This was emailed to me today.
PLEASE CALL TODAY TO KEEP ANTI-IMMIGRANT PROVISIONS OUT OF THE 9/11 INTELLIGENCE BILL!!
Take Action: Call the White House at (202) 456-1111 and Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) at (202) 225-2976
It appears that the anti-immigrant groups like FAIR have mobilized and are calling Congressional offices 5 to 1 in favor of the anti-immigrant provisions. PLEASE CALL TODAY!When you call, the key messages are :
-Keep the anti-immigrant provisions out of the intelligence reform bill.
-The compromise bill closely tracks the recommendations of the 9/11 commission without adding on extraneous immigration measures. No more compromising.
-The compromise already includes tough border measures and federal standards for driver's licenses which make licenses more secure and make us safer, but does not needlessly scapegoat all immigrants.
-Enact the real recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, not the agenda of House immigration restrictionists. The immigration provisions Rep. Sensenbrenner wants would not have prevented the terrorist attacks and will not make us safer.
Here's the entire text of the message that was emailed to me today:
PLEASE CALL TODAY TO KEEP ANTI-IMMIGRANT PROVISIONS OUT OF THE 9/11 INTELLIGENCE BILL!!
Take Action: Call the White House at (202) 456-1111 and Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) at (202) 225-2976
It appears that the anti-immigrant groups like FAIR have mobilized and are calling Congressional offices 5 to 1 in favor of the anti-immigrant provisions. PLEASE CALL TODAY!
When you call, the key messages are :
-Keep the anti-immigrant provisions out of the intelligence reform bill.
-The compromise bill closely tracks the recommendations of the 9/11 commission without adding on extraneous immigration measures. No more compromising.
-The compromise already includes tough border measures and federal standards for driver's licenses which make licenses more secure and make us safer, but does not needlessly scapegoat all immigrants.
-Enact the real recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, not the agenda of House immigration restrictionists. The immigration provisions Rep. Sensenbrenner wants would not have prevented the terrorist attacks and will not make us safer.
-Finally, tell them that we need comprehensive immigration reform--not non-solutions that will only drive people further underground and cause panic among immigrant communities.
DRIVER'S LICENSES The issue of driver's licenses for immigrants has become a key factor in this debate. The 9/11 Commission Report recommended federal standards for driver's licenses and other identification documents. Rep. Sensenbrenner (R-WI, Chair House Judiciary Committee) is insisting that the bill go beyond this recommendation and include provisions prohibiting states from granting licenses to undocumented immigrants be included in the bill. He claims that this provision is crucial for stopping terrorists. Unfortunately much mis-information has been spread about the driver's license provisions.
If you receive questions about the driver's license provisions, here are some key messages:
a.. The compromise bill already includes tough driver's license language that would set federal standards for driver's licenses. However, it would allow states to continue to set eligibility requirements.
b.. The 9/11 terrorists obtained valid licenses and had valid immigration papers. In a few cases, the terrorists lied about their state residency, NOT their legal status. Preventing undocumented immigrants from getting licenses would NOT have stopped the 9/11 terrorists from getting licenses.
c.. We are all safer when all drivers have licenses and insurance, and when all people can correctly identify themselves.
YOUR VOICE IS IMPORTANT!! PLEASE TAKE ACTION TODAY!!
Hope I can make it. I wanted to let you guys know about it.
CAN THE RIGHTS OF THE PEOPLE SIMPLY DISAPPEAR BY PRESIDENTIAL ORDER?NO TO THE "ENEMY COMBATANT" STATUS!
WHEN: TUESDAY, APRIL 20TH, 12 NOON
WHERE: FEDERAL BUILDING, SAN FRANCISCO, GOLDEN GATE & POLK
WHAT: PRESS CONFERENCE IN SOLIDARITY WITH THE DEMONSTRATION AT THE SUPREME COURT IN WASHINGTON D.C., WHERE ORAL ARGUMENTS WILL BE HEARD ON BEHALF OF GUANTANAMO BAY PRISONERS BEING HELD AS "ENEMY COMBATANTS"
Press contacts: 510-610-7070 or 510-684-8270
General information: Larry, 510 684-8270
Bay Area participants and endorsers:Bob Kearney of ACLU of No. California
American Muslim Voice
Blue Triangle Network
California Interfaith Alliance For Prison Reform
Cecilia Chang of Justice for New Americans*
Global Exchange
Grace Shimizu, Japanese American Community organizer
Gray Panthers
Stacy Tolchin, National Lawyers Guild, Immigration Committee
Not In Our Name
Riva Enteen, Chair KPFA Board*
Refuse and Resist
Reverend Michael Yoshi, Buena Vista Methodist Church*
Sara Olson, Indep. Radio Journalist, author of "Under Attack" 30 min. audio documentary
about attacks on the Muslim, Arab, S. Asian community
Shashi Dalal, Board of Trustees, *Fellowship Church
Rev. Dorsey O. Blake, Sr. Pastor* Organizations mentioned for identification purposes.
Below is a national call and a list of national endorsers for actions
at the Supreme Court in opposition to the use of Guantanamo Bay as a torture center/prison camp and against the ability of the president to designate persons, including citizens, as in the cases of Yaser Hamdi and Jose Padilla, as 'enemy combatants' and then lock them away incommunicado indefinitely without charges or judicial review:Can the Rights of People Simply Disappear by Presidential Order?
What does it mean when the President of the United States can on his own designate a citizen in the U.S. as an "enemy combatant" and order the military to hold that person incommunicado, indefinitely, and without charges? The U.S. Supreme Court is now deciding whether the courts even have the right to question the President's action.
What does it mean when the U.S. military internationally can literally snatch people off the street, designate them as "enemy combatants," and assert that they are beyond the reach of either U.S. or international law? Many are transported to a facility under total U.S. control and funded by Congressional appropriations, where they are held incommunicado, indefinitely, without charges, and some are threatened with trials before a military commission that falls short of basic standards of justice.
If the Supreme Court upholds these actions, it will condone the President's claim of virtually unlimited "wartime powers" without a formal declaration of war by the Congress, and with no or extremely limited oversight by the courts or the Congress.
On April 20 the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on the President's alleged right to create a "law free zone" at the Guantánamo detention center in Cuba. And on April 28, the Court will hear oral arguments on the President's asserted right to designate citizens as "enemy combatants," hold them at the U.S. Navy base in Charleston, SC, and deny them the ability to challenge the lawfulness of their detention.
We believe that the President cannot be allowed to create a "legal Black Hole" into which people are dropped with no recourse to the courts or to international law. Among us we hold many varied views on how and why this situation has arisen and what is ultimately needed to ensure justice. But we all agree that this dangerous new presidentially designated category of "enemy combatants" who have no legal rights is unjust, illegal, and immoral, and cannot be allowed to stand.
The silence over this perilous issue must be broken, and public opposition must be manifested. Join us in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on April 20 and April 28 to declare a resounding NO!
Our future and the future of hundreds of anonymous detainees now hang in the balance. This is a watershed event in history. What is at stake is just how much the President will be allowed to get away with. Your silence will be taken as assent.
[list in formation]
American Friends Service Committee
Amnesty International USA
Bill of Rights Defense Committee
Blue Triangle Network
Cambios Planetarios
Community Solutions Foundation Trust, LLC.
Council on American-Islamic Relations
Equal Justice USA/Moratorium Now!
First Amendment Foundation
Freedom Socialist Party
Guantanamo Human Rights Commission
La Resistencia
Muslim Civil Rights Center
National Committee Against Repressive Legislation (NCARL)
National Lawyers Guild
Oct. 22nd Coalition to Stop Police Brutality, Repression and the Criminalization of a Generation
Pax Christi USA
Refuse & Resist!
Solidarity USA
This just in from:
Amnesty International USA
Bill of Rights Defense Committee
Blue Triangle Network
First Amendment Foundation
Guantanamo Human Rights Commission
National Committee Against Repressive Legislation (NCARL)
National Lawyers Guild
Refuse & Resist!
Solidarity USA
Communities United Against Police Brutality (Minneapolis)
Greensboro Justice Fund
Elaine Cassel, Civil Liberties Watch
Stephen Rohde, Civil liberties lawyer
Website: http://www.nlg.org/eccases/
On April 20 the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on the President'??s alleged right to create a '??law free zone'?? at the Guantanamo detention center in Cuba. And on April 28, the Court will hear oral arguments on the President'??s asserted right to designate citizens as '??enemy combatants,'?? hold them at the U.S. Navy base in Charleston, SC, and deny them the ability to challenge the lawfulness of their detention.We believe that the President cannot be allowed to create a '??legal Black Hole'?? into which people are dropped with no recourse to the courts or to international law. Among us we hold many varied views on how and why this situation has arisen and what is ultimately needed to ensure justice. But we all agree that this dangerous new presidentially-designated category of '??enemy combatants'?? who have no legal rights is unjust, illegal, and immoral, and cannot be allowed to stand.
The silence over this perilous issue must be broken, and public opposition must be manifested. Join us in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on April 20 and April 28 to declare a resounding NO! Legally permitted, non-violent demonstrations will occur on both days from 9:30 am to 12:30 pm with a program of speakers beginning at 11:am.
Our future and the future of hundreds of anonymous detainees now hang in the balance. This is a watershed event in history. What is at stake is just how much the President will be allowed to get away with. Your silence will be taken as assent.
To endorse this call, e-mail eccases@nlg.org.
Exact email that I received:
Below is a call for protest outside the US Supreme Court on the dates of hearings about the presidentially designated category of enemy combatant. As the call says: Our future and the future of hundreds of anonymous detainees now hang in the balance. This is a watershed event in history. What is at stake is just how much the President will be allowed to get away with. Your silence will be taken as assent. Please endorse this call and start mobilzing for it. Email eccases@nlg.org for more info.
Demonstrate April 20 (Tuesday) & April 28 (Wednesday)
9:30am-12:30pm In front of the US Supreme Court, Washington, DC
11am Speakers. Legally permitted rally. www.nlg.org/eccases/
Can the Rights of People Simply Disappear by Presidential Order?
What does it mean when the President of the United States can on his own designate a citizen in the U.S. as an '??enemy combatant,'?? and order the military to hold that person incommunicado, indefinitely, and without charges? The U.S. Supreme Court is now deciding whether the courts even have the right to question the President'??s action.
What does it mean when the U.S. military internationally can literally snatch people off the street, designate them as '??enemy combatants,'?? and assert that they are beyond the reach of either U.S. or international law? Many are transported to a facility under total U.S. control and funded by Congressional appropriations, where they are held incommunicado, indefinitely, without charges and some are threatened with trials before a military commission that falls short of basic standards of justice.
If the Supreme Court upholds these actions, it will condone the President'??s claim of virtually unlimited '??wartime powers'?? without a formal declaration of war by the Congress, and with no or extremely limited oversight by the courts or the Congress.
On April 20 the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on the President'??s alleged right to create a '??law free zone'?? at the Guantanamo detention center in Cuba. And on April 28, the Court will hear oral arguments on the President'??s asserted right to designate citizens as '??enemy combatants,'?? hold them at the U.S. Navy base in Charleston, SC, and deny them the ability to challenge the lawfulness of their detention.
We believe that the President cannot be allowed to create a '??legal Black Hole'?? into which people are dropped with no recourse to the courts or to international law. Among us we hold many varied views on how and why this situation has arisen and what is ultimately needed to ensure justice. But we all agree that this dangerous new presidentially-designated category of '??enemy combatants'?? who have no legal rights is unjust, illegal, and immoral, and cannot be allowed to stand.
The silence over this perilous issue must be broken, and public opposition must be manifested. Join us in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on April 20 and April 28 to declare a resounding NO! Legally permitted, non-violent demonstrations will occur on both days from 9:30 am to 12:30 pm with a program of speakers beginning at 11:am.
Our future and the future of hundreds of anonymous detainees now hang in the balance. This is a watershed event in history. What is at stake is just how much the President will be allowed to get away with. Your silence will be taken as assent.
To endorse this call, e-mail eccases@nlg.org.
[national and international organizations]
Amnesty International USA
Bill of Rights Defense Committee
Blue Triangle Network
First Amendment Foundation
Guantanamo Human Rights Commission
National Committee Against Repressive Legislation (NCARL)
National Lawyers Guild
Refuse & Resist!
Solidarity USA
[regional and local organizations]
Communities United Against Police Brutality (Minneapolis)
Greensboro Justice Fund
[individuals]
Elaine Cassel, Civil Liberties Watch
Stephen Rohde, civil liberties lawyer
Website: http://www.nlg.org/eccases/
Info about today's Special Registration Protest
The schmuks running this country are about to do it all over again. They are requiring a second round of immigrant special registrations.
Incredible.
Wish I had more time to elaborate. But I'll just see you at noon on Wednesday.
Refuse & Resist has endorsed the opposition to the special INS registrations - has part of taking on the whole reactionary agenda! Please get your friends and co workers to come out on Wed Nov 19th - Support our Arab, Muslims and South Asian brothers and sisters!Remember what happened in World War 2 to the Japanese Americans - what would you have done then, what will you do now?
TAKING A STAND AGAINST SPECIAL RE-REGISTRATION
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 2003 BICE (INS) BUILDING, WASHINGTON AND SANSOME, San Francisco 11 AM TO 1 PM (Press conference at 12 noon).
The Dept. of "Homeland Security" Special Re-registrations of men and boys from 24 mainly Muslim countries has already begun again this month. Last year special registration meant humiliation, detentions and brutality for many of the nearly 90,000 who came in to register. This program has created fear, anxiety, frustration and despair in the Arab and Muslim communities, causing great distress to wives, children and relatives as reported by the American Muslim Voice nationwide hotline. Last year, registerees were fingerprinted, photographed, and had to turn over bankcards, social security cards, driver's licenses, credit cards and other information. Every time they left the country they were required to get an exit stamp and re-register upon return. And in the end, about 13,000 men are facing deportation proceedings! The pettiest of visa violations, even those caused by INS incompetence are now tearing families apart.
