Thread: The Big Money Behind the Push for an Immigration Overhaul

The Big Money Behind the Push for an Immigration Overhaul

By JULIA PRESTON NOV. 14, 2014



Protesters in front of the White House last week. 7. The immigrant movement has built up clout in recent years, growing from scattered Washington lobbying groups into a national force. CreditJabin Botsford/The New York Times




The calls started shortly after President Obama’s news conference on the day after the midterm elections. He had said he would go ahead with action on immigration before year’s end, in spite of warnings from Republicans that he could wreck relations with the new Congress they will control. White House officials were calling immigrant advocates to talk strategy and shore up their support.
The officials wanted to reassure them, several activists said, that the president, after delaying twice this year, was ready to take the kind of broad measures they had demanded to shield immigrants here illegally from deportation.

The White House calls — and the president’s decision itself — reflected the clout the immigrant movement has built up in recent years, as it grew from a cluster of scattered Washington lobbying groups into a national force.

A vital part of that expansion has involved money: major donations from some of the nation’s wealthiest liberal foundations, including the Ford Foundation, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Open Society Foundations of the financier George Soros, and the Atlantic Philanthropies.

Over the last decade those donors have invested more than $300 million in immigrant organizations, including many fighting for a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.

The philanthropies helped the groups rebound after setbacks and financed the infrastructure of a network in constant motion, with marches, rallies, vigils, fasts, bus tours and voter drives. The donors maintained their support as the immigration issue became intensely partisan on Capitol Hill and the activists grew more militant, engaging in civil disobedience and brash confrontations with lawmakers and enforcement authorities.

Some opponents accuse the foundations of blatant partisanship.

“The whole apparatus has become the handmaiden of the Democratic Party,” said Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, or FAIR, which opposes legalization for undocumented immigrants. “These foundations fund activist organizations designed to create ethnic identity enclaves and politically control them for partisan purposes.”

Foundation leaders said they have been vigilant to ensure their donations did not violate tax laws prohibiting them from funding partisan campaigns.

“We want to protect the interests of immigrants,” said Stephen McConnell, director of United States programs for the Atlantic Philanthropies, which has given nearly $69 million in 72 immigration grants in the last decade. Echoing statements by other funders, he said, “Atlantic does not in any way support candidates or get involved in partisan politics.”

Mr. Stein’s group, FAIR, is funded by followers’ donations and some large contributions from conservative donors.

Most of the philanthropies’ funds have been tax-exempt charitable donations that cannot be used primarily to influence legislation. In 2013, when the Senate passed a comprehensive immigration bill and the House was weighing its options, several foundations also made multimillion dollar “social welfare” grants that can be used for lobbying.

“Our grantees are generally working in the direction of our long-term goal of protecting the rights and dignity of immigrants and our belief that immigrants should have a voice,” said Mayra Peters-Quintero, a senior program officer at the Ford Foundation, which has donated about $80 million to immigrant groups over the last 10 years, all in charitable funds.

“The compass that drives our work is not the political cycle of the moment,” she said.

The philanthropies focused on a dozen regional immigrant rights groups that make up the armature of the movement. They also supported Latino service organizations like NCLR, also known as the National Council of La Raza, and legal groups like the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, or Maldef, and the National Immigration Law Center.

“The credit for our movement goes to immigrant leaders who had the courage to step out of the shadows,” said Deepak Bhargava, executive director of the Center for Community Change, a core organization in the coalition. “But the growth and speed of the movement was significantly aided by a small number of visionary philanthropies.”

The donors’ strategy arose in 2007, when immigrant groups were nursing wounds from a rout after a bill pushed by President George W. Bush failed in Congress.

“For all our vaunted work we were basically a fractious coalition that just got our butts kicked,” said Frank Sharry, a longtime advocate who is now executive director of America’s Voice, another core group.

Atlantic and several other philanthropies funded a series of soul-searching retreats. Days and nights of arguments produced a plan that came to be known as the four pillars. The groups agreed to redouble their local community organizing; to expand their work into mobilizing voters; to create policy research to underpin their pro-immigrant message; and to “turbocharge” their media communications, as Mr. Sharry put it, a task that fell to him.

“The good news was that the funders really got the idea of building up a movement that could press for change at all levels,” Mr. Sharry said. “We were really talking about a movement that could win the grand prize, legislation that puts 11 million people on a path to citizenship.”

The Ford Foundation already had a decades-long track record of funding nonprofit organizations aiding immigrants. In 2003 Ford and Carnegie joined with several other donors to create an unusual collaborative fund to augment support for local groups. Since then, Carnegie has given about $100 million for immigration initiatives, all in conventional charitable donations, including millions to help legal immigrants become American citizens.

The Open Society Foundations of Mr. Soros, an immigrant born in Hungary, have invested about $76 million in the last decade under the rubric of immigrant rights, according to Archana Sahgal, a program officer.

The Atlantic Philanthropies were founded by Charles Feeney, a billionaire who built his fortune with a chain of duty-free shops, and who is Irish-American. About half of Atlantic’s grants were made in donations that allow lobbying.

After setting their course in 2008, the advocacy groups expanded rapidly, amplifying their street actions with news conferences, Twitter feeds and texting lists.

A rally on the National Mall in March 2010 drew many tens of thousands of protesters from around the country. But internecine bickering weakened the push for the Dream Act, a bill with a path to citizenship for young immigrants who came when they were children.

It failed in a Senate vote in late 2010.

