enlarge

There really does appear to be a lot of momentum for repealing Alabama's draconian new immigration law, now that they've seen and felt the economic and social consequences:

Thousands gathered outside the historic 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama yesterday to demand the repeal of the state’s harsh anti-immigration law, HB 56. Religious, community and civil rights leaders, as well as a special Congressional delegation, urged state legislators to bring an end to Alabama’s immigration law—a law which continues to slow state businesses, separate families and drive immigrants from the state. The Congressional delegation also held an ad hoc hearing at Birmingham City Hall to hear how the controversial law is effecting state residents, especially the Latino and immigrant communities where, according to Rep. Luis Gutierrez, “the feeling of danger and despair is palpable.” One Congressional member, Rep. Al Green of Texas, commented that the law “deserves to be placed on the trash heap of history.”

During yesterday’s hearing, Birmingham Mayor William Bell told 11 Congressional members that Alabama’s law “smacks of apartheid and Jim Crow laws,” places financial burdens on cities and could force police officers to employ racial profiling. Echoing the mayor’s economic concerns, Rep. Raul Grijalva of Arizona forewarned that much like Arizona’s SB1070, Alabama’s immigration law “is going to hurt the economy and the social fabric of the state.”

Continue reading »

You know, we progressives like to rely on rational appeals a lot. And we're often frustrated when we discover that they're not working -- while Republican crooks and liars prosper with their often irrational appeals to people's emotions.

Thus, in the immigration debate, we can recite the whole litany of facts debunking the people -- like those in Arizona who passed and are now promoting its police-state immigration law, SB1070 -- who are trying to convince Americans that Latino immigrants are bringing with them a wave of crime. And you know what? The lizard-brain appeal often wins out.

We can point out till we're blue in the face that:

-- Despite the defenders of SB1070's claims that the law will brook no racial profiling, all Latino travelers from out of state -- including American citizens -- will be at risk should they choose to travel to Arizona if the law takes effect.

-- The law gives federal enforcement powers to local authorities -- something previously unseen in law enforcement.

-- Arizonans have been inverting reality when it comes to the levels and nature of immigrant-related border crime, conflating without evidence a handful of cases involving white victims while completely ignoring even more startling incidents involving white vigilantes and Latino victims.

-- The bill and its ensuing controversy has proven a major nexus for the mainstreaming of the racist right's white-supremacist agenda.

SB1070's defenders like to point to its popularity -- and yes, we can just as easily point out that, historically speaking, depriving the rights of others in this country has always been a popular proposition. But that's the rational argument.

We need to realize that we can make appeals that are both rational and emotional. Which is where this new video by the Black Eyed Peas' Taboo comes in.

Because really, the issues around SB1070 are very simple: right and wrong, just and unjust. And sometimes there's no better way to make that point than with a simple, great, heartfelt song.

And this is exactly that. The video features some guest vocals by Dolores Huerta, Eva Longoria, Oscar De La Hoya, Shakira & Juanes. It builds off the familiar riff of "One People" and becomes its own song.

Indeed, lots of musicians are joining this cause, and it can only help. Recall that Los Lobos has already made a statement of its own.

So while we're waiting for Judge Benson to rule on the Justice Department's suit to block the enactment of SB1070, here's something to remind us that sometimes the appeals from the heart can be the most powerful.

FWIW, Taboo was interviewed on MSNBC today about the video:

Continue reading »

Gov. Brewer: We cannot afford all this illegal immigration and everything that comes with it, everything from the crime to the drugs to the kidnapping and the extortion and the be-headings...

Governor Jan Brewer and the John McCains of Arizona are pushing the most disgusting lies about border violence to justify their race hating immigration law. In republican circles, if you repeat a lie long enough they believe it to be fact. I mean, how can any poll of Americans consider President Obama to be a socialist? But, that's conservatism for you. Jan Brewer is doing her best to match Sarah Palin, Sharron Angle and Rand Paul in her effusive lying about illegal immigration violence.

