Project Economic Refugee

Prominent progressives AND conservatives have called out Arizona’s SB 1070 immigration law as un-American.  So why are we still afraid to name just how authoritarian and racist that law is by using the term “Nazi”?

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.”
-From Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet

In the case of Arizona, perhaps the more appropriate question should be “would calling Arizona’s SB 1070 law by any other name other than “Nazi” make it any less racist or any less authoritarian?” 


It’s time to stop apologizing for calling out racism and for categorizing Arizona’s immigration law as what it truly is about.  Now that Judge Susan Bolton (a conservative judge that was recommended to the bench by Republican Senator Jon Kyl) has struck down major portions of Arizona’s authoritarian police law, new major dynamics have consolidated for both opponents and supporters of Arizona’s runaway law.  On the one hand, opponents of the immigration law have been validated: by the blocking of major provisions of SB 1070, other states have been put on notice; also, opponents of the immigration law have been proven right in the arguments that classify Arizona’s dacronian law as an alarming threat to American liberty itself.  On other side of the debate, by fighting Judge Bolton’s decision, Governor Brewer and her camp are looking more and more like nothing else but right-wing authoritarians that have embraced ideals that are in direct opposition to American values.  Bottom line is that by continuing to peddle such immigration laws, right-wing Arizonan politicians are forcing honest well-intentioned police officers to act as some sort of gestapo agents. 

Before you start to argue otherwise, let’s take a hard look at why it has been hard not to make the gestapo comparisons.  When you hear about the horrible acts that are being committed in the name of “immigration enforcement”, it is hard to not compare what Arizona is doing to Nazi and/or white supremacist ideology.  When you hear about how actual neo-Nazis are literally out hunting down immigrants, it’s hard not to call it “Nazi”.  When you hear about how white supremacist nationalists are behind the legal defense fund in support of SB 1070, it’s hard not to call it “Nazi.”  When you see cases where racial profiling has led to such barbaric acts such as the time when a pregnant woman was forced to give birth cuffed by the wrists and ankles, it’s hard not to use the word “Nazi” … and again, when you find out that SB 1070 was written by and introduced to the Arizona legislature by people that are proud to identify themselves as “Nazis”, it’s hard not to use the word “Nazi”.  Equally unsettling, it’s been at times difficult to understand just how some have argued otherwise.  Perfect example was the furor that was spread in local Southern Californian media outlets when Congresswoman Linda Sanchez pointed out something that is very much the case: how some of the people behind the Arizona law actually ARE white supremacists.  After her comments, it was astounding to see how the right-wing talking points started to shape media coverage of the chain of events: implying that she was a racist for merely calling out and standing up to the true racists!  What an upside-down world we live in, truly.       

Speaking of mainstream media coverage, there was one particularly reporter that went out of his way to promote the argument that using Nazi comparisons in describing Arizona’s SB 1070 was completely inappropriate.  Last May, Robert Jablon of AP interviewed a prominent rabbi, implying that the Nazi comparisons were going too far because they diminished the Holocaust, stating that:

Arizona’s tough new law against illegal immigration has prompted furious protests and boycotts but Jewish groups say opponents who compare it with the rise of Nazi Germany are going too far.

“It diminishes the Holocaust,” said Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder and dean of the Wiesenthal Center, an internationally known Holocaust studies center based in Los Angeles.

“Survivors and others are very upset about this,” he said Friday. “When you exaggerate, it’s very harmful to them when they know that their mothers and fathers were taken to the gas chambers without any recourse to the law. They lost children.”

First off, I completely agree that comparisons between the Holocaust and Arizona’s immigration law would be completely inappropriate.  However, I highly doubt that most people are actually comparing Arizona’s law to the actual Holocaust.  What most people are doing, is comparing Arizona’s law to the threat of racist authoritarian supremacist acts.  It also begs this question: if it talks like a Nazi, acts like a Nazi, and in fact calls itself “Nazi”, are we then safe to assume that it IS “Nazi”?  Reporter Jablon, to his credit, did mention that Rabbi Hier’s homebase, The Wiesenthal Center itself, has actually come out in opposition to Arizona’s immigration law.  Nevertheless, it seems that the reporter went one step further to try to paint the picture as if there was widespread consensus on this matter on the part of Jewish groups; quote:

The national director of the Anti-Defamation League, Abraham H. Foxman, wrote earlier this month that comparisons between Arizona’s laws and Nazism “delegitimize and trivialize the deaths of 6 million Jews and millions of others and soldiers who fought to defeat Nazism. They also play into the hands of those who support the Arizona law.”

He noted that some opponents of President Barack Obama’s policies have compared him to Adolph Hitler.

“It seems to happen with greater regularity in American political debate today than ever before: When anger reaches a fever pitch on a particular issue, out come the inevitable comparisons to the Holocaust,” Foxman said in an article in the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “It has become a rule of thumb, an all-too-convenient catchphrase of the times.”

