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In a Guest Columnist article that appeared in the Sylva Herald Feb. 17, Ron Robinson gave his version of what he heard in a conversation from which he eavesdropped while drinking a beer in the Crazy Biker Brewery. Ron claimed he heard a conversation between a young lady and a bearded fellow called Joe.

According to Robinson, the young lady said she had attended the Republican debate between eight candidates in Franklin. Ron claimed the young lady conveyed the following comments: (1) The Republican debate in Franklin was a contest to broadcast their radical right agendas ... and opposed Build Back Better funding for our states infrastructure. (2) The Republican candidates will keep your neighbor from going back to work by opposing lower cost of child care provided by Build Back Better.

Regarding item #1 above, some consider quoting hearsay irresponsible due to the lack of verification of the information from first hand witness.

My wife and I attended that debate. We heard no radical right agenda expressed by the Republican candidates. Perhaps the mistake is the quality of Rons source who might have been perverted by a radical left agenda.

One thing is clear: the Infrastructure Bill and the Build Back Better Bill are two different bills. For the young lady to say Build Back Better funding for our states infrastructure indicates a lack of understanding that the two bills are not the same. This should have been a red flag to a reasonable person as to the credibility of the young lady.

Regarding item #2 above, the Republican candidates are not the ones keeping ones neighbor from going back to work.

What the young lady, if Ron heard her correctly, is saying is that the government is responsible for financing the care of our children. That was one of the objectives of the Build Back Better bill that did not pass the Senate, government financed child care.

The definition of a Socialist government is the following according to Websters dictionary: advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production.

Going to work is a means of production. Therefore, what the young lady was advocating was a more socialistic government, as is advocated in President Bidens Build Back Better Bill.

Therefore, Joe was correct in labeling Joe Bidens administration as a socialist government ... giving away millions and billions to those that need the governments help in order to go to work. The revised Build Back Better Bill is valued at $1.9 trillion. Yes, most would call that millions, billions, and even almost $2 trillion!

Last, as to the question Ron Robinson said the young lady raised regarding who do you consider patriots in our country?

A good answer to that question was given to us by President Kennedy on 20 January 1961: Ask not what your country can do for you-ask what you can do for your country. The Build Back Better Bill is full of what your country can do for you, which sure sounds like Websters definition of Socialism.

Robinson stated that he could not hear Joes answer to what constitutes a Socialist government. Is that because Ron did not want to hear Joes answer?

Michael Padgett is a retired Army Colonel having commanded units through Brigade level command. He currently teaches federal government employees. He and his wife, Sheila, reside in Sylva.

Read the rest here:
Differing thoughts on BBB and defining socialism - The Sylva Herald

The Stop the War Coalition held a No to war in Ukraine rally in Londons Conway Hall Wednesday evening. In an act of supreme political cowardice, neither former shadow chancellor John McDonnell nor former shadow home secretary Diane Abbott, leading figures of the Labour left, took their seats next to former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn.

The event took place amid an ongoing witch-hunt of anti-NATO opposition organised by current Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, who has greeted the Ukraine war with the declaration that his is the party of NATO.

Last Thursday, Starmer threatened to withdraw the party whip from 11 Labour MPs, a rump of the Socialist Campaign Group, including Abbott and McDonnell, if they did not withdraw their support from an STWC open letter. The letter opposed NATOs eastward expansion and the UKs pouring oil on the fire in Ukraine, calling for a negotiated settlement recognising the right of the Ukrainian people to self-determination while addressing Russias security concerns.

Starmer claimed all 11 scalps within the first hour, as every one of them rushed to remove their signature. He pushed his advantage the next day, effectively shutting down the partys youth movement, Young Labour, for tweets supporting Stop the War and criticising Labours backing Nato aggression.

Last Saturday, McDonnell spoke at a pro-Ukraine demonstration in London with the ferociously pro-NATO warmonger Paul Mason. On Tuesday, Abbott told Politics Live, Nobody wants to attack NATO. Asked if Starmers threat to withdraw the whip applied to her she replied, I am a loyal supporter of Keir Starmer, and it will never come to that.

Abbott and McDonnell pressed their faces further into the dirt on Wednesday. Throughout the morning, the media was full of speculation about whether McDonnell, listed on the STWCs advertising as a panellist, would attend the Conway Hall rally.

