White House Plan on Immigration Includes Legal Status

by Julia Preston, New York Times
November 13, 2009

The Obama administration will insist on measures to give legal status to an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants as it pushes early next year for legislation to overhaul the immigration system, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said on Friday.

In her first major speech on the overhaul, Ms. Napolitano dispelled any suggestion that the administration — with health care, energy and other major issues crowding its agenda — would postpone the most contentious piece of immigration legislation until after midterm elections next November.

Laying out the administration’s bottom line, Ms. Napolitano said officials would argue for a “three-legged stool” that includes tougher enforcement laws against illegal immigrants and employers who hire them and a streamlined system for legal immigration, as well as a “tough and fair pathway to earned legal status.” [...]

Read the full article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/14/us/politics/14immig.html?_r=1&ref=us

Napolitano's "three-legged stool" is similar to the "three pillars" Tamar Jacoby outlined in a New York presentation last spring, except that Jacoby made it clear that the "most important" of the three pillars was a guest worker program:

http://thepoliticsofimmigration.blogspot.com/2009/04/grow-our-economy-with-guest-workers-nyc.html

1,200 janitors fired in 'quiet' immigration raid

by Sasha Aslanian, Minnesota Public Radio
November 9, 2009

Minneapolis — One of the largest immigration crackdowns under the Obama administration to date took place in the Twin Cities last month, when 1,200 undocumented janitors were fired from their jobs, according to immigration lawyers.

The janitors worked for ABM, a San Francisco-based contract company that cleans many downtown office towers in the Twin Cities.

The Obama administration has shifted away from the dramatic workplace raids that were a hallmark of the Bush administration's enforcement strategy. Under President Obama, the Department of Homeland Security says it is putting pressure on employers who break the law. [...]

Read the full article:
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2009/11/09/immigrants-fired/

In Dallas, Tickets for Not Speaking English

New York Times from Associated Press
October 24, 2009

DALLAS (AP) — Dallas police officers have improperly cited drivers for not being able to speak English 38 times in the past three years, Chief David Kunkle said Friday.
The discovery came after a woman was pulled over earlier this month for making an illegal U-turn and was given a ticket for being a “non-English-speaking driver.”

Chief Kunkle said the citations were disappointing for Dallas, a city where Hispanics make up 44 percent of the more than one million residents and where many other residents are Southeast Asian refugees.

“I was, I guess, surprised and stunned,” the chief said of the ticketing. “We are a very diverse community.” [...]

Read the full article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/25/us/25dallas.html?_r=1&ref=us

Obama’s Dirty War On Immigrants

by Shamus Cooke, Upside Down World
October 26, 2009

Under Bush, immigrant communities lived in a constant state of fear. “Homeland Security” agents terrorized citizens and workers alike, arresting anyone who appeared Latino or lacked ID. Families were separated, children left parentless, property abandoned, and long-lasting relationships severed.

This scenario has changed only slightly under Obama, and some say for the worst. Obama’s campaign promise of undoing Bush’s immigration strategy was, like nearly every other promise he’s made, a blatant lie. Instead, he’s adopted the “enforcement first” immigration approach: John McCain’s campaign platform which Obama once mocked. [...]

Read the full article:
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/2179/1/

Young Immigrant Women: Pick Your Poison

by Prerna Lal, Immigrant Rights
October 26, 2009

Immigrant women migrating to the United States now have the option to choose between either Gardasil or Cervarix for their required vaccination against sexually transmitted human papilloma virus (HPV).

The vaccine is mandatory for women 15 to 26 entering the U.S. as part of their immigrant application process. It does little to prevent HPV and uses young immigrant women as guinea pigs for experimenting vaccines without incurring the expense of clinical trials. The burden of cost falls squarely on immigrant women and neither vaccines are covered by most insurance companies. [...]

Read the full article:
http://immigration.change.org/blog/view/young_immigrant_women_pick_your_poison

A Death in Texas: Profits, poverty, and immigration converge

Galindo’s father broke down, "We don’t understand how there can be so little humanity. . . . It was so cruel, and he died sick and afraid."

by Tom Barry, Boston Review
November/December 2009

County Clerk Dianne Florez noticed it first. Plumes of smoke were rising outside the small West Texas town of Pecos. “The prison is burning again,” she announced.

About a month and a half before, on December 12, 2008, inmates had rioted to protest the death of one of their own, Jesus Manuel Galindo, 32. When Galindo’s body was removed from the prison in what looked to them like a large black trash bag, they set fire to the recreational center and occupied the exercise yard overnight. Using smuggled cell phones, they told worried family members and the media about poor medical care in the prison and described the treatment of Galindo, who had been in solitary confinement since mid-November. During that time, fellow inmates and his mother, who called the prison nearly every day, had warned authorities that Galindo needed daily medication for epilepsy and was suffering from severe seizures in the “security housing unit,” which the inmates call the “hole.” [...]

Read the full article:
http://bostonreview.net/BR34.6/barry.php

Immigrant activist leaves sanctuary after nearly two years

by Pepe Lozano, People's Weekly World
October 20, 2009

CHICAGO - Flor Crisostomo is a well-known immigrant rights activist here who spent nearly two years in sanctuary at the Adalberto United Methodist Church on the city's northwest side. In a prepared statement released Oct. 19, Crisostomo announced she has left the church in order to begin the next phase in her struggle for immigration reform and the rights of indigenous communities.

In a written letter Crisostomo said, "I am writing today to inform my supporters and all undocumented people concerned with this struggle that I am no longer in sanctuary, but have moved to a different location."

She continues, "The decision to move was prompted by my realization that after two years my sanctuary had begun to lose its political effectiveness for the immigrant rights movement." [...]

Read the full article:
http://www.peoplesworld.org/immigrant-activist-leaves-sanctuary-after-nearly-two-years/