What the reporter failed to mention was that The Anti-Defamation League itself has also come out in staunch opposition to Arizona’s immigration law, going as far as filing an actual legal challenge to it.  Lastly, in the reporter’s AP note there was absolutely no mention whatsoever of how, again, the law was written and introduced by people that are proud to consider themselves supporters of actual neo-Nazis.

To downplay what Arizona’s law truly is about is just as dangerous as to overplay it.  All in all, I’m reminded of the words of Holocaust survivor, Elie Wiesel: “No Human Being is illegal”.  So what’s in a name?  Do you think the Nazi comparisons are spot on?  Or do you think otherwise?

It is heart breaking enough to observe how British Petroleum’s negligence (and arguably Halliburton’s by extension) has resulted in the wasteful destruction of vast natural resources and on the death of countless innocent animals but as if that were not enough now we get word that the cleanup workers are getting sick due to lack of proper protective equipment.  Even more outrageous: there are now reports that BP threatens to fire its cleanup workers if they bring their own protective equipment.  Keith Olbermann recently featured Marylee Orr of the Louisiana Environmental Action Network and discussed the atrocious working conditions that are causing cleanup workers to get sick:  

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

As the gulf’s local ocean-dependent economic activities lie in shambles, it is not surprising to see people in the area impacted by the oil disaster risk their own health in desperate attempts to feed their families and help alleviate the disastrous situation.  There is no question that the unprecedented nature of BP’s oil catastrophe on America’s coastline has forced everyone to improvise quick responses.  Edward James Olmos was recently interviewed by Anderson Cooper and had this to say (to access video of his interview, click here):

[...] no one knows why things are happening the way they are here; I have friends and relatives who want to volunteer their boats, to come down here and help, save their backyard [...]

People are anxious to help, in fact, perhaps the diversity in cleanup workers should come as no surprise in the cause to clean up America’s waters. Last June 2nd, El Diario La Prensa reported (translation via New America Media):

NEW ORLEANS — As oil escapes from the depths of the Gulf of Mexico and washes up on the coasts of Louisiana, hundreds of Latinos are working hard on the clean-up efforts.

Among them are 40 women. They are part of a group of 500 people who are preparing the dam near Hopedale, two hours from New Orleans, for the arrival of the oil slick. These 40 workers are employees of the subcontractor Tamara’s Group, which was contracted by the company Oil Mop.

..and what are the thank you’s that they are getting for risking their health?

Exhibit A.  AlterNet post: [Conservative] Cato Scholar Jokes About Using Undocumented Immigrants to Soak Up BP’s Oil.

Exhibit B.  Mother Jones’ report: ICE Running Immigration Raids on Oil-Spill Workers.

The gulf needs all the help that it can get, but it seems that the usual corporate exploitation of workers is unsurprisingly taking precedence over good will.  We need solutions to this disaster and we need them fast.  In fact, In light of all this urgency, the cleanup activities have been downright chaotic (as reported by The New York Times), to say the least.  Rachel Maddow on her blog highlights the conditions in which community members are forced to take actions into their own hands:

The local communities and shore areas most directly affected by the oil have been left, essentially, to fend for themselves. It’s a disgrace, it’s been a disgrace for weeks, and it needs to be fixed. 

Many commentators on the media argue that there are no true experts on how to deal with an oil explosion of this magnitude and so that makes the President’s job all the harder.  That may be partly true, but it ignores one key point that is not getting much play in the news: the expertise that does exist, is, in fact, not being tapped into.  Yes, that may be hard to believe, but it is something that is well-known among in the environmental circles and that the White House for some reason seems to be oblivious to.  Perhaps James Carville expressed best the urgent need for Obama to put an expert in charge.  Prior to Obama’s more public engagement in the crisis, Carville said the following during an interview with Good Morning America (Via the raw story):  

[...] The political stupidity of this is just unbelievable…

[...] Here you have a situation where you have eleven hard-working people blown off [an oil rig in the gulf] as a result of corporate malfeasance and maybe criminal negligence as a result of inept bureaucrats who were part of the — you can actually blame the previous Administration for this [...]

[...] These people are crying, they’re begging for something down here and he just looks like he’s not involved in this. Man, you got to get down here and take control of this, put somebody in charge of this thing and get this thing moving. We’re about to die down here.

