House Passes the Dream and Promise Act

Washington — With a handful of Republican votes, House Democrats passed the latest version of the DREAM Act, an ambitious expansion of a nearly two-decades-long legislative effort that would place millions of young undocumented immigrants and immigrants with temporary status on a pathway to U.S. citizenship.

The Democratic-led chamber approved the sweeping immigration bill, dubbed the DREAM and Promise Act of 2019, by a vote of 237 to 187, sending the legislation to the Republican-controlled Senate, which is unlikely to consider it. The White House has also issued a veto threatagainst the measure. 

Seven Republicans in the House joined 230 Democrats in voting for the bill. No Democrats voted against the measure.

Mexican Workers Pay the Cost of the Immigration Crackdown

Mexican Workers Pay the Cost of the Immigration Crackdown

https://portside.org/2019-06-04/mexican-workers-pay-cost-immigration-crackdown

Portside Date: June 4, 2019

Author: Fernando Herrera Calderón

Working Class Perspectives

The crackdown on illegal immigration at the southern border and the increase in deportations are taking a toll on Mexican workers in the United States and Mexico. While strict immigration policy is not a new phenomenon, Trump’s hardline anti-immigration policies and incendiary rhetoric exacerbate the situation.
With support from the conservative media, Trump has framed immigration as a “crisis” along the southern border. Warnings that hordes of criminals, rapists, gangbangers, and drug dealers from Mexico and Central America are invading the United States, from both Trump and conservative pundits, encourage people to express their xenophobic or nativist tendencies openly. Trump’s portrayal of undocumented Mexican immigrants as violent criminals defines them as a national security threat, and that has inspired some to take matters into their own hands to weed-out “enemies of the state.” Without a doubt, Trump’s tirades have contributed to the increase of hate crimes. Mexican immigrants of all ages have fallen victim to racially motivated crimes. Many have been run out of towns by locals who deliberately made their lives insufferable. Some towns have enacted laws outlawing landowners to rent to people unable to prove their legal status. Businesses that hire workers illegally in the United States are subject to fines, leading many of them to screen people more thoroughly. Years ago, business owners could get away with hiring an individual without verifying their legal status. Today, the Department of Homeland Security is taking measures to ensure businesses and companies use E-Verify to check whether an individual can legally work in the United States.
All of this creates major challenges for undocumented Mexican workers in the United States, who must navigate in this hostile environment, but it also affects their families in Mexico who depend the money workers send home. Remittances hit a record high of $33 billion in 2018, a 10.5% increase compared to 2017. But those numbers are likely to fall in 2019, as the crackdown on the border intensifies and deportations grow. As a result, millions of families in Mexico will struggle to remain economically solvent in an economy where the urban working class earns just over $5 a day.
Deportation creates additional challenges for those who have lived in the United States for decades and established roots. After years of not being able to move freely across the border, immigrants’ connection to Mexico diminishes, and this presents significant social problems for the Mexican worker on top of financial ones. Many have grown accustomed to their way of life in the United States. Deportees undergo a culture shock and must grapple with unfamiliar laws, norms, and regulations. Many suffer from depression and worry that they’ve disappointed their families. As these feelings increase, so does their desperation to return to the United States –even as that option becomes less accessible.

House to Vote Today on Dream Act

HAPPENING TODAY

The House will vote today on the American Dream and Promise Act H.R. 6 (116) , which would provide a pathway to citizenship for more than 2 million undocumented people who came to the U.S. as children. House leaders agreed Monday night to send the bill to the floor and to waive rules requiring Congress to offset the bill's costs, two sources with knowledge of the meeting tell POLITICO's Sarah Ferris. (The legislation would increase budget deficits by about $35 billion, according to CBO estimates.)

Racial Incitement in the Open- The White House

Racial prejudice from the White House, in the open.

Statement from the President Regarding Emergency Measures to Address the Border Crisis

 IMMIGRATION

 Issued on: May 30, 2019

"El niño es el pasaporte para cruzar", cuando los menores se convierten ...

AMLO a Trump;

AMLO

President Donald Trump: 

I’ve learned about your latest position regarding Mexico. First of all, I want to express that I do not want a confrontation. When facing a conflict in our relationship, no matter how serious, the cities and nations we represent deserve that we turn to dialogue and act with caution and responsibility. 

