Immigration :

LATINO YOUTH DEFINES DREAM ACT AS A DE FACTO MILITARY DRAFT

 

We write this statement to raise our voices as Latino youth working and living in the Bronx, New York in opposition to the DREAM ACT as it stands. We demand that we return to our original DREAM ACT that had a community service option instead of a military one. The military has been losing their numbers due to the multiple wars the US has begun. The DREAM ACT would hand us over on a platter to fight these unjust wars. The DREAM ACT has been warped over the years to draft Latino youth into the military, as they need more and more soldiers to fight their wars.

 

We have been living under harsh conditions. Our communities have been historically underprivileged, with militarized streets, schools that seem more like jails than educational institutions, and poverty that pushes people to desperation and sadness. We have grown up with the trauma of having our family members and friends detained, jailed, and deported. But we are strong and determined, so we keep onwards. We have stood next to our parents as they worked as street vendors, as they were ticketed, arrested, and sometimes assaulted by police for trying to make a living. We, as youth, have also been ticketed and arrested alongside our parents. We have come to understand what it is to be humiliated and then stand and fight for what is right, what is principled, what is just. Our parents’ unrelenting strength to fight for us and their rights have taught us to always stand up for what is right and never sell out.

 

We have asked ourselves “Is the DREAM ACT an advantage or disadvantage for us as immigrant youth?” Many of us were excited about the possibility of getting documents and finally being able to be recognized as human beings, be able to get a job, an education, and help our families. Along with our teachers and mentors we delved into community organizing and becoming politically conscious. We began learning about our history and our people’s resistance. We then expanded to other cultures and histories and began to appreciate them. We marched side by side with youth from all over the world including South Asia and the Middle East. We saw that within our hearts there was no difference, and enjoyed each other’s company and diversity. Our spirits were momentarily paralyzed when we began learning about the effects of war and how their families and communities had been destroyed. We began to ask ourselves “How can we stop these wars, how can we help?” Our political education allowed us to see through the military propaganda and the army recruiters in our blocks and schools. Speaking to our peers we saw how the military was using them to fight wars that didn’t concern us and killed our friends. This forced us to look at the DREAM ACT a lot closer.

 

THE DREAM ACT REVEALED

 

In order to qualify for the DREAM ACT you have to have migrated before the age of 16 and have proof of residence in the United States for 5 consecutive years since the date of arrival. Also, you have to have graduated from high school or have a GED. This would eliminate many of our older youth, those that did not finish high school, and recent arrivals. You must then complete the following:

 

1. Serve two years in the military, or;

2. Finish two years of bachelor’s program or higher degree in the US.

 

What happened to the community service option that the original DREAM ACT contained? Why did our supposed advocates allow for the removal of the community service option? Was it because it became in this form the DREAM ACT became winnable? At what expense?

 

Two Years of College

 

The first option on the DREAM ACT is to go to school for at least 2 years; this is great for people who can afford the high tuition rates. But what about those of us who do not have enough money for the tuition, the books, and personal expenses? Also let’s not forget about our families who have more than one undocumented child who needs to go to school to get their papers.

 

DREAM ACT proponents say that most people will not go to the military, that they can afford school if we work. Unfortunately those folks are distanced from our realities and don’t understand our economic hardships. We broke down the cost of each year in school without the aid of Pell Grants or Financial Aid for attending 2 years of a 4 years University; our calculations were the following for a university in Ohio, which does not allow in-state tuition for undocumented students:

 

Cleveland State University: Out of State

12 Credit Hours – $7,884.00 X 2 = 1 Year = $15,768.00 X 2 years = $31,536.00

Expenses for Students Living at Home with their Parents = $6,568.00 X 2 years = 13,136.00

GRAND TOTAL = $44,672.00

 

Only 10 states allow for undocumented students to pay for in-state tuition. The majority of undocumented youth would have to pay amounts as stated in the example above. We are lucky to be in New York as it is one of the states that allow undocumented youth to apply for in-state tuition. At the same time we understand that by accepting the terms under the DREAM ACT most youth would not have the same opportunity we do here in New York. Undocumented youth in states like North Carolina, Virginia, Illinois, Ohio, New Mexico would be forced to take the military option in large numbers as they would not be able to pay the high prices of education. For this reason we do not support the DREAM ACT.

