Ax, not expand, President Obama's racist immigration policie
Ax, not expand, President Obama's racist immigration policies
Albor Ruiz - Ny Local
Wednesday, August 17th 2011, 4:00 AM
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President Barack Obama has had the audacity to crush the hopes of many immigrants across the country.
Outrage, disappointment, disbelief.
Those are the sentiments provoked in thousands of people across the country by the Obama administration's decision to unilaterally expand the discredited Secure Communities even if it means ignoring state governments that, like New York, want no part of the deportation program.
"If the President continues to alienate Latino voters, he will lose the election, plain and simple," said Carlos Roa of Presente.org, a national online Latino advocacy group. "He cannot expect Latino voters and an entire community to simply stand by and watch as he expands the extremely controversial S-Comm."
With his popularity taking a nosedive, Obama can ill afford the luxury of losing the support of Latino voters, 69% of whom enthusiastically helped him get elected.
Presente.org, a leader of the successful campaign to oust Lou Dobbs from CNN last year, has collected thousands of petitions to scuttle S-Comm.
In what was dubbed a National Day of Action, yesterday hundreds of immigrants and advocates delivered the petitions to Obama's campaign headquarters in Chicago and Democratic Party offices in Houston, Boston, Miami, Atlanta and Charlotte, N.C.
The protestors also delivered an report condemning the program and recommending its termination. The report, "Restoring Community: A National Community Advisory Report on ICE's Failed 'Secure Communities' Program," includes testimony from former Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau, top law enforcement officials, community leaders and victims.
The report was produced by, among others, the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, American Friends Service Committee, Asian Law Caucus, National Immigration Project of the National Lawyer's Guild, Northern Manhattan Coalition for Immigrant Rights and the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations.
"Conscripting local police into immigration enforcement has provoked a massive civil rights crisis our country now faces. The only suitable approach is to end Secure Communities," the authors conclude. The report is available at http://altopolimigra.com/s-comm-shadow-report/.
When asked if his group would recommend Latinos not vote for Obama next year, Roberto Lovato, a Presente.org founder, responded: "No. We're not.
"Obama is doing an outstanding job of discouraging Latino voters with his racist immigration policies," he added.
That is the problem. Racist or not, Obama's immigration policies - no matter what he says - are clearly the increased persecution and massive deportation of undocumented immigrants, the majority of which are hardworking men and women with no involvement in any crime.
Not surprisingly, Latinos are no longer buying the President's immigration snake oil.
But the National Day of Action wasn't the only protest against S-Comm. Hundreds of people, following the leadership of the immigrant advocacy group Long Island Wins, phoned the White House last week as part of a national campaign to give the President the same message: Secure Communities must be stopped.
The program violates our due process and has no place in a democratic society, said Patrick Young, of Long Island Wins. S-Comm encourages racial profiling by indiscriminately funneling immigrants into an unjust and dysfunctional detention and deportation system, and it separates families and destroys communities, he said.
The sooner it is scrapped, the better.
aruiz@nydailynews.com
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