Home News Tribune Online 12/18/07 By RICHARD KHAVKINE STAFF WRITER rkhavkine@thnt.com
FRANKLIN "” Six township children are asking for just one Christmas gift "” getting their mother back home in time for the holidays.
But whether Maria Martinez returns to the family's Eugene Avenue home is now up to federal immigration officials.
Martinez awaits her fate in a jail cell after pleading guilty in Middlesex Superior Court Thursday to an assault charge stemming from a late-summer altercation with a woman having an affair with Martinez's husband.
But since Martinez entered the country illegally, her case has since been taken up by the federal government, which ultimately will determine whether she can stay in the United States "” with her six children, all born here, all of them citizens "” or gets deported back to her native Mexico.
While the length of her stay here "” over 10 continuous years "” makes her eligible to stay in the United States, her criminal record could disqualify her from that reprieve.
Forthcoming federal documents outlining in greater detail her brush with the law will establish Martinez's eligibility for so-called cancellation of removal, said her immigration attorney, Arlindo B. Araujo.
"One of the disqualifiers is you have an aggravated felony. What constitutes an aggravated felony is for a federal immigration judge to decide," Araujo said.
Martinez was sentenced Thursday to time served on the assault charge "” the three months she spent at the Middlesex County Adult Correction Center in North Brunswick.
That sentence, rather than being sentenced to a longer term, could convince an immigration judge that she did not commit an aggravated felony, a near-certain one-way ticket out of the country.
What complicates matters is that while Martinez was charged with violating the criminal code, the statutory language outlined by prosecutors did not match that in the corresponding code section.
One of those speaks of assault with a deadly weapon "” an aggravated felony. Should that language remain in the government's complaint, it could ice the deportation proceedings.
"Maria can still qualify for cancellation of removal if I can convince an immigration judge that she got one form of aggravated assault as opposed to another one" Araujo said.
Should that happen, Araujo said, whether Martinez remains in the United States will largely hinge on the immigration judge's deliberations into the children's welfare.
"You have to show extreme and unusual hardship, not to Maria "” but to her family members that are legal, in this case six children," Araujo said. "The question for an immigration judge is who is going to take care of these children."
Despite entering the country illegally, the Martinezes, who met in the Mexican state of Puebla, were married here 14 years ago. The first of their children, Jocelyn, was born 13 years ago. Their youngest, Giselle, is nearly 15 months.
Martinez was arrested by New Brunswick police after confronting a woman there with whom Miguel Martinez was having an affair. Martinez hit her over the head with a drill.
While the woman sustained only a slight injury, Maria Martinez was arrested on assault with a deadly weapons charge. She pleaded guilty Thursday to a reduced charge.
Miguel Martinez, chastened by his infidelity and the consequent fallout, said he and his wife want another opportunity to prove that they are solid members of the community.
"I sacrificed a lot to give my kids a good life, but I lost my head," he said in Spanish shortly after the family finished dinner one evening last week. "We are human beings. We make mistakes."
Miguel, who works a six-day week as a furniture deliveryman, said he is borrowing money from colleagues to pay his lawyer fees. "I'm here for the kids, but they need their mother," he said while sitting near the living room's extensive Christmas display and dozens of family photos on the walls behind him.
By virtue of Miguel and Maria's legal partnership, Miguel's immigration status will be bundled up with Maria's, Araujo said.
The judge, assuming the children would follow their parents to Mexico, will likely look at several factors before making a determination, Araujo said. A judge will typically consider what economic, educational, medical and other opportunities the children, as American citizens, would have in Mexico.
Economic factors, while significant, would not be sufficient to make a determination one way or the other, Araujo said. A psychological assessment, which measures "cultural affiliations," typically carries more weight, he said.
For instance, while the youngest of the Martinez children might not yet be culturally affiliated to the United States and would have an easier time acclimating to a new life in Mexico, the older children "” 13-year-old Jocelyn and her 12-year-old brother Alex "” have built a life here and could face at difficult time in Mexico, a country they have never known.
"The legal standard is very, very high," Araujo said. "An immigration judge is going to say "Wow, If I remove both parents what effect does that have on the legal citizens?' " "” in this case the Martinezes' children.
He expects Maria's case to be resolved in one to three years.
"They are amenable to doing the right thing sometimes," Araujo said of immigration authorities. "If there's ever a compelling case for the government to exercise good discretion, this should be the one."
In one of the Martinez home's three bedrooms, the children gathered on one bed. All shed tears when asked about life without their mother.
"She's really kind to us," Alex, a fifth-grader at Sampson G. Smith Upper Elementary School, said. "She helps us with our homework. She's very nice and kind."
Giselle, the youngest, still goes from room to room looking for her mother, her brothers and sisters said.
"It's going to be the first Christmas and New Year's she's not going to be with us," Jocelyn said.
The government's charging documents, due any day, will determine whether Martinez will be able to post bond and return home as she, and her family, wait for her case to come before an immigration court.