 

2 Years of Military Requirement

 

We, the VAMOS UNIDOS YOUTH, do not support the DREAM ACT due to the military component. The fact that it has been introduced as a defense appropriation bill adds insult to injury.  The DREAM ACT is a de facto military draft, forcing undocumented youth to fight in unjust wars in exchange for the recognition as human beings, a Green Card. This is a trick by the politicians, Democratic Party, and DC immigration advocates. The same way many supposed “advocates” for immigrant rights sold out the community with Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR), they now sell us out with the DREAM ACT. We stand against any militarization- whether it is of the border, our communities, or our status. We will not kill innocent people in exchange for Green Cards. Our parents have firmly stated in their fight for immigration reform, “We will not accept papers tainted with the blood of our people still crossing the border and dying,” in regards to CIR and it’s militarization of the border component. We say the same “We will not be used for the wars of the corporations and the rich in any part of the world in exchange of blood-stained immigration papers.”

 

            We make a call out to all community organizations and allies to stand firmly on what is principled, against the DREAM ACT if it contains the military provision. Our fight will not be won in one or two years. We are prepared to organize our communities and struggle for many years. We cannot negotiate out our lives, our dignity, and the lives of others. We must rethink our strategies and take control away from the DC immigration advocates which have shown us they don’t have our interest. They have watered down good legislation at a very high cost to the community. Our communities need to decide and take control. We stand with our brothers and sisters affected by wars; we feel their pain and desperation. We will not be used to decimate other countries and their people. Thus, we stand together against the DREAM ACT with the militarization component and fight for what is principled, even if it takes us a very long time.

 In Solidarity,

VAMOS UNIDOS YOUTH

On this day immigrants and their allies will march across the iconic Brooklyn Bridge in solidarity with Arizona in the spirit of bridging borders and uniting cultures to demand:
•
Policies that affirm Family Unity, Due Process and Fairness;
•
That local law enforcement in Arizona and across the country focus on protecting our communities, not destroying them; and
•
That President Obama and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) immediately halt the Criminal Alien Program, Secure Communities, 287(g), and all partnerships between ICE and local law enforcement
SPONSORED BY: Churches United to Save and Heal (CUSH), Families for Freedom (FFF), American Friends Service Committee?NJ (AFSC), New York New Sanctuary Coalition (NYNSC), Immigrant Defense Project (IDP), Wind of the Spirit, The Black Institute, & Northern Manhattan Coalition for Immigrant Rights (NMCIR)
WHEN:
Thursday, July 29, 2010 at 9:30am
WHERE:
Gather at Cadman Plaza, Brooklyn at 9:30am to March (take A/C trains to High Street, OR 2/3/4/5/R trains to Borough Hall) and assemble at 11:30am Foley Square, Manhattan for Rally (4/5 to Brooklyn Bridge OR N/R/W to City hall)
WHO IS MARCHING:
YOU, all people of conscience who want to raise their voice for immigrant justice
FOR MORE INFORMATION ON HOW TO JOIN THE MARCH ON JULY 29th CONTACT:
Families for Freedom (646?290?5551), Churches United to Save and Heal (718?469?8900), New York New Sanctuary Coalition (646?395?2925)
DOWN WITH SB1070!
Stop Deportation NOW!

 

<http://usacbi.wordpress.com/2010/07/01/open-letter-in-support-of-the-boycott-of-arizona-by-the-u-s-campaign-for-the-academic-and-cultural-boycott-of-israel/>

27 June 2010

The U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI)
endorses and supports the call for Boycott of Arizona on account of its
manifestly racist laws, HB1070 and SB 2281.