One organization, the National Immigration Forum, branched out beyond the main funders, and shifted its focus to recruiting conservatives, including evangelical Christians and leaders from business and law enforcement.

Young immigrants, who call themselves Dreamers, agitated for faster change. With little more than pocket money, students staged protests in 2012 that prodded Mr. Obama to take his first major executive action on immigration, a program that has given reprieves from deportation to more than 580,000 Dreamers.

“We did it with nothing and we won,” said Cristina Jimenez, managing director of United We Dream, one group that led that crusade. “It was a powerful feeling.”

In 2013, Ford gave $2.3 million to the group for a national effort to help young immigrants sign up for the reprieves.

In the heat of the debate in Congress last year, the policy advocacy wing of Open Society gave $6.2 million to several groups in donations allowing lobbying.

“We have enormous faith in the groups with which we have had longstanding relationships, and we wanted to give them resources to pursue the best possible legislative fix for the problems in our immigration system,” said Caroline Chambers, deputy director of the Open Society Policy Center.

The advocates backed the bipartisan bill that passed the Senate last year. But the Republican majority in the House rejected it. In August, the House approved a bill to cancel the Dreamer reprieve program, an early warning to Mr. Obama that Republicans were ready to challenge any new unilateral action.

Foundation leaders said they have not had misgivings, even as Republican resistance to their beneficiaries’ agenda intensified.

“Name me something in the American political debate that isn’t partisan right now,” said Mr. McConnell of Atlantic. “It’s just the nature of the beast.”

This year foundation funding waned by at least 50 percent, activists said, leaving them scrounging. Atlantic, a mainstay, is winding down its operation, following Mr. Feeney’s instructions to give away his assets during his lifetime. Atlantic will make its last donations in 2016.

Immigrant and Latino groups carried on limited voter mobilization efforts for the midterms. They no longer have funds for showy rallies.

But now that the White House has confirmed that Mr. Obama plans measures that could shield five million immigrants from deportation, the advocates are mobilized and pushing him to act as broadly as his powers allow.

Last week, just two days after the president’s new conference, Gustavo Torres, the director of CASA de Maryland and a coalition leader, was protesting once again in front of the White House. “We expect the president to be big and bold,” he said. “This is his opportunity to make sure we are going to remember him as the president who made a difference for Latino and immigrant communities.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/15/us/obama-immigration-policy-changes.html

Since Tom Perez started as a volunteer for Casa de Maryland and became the President we should review his roots. Please notice the links to Egypt.

Full article at:
CASA de Maryland: The Illegals’ ACORN

CASA de Maryland: The Illegals’ ACORN

James Simpson — September 20, 2011




Headquarters of CASA de Maryland

Note: Be sure to check out the “Radical Connections” supplement to this report which explores in detail CASA de Maryland’s extremist pedigree.

The illegal immigration debate has become an urgent focal point of American politics. Liberal politicians from the White House on down have vigorously advocated for illegal immigrant amnesty and lax border enforcement in a naked attempt to bolster prospective voter rolls.[1]

This controversy has been brewing for some time in Maryland, whose Hispanic population more than doubled between 2000 and 2010.[2] Under Governor Martin O’Malley’s sanctuary policies the state has become an illegal alien magnet.[3] The current cost of illegals in Maryland is estimated to be $1.7 billion per year, more than three-quarters of the state’s $2 billion structural deficit.[4]
Taxpayer ire overflowed this March with the passage of Maryland’s Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act, granting in-state college tuition rates to illegals. A nonpartisan coalition of concerned Marylanders launched a petition drive to delay the measure and place it on the 2012 ballot as a referendum. They needed 55,736 signatures. They received twice that amount.

CASA de Maryland

The driving force behind the DREAM Act was CASA de Maryland, an increasingly vocal advocate for Maryland’s illegals. The group’s aggressive tactics and questionable dealings helped provoke the outrage that drove the DREAM Act petition to overwhelming victory. CASA’s defeat, however, did not deter them.They recruited longtime Democratic National Committee chief lawyer, Joseph E. Sandler, an attorney who specializes in harassing conservatives with frivolous litigation threats. They have now sued Maryland’s Election Commission to overturn the petition.5

CASA receives about 40 percent of its funding from Maryland state and local governments—almost $5 million of taxpayer dollars in 2010—and spends most of it lobbying for illegal immigrant perks and exceptions. Their recent lawsuit is a blatant attempt to derail the democratic process itself. So it is a fair question to ask: what is CASA de Maryland?

CASA de Maryland was founded by a young activist named Bette “Rainbow” Hoover. CASA’s name is a metaphor for the organization’s duplicitous nature. CASA means “house” or “home” in Spanish; however, “CASA” is actually an acronym for Central American Solidarity Association. It is more in keeping with the designs and philosophies of other Central American solidarity organizations formed at the time, like the communist-founded6Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES).

It was incorporated on February 28, 1985, but Hoover said it actually began operating in 1983,7 based out of Takoma Park Presbyterian Church in Takoma Park, Maryland. From its modest beginnings, CASA has grown into a multi-million dollar operation, with influence reaching to the Obama White House. It is headquartered in the newly-renovated (with $10 million in taxpayer dollars), 18,000 square foot, 28-room, Langley Park Mansion, right up the street from Takoma Park. It boasts a community center and five day-labor centers spread over a 35-mile radius from the Washington, D.C. metro area to Baltimore. Recently, CASA created a political-action arm, “CASA in Action,” based at Takoma Park Presbyterian Church, bringing CASA full circle back to where it all began.


Hoover described CASA’s early days: “We just had to do something. People were coming here who really needed help…” She said that virtually all were illegals fleeing El Salvador’s civil war. Hoover added that they decided early on to help all comers, including communist guerillas of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN)8.

The Sanctuary Movement

Most Central Americans came to America via the Sanctuary movement.9 What began informally on the Southwest border in the early 1980s grew into a nationwide network of “underground railways” terminating in hundreds of “sanctuary” terminals before the end of the decade. One source identified 399 discreet sites.10 Another claimed there were as many as 3,000.11 In 1985, the same year as CASA’s founding, Takoma Park became one of the first “Sanctuary” cities.12 Takoma Park Presbyterian Church was DC’s Underground Railroad terminus (there were ultimately six in Maryland),13 and remains an official Sanctuary Church.14

As it grew, the movement formed two main camps, the Tucson Ecumenical Council (TEC) and the Chicago Religious Task Force on Central America (CRTF), based out of Chicago, Illinois. The two groups clashed on movement goals. TEC wanted to assist whoever needed help. The CRTF was a nominally Catholic organization promoting Liberation Theology—the Catholics’ own version of Marxism, and was formed “with the explicit objective of challenging U.S. foreign policy.”15

The CRTF even went so far as to demand an ideological litmus test for refugees. At its height, the movement vetted prospective refugees for their ideological pedigree through the Catholic networks in Mexico and Central America, before they even reached the border.16

How did this happen? Much of Chicago’s Catholic Church had already been captured by the Left. Radical organizer Saul Alinsky collaborated with local Catholics who helped him found his Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF).17 The Catholic Campaign for Human Development, today’s funding arm of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, (and a funder of CASA) was started in 1969 specifically to provide adequate funding for Alinsky’s IAF.18

Illegal Alien Advocacy

The 1980s flood of illegal aliens escaping instability in Central America was the impetus for CASA’s creation. It has since morphed into a multi-million dollar institution whose primary mission is illegal alien advocacy. Following is a partial list of its activities:

1. Day labor centers—a hub for illegal aliens
2. Instruction in avoiding police/immigration officials
3. What to do if detained by police/immigration officials
4. English as a second language
5. Counseling on available government benefits
6. Agitating for driver’s licenses for illegals
7. Agitating for bi-lingual education
8. Agitating for social services, like in-state tuition for illegals (i.e. the DREAM Act)
9. Undermining security and border laws
10. Interfering with law enforcement efforts against illegals.

On the website Somos Baltimore Latino CASA advertises membership with a drawing depicting the CASA membership ID card, (translated into English via Google with corrections):

BECOME A MEMBER OF HOUSE [CASA] -The organization CASA de Maryland is re-launching the campaign “BECOME A MEMBER OF [CASA]“in order to register more Latinos brothers. To date, CASA [has] more than 10,000 members.

Membership allows us to achieve many legal and civil rights [victories], the most recent is that of Maryland’s Dream Act favoring undocumented students. CASA is currently working alongside other organizations to promote immigration reform.

CASA membership gives you access to services as well as take classes in English, computer, citizenship, health care, legal advice and participation in activities and programs of CASA.


State offices are allowing Illegal immigrants to use this card to register for welfare benefits, in violation of state and federal law. More about this later.

CASA collaborated with the National Lawyers Guild (NLG) through its “Detention Watch National Immigration Project” on abrochure explaining how illegals can protect themselves during immigration raids and arrest. This brochure is readily available at CASA locations. Text on the cover says:

Some people who are not United States citizens have been arrested or detained by the U.S. government. Learn how to protect yourself if this happens to you.


It essentially tells you how to evade the law, or if caught, minimize the impact and avoid deportation.


It explains what you should do if you are arrested, questioned by police, accused of a crime, if immigration officers come to your home or workplace, or if you are stopped by police on the street. In each case it is either “call your lawyer” or “don’t say anything” and suggests you carry cards that say things like, “I want to speak to my lawyer.” If you don’t have a lawyer, it says,get one. It suggests you post your lawyer’s phone number in a handy place and keep a copy with you. It instructs you to develop an “action plan” in case of a workplace raid. All of the pictures depict Hispanic-looking people. What do you do if you are Somali?

The DREAM Act

During the petition drive to stop Maryland’s DREAM Act, CASA revealed its deep contempt for American democratic processes. CASA and other local leftist activists—paid and unpaid—shadowed and confronted petitioners in what can only be characterized as a coordinated, quasi-military campaign of threats, interference and direct confrontation. Behavior reported by petitioners included:19

• Screaming racist and obscene epithets in their faces
• Blocking interested citizens from approaching petition tables
• Pleading with people not to sign
• Passing out misleading “Think Before You Ink” flyers
• Field Works paid operatives shadowing petition locations and coordinating by phone
• Calling police
• One petitioner even reported being spat at

In other cases, CASA and other activists threatened businesses that allowed petitioners to gather signatures on their property. Business owners, fearing a backlash, often caved and asked petitioners to leave.

They were aided and abetted in this campaign by unidentified sources within Maryland government, for when CASA activists called police, they would immediately appear, and despite their legal rights, petitioners were sometimes ordered by police to leave.20

The End Game

CASA’s true goal is blanket amnesty. Democrats are pinning their future on the illegal vote. Eliseo Medina21 is thehonorary Chair of the Democratic Socialists of America, and International Vice President, Secretary and Treasurer of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). In 2008, he spoke at a “Take Back America” conference sponsored by the radical leftist Campaign for America’s Future. He said:

…If we reform the immigration laws, it puts 12 million people on the path to citizenship and eventually voters. Can you imagine if we have …even two out of three, if we get 8 million new voters… we will create a governing coalition for the long term, not just for an election cycle.