Where Anti-Immigrant Zealots Like Lou Dobbs Get Their 'Facts'
The media keeps turning to racist group FAIR
By Heidi Beirich, Intelligence Report. Posted December 17, 2007.
The forces seeking to sharply reduce the number of immigrants coming to America won a stunning victory last June, when nativist anger at an "amnesty" for the undocumented scuttled a major bipartisan immigration reform package backed by President Bush. Many members of Congress were completely unprepared for the flood of angry E-mails, phone calls and faxes they received -- an inundation so massive that the phone system collapsed under the weight of more than 400,000 faxes.
They should not have been surprised. The furious nativist tide was largely driven by an array of immigration restriction organizations that has been built up over the course of more than 20 years into fixtures in the nation's capital.
The vast majority of these groups were founded or funded by John Tanton, a major architect of the contemporary nativist movement who, 20 years ago, was already warning of a destructive "Latin onslaught" heading to the United States. Most of these organizations used their vast resources in the days leading up to a vote on the bill to stir up a nativist backlash that ultimately resulted in its death.
At the center of the Tanton web is the nonprofit Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), the most important organization fueling the backlash against immigration. Founded by Tanton in 1979, FAIR has long been marked by anti-Latino and anti-Catholic attitudes. It has mixed this bigotry with a fondness for eugenics, the idea of breeding better humans discredited by its Nazi associations. It has accepted $1.2 million from an infamous, racist eugenics foundation. It has employed officials in key positions who are also members of white supremacist groups. Recently, it has promoted racist conspiracy theories about Mexico's secret designs on the American Southwest and an alternative theory alleging secret plans to merge the United States, Mexico and Canada. Just last February, FAIR President Dan Stein sought "advice" from the leaders of a racist Belgian political party.
FAIR officials declined repeated requests for comment.
None of this -- or any other material evidencing the bigotry and racism that courses through the group -- seems to have affected FAIR's media standing. In just the first 10 months of 2007, the group was quoted in mainstream media outlets nearly 500 times with virtually no mention of its more unsavory aspects. Stein was featured on CNN's "Lou Dobbs Tonight" at least 12 times in the same period, along with countless appearances on other television news shows. And, perhaps most remarkably of all, FAIR has been taken seriously by Congress, which has called upon its officials to testify on immigration more than 30 times since 2000.
"The sad fact is that attempts to reform our immigration system are being sabotaged by organizations fueled by hate," said Henry Fernandez, a senior fellow and expert on immigration at the Center for American Progress, a "progressive" think tank. "Many anti-immigrant leaders have backgrounds that should disqualify them from even participating in mainstream debate, yet the American press quotes them without ever noting their bizarre and often racist beliefs."
The Founder: Early Hints
For decades, John Tanton has operated a nativist empire out of his U.S. Inc. foundation's headquarters in Petoskey, Mich. Even as he simultaneously runs his own hate group -- The Social Contract Press, listed for many years by the Southern Poverty Law Center because of its anti-Latino and white supremacist writings -- Tanton has remained the house intellectual for FAIR. In fact, U.S. Inc. bankrolls much of FAIR's lobbying activity and, at least until 2005, Tanton ran its Research and Publications Committee, the group that fashions and then disseminates FAIR's position papers. In its 2004 annual report, FAIR highlighted its own main ideologue, singing Tanton's praises for "visionary qualities that have not waned one bit."
But what, exactly, is Tanton's vision?
As long ago as 1988, when a series of internal 1986 documents known as the WITAN memos were leaked to the press, Tanton's bigoted attitudes have been known. In the memos, written to colleagues on the staff of FAIR, Tanton warned of a coming "Latin onslaught" and worried that high Latino birth rates would lead "the present majority to hand over its political power to a group that is simply more fertile." Tanton repeatedly demeaned Latinos in the memos, asking whether they would "bring with them the tradition of the mordida [bribe], the lack of involvement in public affairs" and also questioning Latinos' "educability."
Echoing his 19th-century nativist forebears who feared Catholic immigrants from Italy and Ireland, Tanton has often attacked Catholics in terms not so different from those used by the Klan and the Know-Nothing Party of the 1840s. In the WITAN memos, for instance, he worried that Latino immigrants would endanger the separation of church and state and undermine support for public schooling. Never one to miss a threatening and fertile Catholic, Tanton even reminded his colleagues, "Keep in mind that many of the Vietnamese coming in are also Catholic."
The leaked memos caused an uproar. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Walter Cronkite quit the board of a group Tanton headed, U.S. English, after the memos became public in 1988. U.S. English Executive Director Linda Chavez -- a former Reagan Administration official and, later, a conservative commentator -- also left, calling Tanton's views "anti-Hispanic, anti-Catholic and not excusable."