Mexico’s best president, Benito Juárez, maintained an excellent relationship with his Republican counterpart, Abraham Lincoln. Later on, during the oil expropriation (when Mexico kicked out foreign oil companies), Democratic President Franklin D. Roosevelt understood the profound reasons that led patriot President Lázaro Cárdenas to act in favor of our sovereignty. Indeed, President Roosevelt was a titan of liberty. Before anyone else, he proclaimed the four fundamental human rights: the right to speak freely, to practice religion freely, to live free of fear, and to live free of misery.

That’s the thinking behind our politics when it comes to the migration issue. Human beings don’t abandon their hometowns because they want to, but because they need to. That’s why, when I first took office, I proposed to partner in helping develop Central American countries by making productive investments that will create jobs and address the root cause of this terrible issue.

You must also know that we are complying with our responsibility to prevent, to the extent possible and without violating human rights, passage through our country. It’s worth reminding you that, before long, Mexicans will no longer need to go to the United States, and that migration will be optional, not forced. That’s because we are fighting corruption, Mexico’s main problem, like never before! And that’s how our country will become a great power with a social dimension. Our fellow citizens will be able to work and be happy where they were born, where their families, traditions and cultures are.

President Trump: You can’t solve social problems with taxes or coercive measures. How does one transform, overnight, the country of fellowship with immigrants from around the world into a ghetto, a closed-off space that stigmatizes, mistreats, chases, expels and cancels legal rights to those who are seeking —with effort and hard work— to live free of misery? The Statue of Liberty isn’t an empty symbol.

Trump's New Mexico Policy is Dumb

From the NY Times.,

“President Trump said Thursday that he planned to impose a 5 percent tariff on all imported goods from Mexico beginning June 10, a tax that he said would “gradually increase” until Mexico stopped the flow of undocumented immigrants across the border.”

“The president’s threat was a significant escalation in his fight with Mexico and a drastic move against an American ally, which essentially dared the Mexican government to risk economic catastrophe on both sides of the border if it did not capitulate to the angry demands of the United States president.”

Trump’s escalation is stupid.  When General Kelley was Chief of Staff, ( former head of the U.S. Central Command,) he knew how misinformed this policy was.

Response. editor. 

This poorly informed action ignores many of the realities of the U.S.-Mexico relationship.  Mexico provides the primary security against migration to the U.S. on our southern border.  Mexican police and military restrict migration and turn thousands of would-be migrants back each year at their southern border.

These  decisions are the kind we get since when we have President who listens to Fox News  and Kris Kobach rather than to listen to persons who know the region and the issues.

The Mexican army and police already provide the primary obstacle to migrants from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala from reaching the U.S. border.  The U.S. pays the Mexican forces to do this enforcement.  Given Trump’s provocative statements and acts, they could simply stop serving as a border security force for the U.S. The end of bi-national police cooperation would massively increase immigration and severely reduce efforts to restrict drug cartels from moving drugs into the U.S.

Report from the Tijuana border

This weekend I witnessed the refugee crisis in Tijuana along with my comrades in DSA-LA's Immigration Justice Committee. What I saw was a manufactured crises. Both US & Mexican governments collaborate on creating backlogs for processing migrants, using an illegal numbering system. Migrants must wait for months to be processed, only to be separated from their families, detained or denied entry. Those unable to make it past credible fear interviews resort to laying down roots in Tijuana, returning to a violent home country, or crossing the border illegally. None of this has to happen. Both governments can process far more refugees humanely - but they manufacture a crisis for deterrence. 

The migrants we spoke with are kind and strong-willed. They made their journey from places like Cameroon, Eritrea, Haiti, and Central America. An overwhelming majority of migrants are black, contradicting the popular media narrative and underscoring the global white supremacy that characterizes imperialism. It's unfair. These are people that pose no threat, have risked everything, only to be met with dehumanization by the most powerful and wealthy country on the planet.

I'm thankful for organizations like Al Otro Lado which work tirelessly to reject these xenophobic policies. The staff and volunteers are some of the kindest people I've met and I encourage you to support their work with your time, money, and praises.

Unfortunately climate change, capitalism, and violence will continue to generate refugees. Our analysis must expand to not merely calling for the abolition of ICE and an end to detention, but for an insistence to end senseless military and economic intervention and ultimately adopt an open border policy.

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43You, Jack Suria Linares and 41 others

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Immigration Workshop

Detained, Abused & Denied Medical Care: How Trump Immigration Policies L...

Children Die in ICE Detention

https://www.democracynow.org/2019/5/21/detained_abused_denied_medical_care_how

#RedForEd | Rally - May 22nd

Addressing Immigration Policy

Addressing Immigration Policy and Defending Immigrants and Refugees.

(resolution submitted to the convention of the Democratic Socialists of America)

WHEREAS   one of the first principles of democratic socialism is the importance of collective action;
WHEREAS   our political work should be informed by a strategic analysis of the political economy of U.S. capitalism and the cutting edge issues of the day, with an eye to identifying the critical points of system leverage where we can collectively intervene to maximum political effect; and

Whereas    DSA individuals, chapters, and the Immigrants’ Rights Working Group have been actively engaged for over six  years, and continue to engage in the defense of immigrants and refugees from racists attacks, and promoting 
and the promotion of comprehensive immigration reform that would secure their place in the U.S., putting an end to corporate induced competition between native born and immigrant workers, and between U.S. workers and workers abroad. ( See resolution #41 from the 2017 convention). 
 
  And, whereas,  In the last half century, there has been a major restructuring of the global economy, conducted largely on the terms of transnational corporations seeking ever greater profits. Neo-liberal ‘free trade’ agreements, such as NAFTA I and II and CAFTA, have produced a global ‘race to the bottom,’ with capital flight sending good paying union jobs away from workers in the U.S. to countries with low wage employment, many of which are ruled by authoritarian states that ban independent unions. In the Americas, this global ‘free trade’ economy has devastated entire sectors of the economies of Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean, leading millions of people attempting to migrate to the U.S. in search of food, jobs, and security. Many also flee the ruthless violence of criminal groups in nations with ‘failed’ states, as well as the effects of climate catastrophes, from drought to increasingly vicious and destructive storms. 
 
And, whereas, the racist nationalism of Trump and his cohort  seeks to exploit the anger of U.S. workers by scapegoating immigrants and refugees, projecting racist fears and resentments on them. 
 
And, whereas, only a politics which breaks with the neo-liberal paradigm can successfully counter the racism of Trump and the nationalist right wing, bringing a measure of justice both to immigrants and refugees and to workers in the U.S.
 

 
Be it therefore resolved that:
 
In conjunction with the DSA Immigrant Rights Working Group, National staff and the NPC will develop a DSA platform for comprehensive immigration law reform, which shall be the basis for our educational, legislative, and direct action  work. The platform shall include, but not necessarily be limited to, provisions for:

      Legal residence for all those presently living in the U.S.

·      A path to legal status (and where desired, citizenship) for DACA dreamers and TPS recipients;
·      The abolition of ICE, and its replacement with a new federal agency located in the Department of Justice  that respects the rights of immigrants and refugees ;
·       The legal recognition and enforcement of international treaties establishing the rights of migrants and refugees;
·       The quick and timely adjudication of claims of refugee status and rights of asylum, and quick and timely processing of applications for visas and ‘green card’ status;
·       An end to racial and ethnic disparities in the provision of visas and ‘green card’ status;
·       The reform of the current system of employment and family visas, including H2A and H1B visas, to end employer misuse of work visas and abuse of international workers, and to respect the right of family reunification; and
·       The securing of the labor rights of immigrant workers, and the full integration of those workers into the organized labor movement.
         A path to legal residence for all those living in the U.S. at this time.
·        A repeal of employer sanctions in all its forms. 
·      Legal status for the currently  undocumented, in a rapid and inclusive process, without excessive fees, fines, waiting periods or a preliminary temporary status.  
·      Opposition to the expansion of guest worker programs. 
 
 
 
Further, national DSA working with the Immigrants’ Rights Working Group  shall develop educational materials which provide a democratic socialist analysis of the underlying causes of the current immigration crisis, including 
·       The role of US government policy – economic, military and diplomatic – in the conditions that create refugees and economic immigrants;
·       The role of drug trafficking and the organized crime and violence associated with it, as well as the role of the U.S. as a major drug market, in the conditions that create refugees and economic immigrants;
·       The role of ‘free trade’ agreements, and the restructuring of the global economy along neo-liberal lines, in the conditions that create economic immigrants; and
·       The role of institutions of the global economy, such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, in the conditions that create economic and immigrants. 

​{ End of resolution} 

The prior posts deal with how we arrived at this resolution.

 

Immigrants' Rights Day - Sacramento