Let me be frank: I am not a fan of Carville.  His connections with the conservative arm of the Democratic Party, the DLC, have always irked me.  However, I think James Carville made great points during his interview.  He was absolutely right in saying that there needs to be a person put in charge by Obama.  The person in charge should be someone that actually has expertise, unlike the mish-mash of bureacrats that have been handling the situation up to this point.  In fact, word on the environmental circles is that the White House has virtually shut the Environmental Protection Agency out of the cleanup decision making process.  In case you didn’t know, the EPA is the one agency in the nation that has the most expertise on oil spills and pollution response.  Yet, the White House for some reason seems to be tying their hands!  The current Administrator of the EPA, Lisa Jackson, would make an excellent choice to lead the cleanup efforts.  Mark Gold, President of the Southern California-based environmental organization Heal the Bay had the following to say on Huffington Post:

Change the face of the federal response. Lisa Jackson is telegenic, bright, articulate, a Princeton graduate in chemical engineering, a specialist in toxics, and a Louisiana native! What more can you possibly ask for? Oh yeah. She runs the agency with the most oil spill and pollution response expertise: the EPA. A Hollywood casting call wouldn’t give you a better candidate to lead the cleanup effort. The buddy team for 2010 should be Lisa J. and Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen. The public doesn’t want to see anyone from the MMS. Jane Lubchenko and the NOAA folks are mainly needed to trot out the latest scientific findings. And the other secretaries and special assistants just aren’t as reassuring to the public as Jackson. Stick a Saints hat on her head, give her some real authority beyond regulating dispersants, and let her lead. She will not disappoint.

It’s time to get our act together.  Instead of raiding Latinos and other immigrants, we need to ensure that all workers and volunteers are protected.  We need to make sure the cleanup efforts have the proper expertise and leadership behind them.  We need to get our priorities straight.  We need to protect America from the oil industry’s poisonous greed.

While the violence and harassement on the border seems to be on the rise against immigrant economic refugees, the right-wing continues to deny that violence is on the rise against these immigrants, while at the same time typically claiming that border cities are riddled with crime; and of course they blame the immigrants for this. In light of the Obama’s recent decision to appease the conservatives and militarize the border by sending 1,200 National Guard troops there, Sam Seder discusses how a recent report showed that the cities with the lowest crime rates in the country have actually been, gasp, along the border!

She’s claimed that she is against and offended by sexism (she did this specially during her tiff with David Letterman) but yet she remained utterly and suspiciously silent as the right-wing ravaged Sonia Sotomayor with sexist and racist attacks during her confirmation process as a Supreme Court Justice (click here to read the back story on that) at a time when even other Republicans were speaking out against such utter racism. People wondered “why?” Why remain silent when it would be a good political opportunity for her to speak out?  She could’ve easily capitalized on Newt Gingrinch’s stumble on some racist comments against Sotomayor and on the Spanish language itself (wished I were making this stuff up but it really happened) that he had made around that same time; she could’ve grabbed the opportunity to reach out to the Latino vote and upstaged one of her main Republican rivals (that is, if her intentions were still to eventually run for President) … but she didn’t. People again wondered “why?” 

She falsely accused President Obama of pal’ing around with terrorists during the election, when in fact she herself has been pal’ing around with racist extremists in the Tea Party crowd by attending their rallies and catering to their hatred.  In fact, she has been notorious for also remaining silent when Tea Party people attend her rallies and shout racist epithets at Obama calling him the “N” word and worse (I got alerted to this back in 2009 via a comment someone left here).

Now, her recent comments on Fox News justifying Arizona’s new immigration police law have revealed a sliver of what her attitudes are towards immigrants and especially towards Latinos and other minorities.  Watch:

Via Media Matters:

Palin: “There is no ability or opportunity in there for the racial profiling.” Appearing on the April 27 edition of Hannity, Fox News contributor Sarah Palin stated that “[t]here is no ability or opportunity in there for the racial profiling. And shame on the lame stream media again for turning this into something that it is not.” Palin added, “I think it’s shameful, too, that the Obama administration has allowed, too, this to become more of a racial issue by perpetuating this myth that racial profiling is a part of this law.”

Is there a pattern emerging here? Is there a racial undertone that Sarah Palin is starting to reveal in her actions? Why is Sarah Palin supporting a law that was written by white supremacists and then accusing others of racism? I’m not using hyperbole here, it was actually written by people that are well-known to have ties to actual Nazis.  Furthermore, she claims to be against so-called “big government”, which Arizona’s new immigration law clearly is: BIG government forcing honest, hard-working police officers to act as a kind of Nazi German Gestapo under the threat of being sued should they not act like it.   

For God’s sakes, even people that previously railed against so-called “big government” and even threatened to secede from the union at Tea Party rallies like Texa’s Governor Rick Perry have now come out against what Arizona has done.  Via Governor Perry’s website: 

“Recently, there has been much debate over immigration policy in Washington and what has been implemented in Arizona. I fully recognize and support a state’s right and obligation to protect its citizens, but I have concerns with portions of the law passed in Arizona and believe it would not be the right direction for Texas.

“For example, some aspects of the law turn law enforcement officers into immigration officials by requiring them to determine immigration status during any lawful contact with a suspected alien, taking them away from their existing law enforcement duties, which are critical to keeping citizens safe. Our focus must continue to be on the criminal elements involved with conducting criminal acts against Texans and their property.  I will continue to work with the legislative leadership to develop strategies that are appropriate for Texas.