In 1994, Tanton's Social Contract Press republished an openly racist French book, The Camp of the Saints, with Tanton writing that he was "honored" to republish the race war novel. What Tanton called a "prescient" book describes the takeover of France by "swarthy hordes" of Indians, "grotesque little beggars from the streets of Calcutta," who arrive in a desperate refugee flotilla. It attacks white liberals who, rather than turn the Indians away, "empty out all our hospital beds so that cholera-ridden and leprous wretches could sprawl between white sheets ... and cram our nurseries full of monster children." It explains how, after the Indians take over France, white women are sent to a "*****house for Hindus." In an afterword special to Tanton's edition of the novel, author Jean Raspail wrote about his fears that "the proliferation of other races dooms our race, my race, to extinction."
Tanton's view of the book he published? "We are indebted to Jean Raspail for his insights into the human condition, and for being 20 years ahead of this time. History will judge him more kindly than have some of his contemporaries."
Tanton has repeatedly suggested that racial conflict will be the outcome of immigration, saying in the WITAN memos that "an explosion" could be the result of whites' declining "power and control over their lives." More than a decade later, in 1998, he made a similar point in an interview with a reporter, suggesting that whites would inevitably develop a racial consciousness because "most people don't want to disappear into the dustbin of history." Tanton added that once whites did become racially conscious, the result would be "the war of each against all."
In 1997, Tanton spelled out his views on the inevitability of immigration overwhelming American whites. "In the bacteriology lab, we have culture plates," he explained. "You put a bug in there and it starts growing and gets bigger and bigger. And it grows until it finally fills the whole plate. And it crashes and dies."
The Founder's Friends
It's no surprise that Tanton employs people with similar views. His long-time deputy, for example, is Wayne Lutton, who works out of Tanton's Petoskey offices and edits the journal, The Social Contract, published by Tanton's press. Lutton is not just linked to white supremacist ideas, many of which he publishes in his journal -- he has actually held leadership positions in four white nationalist hate groups: the Council of Conservative Citizens, the National Policy Institute, and The Occidental Quarterly and American Renaissance, both racist publications. Lutton has written for the Journal of Historical Review, which specializes in Holocaust denial. Early on, Lutton and Tanton collaborated on The Immigration Invasion, a nativist screed that has been seized by Canadian border officials as hateful contraband.
Under Lutton's editorial leadership, Tanton's journal has published dozens of articles from prominent white supremacists. One special issue was even devoted to the theme of "Europhobia: The Hostility Toward European-Descended Americans" and featured a lead article from John Vinson, head of the Tanton-backed hate group, the American Immigration Control Foundation. Vinson argued that multiculturalism was replacing "successful Euro-American culture" with "dysfunctional Third World cultures." Tanton elaborated in his own remarks, decrying the "unwarranted hatred and fear" of whites that he blamed on "multiculturalists" and immigrants.
Presumably, these articles and more are well known to Stein, the president of FAIR -- until 2003, he was an editorial adviser to The Social Contract. And Stein had lots of company. FAIR board members Sharon Barnes and Diana Hull also have been on the journal's board of editorial advisers. FAIR's current media director, Ira Mehlman, was an adviser in 2001 and 2002, and his essay, "Grand Delusions: Open Borders Will Destroy Society," was published in the journal's pages. Today, FAIR still advertises The Social Contract on its website, saying the journal "offers in-depth studies on immigration, population, language, assimilation, environment, national unity and balance of individual rights and civil responsibilities."
So where does FAIR stand on the matter of Tanton's views? The group has never criticized or sought distance from its founder. In 2004, in fact, Stein insisted that Tanton "never asserted the inferiority or superiority of any racial, ethnic or religious group. Never." The same year, FAIR hosted a gala event honoring Tanton for his 25 years of service. To this day, Tanton remains on FAIR's board.
The Eugenics Connection
Probably the best-known evidence of FAIR's extremism is its acceptance of funds from a notorious, New York City-based hate group, the Pioneer Fund. In the mid-1980s, when FAIR's budgets were still in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, the group reached out to Pioneer Fund, which was established in 1937 to promote the racial stock of the original colonists, finance studies of race and intelligence, and foster policies of "racial betterment." (Pioneer has concentrated on studies meant to show that blacks are less intelligent than whites, but it has also backed nativist groups like ProjectUSA, run by former FAIR board member Craig Nelsen.)
The Pioneer Fund liked what it saw and, between 1985 and 1994, disbursed about $1.2 million to FAIR. In 1997, when the Phoenix New Times confronted Tanton about the matter, he "claimed ignorance about the Pioneer Fund's connection to numerous researchers seemingly intent on proving the inferiority of blacks, as well as its unsavory ties to Nazism." But he sounded a different tune in 2001, when he insisted that he was "comfortable being in the company of other Pioneer Fund grantees." Today, Tanton's defense is that he is no different than the "open borders crowd" that accepts money from the liberal Ford Foundation, which was founded by Henry Ford, the anti-Semitic auto manufacturer. What he ignores is that the Ford Foundation, unlike the Pioneer Fund, is not promoting racist ideas.