SB1070 calls for police officers to require documentation from people to
establish resident status. The law essentially requires police to engage in
racial profiling and discrimination on the basis of appearance.1 SB 2281
outlaws the teaching of ethnic studies in Arizona schools. It builds a
pretext for the censorship of books and suppression of historical texts
which are perceived by the state as political literature.2

USACBI calls attention to the similar plight of Palestinians in occupied
Palestine.3 Analogous to Arizona’s policies, Palestinian narratives are
suppressed by the state of Israel, including a new piece of legislation
outlawing the commemoration of an nakba, the ethnic cleansing of Palestine
in 1948.4 Israel also requires identification papers of Palestinians in
order to engage in routine and essential daily tasks. These ID cards, which
not all Palestinians are granted, forces many Palestinians from the diaspora
to be foreigners in their own land and often denies them entry into their
own country or results in expulsion from it.5

Palestinians, like many Mexicans and Mexican Americans, are forced to resist
borders that were imposed on them by foreign powers. In this context we also
call attention to stark similarities between Israel’s Apartheid Wall and the
U.S. Apartheid Wall.6 Israel’s Apartheid Wall confiscates Palestinian water
and land for the sole benefit of illegal Israeli settlements, and strangles
the lives and livelihoods of Palestinians.7

The two walls have much in common – not only because both are built on land
that was occupied by conquest, that displace indigenous people, and that
separate families, but also because these walls are built by the same
colonial forces. The Israeli firm, Elbit Systems, played a leading role in
the construction of both walls.8 Naomi Klein warned that the U.S. Apartheid
Wall (which the U.S., like Israel, calls a “fence”) will have similar
consequences to the one on Palestinian land:

In April 2007, special immigration agents with the U.S. Department of
Homeland Security, working along the Mexican border, went through an
intensive eight-day training course put on by the Golan Group. The Golan
Group was founded by ex-Israeli Special Forces officers and boasts more than
3,500 employees in seven countries. “Essentially we put an Israeli security
spin on our procedures,” Thomas Pearson, the company’s head of operations,
explained of the training course, which covered everything from hand-to-hand
combat to target practice to “getting proactive with their SUV.” The Golan
Group, now based in Florida but still marketing its Israeli advantage, also
produces X-ray machines, metal detectors, and rifles. In addition to many
governments and celebrities, its clients include ExxonMobil, Shell, Texaco,
Levi’s, Sony, Citigroup, and Pizza Hut.”9

The U.S. Wall will further segregate border communities, break families
apart, and increase the number of deaths on the border as migrant workers
are pushed deeper into the desert.

Both walls protect imperial interests, not those of indigenous people whose
rights are violated by these states and their structures. Like Israeli
settlers, militia organizations like the Minute Men have found legitimacy
for attacking economic refugees crossing the border. These armed, racist
groups find their counterparts in groups of Israeli settlers shooting at
Palestinian farmers attempting to access their own land, visit families, or
travel between home and work.

USACBI expresses its solidarity with organizations that strive for equality
and justice of oppressed indigenous peoples, particularly the move to
boycott Arizona until it reverses these racist laws. We call on others to
join us in the boycott of Arizona10 and to build divestment campaigns
targeting companies like Elbit that profit from the oppression of indigenous
people on stolen land whether in the U.S. or Palestine.11

USACBI
www.usacbi.org
uscom4acbi[at]gmail.com

1 Guy Adams, “Arizona boycotted over ‘Nazi’ purge of migrants.” The
Independent. 14 May 2010.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/arizona-boycotted-over-nazi-purge-of-migrants-1973028.html.
http://www.altoarizona.com/about.html.

2 Jessica Calefati, “Arizona Bans Ethnic Studies.” Mother Jones. 12 May
2010. http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/05/ethnic-studies-banned-arizona.

3 “Solidarity Letter from Mexico to the Palestinian People.” Palestine
Monitor. 20 April 2008.
http://www.palestinemonitor.org/spip/spip.php?article377.

4 http://www.badil.org/en/press-releases/135-2010/2179-press-en-18.

5 http://www.righttoenter.ps/.

