Who will control public policy? F.A.I.R or the average citizen!
FAIR and IRLI are clearly very busy orchestrating their long term strategy. With McCain and Obama, advocating some form of legalization, immigration reform, and enforcement, FAIR’s appetite to stop immigration, legal and illegal, just won’t be satiated. Once again, we see Mike Hethmon, I.R.L.I/F.A.I.R. attorney, using unsuspecting localities for the ultimate immigration legal experiment, so far they haven’t won, but they keep trying. Isn’t compromise the most reasonable and humane response to our immigration dilemma, compromise that the majority of Americans will find themselves willing to support? Why is FAIR so vehemently opposed to reaching a consensus?
Excerpts below, full article link posted at the bottom:
Although heavily supported and highly organized, those who oppose illegal immigration suddenly find themselves without a champion.”That’s the reality we’re dealing with: a choice we don’t consider a choice,” said Roy Beck, executive director of NumbersUSA, which advocates stricter controls on legal and illegal immigration. “These two guys were pretty much at the bottom of all the candidates. They’re the worst, the bottom of the barrel, that ended up winning.”
The picture looked much rosier a few months ago, as far as these groups were concerned. The field of Republican presidential candidates included two — Reps. Duncan Hunter of Alpine and Tom Tancredo of Colorado — who ran campaigns based largely on their opposition to>illegal immigration. But Obama and McCain are seen as generally indistinguishable on the issue. McCain, while toughening his stance recently, has backed proposals providing a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants. Obama favors a similar mix of enforcement and legalization.
The staff of the Immigration Reform Law Institute has been working since 2002 to aid state legislators concerned about illegal immigration. Every step of the way, there have been legal challenges to the bills they have written, said institute director Michael M. Hethmon, and with each challenge, they’ve found ways to make their bills stronger.”We were constantly learning,” Hethmon said.
“We’ve spent the last seven years separating the Republican back bench from the party leadership with tremendous success,” said Beck, who said his sights are now on the Democrats. “We’ll continue to push that line hard.”
>http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-immig23-2008jun23,0,6052440.story?track=rss
Manassas’s Week of Hope
What a heart-rending story in the Washington Post this morning about the volunteer work of local people, mainly kids, and youngsters from as far away as Tennessee. Manassas City neighborhood services director Kisha Wilson-Sogunro is to be congratulated for her efforts orchestrating this tremendous effort.
Approximately 900 volunteers participate in the Week of Hope Program. Most of the worker bees are kids. Talk about team work. Many of these kids came from out of town, hours away.
I certainly hope that the City of Manassas has evening activities such as swimming available for these welcome guests. Last year this program saved the city over $35,500.
Let’s also hope some of the whiners I have heard on both blogs went out and helped these kids. This effort is definitely an example of what friends, neighbors, and even outsiders can accomplish in the face of adversity. Now HERE is a solution!
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/27/AR2008062703586.html
“Citizens sue after detentions, immigration raids”
EG posted the link to this article, I read it, and thought it would be a great topic of discussion. Here are some excerpts, but I really urge everyone to read the entire article.
Whether their brief detention was a mere inconvenience or a flagrant violation of their constitutional rights is the subject of a growing debate that seems likely to be resolved in federal court. Immigration officials, charged with enforcing the law against the estimated 12 million undocumented foreigners in the USA, are mounting more raids at slaughterhouses, restaurants and factories.
Increasingly, U.S. citizens and legal residents who work alongside illegal immigrants are being detained and interrogated, too. And some, such as Dhopade, are filing claims or lawsuits against the government.
Dhopade says he was a victim of racial profiling by ICE. An ICE agent questioned him about his immigration status and his ability to speak English “because of my skin color,” he says. “None of the white folks in the office … that I know of were asked for proof of citizenship. To be asked for proof of citizenship, in this country, it’s an insult. This is the United States of America. This country does not require that.”
“You cannot in this country engage in group detentions of large numbers of people because you think a smaller number within the larger group has done something wrong,” Schey says. At the Van Nuys plant, ICE “created a powerful atmosphere of fear and intimidation. People felt like they had been taken hostage.”
Barbara Coe, chairwoman of the California Coalition for Immigration Reform, says raids “are providing the incentive for at least some of these illegal aliens to get out of here before they are deported. I don’t think there are enough raids. There should be more.” She says she’s sorry legal residents are sometimes questioned during raids but believes ICE needs time to determine who is here legally.
So does Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington. “It’s not the end of the world,” he says of citizens who are detained. “These people were briefly inconvenienced. Too bad.”
Denise Shippy, nine months pregnant the day of the MSE raid, says it was more than an inconvenience.
