By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, May 18 2011 (IPS)

The United States’ self-proclaimed “toughest sheriff” has made international headlines for housing inmates at outdoor tent facilities and conducting immigration sweeps in Latino neighbourhoods.

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is the subject of a federal grand jury investigation into abuse of power. Credit: Valeria Fernandez/IPS

An internal investigation that shed light on corruption and nepotism, and a budget audit that revealed 100 million dollars in misspending within his agency are fuelling calls from critics for his resignation.

Recent evidence also emerged of racially derogatory emails circulated among his officers, stemming from a civil lawsuit that accuses his office of racial profiling during immigration sweeps. The emails made fun of Mexican immigrants, with the picture of a mock driver’s license from a fictional state called “Mexifornia”.

The 78-year-old sheriff appears to have no intention of stepping down any time soon. After being in power for 18 years, he still wants to run for re-election.

“I’m not going to resign, as long as the people want me and elect me. Whether it’s this position or maybe another position, I’m not leaving,” he said at a recent press conference.

Arpaio did not respond to an IPS request for comment.

For over a decade, Arpaio has remained popular with Maricopa County voters, appealing to their frustration with the lack of federal action on immigration by enforcing state laws aimed at undocumented immigrants.

His controversial tactics placed him at the centre of a civil rights investigation for alleged racial profiling. He has dismissed this claim, saying that he is being targeted as a “poster child” by a liberal presidential administration, even though the probe started under president George W. Bush.

But Arpaio’s immigration enforcement is not what could cost him his job.

The recent revelations could be giving political momentum to a two- year long ongoing grand jury criminal investigation led by the U.S. Department of Justice that is focusing on abuse of power by his office.

“President Obama we appeal to you. Help Arizona get back to normalcy,” said Maricopa County Board Supervisor Mary Rose Wilcox.

Last week, members of the group Maricopa County Citizens for Safety and Accountability (MCSA) joined her in a press conference to call for Arpaio’s resignation and his indictment by the federal government.

The group not only spoke about alleged human and civil rights violations as a result of his immigration policies, but concerns about ethical violations within his agency and misappropriations of a taxpayer fund used to finance other activities like his immigration sweeps.

“This is corruption at its core. You have the top law-enforcement officer elected in Maricopa County breaking the law, creating a culture of corruption, misusing our taxpayers dollars upwards of 100 million dollars,” said Randy Parraz, a co-founder of MCSA.

A few weeks ago, Arpaio announced that he had fired three people within his command staff, among them his right-hand man, Chief David Hendershott, as a result of an internal investigation that he commissioned revealing corruption and nepotism. He said he was deceived by people in a position of trust.

But the group is demanding that Arpaio himself be held accountable.

“Joe Arpaio would have us believe these were the workings of some of his rogue chief deputies acting alone, not with his knowledge. Nothing could be further from the truth,” said attorney Chad Snow, one of the founders of MCSA. “Joe Arpaio had his hand in every single one of these abuses.”

Snow referred specifically to the workings of Arpaio’s anti- corruption unit, which he allegedly used to arrest and press charges against his political opponents. Supervisor Wilcox and supervisor Don Stapley, both critical of his immigration enforcement and his use of funding administered by the county, said they were targeted for political retaliation.

Stapley recently wrote to President Barack Obama, urging him to support grand jury indictments in the Arpaio probe. “I am a first- hand witness to the crimes committed,” Stapley wrote, “having been falsely charged, subjected to a staged media show arrest, publicly humiliated, damaged politically and nearly ruined financially.”

Paul Charlton, a former U.S. attorney who also represents Stapley, said either the sheriff didn’t know what was going on in his department, making him ineffective and incompetent, or he did know and is “as culpable as Hendershott”.

This is not the first time that Arpaio’s agency has been investigated by the Department of Justice. In 1995, the agency initiated a probe following complaints of mistreatment in his jails, but it ended in a suit that was dismissed by Janet Napolitano, the former U.S. attorney general who is now the secretary of Homeland Security.