Some have called for FAIR to return the Pioneer money, but that has not happened. In fact, when asked about it in 1993, Stein told a reporter, "My job is to get every dime of Pioneer's money." One reason for Stein's lack of hesitation may be that FAIR has long been interested in the pseudo-science of eugenics.
One of FAIR's long-time leaders, and a personal hero to Tanton, is the late Garrett Hardin, a committed eugenicist and for years a professor of human ecology at the University of California. Hardin, who died in 2003, was himself a Pioneer Fund grantee, using the fund's money to expand his 1968 essay, "The Tragedy of the Commons." In it, Hardin wrote, "Freedom to breed will bring ruin to all."
Race War and the Duty to Die That was the least of it. In a 1992 interview with Omni magazine, Hardin said he supported infanticide -- "A fetus is of so little value, there's no point worrying about it" -- as "effective population control." He argued the Third World is filled with "the next generation of breeders" who need to be stopped. He discouraged aid to starving Africans because that would only "encourage population growth."
Hardin wasn't alone. A current FAIR board member, three-time Democratic governor of Colorado Richard Lamm, sounded a similar theme in 1984, while still governor, saying "terminally ill people have a duty to die and get out of the way."
Like Tanton, Lamm seems to fear a coming race war. In his futuristic 1985 novel, Megatraumas: America at the Year 2000, Lamm sketches it out like this: "[O]ur lack of control of our borders allowed 2 million legal and illegal immigrants to settle in the United States every year. That caused unemployment to rise to 15.2 percent by 1990 and 19.1 percent this year. ... [T]he rash of firebombings throughout the Southwest, and the three-month siege of downtown San Diego in 1998 were all led by second-generation Hispanics, the children of immigrants."
As late as 2004, Lamm was sounding similar racial fears, telling a reporter that "new cultures" in the U.S. "are diluting what we are and who we are."
For his part, Stein was asked about Hardin's belief that only "intelligent people" should breed for an editorial by Tucker Carlson in the 1997 Wall Street Journal. "Yeah, so what?" Stein replied. "What is your problem with that?"
After Hardin's death, John Tanton created in honor of his mentor a group called The Garrett Hardin Society, devoted to "the preservation of [Hardin's] writings and ideas." On the society's board are Tanton, Wayne Lutton and U.S. Inc.'s recently appointed chief executive, John Rohe, the author of an adoring 2002 biography of Tanton and his wife that reads like the life of a saint.
Hiring Haters
In late 2006, FAIR hired as its western field representative, a key organizing position, a man named Joseph Turner. Turner was likely attractive to FAIR because he wrote what turned out to be a sort of model anti-illegal immigrant ordinance for the city of San Bernardino, Calif. Based on Turner's work, FAIR wrote a version of the law that is now promoted to many other cities. (The law almost certainly violates the Constitution, but that has not stopped many municipalities' interest.)
But there was more to Turner than FAIR let on. In 2005, Turner had created, and then led, a nativist group called Save Our State. The group was remarkable for its failure to disassociate itself from the neo-Nazi skinheads who often joined its rallies -- something that virtually all other nativist groups, worried about bad publicity, worked hard to do. Save Our State's electronic bulletin board, too, was remarkable for the racist vitriol that frequently appeared there.
It was in that forum that Turner made one of his more controversial remarks, amounting to a defense of white separatism. "I can make the argument that just because one believes in white separatism that that does not make them a racist," Turner wrote in 2005. "I can make the argument that someone who proclaims to be a white nationalist isn't necessarily a white supremacist. I don't think that standing up for your 'kind' or 'your race' makes you a bad person." The Southern Poverty Law Center has listed Save Our State as a hate group since it appeared in 2005.
Turner's predecessor in the FAIR organizing post, Rick Oltman, was cut from the same cloth. Oltman has been described as a member of the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC) in the publications of that hate group, which is directly descended from the segregationist White Citizens Councils and has described blacks as "a retrograde species of humanity." He has spoken at at least one of the CCC's conferences and has taken part in one of its rallies. And he wasn't alone.
According to the CCC newsletter, FAIR's longtime associate director, Dave Ray, was scheduled to speak at another CCC event. And, in September 2002, FAIR Eastern Regional Coordinator Jim Stadenraus participated in an anti-immigration conference on Long Island, N.Y., with Jared Taylor. Taylor is both a CCC member and the founder of the racist eugenicist publication, American Renaissance.
FAIR has also produced programming featuring hate group leaders linked to the CCC. According to the anti-racist Center for New Community, FAIR's now defunct television production, "Borderline," featured interviews with Taylor and Sam Francis, who edited the CCC's newsletter until his death in 2005.
Donald Collins, a member of both FAIR's board of directors and its board of advisers, has his own ties to white supremacy. Collins posts frequently to a hate website called Vdare.com, which is named after Virginia Dare (said to be the first white child born in the New World) and publishes the work of white supremacists and anti-Semites. Collins also has been published in The Journal of Social, Political and Economic Studies, a periodical run by longtime academic racist Roger Pearson. (Pearson founded the Eugenics Society in 1963 and worked with at least one former SS officer in England. He is also the recipient of several Pioneer Fund grants.)