6 “Death on the U.S.-Mexico Border.” Socialist Worker. 7 March 2009.
http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=17252 and Jimmy Johnson,
“Palestine-Mexico Border.” Tadamon. 3 May 2010.
http://www.tadamon.ca/post/6394.

7 http://stopthewall.org/internationallaw/1001.shtml

8 http://www.wri-irg.org/de/node/9663.

9 Naomi Klein, *The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism*. (New
York: Metropolitan Books, 2007), 438.

10 Dave Zirin, “Who’s afraid of a boycott?” Socialist Worker. 12 May 2010.
http://socialistworker.org/2010/05/12/whos-afraid-of-a-boycott. Sean
Michaels, “Rage Against the Machine Lead Arizona Boycott.” Common Dreams 27
May 2010. http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/05/27-3.

11 Adri Nieuwhof, “Scandanavian financial institutions drop Elbit due to BDS
pressure.” The Electronic Intifada. 19 February 2010.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article11084.shtml.

 

 

Comprehensive=Inclusive Immigration Reform

US Immigration law is based upon the principle of family unification, and when an American citizen or legal permanent resident falls in love with someone from another country, they are allowed to petition to bring their fiancé or spouse into the US.

 

This does not if you’re gay or lesbian and I learned this first-hand when I met my partner.

 

I’m a US citizen, born and raised in New York. My grandparents came to the US as immigrants and that was about as familiar as I was with our immigration laws – completely ignorant of how next-to-impossible it is to come here legally.

 

After discovering there was no legal way for me to bring my partner here, I moved to Europe in order for us to be together. A year later, a former employer contacted me and offered me a job back in the US. After lengthy e-mail and phone call discussions, they agreed to sponsor a training visa for my partner, good for 18 months, so he could move with me. Shortly after arriving in the US, our attorney advised us to approach the employer to file for a skilled worker visa, which would give us more time here and a possible path to a green card. The employer agreed to do this, but we had to cover the expenses (both visas totaled over $10,000).

 

Later that year, we travelled back to Europe and received the skilled worker visa, and then a few months later, the company almost went bankrupt. They let my partner know his position was being eliminated, and after consulting with the attorney, discovered this meant we’d have to leave again (once a work visa is ended through job loss, the employee becomes undocumented). It felt like the whole world came crashing down that day. We rushed to find another job for my partner, and luckily, miraculously, within a week we did, and they agreed to sponsor another visa and possibly a green card down the line.

 

After this, everything was moving along great. We bought an apartment together in Westchester and were enjoying the life we were building here with family and friends. Then the economy took a turn for the worst and my partner’s new employer notified him that they would be eliminating his job. Once again, our world was turned upside down. Imagine being told you’d have to sell your home, leave your family and friends, and not know when – if ever – you’d be able to return together. It felt like we were screaming in a vacuum and nobody was listening.

 

When we explained all of this to the employer, they agreed to reduce my partner’s hours and allow him to search for another job.

 

Forcing gay and lesbian Americans into exile in order to stay with the person they love hurts American families, businesses and communities. America is losing talented, tax-paying citizens, and American companies are losing talented employees because they are forced to move abroad to keep their family together.

 

 

The US Government discriminates against gay and lesbian couples by not allowing us to sponsor our foreign-born partners or spouses for residency the way straight couples can. No matter how long we’ve been together, no matter if we are married or in a civil union or domestic partnership in any of the States or Countries that grant this right – we are not afforded this basic dignity in the US. At least 19 other countries provide equal immigration benefits to gay and lesbian couples, including most of our closest allies.

 

Like many other gay and lesbian bi-national couples, we are forced to ‘visa-juggle’ to stay here legally. If we were a straight couple, all we’d have to do is get engaged or married to gain permanence legally.

 

The Uniting American Families Act (UAFA – H.R. 1024/S. 424) would end this discrimination and would allow me to sponsor my partner for immigration, with the same process, procedures and penalties applied to straight couples – including imprisonment for up to five years and a $250,000 fine for fraud.

 

The UAFA does not redefine marriage and it would not repeal the Defense of Marriage Act law. We simply want the same opportunity to prove that our family deserves to stay together.