Washington Monthly:

We talked a week ago about Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (R) trying to defend her anti-immigrant policies, prompting her to argue that immigrants entering the U.S. illegally are responsible for "beheadings." All available evidence suggests Brewer just made it up, and her office hasn't been able to substantiate the claim.

But Brewer seems to be leading a larger crusade among Arizona Republicans, making it seem as if their state is on the verge of immigrant-based anarchy, overrun with immigrant drug trafficking, kidnappings, and police shootings. The more the rest of the country hears about these nightmare scenarios, the more they're inclined to support measures like the odious Arizona immigration law.

Dana Milbank explained today, "Last year gave us death panels and granny killings, but compared with the nonsense justifying the immigration crackdown, the health-care debate was an evening at the Oxford Union Society."

Two months ago, the Arizona Republic published an exhaustive report that found that, according to statistics from the FBI and Arizona police agencies, crime in Arizona border towns has been "essentially flat for the past decade." For example, "In 2000, there were 23 rapes, robberies and murders in Nogales, Ariz. Last year, despite nearly a decade of population growth, there were 19 such crimes." The Pima County sheriff reported that "the border has never been more secure."

FBI statistics show violent crime rates in all of the border states are lower than they were a decade ago -- yet Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) reports that the violence is "the worst I have ever seen." President Obama justifiably asserted last week that "the southern border is more secure today than any time in the past 20 years," yet Rush Limbaugh judged the president to be "fit for the psycho ward" on the basis of that remark.

The "beheadings" lie was amusing in its hyperbole, but we're reaching a point at which nearly every claim made by Arizona Republicans and their allies is simply, demonstrably wrong. Violence from Mexican drug cartels is spreading north? There's no evidence of that. Phoenix, according to McCain, is the "No. 2 kidnapping capital of the world"? No, it's not. Most immigrants from Mexico are drug mules? That's wrong, too. Most law-enforcement shootings are at the hands of undocumented immigrants? Total bunk.

John McCain embarrassed himself during the general election when he sucked up to such right wing extremists as Pastor John Hagee. The very people that he once considered "lunatics" when he ran for president in 2000:

McCain, who had been courting the endorsement for over a year, said that he was “very honored by Pastor John Hagee’s endorsement.”

Demonstrating how wildly out of the American religious and political mainstream Hagee’s views are, McCain’s acceptance of Hagee’s endorsement was condemned today by conservative William Donohue, president of the Catholic League. Calling Hagee a “bigot,” Donahue said the right-wing pastor has waged “an unrelenting war against the Catholic Church” by “calling it ‘The Great Whore,’ an ‘apostate church,’ the ‘anti-Christ,’ and a ‘false cult system.’”

If a far right religious zealot like Bill Donohue was appalled, what does that say about John McCain? And why is he a weekly guest on all the Sunday Talk Shows? I predict the ex-maverick will be pushed into the Aztlan theory very soon. Maybe Brewer and McCain will appear at the next white supremacist rally put together by Barbara Coe.

Well, we were hoping to hear this news -- and figuring it was likely -- but later this afternoon, it will become official:

Feds to file lawsuit over Arizona immigration law

The U.S. Justice Department is filing a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Arizona's new law targeting illegal immigrants, setting the stage for a clash between the federal government and state over the nation's toughest immigration crackdown.

The planned lawsuit was confirmed to The Associated Press by a Justice Department official with knowledge of the plans. The official didn't want to be identified before a public announcement planned for later Tuesday.

The lawsuit will argue that Arizona's new measure requiring state and local police to question and possibly arrest illegal immigrants during the enforcement of other laws, like traffic stops, usurps federal authority.

The Washington Post:

The lawsuit, which three sources said could be filed as early as Tuesday, will invoke for its main argument the legal doctrine of "preemption," which is based on the Constitution's supremacy clause and says that federal law trumps state statutes. Justice Department officials believe that enforcing immigration laws is a federal responsibility, the sources said.