Several of Collins' articles have attacked Catholics and their church for their pro-immigrant stances. In one, he accused Los Angeles Archbishop Roger Mahony of selling out his country "in exchange for more temporal power and glory." Collins has also accused Catholic bishops of "infiltrating and manipulating the American political process" in order to undermine the separation of church and state.
Collins is not FAIR's only link to the Vdare.com hate site. Joe Guizzardi, a member of FAIR's board of advisers, is the editor of Vdare.com. He writes there frequently about how Latin American immigrants come to the United States in order to "reconquer" it -- a conspiracy theory pushed by numerous hate groups.
Bad Press
By and large, FAIR has escaped negative publicity, generally being depicted as a mainstream critic of American immigration policy. But there are exceptions.
In 2000, FAIR ran ads opposing the reelection of Sen. Spencer Abraham (R-Mich.), a Lebanese American who defeated Tanton in the primaries, because he had supported issuing more visas for immigrants with high-tech skills. The ads featured side-by-side photos of Abraham and Osama bin Laden and this question: "Why is Senator Abraham trying to make it easier for terrorists like Osama bin Laden to export their war of terror to any city street in America?" The ads also accused the senator of pushing a bill that would "take American jobs. Our jobs."
The ads produced an immediate controversy, and a staunch conservative, Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.), quit FAIR in protest. Under attack, Stein insisted the ads weren't racist and later claimed that he'd thought Abraham was Jewish.
That same year, FAIR helped fund ads in Iowa that were rejected as "borderline racist" by the general manager of WHO-TV in Des Moines. When the same ads appeared in Nebraska, Sen. Chuck Hagel, a Republican, lost his temper. "The trash that this crowd puts out is just beyond terrible," Hagel said.
Four years later in Texas, the Coalition for the Future of the American Worker -- a FAIR front group designed to look like it represents labor interests -- ran ads heavy on images of dark-skinned men loitering on corners and running from police cars. One of the ad's prime targets, Rep. Martin Frost (D-Texas), condemned the ads as racist. His Republican challenger, Pete Sessions, found them so repugnant that he joined Frost in calling for them to be yanked off the air in their district.
In 2004, FAIR made an extremely unusual criticism of a fellow nativist, a woman named Virginia Abernethy who had just joined the national advisory board of Protect Arizona Now (PAN). PAN, aided by some $600,000 from FAIR, had worked to collect signatures for a referendum (which ultimately passed) to require proof of citizenship when registering to vote or signing up for public benefits. But as Election Day neared, newspapers trumpeted the revelation that PAN's new adviser was a self-declared "white separatist" who had long been active in the CCC.
FAIR reacted instantly with a pious press release denouncing "Abernethy's repulsive views." The release left many scratching their heads -- FAIR, after all, had CCC members on its payroll, and any number of other ties to the group. Its own officials had in several cases endorsed similar separatist views. And Tanton, FAIR's founder and chief ideologue, was intimately familiar with Abernethy's work. After all, he had published her writings frequently in The Social Contract and his editor, Wayne Lutton, had shared the podium with Abernethy at forums of the CCC.
Whither FAIR?
Following the defeat of the bipartisan immigration package this summer, FAIR flew into action one more time. This time, it went after the DREAM Act, a widely supported, bipartisan bill that would have provided a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrant students accepted to college. FAIR was the key advocate for its defeat and, sure enough, the DREAM Act finally died this October.
Is this the future for FAIR? Will journalists, politicians and the general public continue to take the organization and its nativist propaganda seriously?
Dan Stein thinks so.
As he put it at FAIR's 25th anniversary celebration in 2004, just when the American nativist movement had begun to sense its own strength: "[T]oday," he said, "as the country moves finally into a serious and realistic debate, the founders have created a mature and knowledgeable organization prepared to lead."
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By Carolyn Casey Rocky Mount Telegram Sunday, December 16, 2007
Recent decisions from the state's higher education systems have sparked debate about the state's obligation to educate illegal immigrants past high school.
While local community colleges must follow the state ruling, government officials say opposition remains strong and discussions are far from over.
An N.C. Community College System announcement made nearly three weeks forces each of the 58 campuses to keep an open-door policy regardless of immigration status. Days later, the University of North Carolina system said it will consider allowing illegal immigrants to pay in-state tuition.
"I don't think North Carolina has any obligation to offer higher education (to illegal immigrants) whether it be community college or the university system," said N.C. Rep. Bill Daughtridge, R-Nash. "If we give away free higher education at taxpayers' expense, there will be no reason for them to become a documented legal alien."
Those wanting to pursue education past high school should be on a pathway to citizenship, said N.C. Sen. A.B. Swindell, D-Nash, who is concerned that classroom space will be taken up by those who can't seek legal employment after graduating with a degree.
Proponents for extending education past high school say the community college policy is realistic and speaks to the current job force.
