Tuesday, November 30, 2010

As Deportations Increase, So Have Officials’ Attempts to Deport the Wrong People

by Marian Wang, ProPublica
November 10, 2010

As deportations have increased under the Obama administration, immigration judges have also increasingly denied requests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement to deport people who were legitimately entitled to stay in the country [1], according to new data obtained by Syracuse University’s Transaction Records Access Clearinghouse.

From July to September of this year, for instance, almost a third of all deportation cases brought by ICE were rejected by immigration judges—up from 12 months earlier, when the rate was one out of every four. According to TRAC, judges have rejected removal orders for more than a quarter of a million individuals in the past five years. [...]

Read the full article:
http://www.propublica.org/blog/item/as-deportations-increase-so-have-officials-attempts-to-deport-the-wrong-peo

Monday, November 29, 2010

DREAM Act Students Defy Deportations, Demand Vote in Congress

by David Bacon, t r u t h o u t
November 28, 2010

Oakland, California - This coming week, if Sen. Harry Reid keeps his word, Congress may get a chance to vote on the DREAM Act. First introduced in 2003, the bill would allow undocumented students graduating from a US high school to apply for permanent residence if they complete two years of college or serve two years in the US military. Estimates state that the act would enable 800,000 young people to gain legal residence status and eventual citizenship.

A vote in Congress would be a tribute to thousands of these "sin papeles," or people without papers. For seven years, they have marched, sat in, written letters and mastered every civil rights tactic in the book to get their bill onto the Washington, DC agenda. [...]

Read the full article:
http://www.truth-out.org/dream-act-students-defy-deportations-demand-vote-congress65463

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

NYC, 11/20-21: "Faces of Immigration"

Two-day workshop
facilitated by Kayhan Irani and Marie-Claire Picher

with a special presentation by David Wilson, co-author (with Jane Guskin)
of The Politics of Immigration

Date: Saturday, November 20, 2010 - 10:00am - 6:00pm

Location: The Brecht Forum, 451 West Street (between Bank & Bethune Sts): A, C, E to 14 St. (south exits to 14th & 8th Av.; L to 8th Av. (at 14th); #1, 2, 3 to 14 St.(south exits to 12th St. & 7th Av.); PATH to Christopher St. (nr. Hudson St.); F, M to 14 St (at 6th Av.); B, D to W. 4 St. (north exits to Waverly & 6th Av.); maps below

Contact: 212-242-4201, brechtforum@brechtforum.org ; directions http://bit.ly/bierxE ; map http://bit.ly/bzOKJp

This workshop will focus on and emphasize immigration themes and issues and is open to anyone who is interested in these issues or would like to learn more about them while simultaneously training in Image Theater techniques. The workshop will especially benefit people who are working inthe area of immigrants' rights.

Saturday, November 20, 2010 from 10:00 am to 6:00 pm, and
Sunday, November 21 from 10:00 am to 6:00 pm

On Sunday morning, David Wilson, co-author (with Jane Guskin) of The Politics of Immigration (New York: Monthly Review Press, 2007. ISBN 978-1-58367-155-9) will give a special presentation that will augment and enhance the work which develops and is created in this workshop.

No prior theater experience is necessary to participate in this workshop. Participants must commit to attending both sessions in their entirety. During Theater of the Oppressed workshops a process develops among the members and when people arrive late, leave early or fail toreturn to the next session that process is compromised. If you think you will not be able to attend the whole workshop please consider enrolling in a future workshop when your schedule will allow you to attend for its complete duration.

Tuition--sliding scale: $95-$150

Register online at
http://brechtforum.org/civicrm/event/info?id=11753&reset=1

Links:
http://brechtforum.org/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=11753
http://nycal.mayfirst.org/node/1971

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Report Questions the System Used to Flag Rikers Island Inmates for Deportation

by Sam Dolnick, New York Times
November 10, 2010

As the Obama administration steps up efforts to deport immigrants held on criminal charges, federal officials in New York City have long been on the job. At the city’s main jail on Rikers Island, immigration officers comb through lists of foreign-born inmates, then question, detain and deport about 3,200 of them a year.

Immigration authorities say they decide whom to flag by considering the severity of the crime and the inmate’s criminal history and immigration record. Their top priority, they say, is removing the most dangerous offenders.

But a new analysis of Rikers Island statistics by Justice Strategies, a prisoner advocacy group based in New York, shows that among inmates held on drug charges, those accused of misdemeanors were chosen for deportation proceedings more often than those charged with felonies. [...]

Read the article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/11/nyregion/11rikers.html?ref=nyregion

Read the report, by Aarti Shahani:
http://www.justicestrategies.org/sites/default/files/JusticeStrategies-DrugDeportations-PrelimFindings.pdf

Monday, November 15, 2010

Un rencuentro familiar

by Elvira Arellano, El Diario-La Prensa (NY)
November 3, 2010

El martes vimos los resultados de los esfuerzos organizativos de la "Fiesta de Te" (Tea Party), que han sucedido durante los últimos dos años. Los de la Fiesta del Te aprovecharon la decepción de los millones que votaron a base de promesas que luego no fueron cumplidas.

Los activistas de la Fiesta de Te contaban con el respaldo de los mismos millonarios que causaron el colapso económico de los Estados Unidos. La verdad sobre este movimiento, supuestamente de la base, salió en las campañas de elecciones. Se gastaron millones en anuncios televisados que culparon a los latinos por todos los problemas del país. ¡Aquellos dólares no provinieron de las bases populares! [...]

Read the full article:
http://www.impre.com/eldiariony/opinion/2010/11/3/un-rencuentro-familiar-220153-1.html#commentsBlock

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Hispanics Cite Bias in Survey

By Julia Preston, New York Times
October 28, 2010


More than 6 in 10 Latinos in the United States say discrimination is a “major problem” for them, a significant increase in the last three years, according to a survey of Latino attitudes by the Pew Hispanic Center, a nonpartisan research group.

In 2007, the center reported, 54 percent of Latinos said discrimination was a major problem. That year, nearly half of Latinos — 46 percent — cited language as the primary cause for that discrimination. In the new survey, 36 percent — the largest number — said that immigration status was the leading cause. [...]

Read the full article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/29/us/29pew.html?_r=1&ref=us

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Workers Without Status in France Emerge as a Social Force

France is the second immigrant nation in the world, after the United States. For more than a century, migrant workers – often from countries colonized by France and from Eastern and Southern Europe – came to build the country.

by Karen Wirsig, The Bullet
October 19, 2010

At the end of the afternoon of May 27, a mass demonstration marched into the Place de la Bastille in Paris. The march itself represented what can now be viewed as a low point in the national union mobilizations to challenge the proposed weakening of France's public pension regime and other reactionary responses of Nicholas Sarkozy's government to the world economic crisis. But despite the rain, despite the niggling worry that fatigue was overtaking the movement and apathy the French public, a group of marchers went to work making sure it was a day the French labour movement won't soon forget.

Workers without status demonstrating against the Sarkozy government reforms.
Hundreds of striking workers without status, known as “travailleurs sans papiers,” set about occupying the steps of the Bastille Opera House in what was to be a crucial stand in their astounding strike. [...]

Read the full article:
http://www.socialistproject.ca/bullet/421.php