A dangerous pattern is emerging on Sarah Palin: support for big government authoritarian laws written by Nazis, and absolute silence in the face of racist and sexist hate.  As a major public figure in the national scene, she bears responsibility, whether she likes it not, on all this, because after all, sometimes silence is tacit approval or in her case, a resounding endorsement.

 Arizona Republicans pulled a suicide pistol on their political careers by passing such racist unconstitutional and therefore anti-America law. These politicians and their allies in the Tea Party crowd are about to get a lesson on what a real rally looks like.   

So where is your city going to be meeting to rally against racist authoritarian police laws (like Arizona’s), and demand immigration reform?

In Downtown Los Angeles, there’ll be a big meeting point on the corner of Broadway and Olympic at 10:00am and will end with a rally at Broadway and Temple.

Here’s a map plotting planned marches (via reformimmigrationforamerica.org) across the United States; you can also see their running list here.

Here’s another working list (via immigrantsolidarity.org) of rallies and meetings points across the nation.

Articles:

Reuters: Arizona immigrant law energizes Hispanics, Democrats

New America Media: After Arizona, 100,000 Expected for LA’s May Day March

CNN: Group plans protests for immigrants’ rights in 39 cities Saturday

Just in case you still doubt that Arizona’s new authoritarian police law (aka SB 1070) was racially motivated:

Via Imagine 2050:

The anti-immigrant law just signed into effect in Arizona was introduced by Arizona Republican Russell Pearce (shown here hugging a neo-nazi) and written by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (a designated hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center).

Read more here.

Update: Here’s a segment that appeared on Rachel Maddow on this topic.

Thanks to Immigration Talk with a Mexican American for sounding the alarm off on this.  Watch Senator Huppenthal squirm as he falsely states that this new law does not legalize racial profiling (it in fact, does legalize racial profiling because it forces police officers to stop someone if they have “reasonable suspicion” of someone looking like an “illegal”, which can be dangerously interpreted as anything the police arbitrarily chooses, for ex. if someone merely looks brown). See for yourself: incredibly, it appears Sen. Huppenthal does not even know what was in his own bill:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I’ll add to this by repeating what I have said on this previous post of mine:

…it seems that the focus right now is in how this law will lead to unprecedented racial profiling. While that is important to point out, the topic of how this law will probably lead to an increase in crime rates is getting lost in the media coverage.  When you talk about this with your friends, be sure to point out how this law will destroy the Arizona police’s ability to work with the immigrant community to report and combat crime because all trust between the two parties will be destroyed.

Now that Governor Brewer has signed SB1070 into law, there’s been a lot of talk in the past few days about boycotting Arizona (besides the protests, the lawsuits, and the election consequences that are sure to come down on those that supported the law).  However, in order for a boycott to be truly effective, it needs to be as targeted as possible to maximize impact.  I recommend the boycott start with targeting those companies that donated to the politicians that voted to pass the law in the first place. 

Here’s the list of Senators and their district numbers that voted YES (via the AZ legislature website; click on their names to find out who were the major funders of their last election campaigns):


Sylvia Allen (R-5)
David Braswell (R-6)
Chuck Gray (R-19)
Jack W. Harper (R-4)
Barbara Leff (R-11)
Al Melvin (R-26)
Russell Pearce (R-18)
Jay Tibshraeny (R-21)
Ed Bunch (R-7)
Linda Gray (R-10)
John Huppenthal (R-20)
Steve Pierce (R-1)
Thayer Verschoor (R-22)
Frank Antenori (R-30)
Ron Gould (R-3)
John Nelson (R-12)
Robert “Bob” Burns (R-9)

Notice that they were all Republican.  In fact, the only Republican to vote “No” was:

Carolyn S. Allen (R-8)

Here’s the list of those that voted for it and their district numbers in the AZ House or Representatives (via Project Vote Smart; also click on their names to find out who were the major funders of their last election campaigns):

Rep. Lucy Mason (R-1), Rep. Andrew Tobin Sr. (R-1), Rep. Doris Goodale (R-3), Rep. Nancy McLain (R-3), Rep. Tom Boone (R-4), Rep. Judy Burges (R-4), Rep. Bill Konopnicki (R-5), Rep. Amanda Reeve (R-6), Rep. Carl Seel (R-6), Rep. Ray Barnes (R-7), Rep. Nancy Barto (R-7), Rep. John Kavanagh (R-8), Rep. Michele Reagan (R-8), Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-9), Rep. Rick Murphy (R-9), Rep. Doug Quelland (R-9), Rep. James Weiers (R-9), Rep. Adam Driggs (R-11), Rep. Steve Montenegro (R-12), Jerry Weiers (R-12), Rep. Cecil Ash (R-18), Rep. Steve Court (R-18), Rep. Kirk Adams (R-19), Rep. Rich Crandall (R-19), Rep. John McComish (R-20), Rep. Warde Nichols (R-21), Rep. Steven Yarbrough (R-21), Rep. Andy Biggs (R-22), Rep. Laurin Hendrix (R-22), Rep. Frank Pratt (R-23), Rep. Russell Jones (R-24), Rep. David Stevens (R-25), Rep. Vic Williams (R-26), Rep. David Gowan (R-30), Rep. Ted Vogt (R-30).

