Immigrant Rights News - Week of February 2-6, 2009

Immigrant Rights News – Week of February 2-6, 2009

 

1. Two on Sherriff Joe Arpaio:

A. “Parade of Injustice”

B. La Frontera Times: Arpaio dando circo, maroma y teatro…” El sheriff Arpaio está usando a los inmigrantes indocumentados para publicitarse

 

2. Los Angeles Times: No longer rounding up just fugitive immigrants

 

3. New York Times: Target of Immigrant Raids Shifted

 

4. Americas Program Report: NAFTA's Dangerous Security Agenda

 

5. New America Media: Immigration Detention Reform Moves to Front Burner

 

6. Orlando Sentinel: Los Angeles City Council OKs nearly $13M payout for police beatings at pro-immigration rally

 

 

 

<><><> 1A

 

“Parade of Injustice” video on Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s public humiliation and transfer of immigrants in his custody to a tent jail or concentration camp.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PP7AcZNwvhc

 

NOTE: The National Day Laborer Organizing Network is launching a national campaign this month to expose Arpaio’s immigration policing collaboration and state of siege he has imposed on Latino and immigrant communities in Maricopa County in Arizona.

 

<><><> 1B

 

La Frontera Times

http://www.lafronteratimes.com/indexrosarpaio.php

 

A Colorado Sheriff unveils new tactic...seizes tax records...using the law to scare others into breaking the law. New York Latino Leaders meet with Sen. Gillibrand and the don\’t cave! Orale! The new GOP Chairman suffers from serious delusions and denial, Fox lies and so do Lou Dobbs and Drudge, and from \”Cara a Cara\” in Los Angeles a video discussion on La Red de Odio y La Frontera Times. Y TAMBIEN Calle 13\”No Hay Nadie Como Tu\” and at Arte y Cultura the Dalai Lama, Buddist art y un mensaje de paz. The feature at Arte y Cultura focuses on women in wa…LA CIUDAD DE LAS DIOSAS.

 

All this and more at http://www.lafronteratimes.com/ Take a Look!

 

 

<><><> 2

 

Los Angeles Times

 

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-immigraids5-2009feb05,0,4055388.story

No longer rounding up just fugitive immigrants

A federal program shifted its focus to boost arrests, a report says, and is going after any undocumented workers.

 

By Anna Gorman

February 5, 2009

 

For more than five years, U.S. immigration authorities have touted the success of a national program aimed at arresting and deporting dangerous criminals and fugitives…. But new data released Wednesday showed that 73% of the nearly 97,000 people arrested by the fugitive operations teams between 2003 and early 2008 did not have criminal records….

 

<><><> 3

 

New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/04/us/04raids.html?scp=1&sq=Target%20of%20Immigrant%20Raids%20Shifted&st=cse

 

February 4, 2009

Target of Immigrant Raids Shifted

 

By NINA BERNSTEIN

The raids on homes around the country were billed as carefully planned hunts for dangerous immigrant fugitives, and given catchy names like Operation Return to Sender.

And they garnered bigger increases in money and staff from Congress than any other program run by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, even as complaints grew that teams of armed agents were entering homes indiscriminately.

But in fact, beginning in 2006, the program was no longer what was being advertised. Federal immigration officials had repeatedly told Congress that among more than half a million immigrants with outstanding deportation orders, they would concentrate on rounding up the most threatening — criminals and terrorism suspects.

 

<><><> 4

 

Americas Program Report

http://americas.irc-online.org/am/5813

 

NAFTA's Dangerous Security Agenda

 

Laura Carlsen | January 23, 2009

 

When the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was negotiated and signed in the early 90s, few people were thinking about its security implications. Environmentalists objected, fearing a corporate race to exploit natural resources and produce industrial wastes where environmental regulation and enforcement was weakest. Labor objected, arguing that companies would move jobs to where organized labor and workers' rights were most vulnerable. There was vague talk about improving trinational relations and promoting joint foreign policy agendas, but the goal of a broader North American alliance remained formally off the table in order to steer the agreement through a reluctant U.S. Congress.

 

The resulting pact was called a trade agreement, but is really a trade and investment agreement with significant changes in other areas important to transnational business, including expanded intellectual property protections. It was not until after the Bush administration came into power and the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 provided the rationale for adoption of the Bush National Security Doctrine that security issues took center stage in the regional integration model.

*

Recommended citation:

Laura Carlsen, "NAFTA's Dangerous Security Agenda," Americas Program Report (Washington, DC: Center for International Policy, January 23, 2009).

 

For More Information

 

A Primer on Plan Mexico

http://americas.irc-online.org/am/5204

 

Drug Trafficking, Violence and Repression

http://americas.irc-online.org/am/5218

 

North America Doesn't Exist

http://americas.irc-online.org/am/5343

 

Extending NAFTA's Reach

http://americas.irc-online.org/am/4497

 

Dissecting the North American Summit Joint Statement: Bush's Last Stand

http://americas.irc-online.org/am/5178

 

Time to Renegotiate NAFTA, Not Expand It

http://americas.irc-online.org/am/5175

 

"Deep Integration"-the Anti-Democratic Expansion of NAFTA

http://americas.irc-online.org/am/4276

 

 

<><><> 5

 

New America Media

Immigration Detention Reform Moves to Front Burner

via Of América by robvato on 2/2/09
http://ofamerica.wordpress.com/2009/02/02/immigration-detention-reform-moves-to-front-burner/

New America Media, Roberto Lovato, Posted: Feb 02, 2009

Guantanamo Bay isn't the only prison crisis that President Barack Obama will have to deal with. There's another crisis growing - in the many immigration detention centers carpeting the interior of the country. Long ignored by policymakers because they make up the politically lethal combination of immigration and prison reform, calls for major restructuring of the immigration detention system may soon become unavoidable. The death of German immigrant Guido Newbrough in a Virginia detention center has pushed the issue to the front burner, helped along by incessant calls for change from advocates like Gil Velazquez.

<><><> 6

 

Orlando Sentinel

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-may-day-melee,0,3269137.story

 

Los Angeles City Council OKs nearly $13M payout for police beatings at pro-immigration rally

 

By Associated Press

9:34 AM EST, February 5, 2009

 

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The Los Angeles City Council approved a $12.85 million payout Wednesday for demonstrators and bystanders who were beaten by police at a pro-immigration rally, one of the largest settlements ever for Police Department misconduct.

 

 

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