The actual number of illegals in the U.S. is more likely between 20 and 30 million,22 hence the Democrats’ blind obsession with servicing illegals.


Eliseo Medina was the guest of honor last December at an event heralding CASA’s 25 year anniversary:

“I’ve started to lobby Gustavo,” Medina says. “Are you just a CASA of Maryland? How about a CASA of the East? A CASA of the United States?”23

CASA de Maryland has published a plan called the “New Americans Initiative.”24 Through this plan they hope to naturalize the approximately 270,000 legal permanent residents in the area. CASA wants them to: “…take the final and critical step of political integration by naturalizing and becoming citizens.”

President Obama’s most recent vote-buying scam is to promote mortgage subsidies to illegals through the National Council of La Raza. Why NCLR? Obama’s Director of Intergovernmental Affairs, Cecilia Muñoz, is a former NCLR Vice President. She also served on the Board of CASA de Maryland:

The new [Spanish-language] campaign warns Hispanics [both legal and illegal] that time is running out to get up to $50,000 from Uncle Sam to pay their mortgage, past due charges, taxes, insurance and even legal fees associated with their home.25


It bears repeating that this kind of encouragement is exactly what caused the subprime mortgage meltdown:

In 2008 the [Department of Housing and Urban Development] revealed that some 5 million fraudulent or defaulted home mortgages were in the hands of illegal immigrants, who obtained the loans from banks that were pressured by the government to offer them.26


Why Maryland?

CASA de Maryland has enormous influence in state politics. But it also has disproportionate influence at the White House. Two former CASA Board members, the current Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, Thomas Perez, and the aforementioned Cecilia Muñoz, have powerful positions within the Obama administration and have used their positions to assist CASA.

Maryland is a secure base of operations for field-testing a new kind of community organization. In discussing his New Americans Initiative, CASA Director Gustavo Torres recently said:“My goal is to build 200,000 members in the next five years”… [And to someday] “build a powerful … movement of immigrants and other minorities including the African American community to fight for justice—and they decide what justice means.” (Emphasis added.)27


CASA wants to become the illegal immigrants’ ACORN. And Torres has a good teacher: ACORN founder Wade Rathke, with whom he has become fast friends.

Gustavo Torres


Gustavo Torres’ career has enjoyed a meteoric rise since his arrival in the U.S. in 1991. Starting as a CASA organizer that year, he became Director in 1994. He was an awardee of Ford Foundation’s Leadership for a Changing World in 2001and was one of 15Washingtonians of the Year in 2002. Under his leadership, CASA has also received the Institute for Policy Studies’ Letelier-Moffitt award (2003), National Council of La Raza’s Affiliate of the Year award (2004), the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund Community Service award (2006) and others.

Torres has connections to the Obama administration and has visited the White House. He was co-chair of Governor O’Malley’s transition team, serves on O’Malley’s Council for New Americans where they meet regularly behind closed doors, and has many friends in both the state legislature and Montgomery County government. His current wife, Sonia Mora, works for Montgomery County and serves on O’Malley’s Commission on Hispanic Affairs.

Mystery Man

For years, the only information publicly available about Torres was an abbreviated bio on the CASA website and a fewWashington Post articles that parroted that information.28 He had apparently fled Colombia in 1987, where his brother was killed a few months later by “paramilitary forces,” went to Nicaragua or El Salvador, depending on the version, and came to the U.S. four years later.

None of CASA’s early leaders were willing to discuss him. Bette Hoover stated flatly, “If you want to know anything about Gustavo, you will have to ask him yourself.”29

We attempted to do that—for three months. We were initially scheduled for an interview on March 4^th. The morning of the interview, they cancelled, but assured us they would reschedule… later. Over the ensuing months, requests were met with delays, apologies or simply unreturned calls.

CASA’s community organizer, Kim Propeack, finally informed us, “Mr. Torres is very busy and while he makes himself available for many interviews, we must prioritize them based on size of readership. In light of that, we have decided that your outlets are not a priority.”30

On July 14, 2011, however, The Washington Post published an obsequious profileof Torres by reporter David Montgomery. It gave the first detailed account of his life prior to coming here.31
Torres supposedly grew up in Medellin, Colombia. He came to the U.S. with a woman he met in Nicaragua, and married here. In 1995 he obtained citizenship, and divorced in 1996.
Between 1987 and 1991, he worked for a Sandinista newspaper in Nicaragua, which means he supported their communist revolution.



Prior to the Post article, he went to great lengths to keep a low profile. His Facebook page, shown here, provides little information, not even acknowledging his marital status.

The “friends” connections, however, establish this to be Torres. Among them are CASA de Maryland, friendly Maryland legislators and significantly, ACORN founder, Wade Rathke.

Torres’ Politics—No Mystery

Torres has organized public rallies and functions with the American Communist Party, Free the Cuban Five Committee (a Cuban front group demanding release of convicted Cuban spies), FMLN (DC branch), CISPES, and a litany of other communist, socialist and radical leftist open borders groups and individuals.


The YouTube screen capture (left) shows Torres protesting deportation of illegals in front of DHS. Watch the video.
In 2007, Torres participated in a five-day conference in Venezuela debating prospects for communist revolution in America. Torres was joined by such luminaries as Ward Churchill, the college professor fired for comparing 9-11 victims to “Little Eichmanns,” Dada Maheshvarananda, founder of the communist-alternative Prout Institute, representatives from theSocialist Workers Party, the Black Panther Party, and many others.32
Torres emphasized the importance of securing the Hispanic vote:Both Torres and Antonio González, president of the Southwest Voter Education and Registration Project, said the road to “empowerment” is organizing Latinos to vote. “What does a revolutionary do in the U.S. today?” asked González. “Take power wherever you can” by electing Latinos to city, state, and federal offices.33


Torres serves on the Board of Directors of Organizer’s Forum, founded by Community-Organizer-in-Chief, ACORN’s Wade Rathke. Despite the complete lack of biographical information about him here, membership on this board marks Torres as a prominent member of America’s radical left.

This fall, 2011, Forum members are taking a trip to Egypt:

“There are exciting changes and developments that are currently taking place in Egypt with elections coming soon to determine leadership transitions in what has been an autocratic regime, now challenged by the Muslim Brotherhood and succession and democracy issues. (Emphasis added).”


It is believed that American radicals were involved in fomenting this year’s Middle East unrest.34 Was Torres involved in thattoo?
Torres’ Attitude—No Mystery

Reporting on the 2009 May Day rallies that occurred all over the United States,Socialist Worker quotes Torres, the leader of DC’s rally:

Emcee Gustavo Torres stressed that “Obama is our president not our savior,” arguing that only struggle will win broad legalization for the undocumented, (emphasis added).35


Torres threatened Minutemen volunteers monitoring CASA’s day labor centers for illegals:

We are going to target them in a specific way… Casa representatives will go out with cameras and video cameras to record the Minutemen, but that will only be the first step.

Then we are going to picket their houses, and the schools of their kids, and go to their work. If they are going to do this to us, we are going to respond in the same way, to let people know their neighbors are extremists, that they are anti-immigrant. They are going to hear from us.36


Torres participated in a large demonstration on the eve of the vote for the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill in 2006. CISPES quoted him as saying: “if they don’t pay attention to us now the next step is civil disobedience.”37

Torres has said: “This is the country I chose to live in… But I didn’t choose to be quiet, and to not push for changes. If I did these kinds of things in Colombia, I’d have been killed a long time ago.”38
And what could he be doing that would make him say such a thing? Helping poor “immigrants?” No.

He wants to do just what he was doing in Colombia, Nicaragua and Venezuela: agitating for communist revolution, this time in America.

All on your tax dollars.

CASA’s Radical Connections

Maryland Delegate Pat McDonough characterizes CASA as “a globally significant organization.”39 He is right. Torres’ and CASA’s radical associations place CASA among a vast network of communist, socialist and radical leftist organizations with international reach.

These associations are too extensive to explore in this essay. For an in-depth description of CASA’s radical connections, including a blowup of the flowchart illustration below, go to the following web link:

CASA de Maryland’s radical connections (PDF)



CASA’s Own Communist Guerilla


Given that many of those fleeing El Salvador in the 1980s were communist guerillas and FMLN supporters, it is not surprising that at least one of them should now be working for CASA. This past March, CASA representative Lindolfo Carballo spoke at a “Bring the War Dollars Home” conference sponsored by Fund Our Communities.Code Pink co-founder Medea Benjamin also spoke at this event.

In a video of the event, Carballo admits (right past minute 2) that he fought against both the Salvadoran Army and US forces.If true, this admission tags Carballo as a former member of the communist FMLN. While an apparently frequent CASA spokesman, Carballo is not listed among the staff on CASA’s website. Another mystery man…

Corruption and Abuse in High Places


Between August 2003 and March 2007, the State of Maryland’s Office of Legislative Audits conducted an in-depth audit of the Family Investment Administration (FIA) of Maryland’s Department of Human Resources (DHR).40The audit found glaring problems; among other things, in 2006 alone, approximately 52,000 public assistance recipients had invalid or non-existent Social Security numbers. However, “shortcomings” were identified, “solutions” proposed and implemented. Problems solved!

Fast forward to 2009.

Paulette Faulkner has been a benefits administrator for most of her professional career. In 2009, she took a job with Montgomery County’s Office of Child Support Enforcement. Paulette is a lifelong Democrat.

Her job was to ensure compliance with child-support laws and thus had to approve all applications for welfare. Applicants are required to provide a Social Security card, picture ID and birth certificates for children.

She said that applicants began showing up with no Social Security card, expired visas and many only had a CASA ID. She would deny their benefits, as required by law.41

These applicants would then turn to her Hispanic supervisor who would reverse her decisions. Those cases that weren’t reversed were appealed and later approved by a judge.

This all struck her as very wrong, but no one in her office seemed willing to deal with the problem, so in September 2009 she wrote an e-mail to Governor O’Malley. She concluded:

What I’m confused about is this: how can an illegal immigrant appeal my decision when they are breaking the law by being in this country? Secondly how can they receive State benefits if they are illegal? … Am I aiding and abetting illegal activity? Shouldn’t I be reporting these people to ICE…?42 I am really concerned because I am a candidate for the Central Democratic Committee in my District… and I want to make sure that I am following the law.43

On October 2^nd Faulkner met with DHR Deputy Secretary Stacy Rodgers. (Rodgers sits on the Governor’s Council for New Americans along with Gustavo Torres). Rodgers told Faulkner not to contact the Governor, adding that it was not her place to call ICE, and she must accept any ID with a picture on it.

Faulkner asked, “What about a CASA ID with no expiration date?” Rodgers responded that the CASA ID was a proper credential.
Faulkner informed her superiors that she would not aid and abet illegal activity. They accused her of insubordination.

On October 22^nd she was called into Child Support Enforcement Director John Castellano’s office. The Director accused her of failing to inform them that she had a website for her Central Committee campaign listing her office phone. He threatened punitive action. In Faulkner’s words:

I asked Mr. Castellano if this was in relation to me sending the information regarding the applications of illegal immigrants being approved, he said to me “well did you think about the repercussions before you did that?” I told him that it should not be any repercussions because what we were doing was illegal [sic].


The next day she was ordered by her superiors to explain in writing why she was running for Democratic Central Committee in P.G. County. She went to her desk to type it but according to Faulkner, Assistant Director Debbie Hinds ordered her, humiliating her in front of her co-workers, to write her response by hand. Faulkner related:44

“I tried to explain that I suffer from carpal tunnel syndrome and that I could not write that much information by hand.”

She said that Hinds replied:

“Oh well! Mr. Castellano says you have to hand-write it.”
Faulkner says she wrote a three-page response and called her doctor because she knew she would be hurting.

On October 28, Faulkner was asked to resign or be fired. She refused to resign. She said:

“I thought it was a joke until they had the attorney in the office escort me out of the building, and they said that they would mail my belongings.”

Faulkner was fired for having a campaign website with the office number on it. But at that point, the website was not yet public. She had changed that information prior to taking the site public. Investigators had accessed her site before it was operational.

On November 2^nd she appealed to the Department of Human Resources. On the 5^th she filed a complaint with the Maryland Department of Budget Management for whistleblower retaliation and a complaint with the EEOC.

No Maryland legislator would help.

On November 9^th, Faulkner sent another letter to O’Malley, this time to express her disgust. It read, in part:

This termination was blatant retaliation for me contacting your office… How can you as Governor continue to condone this type of behavior…? Nepotism, racism, and manipulation of power are so prevalent in this agency… This is wrong, and I should not have been fired. I’m asking you to step in to correct this wrong…


O’Malley did nothing. On November 18^th she was denied unemployment benefits. On December 7^th she went to the DHR hearing with union representation. Still no.

Faulkner was unemployed for a year, during which time she had to declare bankruptcy. She is back at work now as a supervisor for a private health insurance applications processor.45

All of these documents can be examined in full on the Citizen’s District blog of U.S. Senate candidate William Capps. Capps was inspired to run by Faulkner’s story, which he broke in January of 2010.

As a fitting conclusion, the 2010 audit of the FIA reported many of the same problems identified in 2006, including 28,700 fraudulent or non-existent Social Security numbers.46 Are these the illegals being allowed to slip through the cracks that Faulkner identified? Not surprisingly, it has just been reported that Maryland ranks second in the Nation in food stamp fraud.47

Financials

In 2010 CASA received $12.3 million in grants and donations, about $5 million of which came from government contracts (see chart below). The rest came from corporate and non-profit foundations. Figures are incomplete. Unsurprisingly, CASA was of little help.


Still, much can be learned from the information that is available. United Way spent a significant amount supporting illegal immigrant advocacy, including CASA. They also funded ACORN, as their 2008 IRS form 990 reveals. Venezuela’s state-owned CITGO is the vehicle Hugo Chavez uses to fund friends around the world. CASA received $1.5 million, spread over three years. The Ford Foundation almost gave as much as Chavez, providing $1.2 million over three years.

More than 40 percent of CASA’s revenue comes directly from government. More comes indirectly through non-profits. CASA donors like the Catholic Campaign for Human Development also receive much of their funding from government. Official tallies therefore underestimate the actual level of CASA’s taxpayer support.

Finally, the Combined Federal Campaign collects hundreds of millions from federal employees every year for charitable donations. 2010’s take was $281.5 million.48Catholic Charities is on this list, as is United Way, MALDEF, NCLR and yes, CASA.49 Since taxes pay for government salaries, those are your tax dollars at work too.



Also see: CASA Donors as listed in 2010 Annual Report (PDF)

Conclusion

CASA de Maryland is a case study in the corrosive effects of political corruption and a reflection of our degenerating political class. This type of corruption threatens our nation’s entire political infrastructure. If law has no meaning, then our Nation will and must degenerate into the law of the fist. As Obama’s most frequent White House visitor,former SEIU President Andy Stern, has famously threatened, “We’re trying to use the power of persuasion, and if that doesn’t work, we’ll use the persuasion of power…” It appears some among the political class believe this is a legitimate method of exerting influence. As enablers of such abuse, CASA de Maryland and its ilk must be stopped, and America must seek and elect the kinds of leaders who will not trade their souls for votes.

James Simpson is an economist, businessman and freelance writer. Best known for his exposé on the Cloward Piven Strategy of manufactured crisis, his writings have been published in American Thinker, Big Government, Washington Times, FrontPage Magazine, Soldier of Fortune and others. Email James.