On Monday, Starmer had told the Parliamentary Labour Party that there was no place for anyone drawing false equivalence between the actions of Russia and the actions of NATO. One Labour source told the Huffington Post that if McDonnell attended the STWC event, hell lose the whip. Any Labour MPs who speak at anything that is anti-Nato from now on are likely to be out.

LabourList reported that the threat of expulsions was still a live issue: behind the scenes, a number of Labour MPs have been urging Starmer to go further. With the chances of Jeremy Corbyn returning to the parliamentary party looking close to zero now, some are determined that as many Corbynites as possible are also ousted.

McDonnell was as eager as Abbott to prove his loyalty, issuing a statement that afternoon. Referring to the speculation about my attendance at tonights Stop the War meeting and reports of threats if I do, he said, My response is that people are dying on the streets of Ukrainian cities. This is not the time to be distracted by political arguments here. Now is the time to unite and do all we can to assist the people of Ukraine desperately seeking asylum and to do all we can to bring about peace.

Nothing is more important at this time. Nothing should distract us from that. So I wont feed into that distraction by going tonight.

Suggesting Labour Party members be given clarity over the Labour Partys attitude to attending demonstrations organised by Stop the War, he concluded, My final comment is that, in the wider context of securing a socialist Labour government, and possibly inspired by my team Liverpool at Wembley at the weekend, I do believe its important for socialists to stay on the pitch for as long as it takes.

Abbott made the same decision, though she is such an inconsequential figure that the first time anyone knew she had been planning on attending the event was when she told the Guardian late Wednesday evening she no longer was.

McDonnells statement is an insult to anyone who ever followed him. There is no effort to assist the people of Ukraine being organised by the Labour Party to distract from. What McDonnell proposes to avoid a political argument over is a relentless campaign of anti-Russian militarism and invective unleashed by the worlds imperialist powers in an effort to use the invasion of Ukraine they provoked to engineer regime change in Moscow.

To move from a war crisis threatening the worlds working class with catastrophe to a tortured football analogy is politically revolting. McDonnell is not staying on the pitch to wait for a socialist Labour government. His pitch is a party of imperialist warmongers and he will remain a well-paid flunkey of that party no matter what crimes it commits.

What socialist could possibly want to remain a member of an out-and-out Thatcherite party of war? It is a political cesspit.

Stop the War pressed on with their rally, with Corbyn, convenor and vice chair of STWC Lindsey German and Chris Nineham, leading Pabloite Tariq Ali, general secretary of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament Kate Hudson, National Education Union joint general secretary Kevin Courtney (in a personal capacity) and Sinn Fin MP Chris Hazzard in attendance. But its entire political perspective is in ruins. Hostile to an anti-war movement based on the working class and the struggle for socialism, the STWC makes appeals to the British ruling class to adopt a different, less militarist, foreign policyfor which the Labour left were identified as parliamentary champions.

This bankrupt perspective was summed up in the organisations refusal to criticise Corbyns countless retreats before the right-wing, pro-war majority of the Parliamentary Labour Party during his time as leader. McDonnell and Abbott, Corbyns closest allies, entrusted with the most senior positions in his shadow cabinet, are only continuing his record of political prostration.

At Stop the Wars 20th anniversary meeting last year, former chair Andrew Murray, one of Corbyns advisers, explained, We have to think about everything we say, and how we protesthow itll not just impact on public opinion, but how it could impact on Jeremy, who is a very staunch friend of Stop the War We have a lot of money in the bank with each other, as it were.

The end result of Corbyns STWC-approved capitulations is that the Labour Party is firmly in the hands of Starmer, more right-wing than ever, and not even one of its MPs will turn up to STWC events or sign their open letters. None will any longer utter a word of criticism of NATO and all will collaborate with Starmers crackdown.

Neither Stop the War nor Corbyn have made criticisms of Abbott, McDonnell or any of the other SCG MPs. Were Corbyn still sitting as a Labour MPhe had the whip withdrawn over the anti-Semitism witch-huntthere is every likelihood he would have done the same as his followers.

