Category: Uncategorized

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

URGENT PRESS ALERT (April 19, 2006)

PRESS CONFERENCE AND RALLY THURSDAY,
APRIL 20 AT 12AM AT 10 W. JACKSON
BLVRD. MIGRA BUIDING.

Religious leaders, workers and community leaders
decry immoral ICE raids
The community organizations calls upon the Bush
Administration and U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement to immediately cease a series of
raids targeting immigrant workers.

On Wednesday, April 19, Immigration and Customs
Enforcement officials began a series of raids on
immigrant workers in what reports describe as a
nationwide crackdown on undocumented immigrants.
The Associated Press has reported raids in Cincinnati,
Phoenix, Houston, and Albany, and Immigration
and Customs Enforcement will likely lay out a new
enforcement strategy tomorrow.

“This is an unjust and immoral attack on immigrant
workers’ rights. Immigrant workers are being
punished for exercising their freedom of speech
and freedom of assembly.” Kim Bobo, Interfaith
WorkerJustice Executive Director.

In the past month, immigrants’ rights groups have
held a series of massive rallies, with turnout of tens
and even hundreds of thousands in over a hundred
cities. Immigrants rights groups are planning
another national day of action on May 1.

Conferencia de prensa y rally ante
el edificio de inmigración.
10 W. Jackson Blvrd. Chicago

El 19 de abril, en diferentes localidades
de los Estados Unidos el Departamento de
Home Land Security a estado haciendo
redadas de inmigrantes indocumetados, todas
enfocadas a dos empresas que tienen localidades
en diferentes estados del país, hoy 19 de abril
lo ha hecho en la ciudad de Chicago asi como
en Cincinnati, Phoenix, Houston y Albany, nos
parece muy peculiar dado que hemos estado
preparando la manifestación del primero de
mayo.

La posibilidad de que muchas de las personas
que han sido detenidas puedan calificar para
algún tipo de regularización el próximo mes,
cuando se reúna nuevamente el Senado de
los Estados Unidos nos parece sumamente injusto
y es un atentado por parte del Departamento
de Home Land Security contra estas gentes y
una manera de acallar nuestras voces, estan
tratando por medio de el temor a la deportación
de hacer que no nos manifestemos mas, que no
se desarrolle mas este movimiento por los derechos
civiles que en Chicago ha nacido.

Las organizaciones comunitarias unidas al Movimiento
10 de Marzo, estaremos dando una conferencia de
presa y rally enfrente de las oficinas de Inmigración
en la calle Jackson el 20 de abril a las 12:00PM

Received via email April 20 from Roberto Calderon’s list “beto – at – unt.edu”, sourced to Rosalio Munoz “rosalio_munoz – at – sbcglobal.net”

January 19, 2006

ICE REMOVES MORE THAN 2,000 ILLEGAL ALIENS FROM THE SOUTH TEXAS REGION DURING DECEMBER

Southwest Border Initiative aims to quickly return illegal aliens to their home countries

SAN ANTONIO, Texas – U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced today that the office here deported 2445 non-criminal aliens during the month of December under the new Secure Border Initiative (SBI).
SBI is a two-month-old program announced by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff during his recent visit to Texas. One SBI aspect allows ICE to quickly remove “other than Mexican” (OTM) illegal aliens to their home countries under an “expedited removal” process. Those OTMs removed from the South Texas Region had been arrested by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) – which includes the Border Patrol – and ICE along the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas.

Expedited removal is an administrative process aimed at reducing the number of OTMs who have spent less than 14 days in the United States, and who are apprehended within 100 miles of the border. OTMs apprehended under the expedited removal program are detained and quickly returned to their countries of origin after they receive travel documents. Since the expedited removal process doesn’t require these aliens to appear before a federal immigration judge, they’re able to be deported more quickly. Consequently, expedited removal reduces the time illegal aliens remain in detention awaiting their deportation from about 30 days to an average of 15 days.

“Expedited removal allowed ICE to be able to remove more than 500 OTMs per week,” said Marc J. Moore, ICE field office director in San Antonio. “The numbers indicate that expedited removal is working, and we’re deporting as quickly as possible those individuals who have no legal right to be in the United States.” Moore oversees ICE Detention and Removal Operations in the south Texas area, which includes the cities of: San Antonio, Austin, Harlingen and Laredo.

Those aliens deported in December had been lawfully ordered to leave the United States by a federal immigration judge; they were removed to the following countries: Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Argentina, Bolivia, China, Panama, Peru, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Brazil, Burma, Colombia, Dominican Republic, and Pakistan.

When cost effective, some aliens from Mexico are deported via bus. OTMs are usually deported aboard both commercial and government aircraft. The government’s aircraft is run by the U.S. Marshal Service, and is called the Justice Prisoner and Alien Transportation System (JPATS). JPATS is one of the largest transporters of prisoners in the world and handles hundreds of requests every day to move prisoners and criminal aliens nationally and internationally. There is an automatic 10-year bar against deported aliens from legally re-entering the U.S.

The Office of Detention and Removal (DRO) focuses on promoting public safety and national security by ensuring that all aliens who are subject to deportation are removed from the United States as expeditiously as possible.

By Greg Moses

Whip lashed by serial collisions of imperial power, dissident movements
in the USA brace for the next shocking thing. We have been hijacked
into a crashing invasion of Iraq, slammed around by evasive maneuvers
in New Orleans, and now along the borderlands of the Southwest USA,
signs warn that a highway of accommodation is about to end, dumping us
head-on into deserts of aggression upon Latin American peoples.

Into each new crisis, empire roars forward, pumping high
octane into its five-piston engine. Whether stirring borderland
provocations at home, fighting wars of aggression abroad, or exploiting
crises of colonized communities anywhere, the five pistons of empire
always work the same. Full article posted at Peacefile

In order for the wealthier districts to pursue higher local tax rates,
they had to argue that the existing tax cap left them no ‘meaningful
discretion’ beyond funding educational basics.  Here the Supreme
Court agreed that the trial judge had made the right assessment; the
richer districts in Texas needed more money:

Meaningful discretion cannot be quantified; it is an
admittedly imprecise standard. But we think its application in this
case is not a close question. The district court found that the
plaintiffs= Afocus districts@ for which evidence was offered Alack
>meaningful discretion= in setting their local property tax rates.@
Contrary to the dissent=s assertion, this finding was supported by
evidence other than conclusory opinions of district superintendents.
The district court detailed evidence showing 108 how the districts are
struggling to maintain accreditation with increasing standards, a
demographically diverse and changing student population, and fewer
qualified teachers, while cutting budgets even further. The district
court found that due to inadequate funding: 52.8% of the newly hired
teachers in 2002 were not certified, up from 14.1% in 1996; more
teachers were being required to teach outside their areas of expertise;
and attrition and turnover were growing. The court cited the higher
costs of educating economically disadvantaged students and students
with limited English proficiency, noting that 90% of the growth in the
student population has come from low-income families. And as set out in
more detail above, the district court noted the increased curriculum,
testing, and accreditation standards, and the increased costs of
meeting them. These are facts, not opinions. The State defendants point
to evidence of some discretionary spending on programs not essential to
accreditation, but there is also evidence that such programs are
important to keeping students in school.