She had planned to take off that afternoon for parent-teacher conferences and a doctor’s appointment. But Shippy, 30, needed to train a receptionist to fill in for her while she was on maternity leave, so she took her two children to the office with her. The raid occurred as she settled Cassidy, 7, and Ricky, 9, into the mailroom for lunch.
As she left the mailroom, Shippy found the lobby filled with ICE agents, and she, the children and co-workers were herded in there. When Shippy tried to respond to an e-mail, she says, one ICE agent said, “Stop typing.”
“My rights were violated,” Shippy says. “I am a citizen of this United States. I was born here. I’m not who they’re looking for. I wasn’t allowed to leave. … I couldn’t go anywhere and couldn’t do anything. Neither could my children.”
Although she was upset, she tried to calm her kids, she says. She needed to use the restroom, but held off because she didn’t want an agent to accompany her.
“I didn’t want to scare the heck out of my kids,” she says. “I was trying to be cool and calm for my children. My heart was racing.”
As long as ICE has a warrant to enter a workplace, Myers says, agents can conduct what she calls a “survey” to determine the legal status of “anyone within the premises.”
She cites a 1984 Supreme Court ruling that said factory surveys during immigration raids don’t amount to an unconstitutional detention or seizure of those being questioned, even U.S. citizens.
In its ruling, however, the Supreme Court emphasized that the employees in the factory were not prevented from moving around, continuing to work or leaving. The current raids are different from those the Supreme Court approved, Schey says.
ICE can question workers as long as the interaction is voluntary, “but what they’re doing (now) is not that,” he says, because workers think they have no choice except to answer questions — which may incriminate those here illegally.
ICE’s raids foster discrimination, says Domingo Garcia, attorney for the League of United Latin American Citizens. “There’s a lot of racial profiling. … If you look like a Hispanic, you’re detained or arrested.”
He says he plans to file a class-action, civil rights lawsuit on behalf of legal workers detained in raids, including Jesus Garcia, 27, a green-card holder from Mount Pleasant, Texas. Domingo Garcia says he will ask the court to prohibit ICE from conducting raids until it changes its policies to prevent racial profiling.
ICE agents went to Jesus Garcia’s home on April 16 in conjunction with a raid on a nearby Pilgrim’s Pride poultry processing plant, where he worked marinating chicken meat. Garcia, from Mexico, has been a legal permanent resident for a year and a half. When about 10 ICE agents and local sheriff’s deputies knocked on his door, they told him he was using the wrong Social Security number, says his wife, Olivia Garcia, a U.S. citizen.
Though Garcia showed the agents his green card, they handcuffed him and jailed him. He was released a day and a half later after agents told him he wasn’t the person they wanted, he says. He had spent the night in jail. “He said it was pretty bad,” Olivia says. “People were crying and screaming.”
Jesus Garcia, who has since left Pilgrim’s Pride for another job, says the mishap cost him three days of work. “I worked hard to get my residency,” he says. “And to take me to jail just over a mistake?”
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-06-24-Immigration-raids_N.htm?csp=34
“Death by Detention”
When I watch this story, I am compelled to reach a consensus regarding a reasonable humane immigration solution. Is this the immigrant we want to focus our time and attention on? Don’t you think our collective immigration energy and MONEY should be focused on real criminals, like murderers, gang bangers, and felony criminals? If this was your sister, what would you do?
OnefortheRoad’s duplicitous nature
Dear Posters,
We could tell, from behind the scenes, that onefortheroad was not who “he” said he was. Our mistake was wanting the “democratic” blog process to run its course and hope, with enough people here ignoring him, he would simply go away. However, it is clear, that there was a set up, so that Greg could use the comments posted by onefortheroad to demonstrate that we are a “hate” group over on Anti. What I have done is posted every comment, beginning with Moon-howler, calling out onefortheroads behavior. Unlike Greg’s blog, where hateful comments mostly go unchallenged, several posters attempted to encourage onefortheroad to go away, or suggest instead we ignore him in hopes HE would go away. This has been a learning experience for the blog, and we will make sure, in the future, that we are more aware of the duplicitous nature of the cyberworld and react accordingly to deal with hateful/aggressive comments when they are directed at a person or a specific group. Onefortheroad was clearly not here to discuss anything, his posts were simply to give an opportunity for Greg to “capture” the comment and use if for his own purpose. For those of us who can see behind the scene in the cyber IP world, it was clear that onefortheroad was questionable. We want to let free speech reign here, but we also want to allow people an opportunity to debate with people who are actually interested in having a “conversation”, not just playing a game that wastes people’s time.