 

Comprehensive immigration reform is not comprehensive unless it includes all families – including gay and lesbian families. We are hoping Congress remembers this when they draft the next immigration reform bill.

 

To learn more, please visit: www.ImmigrationEquality.org

 

Thank you,

Tom

[email protected]

Citizenship Summit in Albany

By Patrick Young, Esq. CARECEN May 14, 2009 9:33 AM

I went to the New York Immigration Coalition’s Citizenship Summit yesterday. The talk of the Summit was the move by many New York Congressional Representatives who had been lukewarm supporters of immigration reform over to the “firmly committed” column. Now this does not mean that we are well on our way to reform. The other side is organizing using the Tea Parties and other conservative gatherings to identify supporters. In fact, Chung-Wha Hong of the Coalition said that the anti-immigrant groups have a list of 900,000 supporters they think they can mobilize against our push for change. She did say that we are also getting better organized and noted that a few weeks ago the immigrant rights groups generated 20,000 electronic messages to Congress calling for immigration reform.

David Hansell, Commissioner of the state’s agency dealing with immigrants, spoke of the need to confront anti-immigrant hate crimes, particularly in Suffolk County. The state is going to initiate a campaign against bias crimes like the killing of Marcelo Lucero. Hansell also debunked the rhetoric of the anti-immigrant movement which portrays immigrants as a drain on New York’s economy. “This is contrary to the facts”, he said, adding “it is in our best interests to continue to welcome immigrants and encourage their integration”. He said that, in spite of the current climate, New York State expects to receive 100,000 new immigrants every year as well as 5,000 refugees.

He didn’t just talk about citizenship. Hansell helped initiate a new state program to assist the victims of human trafficking and he is looking at ways to improve services for trafficking victims while the cases against their traffickers are going through the legal system. In the short time the program has been in place, 55 trafficking victims have been helped. New York is one of the few states with a law that not only provides penalties for traffickers, but also provides services for victims. This was a law that the New York Immigration Coalition helped guide through the legislative process and that local groups like CARECEN and Catholic Charities pushed.

Larry Frank of New York State’s Bureau of Refugee and Immigrant Affairs (BRIA), one of the really great civil servants in Albany, introduced a panel of people from Utica. The first speaker called Utica the City that Loves Refugees. Utica, like many upstate cities, has faced tough economic times over the last thirty years. At the beginning of the city’s economic slide, its political leadership made the decision to try to arrest the loss of population, which has killed places like Buffalo and Rochester, by entering into an agreement with the Federal government to resettle refugees. The small city of 60,000 people is now home to 13,000 refugees, one of the highest proportions of any city in the country. The Mohawk Valley Refugee Center helps 400 refugees each year prepare for American citizenship. Elizabeth Bowers from ConMed, a medical manufacturing firm, said that when her workers get sworn in as citizens, their co-workers and supervisors often go along to support them. She said that it really expands the horizons of the native-born workers to have co-workers from all over the world.

Larry Frank’s boss, Tom Hart of BRIA, gave the Summit participants the good news that among the seven states with the largest immigrant populations, New York has the highest percentage of immigrants who are eligible for citizenship who actually become citizens. This has to have something to do with the State’s own efforts to fund community groups that prepare immigrants for citizenship.

Chung-Wha Hong emphasized that citizenship “is a piece of a broader immigrant integration agenda”. She said that “we need to ensure that immigrants are contributing their maximum to our state”.

Anti-immigrant politicians may cling to a view of the foreign-born population as a mass of “illegal aliens” who can be targetted for political points and who are too tame and powerless to strike back. But they are missing the point. Immigrants are becoming citizens in record numbers and they are voting in unprecedented percentages. And they are reading the newspapers to find out who their political friends are.

WESPAC is a member of the Hudson Valley Community Coalition that is working together to encourage immigration solutions that include and work for everyone, to expand the conversation about our diverse community and the value it brings to the people of the Hudson Valley.

hvccoalition.org/