As you can see, all were Republicans on the House side.  So in summary the only Republican to vote “No” in the whole Arizona state congress was Senator Carolyn Allen.

Update: it seems that the focus right now is in how this law will lead to unprecedented racial profiling. While that is important to point out, the topic of how this law will probably lead to an increase in crime rates is getting lost in the media coverage.  When you talk about this with your friends, be sure to point out how this law will destroy the Arizona police’s ability to work with the immigrant community to report and combat crime because all trust between the two parties will be destroyed.

Update # 2: well surprise surprise; it appears that the people behind this new authoritarian law have even more wicked intentions having to do with voter suppression, aka election fraud.  Thom Hartmann interviewed Greg Palast today (April 26) on this and this is what Mr. Palast had to report on the matter:

What moved GOP Governor Jan Brewer to sign the Soviet-style show-me-your-papers law is the exploding number of legal Hispanics, US citizens all, who are daring to vote — and daring to vote Democratic by more than two-to-one. Unless this demographic locomotive is halted, Arizona Republicans know their party will soon be electoral toast. Or, if you like, tortillas.

It appears that not only does the Republican Party in Arizona want to incarcerate economic refugees, aka “undocumented workers”, but they also want to intimidate Latino U.S. citizens into not voting by making them afraid, accusing them of being “illegal” with the threat of putting them in jail.  This new law basically makes it legal to intimidate Latinos at the voting booth come the next election.  Read the rest of Palast’s report here.

Update # 3: (thanks to NamelessGenXer in this comment section)

…here’s a list of “bigger than just AZ” entities that have contributed to the formation of the Arizona Gestapo:

WELLS FARGO
COX COMMUNICATIONS
HONEYWELL INTERNATIONAL
BURLINGTON NORTHERN SANTA FE RAILWAY
SAFEWAY
NATIONAL FEDERATION OF INDEPENDENT BUSINESS
SOUTHWEST GAS
PFIZER
ENTERPRISE RENT-A-CAR
FARMERS INSURANCE GROUP
WESTERN GROWERS ASSOCIATION
NAIOP (aka the Commercial Real Estate Development Association)

Update #4: looks like Project Economic Refugee is not the only one calling for the boycott to be as targeted as possible.  Reform Immigration for America just sent out a request to its members to target the following companies:

To join Reform Immigration for America’s campaign to be as targeted as possible on the boycott of Arizona, visi this link.

In case you haven’t heard, the Arizona state legislature just passed a new law that will force the police to go after economic refugees (aka “undocumented immigrants”), even when that state’s Association of Chiefs of Police actually opposes this; therefore destroying any sort of confidence or working relations that the police might’ve had with the Latino and other immigrant communities in reporting and fighting crimes in Arizona. 


The National Day Laborer Organizing Network has issued the following statement, which encapsulates our emotions on this:

For Immediate Release / Please Distribute 
 
Contact: Marco Loera, 602-373-3859 and
 
newman@ndlon.org
 
Date: April 13, 2010
 
The following is a statement by Chris Newman, Legal Director of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network:
 
“Arizona is on the verge of enacting the most anti-immigrant legislation the country has seen in a generation. We are hopeful Governor Brewer will consult with her legal counsel, issue a veto, and spare Arizona the expense of defending an unconstitutional, unwise, and odious bill in federal courts. Arizona has long been a laboratory for anti-immigrant experimentation, and its demagogue leaders have become folk heros for white supremacists throughout the United States, but this bill ushers in a new chapter of disgrace for the state that resisted celebrating the life of Martin Luther King.”

This new Arizona legislation could become law as early as next week!  Here’s what you can do to help stop it (via the UFW):

1. Arizona’s Governor Brewer has not responded to any of the tweets that have been sent to her asking her to veto SB 1070. However, she is tweeting on other stuff and she just tweeted, “Don’t forget to sign up to be a fan on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/GovJanBrewer.”

So, join her fan page and leave a wall message asking her to “say NO to racial profiling by vetoing the SB1070!”

2. You can also sign the UFW’s twitter petition by tweeting the following message:
petition @GovBrewer Veto AZ’ SB1070. Say NO to racial profiling. http://act.ly/1wg RT to sign #actly #ufw
 
[The petition to Arizona’s Governor was actually the #2 tweet of the week at one point].
 
