Mediaboss Marketing

The immigration-status checks SB 1070 requires are not always as simple as a request for information sent over the radio.

More and more, police officers are surrounded by activists, many of them holding video recorders and asking a long list of questions.

Frustrated with immigration reform stalled in Congress and increased cooperation between local police and the Border Patrol, immigrant-rights activists have escalated their civil-disobedience campaign. Over the past year, routine news conferences gave way to people lying in the street before the wheels of a Border Patrol vehicle.

On Oct. 8, the campaign intensified when more than 100 activists encircled a Border Patrol vehicle holding a driver and passenger Tucson police had stopped because of an improperly lighted license plate. The protest lasted more than an hour, required the deployment of two dozen police and Border Patrol agents, and ended only after a barrage of pepper spray.

Law-enforcement officials, increasingly wary of drawing a crowd, are shifting their tactics, too. Instead of the Border Patrol showing up at the site of a traffic stop, an agent might ask police to meet at a neutral location. Agents might also show up at a traffic stop disguised in plain clothes and an unmarked car.

Some officers are taking people they have detained directly to the Border Patrols gated campus on South Swan Road. Others are booking people into jail if its an option. The jail staff checks the immigration status of everyone booked.

One month after the October protest, Tucson police stopped Alberto Garca, a 31-year-old day laborer from Guatemala, because a records check showed a mandatory insurance suspension on the vehicle he was driving. When the officer asked for proof of who he was, Garca, who had no drivers license, showed the officer an ID issued by Southside Presbyterian Church.

Garcas lack of state-issued ID and difficulty speaking English prompted the officer to call the Border Patrol to identify him, said Sgt. Chris Widmer, a Tucson Police Department spokesman.

But before a border agent arrived, a group of eight to 10 activists with a video camera arrived, knocking on the officers window and asking why Garca was being arrested, the police report said. Fearing a repeat of the October protest, he drove away with Garca in handcuffs, inviting the agent to follow him.

The officer and agent drove to the west-side substation, where they passed through a gate that kept activists from following. The agent confirmed Garcas unauthorized status, and police decided to book him into jail for the crime of driving without a license, a violation for which people are usually cited and released.

See original here:

SB 1070 frustrations at a boil for protesters, police

Rep. Cardenas joins New Dems to talk about Comprehensive Immigration Reform
originally recorded Feb. 27, 2014.

By: Rep. Tony Cardenas

See the original post here:

Rep. Cardenas joins New Dems to talk about Comprehensive Immigration Reform - Video

L.E. Baskow

Supporters with Fast for Families rally with their speakers during a media stop in downtown Henderson as part of a nationwide bus tour Friday, Feb. 28, 2014. L.E.Baskow

By Tovin Lapan (contact)

Friday, Feb. 28, 2014 | 7:24 p.m.

Fast for Families, a national campaign advocating for immigration reform, visited Southern Nevada on Friday, picking up fellow hunger strikers and proponents for congressional action along the way.

In November, Fast for Families sought to catalyze the immigration debate when Eliseo Medina of the Service Employees International Union, Dae Joong DJ Yoon of the National Korean American Service & Education Consortium, Rudy Lopez of the Fair Immigration Reform Movement and Cristian Avila of Mi Familia Vota participated in a hunger strike on the National Mall, abstaining from all nourishment except for water, for 22 days.

Avila spoke at a press conference Friday morning across the street from the Henderson Detention Center, the main facility in Nevada for housing immigrants detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Inaction is not an option, he said. There were a lot of ups and downs in 2013 for the movement. It was like a roller coaster. The fast created a lot of momentum, and we are building on that momentum with the bus tour. Congress will get the message, from community after community, people are committed to seeing reform happen.

Avila, 23, has received a work permit under the deferred action for childhood arrivals program, but his parents are still living in the country illegally. He said the 26 pounds he lost during the winter fast were nothing compared with the sacrifice his parents and others have made in search of a better life for their children.

Immigration reform was dubbed a top priority by the Obama administration after the 2012 election. And a bill addressing border security, guest workers, high-skilled labor and the estimated 11 million immigrants living in the country illegally did pass the Senate the following June, but stalled in the House.