Now the same people who registered last year are being registered again.
Last year the protest of Iranians in Los Angeles in December and opposition in the streets in January across the country, brought the reality of this ugly program to light. These actions drew attention to the fact that the 1940s Alien Registration Act foreshadowed the round up and detention of 120,000 Japanese Americans. Registration also preceded the round up of Jews in Europe. This year, as the ACLU has pointed out, the secrecy surrounding registration has all the markings of a TRAP, by which those who do not realize they have to register or miss a deadline will be subject to deportation. The Blue Triangle Network in close association with American Muslim Voice and many other organizations is calling for a rally and press conference Wednesday, Nov. 19 to denounce special re-registration, demand an end to it, and stand in solidarity with people subjected to it. Please join this effort and PASS THE WORD.
Right On Coleen! Thanks for having the guts to publish this article. It means a lot coming from you.
There are a lot of good people working for the government right now that are working for change, but it's really hard because their hands are tied. Most of them are in Damage Control mode and just trying to make it through their day-to-day activities without having to participate in anything too horrible until this administration can be replaced.
Coleen Rowley: The wrong side of 'us vs. them'
By Coleen Rowley for the Star Tribune.
I didn't attend Attorney General John Ashcroft's speech last month in Minneapolis, but newspapers have quoted him as saying that Americans are "freer today than at any time in the history of human freedom."Well, this American disagrees! And I would venture to say that many others feel the same way -- those who have been put on the "them" side of the "us vs. them" equation in the context of the administration's "you're either with us or against us" mentality.
It didn't matter whether you were a career FBI agent, a decorated war veteran, a duly elected congressman or senator, a military general or even a former president, you were labeled a traitor for voicing any criticism of administration policies. You were accused of giving aid and comfort to the enemy, called a friend of Osama bin Laden and thrown to the wolves (or more accurately, the FOXes).
The intimidation in this country that's been whipped up by this official fear and warmongering has been far more effective than any Patriot Act in whittling away our civil liberties...
It's also no secret that this administration has used its considerable power to fight giving any real legal protection to government whistle-blowers and even attempted to water down the Sarbanes-Oxley Act's protections recently enacted for corporate whistle-blowers.
Of course, no "whistle-blower protection" exists for public disclosures or articles such as this one. But even without it, the First Amendment should suffice and is what I rely on. However, the official warnings along these lines that I've repeatedly received in the course of my attempts to speak on issues of public importance seem little more than veiled threats; or are they perhaps a warning that the First Amendment is not as robust as it used to be?
There's another large segment of our citizenry who have found themselves cast as "thems" by this "war" mentality. Complaints of discrimination against Muslim workers and reports of hate crimes against people believed to be of Middle Eastern descent have at least doubled...
Although it must be recognized that the origin of this problem was in the horror of the violent attacks themselves and that certain government leaders, such as FBI Director Robert Mueller, have undertaken efforts to reach out to affected Arab groups, the social scientists point to other government actions following 9/11 (including the government's roundup and detention of illegal immigrants, the special registration requirements that single out students and visitors from Muslim nations, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq) as sending "social signals" that are worsening these biases.
A specialist in the issues of prejudice and stereotyping has noted that people who perceive themselves under threat naturally tend to think of "who's with me" and "who's against me." In any event, I doubt that many in the Arab-American segment of the populace feel "freer today," as Ashcroft's generality suggests.
Here is the text of the entire article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.startribune.com/stories/562/4147904.html
Coleen Rowley: The wrong side of 'us vs. them'
Coleen Rowley
Published October 12, 2003
ROWLEY1012
I didn't attend Attorney General John Ashcroft's speech last month in Minneapolis, but newspapers have quoted him as saying that Americans are "freer today than at any time in the history of human freedom."
Well, this American disagrees! And I would venture to say that many others feel the same way -- those who have been put on the "them" side of the "us vs. them" equation in the context of the administration's "you're either with us or against us" mentality.
It didn't matter whether you were a career FBI agent, a decorated war veteran, a duly elected congressman or senator, a military general or even a former president, you were labeled a traitor for voicing any criticism of administration policies. You were accused of giving aid and comfort to the enemy, called a friend of Osama bin Laden and thrown to the wolves (or more accurately, the FOXes).
The intimidation in this country that's been whipped up by this official fear and warmongering has been far more effective than any Patriot Act in whittling away our civil liberties.
Interestingly enough, Ashcroft himself is not above using this technique to lump those who disagree with him in with the terrorists to thereby discourage debate. Recall his statement, three months after Sept. 11: "To those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty, my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists -- for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve. They give ammunition to America's enemies."
It's also no secret that this administration has used its considerable power to fight giving any real legal protection to government whistle-blowers and even attempted to water down the Sarbanes-Oxley Act's protections recently enacted for corporate whistle-blowers.
Of course, no "whistle-blower protection" exists for public disclosures or articles such as this one. But even without it, the First Amendment should suffice and is what I rely on. However, the official warnings along these lines that I've repeatedly received in the course of my attempts to speak on issues of public importance seem little more than veiled threats; or are they perhaps a warning that the First Amendment is not as robust as it used to be?
There's another large segment of our citizenry who have found themselves cast as "thems" by this "war" mentality. Complaints of discrimination against Muslim workers and reports of hate crimes against people believed to be of Middle Eastern descent have at least doubled.
Social psychologists say that the attacks of Sept. 11 and their aftermath have created a real-world experiment which unfortunately indicates that the more positively one feels about the United States, the more likely one is to be anti-Arab.
Although it must be recognized that the origin of this problem was in the horror of the violent attacks themselves and that certain government leaders, such as FBI Director Robert Mueller, have undertaken efforts to reach out to affected Arab groups, the social scientists point to other government actions following 9/11 (including the government's roundup and detention of illegal immigrants, the special registration requirements that single out students and visitors from Muslim nations, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq) as sending "social signals" that are worsening these biases.
A specialist in the issues of prejudice and stereotyping has noted that people who perceive themselves under threat naturally tend to think of "who's with me" and "who's against me." In any event, I doubt that many in the Arab-American segment of the populace feel "freer today," as Ashcroft's generality suggests.
I could go on in a more general, abstract way about how "free" any of us truly is living with the ongoing terrorist threat to our safety that will be with us for a long time. For, distilled to their essences, security and liberty are very intertwined, if not the same thing. In that sense, how many people in yellow/orange-alert America feel "freer" today than they did prior to 9/11?
Ashcroft may be correct on other matters, including that the letter of the law contained in the Patriot Act is, for the most part, not the problem, but he is certainly either in denial, out of touch or painting far too rosy a picture by saying that Americans are "freer today than at any time in the history of human freedom." For our civil liberties can be and are in jeopardy in other ways.
For starters, we must do more to break down the "us vs. them" mind-set and the accompanying intimidation that ultimately threaten us all. We must recognize that we are all in this together.
Coleen Rowley works for the Federal Bureau of Investigation as a special agent with the Minneapolis office. (The views expressed are her own and are not to be construed as the official views of the FBI.)
This footage is from the protest in front of the INS building that took place from noon to 1pm at 444 Washington Street in San Francisco on June 13, 2003.
Speaker: Sydney Levy
Organization: Jewish Voice For Peace
Sydney Levy in San Francisco (Small - 10 MB)
Audio - Sydney Levy in San Francisco (MP3 - 3 MB)
Sydney Levy, Jewish Voice For Peace
Need technical help with viewing these videos?
This footage is from the protest in front of the INS building that took place from noon to 1pm at 444 Washington Street in San Francisco on June 13, 2003.
Speaker: Father Louie Vitale
Organization: Franciscian School Of Theology, St. Boniface Church in San Francisco
Father Louis Vitale, O.F.M. is a Lecturer in Spirituality and Practice of Nonviolence at the Franciscian School Of Theology. He is also a Pastor of St. Boniface Church in San Francisco.
Father Louie ended up serving some time in a Federal Prison in Georgia for committing acts of civil disobedience while protesting the School of the Americas (a U.S. terrorist training camp whose graduates are known for committing human rights violations).
Father Louie Vitale in San Francisco (Small - 24 MB)
Audio - Father Louie Vitale in San Francisco (MP3 - 7 MB)
Father Louie Vitale, Pastor of St. Boniface Church
(Excerpt) I just want to say to those of you who are from maybe my background -- a Judeo-Christian tradition -- If you want to honor the scriptures we have that talk about loving your neighbor and bearing one another's burdens, then we better get off our duffs and do something, or put away our bibles and forget it.We have to be outraged! And we have to get out and show our rage in non-violent and peaceful ways, and put a stop to this terrible, terrible racism that's going on and the abuse and oppression that destroying families and simply destroying lives.
Need technical help with viewing these videos?
This footage is from the protest in front of the INS building that took place from noon to 1pm at 444 Washington Street in San Francisco on June 13, 2003.
Speaker: Andrew Lichterman
Organization: The People's Non-violent Response Coalition
Andrew Lichterman in San Francisco (Small - 20 MB)
Audio - Andrew Lichterman in San Francisco (MP3 - 8 MB)
Andrew Lichterman Of The People's Non-violent Response Coalition
Need technical help with viewing these videos?
This footage is from the protest in front of the INS building that took place from noon to 1pm at 444 Washington Street in San Francisco on June 13, 2003.
Speaker: Greg Marutani
Organization: Japanese American Citizens League
Greg Marutani in San Francisco (Small - 12 MB)
Audio - Greg Marutani in San Francisco (MP3 - 4 MB)
Greg Marutani, Japanese American Citizens League
Need technical help with viewing these videos?
I just wanted to make sure there was a link in this category to the Video and Audio and Articles About the June 13, 2003 Protest in San Francisco.
I'll be posting video from this tomorrow.
Muslim And Middle Eastern Men Targeted
By Jessie Mangaliman for the SJ Mercury News.
A number of Bay Area civil rights and immigrant advocacy groups rallied outside the federal immigration office in San Francisco on Friday to protest the pending deportation of more than 13,000 Muslim and Middle Eastern men found to be living illegally in the United States during a national security registration program.``What the government is doing is targeting immigrants instead of targeting terrorists,'' Jayashri Srikantiah, an attorney with the Northern California chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said to a group of about 50 people, across the street from the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services, the former Immigration and Naturalization Service, in downtown San Francisco...
In all, more than 82,000 people registered. About 16 percent, or more than 13,000, were found in violation of their visas and placed in deportation proceedings, according to a government report issued last week.
Here is the full text of the article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/6085669.htm
Posted on Fri, Jun. 13, 2003
Groups rally in S.F. against deportations
MUSLIM AND MIDDLE EASTERN MEN TARGETED
By Jessie Mangaliman
Mercury News
A number of Bay Area civil rights and immigrant advocacy groups rallied outside the federal immigration office in San Francisco on Friday to protest the pending deportation of more than 13,000 Muslim and Middle Eastern men found to be living illegally in the United States during a national security registration program.
``What the government is doing is targeting immigrants instead of targeting terrorists,'' Jayashri Srikantiah, an attorney with the Northern California chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said to a group of about 50 people, across the street from the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services, the former Immigration and Naturalization Service, in downtown San Francisco.
Srikantiah and others repeated their criticism of a national anti-terrorism program that required men and boys older than 16 from 25 primarily Muslim, Arab and Middle Eastern countries to register with the government. They were required to report to local offices of the BCIS to be fingerprinted and photographed as part of a system designed to monitor the comings and goings of U.S. visitors.
In all, more than 82,000 people registered. About 16 percent, or more than 13,000, were found in violation of their visas and placed in deportation proceedings, according to a government report issued last week.
``It doesn't seem unjust to place in deportation proceedings those who are in violation of the terms of their visas,'' said Sharon Rummery, a BCIS spokeswoman in San Francisco.
Rummery said everyone who received deportation notices from the special registration program will get a chance to ``tell the immigration judge why they shouldn't be deported.''
Esam Jalboush, 34, a Jordanian-Palestinian who has been living in the United States since he was 19, was among many Bay Area residents caught in the dragnet and ordered deported. But rather than fight the deportation, Jalboush, who came on a student visa in 1988, said he will leave the country voluntarily.
Accompanied by his lawyer, Jalboush, a supermarket store manager in San Francisco, picked up his expired Jordanian passport at the BCIS office Friday afternoon. Officials had confiscated his passport when he registered in March. He was detained for 24 hours and released on a $15,000 bond.
He has agreed to leave the United States and is bound this weekend for Montreal, where he has a sister. He said he will fly into Detroit and enter Canada at Windsor, where he hopes to get political asylum.
``There is no justice here for me; that's why I've chosen to leave rather than fight,'' said Jalboush, who said he fled Jordan because he was persecuted as a Palestinian.
He had a green card application pending in March when he was placed in deportation. He had applied for a green card in 2000. An immigration official found that after his student visa expired in 1993, Jalboush was out of status -- in the United States illegally for about a year. He then married an American citizen.
``Now a decade later, the government is deporting him for that violation. How is that good for the country's national security?'' said Banafshe Akhlaghi, an immigration lawyer in San Francisco representing Jalboush and about about three dozen other people facing deportation.
Akhlaghi spoke at the protest before accompanying Jalboush to the BCIS office.
``The targeting of immigrants and Muslims has created a culture of fear and helplessness,'' said Samina Faheem, a member of the American Muslim Alliance, a national non-profit group in Fremont.
Contact Jessie Mangaliman at jmangaliman@mercurynews .com or (408) 920-5794.
There's an "emergency" protest going on tomorrow afternoon to protest the Shrub Administration's deportation of over 13,000 muslim men who cooperated voluntarily with the INS Special Registration Program.
The news conference and rally afterwards is going on from 12pm (noon) - 1:30pm at the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) Building on 444 Washington Street (at Sansome) in San Francisco. Here's a map of the location and a gif of that map, in case the mapquest link doesn't work.
I'll be there recording it so you'll still be able to check it out if you can't make it, but it's very important to get as many people there as possible for this so please try to make it if you can.
See you there!