A mass anti-war movement must be built. It is being given sharp lessons in who its friends and enemies are. The fight against war must be based on a struggle to organise the international working class and waged in absolute opposition McDonnell, Abbott, Corbyn and all the other faux-left enablers of British imperialism.

Foreword to the German edition of David Norths Quarter Century of War

Johannes Stern, 5 October 2020

After three decades of US-led wars, the outbreak of a third world war, which would be fought with nuclear weapons, is an imminent and concrete danger.

Excerpt from:
John McDonnell and Diane Abbott pull out of Stop the War Coalition rally - WSWS

An Erdington byelection special four-page wrap-around with the Socialist issue 1169

Voting for more of the same will only get us more of the same. And, when that same means soaring energy bills for us and soaring energy profits for them we cant take any more of the same! Cuts to public services hit us hard, while billionaires get even richer.

A vote for Labour or the Tories will be seen by Boris Johnson, or Sir Keir Starmer, as support for their approach: to carry on privatising our NHS, letting the bosses get away with fire and rehire, saddling our young people with tens of thousands of pounds of student debt, and so on.

At best, there will be a discussion on how working-class people should pay for the crisis we didnt cause. No party in Westminster says make the billionaires pay instead because working-class people dont have our own political voice, our own party.

Dave Nellist, a member of the Socialist Party, is standing as the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) candidate so we can use our vote to send a message to Westminster that we have had enough and want an alternative to their same old, same old.

Dave will be a voice for us instead. He has a record of being a workers MP who only took a workers wage and as a fighter for working-class people. The result in this by-election wont change the government, but a vote for Dave can shake up the establishment. Daves campaign is also part of the fight to build a powerful voice for the working class a new mass workers party.

Youth clubs, home care, school budgets, swimming pools, libraries many have disappeared, and more have been cut beyond recognition, privatised by profiteering corner-cutting companies, or now carry hefty charges. The decent public services needed for dignity, support and a start in life are being destroyed.

These attacks represent political choices about which part of society should foot the bill which class. The Tories made their position clear from the get-go in 2010, with the slashing of 40 billion of funding for councils in the years since. In that period, the amount paid by FTSE 100 companies in dividends to shareholders doubled to a record 110 billion in 2019. This is still the fifth-richest country on the planet.

Birmingham City Council, like all the Labour-led councils across the country, has dutifully accepted the Tory line and cut over 770 million from services since 2010. Over 13,000 jobs have been slashed. Birmingham Labour council has closed 43 youth centres, 12 nurseries, 21 childrens centres, five childrens homes, four libraries and countless community and leisure facilities. And then privatised or sold off most of whats left, as its trying to do with Short Heath playing fields too.

Labour cuts

The Labour candidate for Erdington, Paulette Hamilton, was a council cabinet member in 2018 when Birmingham care workers in Unison took strike action against the council plan to cut their hours. Some workers faced a cut from 37 hours to just 14 hours a week! Their 20-month strike defeated the plan, and the new rota was dropped. Unite and Unison refuse workers were also forced to strike against cuts in 2019.

Paulette has no defence, as she told LabourList: Ive had that portfolio for over seven years they can only name two disputes. I have managed a budget of over 354 million. I have also managed the public health budget each year of over 100 million. And they have highlighted two disputes that happened over five years ago, when we were looking at how we could upgrade a service. We had cross-party agreement when it was all decided. Thats cross-party with the Tories by the way

In Coventry, the Labour council is brutally attacking the trade unions trying to defend services and jobs. That council is refusing to pay bin drivers the rate for the job. But even worse, it is paying outside workers twice the going rate to do the work of their own workforce, spending over 2 million in an attempt to break the strike in defence of fair pay.

The socialist-led Liverpool Labour council in the 1980s provides a lesson of what a fighting council could do if it chose to represent and mobilise the working class. Its legacy is undeniable. It includes 4,800 houses and bungalows built; six new nursery classes built and opened; five new sports centres, one with a leisure pool attached; three new parks built; and rents frozen for five years.

The council defeated Tory Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, winning 60 million for Liverpool. It was achieved on the basis of workers and young people taking a democratic part in the decision process. That was in the form of mass meetings but also mass demonstrations and strike action to fight for what had been agreed in the council chamber.