Below are all the comments to onefortheroad, calling him out on his unacceptable comments. I’ll begin with Moon-howler as they told him he was now in moderation due to his comments:
Moon-howler, 24. June 2008, 16:21
OneForTheRoad has been placed in time out until the Blog-Mom is home and can review his posts. I did this with her approval because people felt that threats were being made.
New rule until Mom gets home: Do not threaten anyone. If you don’t like my decision, tattle to her later today.
Meanwhile, perhaps other bloggers might not want to respond to OFTR. Granted he not only enjoys talking with himself, but also arguing with himself, but let’s not give him the time of day.
Mando, 23. June 2008, 15:06
@Alanna and everyone else
OneForTheRoad/Taco Truck Ted is what is know as a forum troll.
Just Cause, 23. June 2008, 15:10
Mando- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_troll
Like all “pests” if you ignore them long enough, they will go away..trust me, this one too shall pass….
Elena, 23. June 2008, 23:48 Edit This
OnefortheRoad,
It is clear you are not “credible”. Your posts are schizophrenic in nature and you are clearly choosing to single out LPOW for harrassment, he is neither an HSM , KKK or neo-nazi member. Most likely people will choose to disregard your comments, which I believe is the best recourse.
IllegalisILLEGAL, 24. June 2008, 8:49
OneForTheRoad- Do you feel like a “man” now? Threatening people? What’s up with you?
rod2155, 24. June 2008, 9:07
“OneForTheRoad- Do you feel like a “man” now? Threatening people? What’s up with you?”
He’s Trolling, he’s just looking to pick a fight and get attention. He plays to both blogs and switches sides randomly, just ignor him, he gets off on getting people mad.
Elena, 24. June 2008, 10:19
Just in case it isn’t clear to people, please ignore oneforthroad. I think it was Mando that had the intial suggestion, and we should follow that lead.
IllegalisILLEGAL, 24. June 2008, 14:23
OneForTheRoad- You have not answered my questions yet. Why are you threatening people? And, what’s up with you?
Commentary: How to fix our broken immigration system
Ruben Navarrette Jr., a CNN contributor offers a reasonable response for fixing our immigration system.
SAN DIEGO, California (CNN) — In a recent commentary, I spelled out what bothers many Hispanics about the immigration debate. In response, many readers demanded to know — for all my criticisms — how I would go about fixing our broken immigration system. I thought they’d never ask.
First, let’s keep it real. Congress doesn’t have the appetite to reform the immigration system — no matter which party is running the show. It’s always the same story. After all the huffing and puffing, any workable solution needs to have two components: employer sanctions with teeth and a tamper-proof identification card for all U.S. workers to tell employers who is eligible to work. Republicans won’t allow the first; Democrats won’t allow the second. Game over.
But, if it were so inclined, here’s what Congress should do:
1) By way of enforcement — stiffen penalties against employers with a “three strikes” law (first offense, a warning; second, $10,000 fine; third, 10 days in jail); revise the 1996 Immigration Reform and Control Act by removing the word “knowingly,” as in employers only face punishment if they knowingly hire an illegal immigrant; create an identification card; instead of adding more border patrol agents (the agency can’t meet hiring goals as it is), give the agents already on the line better tools, including tunnel detection equipment; extend the deployment of the National Guard on the border, now set to expire on July 15; continue workplace raids but, for heaven’s sake, arrest an employer every once in a while; and speed up deportations.
2) By way of legalizing the undocumented — make it contingent on meeting enforcement goals, or “triggers”; establish a cutoff so that only those who can prove that they’ve been in the country for five years or more are eligible to apply for legal status and deport more recent arrivals; require applicants to learn English, pay a $5,000 fine, undergo criminal background checks, return to their home country to be processed, and take their place in the back of the line behind all those who are trying to enter the country legally; and, for those who are eventually given legal status, institute a lifetime ban on receiving welfare, Medicaid or food stamps but allow them to collect what they’ve contributed to Social Security.
3) By way of reforming the system for those who immigrate legally — increase the allotment of green cards and work visas, including H1B visas for highly skilled workers; triple the number of legal immigrants currently admitted from 1 million to 3 million, or 1 percent of the total U.S. population; abandon the current system of using family reunification as the main criteria for admitting new immigrants but don’t adopt the silly and offensive idea of a point system that rewards education and skills; instead, let the market drive the process by making labor demands the major criteria so (how’s this for radical?) we always have jobs for those who come here instead of admitting engineers and doctors if what we really need are teachers and nurses.
This isn’t brain surgery. But some of this will take courage and common sense. The bad news is, those can be scarce commodities in Washington.