Here's the official scoop (courtesy of an email I received from Refuse and Resist:
Civil rights and community organizations will hold a
news conference and demonstration outside the Immigration and
Naturalization Service (INS) offices in San Francisco on Friday, June
13. Following reports that 13,000 of the Arab and Muslim men who
voluntarily registered with the INS as part of the government's
controversial Special Registration Program (NSEERS) will face
deportation, the groups are calling on the INS to halt the expulsions
of men from a list of mainly Arab and Muslim nations. The groups say
that the proposed deportations constitute racial profiling and will
not aid the fight against terrorism.
Speakers will include:
-Jayashri Srikantiah, American Civil Liberties Union of Northern
California
-Samina Faheem, American Muslim Alliance / Pakistan American
Democratic Forum
-Matthew Van Saun, Amnesty International
-Ben Allen, Blue Triangle Network
-Medea Benjamin, Global Exchange
-Riva Enteen, National Lawyers Guild
-Rev. John Oda, Pine United Methodist Church
-Greg Marutani, SF Japanese American Citizens League
-Statement from Attorney Lynne Stewart
Speakers at the protest following the news conference include
representatives of ANSWER, Arab-American Anti-Discrimination
Committee, Global Exchange, Refuse & Resist, South Alameda Peace &
Justice Committee, Not in Our Name, and others.
MEDIA ADVISORY
Thursday, June 12, 2003
CONTACT:
Samina Faheem,
American Muslim Alliance:
650-387-1994
Ben Allen, Blue Triangle Network:
415-713-3103
Civil Rights, Community Groups Protest Looming Deportations of 13,000
Immigrants,
Call on INS to Halt Expulsions of Muslim and Arab Men
What: News Conference and Protest
When: Friday, June 13, 2003, 12:00 noon-1:30 PM
Where: Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) Building
444 Washington Street (at Sansome), San
Francisco
Who: News Conference Speakers
„X Jayashri Srikantiah, American Civil Liberties Union of Northern
California
„X Samina Faheem, American Muslim Alliance / Pakistan American
Democratic Forum
„X Matthew Van Saun, Amnesty International
„X Ben Allen, Blue Triangle Network
„X Medea Benjamin, Global Exchange
„X Riva Enteen, National Lawyers Guild
„X Rev. John Oda, Pine United Methodist Church
* Greg Marutani, SF Japanese American Citizens League
„X Statement from Attorney Lynne Stewart
Speakers at the protest following the news conference include
representatives of ANSWER, Arab-American Anti-Discrimination
Committee, Global Exchange, Refuse & Resist, South Alameda Peace &
Justice Committee, Not in Our Name, and others.
SAN FRANCISCO -- Civil rights and community organizations will hold a
news conference and demonstration outside the Immigration and
Naturalization Service (INS) offices in San Francisco on Friday, June
13. Following reports that 13,000 of the Arab and Muslim men who
voluntarily registered with the INS as part of the government¡¦s
controversial Special Registration Program (NSEERS) will face
deportation, the groups are calling on the INS to halt the expulsions
of men from a list of mainly Arab and Muslim nations. The groups say
that the proposed deportations constitute racial profiling and will
not aid the fight against terrorism.
This is at 444 Washington Street.
More information is below.
See you there!
PROTEST THE REGISTRATIONS, DETENTIONS AND ROUND-UPS OF OUR ARAB, MUSLIM, AND SOUTH ASIAN BROTHERS!
Friday, April 25 – 12pm to 1 pm
PROTEST AND PRESS CONFERENCE
San Francisco INS Office, 444 Washington St @ Sansome, San FranciscoSpread the word about the protest. Please call your friends, family, co-workers and members of the press and tell them why it’s important to stop these arbitrary detentions and scapegoating.
Wear a blue triangle as a symbol of resistance — and in solidarity with those who are in detention. Please visit www.bluetriangle.org
Contact INS District Director David Still at 415-844-5110. Tell him the INS should stop its arbitrary detentions and its special registrations, and to release all detainees now.
Also share this message with your Members of Congress and ask for an inquiry into INS activities since the passage of the USA Patriot Act. The Capitol Switchboard is 202-224-3121 or 800-839-5276
Background:
The U.S. government is requiring Middle Eastern and South Asian visitors, immigrants and students to register with the INS. By singling out a certain group of people for special registration, the government is engaging in racist scapegoating. To make matters worse, hundreds of well-meaning people who went
to be registered have been detained without hearings. This is not only wrong, but also counterproductive, since the government is punishing the very people who have chosen to cooperate. Singling out an entire group of people for harsh treatment is simply racist, and it sets us on a path toward the kind of detentions seen during World War II. Please act today to protect the civil liberties of all people.ENDORSERS
ADCSF
ACLU
Blue Triangle Network
Global Exchange
Not in Our Name
October 22nd Coalition to Stop
Police Brutality
Refuse & Resist!
South Alameda Peace & Justice Coalition
CodePink
I wish I could say I am happy with her response.
Letter To Me From Leader Nancy Pelosi regarding the INS Special Registrations.
I believe that the US government must ensure that immigration laws are not applied in a way that violates fundamental protections against discrimination. Any registration process must be administered fairly, and those facing questioning, detention or other legal proceedings should be given prompt access to lawyers...There is no doubt that the tragic events of September 11 have changed our country. Some additional security measures and policy changes are necessary to reduce the threat of future attacks. In 2002, Congress passed the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act, which authorized the implementation of an entry/exit system in order to track the flow of non-immigrants arriving into, and departing from, the United States. However, NSEERS was not contemplated in the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act and was developed by the Department of Justice without any Congressional consultation or oversight.
In February, the Senate agreed to an amendment (S.Amdt.54) during it's consideration of the FY2003 Omnibus Appropriations bill (H.J.Res.2) that prevented funds from being spend on any NSEERS activity and directed the Attorney General to provide Congress with NSEERS-related documents and materials. The final version of H.J.Res.2, signed into law by President Bush, restored the funds for NSEERS, but required the Attorney General to provide Congress with materials regarding NSEERS by March 1, 2003. To date, the documents have not been provided to Congress.
Here is the full text of the letter in case the link goes bad:
http://www.lisarein.com/peace/pelosi-reply-4-4-03.html
This letter was sent to me in reply to this letter I wrote to Nancy on January 10, 2003.
Note: All underlines were included in the original.
April 4, 2003
Ms. Lisa Rein
(My home address here)
Dear Ms. Rein,
Thank you for contacting me to express your concern about the Department of Justice's "special registration" program. I appreciate hearing from you on this issue.
I believe that the US government must ensure that immigration laws are not applied in a way that violates fundamental protections against discrimination. Any registration process must be administered fairly, and those facing questioning, detention or other legal proceedings should be given prompt access to lawyers.
As you know, the Department of Justice has implemented a new system of tracking non-immigrant visa holders in the United States through a process known as the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS). Under the NSEERS program, all non-immigrant men over the age of 16 from a list of 25 countries must register in person at Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) offices before certain deadlines.
There is no doubt that the tragic events of September 11 have changed our country. Some additional security measures and policy changes are necessary to reduce the threat of future attacks. In 2002, Congress passed the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act, which authorized the implementation of an entry/exit system in order to track the flow of non-immigrants arriving into, and departing from, the United States. However, NSEERS was not contemplated in the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act and was developed by the Department of Justice without any Congressional consultation or oversight.
In February, the Senate agreed to an amendment (S.Amdt.54) during it's consideration of the FY2003 Omnibus Appropriations bill (H.J.Res.2) that prevented funds from being spend on any NSEERS activity and directed the Attorney General to provide Congress with NSEERS-related documents and materials. The final version of H.J.Res.2, signed into law by President Bush, restored the funds for NSEERS, but required the Attorney General to provide Congress with materials regarding NSEERS by March 1, 2003. To date, the documents have not been provided to Congress.
Thank you again for taking the time to express your views on this important subject. I hope you will continue to communicate with me on matters of concern to you.
Sincerely,
Nancy Pelosi
Member of Congress
This just in from
Elizabeth Barker Brandt,
Professor, University of Idaho College of Law:
Subject: 120 armed FBI agents stage pre-dawn visa raid at Univ. of Idaho
Date: Fri, 07 Mar 2003 13:15:20 -1000
The following letter was forwarded to SEVIS, and is chilling testimony to the campaign of fear and intimidation on university campuses.
Information shared by universities through the SEVIS tracking system enable the INS, FBI and CIA to carry out such crimes. Send copies of this letter to
your International Student Services, and your administration! Put it in your campus newspaper! This raid conveniently happened in a small town
where it is difficult to build a strong movement in support of immigrants and international students. We'll keep you posted.
From: Prof. Elizabeth Brandt from Univ. of Idaho:
Well, yesterday was an exciting day in my small town. The FBI flew in 120 agents, fully armed in riot gear, on two C-17 military aircraft (I
think -- they were BIG planes) to Moscow Idaho (population 17,000 +/-) to arrest one Saudi graduate student for visa fraud. The raid went
down in University of Idaho student housing at 4:30 a.m. in the morning, terrorizing not only the suspect's family (he lived in student
housing with his wife and three elementary school age children) but also the families of neighboring students who were awakened by the
shouting and lights and were required to remain in their homes until after 8:30 a.m. At least 20 other students who had the misfortune to either know the
suspect or to have some minor immigration irregularities were also subjected to substantial, surprise interrogations (4+ hours) although
none were detained or arrested yesterday. Now, however, a witch hunt for additional unamed suspects who supposedly helped the guy who was
arrested is on.
The INS and FBI are working together using gestapo tactics to question the students -- threatening their immigration status (and
hence their education) if they don't answer questions which are really aimed at the criminal investigation. They have also threatened their partners
and spouses with perjury charges if they don't talk.
I spent yesterday working with our immigration clinic director and local criminal defense attorneys to organize legal representation for
the students who are being swept into the hunt for co-conspiritors. We have reached out to our entire area (40 -mile radius) to find enough
attorneys. Now I'm working on getting resources and support to them.
The Saudi government is providing financial support.
Reading about this stuff is one thing. Having it in your backyard is another. The international students at the University of Idaho are
terrorized and scared.
Liz Brandt
Elizabeth Barker Brandt
Professor
University of Idaho College of Law
3 minority caucuses want Coble renounced
House leaders asked to repudiate remarks by N.C. congressman
Three minority congressional caucuses asked House leaders Wednesday to denounce remarks by Rep. Howard Coble, R-N.C., defending the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.The Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, the Congressional Black Caucus and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus called on leaders to repudiate the remarks.
"As our country is engaged in a war against terrorism, and is on the brink of a war against Iraq, respect for civil liberties is crucial to ensure that we do not repeat the mistakes of the past," the groups said in a letter to House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., and Judiciary Committee chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis.
"To demonstrate that you have learned from the Trent Lott experience and the importance of getting history right, we ask you to repudiate Congressman Coble's statements as an inaccurate, misleading and potentially damaging view of history," the letter said.
The caucuses also asked House leaders to pass a resolution that calls for a "Day of Remembrance" for the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
Neither Hastert's nor Sensenbrenner's offices returned telephone messages Wednesday seeking comment.
Coble chief of staff Missy Branson referred only to Coble's written statement of Feb. 10 in which he said, "I regret that many Japanese and Arab Americans found my choice of words offensive because that was certainly not my intent."
In a radio show appearance Feb. 4, Coble disagreed with a caller who said Arab-Americans should be confined, but appeared to defend the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
"We were at war. They were an endangered species," Coble said. "For many of these Japanese-Americans, it wasn't safe for them to be on the street."
Coble said most Japanese-Americans during World War II, like most Arab-Americans today, were not America's enemies, but President Roosevelt had to consider the nation's security.
"Some probably were intent on doing harm to us," he said, "just as some of these Arab-Americans are probably intent on doing harm to us."
The remarks sparked protests from several minority groups and from three Asian-American congressmen: Reps. Mike Honda, D-Calif., Robert Matsui, D-Calif., and David Wu, D-Ore.
The Democratic National Committee has asked Coble to resign as chairman of the House Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security subcommittee.
Here is the full text of the article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observer/news/local/5326983.htm
Posted on Thu, Mar. 06, 2003 story:PUB_DESC
3 minority caucuses want Coble renounced
House leaders asked to repudiate remarks by N.C. congressman
Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Three minority congressional caucuses asked House leaders Wednesday to denounce remarks by Rep. Howard Coble, R-N.C., defending the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
The Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, the Congressional Black Caucus and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus called on leaders to repudiate the remarks.
"As our country is engaged in a war against terrorism, and is on the brink of a war against Iraq, respect for civil liberties is crucial to ensure that we do not repeat the mistakes of the past," the groups said in a letter to House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., and Judiciary Committee chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis.
"To demonstrate that you have learned from the Trent Lott experience and the importance of getting history right, we ask you to repudiate Congressman Coble's statements as an inaccurate, misleading and potentially damaging view of history," the letter said.
The caucuses also asked House leaders to pass a resolution that calls for a "Day of Remembrance" for the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
Neither Hastert's nor Sensenbrenner's offices returned telephone messages Wednesday seeking comment.
Coble chief of staff Missy Branson referred only to Coble's written statement of Feb. 10 in which he said, "I regret that many Japanese and Arab Americans found my choice of words offensive because that was certainly not my intent."
In a radio show appearance Feb. 4, Coble disagreed with a caller who said Arab-Americans should be confined, but appeared to defend the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
"We were at war. They were an endangered species," Coble said. "For many of these Japanese-Americans, it wasn't safe for them to be on the street."
Coble said most Japanese-Americans during World War II, like most Arab-Americans today, were not America's enemies, but President Roosevelt had to consider the nation's security.
"Some probably were intent on doing harm to us," he said, "just as some of these Arab-Americans are probably intent on doing harm to us."
The remarks sparked protests from several minority groups and from three Asian-American congressmen: Reps. Mike Honda, D-Calif., Robert Matsui, D-Calif., and David Wu, D-Ore.
The Democratic National Committee has asked Coble to resign as chairman of the House Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security subcommittee.