3. Call the Governor’s office at: 1800-253-0883 or 602-542-4331.
4. TAKE ACTION. The UFW has an action alert up on this that sends a fax to the governor asking her to veto this bill at http://action.ufw.org/az410

Update # 1: CREDO Action has sent out this action alert to 21,000 members in Arizona. In less than two hours, they generated 623 faxes to the governor’s office! 

Here is the direct link to the fax action.  Below is the email that was sent out:

Tell Gov. Jan Brewer: Stand up for civil rights and veto SB 1070
Don’t let Arizona become a police state. 

Dear [friend],

Yesterday, we received an email from our friends at the United Farm Workers. They wanted to alert us to a chilling new Arizona law that has been passed by the legislature and will soon land on the desk of Gov. Jan Brewer for her signature.

If signed into law, the bill would create a unique and frightening police state within Arizona’s borders. A state where anyone who forgets to carry identification or papers proving immigration status could be picked up by police. A state where someone who appears to be a Latino or speaks English with an accent will be at constant risk of being stopped and interrogated by police.

It’s up to Gov. Jan Brewer to put a stop to this law. Send a message today urging her to veto the bill.

As Alessandra Soler Meetze, president of the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona, says, “A lot of U.S. citizens are going to be swept up in the application of this law for something as simple as having an accent and leaving their wallet at home.”

And its not just the Arizona ACLU and civil rights groups that are raising the alarm. The Arizona Association of Chiefs of Police opposes the bill because it will deter immigrants who are witnesses to crimes from coming forward and helping police.

Not only does the bill make it a misdemeanor not to carry proper immigration paperwork in Arizona. It would also require police officers to demand verification of immigration status whenever they have “reasonable suspicion” that someone is undocumented. Under current state law, officers can inquire about immigration status if an individual is a suspect in another crime, but the wholesale racial profiling required by SB 1070 is not condoned.

Gov. Jan Brewer has not taken a public stand on SB 1070. She needs to hear from us that we expect her to stand up for civil rights and veto SB 1070. Send her a fax today!

Thank you for standing up for civil liberties.

Becky Bond, Political Director
CREDO Action from Working Assets

Update # 2: in case you haven’t been paying attention to Arizona’s growing authoritarian trends towards terrorizing the Latino community, check out what Rep. Luis Gutierrez just published on Huffington Post.

It is open season on the Latino community in Arizona. In Phoenix, Tucson, and across the state, people in Latino neighborhoods are afraid to leave their houses, afraid to be apart from their children for even a minute, and afraid to walk the streets because they feel their arrest on suspicion of being an undocumented immigrant could happen at any moment. It is a horrifying glimpse at what our future holds across the country if we continue down the path the Obama administration is leading us on immigration.

This week, we saw how destructive things are getting. The combination of a harsh piece of anti-immigrant legislation advancing in the Arizona legislature and a massive, well-publicized federal enforcement action against a broad human smuggling network has sent the unmistakable message to Arizona’s one million immigrants and two million Hispanics: there is a target on your backs and authorities are coming after you.

To read the rest of the article, click here.

Update # 3: just got word of the following.

Since Thursday, CREDO members in Arizona have sent 1991 faxes to Gov. Brewer. [They're] hoping to be at 2,000 by Monday morning.

The UFW’s advocacy campaign at http://action.ufw.org/page/speakout/az410 has generated 4,845 faxes from folks to Gov. Brewer.
 
[Their] Act.ly twitter petition at http://act.ly/1wg is at 153 tweet that have been re-tweeted to 68,897 followers.  It is the # 1 act.ly twitter petition campaign of the month in “who’s in the hot seat”.  If you have not yet signed it, you can by tweeting the following message out:  

petition @GovBrewer Veto AZ’ SB1070. Say NO to racial profiling. http://act.ly/1wg RT to sign #actly #ufw

If you make changes it’s important to keep the @GovBrewer and the http://act.ly/1wg RT to sign or to take action directly from http://act.ly/1wg or the signs won’t count towards the total.
 
…and for a while the front of the Gov.’s facebook fan page at http://www.facebook.com/GovJanBrewer was covered w/anti SB1070 comments.  **this is no longer true.  Currently her supporters have put up a lot of comments encouraging her to sign the bill, so now might be a good time to post more comments asking her to veto it.

Update # 4: Adam Luna over at America’s Voice sent this great e-mail to his organization’s supporters asking ”do I look undocumented to you?”

Remember Joe Arpaio, the Arizona sheriff who paraded immigrants in shackles through Phoenix to a tent city in the desert? The renegade sheriff who is being investigated by the Justice Department for racial profiling?

I’m sorry to say that the Arizona legislature has passed a bill that would tell every police officer in the state to do their jobs just like Sheriff Joe: stopping anyone who “looks” like they could be undocumented — or risk getting sued. It’s pretty horrifying.

