration, in which the man left to find work and send home money, has changed. Women are assuming head of the household duties, even if in their prior situation they were in less of a leadership role. The women interviewed for the poll named “securing family stability” as the most important motivator for seeking U.S. citizenship.
NAM also features a number of articles that break down the poll’s findings, all available on the Immigration Ladder. Some feature short videos such as the one below, titled Family, Work and Progress — Latina Immigrants Speak. In this video, Latinas talk about why they came to the U.S. The reasons range from political asylum to simply being able to raise and feed their children. These are hard-hitting pieces because we can see and hear people tell their own story in their own words.
A common line spouted by those in favor of a strong enforcement agenda is that immigrants come here to ’steal’ or ‘take’ our jobs. The focus is on an abstract, shadowy fence-hopper from Latin America who encroaches on turf and swipes resources. Ironically, there is never a mention of NAFTA and the effect it has had on the Latin American economy in these particular discussions! Perhaps no families would need to migrate north if unfair economic practices hadn’t taken so many jobs from Mexico, Guatemala, and the rest of Latin America.
Quite different than recycled stock footage of a man sliding over a busted-up border fence, NAM’s poll and videos present the truth in its plain and sorry reality. While it may make for less thrilling copy, it’s important to hear a mother talk about leaving a child behind so that she can forge a better path for them both, or about being alone in a strange place with nobody to help; about spending as much on long-distance phone calls to your children as you would on bringing them across the border.
These stories are important. Watching and reading human dramas that demand emotional engagement combat the anti-immigration punditry’s characterization of immigrants. As a result, a question forms that won’t go away: Why are these women alone in their struggle? If they were perceived as U.S. citizens, we would move mountains to come to their aid. It isn’t surprising that some Feminists strongly support immigration, though there is an ongoing debate.
Enforcement tactics are also devastating on a large scale. Writing for the American Forum, Dr. Erik Camayd-Freixas paints a clear picture of how the tactics deployed supposedly in the name of U.S. “security” do nothing to secure either happiness, safety, or a sound economy.
In Wiretap, 15-year-old Lupe Carreno tells about the day ICE took her father from her own home, and what that means to her life today: “When they began to walk down the stairs with my dad, it hit me. This could be the last time I see him for a long time. I looked away. I didn’t want to see them take my dad. When I looked down the stairs and didn’t see them anymore, I cried. My mom and my aunt told me not to cry, but this made me cry even more. The whole event only took 15 minutes.”
Lupe’s family has medical problems, but her father’s insurance is no longer there. The enforcement agenda has transformed a happy, cohesive family unit into a fractured cluster of pain and fear. Lupe lives in uncertainty now and worries her mother may be deported any day.
As in Lupe’s case, there are weaknesses in the system that do not provide for those with medical needs. Such as in the case of Xiu Ping Jiang, a Chinese immigrant who fled to the U.S. after being forcibly sterilized for having a second child. In Immigration Limbo for the Mentally Ill, Wiretap’s Brittany Shoot tells how Jiang was separated from her children by immigration officers, and shortly after, fell into a depression. Being an immigrant, she had no state-funded legal counsel to represent her. “This has caused her case to be drawn out for more than a year while she languishes in a detention center,” Shoot writes. “With a history of attempted suicide, her family members in the States grow increasingly fearful that they will lose their fragile sister inside the system.”
Will telling Xiu Ping Jiang’s story produce more than “[o]ne day of frenzied blogging” following the original reportage? Shoot seems to doubt it.
Returning to New America Media, we have the story What Am I Without My Leg? Eglis, an undocumented immigrant, lost her leg to an uninsured driver and is struggling to live with the consequences. Eglis’ story is a brutal example of the healthcare gap for immigrant women.
Finally, the Colorado Independent reports on a bill sponsored by Senator Dianne Feinstein D-Calif. that would create “a special ‘blue card’ status for undocumented immigrants who’ve worked a minimum number of hours in the agriculture sector in the past two years.” Some immigration advocates would call this a success. But true progress includes acknowledging in law and public dialogue what such a move truly indicates: That immigrants are not a threat to our nation, but in fact, a crucial and needed part of our way of life. Without them, we fall apart. This is what happens when you remove a mother from a family. This is what happens when you remove a workforce from a factory in Postville, Iowa. And this is what will happen if we continue to punish or forcibly remove immigrants from our nation.
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.
Weekly Immigration Wire: Fighting H1N1 Hype
by Nezua, TMC MediaWire Blogger
This week’s Wire focuses on the opportunities for change that crisis can introduce. From the H1N1 “Swine” flu’s declining fervor to 2009’s May Day marches for worker rights and immigrant solidarity; from the tragic killing of Luis Ramirez to legislative movement on immigration, these are tumultuous times. But it is precisely such conflict and challenge that provides the best opportunities to make lasting change.