Wow. I'm still speechless and left trying to even fathom this one.
Ten years from now this may be regarded as an urban legend, but...
The official story is that a couple INS managers lost it one day and started having incoming INS mail professionally shredded because there was just too much of it. (A new variation on going postal!)
I.N.S. Shredder Ended WorkBacklog, U.S. Says
By John M. Broder for the NY Times.
Tens of thousands of pieces of mail come into the huge Immigration and Naturalization Service data processing center in Laguna Niguel, Calif., every day, and as at so many government agencies, it tends to pile up. One manager there had a system to get rid of the vexing backlog, federal officials say. This week the manager was charged with illegally shredding as many as 90,000 documents.Among the destroyed papers, federal officials charged, were American and foreign passports, applications for asylum, birth certificates and other documents supporting applications for citizenship, visas and work permits.
The manager, Dawn Randall, 24, was indicted late Wednesday by a federal grand jury, along with a supervisor working under her, Leonel Salazar, 34. They are accused of ordering low-level workers to destroy thousands of documents from last February to April to reduce a growing backlog of unprocessed paperwork...
By the end of March, the backlog had been cut to zero, and Ms. Randall ordered her subordinates to continue destroying incoming paper to keep current, the government says.
"There was no I.N.S. policy that required this, nor was she ordered to do it by any superior, as far as we know," said Greg Staples, the assistant United States attorney handling the case. "The only motive we can think of is just the obvious one of a manager trying to get rid of a nettlesome problem."
Ms. Randall and Mr. Salazar were each charged with conspiracy and five counts of willfully destroying documents filed with the I.N.S. The conspiracy charge carries a maximum penalty of five years in federal prison. Each of the other counts can bring three years in prison.
Their subordinates were not charged because they were low-level workers acting on instructions, the government said.
After the shredding was discovered, the immigration service opened a hotline for people who suspected their paperwork had been destroyed. Agency officials helped petitioners reconstruct their files and gave applicants the benefit of the doubt if they could not replace the documents they had submitted, said Lori Haley, a spokeswoman for the I.N.S.'s western regional office.
She said the agency made an effort last year to publicize the problem and was confident that it had rebuilt most of the lost files. She also said that additional staff members had been hired at the center and that oversight had been tightened...
The four document processing centers are operated under a $325 million contract with JHM Research and Development of Maryland, which in turn subcontracts the operations to two other companies. John Macklin, president of JHM, was unavailable for comment.
Mr. Staples, the federal prosecutor, said the contractors were cooperating with the investigation and would not be charged unless more evidence against them was developed.
"If we had found criminal liability, we would have indicted the companies," he said.
Here is the full text of the article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/31/national/31FILE.html
I.N.S. Shredder Ended WorkBacklog, U.S. Says
By JOHN M. BRODER
OS ANGELES, Jan. 30 — Tens of thousands of pieces of mail come into the huge Immigration and Naturalization Service data processing center in Laguna Niguel, Calif., every day, and as at so many government agencies, it tends to pile up. One manager there had a system to get rid of the vexing backlog, federal officials say. This week the manager was charged with illegally shredding as many as 90,000 documents.
Among the destroyed papers, federal officials charged, were American and foreign passports, applications for asylum, birth certificates and other documents supporting applications for citizenship, visas and work permits.
The manager, Dawn Randall, 24, was indicted late Wednesday by a federal grand jury, along with a supervisor working under her, Leonel Salazar, 34. They are accused of ordering low-level workers to destroy thousands of documents from last February to April to reduce a growing backlog of unprocessed paperwork.
Ms. Randall was the file room manager at the I.N.S. center. Mr. Salazar was her file room supervisor. The Laguna Niguel center handles paperwork for residents ofCalifornia, Arizona, Nevada, Hawaii and Guam and is one of four immigration service centers around the country operated by private contractors under I.N.S. supervision.
According to the federal indictment, Ms. Randall ordered her subordinates last January to count the number of unprocessed papers in the filing center. They reported that about 90,000 documents were waiting to be handled. In February, the government says, she ordered at least five night-shift workers to begin shredding many boxes of papers.
By the end of March, the backlog had been cut to zero, and Ms. Randall ordered her subordinates to continue destroying incoming paper to keep current, the government says.
"There was no I.N.S. policy that required this, nor was she ordered to do it by any superior, as far as we know," said Greg Staples, the assistantUnited States attorney handling the case. "The only motive we can think of is just the obvious one of a manager trying to get rid of a nettlesome problem."
Mr. Staples said one frustrating thing about the case was that most of the evidence had been carted out with the trash and that it was impossible to identify all of the victims.
"It's like a murder case without a body," he said. "We will never really know what was destroyed."
The shredding was discovered in April by an agency supervisor who witnessed what appeared to be unauthorized destruction of documents. The I.N.S. office of internal audit, the Justice Department's inspector general and theUnited States attorney's office for Southern California conducted the investigation that led to this week's indictments.
Ms. Randall and Mr. Salazar were each charged with conspiracy and five counts of willfully destroying documents filed with the I.N.S. The conspiracy charge carries a maximum penalty of five years in federal prison. Each of the other counts can bring three years in prison.
Their subordinates were not charged because they were low-level workers acting on instructions, the government said.
After the shredding was discovered, the immigration service opened a hotline for people who suspected their paperwork had been destroyed. Agency officials helped petitioners reconstruct their files and gave applicants the benefit of the doubt if they could not replace the documents they had submitted, said Lori Haley, a spokeswoman for the I.N.S.'s western regional office.
She said the agency made an effort last year to publicize the problem and was confident that it had rebuilt most of the lost files. She also said that additional staff members had been hired at the center and that oversight had been tightened.
"Monitoring of the activities of the support services contractor has been enhanced at the service center," Ms. Haley said. "All materials to be shredded or destroyed are reviewed first by I.N.S. personnel to make sure that no unauthorized materials are destroyed."
Ms. Randall's lawyer, Joseph G. Cavallo, said today that he had not read the charges and would not comment. He said, however, that Ms. Randall would plead not guilty at her arraignment on Monday. Mr. Salazar's lawyer, Tom Brown, did not return calls seeking comment.
The four document processing centers are operated under a $325 million contract with JHM Research and Development of Maryland, which in turn subcontracts the operations to two other companies. John Macklin, president of JHM, was unavailable for comment.
Mr. Staples, the federal prosecutor, said the contractors were cooperating with the investigation and would not be charged unless more evidence against them was developed.
"If we had found criminal liability, we would have indicted the companies," he said.
We did it guys! We all did it together!
It looks like the folks on Capitol Hill actually listened to the last month of letters and protests!
Pat yourselves on the back and check this out:
Senate Votes to Halt INS Registration Program
By Edward Walsh for the Washington Post.
The massive appropriations bill approved by the Senate late Thursday includes a little-noticed amendment that would cut off funding for a Justice Department program that requires male immigrants from two dozen predominantly Muslim countries to register and be fingerprinted by the Immigration and Naturalization Service.The main purpose of the amendment was to restore funding for a congressionally mandated program that by 2005 is designed to provide information on the identity of all visitors to the United States and track when they enter and leave the country.
But the amendment also included language that bans the use of any of the money for the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS), a program targeted at male temporary visitors from countries the government considers to be terrorist harbors...
Since last October, the INS also has been fingerprinting and questioning male immigrants from countries on the NSEERS list at selected ports of entry to the United States. The Senate spending ban, which would apply to "any expenses relating to NSEERS" apparently would cut off funds for that effort and the more controversial registration program, which began late last year.
The Senate amendment also would require Attorney General John D. Ashcroft to provide Congress with documents and other information on the creation and operation of NSEERS, and provide an assessment of the program's effectiveness. Corallo said the Justice Department "will work with Congress and answer all of their questions and concerns."
The amendment to restore $165 million for the larger tracking system, which had been cut from the bill by Senate appropriators, was offered on the Senate floor by Sens. John McCain and Jon Kyl, both Arizona Republicans, and was adopted by voice vote. In their brief remarks on the floor, neither mentioned the provision cutting off funding for the NSEERS program. The Bush administration had requested $16.8 million to fund the program for the current fiscal year.
Congressional sources said the NSEERS funding cutoff was included in the amendment at the request of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.). James Manley, a Kennedy spokesman, said the amendment "cuts funding until Congress has the information it needs to assess whether this is the most effective use of tax dollars in the war on terrorism."
Here is the full text of the article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A40377-2003Jan24.html
Senate Votes to Halt INS Registration Program
By Edward Walsh
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 25, 2003; Page A11
The massive appropriations bill approved by the Senate late Thursday includes a little-noticed amendment that would cut off funding for a Justice Department program that requires male immigrants from two dozen predominantly Muslim countries to register and be fingerprinted by the Immigration and Naturalization Service.
The main purpose of the amendment was to restore funding for a congressionally mandated program that by 2005 is designed to provide information on the identity of all visitors to the United States and track when they enter and leave the country.
But the amendment also included language that bans the use of any of the money for the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS), a program targeted at male temporary visitors from countries the government considers to be terrorist harbors.
Under the NSEERS program, thousands of men older than 16 have been fingerprinted and questioned by INS agents, causing widespread confusion and apprehension among Muslims across the country. Thousands lined up at INS offices to meet a series of deadlines. More than 1,200 men who were found to be in violation of immigration laws were detained -- most of them briefly -- and face deportation hearings.
The confusion and delays prompted the government to give visitors from 18 nations another chance to register. The program applies to male immigrants from 24 predominantly Muslim countries and North Korea.
The House version of the Senate's more than $390 billion spending measure would not cut off funding for the registration program, and it is not clear whether the Senate ban will survive negotiations with the House on a final version of the legislation. Mark Corallo, a Justice Department spokesman, said yesterday that the Bush administration will work to keep NSEERS in place.
"We are committed to the National Security Exit-Entry Registration System, which has already proven to have been a success in apprehending persons who would have presented a severe risk to the American people," Corallo said. He said the system has allowed law enforcement authorities to apprehend 330 "known criminals" and three "known terrorists."
Since last October, the INS also has been fingerprinting and questioning male immigrants from countries on the NSEERS list at selected ports of entry to the United States. The Senate spending ban, which would apply to "any expenses relating to NSEERS" apparently would cut off funds for that effort and the more controversial registration program, which began late last year.
The Senate amendment also would require Attorney General John D. Ashcroft to provide Congress with documents and other information on the creation and operation of NSEERS, and provide an assessment of the program's effectiveness. Corallo said the Justice Department "will work with Congress and answer all of their questions and concerns."
The amendment to restore $165 million for the larger tracking system, which had been cut from the bill by Senate appropriators, was offered on the Senate floor by Sens. John McCain and Jon Kyl, both Arizona Republicans, and was adopted by voice vote. In their brief remarks on the floor, neither mentioned the provision cutting off funding for the NSEERS program. The Bush administration had requested $16.8 million to fund the program for the current fiscal year.
Congressional sources said the NSEERS funding cutoff was included in the amendment at the request of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.). James Manley, a Kennedy spokesman, said the amendment "cuts funding until Congress has the information it needs to assess whether this is the most effective use of tax dollars in the war on terrorism."
I just wanted to make sure I had a simple link to the main page of my immigrant roundup/INS Detainee Protest website.
Lisa Rein's INS Detainee Protest Website
I just realized that I hadn't yet placed a simple link to the website from this blog category...
Sorry for my still adequate-at-best style of navigation between the content of my various websites. (Growing pains! So much to do, so little time to organize.)
This just in:
INS Detainees on Hunger Strike in Passaic County
JailAs of 3pm Tuesday January 14, 2003, seven men
detained by the US Immigration and Naturalization
Service (INS) are on a hunger strike to protest
their detention by the INS and their treatment
in the Passaic County Jail. They say that they
will continue their strike until the INS meets
with them to discuss their complaints.The hunger strikers are demanding the release of
9/11 detainees, most of whom are not charged
with crimes but are being held in prison while
the INS attempts to deport them or resolve their
status. They are demanding improvements in
food, medical care, air quality and family visits,
a resumption of the Friday Islamic services
the prison provided until a month ago, and
separate living quarters for Muslim detainees.Conditions at Passaic County Jail continue to
worsen.The detainees say that the prison's food is
insufficient, unpalatable and does not provide
adequate protein and vitamins, leading to health
problems, while the medical services are limited
and slow; dental services do not go beyond the
removal of teeth. The aging ventilation system
also contributes to their health problems.9/11 ("Special Interest') Muslim detainees demand
separate living quarters. At present, they are
experiencing xenophobia, abuse and threats from
the general prison population, which are largely
ignored by prison guards.
ACTION ALERT:
Send letters or fax to:
Andrea Quarantillo
INS District Director
INS Newark District Office
970 Broad St. Rm. 136
Newark, NJ 07102
Phone: 973-645-4421
Fax: 973-645-2304
INS Detainees on Hunger Strike in Passaic County
Jail
As of 3pm Tuesday January 14, 2003, seven men
detained
by the US Immigration and Naturalization Service
(INS)
are on a hunger strike to protest their detention by
the INS and their treatment in the Passaic County
Jail. They say that they will continue their strike
until the INS meets with them to discuss their
complaints.
The hunger strikers are demanding the release of
9/11
detainees, most of whom are not charged with crimes
but are being held in prison while the INS attempts
to
deport them or resolve their status. They are
demanding improvements in food, medical care, air
quality and family visits, a resumption of the
Friday
Islamic services the prison provided until a month
ago, and separate living quarters for Muslim
detainees.
Conditions at Passaic County Jail continue to
worsen.
The detainees say that the prisonÌs food is
insufficient, unpalatable and does not provide
adequate protein and vitamins, leading to health
problems, while the medical services are limited and
slow; dental services do not go beyond the removal
of
teeth. The aging ventilation system also
contributes
to their health problems.
9/11 (ÏSpecial InterestÓ) Muslim detainees demand
separate living quarters. At present, they are
experiencing xenophobia, abuse and threats from the
general prison population, which are largely ignored
by prison guards.
The detainees want to be able to have physical
contact
visits with their families; currently they must talk
to their wives and children through a glass wall.
As
a result, many young fathers have been unable to
hold
their newborn babies.
The Campaign to Stop the Disappearances, Islamic
Circle of North America Ò Relief, and the Committee
for the Release of Farouk Abdel-Muhti express our
solidarity with the detainees on hunger strike. We
demand that Andrea J. Quarantillo - the INS District
Director of New Jersey (Ph: 973-645-4421), Jerry
Speziale, the Sheriff of Passaic County
(973-881-4619)
and Warden Charles Meyers - Passaic County Jail (Ph:
973-881-4591) be held accountable for the violation
of
detaineesÌ rights and we urge all three to meet with
the detainees and community organizations to discuss
their needs immediately.
For more information, contact DRUM (718) 205 3036
Immigrants may get more time to register with anti-terror list
By Matthai Chakko Kuruvila for the San Jose Mercury News.
As immigrants from five more Muslim countries are
expected to be added today to the list of those required
to register with the INS, the agency will reportedly grant
a grace period for those who failed to check in over the
past two months.The grace period responds to concerns aroused during
the first two rounds of registrations, when many
immigrants were arrested for registering late even
though they said they heard about the rule after the
deadline...Bay Area immigration attorneys said some of their
clients, including some with legal status, had been
incarcerated for registering late when they had been
unaware of the requirement. Now, most face deportation
hearings.The INS has released few details about the detentions,
other than to say that 400 people had been arrested in
California. Immigration activists say the real figure is
higher. The lack of information prompted activists
to conduct an ad hoc accounting of which special
registrants entered the San Francisco INS office and who
left.Heba Nimr, an attorney with the INS Watch-La Raza
Centro Legal, said that at least 65 people had been
detained at the San Francisco INS office during the
last week of the most recently completed registration
round, which ended last Friday. Fifty of those were
arrested on the last day, Nimr said.
Here's the full text of the article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/4959899.htm
Immigrants may get more time to register with anti-terror list
By Matthai Chakko Kuruvila
San Jose Mercury News
As immigrants from five more Muslim countries are expected to be added today
to the list of those required to register with the INS, the agency will
reportedly grant a grace period for those who failed to check in over the
past two months.
The grace period responds to concerns aroused during the first two rounds of
registrations, when many immigrants were arrested for registering late even
though they said they heard about the rule after the deadline.
Critics say unless the Immigration and Naturalization Service increases its
publicity about the registration requirements, more law-abiding immigrants
will be unfairly detained.
``While we welcome this short grace period, the fact is that if it's not
publicized, it's not worth anything,'' said Crystal Williams, a government
liaison with the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
According to the Federal Register, immigrants who are not permanent
residents, are from the listed countries and who failed to register during
their allotted time will now have a two-week grace period between Jan. 27
and Feb. 7. INS officials could not confirm information on the Federal
Register about the grace period or the additional round of registrations.
Hundreds of immigrants were detained in Los Angeles as the first round of
registration finished in December, and at least 65 people were reportedly
detained at the San Francisco INS office last week. Many were detained for
having invalid visas or registering late.
Government officials and supporters say the registrations are an important
step in improving the nation's security in the wake of the Sept. 11
terrorist attacks. All of the Sept. 11 terrorists entered the country on
tourist visas.
Process criticized
Critics say no terrorist would voluntarily register. They add that the
registration process unfairly targets those from Muslim countries. They also
say many people have been detained simply because notoriously backlogged INS bureaucracy can't keep track of who has legal status and who doesn't.
Over the past few months, two separate sets of immigrant men and boys here
on visitor visas have had to go to INS offices to be fingerprinted,
photographed and interviewed about their activities and whereabouts as part
of a Department of Justice counterterrorism program. Immigrants from
Pakistan and Saudi Arabia began registering on Monday as they face a Feb. 21
deadline.
Five new countries
Today, immigrant men and boys over age 16 from Egypt, Bangladesh, Indonesia,
Kuwait and Jordan are expected to be added to the list, according to the
Federal Register, a compilation of the rules and notices issued by agencies
in the executive branch of the federal government. Those immigrants will be
required to register between Feb. 24 and March 28 or risk possible
deportation.
Immigrant men and boys from Sudan, Syria, Libya, Iran or Iraq were required
to register by Dec. 16, and those from an additional 13 countries had to
register by Jan. 10.
The INS Web site on Wednesday had no indication either of the new
registration list or of the extension for the first two groups, and Bay Area
INS officials were oblivious to any new rules.
``I haven't heard anything about it,'' said Sharon Rummery, an INS
spokeswoman in San Francisco.
The consequences of not knowing can be dire.
Bay Area immigration attorneys said some of their clients, including some
with legal status, had been incarcerated for registering late when they had
been unaware of the requirement. Now, most face deportation hearings.
The INS has released few details about the detentions, other than to say
that 400 people had been arrested in California. Immigration activists say
the real figure is higher.
The lack of information prompted activists to conduct an ad hoc accounting
of which special registrants entered the San Francisco INS office and who
left.
Heba Nimr, an attorney with the INS Watch-La Raza Centro Legal, said that at
least 65 people had been detained at the San Francisco INS office during the
last week of the most recently completed registration round, which ended
last Friday. Fifty of those were arrested on the last day, Nimr said.
Our country is about justice and a legal system. And we have to insist on that legal system. And when U.S. citizens can be incarcerated, indefinitely, on the mere allegation given in secret by somebody we don't know, that they may be a terrorist -- and stripped of their rights to ever have a court hearing where they say "I'm innocent. This is wrong!" Then our country is falling apart.
And what we need to do is say: "Stop! Enough is enough!"
Near complete version of Marc Van Der Hout's Speech:
Marc Van Der Hout, National Lawyers'
Guild (Hi-res 79 MB)
Marc Van Der Hout, National Lawyers'
Guild (Med-res 54 MB)
Marc Van Der Hout, National Lawyers'
Guild (Lo-res 29 MB)
Marc Van Der Hout, National Lawyers' Guild
(MP3 7 MB)
"It doesn't make me feel more secure to know that families will be torn apart, to know that I might see the police coming for my neighbors, or, worse yet, I might not even see them at all. I won't know until it's too late.
It doesn't make me feel more secure to know that first it will be the Arabs and the Muslims that will be taken from general society, and then, who knows? It might be the Koreans. The Tunesians. The Socialists. The Communitsts. The Anti-war activists. We can't afford to lose each other. We can't afford to lose each others' voices.
My grandmother graduated from high school from behind barbed wire, out in the desert. And like most other Japanese families living in those times, when those trains rolled in, they lost everything.
Sixty some odd years ago, there was another similar gathering of names, like this one. I cannot stand by and let history repeat itself...
The government knows we're watching them. Thanks to thousands raising their voices in L.A. and the hard work here of all of the people here. They know that we're keeping tabs. They can't just handcuff people left and right like they did in December."
Tom Ammiano - San Francisco District Supervisor
Here's Tom Ammiano - San Francisco Board of Supervisors
Tom Ammiano -San Francisco Board of Supervisors (Hi-res 30 MB)
Tom Ammiano - San Francisco Board of Supervisors (Med-res 20 MB)
Tom Ammiano - San Francisco Board of Supervisors (Lo-res 9 MB)
Tom Ammiano - San Francisco Board of Supervisors (MP3 - 3 MB)
Jeff Adachi - San Francisco Public Defender
Here's Jeff Adachi - San Francisco Public Defender
Jeff Adachi - San Francisco Public Defender (Hi-res 49 MB)
Jeff Adachi - San Francisco Public Defender (Med-res 35 MB)
Jeff Adachi - San Francisco Public Defender (Lo-res 19 MB)
Audio - Jeff Adachi - San Francisco Public Defender (MP3 - 4 MB)
Yesterday's rally was incredible! There must have been at least 500 people there. (Enough to fill up all four corners for 100 meters in every direction.
The cops brought out barriers and gave the crowd a lane of traffic on Washington Street too. The cops didn't seem to mind that me and fifty other camera people were (gasp) filming the building!
The "stage" was a big truck with a generator, microphones, speakers and a PA in back.
I'll be putting the footage from Friday's protest together on one page in a day or two. But I'll also be posting them here as they emerge from my machine.
I really wanted to start publishing what few clips I do have available as soon as possible in the the interest of being more of a dependable "news" source. In case people are trying to put shows together to air on Sunday, they can use clips from Tom Ammiano and Jeff Adachi's speeches (below).
Remember that you can always email me if you need a louder MP3 file or a different format or a DV tape of a scene or something else for a project your working on. My news footage is always Public Domain'd under a Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication so you or whatever (hopefully huge multimedia conglomorate) company that you work for can be assured of having the rights to rebroadcast the footage.
The whole point of me doing all this is to have this footage redistributed and rebroadcast and reanalyzed and discussed as far as wide and to as many people as possible.
Thanks in advance for making millions of copies of everything and giving them to your friends and for using my video footage in your own films, television programs, artistic and commercial endeavors.
Whatever clips/audio I'm able to upload this morning will be all until tomorrow am because I'm actually going to be offline with family for perhaps the rest of the day. (But more likely only till later tonight.)
Tomorrow will be the big day that I'm crunching video and uploading it for pretty much all day long. There's a lot of great stuff from Friday and I still have Tuesday and Thursday to edit and upload from last week once I've finished with Friday's protest and speakers (all 8 or so of them). (Why go back to finish Tuesday and Thursday? -- Because there were protesters every day last week and I want you guys to be able to see it all, dag nabbit!)
Speakers have been announced for today's rally!
Rally from 11-1pm in San Francisco to Protest the Special RegistrationsWhere:444 WASHINGTON (at the corner of Washington and Sansome), Downtown San
Francisco
Press conference at 1:30 pm featuring:
Yuri Kochiyama, Human Rights Activist
Cecil Williams, Glide Memorial Church
Renee Saucedo, La Raza Centro Legal
Tom Ammiano, San Francisco Board of Supervisors
Linda Sherif, American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, SF
Chapter
Marc Van Der Hout, National Lawyers' Guild
Hatem Bazian from the Islamic Society of San Francisco
Khalil Khaid, SEIU 1877
Kawal Ulanday, Filipinos for Affirmative Action
Others, as confirmed
For more information please call the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, San Francisco Chapter at 415-861-7444 or Not in Our Name 510-444-NION
Okay guys, now's where I can use your help.
If you can't make the protests tomorrow, please FAX a letter to Nancy Pelosi or do whatever else you can to help.
Damned if you do or don't -- With arrest likely either way, immigrants weigh INS deadline
By Anastasia Hendrix for the SF Chronicle
Members of the San Francisco chapter of the Arab-American Anti-Defamation Committee have been standing outside the INS office on Washington Street conducting an independent survey of those coming to participate in the special registration program.Heba Nimr, an attorney for La Raza Centro Legal's INS Watch who is also a member of the anti-defamation committee, said volunteers tallied 12 people who came to register Friday, 30 on Monday and 40 on Tuesday. Of those, three had been detained, and all were from Tunisia.
Not all registrants agree to check in with the group, Nimr quickly added, and the figures were not reflective of the 30-day registration period.
Friday's deadline affects males over age 16 from Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Eritrea, Lebanon, Morocco, North Korea, Oman, Qatar, Somalia, Tunisia,
United Arab Emirates and Yemen.The policy has attracted widespread criticism from several immigrant, Arab and civil rights groups, many of which have organized a protest rally to be held Friday morning outside the INS office on Washington Street. Demonstrators have been positioned at the intersection of Washington and Sansome streets since Monday.
Here is the full text of the article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2003/01/09/MN215594.DTL
Damned if you do or don't
With arrest likely either way, immigrants weigh INS deadline
Anastasia Hendrix, Chronicle Staff Writer Thursday, January 9, 2003
As a Tunisian in this country on a temporary visa, Chedli Fathi must register with the INS by Friday to comply with a new immigration policy or face deportation.
But he was not at the San Francisco Immigration and Naturalization Service office to register Wednesday morning. Instead, Fathi went to visit five friends who were detained Monday, he said, when they complied with the government's demand.
Fathi fears he may join them in the detention cells.
"I'm totally scared," said the 28-year-old, whose student visa expired in 2001. "Because after Jan. 10 there is no exception or excuse for not showing up. But if I go, I can get arrested, and if I don't go, I can get arrested. In both cases, it is bad for me."
Fathi's five friends also are from Tunisia, one of the 13 countries affected by the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System's Jan. 10 deadline for men age 16 or older who hold temporary visas to report to the INS to be fingerprinted, photographed and interviewed.
As of Friday, 400 people had been detained in California related to suspected immigration violations since November when the registration of visa- holders from countries considered high risks for terrorist activity began, said Jorge Martinez, a spokesman with the Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. He said all but 20 had been released after their names were run through criminal databases and international terrorist watch lists.
Martinez said he did not know how many of those detentions had occurred in Northern California, and officials at the San Francisco INS office did not return calls seeking comment.
INDEPENDENT SURVEY AT INS
Members of the San Francisco chapter of the Arab-American Anti-Defamation Committee have been standing outside the INS office on Washington Street conducting an independent survey of those coming to participate in the special registration program.
Heba Nimr, an attorney for La Raza Centro Legal's INS Watch who is also a member of the anti-defamation committee, said volunteers tallied 12 people who came to register Friday, 30 on Monday and 40 on Tuesday. Of those, three had been detained, and all were from Tunisia.
Not all registrants agree to check in with the group, Nimr quickly added, and the figures were not reflective of the 30-day registration period.
Friday's deadline affects males over age 16 from Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Eritrea, Lebanon, Morocco, North Korea, Oman, Qatar, Somalia, Tunisia,
United Arab Emirates and Yemen.
The policy has attracted widespread criticism from several immigrant, Arab and civil rights groups, many of which have organized a protest rally to be held Friday morning outside the INS office on Washington Street. Demonstrators have been positioned at the intersection of Washington and Sansome streets since Monday.
Suda Putnam sat on the sidewalk with a clothesline binding her wrists and a blindfold around her head. A sign around her neck read: "Japanese Americans, 1942. Muslims, Arabs, Iranians, South Asians, 2002-3. Who's Next?"
"It may seem like an extreme comparison, but everything starts somewhere before growing into great tragedy," she said.
'I'M NOT A TERRORIST'
Across the street, Ghazi Balti, also of Tunisia, waited in line to enter the INS building with his attorney. His tourist visa expired two years ago.
"I'm ready," he said, jutting his arms in front of him, wrists together, as if imaginary handcuffs were about to be clasped on them. "I'm here to tell them I'm not a terrorist, and I want to do it on time."
Nasser Gamiel, who was born in Yemen but lives in Oakland, also came to register Thursday. He was uncertain of what awaited him and his case, which is complicated by a previous jail term on immigration-related charges last year and an expired tourist visa.
"I have to take it like it is," he said, speaking in Arabic with a friend translating. He shrugged as he leaned against the building. "It doesn't matter if I get angry about the rules or not -- they are going to be there."
Lucas Guttentag, who heads the Immigrants' Rights Project for the American Civil Liberties Union, said that group was closely monitoring the registration process to ensure that "the debacle of December is not repeated." Last month's registration deadline resulted in mass detentions at the INS's Los Angeles office.
LACK OF OUTREACH BLAMED
Guttentag, like many critics of the program, said one of the most glaring problems was that the agency did not conduct enough outreach to explain to immigrants the intricacies of the policy.
A case in point was an Algerian woman who identified herself only as Fatimah. She was standing in line to check on her green card status and was surprised to see the media and activists milling about. She said she had not heard about the special registration requirements for men from Algeria, nor had several of her friends and relatives -- many of whom are temporary visa- holders.
"They will never believe this," she said.
Fathi knows his chances of being detained, possibly even deported, are high,
and so he said he was still uncertain whether he would go through with the registration.
"For the safety of the country, I think the INS is doing their best to keep it safe, but what troubles me is that they did not give us enough time to examine the law and make a decision about what to do," he said. "I am so conflicted. I really don't know what I am going to do."
E-mail Anastasia Hendrix at ahendrix@sfchronicle.com.
Chris Michael at the INS Detainee Protest, January 6, 2003 - San Francisco - (Med-res 41 MB)
Chris Michael at the INS Detainee Protest, January 6, 2003 - San Francisco - (Lo-res 23 MB)
Audio - Chris Michael at the INS Detainee Protest, January 6, 2003 - San Francisco - (MP3 - 4 MB)
Montage - INS Detainee Protest, January 6, 2003 - San Francisco - (Hi-res 12 MB)
Montage - INS Detainee Protest, January 6, 2003 - San Francisco - (Med-res 9 MB)
Montage - INS Detainee Protest, January 6, 2003 - San Francisco - (Lo-res 5 MB)
Let your voice ring out in times of fear
By L.A. Chung for the SJ Mercury News
I'm reminded of Walt and Milly Woodward of Bainbridge Island in Washington
state. More than 60 years ago, the owners of the little Bainbridge Review
weekly newspaper opposed the internment of Japanese-Americans, who were a
vital part of the island community. It cost Walt good money in canceled ads
and goodwill. But he persisted. He hired four Japanese-Americans to send
reports on internment camp life, which he published in the Review. Births.
Deaths. Camp goings-on.Bainbridge Island Japanese-Americans would return to the island, he
reasoned, and this would be a way for their neighbors to continue to see
them as members of the community.To his fellow islanders, Walt Woodward wrote in the Review, ``These
Japanese-Americans of ours haven't bombed anybody.'' But Lt. Gen. John L.
DeWitt, in command of West Coast defenses, said, ``A Jap is a Jap.'' So
everyone was painted with the same broad brush...Now, as then, concerned -- and sensible, practical -- folk want the United
States to hold fast to one of the tenets of its greatness: due process.It took courage then. Much recognition for the Woodwards' stand came
posthumously. The Woodwards remind us that it's critical, even in this time
of fear, to insist that the United States hold true to its principles.
Do so in your churches, temples and mosques. In letters to the editor. In
calls and e-mails to your elected representatives. And in standing quietly
at a protest or getting arrested for the television cameras.``We are the ones who have to speak up,'' said Dawson. ``We have the luxury
of speaking up for our principles without fear of deportation or major
disruption of our families' lives.''
Here is the full text of the article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/bayarea/news/columnists/la_chung/4890268.htm
Posted on Tue, Jan. 07, 2003
Let your voice ring out in times of fear
By L.A. Chung
San Jose Mercury News Staff Columnist
Katy Dawson is upset that immigrants who did nothing wrong now fear
deportation.
Diane Sjogren is angry that foreign visitors were detained while complying
with a new registration requirement. And David Jenks believes the privacy
intrusions of some of the homeland security measures smack of Big Brother.
These are South Bay folks who haven't made a career out of protest marches
or getting arrested for the television cameras. None of them is from the
targeted countries. And all of them consider themselves to be sensible,
practical people. But they are concerned.
Another deadline looms Friday for the registration of men and boys in this
country on temporary visas, whether they are tourists, students or H-1B
workers. This time, in addition to Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya and Sudan, the
registration includes those from 13 countries in North Africa, the Mideast,
Central Asia and East Asia.
Speaking out on principle
How can one register one's growing misgivings?
For now, the only protests planned are in front of the Immigration and
Naturalization Service (INS) building in San Francisco, not the one in San
Jose. Groups like the San Jose Peace Center and the Council on American
Islamic Relations are advertising or endorsing a rally on Friday in San
Francisco's Financial district that caps a week of activities. But a sizable
population of people who come from the countries next up on the special
registration deadline live in the South Bay.
Why San Francisco only? It's probably a combination of factors, the most
important being that our neighbors to the north have an established
infrastructure of advocacy groups that can quickly organize public events.
And in these days of identity politics and special interests, it's also easy
to wait for these groups to step forward.
But these are challenging times, and it's never wrong to speak out.
I'm reminded of Walt and Milly Woodward of Bainbridge Island in Washington
state. More than 60 years ago, the owners of the little Bainbridge Review
weekly newspaper opposed the internment of Japanese-Americans, who were a
vital part of the island community. It cost Walt good money in canceled ads
and goodwill. But he persisted. He hired four Japanese-Americans to send
reports on internment camp life, which he published in the Review. Births.
Deaths. Camp goings-on.
Bainbridge Island Japanese-Americans would return to the island, he
reasoned, and this would be a way for their neighbors to continue to see
them as members of the community.
To his fellow islanders, Walt Woodward wrote in the Review, ``These
Japanese-Americans of ours haven't bombed anybody.'' But Lt. Gen. John L.
DeWitt, in command of West Coast defenses, said, ``A Jap is a Jap.'' So
everyone was painted with the same broad brush.
Courage in uncertain times
The Woodwards weren't suggesting that someone who engaged in sabotage should
be left alone. Just the way this column has never suggested that those who
break INS rules should not face the consequences.
Now, as then, concerned -- and sensible, practical -- folk want the United
States to hold fast to one of the tenets of its greatness: due process.
It took courage then. Much recognition for the Woodwards' stand came
posthumously. The Woodwards remind us that it's critical, even in this time
of fear, to insist that the United States hold true to its principles.
Do so in your churches, temples and mosques. In letters to the editor. In
calls and e-mails to your elected representatives. And in standing quietly
at a protest or getting arrested for the television cameras.
``We are the ones who have to speak up,'' said Dawson. ``We have the luxury
of speaking up for our principles without fear of deportation or major
disruption of our families' lives.''
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Contact L.A. Chung at lchung@sjmercury.com or (408) 920-5280.
I had the oddest encounter with a police officer today at the INS Detainee Protest in San Francisco at 444 Washington Street. (Note: protests going on from 11am-1pm all week long.)
Unfortunately, my camera wasn't recording when he came over to start asking me questions (I really need to just start the thing rolling and leave it going) and I was paying to much attention trying to understand exactly what he was saying to me -- and trying to figure out what exactly his concerns were -- that it didn't even occur to me to press the record button or anything. (Turned out my camera had already timed out.)
After all this happened, I was pretty much intimidated and didn't feel much like filming too much more today.
I didn't want to forget the details of what had taken place, so I had someone film me right afterwards while I had a fresh recollection...
Lisa Rein at the INS Detainee Protest, January 8, 2003 - San Francisco - (Hi-res 20 MB)
Lisa Rein at the INS Detainee Protest, January 8, 2003 - San Francisco - (Med-res 15 MB)
Lisa Rein at the INS Detainee Protest, January 8, 2003 - San Francisco - (Lo-res 9 MB)
Audio - Lisa Rein at the INS Detainee Protest, January 8, 2003 - San Francisco - (MP3 - 3 MB)
I've just launched my INS Detainee Protest website. It's not too late to organize something for Friday in your town. Email me at lisarein@finetuning.com with any details and I'll post them to my site.
It's been a really interesting experience working with the ad-hoc group of concerned citizens over the last two weeks planning this protest. This is really the first protest that I've ever been involved in organizing. I'll be writing more about all that soon.
For today, I'll be fleshing out the FAQ and How You Can Help sections more over the course of day. (Sorry that those are still a bit rough -- they're like the most important pages, I know! There's a ton of questions to answer and the letters need polishing and I just had to get some zzzz last night :)
If you have a specific question - please email it to me so I can answer it in the FAQ.
I just wanted to get this up in time to get the word out -- If you're here in San Francisco - we're protesting out in front of the INS Building at 444 Washington everyday between 11am-1pm. Then the big protest is Friday from 11-1pm. There will also be a rally and a number of speakers on Friday.
Thanks for spreading the word and coming back to the site to check out the footage of the protest.
I've got footage from Monday and Tuesday going up this morning.
I've also posted a page of a lot more Footage from the December 23, 2002 INS Detainee protest in San Francisco. (And added the footage to my video index.)
Class action lawsuit filed against the US government
The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), the Alliance of Iranian Americans (AIA), the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), and the National Council of Pakistani Americans (NCPA) filed a class action lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Central District of California against John Ashcroft; Attorney General of the United States, and the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS).The essence of the lawsuit is that on Dec. 16-18, the INS unlawfully arrested large numbers of people, especially in Los Angeles, as they came forward to voluntarily comply with new "special registration" requirements. The groups are seeking an injunction before the next registration deadline to avoid a repetition of last week's mass arrests. Six individuals detained as a result of the new INS policy of special registrations are co-plaintiffs, and represent a broader group of victims in this class action suit.
Here is the full text of the link in case the link goes bad:
http://www.adc.org/index.php?id=1540
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Class action lawsuit filed against the US government
December 24, 2002
WASHINGTON, DC - The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), the Alliance of Iranian Americans (AIA), the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), and the National Council of Pakistani Americans (NCPA) filed a class action lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Central District of California against John Ashcroft; Attorney General of the United States, and the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS).
The essence of the lawsuit is that on Dec. 16-18, the INS unlawfully arrested large numbers of people, especially in Los Angeles, as they came forward to voluntarily comply with new "special registration" requirements. The groups are seeking an injunction before the next registration deadline to avoid a repetition of last week's mass arrests. Six individuals detained as a result of the new INS policy of special registrations are co-plaintiffs, and represent a broader group of victims in this class action suit.
The lawsuit takes issue with four aspects of the recent detentions:
1- The detentions were illegal because the government did not obtain the necessary arrest warrants;
2- It is unlawful and unjust to deport people who have been slated for adjustment of status and who have complied with the law at every stage;
3- Detainees are being held without bail or bond, and are subject to deportation without due process;
4- The fear of mass arrests created by these detentions will inhibit compliance by people facing similar registration deadlines in the near future.
The groups are seeking:
1- An injunction ordering the government not arrest any additional persons in the "special registration" process without appropriate warrants from federal judges;
2- An order preventing the deportation of detainees without due process.
Although the special registration policy has been presented as a national security measure designed to counter potential terrorist threats, the INS has been using the registration process to not only enforce immigration law but to arrest and deport people who have complied with the law at every stage and are on the road to becoming permanent residents. The effort to deport law-abiding people who could just as easily be allowed to continue the immigration process seriously undermines prospects for future compliance and constitutes as absurd waste of resources. The mass arrests have further eroded confidence in the fairness of the INS and immigration system among Arab and Muslim communities.
Dec. 16 was the first in a series of deadlines for special registration, which are set to culminate in 2004 with the registration of all foreign nationals in the United States. The mass arrests wich took place in Los Angeles last week, and the lawsuit filed today, have profound significance for the future of the registration process in many immigrant communities, and immigrants' rights in general.
The lawsuit was filed by attorneys Peter A. Schey and Carlos R. Holguin of the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law. Other co- counsel include several attorneys in the ADC Legal Department, Babak Sotoodeh of AIA, Khurrum Wahid of CAIR, Joannie Chang of the Asian Law Caucus, and several California law firms.
I've been working on the web site for this week's INS Immigration Roundup Protests going on in various locations around the country all week. I've got more footage from the Dec 23 protest, footage from yesterday's protest, and footage from the SF protest everyday this week (This Friday, January 10, is the big day guys!)
Anyway, sorry for leaving my post here for a couple days. It's been *really* hard to wrap my head around this crazy stuff going on over at the agency-formerly-known-as-the-INS (now part of Homeland Security). It's hard to believe that poor planning and a series of administrative gaffs are the only excuses our government has for the incarceration and subsequent brutal treatment of thousands of people. But that's what's happening alright.
I've been assembling all of the information together and collecting it into a website that will hopefully help you to understand everything quickly -- so you can all do what you can to help. It's really important.
Okay -- Back in a flash! I've got an excellent Daily Show Interview with Katrina vanden Heuvel, Editor of "The Nation", I'll be uploading in a second to tide you over until I can get the other stuff up later this morning.
Thanks!
Detentions today remind of yesterday's
By L.A. Chung for the San Jose Mercury News
Critics have scoffed at protesters' comparisons of the detentions with the well-known internment camps that detained 120,000 Japanese and Japanese-Americans from 1942 to 1946.Successive restrictions
But ask someone who is intimately familiar with the events affecting the Japanese-American community after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The initial calls not to blame a community. The gradual restrictions. Curfews. Registration. Finally, internment...
Lest we forget. It is time to turn up the volume. Next Friday, at the INS building in San Francisco.
More on the protest going on all next week in front of INS Buildings all around the country!
Posted on Fri, Jan. 03, 2003 story:PUB_DESC
Detentions today remind of yesterday's
By L.A. Chung
Mercury News Staff Columnist
It could be a page out of Kafka. Or Orwell.
. . . Or U.S. history.
While many of us were engrossed in pre-Christmas festivities with our families, others here and around the country were trying to figure out just where their husbands, brothers or sons had disappeared to and whether they would ever see them again.
John Tateishi read the accounts about Silicon Valley tech workers and Southern California men who vanished in the INS' clutches after showing up at the agency to register -- as required by our hastily passed USA Patriot Act. It smacked of America, circa 1942, the reactive, ugly side.
``I was appalled,'' said the executive director of the Japanese American Citizens League. ``I felt really bad for the families. Until you go through it, it's hard to understand.''
Critics have scoffed at protesters' comparisons of the detentions with the well-known internment camps that detained 120,000 Japanese and Japanese-Americans from 1942 to 1946.
Successive restrictions
But ask someone who is intimately familiar with the events affecting the Japanese-American community after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The initial calls not to blame a community. The gradual restrictions. Curfews. Registration. Finally, internment.
Tateishi was 3 when his family in Los Angeles was shipped off to Manzanar, a barren California camp. As national director of the JACL's campaign for redress and reparations, he heard story after story of children who saw their fathers taken away, wives left with children to feed and no means of support. He wrote their oral histories in a 1984 book, ``And Justice For All,'' now published by the University of Washington Press.
The modern version of our government behaving badly erupted in full view when distraught families took to the streets in Los Angeles in December, where a large number of Iranians had been detained after reporting. Men and boys over 16 who were born in Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya and Sudan were required to register with the INS and submit to fingerprinting and questioning by Dec. 16.
But hundreds were detained and flown from state to state in search of large enough detention facilities, some because of minor infractions like being two days late to register. Others were detained because their immigration files were ``out of status'' -- in some cases because of the INS' own backlog.
They were Muslims. And Christians. And Jews. Some had come here to escape persecution. They were not, as far as any officials have hinted, related to terrorists.
To be sure, such detentions can't match the scale of the mass internment of Japanese-Americans, and the lesser-known internment of some 10,000 Germans and 3,000 Italians for several years during World War II. Many of those detained this time were returned to their families around Christmas, but will have to report back for deportation hearings.
Harbinger or history?
But the detentions do recall the incarceration of some 31,000 ``enemy aliens'' -- mostly Japanese, but also Germans, Italians and other Europeans -- that preceded internment.
Some came into government offices when asked. Others were picked up by the FBI. Sound familiar?
``The Issei put on their Sunday suits with a tie, and reported to government buildings -- and then were never heard from for months and months,'' said Tateishi, referring to the first-generation Japanese, who were barred by law from citizenship.
So, who would blame the next group of men and boys from 13 other countries who must register next Friday for fearing what will happen? How can we insist on fair play?
``When you look at the World War II internment of Japanese-Americans, it didn't make Americans safer," said Tateishi. ``It didn't make one iota of difference. Yet it cost the country millions and millions of dollars, and they were misplaced resources.''
Lest we forget. It is time to turn up the volume. Next Friday, at the INS building in San Francisco.
Contact L.A. Chung at lchung@ sjmercury.com or (408) 920-5280.
Mass LA Muslim arrests condemned
Iranian-American Lawyers Association president Kayhan Shakhib said he feared that the men were being held in inhumane, overcrowded conditions.California was among the first states where non-resident men from the Middle East were obliged to register. Other states with large Muslim populations have been set later dates.
The Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) has refused to say how many people were arrested, but said detainees were being held for suspected visa violations and other offences.
Here's the full text of the article in case the link goes bad:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2595391.stm
Friday, 20 December, 2002, 17:45 GMT
Mass LA Muslim arrests condemned
A woman sobs over the detention of her son
The men had gone to register voluntarily
Civil liberties groups in the United States have called on the justice department to scrap an anti-terror scheme which has led to the detention of hundreds of Muslim men.
REGISTRATION ORDER
Introduced after 11 September attacks
Affects all males over 16 from a list of Arab and Muslim countries who do not have permanent resident status in the US
A 10 January deadline will affect men from Afghanistan, Lebanon, Eritrea, North Korea, Somalia, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen
A coalition of nine civil liberties groups called it a "flawed and misguided" scheme which has "damaged America's global image".
Immigration lawyers say at least 500 men - mainly Iranians - were arrested in and around Los Angeles after they complied with an order to register with the authorities by 16 December.
The programme, conceived after the 11 September 2001 attacks, is aimed at men from more than 20 Arab and Muslim nations who do not have permanent resident status in the US.
Critics say it is unlikely that the plotting terrorists the scheme is supposed to uncover would take part in a voluntary registration programme.
'Flawed and misguided'
The detentions have caused deep unrest within the Iranian-American community in California, with thousands taking to the streets earlier this week in protest.
People in LA demonstrating against immigration detentions
Southern California has a huge Iranian community
California is home to about 600,000 Iranians who have been living in exile since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
Iranian-American Lawyers Association president Kayhan Shakhib said he feared that the men were being held in inhumane, overcrowded conditions.
California was among the first states where non-resident men from the Middle East were obliged to register. Other states with large Muslim populations have been set later dates.
The Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) has refused to say how many people were arrested, but said detainees were being held for suspected visa violations and other offences.
Get involved, or perish
There are innocent people in jail. What are you going to do about it?
By Payam Mohseni for The Iranian.
We were led upstairs and then down almost freezing-cold hallways to the chamber that held all the detainees. It was like a scene from a movie: a glass wall separated the two worlds and our only line of communication was by the phones provided. The detainees were seated behind the glass panes speaking with their families when we arrived to interview them.They were very excited since they had not been able to communicate with the outside world for a long time, and they had thought that there would be no one to help them. They had been waiting to tell us their story. I was able to interview three Iranians, an Iraqi, and a Syrian.
Although they each had different stories to tell, there was a common thread that tied them all together. First, none of them had received notices to appear to register with the INS. Not a requirement, they had all voluntarily gone to the INS just as a precautionary step. They were legally exempt from deportation.
Second, the officers did not explain anything to the detainees as to what was happening, why it was happening, and what the procedures thereafter would be. A few were told not to worry because the judge would release them in less than 72 hours, but here they were speaking with me in jail a week later.
Third, they were all from the San Francisco Bay Area but had been transported around the country. Boarded unto jets, they went from the SF Bay Area to Arizona, then Colorado, back to Oakland, then Bakersfield and finally San Diego. Throughout the travels, they were not told the destination until they actually landed.
This continuous transport was extremely consequential to the services the detainees were able to receive. The detainees have rights to use the phone to call a family member and an attorney, and they also have the right to receive medical attention (a few of the detainees were ill). However, none of these basic rights were given to them with the explanation that since they were "in transit", they would not receive these rights. The ill detainees were not treated by a doctor and did not receive medication either.
Fourth, they were handcuffed and then shackled with chains from around their feet connecting to their handcuffs. This was on them for hours without end while they were held in rooms or were being transported. Eating was a very difficult experience for them.
Fifth, none of them had received court date hearings or been given a bail amount. This is very difficult to handle legally as they are not in the legal system so that an attorney can serve them efficiently and justly.
Sixth, they all reiterated the strategy of sleep deprivation used by the agents. They would be in offices during the day till 1AM waiting to be interviewed or to fill out forms. Then they would be woken up at 4AM to be transported again.
All identified lack of sleep as their most pressing concern as it destroyed their short-term memory and increased stress. Seventh, facilities were of poor quality or misused. They were forced to sleep on concrete floors even though there were rooms with beds present.
There was always an open toilet in the middle of the room that was usually clogged and unsanitary. Blankets were not provided at times even though the detainees requested them. There was an incident where toilet paper was used for insulation from the cold.
Furthermore, the detainees were able to take a shower only once last week. Also, vending machines for food were provided but the detainees were not allowed to use their money to purchase food. And of the food that they were served, some had passed their expiration dates.
Lastly, they were all harassed verbally with extreme profanity and ethnic slurs relating to their Middle Eastern origin. They would not tell me precisely what was said as they hoped to forget the obscene comments. The treatment by the officers was overall very rude. Some were even described as downright "scary", such as a man in the San Diego detention camp, the place they had been taken before the CCA, who smoked a big cigar behind his desk in the facility and made continuous insulting slurs to the detainees.
Here is the full text of the entire article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.iranian.com/Features/2002/December/Detain/index.html
Get involved, or perish
There are innocent people in jail. What are you going to do about it?
By Payam Mohseni
December 23, 2002
The Iranian
With this article, I intend to not only inform the public of the unconstitutional arrests and inhumane treatment of individuals who voluntarily registered with the INS but to demand of the Iranian-American community a political and cultural renaissance to reflect our needs.
I thank Ms. Banafsheh Akhlaghi, an attorney of Akhlaghi & Associates in San Francisco, for her intense passion and ceaseless aid to the plight of those affected by the new INS laws. Most importantly, I thank the detainees who touched my life through their stories of hardship and pain. The impression that their teary and pleading looks left in me will never be erased from my mind.
This is the story they imparted me with to tell you, you who truly cares about the welfare of our fellow human beings and the inviolable rights that should be highly safeguarded in our society: Families and news cameras were all outside the morning of Sunday December 22, when I arrived at the CCA, the INS detention facility on Otay Mesa in San Diego, California, to accompany Ms. Akhlaghi along with Farhan, a first year law student, to interview the detainees.
An Iranian gentleman stated that he had not been allowed to see his brother when he visited the facility a day earlier; everyone was waiting for an official response. An INS agent came outside and explained that it was probably a misunderstanding. Consequently, the families were granted entrance as well as Ms. Akhlaghi, Farhan and I, as the legal team of the detainees.
We were led upstairs and then down almost freezing-cold hallways to the chamber that held all the detainees. It was like a scene from a movie: a glass wall separated the two worlds and our only line of communication was by the phones provided. The detainees were seated behind the glass panes speaking with their families when we arrived to interview them.
They were very excited since they had not been able to communicate with the outside world for a long time, and they had thought that there would be no one to help them. They had been waiting to tell us their story. I was able to interview three Iranians, an Iraqi, and a Syrian.
Although they each had different stories to tell, there was a common thread that tied them all together. First, none of them had received notices to appear to register with the INS. Not a requirement, they had all voluntarily gone to the INS just as a precautionary step. They were legally exempt from deportation.
Second, the officers did not explain anything to the detainees as to what was happening, why it was happening, and what the procedures thereafter would be. A few were told not to worry because the judge would release them in less than 72 hours, but here they were speaking with me in jail a week later.
Third, they were all from the San Francisco Bay Area but had been transported around the country. Boarded unto jets, they went from the SF Bay Area to Arizona, then Colorado, back to Oakland, then Bakersfield and finally San Diego. Throughout the travels, they were not told the destination until they actually landed.
This continuous transport was extremely consequential to the services the detainees were able to receive. The detainees have rights to use the phone to call a family member and an attorney, and they also have the right to receive medical attention (a few of the detainees were ill). However, none of these basic rights were given to them with the explanation that since they were "in transit", they would not receive these rights. The ill detainees were not treated by a doctor and did not receive medication either.
Fourth, they were handcuffed and then shackled with chains from around their feet connecting to their handcuffs. This was on them for hours without end while they were held in rooms or were being transported. Eating was a very difficult experience for them.
Fifth, none of them had received court date hearings or been given a bail amount. This is very difficult to handle legally as they are not in the legal system so that an attorney can serve them efficiently and justly.
Sixth, they all reiterated the strategy of sleep deprivation used by the agents. They would be in offices during the day till 1AM waiting to be interviewed or to fill out forms. Then they would be woken up at 4AM to be transported again.
All identified lack of sleep as their most pressing concern as it destroyed their short-term memory and increased stress. Seventh, facilities were of poor quality or misused. They were forced to sleep on concrete floors even though there were rooms with beds present.
There was always an open toilet in the middle of the room that was usually clogged and unsanitary. Blankets were not provided at times even though the detainees requested them. There was an incident where toilet paper was used for insulation from the cold.
Furthermore, the detainees were able to take a shower only once last week. Also, vending machines for food were provided but the detainees were not allowed to use their money to purchase food. And of the food that they were served, some had passed their expiration dates.
Lastly, they were all harassed verbally with extreme profanity and ethnic slurs relating to their Middle Eastern origin. They would not tell me precisely what was said as they hoped to forget the obscene comments. The treatment by the officers was overall very rude. Some were even described as downright "scary", such as a man in the San Diego detention camp, the place they had been taken before the CCA, who smoked a big cigar behind his desk in the facility and made continuous insulting slurs to the detainees.
This was most of the information that was given to me by the detainees, but I knew that this was not the only message they would want me to tell you. They were not only requesting blankets and medication, but they were requesting the community to save them. They were requesting of us to speak out.
On my part, I have to tell you that I am very ashamed! It is not acceptable if the government violates its own laws written in the US Constitution. If it breaks one law, there will always be a possibility that it will break another one as well.
I am also upset at the Iranian-American community. Although there has been a very good uproar over these events and I am truly thankful to all those involved, we need to be more politically organized and have a stronger voice in order to stop these events from the start rather than practicing the process of damage control later.
A couple of the Iranian detainees told me that they had left Iran because of political injustices only to end up under the same kind of persecution in the United States. This comment made me question why so many Iranians in the US are apolitical. I know that most discuss politics a lot, but many never act on what they say.