But the filing is likely to have a civil rights component as well, arguing that the Arizona law would lead to police harassment of U.S. citizens and foreigners, said the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the government has not announced its plans. President Obama has warned that the law could violate citizens' civil rights, and Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. has expressed concern that it could drive a wedge between police and immigrant communities.

The law is obviously unconstitutional. But then, if the latest poll numbers are right, a large majority of Arizonans don't care what the Constitution says.

At least, when it says things they don't like. Bet they all love watching those Glenn Beck shows on the Founding Fathers, though.

DOWNLOADS: (549)

PLAYS: (1267)

Embed

The ACLU raised all kinds of hackles the other day from defenders of Arizona's police-state immigration law, SB1070, when it issued a travel warning giving all out-of-state Latinos a heads up about the potential problems they face if they travel there:

The nation's top civil liberties group on Wednesday issued travel alerts for Arizona, saying the state's new law cracking down on illegal immigrants could lead to racial profiling and warrantless arrests.

American Civil Liberties Union affiliates in Arizona, New Mexico and 26 other states put out the warnings in advance of the Fourth of July weekend. The Arizona chapter has received reports that law enforcement officers are already targeting some people even though the law doesn't take effect until July 29, its executive director said.

The alerts are designed to teach people about their rights if police stop and question them.

The Arizona law requires police, while enforcing other laws, to question a person's immigration status if officers have a reasonable suspicion that the person is in the country illegally. It also makes it a state crime for legal immigrants to not carry their immigration documents and bans day laborers and people who seek their services from blocking traffic on streets.

Attorneys defending the law against constitutional challenges filed by the ACLU and others argue that the Legislature amended it to strengthen restrictions against using race as the basis for questioning by police. Five lawsuits are pending in federal court, and the U.S. Justice Department is believed to be preparing a legal challenge.

Despite the legislative action, the ACLU still believes that officers will inappropriately target minorities.

"We have a long history of racial profiling in this state, and this is basically going to really exacerbate that problem," said Alessandra Soler Meetze, executive director of the ACLU of Arizona.

The story has since been a hot topic at Fox News, where they've been searching up anybody who will say unkind things about the ACLU. Stuart Varney, filling in for Neil Cavuto on Your World on Fox yesterday, decided to ask Democratic Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick of Arizona's 1st District about the advisory. And though Kirkpatrick opposes SB1070, she thinks the travel advisory is a "bad idea" -- just like the various boycotts of the state that erupted after the law was passed.

But Kirkpatrick doesn't explain why it's a bad idea, except to suggest that it will hurt innocent Arizonans (her same rationale for opposing the boycotts). What both she and Varney -- and for that matter, the Associated Press story -- neglected to explain to their audiences was that, if and when SB1070 is enacted, Latino American citizens who travel to Arizona will need to produce more than just their drivers licenses to prove their citizenship.

Radio host Mark Levine made this point clearly and succinctly to Laura Ingraham the other night when she was filling in on The O'Reilly Factor:

DOWNLOADS: (271)

PLAYS: (1920)

Embed

Levine: Certainly, a month from now, if this law goes into effect, all kinds of Latino American citizens may be in danger and I think what they're doing is they're telling people --

Ingraham: In danger?

Levine: Absolutely. Look, Laura, do you have --

Ingraham: How are they in danger? If they're legally in the United States, how are they in danger?

Levine: I'll explain. SB1070, the Arizona law, says if you're not carrying an Arizona drivers license, you can be stopped, and you can be arrested.

Ingraham: No profiling.

Levine: Let's say you're from New Mexico, or Utah, or Nevada, or any of the other fifteen states that don't require you to be a citizen in order to have a drivers license. I don't have an Arizona drivers license! Luckily for me, I don't look Latino, but if I go to Arizona without a drivers license, they can stop me.