"If we deny the opportunity to get an education in the community colleges, then we create more problems than we solve by creating a permanent underclass of poor people," said David Mills, Common Sense Foundation executive director.
Neither Nash nor Edgecombe community colleges have illegal immigrants enrolled in curriculum courses, but officials say they are prepared to follow the state system's guidelines.
"The college has always provided higher educational opportunities for the North Carolina high-school graduates seeking admission," Nash Community College President Dr. Bill Carver said in an e-mail statement. "This being said, it is without question that all procedures and guidelines prescribed by the North Carolina administrative code will be adhered to when evaluating students for admission."
Edgecombe Community College President Dr. Deborah Lamm said in the past the college hasn't dealt with illegal immigrants mainly because of affordability issues.
The Community College System estimates tuition, fees and books for an illegal immigrant would cost about $10,000 per year.
Even with the policy in place, Lamm said the likelihood of attracting those students is slim due to money.
While the N.C. Attorney General's Office reviews the state and federal laws regarding the Community College Systems' policy, its opponents remain vocal. Republican gubernatorial candidate Fred Smith passed through Nash and Edgecombe counties last week speaking out against the policy because of its federal violations.
Swindell and Mills said immigration enforcement should fall under federal jurisdiction, and comprehensive reform needs to happen soon.
"I think it's time for Congress to do what is right," Swindell said. "I think it's a federal issue, and we're having to react because of the federal governments inability to act."
Though there's a clear split on the state's educational responsibility, most agree concentration should focus on state residents.
"I think we have reason to question why people should not be on a pathway (to citizenship) if we're taking space up from educating our own folks," Swindell said.
07:21 AM CST on Tuesday, December 18, 2007 By Alex Sanz / 11 News
11 News report More than 750,000 legal residents are worried about their green cards because they don't have expiration dates, and U.S. immigration officials want to change that.
There's been no indication from the government that a change in policy is even coming, but there seems to be a sense, at least by some, that change may not be far off.
The cards with no expiration dates were issued in the late 1970s through the early 1980s. The idea is that if you get rid of the cards and require immigrants to apply for new cards, it would help authorities track down and deport those who may have committed crimes.
Most have agreed this change would help secure the nation's borders, but critics said it would be nothing more than an attempt to round up legal residents with criminal records, deport them and split their families up.
"Mostly, men are the ones who provide for the families, and usually the women stay home, taking care of the kids, and they are the main provider, and if they are deported, the family will have a great impact," immigration attorney Fernando Alvares said.
Year end is a good time to look back and reflect on what's ahead. If past is prologue, however, the outlook isn't good, and nothing on the horizon suggests otherwise. Voters last November wanted change but got betrayal from the bipartisan criminal class in Washington. Their attitude shows in an October Reuters/Zogby (RZ) opinion poll with George Bush at 24% that tops Richard Nixon's worst showing of 25% at his lowest 1974 Watergate point. And if that looks bad, consider Congress with "The Hill" reporting from the same RZ Index that our legislators scored a "staggering 11%, the lowest (congressional) rating in history," but there's room yet to hit bottom and a year left to do it. Why not with lawmakers' consistent voter sellout and failure record that keeps getting worse.
Kick-the-immigrant' policies debase American ideals
By DAVID J. GRUMMON Special to The Star
Grummon After representing hundreds of families with different immigration statuses, I am alarmed by the falsehoods being repeated about my clients "” that they came to break our laws, spread leprosy, massacre our youth, etc. Those who actually know recent immigrants "” as friends, family, and co-workers "” know that such claims are ridiculous.
Many risked their lives to come work here simply out of love for their families, just like my ancestors did. Yet I am more alarmed at how good Americans are being deceived into believing such claims and then into supporting bad laws which could generally be categorized as "kick-the-immigrant" policies.
For example, a few years ago Kansas and Missouri legislators were told that taking away the ability to get drivers licenses would deter "the illegals" from our states. It clearly didn't, but it did create more work for the police and courts, with more unlicensed and uninsured drivers on the road, more hit-and-run accidents and a new demand for fake insurance cards.
Similarly, deputizing the Missouri Highway Patrol for immigration enforcement will result in some deportations, but it is also making my clients more fearful of all law enforcement. Local police already combating the "Stop Snitching" trend will find their investigations further hindered by a new reluctance to report crime and to cooperate with police. That hurts all of us.
Increasingly, the desire of most of my clients to follow the law is thwarted by the law itself. Rather than helping our society, kick-the-immigrant policies destroy families, divide communities and create criminality where none existed before. Predictably, the anti-immigrant crowd then blames "the illegals" while claiming that they themselves just want our laws enforced.
I'm all for the law, but mere enforcement of bad law does not make for a better America. Like segregation, apartheid, and the Nuremburg laws, kick-the-immigrant policies cannot be justified without appealing to our fear, ignorance and prejudice against another group of people.
Far from patriotic, they conflict with our values as Americans and as people of faith. Indeed, area voters have repeatedly rejected anti-immigrant candidates. We've seen what they have to offer us and, frankly, America can do better.
