Congressional Hispanic Caucus Asks Barack Obama to Terminate 287(g) Program

The brave members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) are taking a stand against Racial Profiling. They have sent a letter to President Obama asking him to terminate the 287(g) program -- which has been so rife with Racial Profiling!
Members of the conservative community and the conservative MSM are already attacking the brave members of the CHC. We need the CHC to stand strong against their attackers and follow through until this program is terminated! STOP THE HATE!!!
From Phoenix New Times:
In a letter to Barack Obama dated Monday, September 28, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus called on the President to terminate the 287(g) program, and cease all of the so-called Memorandums of Understanding authorizing local law enforcement agencies to enforce federal immigration law. The letter -- which is signed by Chairwoman Nydia Velazquez, Representative from New York, and Illinois Rep. Luis Gutierrez, Chair of the CHC's Immigration Task Force -- takes note of efforts by the Department of Homeland Security to reform the program with supposedly new and improved agreements with local cops. But the missive makes it clear that the CHC, an influential group of lawmakers in a majority Democratic Congress, sees the 287(g) program as fatally flawed. (You can read the letter in its entirety, here.)

"Although its stated purpose is to provide law enforcement a tool to pursue criminals," notes the letter, "it is our experience that state and local law enforcement officials actually use their expanded and often unchecked powers under the program to target immigrants and persons of color. It is our opinion that no amount of reforms, no matter how well-intentioned, will change this disturbing reality." The letter continues, with this verbal coup de grace: "For these reasons we ask you to reconsider your evaluation of 287(g) and instead of reforming it, end it entirely."

This communication comes less than a month after 521 organizations -- including the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, the ADL, and the ACLU -- signed a letter pressuring the Obama administration to end the much-hated 287(g) program. That letter and this recently-released one from the CHC, which can be viewed on the Web site of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, each cite the current U.S. Department of Justice investigation into 287(g)-poster boy Sheriff Joe Arpaio and his office's racial and ethnic profiling ways.

In July, DHS honcho Janet Napolitano announced new agreements for the scores of local law enforcement agencies that DHS and Immigration and Customs Enforcement have partnered with. The new rules were seen as aimed at Arpaio and as a sop to the Hispanic community over concerns that Latinos are being treated as second-class citizens by 287(g)-empowered cops. The new agreements have to be re-signed by the 60-plus agencies already involved within 90 days of the announcement. Those 90 days are almost up. Arpaio stated recently that he would sign the new agreement. But my sources inform me that negotiations are ongoing, and that Arpaio's side has sent DHS a "revised" version of the new agreement that would be acceptable to the sheriff.

Though federal worksite raids have generally been brought to heel under Napolitano, Arpaio continues to violate the terms of his old agreement with constitutionally questionable raids on businesses and neighborhood sweeps seeking undocumented Mexicans. This is why Arpaio remains a lightning rod for pro-immigrant and civil rights groups nationwide. But Arpaio is a symptom of the disease, not the disease itself, which is a deadly mixture racism and xenophobia. The Obama administration has allowed -- under the counsel of DHS secretary Napolitano -- this fever to strengthen. Now they are left with a metaphorical dilemma: Either sever a pox-ridden limb (Arpaio) from the corpus; or once and for all battle the infection to its core.

Whether the Obama-ites have the courage to lance the blisters of this grotesque pandemic remains to be seen. Phoenix civil rights activist Salvador Reza of the Puente movement alerted me to this letter to the President. Thursday morning, he and others in this struggle will demand that the Department of Homeland Security release -- under the Freedom of Information Act (if that still means anything) all correspondence between the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office, and ICE/DHS. The purpose of the request is to discover what back-room wheeling and dealing has been going on between the sheriff and the feds. If DHS and ICE do not cough up the docs, then you can safely assume they have something too hide.

Late Breaking News: CHC Elated After Meeting with Napolitano! Republicans Furious & OUT themselves as ANTIs!

The Congressional Hispanic Caucus met with Janet Napolitano today and were elated by her feedback. Republicans were Furious, outing themselves as ANTIs even though they know their response will LOSE more Latino Votes!

thehill.com reports:

Hispanic lawmakers hopeful on immigration

Hispanic lawmakers are more hopeful than ever that Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano will end workplace raids by immigration enforcement officials. Several lawmakers emerged elated from a closed-door meeting Thursday with Napolitano, held one day after she promised to investigate a raid of an engine shop in Bellingham, Wash. Earlier this week. During the meeting with the lawmakers, Napolitano said she had “grave concerns” about the raid, in which 25 people were detained for deportation hearings.