Link:

Immigration advocates go hungry to send message to Washington

Published: Sunday, March 2, 2014 at 6:01 a.m. Last Modified: Thursday, February 27, 2014 at 7:40 p.m.

In the State of the Union address and the Republican response, President Obama and Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers each identified immigration reform as a priority. Just a few days later, House Republicans released their Standards for Immigration Reform, another sign of bipartisan support for this critical issue.

But since then, Speaker John Boehner has expressed doubt about the path forward for reform. As an evangelical pastor in Florida, I pray that leaders will overcome such doubt, and I wholeheartedly support movement on immigration reform.

Immigrants contribute to the growth and prosperity of Gainesville and of our nation. Almost all economists agree that immigrantsand undocumented immigrants specifically have a net positive impact on our economy. Reform would provide an economic stimulus that would not cost a dime of taxpayer money, helping to reduce our deficit.

Immigrants' contributions are not merely economic, though: As a pastor, I also see the plethora of ways that immigrants have helped to build our local church. Our congregation, like thousands of others across the U.S., equips its members many of whom are immigrants to live out our mission of sharing God's love in our community. We need a system that works better for immigrants themselves and for our churches, our national security and our economy.

As a Christian, I know God calls me both to welcome the stranger (Matthew 25) and to uphold the rule of law (Romans 13). Our current dysfunctional immigration laws make it impossible to do either well. They force our hard-working neighbors to live in the shadows, keeping them vulnerable to crime, labor exploitation and even human trafficking.

Indiscriminate deportations have torn families apart, hurting families that were once economically self-sufficient. Hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizen children have experienced the deportation of a parent in the past several years, a reality that I and many other pastors have witnessed firsthand. Our laws must be amended to be more welcoming and family friendly.

Our system also fails to honor the law. Our archaic laws are entirely out of synch with the needs of a dynamic labor market and thus are sporadically enforced. We need a solution that restores the rule of law, providing the opportunity for undocumented immigrants to make things right by paying a penalty and proving over a probationary period that they will work for the privilege of American citizenship.

That also will allow us to separate out those few who have committed serious criminal offenses who should be deported from the majority whose only offense has been a violation of civil immigration law, for whom a fine is an appropriate penalty. We're not advocating for amnesty, but for accountability. The only real amnesty on the table is the status quo.

Thankfully, Republican leaders in Congress have shown signs that immigration reform including further securing our borders and giving aspiring Americans the opportunity to earn legal status is a priority. They must move forward, and they will do so with support among voters across the spectrum, including conservatives and evangelicals as polls show.

Here is the original post:

Mark Vega: Immigration reform would help our economy, community

House Democrats havent launched a discharge petition on immigration just yet, but reform-friendly Republicans are already rejecting the idea.

Three House Republicans who have endorsed the Democrats comprehensive immigration reform legislation all said they will not sign onto any effort from Democrats to push a floor vote.

No, theres just no way, said Rep. David Valadao (R-Calif.), who co-sponsored the Democratic immigration bill last fall. To play politics that way is not the way to get something this serious done.

(Also on POLITICO: Tax plan could hit immigrants)

A spokesman for Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) said she would not sign one. And Rep. Jeff Denham (R-Calif.) also said he is a no on a discharge petition.

I am interested in working through the committee process, he said. Im going to continue to pressure and push my conference on coming to a solution and offering other bills.

The three lawmakers are the only House Republicans who have co-sponsored legislation spearheaded by Democrats that largely takes from the Senate-passed bill, but scales back its border-security provisions.

A discharge petition is a procedural gambit that allows the minority party in the House in this case, Democrats to force a vote on the floor over the wishes of the majority leadership. Very few discharge petitions actually succeed, since it is considered a breach of party loyalty to sign onto an effort from the opposing party.

(CARTOONS: Matt Wuerker on immigration)

Of course, securing the necessary 218 signatures on a discharge petition wouldnt be the only goal of Democrats. Lawmakers are also hoping that the existence of a discharge petition on immigration will create enough pressure on Republicans to force the leadership to start moving reform bills on the House floor.

Excerpt from:

GOPers reject Dem immigration tactic