You'll notice that Ingraham has no reply except to say that the law is popular anyway. (Yeah, we noticed that. So what?)

We explored this point in some depth previously:

Continue reading »

[Note: Video not really safe for work. But true.]

There was a funny smell to the way Arizona's police-state immigration law was passed -- especially the way factions with ties to white supremacists whipped up the phantom menace of a wave of crime associated with illegal immigration, focusing on the still-unsolved murder of a border rancher named Robert Krentz, even though officially the crime is being laid at the doorstep of Mexican drug cartels -- but even on that score, the truth is unclear at best. Notably, the Arizona Daily star reports that the chief suspect in the crime lives in the USA, not in Mexico.

Moreover, as Sam Seder acidly observes, the entire claim that crime has skyrocketed in Arizona is so much cattle offal. In fact, violent crime in Arizona has been steadily declining in recent years.

It kind of makes you wonder, doesn't it, why Arizonans -- and particularly the Arizona media, not to mention the national media -- never picked up on the case of Shawna Forde and her gang of rogue Minutemen, who invaded the home of a Latino family near the border in Arizona and shot them, killing the father and his 9-year-old daughter in cold blood as she pleaded for her life, and wounding the mother -- who managed to get her own gun and shoot back, wounding one of the killers.

Even more incredible, really, is that this 911 call from the wounded mother received so little attention at the time, much less that it did not become a focus of Arizonans fretting about violent crime:

DOWNLOADS: 5977

PLAYS: 18572

Embed

What brings all this into laser focus is what's actually happening right now on the Arizona border: Latinos (some of them American citizens bearing blood-soaked birth certificates) are being shot and killed, and it's beginning to appear that white vigilantes -- not Mexican drug gangs -- are doing the killing.

The shootings that first raised this likelihood occurred a little over a week ago in Pinal County, where two Latino men who called 911 pleading for help, saying they had been shot, were found dead near a locale where a sheriff's deputy had reportedly been wounded by drug smugglers on the border (though many questions remain about that incident as well).

Initially, as you can see both from the Arizona Republic report above, as well as from the local TV coverage, the crime was blamed on "drug smugglers."

But Jill Garvey at Imagine 2050 reports that something far more insidious may be involved:

In addition to shootings of Latinos by Border Patrol agents, there have been mysterious shootings and even murders in Arizona deserts. Troubling details are emerging that suggest these attacks on Latinos are not drug-related, as often reported, but the work of violent border vigilantes.

Continue reading »

If Bud Selig thought we were going to go away he was dead wrong. The good people of Boston showed up at a Red Sox game when the Diamondbacks showed up during an interleague game and voiced their outrage at the hate bill SB 1070.

Boston Globe:

The team has become mired in the vitriolic national debate over illegal immigration, a symbol of a state under fire for recently passing the most restrictive immigration law in the country. Protests have dogged them in Houston and Chicago, Los Angeles and Miami, and yesterday in Boston, where scores of demonstrators gathered behind the Green Monster before game time to rally against the law.

“It’s been happening everywhere we go,’’ said Miguel Montero, a 26-year-old catcher from Venezuela. “We don’t talk about it.’’

Yesterday’s demonstrators — about 200 people from labor unions, church groups, and immigrant advocates — crowded the sidewalk behind sausage stands to assail the law, which was passed in April and takes effect next month. The law makes it a state crime to be in the United States illegally and allows police to question those they suspect of being in the country without papers.

The protesters also spoke out against a proposed crackdown in Massachusetts, where lawmakers are debating budget amendments that would restrict illegal immigrants’ access to government services.

They said they fear that the Arizona law creates a climate for racial profiling, and they urged politicians to instead create a path to legal residency for the millions of immigrants in the United States illegally. They chanted and carried signs saying “We are all Arizona,’’ saying they were protesting the legislation, not the players.