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[1] J.P. Green, Leveraging the Latino Vote in 2012, The Democratic Strategist, February 21, 2011, (http://www.thedemocraticstrategist.o...no_vote_in.php).
[2] Brian Witte, Census Shows Growth in Maryland Hispanic Population,MyFoxDC.com, February 9, 2011, (http://www.myfoxdc.com/dpp/news/mary...ulation-020911).
[3] David Sherfinski, Report: Md., Va. among tops in illegal immigrant population, Washington Examiner, February 1, 2011, (http://washingtonexaminer.com/local/...ant-population).
[4] Jack Martin & Eric A. Ruark, The Fiscal Burden of Illegal Immigration on United States Taxpayers, Federation for American Immigration Reform, July 2010. Estimates were derived from figures supplied by the state. (http://www.fairus.org/site/DocServer...pdf?docID=4921).
5 Annie Linskey, Immigrant advocates file suit to toss tuition referendum,Baltimore Sun, August 1, 2011, (http://articles.baltimoresun.com/201...petition-drive).
6 Founded by Farid Handal, Salvadoran Communist Party leader.
7 Phone interview, June 14, 2011.
8 FMLN was formed of five in-fighting Salvadoran communist factions brought together by Fidel Castro. Fused into one force, they launched the bloody civil war.
9 Hilary Cunningham, God and Caesar at the Rio Grande: Sanctuary and the Politics of Religion, (University of Minnesota Press, 1995), p 64.
10 Ibid.
11 Renny Golden and Michael McConnell, Sanctuary: The New Underground Railroad, (Orbis Books, 1987), p. 53.
12 Steve Hendrix, Takoma Park Stays Immigrant ‘Sanctuary’, Washington Post, October 30, 2007, (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...102902241.html).
13 Cunningham, op. cit., p. 64.
14 Phone conversation with TPPC Reverend Mark Greiner, July 11, 2011.
15 Charles Stastny, Miriam Davidson, Convictions of the Heart: Jim Corbett and the Sanctuary Movement, Book Review, original source unknown, York University Library Digital Journals, (http://pi.library.yorku.ca/ojs/index...le/21564/20237).
16 Ibid.
17 William Droel, Catholic Campaign for Human Development, Social Policy, Fall 2003, Vol. 34, No.1, (http://organizersforum.org/oldweb/index.php?id=815).
18 Ibid.
19 James Simpson, Blatant in-your-face corruption and Nazi tactics in Maryland occurring now, Examiner.com, June 27, 2011, (http://www.examiner.com/independent-...-occurring-now).
20 Ibid.
21 Eliseo Medina, Keywiki.org, (http://keywiki.org/index.php/Eliseo_Medina).
22 Diana Hull, PhD., Introduction: How Many Foreign Nationals Actually Live in the U.S. Illegally? The Social Contract Press, Summer 2007 (http://www.thesocialcontract.com/art...7_4_hull.shtml).
23 David Montgomery, Head of CASA is a man with a plan, Washington Post, July 14, 2011, (http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifest...HEI_story.html).
24 Eliza Leighton, et al., A Regional Citizenship Promotion Plan: The New Americans Initiative for Maryland, Virginia and Washington DC, CASA de Maryland, 2008, (http://www.casademaryland.org/storag...nai_report.pdf).
25 Jim Kouri, La Raza offering taxpayer money for mortgages, Examiner.com, July 12, 2011, (http://www.examiner.com/law-enforcem...-for-mortgages).
26 Ibid.
27 Montgomery, op. cit.
28 Phuong Ly, Gustavo Torres Strives to Tackle Tough Issues, Washington Post, December 13, 2001, (http://www.casademaryland.org/news-a...voice-in-area-).
29 Phone interview, June 14, 2011.
30 Email correspondence, May 24, 2011.
31 Montgomery, op. cit.
32 Olympia Newton, Venezuela forum debates prospects for revolutionary change in the U.S., The Militant, December 3, 2007, (http://themilitant.com/2007/7145/714503.html), Vol. 71, #45.
33 Ibid.
34 Cliff Kincaid, U.S.-Based Marxists Subvert Friendly Regimes and Support Foreign Terrorist Organizations, America’s Survival, (http://www.usasurvival.org/docs/Marxism_islam_rpt.pdf).
35 Elizabeth Schulte, May Day rallies link struggles, Activist News, Socialist Worker.org, May 5, 2009, (http://news–www.socialistworker.org/2009/05/05/may-day-rallies-link-struggles).
36 Sean Sands, Day labor battle brewing, Minutemen, CASA of Maryland set stage for showdown in Takoma Park,Gazette.net, February 22, 2006, (http://ww2.gazette.net/stories/02220...54_31988.shtml).
37 Tens of thousands protest anti-immigration legislation in Congress, CISPES, March 8, 2006, (http://www.cispes.org/index.php?opti...d=28&Itemid=28).
38 Montgomery, Op Cit
39 Ibid.
40 Audit Report, Department of Human Resources, Family Investment Administration, Office of Legislative Audits, Department of Legislative Services, Maryland General Assembly, November 2007, (http://www.ola.state.md.us/reports/F...ance/FIA07.pdf).
41 Phone interview, June 12, 2011.
42 Inspections and Customs Enforcement
43 Letter to Governor O’Malley, September 12, 2009.
44 Interview.
45 Interview.
46 Audit Report, Department of Human Resources, Family Investment Administration, Office of Legislative Audits, Department of Legislative Services, Maryland General Assembly, February 2011, (http://www.msa.md.gov/megafile/msa/s.../20110484e.pdf).
47 Leah Fable, Food stamp program doubles in region, abuse soars, Washington Examiner, June 18, 2011, (http://washingtonexaminer.com/local/...e-soars-region).
48 Combined Federal Campaign, Campaign Results, Trends and History, U.S. Office of Personnel Management, (http://www.opm.gov/cfc/Results/index.asp).
49 2010 Catalog of Caring: Compassion of Individuals, Power of Community,Combined Federal Campaign of the National Capital Area, (http://www.cfcnca.org/files/cfcnca/c...NCA%202010.pdf), p. 75.
http://www.aim.org/special-report/ca...igrants-acorn/

http://www.alipac.us/f9/casa-de-mary...-acorn-239180/

by Tony Lee 14 Nov 2014, 6:17 PM PDT

During the last decade, big-money interests on the left have joined big-money business interests on the right to push for massive amnesty legislation, with the "grand prize" being a pathway to citizenship—and work permits—for all of the country's illegal immigrants.