F.A.I.R and its legal strong arm, I.R.L.I , file lawsuit in N.J.
As I read this story, I wondered, why haven’t they mentioned that F.A.I.R is considered a hate group. Is Plainfield the next “rat” experiment for F.A.I.R, having accomplished what it wanted to do in PWC ? Will I.R.L.I just continue trying until they see what they can get to “stick” legally and rid of us this unwanted menace from our southern border? With Mike Hethmon, playing his favorite role as the “mad scientist”, I cringe when I envision what unsuspecting county is next on F.A.I.R ‘s hit list.
PLAINFIELD, N.J. (AP) – A federal lawsuit using a novel method to challenge a landlord’s right to rent to illegal immigrants is stoking tensions that have been rising for years in this diverse city of 50,000 south of Newark.
A prominent group that opposes illegal immigration sued a Plainfield property management company this month, seeking to set a legal precedent by using anti-racketeering legislation to crack down on landlords who rent to illegal immigrants.
The suit was brought by the Immigration Reform Law Institute _ the legal arm of the Federation for American Immigration Reform _ against Connolly Properties on behalf of a former Connolly employee and two tenants who are U.S. citizens.
The tenants allege they were steered into buildings occupied by illegal immigrants who were too afraid about their legal status to complain about decrepit conditions, according to Mike Hethmon, a lawyer for the group that filed the suit.
Flor Gonzalez, head of the Plainfield-based Latin American Coalition, worries that her city may become the latest battleground in the nationwide debate over immigration. The suit comes as tensions over the city’s large immigrant population are rising to a boil, she said, with police ticketing day laborers, a recent spate of beatings and robberies against immigrants, and raids by federal immigration officials.
“This is the worst it’s been. There is a lot of unfriendliness and disrespect against immigrants, and a lot has been happening quietly,” Gonzalez said. “We need big help in this town.”
The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act _ or RICO _ prosecutes organized crime and immigration-related offenses, including human trafficking and harboring and smuggling illegal immigrants into the U.S.
Hethmon said his group decided to take on the case as part of its strategy of “attrition through enforcement,” or urging illegal immigrants to leave the country by making it more difficult for them to find employment and housing in the U.S.
http://www.wtopnews.com/?nid=104&sid=1426375
Open Thread!
Since many of us will be at the party tonight, someone suggested an open thread for follow up comments. I am not sure how many will be able to continue posting on the “party” thread once we reach 300 posts, so feel free to use this thread to continue the conversation, or start a new one!
Mayors Against Workplace Raids
Three West Coast mayors are asking the leaders of other cities to take a stand against workplace immigration raids that they say hurt local economies and may force companies to relocate.
At the annual meeting of the U.S. Conference of Mayors this week in Miami, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums and Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels will ask their colleagues to challenge how the government raids businesses in search of illegal workers.
They want Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to focus on businesses that exploit workers, such as those that violate wage and safety laws, not “responsible employers” that contribute to economies, their resolution says.
“We’ve never taken the position that you shouldn’t enforce the law,” Villaraigosa says. “What we’ve said is, in a time of limited resources, we should prioritize our enforcement. At a time when we don’t have the resources to go after criminals, we’re going after legitimate businesses and workers instead. That doesn’t make sense.”
The resolution will be discussed by a committee Saturday and, if approved, will go to all the mayors for a vote Monday.
Shoot Yourself, Blame a Hispanic
SPRINGFIELD | The wife of a founder of the Ozarks Minutemen has
pleaded guilty to lying about being raped and shot by three Hispanic
men.
Angela D. Wilburn, 44, appeared in Greene County Associate Circuit
Court on Tuesday and pleaded guilty to making a false report, a class
B misdemeanor. Wilburn is scheduled to be sentenced Nov. 3. She could
face up to six months in prison and a $500 fine.
Wilburn is the wife of Brian Wilburn, who helped form the Ozarks
Minutemen. She was charged with the crime in December, after calling
911 reporting someone had shot her.
Angela Wilburn told investigators that three Hispanic men broke into
her mobile home and that one of the men sexually assaulted her in the
hallway, then shot her in the knee with a handgun.
She soon retracted her story and said she heard a noise, and grabbed
her husband’s gun. She told police the gun went off as she reached for
a flashlight.
By the time Angela Wilburn made the admission, Greene County deputies
had already spent more than 100 man-hours investigating the fictitious
attack.
The sheriff’s department said in December it would seek restitution
from Angela Wilburn for the wasted time. Such repayment could be part
of her sentence, said Greene County Chief Deputy Jim Arnott.