According to CHC members, Napolitano herself brought up the Bellingham raid by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, preempting questions from lawmakers who have long sought to end the policy of raiding workplaces to target workers.“The meeting was very, very constructive. We’re happy,” said CHC Immigration Task Force Chairman Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.).“We shared with her our concerns about the raid. She shared with us that she had grave concerns about the manner in which it was carried out and that it’s under evaluation.”“I think the most important words were that she had ‘grave concerns,’” Gutierrez said.

Napolitano told the House Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday that she would look into the raid. “I want to get to the bottom of this as well,” she told the panel. Napolitano also reiterated the administration’s commitment to focus on the employer side – rather than the employee side — of workplace enforcement.The Tuesday raid is the first conducted by federal authorities since President Obama took office. Although the raids had become a staple of the Bush administration’s approach to immigration enforcement, Napolitano told lawmakers on Wednesday that she was unaware of the raid until it was over.

In Tuesday’s raid, 25 men and three women were suspected of being undocumented aliens working in the United States illegally. All but three – who were released for humanitarian reasons – were detained for immediate deportation proceedings. After having to temporarily give up on a comprehensive immigration reform bill, the CHC and its allies have pivoted to pushing for a scaling-back of the tough enforcement provisions enacted under President Bush’s watch. Some Republicans were as furious as the CHC was pleased with Napolitano’s remarks at the hearing. “Let me see if I have this straight,” House Judiciary Committee Ranking Republican Lamar Smith (Texas), one of the strongest defenders of the Bush policy, said in a statement. “ICE agents arrest a criminal illegal immigrant gang member, discover he had worked illegally with other illegal immigrants at a manufacturing plant, begin an investigation of the employer and arrest the illegal immigrants to get more facts … and the secretary orders an investigation of ICE? “This sounds like good police work, not something to investigate,” Smith continued. “Secretary Napolitano’s decision is beyond backwards.”

Hispanic Democrats had been growing frustrated with what they saw as a lack of commitment from the Obama administration to even consider rolling back the raids policies. Hispanic voters were critical to Obama’s election victory in November. Exit polls showed Obama won the constituency with more than a 2-to-1 margin. He also won several states with large Hispanic populations that were carried by President Bush in 2004, including Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico.

Gutierrez, Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) and others described Napolitano as giving a firm commitment to thoroughly review a Bush administration policy that has resulted in dozens of workplace raids and the deportation of hundreds of immigrants. The CHC has complained that the raids break up families and communities while doing little to punish the employers who hire undocumented workers.

BREAKING NEWS! ALARMING!! ICE RAID SENDS WORKERS TO GEO DETENTION CENTER NOTORIOUS FOR ABUSES!!

ALARMING BREAKING NEWS:

JANET NAPOLITANO HAS A LOT OF EXPLAINING TO DO!!!

Congressional Hispanic Caucus -- PLEASE ASK HER THESE QUESTIONS:

1. Why are the ICE Raids continuing?

2. What Happened to your drive to arrest Felonious Criminals vs Workers?

3. Why are workers being sent to deplorable Detention Centers with history of Abuses?

4. What happened to your plan to have the Detention Centers investigated?

CHC: THE TIME TO ACT IS NOW!!

The Seattle Times reports:

Immigration officers today raided an engine remanufacturing plant in Bellingham, arrested 28 illegal immigrant workers and began processing them for deportation. The arrests are part of an ongoing investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials at Yamato Engine Specialists in Bellingham. ICE officials say the 25 men and three women — most of them from Mexico — may have gained employment at Yamato using phony social security numbers and other counterfeit identity documents.
Yamato officials, who said they had been cooperating with ICE since last fall when investigators began looking at employment documents, were shocked by today's raid.
In fact, three of the workers arrested today had been cleared as having legitimate documents during an employment records audit by ICE in 2005, said Yamato spokeswoman Shirin Dhanani Makalai.
We have been audited before so we do due diligence to get the proper paperwork," Makalai said. "People bring you paperwork that by law you are required to accept. You can't always tell if it's not correct."
With about 100 workers, Yamato specializes in rebuilding Japanese car engines and transmissions.
ICE investigators began looking into its employment records following the arrest of a criminal illegal immigrant who had previously worked there.
After being processed earlier today, officials released three of the immigrants on humanitarian grounds. The others are being held at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma.
"The lure of jobs in the United States continues to be one of the primary factors fueling illegal immigration," said Leigh Winchell, special agent in charge of the ICE Office of Investigations in Seattle. "ICE remains committed to investigating cases where the evidence shows employment laws are being violated."