Attorney Michael Manning, who handled five lawsuits against the sheriff’s office, won over 20 million dollars in settlements for his clients in connection with abuse in Arpaio’s jails. He regretted that the Justice Department didn’t take action the first time around to stop what he described as a “culture of cruelty” within the Maricopa County jails.

Manning said in a recent interview that Maricopa taxpayers are going to start changing their minds about the popular sheriff once they realise how much he has cost them.

According to Maricopa County Risk Management records, over 6,300 claims and lawsuits have been filed against Arpaio’s agency since 1993, at a cost of 50 million dollars.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Aug 4 2010 (IPS)

Ovidio Perez’s brother was planning to return to Guatemala because of a new Arizona law that made it a state crime to be an undocumented immigrant. He returned, but in a coffin.

“My brother used to say, ‘I came here to work because I have a son and at least I want to leave him a place to live when he turns 18’,” said Perez.

Both Perez and his brother worked as day labourers – in Spanish they call themselves “jornaleros”. They stand on street corners of Phoenix looking for daily work that could pay anywhere between eight and 10 dollars per hour. They did anything from painting houses to building retaining walls on backyards.

It was during one of those jobs that Rosalio Perez, 40, an undocumented immigrant, lost his life. He fell from a palm tree he was trimming on Jul. 24, just a few days before the news broke that a judge had blocked part of the Arizona law, known as SB 1070. One provision she struck down would have made it a crime for a person to look for work on the streets.

Yet for an occupation that is already hazardous, a new layer of difficulty would be added through parts of SB 1070 that did take effect. These provisions would make it a crime for day labourers to impede traffic while looking for work and would result in fines to their contractors. People that transport them could also be charged for harbouring undocumented immigrants.

Groups like the National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON) say workers like their members are already at risk when it comes to human right violations and this would make them even more vulnerable. That’s why they filed a legal challenge against the law, and considering whether to file another.

“This is one of the reasons we are not claiming victory,” said Pablo Alvarado, executive director of NDLON. Alvarado argues that the Barack Obama administration is partly to blame for the situation in Arizona.

Through the use of programmes like 287(g) to deputise local police to enforce immigration laws, the federal government has opened the doors for laws like SB 1070.

“What this does is [create] more consternation, horror in the community and distrust towards the police and it doesn’t help to fight crime. People won’t cooperate if they are victims of a crime,” Alvarado said. “You either criminalise or legalise, but the Obama administration is criminalising.”

On a popular street corner outside Home Depot, a home improvement store in central Phoenix, day labourers are already feeling the effects of the law.

“Customers are being scared away,” said Gerardo Perez, a day labourer from Chiapas, Mexico. “They are afraid they will be fined.”

Miguel Resendiz, an immigrant from Morelos, Mexico who also works as a day labourer, said he would not leave because of the new law. After all, he knows the threat has always been there through the frequent raids conducted by the Maricopa County Sheriff’s office.

When questioned about how he would handle SB 1070, Sheriff Joe Arpaio referred to another kind of arrest: the one he has been conducting on businesses that hire undocumented workers.

“We do arrest day labourers, over 1,000 in the business when the employers hire them because it is cheaper to pay them, the illegals,” he said.

Arpaio’s deputies have been at the forefront of arrests not only at workplaces but also of day labourers on the streets. Three years ago a local businessman hired off-duty deputies to chase away day labourers from his property. When the controversial news broke, Arpaio decided to launch sweeps in the area, bringing a larger contingent of deputies to target day labourers.

The impact of the new law may not only be felt on the streets. Police agencies that don’t enforce these provisions could face lawsuits and hefty fines.

Senator Russell Pearce, the sponsor of SB 1070, said the bill was a “success” despite the federal judge’s decision. Pearce is prepared to sue any agency that doesn’t enforce it.