Councils today have a lot of power to fight back against Tory attacks. Councils in England, for example, are responsible for over one fifth of all public spending. If they were to use their reserves and borrowing powers to produce budgets based on whats needed, and combine this with a Liverpool-style struggle, a mass movement could be inspired and built to end Tory austerity and kick them out.

New mass workers party

Today this type of struggle against the Tories is necessary but it is impossible in Starmers New Labour. As we go to press, Labour councillors who say they might vote against this years cuts face being expelled; Jeremy Corbyn is not allowed to sit as a Labour MP; and Starmer takes the side of Coventry council against the workers. The lesson is that cuts can be fought but we require councillors and a party with a no-cuts programme. Labour is not that. A new party must be built.

That can start now. Elections are taking place on 5 May with over 6,000 council seats up. In its existence since 2010, thousands of working-class fighters have stood as no-cuts candidates for the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) trade unionists, socialists, community campaigners, student activists people with a record of standing up to the bosses and campaigning for their community and pledged to vote against cuts.

Standing no-cuts candidates has meant theres a real choice on the ballot paper in those areas. This can also help spread the idea of building a new mass workers party. It can also be an effective way of putting pressure on councillors they dont like a challenge to what they see as their right to rule. So why not be part of that?

See http://www.tusc.org.uk for info.

Birminghams unemployment rate of 12.6% is the highest of any major British city. Now Erdingtons GKN plant is set to close with the loss of 500-plus skilled jobs. Johnsons Tory government could have intervened, nationalised and saved GKN, but instead it let it go to the wall. The Socialist Party fights for the nationalisation of GKN under democratic workers control and management.

Boris Johnson claimed the Tories wanted Brexit to level up working-class communities, but their Brexit is about freedom for the bosses to exploit us. Dave, in contrast, led one of the three national campaigns to leave the EU, explaining it is Thatcherism on a continental scale which limits a governments ability to defend working-class interests for example to nationalise plants threatened with closure.

Johnsons plan for Brexit is the same as the EUs: giving big employers more liberty to attack workers pay, rights and conditions and to sell off our NHS to US private health companies. We need an MP to cut through both Tory and Labour Brexit jargon and put workers first.

Ben Robinson, an organiser of Youth March for Jobs

Dave Nellist has been a longstanding campaigner for young peoples rights. As an MP in the 1980s, Daves maiden speech was against Thatchers Youth Training Scheme forcing young people into low-paid work, and helping to build the movement against it.

Just over a decade ago, I was one of the Youth Fight for Jobs marchers who walked through Coventry on the way from Jarrow to London, following in the footsteps of the 1936 Jarrow march for jobs. In the aftermath of the 2007-8 financial crash, politicians and big business were asking working-class people to pay the price. Youth unemployment shot up to around a million 16 to 24-year-olds.

Again, Dave was one of our biggest supporters, joining us early in the march and helping to organise a rally and protest in Coventry, where he was a Socialist Party councillor. As we marched through the streets, local young people joined us and cheered as we spoke about fighting the Labour councils attacks, including to the local college, and the need for a socialist fightback.

These are just a few examples of Daves record. With fresh attacks on education, and low pay and job insecurity still rife for young people, we need a fightback. Dave has proven time and again that he is a fighter for young people and the working class, and will use any position to build that fightback. Vote for a fighter, vote Nellist!

Adam Powell-Davies, Socialist Students

Every year, hundreds of thousands of students leave university into a world of low pay and temporary contracts, owing the government close to 30,000. The moment we graduate, this figure starts growing. And thats just to cover tuition, leaving aside loans to cover the cost of rent and food.

However, there is no question that the wealth exists in society for education to be run as a free public service, available to all. After all, billionaires wealth has increased by $5 trillion to $13.8 trillion since March 2021. The question is: who owns and controls this wealth, and how is it used?

Free education is entirely possible. After all, university tuition fees were not introduced in Britain until 1998, under newly elected New Labour prime minister Tony Blair. In contrast, as Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn showed the huge support for free higher education when students, young people and workers joined mass rallies in the run up to the 2017 general election. The 2019 election manifesto grey book estimated the cost of abolishing tuition fees and restoring maintenance grants for full-time and part-time students at 13.6 billion. The obstacle is the profit system and the defenders of capitalism.

Corbyns anti-austerity programme was met with disdain by Tory and right-wing Labour MPs, who claimed there is no magic money tree. Yet the same Tory government has shown that the money can be found when the capitalist system they defend is under threat spending over 400 billion since Covid struck, including the 37 billion set aside for the botched test-and-trace system.

The current tuition fee system leaves university graduates saddled with debt for much of our working lives. In fact, the government predicts that only 25% of current undergraduates will have paid off their debt by the time they retire. The situation is only set to worsen following the Tories announcement that the student loan debt repayment window will be extended from 30 to 40 years and the repayment threshold lowered.

Alongside free education, we need institutions that are fully funded by government, and controlled by students, workers and the wider working class. This would bring to an end the university managements vicious attacks on the conditions of staff in the name of balancing the books.

But who will launch the fight for free education? Under Keir Starmer, the Labour Party has taken a clear rightward turn to the side of big business. As of yet, the current Labour leader has not officially renounced his 2020 campaign pledge to support the abolition of tuition fees. But he has retreated from nationalising utilities, suspended Jeremy and introduced rule changes designed to lock out the left from taking the leadership again.

And where was Starmer when students were organising rent strikes last year? When Young Labour urged him to back the rent strikes, he did not respond. A Labour spokesperson refused to confirm the partys position. Starmers right-wing machine has even gone as far as prohibiting access to Young Labour social media accounts, in an attempt to censor Labours official youth wing. Starmer is hell-bent on completing Labours reconfiguration into a safe pair of hands for British capitalism. It is difficult to imagine him ever demanding the super-rich pay for education.

This is why it is time for students to build a new mass movement, starting with campus-wide rallies of students and university workers already on strike, to discuss the next steps to fight cuts and marketisation.

But without a political alternative outside the Labour Party, students would be fighting with one hand tied behind our backs. A mass movement of students fighting for free education would be strengthened by representatives in Westminster like Dave Nellist, fighting on our side against the bosses.

Even just a modest tax or levy on the vast wealth of the super-rich would be enough to provide free education and reinstate maintenance grants. But why should the capitalists maintain their control over our education, and over the economy and the rest of society?

Socialists fight for the wealth and resources to be owned and controlled by the majority, the working class. By nationalising the banks and big business to be run under democratic workers control and management, a socialist government could plan production to meet everyones needs. Only such socialist measures, coordinated with socialist movements internationally, could guarantee a flourishing, free education system on a permanent basis.

Ian Hodson, President Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union: As a founder and funder, and after 119 years of support for the Labour Party, our members decided that they could no longer be supportive of a political organisation riven by factionalism, and more interested in securing positions in its own ranks than dealing with the huge inequalities and hardship so many in our society face.

We have witnessed in recent weeks the actions of Labour in power with its treatment of its bin workers. They are no different to those of the Tory party. We need a fresh start, and Erdington offers an opportunity to send a real shot across the bows of the Westminster elite. By electing Dave Nellist, the people of Erdington will be sending one of their own someone who will be a powerful voice for ending the hardship we see daily in our society. Be it food, energy or housing poverty, it is a political choice by voting Dave Nellist you will be saying its time for change, and time for a better society for all.

Pete Randall, Unite rep for Coventry bin strikers: Dave stands on the side of workers, the community and is honest. So honest, he pledges to take a workers wage! This isnt about greed, its about delivering for the people. Hes done it before, hell do it again.

Chris Williamson, ex-Labour MP and Resist: I have known Dave Nellist for over 30 years. He is a real community champion. No other candidate can match his track record. By contrast, the Labour Party ignores the interests of local people and Labours response to the cost of living crisis is almost identical to the Conservatives.

Joe Simpson, Deputy General Secretary of the Prison Officers Association: I support Dave Nellist simply because of who he is. Dave is a sincere, genuine working-class man who will speak up for his constituents in Erdington and will protect them from the devastating cuts which will come in the next few years. No other candidate is speaking up for the people of Erdington and giving them a voice in parliament they will just take the money, sit on their hands and vote in favour of the party they belong to.

That is the exact opposite of what Dave will deliver, he will deliver a working-class voice on a working-class wage with a working-class agenda.