The bill has made it past the Arizona legislature, but the governor has the power to stop it. Help us make the case!

Please sign the petition to Arizona Governor Jan Brewer asking her to veto this bill now:

http://www.AmericasVoiceOnline.org/Veto

The question is: who judges what an undocumented immigrant “looks” like? Do I “look” undocumented just because I have brown skin, eat guacamole, and listen to Carlos Santana? Do you? I’m sorry, but that’s called racial profiling. That’s discrimination, period.

Police chiefs across the country are already speaking out against the bill, S.B. 1070, which they say will ruin trust with local communities. Tracking down real criminals gets even tougher when witnesses are afraid to come forward and report crime. The Arizona ACLU has come out strongly against it, citing major privacy concerns.

Time is short to stop this unconstitutional bill, so we will hand-deliver your petitions to the Governor early next week alongside major civil rights organizations and our partners in Arizona. We have a chance to stop it, but only if we raise our voices now.

Tell Governor Brewer to veto this awful, un-American bill:

http://www.AmericasVoiceOnline.org/Veto

It’s time for real, federal reform that brings our immigration system back under control.

Thanks for raising your voice to stop this madness and helping to spread the word.

Adam Luna
America’s Voice

Update # 5: looks like police unions, chiefs, and cops are starting to speak out against this legislation because they recognize it will impair their ability to do their jobs-going after actual criminals.  Via the EastValleyTribune.com:

Calling it an “unfunded mandate,” East Valley police departments are concerned about their ability to enforce a sweeping immigration bill that could be passed by the Arizona Legislature as early as this week. […] 

Police unions representing the rank-and-file officers, although not opposed to the bill, believe it could create manpower challenges during a time of budget reductions and are also concerned about potential lawsuits the law could bring, according to Bryan Soller, president of the Fraternal Order of Police Mesa Lodge’s No. 9, which represents 600 officers.

“If we’re getting hammered with calls, is a misdemeanor (trespassing by an illegal immigrant) more important than a stabbing or shooting?” Soller said. “No. The problem with this law is that it’s an unfunded mandate and could eat up a lot of manpower and cost a lot of money.”

You can read more and digg that story here.

Update # 6: to keep informed about all that is going on regarding immigration policy in Arizona, stop by altoarizona.com.

..ehr, I mean “Poizner”; but his name might as well be “poisoner”, though.  He’s been attacking economic refugees by calling them “illegal aliens” and going all Lou Dobbs on them.  Current Insurance Commissioner Poizner has been doing this in a particularly venomous manner throughout his almost now desperate campaign (he’s behind in the polls) to gain the nomination of the Republican Party in California to be the state’s governor against fellow Republican candidate Meg Whitman.  His commercials are everywhere on local TV stations and are filled with poisonous rhetoric.  Here’s one where he uses the dehumanizing and bigoted term “illegal alien”:

Notice that he keeps on blaming California’s economic crisis on ”failed liberal policies”, when in reality a large part of the blame should go to conservative obstructionist policies via the Prop. 13 catastrophe that has resulted in California’s dysfunctional government.  But he’ll never admit to that, of course.

Here’s his latest piece of work where he uses the usual conservative line of fear mongering, using overdramatizing images to blame everything that is wrong with California on immigrants-and by implied extension of course, on Latinos.  What’s particulary interesting about his latest videos is that he drops the term “illegal alien” for “illegal immigration”.  I wonder if that was deliberate, or someone in his camp told him to cool it  a bit if he is to actually be successful at winning the governorship, which would be a near impossible task without the Latino vote:

His attempts at posturing himself at being the “tough enforcer guy” are just plain sad and tragic.  Not only does he look as the antithesis of being macho right-wing guy, but with his skinny mousy insurance clerk physique and look,  his persona just comes across as him being dishonest, nasty, negative, and wreckless (and not in the sexy bad boy kind, but rather in the loser kind).

To add insult to injury, he slams fellow Republican Meg Whitman for supposedly having the same “liberal” immigration policy preferences as President Barack Obama.  In watching the video below, you have to wonder: who is advising this guy?  Are you serious?  Mr. Poizner is running in a state that have entire counties that are now or will be soon predominantly Latino and have strong connnections to the immigrant experience, on a state that voted overwhelmingly for Barack Obama (even in counties that are typically conservative-leaning) and STILL approve of Obama by large margins. It is clear that the majority of Californians agree with President Obama’s policies on a number of issues, INCLUDING on immigration.  So why is Mr. Poizner committing political suicide by not only angering the Latino and other minority voting blocks that will take deep offense to his negative campaign messaging but also by running against President Obama himself?:  

