Recently in Attrition Through Enforcement Category

During the 2008 Presidential campaign Barack Obama promised us he would make comprehensive immigration reform a "top priority" in his first year as President:

Well, I don't know about you, but I think it's time for a President who won't walk away from something as important as comprehensive reform when it becomes politically unpopular.  And that's the commitment I'm making to you.  I marched with you in the streets of Chicago.  I fought with you in the Senate for comprehensive immigration reform.  And I will make it a top priority in my first year as President.  Not just because we need to secure our borders and get control of who comes into our country.  And not just because we have to crack down on employers abusing undocumented immigrants.  But because we have to finally bring those 12 million people out of the shadows. 

Barack Obama - Citizen Orange (13 July 2008)

After hearing promises like that, pro-migrant voters, specifically Latino voters, turned out for Obama in record numbers and helped get him elected. 

It's been two years since Obama made those promises to us.  Not only has policy failed to change under the Obama administration, but the war on migrants has actually gotten worse.  Barack Obama promised to make immigration a "top priority" in his first year as President.  Now, a year and a half into his Presidency, all we have is a speech.

As I just informed readers of Citizen Orange, I published an op-ed this morning alongside Heidi Beirich of the Southern Poverty Law Center, and Clara Long of the Harvard Immigration Project.  I'd also like to thank Sarah Viets of the Center for New Community for her help. 

Please take action by:

1. Signing this petition: Stop legitimizing hate by providing a platform to Mark Krikorian
2. Leaving a supportive comment on our op-ed in the Harvard Crimson

The comments in the op-ed are sure to get swarmed by the nativists because of how much they are referenced, so please help out.

In addition to asking for your support, I'd also like to take this opportunity to further elaborate on my opposition to Mark Krikorian speaking at Harvard.  This isn't the first time I've had a run in with Mark Krikorian.  When he came to Boston University a couple of years ago, it inspired this blog post. It's not just his extremist affilations, commentary, and actions that bother me, I think the policies he advocates for are horrific, and they've been adopted at the highest levels of government.

The pro-migrant organization Voces de la Frontera continues its incredible organizing work in Wisconsin, this time by forcing Congressman Paul Ryan (R-WI) to distance himself from Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), which has been labeled a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

The following is an article in the Racine, Wisconsin publication The Journal Times on the decision to organize the march:

I'm very happy to report that America's Voice, in partnership with the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, the New York Immigration Coalition, and the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles, have finally had enough of Janet Napolitano and the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) continued abuse of migrants in the United States.



I recognize that the Obama administration has a lot on its plate with health care reform, climate change, education, and many other issues I'm anxiously awaiting action on.  That, however, does not give the Obama administration the excuse to continue to allow the DHS to terrorize migrants with the remains Bush-era migrant enforcement apparatus.  The people voted for change on U.S. migration policy and Obama has only given us much of the same. 

I've blogged my heart out for the DREAM Act this week.  Though I've probably exhausted every argument out there I just wanted to draw everyone's attention to a post Dream Activist just put up at change.org:

We already have to battle it out with nativists and with our life circumstances. We do not want to be fighting with our friends and allies too. Be part of the solution, not part of the problem.

Dream Activist (28 March 2009)

I recommend reading the whole thing, but that's a good primer for the argument, from the mouths of unauthorized youth themselves.  Prerna also spoke out courageously in the comments section of Citizen Orange, when a "progressive" spoke out against the DREAM Act.  The whole argument deserves to be reproduced in full.

Lawrence Downs brings us the corrido of Saúl Linares, an organizer from Hempstead, Long Island (next door to one of my least favorite places on earth, the Garden City USCIS office). Linares sings about the exploits of Sheriff Joe "Arpayaso," Arizona's clown prince.

When I started my pro-migrant blogging in 2006, I felt alone.  There were millions marching on the streets, but online, I was shouting into the darkness.  I'll never forget that one of the first people that linked to me was XP over at Para Justicia Y Libertad.  It was the beginning of something that I would soon learn.  Traditional media and even "progressive" bloggers didn't care about what I had to say.  I would have to go to the people that did care, like XP, and work together to create something new. 

Two years later, thanks in great part to the support of the Latin@ Netroots, we have created something new.  It's a web of online pro-migrant activists from all over the nation that are making their voices heard in all kinds of media.  Blogs, particularly Latin@ blogs, have led the charge.  It culminated in the founding of The Sanctuary, which has become the hub of what we have termed the sanctuarysphere.  Pro-migrant blogs were beginning to organize long before anyone else was online, and it shows in the national media attention The Sanctuary garnered by getting Barack Obama to answer a comprehensive questionnaire on immigration policy.

The organization of pro-migrant blogs, though, has spread into all kinds of mediums.  Using new media tools like StumbleUpon and Digg, pro-migrant activists are directing tens of thousands of eyes to pro-migrant content, like my 5 Nativist English Lessons, here on Citizen Orange.  We're also having an effect in mediums like YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.  Networks of friends, email lists, and blog readers are clearly having an impact where there only use to be only silence and nativism.  A string of recent victories, three in short succession, illustrates this.

As Hurricane Gustav was bearing down on the Gulf Coast, Barack Obama sent an email to millions of his supporters asking them to donate to the Red Cross:

Today, the thoughts and prayers of all Americans are with those in the path of Hurricane Gustav -- and many of you are asking what you can do to help.

We do not yet know what the impact of Hurricane Gustav will be, and we hope with all our hearts that the damage will not be as great as it was three years ago.

But we know there will be damage, and there is something you can do right now.

Your financial support will strengthen organizations like the American Red Cross that are evacuating Gulf Coast residents and planning to help communities get back on their feet.

Make a donation to support the American Red Cross today.

Barack Obama (1 September 2008)

Now, according to an editorial from the New York Times, it does not look as if the Red Cross did the best it could evacuating unauthorized migrants from the area and assuaging their fears.