David J. Grummon is a lawyer. He lives in Shawnee.
Orange County communities still wage war on day laborers -- then use them.
By Gustavo Arellano December 18, 2007
STOP ME IF you've heard this one before. Some time ago, immigrant men invaded our tranquil municipality. As long as they quietly toiled, residents tolerated their presence. But once these hombres went out on the town, people became furious.
"Their numbers, appearances and were strange and frightening," wrote one observer. Employers had to teach them how to use restrooms; after payday, the men swarmed into stores, frightening customers and merchants. Eventually, the county fathers tired of the hired hands and had the guys shipped back to their home countries, much to the delight of everyone except the workers.
Sounds like a fevered Tom Tancredodream, no? But the reviled laborers weren't illegal immigrants or even Mexicans; they were about 1,600 Jamaicans who arrived in Orange County during the 1940s at the invitation of farmers.
Refry this anecdote for a bit when considering the war Orange County has waged against day laborers the past couple of years. Costa Mesa kicked it off in 2006 by shuttering a city-run day-laborer center, largely at the behest of Mayor Allan Mansoor. In March, the Lake Forest City Council repealed an anti-solicitation law aimed to drive day laborers away from the town after the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit. Mission Viejo and Dana Point passed no-trespassing laws aimed at harassing day laborers after receiving complaints from residents that too many Latino men were congregating near businesses and street corners. In Dana Point, council members allowed anyone to make a citizen's arrests if they saw someone loitering in the city.
A similar skirmish occurred in Laguna Beach, with reversed roles. This time, the City Council fended off a lawsuit filed by anti-immigrant activists that sought to cut off city funding to a day laborer hiring site nestled in beautiful Laguna Canyon, a spot where regular protests against bewildered Latinos draw everyone from gray-haired patriots to young adults sporting Confederate gray caps.
The latest city to join the battle is Orange. Last week, the City Council passed a slew of ordinances that make it nearly impossible for day laborers to find work.
People in Orange cannot solicit on sidewalks next to streets without parking lanes or wave down cars in traffic, on a driveway or on a median. Day laborers can still loll around on private property, but they need the owner's written permission -- and anyone who allows more than five day laborers to find work on their property must apply for a permit under penalty of fines and jail time. Council members complained that the men -- sometimes numbering in the dozens -- urinated in public, intimidated women and ruined the quality of life in town.
In all these cases, day laborer opponents argue that these transient workers take jobs away from citizens and that allowing them to seek work is a de facto endorsement of illegal immigration. But something else fuels their fury. Day laborers in Orange County are an uncomfortable glimpse into the county's true character, walking reminders of the sins this county commits to maintain its status as an economic powerhouse.
One hundred years before Orange County's incorporation, Europeans relied on "foreign" labor to build their new world. Father Junipero Serra used Juaneños to construct his beloved Mission San Juan Capistrano. In the late 1800s, the German founders of Anaheim -- immigrants themselves -- hired Indian and Mexican laborers to dig the ditches that made the city's grape vines grow.
And as orange groves and other crops blossomed across the county, farmers forsook American manpower in favor of imported peons -- first Chinese, then Japanese, but eventually almost exclusively Mexicans, men like my grandfather, who hopped trains as a 12-year-old from central Mexico to Anaheim around 1918 to pick oranges alongside his father.
Businessmen and politicians forged an uneasy understanding with the dark-skinned drudges -- out of sight, out of mind. When workers tried to make their presence known in the form of strikes, the county response was fierce: mass arrests, scabrous newspaper editorials and the threat of deportation even for legal residents.
Orange County's approach to troublesome immigrants is so notorious that no less an authority than labor historian Carey McWilliams became radicalized here. In a 1940 interview, the writer who went on to edit the Nation magazine said: "I hadn't believed stories of such wholesale violation of civil rights until I went down to Orange County to defend a number of farm workers held in jail for 'conspiracy.' When I announced my purpose, the judge said, 'It's no use; I'll find them guilty anyway.' "
Today's day laborers violate the same old covenant -- they dare to be visible.
Unlike workers of the agricultural past, however, they don't do the jobs that you might consider vital to the county's livelihood -- no, these laborers are more important. They literally burnish Orange County's playground image. They do the seemingly menial tasks -- gardening, plumbing, simple construction -- that many Orange County residents won't do because they're simply too lazy or too skinflint to hire legal workers. That's why day laborers have exploded across Orange County -- not because of open borders but because people have more disposable income to hire them.
Activists leading the charge for more anti-solicitation ordinances, for fewer day laborers, ought to know their efforts are ultimately Sisyphean. In the late 1980s, a different Costa Mesa leadership opened the first city-sponsored day labor center in the country after residents grumbled about Mexicans standing around in parks for work. Since the center's closure, day laborers in the city have returned to those same parks and other places, frightening the populace anew.
When Costa Mesa and other Orange County cities crack down again, the day laborers will simply move to another spot -- and their customers will follow. Ordinances or not, they'll continue to find work. Getting others to do the dirty work, after all, is the main philosophy in our island in the Southland.
Gustavo Arellano is a contributing editor to Opinion, author of the book "¡Ask a Mexican!" and a staff writer for the OC Weekly.
Officers reach out to help Hispanics prevent crime
Many illegal immigrants avoid police, financial institutions
By Adam Jones and Sarah Bruyn Jones Staff Writers
December 18, 2007
NORTHPORT | Mateo Cortez Lopez was conscious when police arrived at Green Village trailer park in Northport on Saturday night, but the bullet that pierced his upper torso would ultimately kill him hours later at DCH Regional Medical Center.
The 31-year-old Guatemalan native was killed after he stopped two men from robbing his friend in front of their home.
His roommate, Domingo Barios, 24, had returned home from running an errand about 8:30 p.m. and was approached by two suspects described as black men about 6 feet tall in their late 20s who also tried to take Barios' car keys, police said.
Lopez, who was inside the trailer, ran out with a baseball bat to help his friend. Lopez chased the suspects "” both of whom were carrying guns "” four lots down the street from his front yard before one of the men turned and fired.
A white or yellow Chevrolet Blazer picked up the suspects and sped away. Barios was injured when one of the suspects hit him on the head with his handgun. Lopez was left lying in the street.
He was not the first Hispanic to take matters into his own hands at the trailer park where immigrants are seen as easy targets. Earlier this year, a group of Green Village residents chased two would-be thieves to the entrance of the trailer park and caught them, said Northport Police Chief Robert Green.
Green said he thinks the suspects in the latest incident are also responsible for a robbery there Sunday morning.
Patrols have been stepped up in the neighborhood this year in response to the rash of robberies, Green said.
"It appears Hispanics are being targeted because they are afraid to usefinancial institutions," he said. "We are dealing with a serious problem in immigration."
The language barrier and fear of questions from bank officials mean many immigrants, especially undocumented immigrants, keep their money nearby, Green added.
Working together to educate
Law enforcement agencies throughout Tuscaloosa County are exploring better ways to reach out to and educate the local Hispanic community about crime prevention. Both the Tuscaloosa Police Department and the Tuscaloosa County Sheriff's Office recently began developing crime prevention education initiatives for Spanish-speaking residents.
To reach the Hispanic population, TPD and the Sheriff's Office have turned to the Hispanic ministry at Holy Spirit Catholic Church. The Spanish-language service at Holy Spirit attracts about 400 people each Sunday, and law enforcement officials see that audience as a good way to teach a lesson about protecting large sums of cash from robbers.
Both law enforcement and clergy see the partnership as a good way to reach the community, which is often fearful of approaching police officers.
"We want to do something soon and this murder reminded me this is not something we can put off," said Deacon Adrian Straley, who works with the Hispanic ministry at Holy Spirit and throughout the region. Early talks have involved holding a crime prevention program after the Spanish language mass at Holy Spirit, Straley said.
"We're trying to encourage people in the Hispanic community to come forward and report crimes without fear of deportation," said Sgt. Andy Norris, spokesman for the Sheriff's office. "We also want to encourage them to use bank accounts."
Overcoming fear
Norris said his department is assuring immigrants "” especially those who are undocumented "” that officers will not ask someone reporting a crime about their immigration status.
"We don't, because we can't enforce the federal law anyway," he said. "We're not actively trying to find [illegal immigrants]. Most of the time we don't ask them, ˜Are you legal?'"
That message is key, Straley said.
"It is important that we prepare the ground for it because Hispanics are kind of wary of police officers," Straley said. "We need them to understand that their local officers have no connection to INS and they are not going to back a truck up and deport everyone."
Similarly, TPD spokesman Capt. Greg Kosloff said officers are trying only to convey the simple message of locking windows and doors to help thwart would-be robberies. Bilingual officers in both offices are working to establish the crime prevention programs.
Both Norris and Kosloff said they didn't think the Hispanic community was being specifically targeted, but that anyone carrying large amounts of money is more likely to be a target.
Norris added that law enforcement may not know to what extent crime against Hispanics is occurring.
"We don't think they are being targeted, but then again, if they are not reporting crimes, we can't really get an accurate count," Norris said.
Norris said he is also trying to translate the Sheriff's Office Web site into Spanish.
Sanctuary policies prohibit city employees from querying an individual's immigration status, an issue that falls under federal purview. To see whether your city is a sanctuary city, see this working list prepared by Ohio Jobs & Justice PAC. http://www.ojjpac.org/sanctuary.asp
We welcome readers to share their opinion and ideas with us by writing to mailto:editor@ilw.com.
SPECIAL TO THE HERALD NEWS Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Bertha came to the Lutheran pastor in Weehawken, weeping uncontrollably. She is a single, undocumented woman with a child. Her husband brought her here to this country some years ago and abandoned her. Bertha works in a
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