Naomi Byron, Unison NEC (personal capacity) and NHS worker: If Dave is elected to Parliament again he will be a real workers representative there. I know Dave will always fight to defend the NHS and for its renationalisation. He stands with health workers and outsourced workers. He fought against the Private Finance Initiative when New Labour introduced it, he is fighting against the Health and Care Bill, for proper NHS funding, and a proper pay rise for all.

Hugo Pierre, Unison NEC (personal capacity) and school worker: I am confident, that if elected, Dave would make a great MP for Erdington. Dave knows the West Midlands and has fought against the drop in workers living standards as formerly skilled, well-paid jobs have been replaced with low-paid precarious work.

He supported and gave solidarity to the Birmingham bin and home care workers who were attacked by the Labour council.

As a trade unionist, support for your struggle is the key. Im backing Dave in Erdington because he will have your backs. But workers across the country will also have a principled and determined socialist fighting for our cause.

Tosh McDonald, retired President of ASLEF the train drivers union and former councillor for Doncaster Town ward: By voting for Dave Nellist, the voters of Erdington have the chance to make a real change to Britains political landscape. With no real difference between Westminsters main parties and their careerist politicians, Dave is a refreshing breath of fresh air. Taking a workers wage instead of lining his own pocket, standing up for people instead of big business, Dave is a real peoples politician. A vote for Dave is a vote to change politics in Birmingham and beyond.

The Socialist Party is part of the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, working with trade unions and others to stand no-cuts, fighting candidates, and take those first necessary steps towards building the new mass workers party we so urgently need.

Within the campaign for working-class political representation, the Socialist Party fights for a bold socialist programme that shows how we can really transform things. The first step is nationalisation of the biggest 150 banks and corporations that dominate the economy, under democratic working-class control and management. This would put the levers for the first steps towards a socialist planned economy, democratically run to meet the needs of all, into workers hands not those of the bosses.

The pandemic revealed the potential power of workers many times, forcing bosses to take safety measures they didnt want to take. What could the six-and-a-half million members of the trade unions do if we acted together? Combine that with those not yet in a union, linked up with young people, and communities!

Key to bringing that potential power to bear is the mass organisation of workers, including building a workers political voice. It also means strengthening the trade unions, the main workers organisations in the workplaces, where workers confront the bosses in the struggles over safety, pay, and conditions.

But it also means joining the Socialist Party. We stand firm for socialism come what may standing up against the bosses, the Tories, and the Labour Blairites, charting a way forward to build the maximum unity of the working class in the struggle for socialist change.

Fighting for a socialist alternative to war, poverty and inequality is an international struggle against an international capitalist system. The Socialist Party is affiliated to the Committee for a Workers International (CWI) to build a worldwide struggle for socialism.

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Erdington byelection - Working-class people need a voice - Socialist Party

The Biden policy may prevent assimilation, increase crime, and create demographic imbalance.

With great difficulty, President Donald Trump was dissuaded by his aides from revoking the citizenship of millions of Americans born of illegal immigrant parents on American soil. Before he could move legislation to insert an exception to the Fourteenth Amendment to thwart children of illegal aliens from acquiring citizenship only because they were born in America, President Trump caught the coronavirus. On release from hospital, he got busy with his reelection campaign and shelved his immigration agenda for the time being. In November 2020, to the great relief of millions of such prospective Americans and 11 million more undocumented immigrants, most of whom were from Latin America, Donald Trump lost his reelection bid.Joseph R. Biden. Jr. of Delaware, who replaced Donald Trump as Americas 46th President, started undoing the immigration policies of his predecessor in fulfillment of a campaign promise. His liberal immigration agenda, product of more than 50 years of the Democratic Partys thinking on both immigration and immigrants, aimed at removing all obstacles to the acquisition of American citizenship by both illegal aliens and refugees till then kept out by successive Administrations. In fact, such illegal immigrants were not aliens anymore. They were to be referred to as noncitizens: a humane treatment of non-Americans who had entered America illegally but regarded American citizenship as a matter of right.Accordingly, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and the Department of Homeland Security, to which it reports, have been instructed by the Biden Administration to refer to illegal aliens as undocumented noncitizens. As a matching instruction, Americans have been asked not to expect immigrants to assimilate, but to integrate them into American society. There are two things here. Even if immigrants dont assimilate, mainstream Americans were not going to insist on their assimilation but accept them as they were and treat them with respect. More importantly, the fact that the federal government intended to treat illegal immigrants with respect meant that the Administration had long-term plans regarding their future, the grant of American citizenship being the minimum respect that the US government could afford them.President Bidens reinstatement of DACA (Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals), instituted by President Barack Obama in 2012 through executive order, was cancelled by a federal court in July last year. The expansion and further extension of DACA, which protects illegal aliens, brought to America as children, from deportation by allowing them to apply for work permits, was rescinded by President Trump. Presently, despite the federal courts ruling banning new applications to DACA, already-enrolled recipients are allowed to retain both their status and their benefits. Though Bidens campaign promise in this regard remains to be fulfilled, he can always tell supporters that he tried.Biden again came across as Americas biggest guarantor against deportation of illegal immigrants as he limited the dreaded United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)s deportation practices to only those guilty of violent crimes and perceived as threats to national security; illegal aliens charged with nonviolent and /or petty crimes were to be left untouched (by extension, that would leave out burglars and sexual offenders as well). Clipping the wings of ICE would definitely make illegal immigration a major source of crime in America.The day he became President, Joe Biden revoked Executive Order 13780, popularly known as the Trump travel ban and perceived by immigration advocates as highly discriminatory toward citizens of certain countries as if it was their natural right to enter America. The urgency with which the travel ban was lifted testifies to its enormity to the ultra-liberal wing of the Democratic Party whom Biden wants to appease, if not empower.A similar urgency was witnessed with regard to the construction of the Mexican border wall. In another order passed on the day he took office, Biden instructed that all work on the wall be stopped forthwith. Biden had always agreed with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that the construction was unnecessary and a huge wastage of federal funds. Curiously, the border wall became a battleground of partisan interests as Republican Greg Abbott, Governor of Texas, resumed construction of the wall along 13 miles of the border of his state with Mexico in October last year, in total disregard of the Biden revocation.By insisting that immigrants need not assimilate into American society but be accepted as they were by Americans, Biden is calling for culture wars on American soil. By stopping the deportation of illegal immigrants with criminal backgrounds, crime is set to rise in America. Lifting the Trump travel ban may make America vulnerable to terrorist acts. All these, apart from the great demographic and cultural imbalance that unbridled grant of citizenship to millions of undocumented noncitizens may entail. If Lyndon Baines Johnson was credited with opening the doors of America to the world, Joe Biden can pride himself on dismantling the door altogether.Dr Saumyajit Ray is Assistant Professor in United States Studies at School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.

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Biden's immigration policy: Aliens no more, alienated forever - The Sunday Guardian Live - The Sunday Guardian

For the next 18 months, Ukrainians already in the United States will be allowed to remain in the country and work without fear of deportation.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) on Thursday designated Ukraine for Temporary Protected Status (TPS),a program that protects foreign nationals from deportation to countries that have undergone natural or human-made disasters.

Russias premeditated and unprovoked attack on Ukraine has resulted in an ongoing war, senseless violence, and Ukrainians forced to seek refuge in other countries, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro MayorkasAlejandro MayorkasDHS grants temporary immigration status to all Ukrainians in the US ICE pauses deportations to Russia, Ukraine amid invasion Live coverage - Ukraine, Russia agree to safe corridors for aid, evacuees MORE said.

In these extraordinary times, we will continue to offer our support and protection to Ukrainian nationals in the United States, he added.

The Biden administration had earlier vowed not to deport people to Ukraine, Russia and seven other European countries in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The TPS designation comes after significant political pressure from top Democrats and some Republicans, who had called on President BidenJoe BidenFire breaks out at major nuclear plant in Ukraine amid fighting Russia inflames political war over gas prices, oil drilling On The Money Push to block Russian imports hits wall MORE to include Ukraine in the humanitarian program.

After a week of Vladimir PutinVladimir Vladimirovich PutinKennedy Center lights up in blue and yellow to show support for Ukraine Russian opera star ditches Met performances to avoid Putin rebuke DHS grants temporary immigration status to all Ukrainians in the US MOREs illegal and ruthless war against the people of Ukraine, I am heartened that Biden administration is heeding our calls to designate Ukraine for Temporary Protected Status," said Sen. Bob Menndez (D-N.J.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

"As a result of todays decision, President Biden is once again making clear the United States will not relent in its support for the people of Ukraine in this dark moment in history," Menndez added.

Earlier this week, Menndez, along with Senate Majority Whip Dick DurbinDick DurbinDHS grants temporary immigration status to all Ukrainians in the US Collins to meet with Biden's Supreme Court nominee Tuesday Supreme Court pick launches a cross-aisle charm offensive MORE (D-Ill.) and Sen. Rob PortmanRobert (Rob) Jones PortmanDHS grants temporary immigration status to all Ukrainians in the US DOJ officials criticize Senate-passed cyber bill Scott reiterates his plan could change after McConnell rebuke MORE (R-Ohio), led 39 senators in a letter calling on Biden to designate Ukraine for TPS.

Democrats are increasingly bullish about TPS designations, which have allowed hundreds of thousands of immigrants to work in the United States, albeit under a temporary status that does not allow an easy transition to permanent residence.

California Democrats Sen. Alex PadillaAlex PadillaDHS grants temporary immigration status to all Ukrainians in the US Overnight Health Care Presented by Alexion Battle lines drawn over COVID-19 funding Senate GOP passes resolution to nix COVID-19 emergency MORE and Rep. Zoe LofgrenZoe Ellen LofgrenDHS grants temporary immigration status to all Ukrainians in the US Numbers don't lie: America's most resilient jobs are venture-backed Congressional stock trading ban must include spouses, lawmakers say MORE, chairs of the immigration subcommittees in their respective chambers of Congress, jointly celebrated Mayorkas's announcement.

Were grateful to see the Biden Administration heed our calls and take swift, just action to grant Ukrainian nationals in the United States with protection from deportation to a country currently under a brutal, unprovoked assault by Vladimir Putin. Our prayers are with the people of Ukraine and we continue to stand firmly behind them as they defend their home and their democracy, they wrote.

More than 300,000 foreign nationals are currently in the country under TPS; the Ukrainian designation could add up to 30,000 people to that number.

This is great news even if it is long overdue. It is necessary but still not sufficient. We hope President Biden takes additional action, and more swiftly, to assist the millions of Ukrainian refugees fleeing for their lives," said Doris Landaverde, the national spokesperson for the National TPS Alliance.

"The days ahead will be the measure of President Bidens presidency," added Landaverde, a TPS beneficiary.

The Biden administration has also granted new TPS designations to Venezuela and Sudan, and it added a new designation over Haiti's preexisting TPS status that greatly expanded the number of Haitians eligible for protections.

Still, the Biden administration has resisted issuing new designations for a handful of countries for which former President TrumpDonald TrumpMcCarthy-backed Republican wins contested Texas House primary DHS grants temporary immigration status to all Ukrainians in the US Senate GOP shrugs off latest Trump revelation MORE tried to end TPS.

The original designation for Haiti, as well as those of El Salvador, Honduras, Nepal and Nicaragua, are currently only active because of a court injunction invalidating Trump's order to repeal them.

Nicole Melaku, the executive director of the National Partnership for New Americans commended the Ukrainian designation, but called for expansions of the program to protect nationals of certain African countries.

"We also call for DHS to create and expand TPS protections for Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and El Salvador, countries that were devastated by environmental disasters. The decisions to grant TPS should not perpetuate long standing racial inequities in immigration enforcement and benefits," Melaku said.

Prominent Democrats joined the call to include more African and Asian countries in the program, particularly war-torn nations that receive less media attention than Ukraine.

"The Biden Admin should also designate TPS for non-white war-stricken countries like Ethiopia, Cameroon, Mauritania, Afghanistan, Mali and others," tweeted Rep. Ral Grijalva (D-Ariz.), the chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee.

Menndez also called on Biden to expand TPS.

"I will continue to urge the Administration utilize this statute to protect more populations who are unable to return home, including nationals from Cameroon, Ethiopia, and Afghanistan," he said.

"Today, as the Biden administration renews its commitment to protect refugees and asylum seekers in the post-Trump era and works to fulfill its promise to welcome migrants fleeing danger at our own borders, I join in commending this important TPS designation and look forward to seeing our economy and communities strengthened by it, he added.

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