“We’re not going to let a law like Arizona’s happen in Massachusetts,’’ said Yessenia Alfaro, director of organizing for the Chelsea Collaborative and a US citizen originally from El Salvador. “I believe in the American dream. This is my country and my children’s country. We came here for a better life.’’

I don't expect many Latino players to speak out like Adrian Gonzalez or Jorge Cantu did because they must be terrified what might happen to them so it's up to us to be their voice for them. Great job Boston. Our Big Coalition have made plans for our next phase in trying to get the 2011 All Star game moved out of Arizona and I'll let you know soon enough.

DOWNLOADS: (672)

PLAYS: (1014)

Embed

When reality catches up to Arizonans for their passage of their misbegotten police-state immigration law, it's going to be ugly and unpleasant. If other states really are considering passing similar laws, they will want to watch what happens to Arizona -- and they will inevitably wind up thinking twice.

We've pointed out previously -- as have the nation's police chiefs -- that the law is almost certain to in fact increase violent crime and dilute law enforcement's capacity to deal with it in Arizona.

And that will only be the first consequence (and a decidedly ironic one, since this law was sold as being a means to crack down on violent crime). The longest-lasting and most significant, however, will be the economic one: When the Latino workforce flees Arizona, their economy will suffer a dramatic downturn unlike any they've seen in decades.

It's already starting to happen:

Arizona’s hard-hitting immigration law is driving Hispanics out of the state weeks before the controversial law goes into effect.

Although concrete figures are not available, anecdotal evidence suggests Hispanics, both legal residents and illegal immigrants, are starting to flee.

Schools in Hispanic neighborhoods are reporting abnormal enrollment drops, and businesses that serve Hispanics also report that business is down, according to a USA Today report published Wednesday.

The report suggests that the immigration law is compounding demographic trends that have already significantly curtailed illegal immigration during the past two years. The bad economy has been the primary deterrent to many Hispanic immigrants seeking to enter Arizona, says Jeffrey Passel, a demographer at the Pew Hispanic Center in Washington.

“If you have a bad economy and a hostile environment, then that’s likely to cause people to think twice about coming, and possibly even to leave,” Mr. Passel says.

... Any loss, however, will be a loss for the Arizona economy, [David Gutierrez, a professor of immigration history, at the University of California San Diego] suggests.

“Latinos...are a highly flexible, highly exploitable work force, a buffer to economic downturns,” he says. “Many of the industries here – agriculture, service industries, low-end manufacturing, construction – are massively dependent on undocumented workers.

“If I were able to conduct an experiment and pay all of Arizona’s undocumented workers to not work for two weeks, the economy would come to a screeching, crashing halt instantaneously.”

This brought to mind a video forwarded to me from my friend Jimmy at McCranium, an Eastern Washington blog, of a Pasco immigration attorney named Tom Roach giving an informational talk to group of local citizens in Kennewick on May 29.

The talk is excellent, and I recommend watching the whole thing if you're interested. Because Roach effectively drills down to the heart of our dilemma with immigration -- namely, our current laws are so screwed up they have no chance of meeting the nation's economic needs or effectively dealing with natural immigration pressures that are driven by not just the economy, but the American Dream itself:

Continue reading »

Checking the box score, in the Major League Props: Hall & Oates hit a grand slam as they joined in on the "Sound Strike," tour, errr, I mean 'cancel tour' of musicians standing in solidarity and vocalizing their feelings against Kris Kobach's Arizona hate bill.

The Arizona Diamondbacks announced that Daryl Hall and John Oates have canceled their post-game concert at Chase Field that had been scheduled to follow a game against the Dodgers on July 2.

Hall and Oates issued the following statement:

"In addition to our personal convictions, we are standing in solidarity with the music community in our boycott of performing in Arizona at this time. We would like to emphasize that this has nothing to do with the management of the Arizona Diamondbacks, who have been professional and cooperative throughout our dealings with them. This is our response to a very specific action of the state."