Northwest Detention Center Examples of HISTORY of Abuses:

1. Food illnesses at GEO detention facility.
Hundreds of detainees fell sick from apparent food poisoning at the Northwest Detention Center near Tacoma, Washington. Northwest is a 1,000 bed immigrant detention center owned by GEO, a private corporation that holds contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for facilities across the country.

2. Public document showdown averted
Posted by Scott Fontaine @ 03:18:06 pm
A court battle over open records and the company that operates the Northwest Detention Center has been avoided. The GEO Group, which has operated the 1,030-bed Northwest Detention Center since 2004, filed a petition in Pierce County Superior Court last week to block the release of several documents requested through public-disclosure laws.

3. Quarantine ends for most at Northwest Detention Center

The quarantine of more than 900 of the 1,000 immigrants held at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma ends Wednesday, six days after a detainee fell ill with chickenpox and federal officials locked down the facility. Court cases for immune detainees resumed Tuesday, and deportations start again as early as Wednesday, said Lorie Dankers, a spokeswoman with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

4. Report: Conditions at the NW Detention Center are inhumane and violate international law and the U.S. Constitution A Report on Human Rights Violations at the Northwest Detention Center (NWDC) confirm human rights abuses are taking place at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility on the tide flats of Tacoma.

GEO Group History of Abuses:

The GEO Group is an international corporation that operates prisons around the country and is frequently in the news for its abuse of prisoners in its care resulting in many preventable deaths.

Janet Napolitano and Congressional Hispanic Caucus to discuss Immigration Reform on Thursday

Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) are meeting with Janet Napolitano tomorrow (2/26/09) to discuss Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR). They are bringing reports and statistics of past Immigration abuses and are asking Napolitano to provide her planned Immigration agenda.
The Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) recently completed a Nation-wide Unity Tour listening to testimony from families impacted by our nation’s broken immigration system.
the hill.com reports:
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano will have her first private meeting with members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) on Thursday, a number of sources have confirmed.The meeting will be in the Capitol, and will be Napolitano’s second straight day on Capitol Hill. On Wednesday, the secretary testified before the House Homeland Security Committee for the first time as the head of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
Immigration reform (CIR) is the top priority for the CHC, and members of the Hispanic Caucus have a number of questions about the former Arizona governor’s commitment to enacting quick changes to strict immigration enforcement policies put in place under the Bush administration, which the CHC has told President Obama they want reformed. Senior leaders in the CHC were said to be particularly curious about a number of review and assessment directives that Napolitano has called for already. In testimony that she submitted to the Homeland Security Committee in advance of her Wednesday appearance, Napolitano said she has already requested “directives to assess the status of the Department’s worksite enforcement programs, fugitive alien operations, immigration detention facilities, removal programs and the 287(g) program.”
Since the Bush administration undertook a much tougher immigration enforcement strategy — culminating in a number of high-profile workplace raids that netted hundreds of undocumented workers, many of whom were deported almost immediately — the CHC has pushed back with a multifaceted attempt to curtail the raids, and is currently on a nationwide tour designed to highlight the impact such raids are having on Latino families and communities. Sources said members of the CHC are looking for specific answers from Napolitano about whether she plans to roll back such Bush initiatives or is leaning toward keeping them in place. Hispanic members of Congress also want to talk to Napolitano about Obama’s choice of her deputy secretary to lead the Immigration and Customs Enforcement arm of DHS, John Morton. Morton, according to a DHS press release, has “lengthy experience in immigration enforcement and criminal prosecution … [Morton has been] responsible for the prosecution of criminal cases and the development of DOJ [Department of Justice] policy in the areas of immigration crime.”
The CHC has taken issue with what it perceives as the over-criminalization of illegal immigration. Along these lines, they plan to question Napolitano about a February report from the Migration Policy Institute, which found that the DHS's “federal fugitive operations program, established to locate, apprehend and remove fugitive aliens who pose a threat to the community, has instead focused chiefly on arresting unauthorized immigrants without criminal convictions.”