Last week, we highlighted how anti-immigration voices were exploiting the nation’s fear of the H1N1 flu to their own advantage. While still no joke (except in biting satire), the flu is an overhyped event used by Republicans to push an anti-immigration agenda, according to the Colorado Independent’s Daphne Eviater. While not all immigration comes from Mexico, the country and its people are often used as convenient scapegoats.
Mexico is suffering most from both the virus and an intensifying conservative backlash, as New America Media (NAM) revealed in several articles this week. As if the confluence of these forces weren’t enough, an April 27th earthquake struck Mexico, adding to the atmosphere “in an almost surrealistic fashion,” writes NAM’s Kent Paterson. At least truths are beginning to surface as to the flu’s origin:
News reports link the possible start of the health crisis to a huge, runaway U.S. pig farm located in the Veracruz-Puebla borderlands. The farm in question is owned in part by U.S.-based Smithfield Foods, the largest hog and pork producer in the world and a company with a record for environmental violations on this side of the border.
Will the government or agricultural industry look into the complaints against Smithfield farms’ with the fervor of anti-immigrant pundits? Unfortunate events like the H1N1 flu can be opportunities to make positive changes to the systems involved. The agricultural sector and its crowded animal farms are clearly in need of reform.
Many supporters of workers’ rights and humane immigration reform came together on May 1. Yes! Magazine’s Colette Cosner explains why solidarity around immigration reform is stronger this year, and why May Day is so inspiring. Workers are standing united, rather than divided: “Work-place raids are being preceded by union drives,” Cosner writes. “Traditional labor groups are recognizing that these raids hinder their organizing capabilities. So too do the immigrant rights activists now see the unions as an integral part their work-place security. … The united platform is spun from our collective desire to live lives free of fear. This fundamental concept is the backbone of each of the May Day demands.”
Fearmongering from the Right has been crowding sense from the airwaves, and it’s a distraction from issues that matter. Such was the case for Luis Ramirez, a recent hate crime casualty. RaceWire’s Michelle Chen tells his story, which echoes civil rights-era cases in its iconic extremes of race-based violence and subsequent lack of justice:
Harsh words between Luis Ramirez, 25, and a group of four local boys, including the convicted teens Derrick Donchak, 19, and Brandon Piekarsky, 17 … escalated into anti-Mexican epithets and a physical confrontation. Despite efforts by his friends to intervene, Ramirez was soon lying on the sidewalk, his skull cracked open by a kick to the head, and his assailants had bolted off into the night.
This brutal murder ended with simple assault charges for the white teenage assailants. The all-white jury threw out charges of third degree murder, aggravated assault, reckless endangerment and ethnic intimidation. Equally amazing is the eyewitness account that reveals willful police negligence in pursuing the killers. The Mexican American community and growing numbers of human rights and immigration activists are springing into motion to demand accountability.
The Ramirez murder is, like the H1N1 flu, another opportunity to examine what protections are in place to guard human health and life. As Chen notes, the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crime Prevention Act has passed the house and will soon be before the Senate. It would be a grievous error and abdication of opportunity to not pass this into law, given the ubiquitous waves of hostility aimed at immigrants as well as gays, transgendered people, and others.
RaceWire also covers the Supreme Court’s May 4 ruling that nullifies another injustice: Charging immigrants who use a sequence of numbers in place of an actual Social Security number with willful identity theft. In To catch a thief: SCOTUS on undocumented workers, Michelle Chen discusses the ruling, which sides with Mexican immigrant Flores-Figueroa, who worked at a steel plant in Illinois. Flores-Figueroa was flagged, then arrested, when he tried to arrange his situation more legitimately. While the case has changed law for so many other immigrants, Flores-Figueroa will most likely be deported, once done serving his time.
In other immigration news, Maryland’s state assembly ruled that undocumented high school graduates should pay three times that of citizen high school graduates attending college; Homeland Security signals a new focus on employers, not workers; and Oregon hopes for a new wave of income by urging the U.S. Senate to legalize the state’s nearly 400,000 undocumented and put them on the tax rolls.
Finally, do take a moment to celebrate the spirit and actions of Arizona public defender Isabel Garcia, profiled recently for In These Times. Garcia’s fight against injustice is well-documented. She works tirelessly to change to the surreal and perilous game that is played out in the borderlands human rights struggle. Garcia was the first non-Mexican to receive the National Human Rights Award from the Comisión Nacional de los Derechos Humanos de Mexico, but refused to speak at the acceptance ceremony because her speech about the militarization of the U.S.-Mexico border was censored. Garcia is not concerned with image, but with changing the standards of living on the borderlands. Let’s hope that while President Obama buys time to negotiate a humane solution to the immigration issue, he keeps this in mind.
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.
Weekly Immigration Wire: Legalize the Undocumented, Help Fix the Economy
by Nezua, TMC MediaWire Blogger
The dialogue on immigration has, historically, been contentious and cyclical. There are times when hysteria peaks, and rational thought struggles to enter the national dialogue. There are also moments of truth. This week, independent media debunked many myths about the undocumented and made the case for the positive impact of immigrants in the US, including the positive effect of legalizing the undocumented on the economy and how citizens are holding elected representatives accountable for votes against pro-immigrant measures.
Wendy Norris, writing for the Colorado Independent, held the New York Times to task for using questionable sources in an article about President Obama’s push for immigration reform. Norris exposes the background of quoted anti-immigration groups like NumbersUSA, CIS, and FAIR, who have ties to white supremacy groups and eugenics promoters and calls the New York Times out for quoting organizations “repeatedly discredited as hate groups.” When hate groups are quoted as legitimate sources, society suffers from the misrepresentation.
Also in New America Media, Jacqueline Esposito and Jumana Musa explore the kinds of “enforcement” that groups like NumbersUSA and FAIR claim is the most important part of Immigration Reform. Esposito and Musa cite the case of Guido Newbrough, a detainee who made multiple requests for medical attention; there was a treatable bacterial infection in his heart. Newbrough was locked in an isolation cell and died of the ailment.
“As the country moves forward on comprehensive immigration reform,” they write, “We must uphold American values by ensuring that all people, no matter where they come from, are afforded fundamental rights, including the right to a fair day in court before being deprived of liberty and the right to be free from inhumane conditions of confinement. As a nation, we cannot stand for anything less.”
The San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee (DCCC) would no doubt agree with that sentiment, as Beatriz Herrera reports for Wiretap. Apparently, the DCCC voted 20-1 against San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom to preserve Sanctuary ordinances for juvenile offenders. These ordinances ensure that offenders have a chance to prove their innocence instead of facing immediate deportation.
During the 2008 election season, voices calling for reason in the immigration debate were often drowned out by the near-hysteria that certain elements of the Right called forth. Another encouraging sign that we are, perhaps, at a new juncture: Today, even democratic state senators are being held accountable. Colorado Sen. Morgan Carroll (D-Aurora) was recently forced to defend her vote against SB 170, the tuition bill was one that would provide in-state tuition equity for undocumented Colorado high school graduates, on the air.
According to the Colorado Independent, Sen. Morgan appeared on progressive talk radio host Mario Solis-Marich’s show on April 10—after “a week of being beat up in the press and on the blogs” for her opposition to the bill.
In Public News Service, Doug Ramsey has news about a report which focuses on the benefits of legalizing currently undocumented workers. Compiled by the nonpartisan Immigration Policy Center, the report breaks down how legalizing the undocumented community would increase the amount of income that the immigrant community brings into the economy. Rather than immigrants costing us, “legalization would boost tax collections at all levels of government by $66 billion over the next few years.”
Public News Service also explores the economic benefits to bringing the underground economy above ground. According to David Kallick, an economist with the Fiscal Institute, billions of dollars are simply “lining the pockets of employers who hire folks in the underground economy and avoid contributing to payroll and other taxes.”
And OneWorld US reports that Hispanic rights advocates are eager to hear the president’s plan for immigration reform and note that very reform is key to economic recovery. Janet Murguía, President and CEO of the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the US notes that “the path to a strong economic recovery includes strategies that lift wages, increase revenue, and create a level playing field—and immigration is a crucial element of that equation.”
Even the American Prospect’s Ezra Klein is writing about immigration in a more proactive light. Just last week, Klein wrote Why Immigration Reform Won’t Happen. He is now making The Political Case for Immigration Reform.
So maybe we’re figuring it out as we go. The costs of letting parts of our country fail and fall away are more than economic, they are moral and profound. We have time to act, but opposition voices are gathering in number. There are many anti-immigrant myths, and many oppose a truly progressive stance on immigration. But we have the will for the struggle and the payoff will come not only in a healthier economy, but in a sounder national soul.
Are you ready? Let’s go.
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.
Weekly Immigration Wire: Policy Must Inspire Allegiance, Not Anger
by Nezua
Media Consortium Blogger
George W. Bush told the world that the US was targeted for 9/11 because “we’re the brightest beacon for freedom and opportunity in the world.” And as President Obama said in his inaugural address:
The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our gross domestic product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on the ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart – not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.
On this week’s Immigration Wire, we examine approaches to immigration that do nothing to synchronize real-life America with the America in songs and storybooks.
Law ought to match ideal. If Law means anything at all, it is because it is a symbol of Truth. And if these eloquent words spoken by two Presidents attempt to declare the true United States of America, then why are our government’s actions causing children to suddenly alter their life plans in ways that position them as adversaries? (video via RaceWire):
Not that becoming an attorney dedicated to helping the unprotected isn’t a good career plan. But as we see from the video, this child’s choice is born from anger at witnessed injustice. This should not be our legacy.
People are migrating North, and then South again. Just as those who live South of the Rio Grand/Rio Bravo do from season to season. How many who blame the immigrant community for so many of our troubles realize that (at least of the Mexican/Guatemalan/Latin American migrants) they wouldn’t put down roots if the border weren’t so militarized?
A nation that wishes to be The Land of the Free does not place fences above families, their property or their traditions.
As President Barack Obama champions change in Washington, D.C., Eloisa Tamez waits to see whether an 18-foot steel and concrete wall will be built in her backyard. The Department of Homeland Security has already taken Tamez to court in an effort to condemn a piece of property, a mile inland from the Rio Grande, that has been in her family since the 18th century.
—The Texas Observer, Back to the Wall, Feb. 6
Beacons shine. Beacons don’t cheat numbers and target the vulnerable to justify their own budgets and existence.
Bloated federal funding and political pressure pushed a U.S. Immigration and Custom Enforcement program to meet arrest quotas rather than focus on rounding up criminal fugitives and addressing national security threats, says a damning new report on the controversial agency.
—Colorado Independent, ICE fugitive unit inflating arrests with non-criminal immigrants , Feb. 10
And extending opportunity to every willing heart looks nothing like this:
Just as the Department of Homeland Security announces a review of the program that unleashed [Sheriff Joe Arpaio's] police department on non-criminal immigrants, he pulls this stunt. Marching chained immigrants awaiting trial through the public square on their way to a tent city prison is a new low, even for him.
—New America Media, Sheriff Joe Arpaio Marches Immigrants Through Public Square, Feb. 10
These kinds of treatment are not just or necessary. What would be the motivation for a person in Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s position to do such things? According to Truthdig this lawman has “became well known for making inmates wear pink underwear, housing them in tents and feeding them green-colored food.”
As New America Media reported almost two years ago, Beacons of Liberty do not devastate families to pressure lawmakers to enact programs which are, in essence, modern day slavery.
A nation that wishes to inspire allegiance does not scapegoat or hunt the least protected members of its populace, as has happened to the immigrant community, and by extension to the Latino community, as well.
“Local police making Latinos and immigrants feel unwelcome in reporting crimes, local politicians speaking out against Latinos and immigrants contribute to the increased level of violence against Latinos and immigrants,” Foster Maer, a senior attorney at Latino Justice who filed a civil rights complaint against the Suffolk, Long Island police in November of 2008. —ipsnews.net, Immigrants Scapegoated as Economy Teeters, January 26
And who can argue against being humane to children who are wandering the world on their own, trying to find health and happiness?
Each year, tens of thousands of such children cross the border without papers and without their parents. They are caught up in our immigration system and too often mistreated, denied basic rights and expected to take on responsibilities well beyond their years.
—The Progressive, Unaccompanied immigrant children deserve protection, February 4
Current approaches to migrants and their families do not inspire others to look at the United States with admiration or respect. These actions alienate millions of people and engender an accumulating pool of pain amongst people who only want what the “American Dream” ideally offers all of us.
It seems like common sense. But it will take many voices and energies to shift this trend. We cannot place all our expectation and hope for change at the feet of Barack Obama and go about our lives. Nor can we blame Republicans alone for the arc that we’ve taken in regards to human rights and the abuse of immigrants.
Those who blame the recent Republican administration for the mess in the detention centers should be reminded that these laws were passed in 1996 and signed into law by President Clinton, who was desperately trying to court conservative voters after the Democratic congressional losses in 1994. The law doubled the number of immigrants in detention; the number grew swiftly after the Bush administration moved against immigrants after Sept. 11, 2001.
—Truthdig, Obama’s Immigration Conundrum, February 7
But the time that George W. Bush brought to life—the era of Fear of Other—ought to be attacked with vigor. We must tear away the veil of xenophobia with an equal passion. One fueled by love and positivity; with a freedom that knows no boundary, and an inclusiveness that only makes us stronger.
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.