Since both of us have backgrounds in the music industry, Howie Klein and I have been trying to persuade artists not to perform in Arizona since SB1070 was passed. Zack de la Rocha is really a hero here.

Howie has much more:

Other artists who have joined suit include Cypress Hill, Pitbull, Rage Against the Machine, Kanye West, Sonic Youth, Carlos Santana, Willie Nelson, Joe Satriani, Tenacious D, Shakira, Massive Attack and Hall & Oates (who were supposed to play at a July 2nd Diamondbacks game). Rage's Zack de la Rocha was organized an Arizona sound strike.

“Fans of our music, our stories, our films and our words can be pulled over and harassed every day because they are brown or black, or for the way they speak, or for the music they listen to,” de la Rocha said. “People who are poor like some of us used to be could be forced to live in a constant state of fear while just doing what they can to find work and survive. This law opens the door for them to be shaked down, or even worse, detained and deported while just trying to travel home from school, from home to work, or when they just roll out with their friends.”

The law-- SB 1070-- takes “racial profiling... to a whole new low,” the singer went on. “When Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat, they arrested her. As a result, people got together and said we are not going to ride the bus until they change the law... What if we got together, signed a collective letter saying, ‘We're not going to ride the bus,’ saying we are not going to comply. We are not going to play in Arizona.”

I'm not pushing for a strike against the Diamondbacks players, but Jerry Colangelo and their ownership has been complicit in helping pass SB 1070 and have been big-time Republican shills.

DOWNLOADS: (509)

PLAYS: (2625)

Embed

All day yesterday on Fox, the talking/shrieking heads were all worked up about some comments from Rep. Linda Sanchez about Arizona's SB1070:

A California congresswoman is pointing the finger at white supremacist groups, who she says have inspired Arizona's new law cracking down on illegal immigrants.

Rep. Linda Sanchez, D-Calif., told a Democratic Club on Tuesday that white supremacist groups are influencing lawmakers to adopt laws that will lead to discrimination.

"There's a concerted effort behind promoting these kinds of laws on a state-by-state basis by people who have ties to white supremacy groups," said the lawmaker, who is of Mexican descent. "It's been documented. It's not mainstream politics."

Oh my God! Somebody tossed a little Baby Ruth of Truth into the swimming pool!

Rick Folbaum told Jon Scott that Sanchez got her information from those notorious dispensers of inconvenient information, a left-wing blogger. (Hey, it coulda been C&L.) Megyn Kelly demanded of Clarissa Martinez of the National Council of La Raza that she denounce these horrendous words. And Sean Hannity didn't even bother to query into whether what Sanchez said might be accurate -- he just ran a quick segment sneering at her "Liberal Lie".

The problem they have is that it's in fact perfectly accurate. Sanchez may have gotten the information from a blogger, but it's more than likely the blog got its information from the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League -- both of which have, as Sanchez suggested, fully documented that a number of the leading "respectable" anti-immigration organizations are in fact fronts created by white-supremacist ideologues.

You see, Fox and everyone else has been running commentary from Kris Kobach, a well-paid lackey for the Federation for American Immigration Reform. Kobach has been boasting on Fox and elsewhere that he and his fellows at FAIR are helping to push the Arizona immigration law in other states as well.

Well, FAIR is exactly what Linda Sanchez described. And it's not exactly news, either. Here's the SPLC's rundown on the three main groups involved in promoting the Arizona law:

FAIR, which Tanton founded and where he remains on the board, has been listed as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Among the reasons are its acceptance of $1.2 million from the Pioneer Fund, a group founded to promote the genes of white colonials that funds studies of race, intelligence and genetics. FAIR has also hired as key officials men who also joined white supremacist groups. It has board members who regularly write for hate publications. It promotes racist conspiracy theories about Latinos. And it has produced television programming featuring white nationalists.

Continue reading »