Painting Meg Whitman as Obama-lite might even be working in Whitman’s favor.  In a weird way, it’s almost like Steve Poizner’s commercials are having the unintended consequence of telling people to vote for Whitman because she is the Obama candidate, not State Attorney General Jerry Brown (the actual Democratic Party potential candidate).  Mr. Brown is not helping the situation either: he’s actually positioning himself as a “centrist”, which is code for progressives for “Conservative Democrat”, a category that has become toxic in progressive circles.  By positioning himself as a conservative-lite on a number of issues (including immigration) and even going as far as pledging to work with the racist “Tea Party” people, Mr. Brown has painted himself as not exciting to his base, which is typically a huge political mistake to do because it can have the unintended consequence of tranlating into Democratic voters staying home come election night.  In some ways, what happened in Massachusetts with Scott Brown is happening in California: the focus is so much on the Republican nominees that Mr. Brown, devoid of an exciting progressive message, is getting lost in the background (and this is independently of the fortune that Meg Whitman is pouring into her marketing campaign).  Not surprisingly, Meg Whitman, who has by the most part stayed away from such direct hate-on-immigrants tactics, is surging on the polls because she has chosen to do what has also proven to work on political campaigns: offer a hopeful and positive message (which has proven to yield powerful results: Obama and Reagan are practically exhibit A’s of this).  What’s even more remarkable, although Meg Whitman appears to be on the same page as Steve Poizner on immigration, she is doing it low-key in a way that is not so public and in-your-face: through one-on-one debates with him, not on full-blown TV commercials.  In fact, Meg Whitman has gone so far as to pledge during the state Republican convention that if elected, she “will ban undocumented students from attending California’s higher education system” and yet this has received very little focus in her campaign to the larger public. 

By comparison, it is clear that Mr. Poizner is either not listening to smart political advise because his own ideological bigotry is blinding him from reality, or he is just surrounded by incompetent advisors.  Via The Los Angeles Times:

[Poizner's] campaign strategist, Stuart Stevens, said the emphasis on illegal immigration stemmed not from polling data but from Poizner himself.

“It’s something that Steve Poizner feels passionately about,” he said.

Stevens brushed aside the concerns of some Republicans that concentrating on the issue could extend the backlash among Latinos, the state’s fastest-growing ethic group and one the GOP is eager to attract for its long-term survival.

“There’s zero concern. . . . I don’t buy into the notion that 187 is the root of difficulties in California that the Republicans have had with Latino voters. I think it’s a specious argument.”

He attributed the breach to the GOP’s attraction to “big money and status quo power” candidates — like, he said, Whitman.

Others, however, see the emphasis as a sideshow in an election in which voters are focused laser-like on other matters.

“There’s absolutely no sign it’s helping Poizner at all,” Quinn said. “The overwhelming issue affecting Republicans and Democrats is the loss of jobs and the budget mess.”

Yeah, keep on living in denial Poizner camp.  There is NO question that Prop. 187 WAS the poison that killed the Republican Party in California and that completely destroyed Pete Wilson’s aspirations of running for President.  Granted, even in this day and age you might get some short term gain from your attacks on economic refugees, but let’s be clear Mr. Poizner: you and your party will pay a high prize for it, just as it happened after Pete Wilson’s Prop. 187 passed and the Republican Party was decimated at the polls in the subsequent years by the Latino vote.

Regardless, we cannot let Mr. Poizner’s media onslaught against immigrants go unanswered.  His tactics might very well be hurting his own political campaign but that is nothing compared to the damage that he’s doing to the entire state of California through his bigoted poisonous rhetoric. 

Let Steve “the Poisoner” know that Latinos and other immigrants will not tolerate being his floor mat.  Contact him to let him know that his campaign messages against ”illegal aliens” are an attack on decency and are filled with hate and that you will not tolerate it come election night.  Here’s Steve Poizner’s contact information:

Steve Poizner’s Facebook Page

Steve Poizner’s Twitter Page

You can write a letter to him to this address:

Steve Poizner for Governor
520 Capitol Mall, Suite 220
Sacramento, CA 95814
(916) 325-6800

…and you can contact him through his website here.

Update: be sure to also tweet Steve Poizner’s Press Secretary, Bettina Inclan on her twitter account @BettinaInclan, who is a Latina herself.  Also take a moment to send a tweet over to Mr. Poizner’s official campaign team account at @TeamPoizner.

Here’s a couple of sample tweets you can send their way (don’t forget to ask people to “RT”!):

plz RT: @StevePoizner @TeamPoizner Prop13 pushd CA economy off cliff, NOT hardworking ppl tryng 2escape poverty http://digg.com/d31Nsm2?t

Poizner zeros in on an untimely issue:http://bit.ly/bXyNfM - wonder if he’s listening to advice from @bettinainclan, or is he getting any?

@StevePoizner, @BettinaInclan@TeamPoizner, What’s with the ”illegal aliens” campaign message? Is @GlennBeck a campaign advisor? #CIR#HATE

Update #2: when you send your tweets to the people above, please use the following hashtags for maximum effect: