The Bush administration is expected to publish Tuesday [today] a second supplemental "Social Security No Match" regulation. The first rule, finalized in August 2007, has been held up in the courts. The regulation is an effort by the Department of Homeland Security to enforce immigration laws by imposing obligations on employers who receive a letter indicating that an employee's information does not match the Social Security Administration's. The Shuler-Tancredo bill contains language that would codify this controversial regulation.
Mandatory use of a federal database known as E-Verify (until recently known as Basic Pilot) to verify the employment eligibility of all workers is at the heart of a number of federal and state proposals. The Shuler-Tancredo bill (H.R. 4088) is the subject of a "discharge petition" gathering signatures in the U.S. House of Representatives, and there are other similar proposals under consideration in Washington. The state of Mississippi joined Arizona and Oklahoma in mandating the use of E-Verify by all employers while Idaho, Indiana, and Virginia recently rejected such proposals.
from Immigration Policy Center
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Monday, March 24, 2008
ICE agent arrested for coercing oral sex from immigrant
This is just so sad. People can be so evil. I am sure this is not an isolated event.
~~~
An Agent, a Green Card, and a Demand for Sex
NEW YORK TIMES
By NINA BERNSTEIN
Published: March 21, 2008
No problems so far, the immigration agent told the American citizenand his 22-year-old Colombian wife at her green card interview inDecember. After he stapled one of their wedding photos to herapplication for legal permanent residency, he had just one morequestion: What was her cellphone number?
Isaac R. Baichu, 46, an adjudicator for the United States Citizenshipand Immigration Services, was arrested after he met with a green cardapplicant at the Flagship Restaurant, a diner in Queens. He is chargedwith coercing oral sex from her.The calls from the agent started three days later. He hinted, shesaid, at his power to derail her life and deport her relatives,alluding to a brush she had with the law before her marriage.
He summoned her to a private meeting. And at noon on Dec. 21, in a parkedcar on Queens Boulevard, he named his price — not realizing that shewas recording everything on the cellphone in her purse."I want sex," he said on the recording. "One or two times. That's all. You get your green card. You won't have to see me anymore."She reluctantly agreed to a future meeting. But when she tried toleave his car, he demanded oral sex "now," to "know that you'reserious." And despite her protests, she said, he got his way.The 16-minute recording, which the woman first took to The New YorkTimes and then to the Queens district attorney, suggests the vastpower of low-level immigration law enforcers, and a growingdesperation on the part of immigrants seeking legal status. Theaftermath, which included the arrest of an immigration agent lastweek, underscores the difficulty and danger of making a complaint,even in the rare case when abuse of power may have been caught ontape.
No one knows how widespread sexual blackmail is, but the case echoesother instances of sexual coercion that have surfaced in recent years,including agents criminally charged in Atlanta, Miami and Santa Ana,Calif. And it raises broader questions about the system'svulnerability to corruption at a time when millions of noncitizenslive in a kind of legal no-man's land, increasingly fearful of seekingthe law's protection.
The agent arrested last week, Isaac R. Baichu, 46, himself animmigrant from Guyana, handled some 8,000 green card applicationsduring his three years as an adjudicator in the Garden City, N.Y.,office of United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, part ofthe federal Department of Homeland Security. He pleaded not guilty tofelony and misdemeanor charges of coercing the young woman to performoral sex, and of promising to help her secure immigration papers inexchange for further sexual favors. If convicted, he will face up toseven years in prison.His agency has suspended him with pay, and the inspector general ofHomeland Security is reviewing his other cases, a spokesman saidWednesday. Prosecutors, who say they recorded a meeting between Mr.Baichu and the woman on March 11 at which he made similar demands forsex, urge any other victims to come forward.
Money, not sex, is the more common currency of corruption inimmigration, but according to Congressional testimony in 2006 byMichael Maxwell, former director of the agency's internalinvestigations, more than 3,000 backlogged complaints of employeemisconduct had gone uninvestigated for lack of staff, including 528involving criminal allegations.The agency says it has tripled its investigative staff since then, andcounts only 165 serious complaints pending. But it stopped posting ane-mail address and phone number for such complaints last year, saidJan Lane, chief of security and integrity, because it lacks the staffto cull the thousands of mostly irrelevant messages that resulted.
Immigrants, she advised, should report wrongdoing to any lawenforcement agency they trust.The young woman in Queens, whose name is being withheld because theauthorities consider her the victim of a sex crime, did not even tellher husband what had happened. Two weeks after the meeting in the car,finding no way to make a confidential complaint to the immigrationagency and afraid to go to the police, she and two older femalerelatives took the recording to The Times.
Reasons to WorryA slim, shy woman who looks like a teenager, she said she had spentrecent months baby-sitting for relatives in Queens, crying over thedeaths of her two brothers back in Cali, Colombia, and longing for theright stamp in her passport — one that would let her return to theUnited States if she visited her family.She came to the United States on a tourist visa in 2004 andoverstayed. When she married an American citizen a year ago, the lawallowed her to apply to "adjust" her illegal status. But unless hergreen card application was approved, she could not visit her parentsor her brothers' graves and then legally re-enter the United States.And if her application was denied, she would face deportation.
She had another reason to be fearful, and not only for herself. About15 months ago, she said, an acquaintance hired her and two femalerelatives in New York to carry $12,000 in cash to the bank. The threewomen, all living in the country illegally, were arrested on thestreet by customs officers apparently acting on a tip in amoney-laundering investigation. After determining that the women hadno useful information, the officers released them.But the closed investigation file had showed up in the computer whenshe applied for a green card, Mr. Baichu told her in December; untilhe obtained the file and dealt with it, her application would not beapproved. If she defied him, she feared, he could summon immigrationenforcement agents to take her relatives to detention.
So instead of calling the police, she turned on the video recorder inher cellphone, put the phone in her purse and walked to meet theagent. Two family members said they watched anxiously from theirparked car as she disappeared behind the tinted windows of his redLexus."We were worried that the guy would take off, take her away and dosomething to her," the woman's widowed sister-in-law said in Spanish.
As the recorder captured the agent's words and a lilting Guyaneseaccent, he laid out his terms in an easy, almost paternal style. Hewould not ask too much, he said: sex "once or twice," visits to hishome in the Bronx, perhaps a link to other Colombians who needed hishelp with their immigration problems.
In shaky English, the woman expressed reluctance, and questioned howshe could be sure he would keep his word."If I do it, it's like very hard for me, because I have my husband,and I really fall in love with him," she said.
The agent insisted that she had to trust him. "I wouldn't ask you todo something for me if I can't do something for you, right?" he said,and reasoned, "Nobody going to help you for nothing," noting that shehad no money.
He described himself as the single father of a 10-year-old daughter,telling her, "I need love, too," and predicting, "You will get to likeme because I'm a nice guy." Repeatedly, she responded "O.K.," without conviction. At one point hethanked her for showing up, saying, "I know you feel very scared."Finally, she tried to leave. "Let me go because I tell my husband Icome home," she said. His reply, the recording shows, was a blunt demand for oral sex. "Right now? No!" she protested. "No, no, right now I can't."He insisted, cajoled, even empathized. "I came from a differentcountry, too," he said. "I got my green card just like you."Then, she said, he grabbed her. During the speechless minute thatfollows on the recording, she said she yielded to his demand out offear that he would use his authority against her.How Much Corruption?The charges against Mr. Baichu, who became a United States citizen in1991 and earns roughly $50,000 a year, appear to be part of a largerpattern, according to government records and interviews.
Mr. Maxwell, the immigration agency's former chief investigator, toldCongress in 2006 that internal corruption was "rampant," and thatemployees faced constant temptations to commit crime."It is only a small step from granting a discretionary waiver of aneligibility rule to asking for a favor or taking a bribe in exchangefor granting that waiver," he contended. "Once an employee learns hecan get away with low-level corruption and still advance up the ranks,he or she becomes more brazen."
Mr. Maxwell's own deputy, Lloyd W. Miner, 49, of Hyattsville, Md.,turned out to be an example. He was sentenced March 7 to a year inprison for inducing a 21-year-old Mongolian woman to stay in thecountry illegally, and harboring her in his house.Other cases include that of a 60-year-old immigration adjudicator inSanta Ana, Calif., who was charged with demanding sexual favors from a29-year-old Vietnamese woman in exchange for approving her citizenshipapplication. The agent, Eddie Romualdo Miranda, was acquitted of afelony sexual battery charge last August, but pleaded guilty tomisdemeanor battery and was sentenced to probation.
In Atlanta, another adjudicator, Kelvin R. Owens, was convicted in2005 of sexually assaulting a 45-year-old woman during her citizenshipinterview in the federal building, and sentenced to weekends in jailfor six months. And a Miami agent of Immigration and CustomsEnforcement responsible for transporting a Haitian woman to detentionis awaiting trial on charges that he took her to his home and rapedher.
"Despite our best efforts there are always people ready to use theirposition for personal gain or personal pleasure," said Chris Bentley,a spokesman for Citizenship and Immigration Services. "Ourresponsibility is to ferret them out."When the Queens woman came to The Times with her recording on Jan. 3,she was afraid of retaliation from the agent, and uncertain aboutmaking a criminal complaint, though she had an appointment the nextday at the Queens district attorney's office.She followed through, however, and Carmencita Gutierrez, an assistantdistrict attorney, began monitoring phone calls between the agent andthe young woman, a spokesman said. When Mr. Baichu arranged to meetthe woman on March 11 at the Flagship Restaurant on Queens Boulevard,investigators were ready. In the conversation recorded there, according to the criminalcomplaint, Mr. Baichu told her he expected her to do "just like thelast time," and offered to take her to a garage or the bathroom of afriend's real estate business so she would be "more comfortable doingit" there.
Mr. Baichu was arrested as he emerged from the diner and headed to hiscar, wearing much gold and diamond jewelry, prosecutors said. Laterreleased on $15,000 bail, Mr. Baichu referred calls for comment to hislawyer, Sally Attia, who said he did not have authority to grant ordeny green card petitions without his supervisor's approval.
The young woman's ordeal is not over. Her husband overheard herspeaking about it to a cousin about a month ago, and she had to tellhim the whole story, she said."He was so mad at me, he left my house," she said, near tears. "Idon't know if he's going to come back."The green card has not come through. "I'm still hoping," she said.
Angelica Medaglia contributed reporting.
~~~
An Agent, a Green Card, and a Demand for Sex
NEW YORK TIMES
By NINA BERNSTEIN
Published: March 21, 2008
No problems so far, the immigration agent told the American citizenand his 22-year-old Colombian wife at her green card interview inDecember. After he stapled one of their wedding photos to herapplication for legal permanent residency, he had just one morequestion: What was her cellphone number?
Isaac R. Baichu, 46, an adjudicator for the United States Citizenshipand Immigration Services, was arrested after he met with a green cardapplicant at the Flagship Restaurant, a diner in Queens. He is chargedwith coercing oral sex from her.The calls from the agent started three days later. He hinted, shesaid, at his power to derail her life and deport her relatives,alluding to a brush she had with the law before her marriage.
He summoned her to a private meeting. And at noon on Dec. 21, in a parkedcar on Queens Boulevard, he named his price — not realizing that shewas recording everything on the cellphone in her purse."I want sex," he said on the recording. "One or two times. That's all. You get your green card. You won't have to see me anymore."She reluctantly agreed to a future meeting. But when she tried toleave his car, he demanded oral sex "now," to "know that you'reserious." And despite her protests, she said, he got his way.The 16-minute recording, which the woman first took to The New YorkTimes and then to the Queens district attorney, suggests the vastpower of low-level immigration law enforcers, and a growingdesperation on the part of immigrants seeking legal status. Theaftermath, which included the arrest of an immigration agent lastweek, underscores the difficulty and danger of making a complaint,even in the rare case when abuse of power may have been caught ontape.
No one knows how widespread sexual blackmail is, but the case echoesother instances of sexual coercion that have surfaced in recent years,including agents criminally charged in Atlanta, Miami and Santa Ana,Calif. And it raises broader questions about the system'svulnerability to corruption at a time when millions of noncitizenslive in a kind of legal no-man's land, increasingly fearful of seekingthe law's protection.
The agent arrested last week, Isaac R. Baichu, 46, himself animmigrant from Guyana, handled some 8,000 green card applicationsduring his three years as an adjudicator in the Garden City, N.Y.,office of United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, part ofthe federal Department of Homeland Security. He pleaded not guilty tofelony and misdemeanor charges of coercing the young woman to performoral sex, and of promising to help her secure immigration papers inexchange for further sexual favors. If convicted, he will face up toseven years in prison.His agency has suspended him with pay, and the inspector general ofHomeland Security is reviewing his other cases, a spokesman saidWednesday. Prosecutors, who say they recorded a meeting between Mr.Baichu and the woman on March 11 at which he made similar demands forsex, urge any other victims to come forward.