In a report that shows why amnesty represents the biggest divide between the bipartisan elite in the permanent political class and Main Street, the New York Times reported that left-of-center philanthropy groups have poured in hundreds of millions of dollars over the last decade to push for amnesty legislation. Pro-amnesty interests from the left and the right have combined to spend nearly $1.5 billion pushing for the legalization of illegal immigrants and massive increases in guest workers that would provide a nearly unlimited supply of cheap labor at the expense of American workers of all backgrounds.

According to the report, "major donations from some of the nation’s wealthiest liberal foundations, including the Ford Foundation, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Open Society Foundations of the financier George Soros, and the Atlantic Philanthropies," have allowed pro-amnesty group to successfully clamor for immigration reform and special benefits for illegal immigrants.

During the last decade, Atlantic Philanthropies gave "nearly $69 million in 72 immigration grants in the last decade" while the Ford Foundation donated nearly $80 million. In addition "Carnegie has given about $100 million for immigration initiatives" while George Soros's Open Society Foundations have reportedly poured in $76 million. As Breitbart News has reported, Soros' millions funded a variety of pro-amnesty immigration front groups while Congress tried to pass the Gang of Eight's amnesty bill.

According to the Times, the philanthropic groups "focused on a dozen regional immigrant rights groups" in addition to La Raza, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), and the National Immigration Law Center. Deepak Bhargava, executive director of the Center for Community Change, said the pro-amnesty movement was "significantly aided by a small number of visionary philanthropies" while Frank Sharry of America's Voice conceded to the Times that the "grand prize" was legislation that would give all of the country's illegal immigrants a pathway to citizenship.

These groups have been instrumental in pressuring Obama to "go big" on his forthcoming executive amnesty, which will reportedly give temporary amnesty and work permits to five million illegal immigrants. And they have been joined by an array of business interests.

As Breitbart News has extensively documented, Silicon Valley, led by Mark Zuckerberg's FWD.us, has poured in millions for amnesty legislation to secure high-tech guest-worker visas even though America has a surplus of high-tech workers. The pro-amnesty Chamber of Commerce has spent $50 million over the last two years pushing for amnesty legislation. Hotel and restaurant industry lobbies that want cheaper labor have also poured in millions. Moguls like Warren Buffett, Sheldon Adelson, and Bill Gates have called for an unlimited number of guest-worker visas. Gates and his wife Melinda have donated millions to a scholarship program for DREAMers. Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim, who owns a stake in the New York Times, has funded a program to help DREAMers get jobs in America. The Ford Foundation even chipped in $2.3 million in 2013, according to the Times, to help illegal immigrants received Deferred Action under Obama's 2012 temporary amnesty program that he instituted by executive fiat. Perhaps this is why Pat Caddell recently said that the Republican establishment refuses to circle the wagons to fight massive amnesty programs because they have to obey "higher orders" from "other masters."

Before the Senate left for its October recess, and Americans threw out Democrats in a midterm election in which 75% of voters, according to a Polling Company exit poll, disapproved of Obama's executive amnesty and another 80% of Americans did not want foreigners taking jobs from Americans and legal immigrants already in the country, Sen. Jeff Sessions called out the "Masters of the Universe" who were trying to rewrite America's immigration laws to suit their interests. He said he had a message to "to all the special interests, the global elites, the activists, and the cynical vote-counting political plotters that are meeting in secret at the White House."

"And the message is this: you don’t get to sit in a room and rewrite the laws of this country. Congress writes the laws," he passionately declared on the Senate floor. "You may not be used to people telling you 'no,' but I’m telling you 'no' today."

Sessions also told the American people that "you have been right from the beginning:"

You have justly demanded that our borders be controlled, our laws enforced, and that, at long last, immigration policy serve the needs of our own people first. For this virtuous demand, you have been demeaned, even scorned by the governing class. They know so much, this cosmopolitan elite. They want you to believe your concerns are somehow illegitimate. That you are wrong for being worried about your jobs, or your schools, or your hospitals, or your communities, or your national security. These elite citizens of the world speak often of their concern for people living in poverty overseas, yet turn a blind eye to the poverty and suffering in their own country. They don’t want you to speak up. They don’t want you to be heard. They don’t want you to feel you have a voice.

Sessions said the people's message against massive amnesty was "being heard," and he was "delivering that message to the Senate" by declaring that America is not an "oligarchy" where the so-called "Masters of the Universe" who do not want borders to get in the way of their multinational agendas get to rewrite the country's immigration laws.

High-tech interests did not appreciate it when Sessions called them out—Facebook board member Marc Andreessen said Sessions was "an odious hack" who was "clinically insane" and engaging in "outright slander" for defending American workers and suggesting that Facebook consider hiring the 18,000 American workers that Microsoft laid off even while it pushed the White House for more guest-worker visas for foreign workers.

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Governm...o-Push-Amnesty