This point has been a difficulty for me as a member of Students for Progress and Development in Iran (SPDI), a non-profit student organization established at UC Berkeley. Many students just do not want to get involved with anything political. And before our existence, all the Iranian student organizations in the US that I know of completely stay out of politics. How can we defend the rights that we are entitled to if no one wants to deal with politics?
With this line of thinking, I absolutely do not understand how one can criticize the government in Iran or why people left. If people really cared about the importance of "democracy" and "accountability" they would have to be active participants within it. Otherwise, in my opinion, they would be undermining the basis of democracy itself.
But many of the students' situation is also due to the parents. Many parents will not let their sons and daughters get involved in politics. Just know that such an act in itself is political as it takes away all of the power that our community could have had in this country! There are innocent people in jail right now, and there are laws in place that ensures the arrest of such people. We must not rest until we organize and unite the Iranian community to gain a strong voice in US politics and secure our Constitutional rights.
We must not rest until all of these innocent individuals are released from prison and an apology is made to the entire country. These were the requests the detainees made to me with their eyes. I hope we serve them well. If anyone knows of any detainees who are missing and have not been accounted for, please e-mail me as soon as possible. To find out more please visit spdiran.org.
Photo
Gisroo Mohajeri, who is more than six-months-pregnant, is comforted by her husband Ali Mohajeri, on the steps of the Federal Building in Los Angeles, Thursday, Dec. 19, 2002, after meeting with goverment officials about her son. Gisroo Mohajeri said her 16-year-old Iranian-born son, Hossein Ahmadi, was taken into custoday three days ago when the two came to the Immigration and Naturalization Services to voluntarily register the teenager with immigration officials. Hossein Ahmadi now faces deportation proceedings, she says. Thousands of Iranian-Americans demonstrated Wednesday against the arrest of Middle Eastern immigrants who had voluntarily registered with the federal government under a new anti-terrorism program. (AP Photo/Jean-Marc Bouju)
Here are audio files of Farhan Memon, Legal Aide for the Bay Area Association of Muslim Lawyers -- from the protest last monday.
Farhan Memon explanation 1 (6 MB)
Farhan Memon explanation 2 (6 MB)
I'm finishing up some nice compressed versions of more footage from monday, with MP3s of everything to match, and I promise they will all be up by this time tomorrow.
Sorry for the hold up. I know that Indy Media and some other media affiliates are actually waiting for this footage (a dream come true for me to have this stuff redistributed through as many channels as possible) -- and I promise that I am putting the systems into place so that I can shoot footage of events like these and have the video and mp3s up on the web in hours rather than days so I can be of real use to the "real" media outlets. (That's what I'm here for -- to help you guys report on this stuff!)
So pardon me while I figure out my equipment and software and get my cataloging act together!
Okay I've got to go to another meeting at in downtown SF this morning to find out more about what we can do to help the situation. (It's at Van Der Hout & Brigagliano, 180 Sutter St., 5th floor, at Kearny and Sutter, Downtown San Francisco - from 10:00-11:30 am, if you're interested in showing up.)
But here are some photos and footage of yesterday's small (200 people) but effective demonstration in front of the San Francisco INS office.
Both of these movies are of Farhan Memon, Legal Aide for the Bay Area Association of Muslim Lawyers, describing the terrible conditions in which these detainees are being treated by the security company contracted out by the INS. (Yep, that's right, these people aren't even in governement custody. Oh yeah, there will be more on this later!)
Farhan Memon explanation 1 (90.3 MB)
Farhan Memon explanation 2 (88.4 MB)
Come down to the protest in San Francisco this morning at 11:00 AM -- that's Monday, December 23, 2002 at 11:00 AM -- at the INS building at 444 Washington Street, San Francisco.
Here's a gif of that map if the mapquest link above doesn't work.
444 Washington is sort of in between the Embarcadero and Montgomery St. BART stations (a couple blocks west of market street ).
From Embarcadero BART Go south on Market (away from the Ferry Building) and make a RIGHT on Drumm street. Then make a LEFT on WASHINGTON St. to the INS building at 444 Washington.
From Montgomery St. BART, take Montgomery St. to Washington and make a RIGHT on Washington to 444 Washington.
Otherwise bring $5-$10 to park in a parking garage somewhere.
I will, of course, be filming the event, so if you can't make it, check back here for footage tomorrow afternoon.
What's next? Photo essay: L.A. protests against detention of Iranians
Photos by Ramin Tabib and Dorna Khazeni.
Danny O'Brien explains how complicated the INS paperwork can be.
When I say, "in the midst of", let me tell you what that involves. I'm on my third attempt to have the documentation even processed. Twice it's been sent back because of a filing error on my part. This is not surprising: the documentation needed to even apply for permanent residency is so vast, and so often changed, that even with the best explanations in the world, there are dozens of ambiguities. And the explanations are not the best in the world. INS requirements differ from office to office: official Website explanations contradict one another. This is hard. Here's the first step in my application process (picture of all of his paperwork here).
Red Flag guys!
Immigrants from a number of Middle Eastern countries are being arrested after coming forward voluntarily to register with the INS.
These people are being treated like as any other criminal suspect while in custody. They have been hosed down before having to sleep on the floor (if there's room) or forced to sleep standing up. (Yeah, I know, even criminal suspects shouldn't be treated like that, but that's another story...)
Now these innocents may be sent away to a jail or internment facility elsewhere -- to be further processed because of the overcrowded living conditions in the Jail they are currently being held in. Their lawyers and loved ones aren't being told when or to where exactly they are to be moved.
These people have committed no crime except that of being a citizen of the country they are from.
This is way to close for comfort to the WWII roundups of Japanese-Americans from 1942-1944.
When Our Government Freaked Out -- and went around rounding up and imprisoning Japanese-Americans in "internment camps" in locations across the country.
I'm not sure yet what it is exactly we can do to help these people, but I'm going to do my best to find out.
We're not going to make let them wait two years like the Japanese had to wait, are we?
Note: There was a big protest (3,000+ people) about this in Los Angeles on Wednesday afternoon.
Here's story by Megan Garvey, Martha Groves and Henry Weinstein (with Greg Krikorian, Teresa Watanabe, Johanna Neuman and Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar) for the L.A. Times:
Hundreds Are Held After Visits to INS
Mideast boys and men living in the Southland were complying with an order to register
Hundreds of men and boys from Middle Eastern countries were arrested by federal immigration officials in Southern California this week when they complied with orders to appear at INS offices for a special registration program...Monday's registration deadline applied to males 16 and older from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan and Syria. Men from 13 other nations, mostly in the Mideast and North Africa, are required to register next month.
Many of those arrested, according to their lawyers, had already applied for green cards and, in some instances, had interviews scheduled in the near future. Although they had overstayed their visas, attorneys argue, their clients had already taken steps to remedy the situation and were following the regulations closely...
"These are the people who've voluntarily gone" to the INS, said Mike S. Manesh of the Iranian American Lawyers Assn. "If they had anything to do with terrorism, they wouldn't have gone."
Immigration officials acknowledged Wednesday that many of those taken into custody this week have status-adjustment applications pending that have not yet been acted on.
"The vast majority of people who are coming forward to register are currently in legal immigration status," said local INS spokeswoman Virginia Kice. "The people we have taken into custody ... are people whose non-immigrant visas have expired."
...Jonoubi said that the mother has permanent residence status and that her husband, the boy's stepfather, is a U.S. citizen. The teenager came to the country in July on a student visa and was on track to gain permanent residence, the lawyer said.
Many objected to the treatment of those who showed up for the registration. INS ads on local Persian radio stations and in other ethnic media led many to expect a routine procedure. Instead, the registration quickly became the subject of fear as word spread that large numbers of men were being arrested.
Lawyers reported crowded cells with some clients forced to rest standing up, some shackled and moved to other locations in the night, frigid conditions in jail cells — all for men with no known criminal histories.
Shawn Sedaghat, a Sherman Oaks attorney, said he and his partner, Michelle Taheripour, represent more than 40 people who voluntarily went to register and were detained.
Some, he said, were hosed down with cold water before finding places to sleep on the concrete floors of cells...
Attorney Ban Al-Wardi, who saw 14 of her 20 clients arrested when she went with them to the registration, said that although everyone understands the need to protect the nation against terrorist attacks, the government's recent action went too far.
"All of our fundamental civil rights have been violated by these actions," she said. "I don't know how far this is going to go before people start speaking up. This is a very dangerous precedent we are setting. What's to stop Americans from being treated like this when they travel overseas?"
Here's the full text of the article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-register19dec19,0,436924.story?coll=la%2Dhome%2Dheadlines
By Megan Garvey, Martha Groves and Henry Weinstein, Times Staff Writers
Hundreds Are Held After Visits to INS
Hundreds of men and boys from Middle Eastern countries were arrested by federal immigration officials in Southern California this week when they complied with orders to appear at INS offices for a special registration program.
The arrests drew thousands of people to demonstrate Wednesday in Los Angeles.
Immigration and Naturalization Service spokesmen refused Wednesday to say how many people the agency had detained, what the specific charges were or how many were still being held. But officials speaking anonymously said they would not dispute estimates by lawyers for detainees that the number across Southern California was 500 to 700. In Los Angeles, up to one-fourth of those who showed up to register were jailed, lawyers said.
The number of people arrested in this region appears to have been considerably larger than elsewhere in the country, perhaps because of the size of the Southland's Iranian population. Monday's registration deadline applied to males 16 and older from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan and Syria. Men from 13 other nations, mostly in the Mideast and North Africa, are required to register next month.
Many of those arrested, according to their lawyers, had already applied for green cards and, in some instances, had interviews scheduled in the near future. Although they had overstayed their visas, attorneys argue, their clients had already taken steps to remedy the situation and were following the regulations closely.
"These are the people who've voluntarily gone" to the INS, said Mike S. Manesh of the Iranian American Lawyers Assn. "If they had anything to do with terrorism, they wouldn't have gone."
Immigration officials acknowledged Wednesday that many of those taken into custody this week have status-adjustment applications pending that have not yet been acted on.
"The vast majority of people who are coming forward to register are currently in legal immigration status," said local INS spokeswoman Virginia Kice. "The people we have taken into custody ... are people whose non-immigrant visas have expired."
The large number of Iranians among the detainees has angered many in the area's Iranian communities, who organized a demonstration Wednesday at the federal building in Westwood.
At the rally, which police officials estimated drew about 3,000 protesters at its peak, signs bore such sentiments as "What Next? Concentration Camps?" and "Detain Terrorists Not Innocent Immigrants."
The arrests have generated widespread publicity, mostly unfavorable, in the Middle East, said Khaled Dawoud, a correspondent for Al Ahram, one of Egypt's largest dailies. He questioned State Department official Charlotte Beers about the detentions Wednesday after a presentation she made at the National Press Club in Washington. Egyptians are not included in the registration requirement.
Beers, undersecretary of State for public diplomacy and public affairs, was presenting examples of a U.S. outreach campaign for the Middle East, which includes images of Muslims leading happy lives here. Dawoud asked how that image squared with the "humiliating" arrests in recent days.
"I don't think there is any question that the change in visa policy is going to be seen by some as difficult and, indeed — what was the word you used? — humiliating," Beers said. But, she added, President Bush has said repeatedly that he considers "his No. 1 ... job to be the protection of the American people."
Relatives and lawyers of those arrested locally challenge that rationale for the latest round of detentions.
One attorney, who said he saw a 16-year-old pulled from the arms of his crying mother, called it madness to believe that the registration requirements would catch terrorists.
"His mother is 6 1/2 months pregnant. They told the mother he is never going to come home — she is losing her mind," said attorney Soheila Jonoubi, who spent Wednesday amid the chaos of the downtown INS office attempting to determine the status of her clients.
Jonoubi said that the mother has permanent residence status and that her husband, the boy's stepfather, is a U.S. citizen. The teenager came to the country in July on a student visa and was on track to gain permanent residence, the lawyer said.
Many objected to the treatment of those who showed up for the registration. INS ads on local Persian radio stations and in other ethnic media led many to expect a routine procedure. Instead, the registration quickly became the subject of fear as word spread that large numbers of men were being arrested.
Lawyers reported crowded cells with some clients forced to rest standing up, some shackled and moved to other locations in the night, frigid conditions in jail cells — all for men with no known criminal histories.
Shawn Sedaghat, a Sherman Oaks attorney, said he and his partner, Michelle Taheripour, represent more than 40 people who voluntarily went to register and were detained.
Some, he said, were hosed down with cold water before finding places to sleep on the concrete floors of cells.
Lucas Guttentag, who heads the West Coast office of the American Civil Liberties Union's immigrant rights project, fears the wave of arrests is "a prelude to much more widespread arrests and deportations."
"The secrecy gives rise to obvious concerns about what the INS is doing and whether people's rights are being respected and whether the problems that arose in the aftermath of 9/11 are being repeated now," he said.
Many at Wednesday's protest said they took the day off work to join the rally, because they were shocked by the treatment.
"I came to this country over 40 years ago and got drafted in the Army, and I thought if I die it's for a good cause, defending freedom, democracy and the Constitution," said George Hassan, 65, from the San Fernando Valley.
"Oppressed people come here because of that democracy, that freedom, that Constitution. Now our president has apparently allowed the INS vigilantes to step outside the Constitution."
Ramona Ripston, executive director of the ACLU of Southern California, called the detentions doubly disturbing because "a lot of the Iranians are Jews who fled Iran because of persecution, and now they are undergoing similar persecution here.... This is just terrible."
Attorney Ban Al-Wardi, who saw 14 of her 20 clients arrested when she went with them to the registration, said that although everyone understands the need to protect the nation against terrorist attacks, the government's recent action went too far.
"All of our fundamental civil rights have been violated by these actions," she said. "I don't know how far this is going to go before people start speaking up. This is a very dangerous precedent we are setting. What's to stop Americans from being treated like this when they travel overseas?"
Times staff writers Greg Krikorian and Teresa Watanabe in Los Angeles and Johanna Neuman and Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar in Washington contributed to this report.