Money, not sex, is the more common currency of corruption inimmigration, but according to Congressional testimony in 2006 byMichael Maxwell, former director of the agency's internalinvestigations, more than 3,000 backlogged complaints of employeemisconduct had gone uninvestigated for lack of staff, including 528involving criminal allegations.The agency says it has tripled its investigative staff since then, andcounts only 165 serious complaints pending. But it stopped posting ane-mail address and phone number for such complaints last year, saidJan Lane, chief of security and integrity, because it lacks the staffto cull the thousands of mostly irrelevant messages that resulted.
Immigrants, she advised, should report wrongdoing to any lawenforcement agency they trust.The young woman in Queens, whose name is being withheld because theauthorities consider her the victim of a sex crime, did not even tellher husband what had happened. Two weeks after the meeting in the car,finding no way to make a confidential complaint to the immigrationagency and afraid to go to the police, she and two older femalerelatives took the recording to The Times.
Reasons to WorryA slim, shy woman who looks like a teenager, she said she had spentrecent months baby-sitting for relatives in Queens, crying over thedeaths of her two brothers back in Cali, Colombia, and longing for theright stamp in her passport — one that would let her return to theUnited States if she visited her family.She came to the United States on a tourist visa in 2004 andoverstayed. When she married an American citizen a year ago, the lawallowed her to apply to "adjust" her illegal status. But unless hergreen card application was approved, she could not visit her parentsor her brothers' graves and then legally re-enter the United States.And if her application was denied, she would face deportation.
She had another reason to be fearful, and not only for herself. About15 months ago, she said, an acquaintance hired her and two femalerelatives in New York to carry $12,000 in cash to the bank. The threewomen, all living in the country illegally, were arrested on thestreet by customs officers apparently acting on a tip in amoney-laundering investigation. After determining that the women hadno useful information, the officers released them.But the closed investigation file had showed up in the computer whenshe applied for a green card, Mr. Baichu told her in December; untilhe obtained the file and dealt with it, her application would not beapproved. If she defied him, she feared, he could summon immigrationenforcement agents to take her relatives to detention.
So instead of calling the police, she turned on the video recorder inher cellphone, put the phone in her purse and walked to meet theagent. Two family members said they watched anxiously from theirparked car as she disappeared behind the tinted windows of his redLexus."We were worried that the guy would take off, take her away and dosomething to her," the woman's widowed sister-in-law said in Spanish.
As the recorder captured the agent's words and a lilting Guyaneseaccent, he laid out his terms in an easy, almost paternal style. Hewould not ask too much, he said: sex "once or twice," visits to hishome in the Bronx, perhaps a link to other Colombians who needed hishelp with their immigration problems.
In shaky English, the woman expressed reluctance, and questioned howshe could be sure he would keep his word."If I do it, it's like very hard for me, because I have my husband,and I really fall in love with him," she said.
The agent insisted that she had to trust him. "I wouldn't ask you todo something for me if I can't do something for you, right?" he said,and reasoned, "Nobody going to help you for nothing," noting that shehad no money.
He described himself as the single father of a 10-year-old daughter,telling her, "I need love, too," and predicting, "You will get to likeme because I'm a nice guy." Repeatedly, she responded "O.K.," without conviction. At one point hethanked her for showing up, saying, "I know you feel very scared."Finally, she tried to leave. "Let me go because I tell my husband Icome home," she said. His reply, the recording shows, was a blunt demand for oral sex. "Right now? No!" she protested. "No, no, right now I can't."He insisted, cajoled, even empathized. "I came from a differentcountry, too," he said. "I got my green card just like you."Then, she said, he grabbed her. During the speechless minute thatfollows on the recording, she said she yielded to his demand out offear that he would use his authority against her.How Much Corruption?The charges against Mr. Baichu, who became a United States citizen in1991 and earns roughly $50,000 a year, appear to be part of a largerpattern, according to government records and interviews.
Mr. Maxwell, the immigration agency's former chief investigator, toldCongress in 2006 that internal corruption was "rampant," and thatemployees faced constant temptations to commit crime."It is only a small step from granting a discretionary waiver of aneligibility rule to asking for a favor or taking a bribe in exchangefor granting that waiver," he contended. "Once an employee learns hecan get away with low-level corruption and still advance up the ranks,he or she becomes more brazen."
Mr. Maxwell's own deputy, Lloyd W. Miner, 49, of Hyattsville, Md.,turned out to be an example. He was sentenced March 7 to a year inprison for inducing a 21-year-old Mongolian woman to stay in thecountry illegally, and harboring her in his house.Other cases include that of a 60-year-old immigration adjudicator inSanta Ana, Calif., who was charged with demanding sexual favors from a29-year-old Vietnamese woman in exchange for approving her citizenshipapplication. The agent, Eddie Romualdo Miranda, was acquitted of afelony sexual battery charge last August, but pleaded guilty tomisdemeanor battery and was sentenced to probation.
In Atlanta, another adjudicator, Kelvin R. Owens, was convicted in2005 of sexually assaulting a 45-year-old woman during her citizenshipinterview in the federal building, and sentenced to weekends in jailfor six months. And a Miami agent of Immigration and CustomsEnforcement responsible for transporting a Haitian woman to detentionis awaiting trial on charges that he took her to his home and rapedher.
"Despite our best efforts there are always people ready to use theirposition for personal gain or personal pleasure," said Chris Bentley,a spokesman for Citizenship and Immigration Services. "Ourresponsibility is to ferret them out."When the Queens woman came to The Times with her recording on Jan. 3,she was afraid of retaliation from the agent, and uncertain aboutmaking a criminal complaint, though she had an appointment the nextday at the Queens district attorney's office.She followed through, however, and Carmencita Gutierrez, an assistantdistrict attorney, began monitoring phone calls between the agent andthe young woman, a spokesman said. When Mr. Baichu arranged to meetthe woman on March 11 at the Flagship Restaurant on Queens Boulevard,investigators were ready. In the conversation recorded there, according to the criminalcomplaint, Mr. Baichu told her he expected her to do "just like thelast time," and offered to take her to a garage or the bathroom of afriend's real estate business so she would be "more comfortable doingit" there.
Mr. Baichu was arrested as he emerged from the diner and headed to hiscar, wearing much gold and diamond jewelry, prosecutors said. Laterreleased on $15,000 bail, Mr. Baichu referred calls for comment to hislawyer, Sally Attia, who said he did not have authority to grant ordeny green card petitions without his supervisor's approval.
The young woman's ordeal is not over. Her husband overheard herspeaking about it to a cousin about a month ago, and she had to tellhim the whole story, she said."He was so mad at me, he left my house," she said, near tears. "Idon't know if he's going to come back."The green card has not come through. "I'm still hoping," she said.
Angelica Medaglia contributed reporting.
ICE's game: make the immigrant disappear
Now that immigrant detentions are getting so common - and ICE seems to have gotten very good at making people disappear for a long while - it seemed like a good idea to search for where a family could request information on a detainee.
A pro-immigrant advocate sent me a couple of web pages. I also found information from specific detention centers. I searched the main ICE website and there is no listing for a number where families can call. The site had numerous listings of arrests for child pornography. I did find a phone number to report suspicious activity.
------------------------------
"In general, ICE is typically rather uncooperative in giving out info on detained individuals. They do have a hot-line that relatives can call to inquire about their family members. However, it is not uncommon for the disappeared to be completely missing, and to be found or heard from only after deportation weeks or months later.When contacting ICE, the family member or lawyer would need the full name of the detained, or alien # if the individual has one."*
Detention Watch Network website is http://www.detentionwatchnetwork.org/index.php
Legal Services of the region : http://www.usdoj.gov/eoir/probono/freelglchtTX.htm
*thanks to S.O. for providing the above information
--------------------------------------------------------------
The following is from an ICE detention center web page:
http://www.ice.gov/pi/dro/facilities/eloy.htm
photo: southerncomfort.wordpress.com/.
*thanks to S.O. for providing the above information
--------------------------------------------------------------
The following is from an ICE detention center web page:
http://www.ice.gov/pi/dro/facilities/eloy.htm
If you feel you were mistreated by an immigration employee, or wish to make a complaint of misconduct by an immigration or contract facility employee:
Call the toll-free Joint Intake Center Hotline at 1-877-2INTAKE
FAX the JIC at 202-927-4607
Write to the JIC at P.O. Box 14475, 1200 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
Washington, D.C. 20044
Send an e-mail message to the JIC at Joint.Intake@dhs.gov or;
Contact the DHS/OIG by calling 1-800-323-8603, write to the
Department of Homeland Security, Washington, D.C. 20528
Attn:Office of Inspector General, Hotline; or
send an email to DHSoighotline@dhs.gov.Detention: (For questions about those held in detention):
[F]or case status information. Please have the alien registration number to expedite your inquiry.
Forms:
You may call 1 (800) 870-3676 to have forms mailed to you.
Freedom of Information Act (FOIA):
All FOIA/PA requests (for detainees to obtain certain information in their immigration files) must be submitted on either Form G-639 (Freedom of Information/Privacy Act Request) or in letter format, and contain the original notarized signature of the subject in question. Please complete the Form G-639 thoroughly and if writing a letter, be sure to include your full name, any other names used, date of birth, place of birth, A-number, and your address and telephone number, so that we may contact you if we have any questions.
----------
From another ICE web page related to the Los Angeles Field Office
http://www.ice.gov/pi/sanpedro.htm
Family Information on El Salvadorian Detainees in ICE CustodyThe safety and well-being of detainees at the Los Angeles Field Office for Detention and Removal Operations is of paramount importance. The need for preventative maintenance of the San Pedro Service Processing Center necessitated the immediate relocation of the detainees to various ICE approved detention facilities. Detainee's family members and/or attorneys are encouraged to call (213) 830-4925 for additional information.
For information on an El Salvadorian detainee housed at another facility, family members and/or attorneys should contact the appropriate Detention and Removal Operations (DRO) field office. ICE personnel will provide the most current information available regarding the location of the individual.”
DRO Field Office Contact Information:
http://www.ice.gov/about/dro/contact.htm
photo: southerncomfort.wordpress.com/.
Soldier death toll reaches 4,000
They are all in my prayers.
I hope that our brave soldier Yoni Leal comes home soon, he left August 07.
On my way home from San Antonio I was hearing KPFT 90.1fm and was listening to soldier testimonials about events Iraqi civilians were enduring, including death of women and children on a daily basis, while expressing opposition to the war...continue listening this week...(OPEN JOURNAL: Winter Soldier: Iraq Veterans Against the War : Mon. 3/24 - Mon. 3/31: Monday through Friday, 12:00 Noon to 1:00 PM)
~~~~~
Four U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq, death toll 4,000
Mon Mar 24, 2008 12:44am EDT
* U.S. death toll reaches 4,000
* Impact on U.S. election unclear
By Ross Colvin
BAGHDAD, March 24
(Reuters) - The number of U.S. soldiers to die in Iraq has reached 4,000, the U.S. military said on Monday, just days after the fifth anniversary of a war that President George W. Bush says the United States is on track to win.
The U.S. military said in a statement four soldiers were killed late on Sunday when a roadside bomb, the biggest killer of American soldiers in Iraq, exploded near their vehicle in southern Baghdad. One soldier was wounded in the attack.
The deaths came on a day when the U.S.-protected "Green Zone", the government and diplomatic compound in central Baghdad, was hit by repeated rocket and mortar fire, part of an upsurge in violence in the capital and elsewhere.
The violence, in which dozens were killed, underscored the fragility of Iraq's security. There has been an increase in attacks since January, although U.S. military commanders say overall levels of violence are down 60 percent since last June.
What impact the 4,000 milestone will have on a war-weary American public and the U.S. presidential campaign will be hard to assess in the short term, but war critics are likely to seize on it to boost their case for U.S. troops to be withdrawn.
The U.S. military dismisses such tolls as arbitrary markers."It is artificial in the sense that somehow the 4,000th tragic loss somehow will be different from the first," U.S. military spokesman Rear Admiral Greg Smith told Reuters in an interview last week.
Anthony Cordesman, a respected Iraq analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said the 4,000 death could trigger another wave of polarised debate.
"Those who oppose the war will see it as further reason to end it. Those who support it, will point to military progress and say that future casualties will be much lower," he said.
Although Americans are more preoccupied with domestic economic troubles, the Iraq war is still an important issue in the presidential campaign, with Democratic hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama calling for a timetable for withdrawal.
Bush said in a speech marking the 5th anniversary of the war on March 19 that the United States was on track for victory and said withdrawing troops, who now number about 160,000, would embolden al Qaeda and neighbouring Iran.
He said he had no regrets about the war, which has pushed his approval ratings near the lowest level of his presidency, but acknowledged the "high cost in lives and treasure".
Bush launched the war in March 2003 hoping for a quick victory with minimal casualties. The Iraqi army was quickly defeated, but within months insurgent attacks had bogged down U.S. forces who struggled to develop a strategy to defeat them.
MILESTONES
The 1,000th U.S. soldier to die was in September 2004, 18 months after the invasion and in the midst of a presidential election that returned Bush to office for a second term.
The toll climbed to 2,000 in October 2005 as Sunni Arab insurgents battled to oust the Baghdad government, and 3,000 in December 2006, before Bush unveiled a plan to send 30,000 more troops to Iraq to quell violence that has killed tens of thousands of Iraqis and displaced millions more."I doubt the 4,000 milestone will have the impact that the 3,000 did. The conventional wisdom then was that things were going badly," said Stephen Biddle, a senior fellow for defence policy at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington.
"Today, by contrast, the public's general perception of Iraq is less negative, and coverage for the last six months has tended to focus on the reduction in violence and U.S. casualties. The war has also been much less visible," he said.
But the weekend barrages on the Green Zone, which houses the U.S. embassy, and the continued attacks on U.S. troops may indicate that Iraqi militants are trying to change to that.
"Al Qaeda and extreme elements of the (Mehdi Army) have every incentive to find ways to raise the U.S. casualties between now and November and will be seeking ways to use bombings to raise the rate and number," Cordesman said, speaking before the latest U.S. deaths were announced.
(Writing by Ross Colvin, additional reporting by Randy Fabi; Editing by Stephen Weeks)
© Reuters 2008 All rights reserved
CLICK ON THE TITLE OF THE POST TO BE REDIRECTED TO THE ARTICLE...
I hope that our brave soldier Yoni Leal comes home soon, he left August 07.
On my way home from San Antonio I was hearing KPFT 90.1fm and was listening to soldier testimonials about events Iraqi civilians were enduring, including death of women and children on a daily basis, while expressing opposition to the war...continue listening this week...(OPEN JOURNAL: Winter Soldier: Iraq Veterans Against the War : Mon. 3/24 - Mon. 3/31: Monday through Friday, 12:00 Noon to 1:00 PM)
~~~~~
Four U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq, death toll 4,000
Mon Mar 24, 2008 12:44am EDT
* U.S. death toll reaches 4,000
* Impact on U.S. election unclear
By Ross Colvin
BAGHDAD, March 24
(Reuters) - The number of U.S. soldiers to die in Iraq has reached 4,000, the U.S. military said on Monday, just days after the fifth anniversary of a war that President George W. Bush says the United States is on track to win.
The U.S. military said in a statement four soldiers were killed late on Sunday when a roadside bomb, the biggest killer of American soldiers in Iraq, exploded near their vehicle in southern Baghdad. One soldier was wounded in the attack.
The deaths came on a day when the U.S.-protected "Green Zone", the government and diplomatic compound in central Baghdad, was hit by repeated rocket and mortar fire, part of an upsurge in violence in the capital and elsewhere.
The violence, in which dozens were killed, underscored the fragility of Iraq's security. There has been an increase in attacks since January, although U.S. military commanders say overall levels of violence are down 60 percent since last June.
What impact the 4,000 milestone will have on a war-weary American public and the U.S. presidential campaign will be hard to assess in the short term, but war critics are likely to seize on it to boost their case for U.S. troops to be withdrawn.
The U.S. military dismisses such tolls as arbitrary markers."It is artificial in the sense that somehow the 4,000th tragic loss somehow will be different from the first," U.S. military spokesman Rear Admiral Greg Smith told Reuters in an interview last week.
Anthony Cordesman, a respected Iraq analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said the 4,000 death could trigger another wave of polarised debate.
"Those who oppose the war will see it as further reason to end it. Those who support it, will point to military progress and say that future casualties will be much lower," he said.
Although Americans are more preoccupied with domestic economic troubles, the Iraq war is still an important issue in the presidential campaign, with Democratic hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama calling for a timetable for withdrawal.
Bush said in a speech marking the 5th anniversary of the war on March 19 that the United States was on track for victory and said withdrawing troops, who now number about 160,000, would embolden al Qaeda and neighbouring Iran.
He said he had no regrets about the war, which has pushed his approval ratings near the lowest level of his presidency, but acknowledged the "high cost in lives and treasure".
Bush launched the war in March 2003 hoping for a quick victory with minimal casualties. The Iraqi army was quickly defeated, but within months insurgent attacks had bogged down U.S. forces who struggled to develop a strategy to defeat them.
MILESTONES
The 1,000th U.S. soldier to die was in September 2004, 18 months after the invasion and in the midst of a presidential election that returned Bush to office for a second term.
The toll climbed to 2,000 in October 2005 as Sunni Arab insurgents battled to oust the Baghdad government, and 3,000 in December 2006, before Bush unveiled a plan to send 30,000 more troops to Iraq to quell violence that has killed tens of thousands of Iraqis and displaced millions more."I doubt the 4,000 milestone will have the impact that the 3,000 did. The conventional wisdom then was that things were going badly," said Stephen Biddle, a senior fellow for defence policy at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington.
"Today, by contrast, the public's general perception of Iraq is less negative, and coverage for the last six months has tended to focus on the reduction in violence and U.S. casualties. The war has also been much less visible," he said.
But the weekend barrages on the Green Zone, which houses the U.S. embassy, and the continued attacks on U.S. troops may indicate that Iraqi militants are trying to change to that.
"Al Qaeda and extreme elements of the (Mehdi Army) have every incentive to find ways to raise the U.S. casualties between now and November and will be seeking ways to use bombings to raise the rate and number," Cordesman said, speaking before the latest U.S. deaths were announced.
(Writing by Ross Colvin, additional reporting by Randy Fabi; Editing by Stephen Weeks)
© Reuters 2008 All rights reserved
CLICK ON THE TITLE OF THE POST TO BE REDIRECTED TO THE ARTICLE...
This American Life. Act Four Just One Thing Missing
So rarely do i get to go to lunch at work but today I did. As i was driving in traffic, i switched to NPR and i heard the story of fellow Dreamer Marta in California.
As i got to office depot- my last destination to pick up some things for the office, i was in tears when listening to Marta talking about dropping out in her last quarter of school.
Listen to this piece and understand more of the struggle, its quite real.
*As you are in this page, listen to Act Four. Just One Thing Missing (Minute 46)
As i got to office depot- my last destination to pick up some things for the office, i was in tears when listening to Marta talking about dropping out in her last quarter of school.
Listen to this piece and understand more of the struggle, its quite real.
*As you are in this page, listen to Act Four. Just One Thing Missing (Minute 46)
George R. Boggs Standing up for the DREAM Act
Why Congress Should Revive the Dream Act
Chronicle of Higher Education, March 28, 2008
By George R. Boggs
In The United States we don't typically punish people, especially children,for the actions of others. But today more than 65,000 undocumented students graduate from our high schools each year with literally nowhere to go.
The Supreme Court has guaranteed those students the right to a free public education through the 12th grade, but once they doff their caps and gowns, national policies stymie their pursuit of higher education at every turn, forcing most of them to the fringes of society, where they will never fulfill their potential. Last year Congress failed again to overhaul the nation's immigration policies, getting bogged down in the thorny issues surrounding illegal immigrants, guest workers, and border security. Given the divisive atmosphere that has engulfed this debate, these complex problems are unlikely to be solved in an election year.But of all the socially, morally, and economically compelling issues in this debate, there is one that I believe Congress should, and can, do something about this year.Congress should act immediately on pending legislation to right the wrongs done to the children of many undocumented immigrants. TheDevelopment, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, or the Dream Act, which has languished in various versions in Congress for nearly seven years, would grant conditional legal residency to certain undocumented students, who would then have to complete two years of higher education or military service within six years to achieve legal residency. The legal status that the Dream Act would provide to those students would open several doors now closed to them. They would be able to enroll in colleges and universities that require legal status to matriculate, pay instate tuition in states that only provide that benefit to legal residents, and
receive some state and federal financial aid for which they are not now eligible - and without which college is financially infeasible for most. Despite what the bill's opponents claim, the Dream Act would not encourage illegal immigration. It would apply only to people brought to the United States before the age of 16 and living here five years before the law is enacted. The Dream Act would extend a lifeline to students who came to this country through no fault or agency of their own, grew up here and consider America home, and now face deportation to unfamiliar countries to which they have no connection or allegiance.
The Dream Act also would directly affect our nation's economic competitiveness. As a community-college leader, I deal every day with the challenge of meeting the economy's demand for more college-educated workers. With more than 70 million baby boomers starting to retire, this is a daunting task and one that requires us to pursue every opportunity to move more people into higher education. America's economic competitiveness depends on it. The Migration Policy Institute estimates that the Dream Act would make upward of one million undocumented high-school graduates eligible for conditional legal status, and the path to permanent legal status travels
straight through higher education or military service. Furthermore, the population that the Dream Act would affect the most - low-income Hispanic students - is one for whom college-attendance rates are historically low.
The nation's business leaders must be made to see clearly the potential of the Dream Act to help produce the skilled workers they so desperately need, and they must act on that insight. While much of the business community supports comprehensive immigration reform and increases in the numbers of highly skilled foreign workers brought into the United States, it has remained largely silent on the Dream Act. But if industry were to join the wide spectrum of interests urging Congress to pass the
Dream Act, 2008 could be the year we clear the final hurdle and enact this vital piece of legislation. I urge college administrators, faculty members, and students to educate their local business leaders about the importance of the Dream Act in their communities.
We must pass the Dream Act now, both to serve individual justice and for our collective best interest.
* George R. Boggs is president and chief executive of the American
Association of Community Colleges.
Section: Commentary
Volume 54, Issue 29, Page A37
Chronicle of Higher Education, March 28, 2008
By George R. Boggs
In The United States we don't typically punish people, especially children,for the actions of others. But today more than 65,000 undocumented students graduate from our high schools each year with literally nowhere to go.
The Supreme Court has guaranteed those students the right to a free public education through the 12th grade, but once they doff their caps and gowns, national policies stymie their pursuit of higher education at every turn, forcing most of them to the fringes of society, where they will never fulfill their potential. Last year Congress failed again to overhaul the nation's immigration policies, getting bogged down in the thorny issues surrounding illegal immigrants, guest workers, and border security. Given the divisive atmosphere that has engulfed this debate, these complex problems are unlikely to be solved in an election year.But of all the socially, morally, and economically compelling issues in this debate, there is one that I believe Congress should, and can, do something about this year.Congress should act immediately on pending legislation to right the wrongs done to the children of many undocumented immigrants. TheDevelopment, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, or the Dream Act, which has languished in various versions in Congress for nearly seven years, would grant conditional legal residency to certain undocumented students, who would then have to complete two years of higher education or military service within six years to achieve legal residency. The legal status that the Dream Act would provide to those students would open several doors now closed to them. They would be able to enroll in colleges and universities that require legal status to matriculate, pay instate tuition in states that only provide that benefit to legal residents, and
receive some state and federal financial aid for which they are not now eligible - and without which college is financially infeasible for most. Despite what the bill's opponents claim, the Dream Act would not encourage illegal immigration. It would apply only to people brought to the United States before the age of 16 and living here five years before the law is enacted. The Dream Act would extend a lifeline to students who came to this country through no fault or agency of their own, grew up here and consider America home, and now face deportation to unfamiliar countries to which they have no connection or allegiance.
The Dream Act also would directly affect our nation's economic competitiveness. As a community-college leader, I deal every day with the challenge of meeting the economy's demand for more college-educated workers. With more than 70 million baby boomers starting to retire, this is a daunting task and one that requires us to pursue every opportunity to move more people into higher education. America's economic competitiveness depends on it. The Migration Policy Institute estimates that the Dream Act would make upward of one million undocumented high-school graduates eligible for conditional legal status, and the path to permanent legal status travels
straight through higher education or military service. Furthermore, the population that the Dream Act would affect the most - low-income Hispanic students - is one for whom college-attendance rates are historically low.
The nation's business leaders must be made to see clearly the potential of the Dream Act to help produce the skilled workers they so desperately need, and they must act on that insight. While much of the business community supports comprehensive immigration reform and increases in the numbers of highly skilled foreign workers brought into the United States, it has remained largely silent on the Dream Act. But if industry were to join the wide spectrum of interests urging Congress to pass the
Dream Act, 2008 could be the year we clear the final hurdle and enact this vital piece of legislation. I urge college administrators, faculty members, and students to educate their local business leaders about the importance of the Dream Act in their communities.
We must pass the Dream Act now, both to serve individual justice and for our collective best interest.
* George R. Boggs is president and chief executive of the American
Association of Community Colleges.
Section: Commentary
Volume 54, Issue 29, Page A37
It doesn't just happen to Latinos
A few weeks ago it was announced that Edwidge Danticat won the National Book Award
Democracynow.org:
for link to DN audio interview click here
Democracynow.org:
Edwidge Danticat is an award-winning Haitian-born writer who now lives in Miami. In November 2004, Danticat’s 81-year-old uncle, Reverend Joseph Dantica, died in the custody of immigration officials. He had arrived from Haiti seeking political asyslum following threats on his life. Denied his medicines and accused of faking an illness, he died just days after his detention. Edwidge Danticat tells this devastating story in her latest book, “Brother, I’m Dying.”
Immigrant detention centers constitute one of the fastest growing forms of incarceration in the United States. Currently there are 30,000 immigrants in detention, and nearly 300,000 are detained each year. They are held in private, federal or county prisons across the country for weeks, and even months, while the government decides whether to deport them. According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, which is a division of the Department of Homeland Security, one quarter of the people they detain suffer from chronic health conditions. ICE claims to spend $98 million a year on healthcare for detainees and to provide them with “humane and safe detention environments.”
But at least 65 people have died in ICE custody since 2004. The House Judiciary Committee organized a hearing Thursday afternoon on this subject. Tom Jawetz of the ACLU prison project called the care at the detention centers “grossly deficient, inexcusable, and immoral.”
Edwidge Danticat is an award-winning Haitian-born writer who now lives in Miami, Florida. She also testified at Thursday’s congressional hearing. In November of 2004, her 81-year-old uncle, Reverend Joseph Dantica, died in the Krome detention center in Miami. He had just fled Haiti after hiding from an armed gang that threatened to kill him because United Nations and Haitian police forces had fired shots from the roof of his church. Reverend Dantica arrived at Miami International Airport with a multiple-entry visa and said he was applying for temporary political asylum. He was immediately detained, and his medicines were taken away from him. A medic at Krome accused him of “faking his illness.” He died a few days later.
Edwidge Danticat tells this devastating story in her latest book. It’s a memoir called “Brother, I’m Dying.” She joins me now from Miami, Florida.
Edwidge Danticat. Award-winning Haitian American novelist. She is the author of several books including “Breath, Eyes, Memory”, “The Farming of the Bones”, “Krik? Krak!” and “The Dew Breaker.” Her latest book is a memoir called “Brother, I’m Dying.” It tells the story of her uncle, Joseph Dantica, dying in the custody of the Department of Homeland Security...
for link to DN audio interview click here
World Food Program Launches Emergency Appeal
Having been in Mexico for a week now, I have had a chance to talk to numerous people about immigration. What I am being told is that the stronger border enforcement, frequent raids and harsh treatment at detention are keeping people home.
Some people may think that is a good thing. But as food costs skyrocket, more and more people in Mexico will be hungry -
as it is many people barely make enough to pay their bus tickets to work.
from Democracynow.org headlines 3-24-08:
for link to Democracy Now page click the title of this post
Some people may think that is a good thing. But as food costs skyrocket, more and more people in Mexico will be hungry -
as it is many people barely make enough to pay their bus tickets to work.
from Democracynow.org headlines 3-24-08:
World Food Program Launches Emergency Appeal Due to Rising Food Costs
The World Food Program has launched an “extraordinary emergency appeal” to raise at least $500 million in the next four weeks. In a letter to donor nations, the UN agency said food aid would have to be rationed off if the new funds are not received by May 1. The World Food Program said its funding gap is largely caused by soaring food prices as well as record high oil prices.
for link to Democracy Now page click the title of this post
U-Va changes it's mind on admissions for U.S. children of undocumented immigrants
-----
Susan Kinzie
UPDATE: U-Va. Accepts Residency Claim
Washington Post
March 24, 2008, B5
Ever since he was a little boy in Virginia, Nelson Lopez has wanted to go to the state's flagship university. But last month he worried when University of Virginia officials followed up on his application, asking him to prove that his parents were legal residents to qualify as an in-stateapplicant. He's a U.S. citizen, born here, but his parents are illegal immigrants from El Salvador
After his story ran in The Washington Post, he got a flurry of calls from lawyers and immigrant advocates offering to help. Now, it looks like he won't need help: Last week he got a letter from U-Va. telling him he will be considered a Virginia resident for his application.
That means that he qualifies for the much lower in-state tuition, thathe won't face the steeper odds for admission for out-of-state students and that he doesn't have to worry about having the same problem at other
schools.
When Lopez saw the letter at home in Alexandria, he was scared to open it. "I just knew it was a big deal," he said. But when he read it, he was speechless for a moment. "I was soexcited. This changes everything!"
Andrea Leeds Armstrong of U-Va.'s committee on Virginia status wouldn't discuss the case but said: "The attorney general's memo shed further light on the situation. It did make it clearer."
The state attorney general's office, responding to a question from the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia this month, emphasized that there could be exceptions to the general rule. State law requires
college officials to look at parents' legal status since students are considered dependent until age 24, so parents here illegally would not be considered Virginia residents. But the law allows case-by-case
exceptions for students 18 and older, the memo explained, who can provide evidence that they are state residents and should be considered separately from their parents.
"I think in circumstances where an applicant has spent his or her life in Virginia, has been educated in Virginia schools, has gotten his or her driver's license in Virginia -- even though financially dependent on
their parents -- that individual has done all that he or she could do at that age to establish a domicile independent of their parents. I think the memo was helpful to us in pointing the way," Armstrong said.
When Lopez got the letter, "he was very, very happy. He kept saying, 'I can't believe it! I can't believe it!' " said Krishna Leyva, director of a mentoring program at T.C. Williams High School . "There are a lot of kids out there in the same situation, but they don't pursue it" because they don't want to endanger
their parents or risk problems with the admissions office. "He really, really wants to go to U-Va."
for link to article click the title of this post
thanks to M.O. for sending this to dreamacttexas
Marriage is no longer enough for U.S. residency
This is all changing, it has been reported that undocumented people married to U.S. citizens have been detained when they visit ICE offices for interviews regarding their applications. A couple in Kansas are finding out that the wife's citizenship isn't enough to keep her husband in the U.S. Some might say this is a good thing for all the people who only marry for immigration papers. Yet there are many, many more who marry for reasons we all do; they have children; and make permanent homes for themselves.
The one thing that is constantly being ignored is that the current problem depicted in the article below emanates from extremely harsh immigration laws passed in 1996 during the Clinton administration. Since Hillary says she was involved in so much of the administration during Bill's tenure - she should be able to take responsibility for this one too -- I wonder why hasn't come up on the campaign trail.
March 22, 2008, 10:46PM
Immigration laws split mixed-legal-status families
Husband goes back to Mexico to begin legal effort to re-enter the U.S.
By CARL MANNING
Associated Press
OVERLAND PARK, KAN. — When Kecia Sales and Juan Marquez were married, they were like scores of other couples: very much in love with plans to live together for the rest of their lives.
But it wasn't to be.
After their December 2004 marriage, he told her he had been living illegally in the U.S. since 1999. After leaving Mexico, Marquez had made his way to her hometown of Kansas City, Kan., where they met and married, and she took his name.
They became one of an estimated 2 million mixed families, where at least one member is a citizen or lawfully living in the country and the other isn't. The vast majority of those families, according to the Pew Hispanic Center, involve an illegal parent and legal children — yet another shade of this country's ongoing immigration conundrum.
That he's among 12 million illegal immigrants didn't change Sales' love for Marquez. They lived in her hometown and both worked to make ends meet.
"It didn't bother me," she said. "It doesn't make him any worse of a person."
But Marquez, 26, and his wife, 40, finally decided he should return to Mexico and begin the long, uphill fight to re-enter the country legally...
Waiver request denied
...[B]ecause Juan Marquez entered the country illegally and stayed more than a year, the law bars him from coming back for 10 years, unless the government approves a waiver request from his wife. She said the waiver request was denied March 13 by the U.S. Consulate in Juarez, Mexico, but it agreed to give Kecia Marquez 30 days to submit new evidence of hardship. Then it could take up to a year for a decision about whether he can return...
for link to complete AP/Houston Chronicle article click the title of this post
Leaving the Hungry Kids in the Donut Shop
As i help my brother with college applications and scholarships i realize how frustrating it has been for him as a DREAMER. He was brought to the states before I was; that is, he has spent all of his schooling in the United States and has not known any different. I came here when i was 13 and adjusted fine, but i came to terms with my status and limitations sooner than later. He is 18 years old now and now just realizes the misfortunes of being a dreamer and everything that comes with it.
When i say everything that comes with it, i mean: anger, depression, tears, frustration and a lot of questions. He is always asking me how come he can't get a driver's license, how come he can't work, how come there is so much opposition on the DREAM Act. You might think that it is a little naive, but he has lived a very different life than i have. He has had the opportunity to go to a school where he is one of the only Latinos in his classes, his friends are non-Latinos for the most part, and the majority of the school population is of wealthy families.
Somebody this weekend made the comparison of leaving a hungry kid in a donut shop but not allowing him to eat any. My brother has been in the donut shop for too long now and he has never been allowed to eat any; there, just staring at all the sweets with his hands tied.
I have come to beleive that i need to stop victimizing myself and enough feeling sorry for our situation as DREAMERs, we need to start doing and stop whining. Yes, this is still true in my theory and practice it everyday for the most part, but we can't all be strong and sometimes these situations of frustration and denial get the best of us. I know it has gotten the best of me at times.
I have come across many younger students, friends, family, and online forums of Dreamers that are under a lot of stress and depression. Many of them feel shame for being undocumented. How to break the news to their boyfriends, girlfriends, or friends that they are undocumented or that they cant go get a driver's license. How do they explain that it is not that they are lazy without a job at 22 years of age, but rather that nobody would hire them.
I used to not understand why many could feel ashamed of being undocumented, but now i understand this a lot better. It is not that they feel ashamed of being dreamers, but rather the pressure of being demonized from every angle. All you have to do is look at the college and scholarship applications to begin to understand this. The requirements from many scholarships are no joke; first requirement you must be a citizen. College applications (most) have the citizen category... what to do here?!
I think that this is a major topic that we don't touch a lot on. The stress and depression that dreamers go through in unbelievable. Maybe now that some of us dreamers are older we are able to assimilate the situation a lot better and we are able to deal with it better. It is our job however to help the younger students with talks, mentoring, and helping them walk through the process as we once were.
Image obtained here
Sunday, March 23, 2008
ESSAY CONTEST: “Does immigration strengthen or threaten the United States?”
The Great American Think-Off releases the 2008 question
“Does immigration strengthen or threaten the United States?”
The 2008 Great American Think-Off question asks “Does immigration strengthen or threaten the United States?” One of the most heated questions debated in all corners of America today needs more light and less heat. And so the New York Mills Regional Cultural Center asks Americans and people from around the globe to address this question in the 2008 edition of the Great American Think-Off.
We commonly note that we are a nation of immigrants, but today more Americans seem frightened of immigration and immigrants than at any time in memory. We build a fence to keep undocumented persons out. We worry about losing even more jobs to the forces of globalization. Yet we all honor the emblem of our immigrant nation: the Statue of Liberty.
The 2008 Great American Think-Off asks for the understandings of American Indian people and newly arrived immigrants; citizens whose ancestors came here on the Mayflower (or soon after) and those who were brought here on slave ships; descendents of Finnish settlers here in Minnesota, of Acadians in Louisiana, and families from places like Michoacan making new lives from California to Maine.
Entering the competition is easy. Just submit an essay of 750 words or less by April 1, 2008. You may send your essay in one of three ways,: through the mail send to New York Mills Regional Cultural Center, P.O. Box 246, New York Mills, MN 56567 or email to nymills@kulcher.org (no attachments) or submit on-line at www.think-off.org .
Click on the title of the blog to link you to the website.
“Does immigration strengthen or threaten the United States?”
The 2008 Great American Think-Off question asks “Does immigration strengthen or threaten the United States?” One of the most heated questions debated in all corners of America today needs more light and less heat. And so the New York Mills Regional Cultural Center asks Americans and people from around the globe to address this question in the 2008 edition of the Great American Think-Off.
We commonly note that we are a nation of immigrants, but today more Americans seem frightened of immigration and immigrants than at any time in memory. We build a fence to keep undocumented persons out. We worry about losing even more jobs to the forces of globalization. Yet we all honor the emblem of our immigrant nation: the Statue of Liberty.
The 2008 Great American Think-Off asks for the understandings of American Indian people and newly arrived immigrants; citizens whose ancestors came here on the Mayflower (or soon after) and those who were brought here on slave ships; descendents of Finnish settlers here in Minnesota, of Acadians in Louisiana, and families from places like Michoacan making new lives from California to Maine.
Entering the competition is easy. Just submit an essay of 750 words or less by April 1, 2008. You may send your essay in one of three ways,: through the mail send to New York Mills Regional Cultural Center, P.O. Box 246, New York Mills, MN 56567 or email to nymills@kulcher.org (no attachments) or submit on-line at www.think-off.org .
Click on the title of the blog to link you to the website.
A few comments on Obama's March 18, 2008 speech
Obama's speech on March 18th - has rattled American society - and has left many of us in awe of this man.
Have we ever had a U.S. President (besides Jefferson and Kennedy) who could have presented the same eloquence?
As I have mentioned before, I believe that our ability to support and listen to Obama was made possible because of the disastrous policies and actions of the current administration.
It is difficult not to idealize when you see a potential president with such gifts while you have a president that at times appears to be barely functioning as a human being.
Perhaps pro-immigrant supporters could spend some time analyzing and evaluating Obama's position (if they haven't already) and decide whether or not they think he will also support Latinos and push this country beyond the tradition of black/Latino
tension.
for link to NYT text and video of the speech click the title of this post
photo: http://brightcove.vo.llnwd.net/d2/unsecured/media/435713706/435713706_452310267_94bb7090a42262e6e788285c0730cd23207f2350.jpg
Finding your voice is not victim-hood
One of the things I have noticed the last few years is that white/anglo people seem to have very intense reactions to being called racist by a person of color. It often creates more conflict than when people start discussing religion or politics.
The scene often plays out as: one person or group states the other is mistreating them based on race or ethnicity - whether the accusations are true or not - the accused group either gets fearful or extremely angry and offended.
The controversy surrounding statements by Obama's minister have exploded the myth that many black people are "over it" and no longer have feelings about America's conflicted and violent racial past. It has also shown what is acceptable and what is not regarding what can be publicly said regarding racial attitudes.
I was struck by this while watching "This Week" on ABC - Stephanopoulos was at the round table with George Will, Donna Brazile and a few others whose names I don't remember. What seemed so odd was Will's and the other white participant's deep sense of being offended. I kept hearing that what Wright said was inappropriate. Then Donna Brazile came in and let us know (thank goodness) that Wright's pastoral comments are part and parcel of African American church sermons. I am sure they heard her, but there there was not much of a response.
This is an extremely complex situation. There is much to discuss. For one thing maybe it's a good thing that the white world knows this is still being said - and - that people can start realizing that what may be termed "inflammatory racial language" - is not dangerous, and does not scream victim-hood. It's really about people finding their voice.
more on this later.
-----
for link to complete WP article click the title of this post
The scene often plays out as: one person or group states the other is mistreating them based on race or ethnicity - whether the accusations are true or not - the accused group either gets fearful or extremely angry and offended.
The controversy surrounding statements by Obama's minister have exploded the myth that many black people are "over it" and no longer have feelings about America's conflicted and violent racial past. It has also shown what is acceptable and what is not regarding what can be publicly said regarding racial attitudes.
I was struck by this while watching "This Week" on ABC - Stephanopoulos was at the round table with George Will, Donna Brazile and a few others whose names I don't remember. What seemed so odd was Will's and the other white participant's deep sense of being offended. I kept hearing that what Wright said was inappropriate. Then Donna Brazile came in and let us know (thank goodness) that Wright's pastoral comments are part and parcel of African American church sermons. I am sure they heard her, but there there was not much of a response.
This is an extremely complex situation. There is much to discuss. For one thing maybe it's a good thing that the white world knows this is still being said - and - that people can start realizing that what may be termed "inflammatory racial language" - is not dangerous, and does not scream victim-hood. It's really about people finding their voice.
-----
JEREMIAD
He's Preaching to A Choir I've Left
Washington Post
By Jonetta Rose Barras
Sunday, March 23, 2008; Page B01
I've known preachers like the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., former pastor to Sen. Barack Obama. Like many of them, he no doubt sees his congregation as full of victims, and thinks that his words will inspire them to rise out of their victimhood. I understand that.
Once upon a time, I saw myself as a victim, too, destined to march in place. In the 1970s and '80s, as a clenched-fist-pumping black nationalist with my head wrapped in an elaborate gele, I reflected that self-concept in my speech. My words were as fiery as the Rev. Wright's. And more than a few times, I, too, damned America, loudly, for its treatment of blacks.
But I turned away from such rhetoric. Is it time that Wright and other ministers do, too?
African Americans differ on this question. "Some of these ministers are like some hip-hop artists," says E. Ethelbert Miller, an Afro-American studies expert. "Their language is not healing." Counters former civil rights leader Lawrence Guyot: "I am so proud of Rev. Wright, who speaks with unreserved passion, who accepts no quarter and gives no quarter. I'm glad the church is standing with him."
The recent furor over the incendiary rhetoric of the pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago pulled back a curtain on black America, sending many in the white commentariat into shock and outrage. But African Americans have been hearing words like Wright's in churches across the country for decades. And for many of us, the uproar over his comments only underlined the quiet culture war going on within our own community.
For a decade, tensions have been rising over questions ranging from what it means to be black, to whether there needs to be a new, post-civil rights meaning of racism, to what features of black America should be transmitted to the mainstream, to whether there even is such a thing as "black America" anymore. Many of these skirmishes have been relegated to our kitchens and living rooms. But they are increasingly being brought to the public square -- often because a white person, a Don Imus or a Michael Richards, commits some infraction or demonstrates cluelessness about African American culture and its unspoken boundaries.
Now the debate is over Wright -- instigated, as many blacks see it, by the media after the presidential campaign of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton accused news organizations of insufficiently scrutinizing Obama. Reporters went trolling for stories and found Trinity Church and its controversial pastor -- and what may have been a Sunday dinner conversation in black households exploded onto the public stage.
At the center of the storm is Wright's practice of what is called "prophetic speech," according to the Rev. Graylan Scott Hagler, pastor of Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ in Washington. This is "provocative speech that attempts to awaken and cause people to respond."
Such speech has been the lingua franca of much of the black leadership since the days of the civil rights movement, aimed at galvanizing blacks and equipping them with an armor for the battle against segregation. Combined with instruction in the history of blacks in Africa and the diaspora, it has helped to transform the psychological landscape of many who had been crushed over time by racism and had come to feel inferior to whites.
It's also, at least in part, the tradition of Wright's denomination. In several incarnations, the United Church of Christ (UCC) has been a leader in the fight for racial equality since the 19th century. According to Hagler, "congregationals," as the church's members were then called, were involved in the case on behalf of 43 African captives who revolted against their captors aboard the Spanish ship La Amistad in 1839. In the 1970s, the UCC established a commission on racial justice; Wright was on its board of directors.
Wright's impassioned speech can be seen as a continuation of a uniquely black religious experience. "The fundamental question is how do I use a religion that has been used to oppress me to now fight against that oppression," says Maurice Jackson, a history professor at Georgetown University. "There has always been this debate about how far black ministers should go."
Some think they should go as far as they need to. "Without prophetic speech," argues Graylan, "we would not have had Martin Luther King Jr. People remember the 'I Have a Dream' speech, but they do not remember his radical critiques of capitalism and the American system. They easily forget his speech on April 4, 1967." That was the one in which King declared: "I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today -- my own government..."
rosebook1@aol.com
Jonetta Rose Barras is the political analyst for National Public Radio affiliate WAMU-88.5.
for link to complete WP article click the title of this post
Saturday, March 22, 2008
Learning from "The Same Moon" - La Misma Luna
Carlitos working at a tomato farm. From "Under the Same Moon"
Movies are the best teachers -
On March 20, I was walking near my hotel in Morelia, Michoacan - I passed the new multiplex movie theater that was built in the shell of a 300 year old building - and saw that "Under the Same Moon" was opening that day. The premier wasn't just for the Mexican state of Michoacan, it was for the whole country.
Having been immersed in the immigration debate (and the concerns of DREAMERS) for the past year and a half, I was glad to see a movie about the subject - something serious - not a comedy.
It was disappointing to see that the screen play was weak - The narrative was somewhat juvenile - overly nostalgic - with a good feeling ending. But then, the theater was full of teenagers and young adults. There were only a handful of those my age. Perhaps the producers were targeting the younger age group. Or - they wanted to make the story line very clear to make sure everyone got the message.
La Misma Luna has its redeeming qualities - in fact - what it teaches the viewer over-rides any mistakes in production.
The dramatic scenes in the movie are accurate representations of the real world of immigration, even though the loss, violence, despondence, and abuse were toned down. If La Misma Luna would have presented the real story (aka how bad it really is) you might have had to leave the theater wanting to throw up.
here are a few notes on what the film provides:
1. Scene: Rosario is fired and her employer does not pay her for the last days she worked -
Undocumented workers often don't get paid for their work. A striking example of this was in New Orleans when many immigrants worked in the early rebuilding of the city.
2. Scene: Rosario has immigrated to the U.S. and left Carlitos with her mother.
There are millions of children left behind in Mexico and other countries, while their parents migrate to the U.S. Even more millions are left behind with their mothers while their fathers migrate - Their fathers often forget their family - find a new wife and have children who are American born. Paco, the almost husband of Carlitos' mother is well into his thirties... did he leave a family behind in Mexico?
3. Scene: ICE agents "rough up" Enrique when they arrest him in the park in L.A.
Violence is a significant component of ICE raids. Immigrants being detained are often injured - with fractures and severe bruises. A more silent type of violence occurs even more often - when ICE officers detain people but do not give them water, or food, for hours and hours after the raid. Many of the ICE raids are themselves illegal according to the U.S. Constitution - homes are entered without warrants, U.S. citizens are detained and deported. There are numerous law suits being considered regarding the illegal actions of ICE officers.
5. Scene: worker at tomato farm screams with pain when he gets something in his eyes - Undocumented immigrants have an extremely high rate of injury on the job. They are often placed in situations that are dangerous or hazardous to their health. Whenever you hear about an accident at a job site, it is almost always someone undocumented.
6. Scene: Dona Carmen tells Rosario that her mother has died. Losing close family members and not being able to attend their funerals is absolutely devastating. Many immigrants decide to risk being caught when they are called back home to attend a funeral.
7. Scene: Rosario telling her employer that she has a second job. People really do work 2 and 3 jobs in order to make enough money to support their families and send money back home to the grandmothers.
8. Scene: Los Tigres del Norte singing a song to Carlitos about being able strong. There are lots of songs (and corridos) being recorded that explain the life of an undocumented immigrant. They would be worth listening to. The songs of Los Tigres del Norte are a good example.
9. Scenes: Carlitos shakes hands with people and says "a sus ordenes" (at your service) Mexican immigrant children are really as polite as Carlitos... no kidding.
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AFF Review: Under the Same Moon
Posted Oct 22nd 2007 3:09PM by Jette Kernion
Earlier this year, Under the Same Moon (originally titled La Misma Luna) was bought at Sundance by Fox Searchlight and The Weinstein Company for a surprisingly high amount of money. It's understandable because underneath the film's unsubtle messages about undocumented Mexican workers working to survive in the U.S., it's essentially an old-fashioned family melodrama. I caught the film at Austin Film Festival this year, and it's currently scheduled to hit theaters in March 2008.
Rosario (Kate del Castillo) is a young immigrant from Mexico living and working in Los Angeles to support her nine-year-old son Carlitos (Adrian Alonso), who lives with Rosario's mother in Mexico. He hasn't seen his mother in four years and misses her terribly. Meanwhile, Rosario is trying to scrape up enough money for a lawyer to help her bring Carlitos to America legally. When his grandmother dies, Carlitos decides to cross the border himself and travel to Los Angeles to find his mother, because he's scared she'll forget about him. He encounters an unlikely lot of helpers and companions during his attempt, including American college students (America Ferrera and Jesse Garcia) who want to make extra money smuggling children over the border, and Enrique (Eugenio Derbez), a migrant worker who has no desire to deal with a small child on his hands.
The movie is Patricia Riggen's feature directorial debut. It begins a little confusingly -- we don't know the characters yet, so in the opening scene where people are trying to cross the border at night, the focus is unclear. The following sequence seems to be meant to show what Rosario is doing in Los Angeles at the same time that Carlos is in Mexico, but it takes a minute to realize they're not all in the same house. Once the setup is complete, however, the plot progresses steadily and smoothly.
Under the Same Moon has an overt agenda: it wants to make you think about the plight of U.S. undocumented workers, and it's not at all subtle about it. Rosario is treated badly by a woman for whom she cleans house, who tells her, "What are you going to do, call the police? Go right ahead." The message is broadcast literally through local radio in the background, such as Spanish-language deejays making jokes about immigration law, and an amusing song about how Superman didn't enter this country legally, either. The story itself should have been able to carry this message alone, and might have been more effective without all the embellishments; as it is, it feels like overkill.
The storyline and many of the characters are stock -- change the actors in the story to Jackie Cooper and Irene Dunne, and maybe Fredric March, and the plot would work perfectly as a 1930s weepie. We've all seen movies about characters attempting a cross-country journey under difficult circumstances. It is not quite believable that a nine-year-old would be as canny -- and as lucky -- as Carlitos, but then this is not meant to be a gritty realistic film. It's a melodrama with inspirational moments, designed to make you smile through tears.
Fortunately, the performances help pull the movie out of tired melodrama and make it watchable -- especially Adrian Alonso as Carlitos. I liked this movie even though the dialogue occasionally seemed trite, even though I rolled my eyes at caricatures of "bad" people, even though it bordered on the emotionally manipulative ... even though I suspected I knew the ending because of the companies that had bought the distribution rights. The story is not innovative, it travels a very familiar road. But the main characters and a few of the minor ones, like Paco the security guard who loves Rosario and Carmen who runs a business of sneaking people over the border, were all warm and real and avoided the easy stereotypes. Despite its flaws, Under the Same Moon is an entertaining film that knows how to charm an audience.
for link to movie review click the title of this post
photo: http://www.greencine.com/central/files/u40/mismaluna.jpg
Friday, March 21, 2008
Chertoff: we are serious about immigration enforcement
Chertoff's comment sounds comical - it is very clear that DHS and ICE are not "serious" about enforcement. What they are serious about is producing fear among a significant amount of the U.S. population - while falsely announcing that enforcement will create a "safe America" for citizens.
Producing fear has always been known as a way to maintain powerful political control of a group (or groups) of people. Being afraid gets people to listen and obey.
Being afraid keeps the Other group (i.e. undocumented immigrants) quiet and subservient. It also keeps people from doing anything - they stay in their jobs, schools and neighborhood. New stories about undocumented people being detained while they are trying to return to their home countries is scaring even those who have given up.
The idea is create terror for a few - this will produce an example for the rest.
This tactic has already worked. A planned protest on May 1 in Chicago has been canceled - the reason being that protesting would make too many people on the other side angry - and might hurt negotiations on a better comprehensive immigration package.
Undocumented people in the U.S. are more vulnerable than ever. The idea of "reporting" someone to immigration was something that very rarely happened. Now it is commonplace. They live in fear - many having double lives (how many DREAMERS have kept their status a secret?)
Chertoff and his people are serious about disrupting the lives of hundreds of thousands of families, creating situations where many many children are being separated from their families or returned to a country they have no memory of.
If he were really serious he would be shipping everybody (who is undocumented) in railroad cars like Hitler did. But he isn't - because in truth - Chertoff and his supporters don't really want all the undocumented workers to leave... they just want to bother a few so they can shake up the rest.
This is all theater - a true tragedy - the acting is good - reality is on shaky ground.
Speaking of theater and tragedy, where is the chorus that should be telling Chertoff he is doing something wrong?
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U.S. Tweaks Proposal On Illegal Workers
Employers Could Get Warnings in June
By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, March 22, 2008; A03
The Bush administration yesterday renewed its drive to crack down on U.S. companies that hire illegal immigrants by slightly altering an earlier initiative stalled by a federal judge since last September.
If the new proposal satisfies the court, the government could begin warning 140,000 employers in writing as early as June about suspect Social Security numbers used by their employees and force businesses to resolve questions about their identities or fire them within 90 days.
The result could intensify an economic and political debate over the administration's immigration policies in the months leading up to November's elections for president and Congress.
The mailings, known as "no-match" letters, were enjoined by U.S. District Judge Charles R. Breyer in San Francisco while he hears a lawsuit brought by a wide-ranging coalition of major American labor, business, farm and civil liberties groups.
The plaintiffs, including the AFL-CIO, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the American Civil Liberties Union, allege that the plan will cause major workplace disruptions and discriminate against legal workers, including native-born Americans.
A systematic effort to wean the U.S. economy off an estimated 8.7 million illegal workers has long been blocked by economic interests and civil rights concerns. But the Bush administration considers that effort the linchpin of its immigration enforcement efforts.
"We are serious about immigration enforcement," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said in a brief written statement yesterday. "The No-Match Rule is an important tool for cracking down on illegal hiring practices while providing honest employers with the guidance they need."
The 44-page proposal released yesterday makes mostly technical changes to the administration's initial proposal. It includes a statement about the regulation's impact on small businesses, as required by a 1980 law. According to DHS, compliance will cost companies with fewer than 100 workers $3,000 to $7,500 overall, while it will cost larger companies $13,000 to $34,000. But these estimates do not include the cost of firing and replacing workers who lack legal documentation.
"DHS does not believe that the direct costs incurred by employers . . . would create a significant economic impact" on most companies, the department stated.
Opponents said the proposal makes no substantive changes to a plan that Breyer in October wrote would have "severe" effects and produce irreparable harm to innocent workers and employers. Lawyers familiar with the plaintiffs' case said they expect to battle the department in the rulemaking process and the courts through the summer.
Critics have noted that the Social Security Administration's inspector general has concluded the database used to cull suspicious numbers contains erroneous records on 17.8 million people, 70 percent of whom are native-born U.S. citizens. Even if the actual error rate of no-match letters is far lower, labor leaders say that unscrupulous employers will use the rule to burden or harass anyone who looks or sounds foreign.
"It's an attempt to justify the fundamentally flawed database without actually fixing any of the problems," said Lucas Guttentag, director of the ACLU immigrants' rights project.
Angelo I. Amador, director of immigration policy at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said the DHS glossed over the true costs. "It keeps the questions before the judge the same. I would have been more concerned if they had come up with a big study" detailing the broader impact on businesses, he said.
for link to WP article click the title of this post
cartoon: http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/CARI.Chertoff.gif
Who are the EMOs and Why are They Under Attack?
It is very common in my house for my parents to turn off the American news and switch to satellite news from Mexico and Latinamerica. Who can blame them right?
When i find time i sit down and listen and most importantly compare the type of news reported as well as the quality. I'm not going to lie, there is bias in Mexican news as well. I don't think that you can get away from that really.
Yesterday I was frozen when i saw a group of youth getting attacked in the streets of Queretaro just for being EMO's by an anti-emo movement.
Who are the EMO's you may ask yourself? I have a mexican cousin who lives in the USA and identifies herself as EMO... she would wear a lot of dark clothing (kind of like a goth style), dark make-up, long bangs that would cover half her face. She was and is prefectly functional and lives a normal life with her own choices and tastes in clothes and music; I also have perfectly normal human conversations with her.
If you ask me, I don't know much about this social movement, but I know that they are youth just like us who are trying to express themselves through their own ways and they are being bullied by the ignorant masses.... Sound familiar?
Well, i was also surprised that the Statesman wrote about this, but i was also glad.
Although this is not directly related to the DREAM Act, I couldn't help but to understand them (the Emos's) and feel their frustration as they were marching through the streets of Guadalajara and México DF. All they were asking was respect, dignity, and a time and space to be.
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Emos under attack
By Jeremy Schwartz | Thursday, March 20, 2008, 02:38 PM
In the last couple of weeks, a particular subculture of Mexican youths, who dub themselves “emos,” have come under violent attack throughout the country. Two weeks ago in the otherwise quiet colonial capital of Queretaro, mobs of kids attacked the emos in an attempt to force them out of the city’s main plaza. A week later, the violence arrived in Mexico City, when emos who hang out at the Insurgentes Metro stop were attacked by gangs of punks and soccer fans. Rumors of more attacks in Mexico City and the northern state of Durango are floating around the Internet.
So who are these emos, and why so much hate? Emos here in Mexico are bound by a specific fashion style (black clothes, tight jeans, huge bangs, black eye makeup) and ideology: according to several Internet sources, a strong chord of sadness, depression and sense of being misunderstood by the larger society runs through emo thought. Bands like Good Charlotte are emo favorites. And self mutilation is apparently common among kids heavily into the emo scene.
Anger against the emos has come from many quarters: punks and goths who think emos are ripping off their culture, homophobes who don’t find emos masculine enough, and those who simply seem threatened by a group that is so different than the mainstream....(More)
Next Requirement to Become a USA Permanent Resident: You Must Give Oral Sex to ICE Employees.
This is not the first case of sexual abuse/cohersion from ICE employees... How many more times are we going to hear cases like these?
I am also sure that many people don't come forth and denounce the abuses like this woman did.
Don't forget to listen to the recording posted in the article.
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An Agent, a Green Card, and a Demand for Sex
Article Tools Sponsored By
By NINA BERNSTEIN
Published: March 21, 2008
No problems so far, the immigration agent told the American citizen and his 22-year-old Colombian wife at her green card interview in December. After he stapled one of their wedding photos to her application for legal permanent residency, he had just one more question: What was her cellphone number?
The calls from the agent started three days later. He hinted, she said, at his power to derail her life and deport her relatives, alluding to a brush she had with the law before her marriage. He summoned her to a private meeting. And at noon on Dec. 21, in a parked car on Queens Boulevard, he named his price — not realizing that she was recording everything on the cellphone in her purse.
“I want sex,” he said on the recording. “One or two times. That’s all. You get your green card. You won’t have to see me anymore.”
She reluctantly agreed to a future meeting. But when she tried to leave his car, he demanded oral sex “now,” to “know that you’re serious.” And despite her protests, she said, he got his way.
The 16-minute recording, which the woman first took to The New York Times and then to the Queens district attorney, suggests the vast power of low-level immigration law enforcers, and a growing desperation on the part of immigrants seeking legal status. The aftermath, which included the arrest of an immigration agent last week, underscores the difficulty and danger of making a complaint, even in the rare case when abuse of power may have been caught on tape.
No one knows how widespread sexual blackmail is, but the case echoes other instances of sexual coercion that have surfaced in recent years, including agents criminally charged in Atlanta, Miami and Santa Ana, Calif. And it raises broader questions about the system’s vulnerability to corruption at a time when millions of noncitizens live in a kind of legal no-man’s land, increasingly fearful of seeking the law’s protection.
The agent arrested last week, Isaac R. Baichu, 46, himself an immigrant from Guyana, handled some 8,000 green card applications during his three years as an adjudicator in the Garden City, N.Y., office of United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, part of the federal Department of Homeland Security. He pleaded not guilty to felony and misdemeanor charges of coercing the young woman to perform oral sex, and of promising to help her secure immigration papers in exchange for further sexual favors. If convicted, he will face up to seven years in prison.
His agency has suspended him with pay, and the inspector general of Homeland Security is reviewing his other cases, a spokesman said Wednesday. Prosecutors, who say they recorded a meeting between Mr. Baichu and the woman on March 11 at which he made similar demands for sex, urge any other victims to come forward.
Money, not sex, is the more common currency of corruption in immigration, but according to Congressional testimony in 2006 by Michael Maxwell, former director of the agency’s internal investigations, more than 3,000 backlogged complaints of employee misconduct had gone uninvestigated for lack of staff, including 528 involving criminal allegations.
The agency says it has tripled its investigative staff since then, and counts only 165 serious complaints pending. But it stopped posting an e-mail address and phone number for such complaints last year, said Jan Lane, chief of security and integrity, because it lacks the staff to cull the thousands of mostly irrelevant messages that resulted. Immigrants, she advised, should report wrongdoing to any law enforcement agency they trust.
The young woman in Queens, whose name is being withheld because the authorities consider her the victim of a sex crime, did not even tell her husband what had happened. Two weeks after the meeting in the car, finding no way to make a confidential complaint to the immigration agency and afraid to go to the police, she and two older female relatives took the recording to The Times.
Reasons to Worry
A slim, shy woman who looks like a teenager, she said she had spent recent months baby-sitting for relatives in Queens, crying over the deaths of her two brothers back in Cali, Colombia, and longing for the right stamp in her passport — one tha... (More)
Image obtained here
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Mega-Prison for immigrants...
Company wants to build a mega-prison in county
By Leslie Berestein
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
March 20, 2008
The private prison company that operates a detention center for U.S.Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Otay Mesa is proposing to build a nearly3,000-bed mega-prison nearby.
According to county records, Nashville, Tenn.-based Corrections Corporation ofAmerica has applied for a permit to build a "secure detention facility" in two phases on a parcel of about 40 acres northwest of Alta and Lonestar roads.
A portion of the latter road has yet to be constructed.The proposed prison would have 2,880 beds and would employ 375 people,according to an application the company filed.
It would hold more than four times the number of people that the immigration agency now holds in San Diego. The agency, known as ICE, contracts with Corrections Corporation of America to house up to 700 detainees individuals awaiting deportation or a decision in immigration cases at the company's private San Diego Correctional Facility, which sits on land leased from the county.
A spokesman for the company said the proposed prison would not be built as part of its existing contract with ICE or as a speculative venture, but as a way of ensuring it retains the immigration agency's detention business if the company loses its existing facility. The lease on the land that the San Diego Correctional Facility sits on is set to expire by the end of 2015.
"We have an existing relationship with ICE and other federal customers, and we want to be able to maintain that relationship," company spokesman StevenOwen said. "We want to take steps in a preventive kind of way, to be able toprovide capacity and retain that relationship.
According to the county, the company owns the parcel that the new facility would sit on, eliminating lease concerns. Local officials from Immigration and Customs Enforcement said they were awareof the project, but that they were not sure if ICE would be using the newprison.
The demand for immigration detention beds definitely exists in San Diego, notonly due to stepped-up immigration enforcement nationwide, but also because theagency does not have as many beds as it once did at the San Diego CorrectionalFacility.
According to Corrections Corporation of America's 2006 year-end financialreport, 200 of the detention center's beds were lost to the county in June of that year when a portion of the lease expired. The report states that the number of people being held was not reduced as a result of the expiration "because we had the ability to consolidate inmates."Less than a year later, in January 2007, the American Civil Liberties Unionsued ICE and the company, alleging overcrowding at the facility. The ACLU said two-person cells were crammed with three civil detainees, the third sleeping onthe floor in a plastic cot.Since then, the Otay Mesa facility has held a maximum of 700 detainees a day,where it once held as many as 1,000, said Lauren Mack, an ICE spokeswoman inSan Diego.
"As long as apprehensions continue to increase, we're going to continue toneed not only bed space, but to identify ways to streamline the entiredetention process," Mack said.
Owen said it has still not been determined if the prison will be built.According to county records, the company filed its initial application for aspecific plan amendment and major use permit in July 2006, a month after thefirst part of the county lease expired. Records show the company has since been working to complete various studies required before the project can go to the county's planning commission.
If built, the new facility would be enormous, with administrative space as wellas prison housing and services. The nearby state prison, the R.J. DonovanCorrectional Facility, was designed to hold 2,280, according to the statecorrections department Web site, though it now houses 4,770.
Rob Hixson, a commercial real estate broker who is chairman of the city of SanDiego's Otay Mesa Planning Committee, said he had not heard any complaintsamong those aware of the proposed prison on nearby unincorporated land.
"A lot of people say 'not in my backyard,' but this is a pretty big backyard," Hixson said. "It is a long way from any of our housing." Withupward of 30,000 immigrants now in ICE custody " up from about 18,500 three years ago " Immigration and Customs Enforcement has increasingly turned to private contractors to house detainees.
The relationship has not come without criticism. In addition to the overcrowding lawsuit, the ACLU sued both Corrections Corporation of America and ICE again last summer, alleging severely inadequate medical care at the OtayMesa facility.
A former detainee at the Otay Mesa facility filed a separate lawsuit in LosAngeles last year against the federal government, claiming that he was denied treatment for what turned out to be penile cancer. He died last month. Lastweek, a federal judge in Los Angeles ruled that his family can go forward with a lawsuit seeking damages from the federal government.
Leslie Berestein: (619) 542-4579;
leslie.berestein@uniontrib.com
To view the article click on the title of the blog.
Copyright 2007 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
By Leslie Berestein
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
March 20, 2008
The private prison company that operates a detention center for U.S.Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Otay Mesa is proposing to build a nearly3,000-bed mega-prison nearby.
According to county records, Nashville, Tenn.-based Corrections Corporation ofAmerica has applied for a permit to build a "secure detention facility" in two phases on a parcel of about 40 acres northwest of Alta and Lonestar roads.
A portion of the latter road has yet to be constructed.The proposed prison would have 2,880 beds and would employ 375 people,according to an application the company filed.
It would hold more than four times the number of people that the immigration agency now holds in San Diego. The agency, known as ICE, contracts with Corrections Corporation of America to house up to 700 detainees individuals awaiting deportation or a decision in immigration cases at the company's private San Diego Correctional Facility, which sits on land leased from the county.
A spokesman for the company said the proposed prison would not be built as part of its existing contract with ICE or as a speculative venture, but as a way of ensuring it retains the immigration agency's detention business if the company loses its existing facility. The lease on the land that the San Diego Correctional Facility sits on is set to expire by the end of 2015.
"We have an existing relationship with ICE and other federal customers, and we want to be able to maintain that relationship," company spokesman StevenOwen said. "We want to take steps in a preventive kind of way, to be able toprovide capacity and retain that relationship.
According to the county, the company owns the parcel that the new facility would sit on, eliminating lease concerns. Local officials from Immigration and Customs Enforcement said they were awareof the project, but that they were not sure if ICE would be using the newprison.
The demand for immigration detention beds definitely exists in San Diego, notonly due to stepped-up immigration enforcement nationwide, but also because theagency does not have as many beds as it once did at the San Diego CorrectionalFacility.
According to Corrections Corporation of America's 2006 year-end financialreport, 200 of the detention center's beds were lost to the county in June of that year when a portion of the lease expired. The report states that the number of people being held was not reduced as a result of the expiration "because we had the ability to consolidate inmates."Less than a year later, in January 2007, the American Civil Liberties Unionsued ICE and the company, alleging overcrowding at the facility. The ACLU said two-person cells were crammed with three civil detainees, the third sleeping onthe floor in a plastic cot.Since then, the Otay Mesa facility has held a maximum of 700 detainees a day,where it once held as many as 1,000, said Lauren Mack, an ICE spokeswoman inSan Diego.
"As long as apprehensions continue to increase, we're going to continue toneed not only bed space, but to identify ways to streamline the entiredetention process," Mack said.
Owen said it has still not been determined if the prison will be built.According to county records, the company filed its initial application for aspecific plan amendment and major use permit in July 2006, a month after thefirst part of the county lease expired. Records show the company has since been working to complete various studies required before the project can go to the county's planning commission.
If built, the new facility would be enormous, with administrative space as wellas prison housing and services. The nearby state prison, the R.J. DonovanCorrectional Facility, was designed to hold 2,280, according to the statecorrections department Web site, though it now houses 4,770.
Rob Hixson, a commercial real estate broker who is chairman of the city of SanDiego's Otay Mesa Planning Committee, said he had not heard any complaintsamong those aware of the proposed prison on nearby unincorporated land.
"A lot of people say 'not in my backyard,' but this is a pretty big backyard," Hixson said. "It is a long way from any of our housing." Withupward of 30,000 immigrants now in ICE custody " up from about 18,500 three years ago " Immigration and Customs Enforcement has increasingly turned to private contractors to house detainees.
The relationship has not come without criticism. In addition to the overcrowding lawsuit, the ACLU sued both Corrections Corporation of America and ICE again last summer, alleging severely inadequate medical care at the OtayMesa facility.
A former detainee at the Otay Mesa facility filed a separate lawsuit in LosAngeles last year against the federal government, claiming that he was denied treatment for what turned out to be penile cancer. He died last month. Lastweek, a federal judge in Los Angeles ruled that his family can go forward with a lawsuit seeking damages from the federal government.
Leslie Berestein: (619) 542-4579;
leslie.berestein@uniontrib.com
To view the article click on the title of the blog.
Copyright 2007 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
Why did Jose have to die for America in order to truly belong?
This is just another article on the endless debate over immigrants enlisting in the armed forces for US citizenship..This topic is dear to my heart and I want everyone to be educated on the conflicting feelings families face, but you make your choice as you read below..
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Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Dead Citizenship and the Latino Body
Posthumous citizenship for US Latino troops killed in Iraq brings conflicted feelings for families
By HELEN O'NEILL
AP Special Correspondent
A young, ambitious immigrant from Guatemala who dreamed of becoming anarchitect. A Nigerian medic. A soldier from China who boasted he wouldone day become an American general. An Indian native whose headstonedisplays the first Khanda, emblem of the Sikh faith, to appear inArlington National Cemetery.
These were among more than 100 foreign-born members of the U.S.military who earned American citizenship by dying in Iraq.Jose Gutierrez was one of the first to fall, killed by friendly firein the dust of Umm Qasr in the opening hours of the invasion.In death, the young Marine was showered with honors his family couldonly have dreamed of in life. His sister was flown in from Guatemalafor his memorial service, where a Roman Catholic cardinal presided andtop military officials saluted his flag-draped coffin.
And yet, his foster mother agonized as she accompanied his body backfor burial in Guatemala City: Why did Jose have to die for America inorder to truly belong?
Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles, who oversaw Gutierrez's service,put it differently."There is something terribly wrong with our immigration policies if ittakes death on the battlefield in order to earn citizenship," Mahonywrote to President Bush in April 2003. He urged the president to grantimmediate citizenship to all immigrants who sign up for militaryservice in wartime."
They should not have to wait until they are brought home in acasket," Mahony said.But as the war continues, more and more immigrants are becomingcitizens in death -- and more and more families are grappling withdeeply conflicting feelings about exactly what the honor means.
Gutierrez's citizenship certificate -- dated to his death on March 21,2003, -- was presented during a memorial service in Lomita, Calif., toNora Mosquera, who took in the orphaned teen after he had trekkedthrough Central America, hopping freight trains through Mexico beforeillegally sneaking into the U.S."On the one hand I felt that citizenship was too late for him,"Mosquera said. "But I also felt grateful and very proud of him. I knew it would open doors for us as a family."
"What use is a piece of paper?" cried Fredelinda Pena after another emotional naturalization ceremony, this one in New York City where herbrother's framed citizenship certificate was handed to his distraughtmother. Next to her, the infant daughter he had never met dozed in hisfiancée's arms.
Cpl. Juan Alcantara, 22, a native of the Dominican Republic was killed Aug. 6, 2007 by an explosive in Baqouba. He was buried by a cardinaland eulogized by a congressman but to his sister, those tributesseemed as hollow as citizenship."He can't take the oath from a coffin," she sobbed.
There are tens of thousands of foreign-born members in the U.S. armed forces. Many have been naturalized, but more than 20,000 are not U.S.citizens."Green card soldiers," they are often called, and early in the war,Bush signed an executive order making them eligible to apply forcitizenship as soon as they enlist. Previously, legal residents in themilitary had to wait three years.
Since Bush's order, nearly 37,000 soldiers have been naturalized. And109 who lost their lives have been granted posthumous citizenship.
They are buried with purple hearts and other decorations, and theirnames are engraved on tombstones in Arlington as well as in Mexico andIndia and Guatemala.Among them:
- Marine Cpl. Armando Ariel Gonzalez, 25, who fled Cuba on a raft withhis father and brother in 1995 and dreamed of becoming an Americanfirefighter. He was crushed by a refueling tank in southern Iraq onApril 14, 2003.
- Army Spc. Justin Onwordi, a 28-year-old Nigerian medic whose heartseemed as big as his smiling 6-foot-4 frame and who left behind a wifeand baby boy. He died when his vehicle was blown up in Baghdad on Aug.2, 2004.
- Army Pfc. Ming Sun, 20, of China who loved the U.S. military so muchhe planned to make a career out of it, boasting that he would rise tothe rank of general. He was killed in a firefight in Ramadi on Jan. 9,2007.
- Army Spc. Uday Singh, 21, of India, killed when his patrol wasattacked in Habbaniyah on Dec.1, 2003. Singh was the first Sikh to diein battle as a U.S. soldier, and it is his headstone at Arlington thatdisplays the Khanda.
- Marine Lance Cpl. Patrick O'Day from Scotland, buried in theCalifornia rain as bagpipes played and his 19-year-old pregnant wifetold mourners how honored her 20-year-old husband had felt to fight for the country he loved."He left us in the most honorable way a man could," Shauna O'Day saidat the March 2003 Santa Rosa service. "I'm proud to say my husband is a Marine. I'm proud to say my husband fought for our country. I'm proud to say he is a hero, my hero."
Not all surviving family members feel so sure. Some parents blame themselves for bringing their child to the U.S. in the first place. Others face confusion and resentment when they try to bury their childback home.
At Lance Cpl. Juan Lopez's July 4, 2004, funeral in the central Mexican town of San Luis de la Paz, Mexican soldiers demanded that the U.S. Marine honor guard surrender their arms, even though the rifleswere ceremonial. Earlier, the Mexican Defense Department had deniedthe Marines' request to conduct the traditional 21-gun salute, sayingforeign troops were not permitted to bear arms on Mexican soil.
And so mourners, many deeply opposed to the war, witnessed anextraordinary 45-minute standoff that disrupted the funeral even as Lopez's weeping widow was handed his posthumous citizenship by a U.S.embassy official.
The same swirl of conflicting emotions and messages often overshadowsthe military funerals of posthumous citizens in the U.S.Smuggled across the Mexican border in his mother's arms when he was 2months old, Jose Garibay was just 21 when he died in Nasiriyah. The Costa Mesa police department made him an honorary police officer, something he had hoped one day to become. America made him a citizen.
But his mother, Simona Garibay, couldn't conceal her bewilderment and pain. It seemed, she said in interviews after the funeral, that more value was being placed on her son's death than on his life.
Immigrant advocates have similar mixed feelings about militaryservice. Non-citizens cannot become officers or serve in high-securityjobs, they note, and yet the benefits of citizenship are regularly pitched by recruiters, and some recruitment programs specificallytarget colleges and high schools with predominantly Latino students.
"Immigrants are lured into service and then used as political pawns orcannon fodder," said Dan Kesselbrenner, executive director of theNational Immigration Project, a program of the National Lawyers Guild."It is sad thing to see people so desperate to get status in thiscountry that they are prepared to die for it."Others question whether non-citizens should even be permitted toserve. Mark Krikorian of the conservative Center for ImmigrationStudies, argues that defending America should be the job of Americans,not non-citizens whose loyalty might be suspect. In granting specialbenefits, including fast-track citizenship, Krikorian says, there is a danger that soldiering will eventually become yet another job thatAmericans won't do.
And yet, immigrants have always fought -- and died -- in America's wars.During the Cvil War, the Union army recruited Irish and German immigrants off the boat. Alfred Rascon, an illegal immigrant from Mexico, received the Medal of Honor for acts of bravery during theVietnam war. In the 1990s, Gen. John Shalikashvili, born in Polandafter his family fled the occupied Republic of Georgia, becamechairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.After the Iraq invasion, the U.S. Embassy in Mexico fielded hundredsof requests from Mexicans offering to fight in exchange forcitizenship. They mistakenly believed that Bush's order also applied to nonresidents.
The right to become an American is not automatic for those who die in combat. Families must formally apply for citizenship within two yearsof the soldier's death, and not all choose to do so."He's Italian, better to leave it like that," Saveria Romeo says ofher 23-year-old son, Army Staff Sgt. Vincenzo Romeo who was born in Calabria, died in Iraq and is buried in New Jersey. A miniature Italian flag marks his grave, next to an American one."What good would it do?" she says. "It won't bring back my son."But it would allow her to apply for citizenship for herself, a benefitonly recently offered to surviving parents and spouses. Until 2003 posthumous citizenship was granted only through an act of Congress and was purely symbolic. There were no benefits for next of kin. Romeo says she has no desire to apply. She couldn't bear to benefit in any way from her son's death, she says. And besides, she feels Italian, not American.
Fernando Suarez del Solar just feels angry -- angry at what he considers the futility of a war that claimed his only son, angry atthe military recruiters he says courted young Jesus relentlessly even when the family still lived in Tijuana. His son was just 13, Suarez del Solar said, when he was first dazzled by Marine recruiters in a California mall. For the next two years Jesus begged the family to emigrate and eventually they did, settlingin Escondido, Calif., where the teen signed up for the Marines before he left high school.
Lance Cpl. Jesus Suarez Del Solar was 20 when he was killed by a bomb in the first week of the war. He left behind a wife and baby and parents so bitter about his death that they eventually divorced.
Today, his 52-year-old father has become an outspoken peace activist who travels the country organizing anti-war marches, giving speeches and working with counter-recruitment groups to dissuade young Latinos from joining the U.S. military."There is nothing in my life now but saving these young people," he says. "It is just something I feel have to do."But first he had to journey to Iraq. He had to see for himself the dusty stretch of wasteland where his son became an American. In tears, he planted a small wooden cross. And he prayed for his son -- and for all the other immigrants who became citizens in death.
Posted by Lázaro Lima at 9:33 PM
http://academicink.blogspot.com/2008/03/dead-citizenship-and-latino-body.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Dead Citizenship and the Latino Body
Posthumous citizenship for US Latino troops killed in Iraq brings conflicted feelings for families
By HELEN O'NEILL
AP Special Correspondent
A young, ambitious immigrant from Guatemala who dreamed of becoming anarchitect. A Nigerian medic. A soldier from China who boasted he wouldone day become an American general. An Indian native whose headstonedisplays the first Khanda, emblem of the Sikh faith, to appear inArlington National Cemetery.
These were among more than 100 foreign-born members of the U.S.military who earned American citizenship by dying in Iraq.Jose Gutierrez was one of the first to fall, killed by friendly firein the dust of Umm Qasr in the opening hours of the invasion.In death, the young Marine was showered with honors his family couldonly have dreamed of in life. His sister was flown in from Guatemalafor his memorial service, where a Roman Catholic cardinal presided andtop military officials saluted his flag-draped coffin.
And yet, his foster mother agonized as she accompanied his body backfor burial in Guatemala City: Why did Jose have to die for America inorder to truly belong?
Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles, who oversaw Gutierrez's service,put it differently."There is something terribly wrong with our immigration policies if ittakes death on the battlefield in order to earn citizenship," Mahonywrote to President Bush in April 2003. He urged the president to grantimmediate citizenship to all immigrants who sign up for militaryservice in wartime."
They should not have to wait until they are brought home in acasket," Mahony said.But as the war continues, more and more immigrants are becomingcitizens in death -- and more and more families are grappling withdeeply conflicting feelings about exactly what the honor means.
Gutierrez's citizenship certificate -- dated to his death on March 21,2003, -- was presented during a memorial service in Lomita, Calif., toNora Mosquera, who took in the orphaned teen after he had trekkedthrough Central America, hopping freight trains through Mexico beforeillegally sneaking into the U.S."On the one hand I felt that citizenship was too late for him,"Mosquera said. "But I also felt grateful and very proud of him. I knew it would open doors for us as a family."
"What use is a piece of paper?" cried Fredelinda Pena after another emotional naturalization ceremony, this one in New York City where herbrother's framed citizenship certificate was handed to his distraughtmother. Next to her, the infant daughter he had never met dozed in hisfiancée's arms.
Cpl. Juan Alcantara, 22, a native of the Dominican Republic was killed Aug. 6, 2007 by an explosive in Baqouba. He was buried by a cardinaland eulogized by a congressman but to his sister, those tributesseemed as hollow as citizenship."He can't take the oath from a coffin," she sobbed.
There are tens of thousands of foreign-born members in the U.S. armed forces. Many have been naturalized, but more than 20,000 are not U.S.citizens."Green card soldiers," they are often called, and early in the war,Bush signed an executive order making them eligible to apply forcitizenship as soon as they enlist. Previously, legal residents in themilitary had to wait three years.
Since Bush's order, nearly 37,000 soldiers have been naturalized. And109 who lost their lives have been granted posthumous citizenship.
They are buried with purple hearts and other decorations, and theirnames are engraved on tombstones in Arlington as well as in Mexico andIndia and Guatemala.Among them:
- Marine Cpl. Armando Ariel Gonzalez, 25, who fled Cuba on a raft withhis father and brother in 1995 and dreamed of becoming an Americanfirefighter. He was crushed by a refueling tank in southern Iraq onApril 14, 2003.
- Army Spc. Justin Onwordi, a 28-year-old Nigerian medic whose heartseemed as big as his smiling 6-foot-4 frame and who left behind a wifeand baby boy. He died when his vehicle was blown up in Baghdad on Aug.2, 2004.
- Army Pfc. Ming Sun, 20, of China who loved the U.S. military so muchhe planned to make a career out of it, boasting that he would rise tothe rank of general. He was killed in a firefight in Ramadi on Jan. 9,2007.
- Army Spc. Uday Singh, 21, of India, killed when his patrol wasattacked in Habbaniyah on Dec.1, 2003. Singh was the first Sikh to diein battle as a U.S. soldier, and it is his headstone at Arlington thatdisplays the Khanda.
- Marine Lance Cpl. Patrick O'Day from Scotland, buried in theCalifornia rain as bagpipes played and his 19-year-old pregnant wifetold mourners how honored her 20-year-old husband had felt to fight for the country he loved."He left us in the most honorable way a man could," Shauna O'Day saidat the March 2003 Santa Rosa service. "I'm proud to say my husband is a Marine. I'm proud to say my husband fought for our country. I'm proud to say he is a hero, my hero."
Not all surviving family members feel so sure. Some parents blame themselves for bringing their child to the U.S. in the first place. Others face confusion and resentment when they try to bury their childback home.
At Lance Cpl. Juan Lopez's July 4, 2004, funeral in the central Mexican town of San Luis de la Paz, Mexican soldiers demanded that the U.S. Marine honor guard surrender their arms, even though the rifleswere ceremonial. Earlier, the Mexican Defense Department had deniedthe Marines' request to conduct the traditional 21-gun salute, sayingforeign troops were not permitted to bear arms on Mexican soil.
And so mourners, many deeply opposed to the war, witnessed anextraordinary 45-minute standoff that disrupted the funeral even as Lopez's weeping widow was handed his posthumous citizenship by a U.S.embassy official.
The same swirl of conflicting emotions and messages often overshadowsthe military funerals of posthumous citizens in the U.S.Smuggled across the Mexican border in his mother's arms when he was 2months old, Jose Garibay was just 21 when he died in Nasiriyah. The Costa Mesa police department made him an honorary police officer, something he had hoped one day to become. America made him a citizen.
But his mother, Simona Garibay, couldn't conceal her bewilderment and pain. It seemed, she said in interviews after the funeral, that more value was being placed on her son's death than on his life.
Immigrant advocates have similar mixed feelings about militaryservice. Non-citizens cannot become officers or serve in high-securityjobs, they note, and yet the benefits of citizenship are regularly pitched by recruiters, and some recruitment programs specificallytarget colleges and high schools with predominantly Latino students.
"Immigrants are lured into service and then used as political pawns orcannon fodder," said Dan Kesselbrenner, executive director of theNational Immigration Project, a program of the National Lawyers Guild."It is sad thing to see people so desperate to get status in thiscountry that they are prepared to die for it."Others question whether non-citizens should even be permitted toserve. Mark Krikorian of the conservative Center for ImmigrationStudies, argues that defending America should be the job of Americans,not non-citizens whose loyalty might be suspect. In granting specialbenefits, including fast-track citizenship, Krikorian says, there is a danger that soldiering will eventually become yet another job thatAmericans won't do.
And yet, immigrants have always fought -- and died -- in America's wars.During the Cvil War, the Union army recruited Irish and German immigrants off the boat. Alfred Rascon, an illegal immigrant from Mexico, received the Medal of Honor for acts of bravery during theVietnam war. In the 1990s, Gen. John Shalikashvili, born in Polandafter his family fled the occupied Republic of Georgia, becamechairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.After the Iraq invasion, the U.S. Embassy in Mexico fielded hundredsof requests from Mexicans offering to fight in exchange forcitizenship. They mistakenly believed that Bush's order also applied to nonresidents.
The right to become an American is not automatic for those who die in combat. Families must formally apply for citizenship within two yearsof the soldier's death, and not all choose to do so."He's Italian, better to leave it like that," Saveria Romeo says ofher 23-year-old son, Army Staff Sgt. Vincenzo Romeo who was born in Calabria, died in Iraq and is buried in New Jersey. A miniature Italian flag marks his grave, next to an American one."What good would it do?" she says. "It won't bring back my son."But it would allow her to apply for citizenship for herself, a benefitonly recently offered to surviving parents and spouses. Until 2003 posthumous citizenship was granted only through an act of Congress and was purely symbolic. There were no benefits for next of kin. Romeo says she has no desire to apply. She couldn't bear to benefit in any way from her son's death, she says. And besides, she feels Italian, not American.
Fernando Suarez del Solar just feels angry -- angry at what he considers the futility of a war that claimed his only son, angry atthe military recruiters he says courted young Jesus relentlessly even when the family still lived in Tijuana. His son was just 13, Suarez del Solar said, when he was first dazzled by Marine recruiters in a California mall. For the next two years Jesus begged the family to emigrate and eventually they did, settlingin Escondido, Calif., where the teen signed up for the Marines before he left high school.
Lance Cpl. Jesus Suarez Del Solar was 20 when he was killed by a bomb in the first week of the war. He left behind a wife and baby and parents so bitter about his death that they eventually divorced.
Today, his 52-year-old father has become an outspoken peace activist who travels the country organizing anti-war marches, giving speeches and working with counter-recruitment groups to dissuade young Latinos from joining the U.S. military."There is nothing in my life now but saving these young people," he says. "It is just something I feel have to do."But first he had to journey to Iraq. He had to see for himself the dusty stretch of wasteland where his son became an American. In tears, he planted a small wooden cross. And he prayed for his son -- and for all the other immigrants who became citizens in death.
Posted by Lázaro Lima at 9:33 PM
http://academicink.blogspot.com/2008/03/dead-citizenship-and-latino-body.html
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