“Sanctuary policies are illegal in the state of Arizona,” he said in reference to what he considers norms in police departments that may limit the instances in which a police officer could inquire about the immigration status of a person.

“In this bill, we the people will sue our government if they fail to enforce our laws to their full extent, that’s also in the bill,” he said. “We have an obligation to the nation to defend this border, to defend the rule of law and to stop it here.”

While is still unclear how law enforcement will implement the remaining provisions of SB 1070, including others that make it a misdemeanor to transport undocumented immigrants in a vehicle, some groups are focused on education.

“No one is going to come and save us. People will have to protect themselves,” said Alvarado.”We will win if there is a strong organising effort in the community to monitor the police.”

According to a survey conducted in 2005 among day labourers across the country, workplace injuries are common. One in five day labourers has suffered a work-related injury, and more than half of those who were injured during the year the survey took place did not receive medical care.

The research conducted by the University of California in Los Angeles also indicated that day labourers regularly suffer employer abuse.

“It is dangerous to work here, you start a job never knowing where you’ll end up,” explained Perez.

Perez shipped his brother’s remains to San Marcos, Guatemala thanks to donations from the NDLON and the Guatemalan Consulate. He doesn’t want to return just yet, because he needs time to mourn. He wants to reunite with his family at a time that they can smile and welcome the son that came back alive.

“I have to move on because what happened can’t be changed,” said Perez.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
DETROIT, Jun 25 2010 (IPS)

Hundreds of grassroots organisations came together at the U.S. Social Forum here to discuss strategies in the fight for immigration policy changes that would put an end to criminalisation and the militarisation of the border with Mexico.

Immigrant rights activists gather at the USSF. Credit: Valeria Fernández/IPS

“We are looking at it by redefining the immigrant rights movement by the people that are more affected,” said Tania Unzueta from the Immigrant Youth Justice League in Chicago, Illinois, referring to immigrants.

Unzueta is part of a growing group of undocumented youth across the country that has staged civil disobedience actions to push for the passage of the Dream Act, even risking their own deportation.

“This is the first movement led by undocumented people,” said Felipe Matos, a member of the Trail of Dreams, a group of students from Florida that has travelled across the country to raise awareness about the plight of undocumented youth.

“Our movement goes beyond legislation, beyond comprehensive immigration reform,” he said. “It’s key here for us to stop calling ourselves criminals.”

Several grassroots organisers echoed those comments and were critical of the current blueprint for “comprehensive immigration reform” – which is heavy on enforcement – proposed by New York’s Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer, as well as the policies set forth by the Barack Obama administration.

“The proposals that are being offered by the government would never meet the needs or the rights of our communities. It’s going to take much more than legalisation,” said Arnoldo Garcia, director of the immigrant justice and rights programme at the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (NNIRR).

“What we are imagining in the discussions is what kind of relationship people will have with the government. So whom do we go to, if the abuser is the person that is supposed to protect us? And the government is the main abuser,” he said.

The border state of Arizona figured prominently during the forum as ground zero for human rights violations due to recent passage of SB 1070, a law that would criminalise undocumented immigrants and anyone who assists them.

One of the resolutions at the assembly on Thursday included a call to action from other organisations to come to Arizona in support of the local movement against the new law, which takes effect on Jul. 29.

“Everyone is really afraid and really alarmed of what’s happening in Arizona, folks are realising it is coming to their cities,” said Carlos Garcia, an organiser from the Arizona PUENTE Movement.

Garcia said the new state law has essentially already been in place in other parts of the U.S. in the shape of programmes like 287(g) and Secure Communities.

Other groups stressed the significance of understanding the root cause of immigration and the global forces at play behind the movement of people, including military policies and trade agreements supported by the U.S.

“In terms of the immigrant rights struggles and concerns in the U.S., if we do a technocratic fix, a certain kind of people legalised, certain kind of control, securing borders, it ignores why people are coming, why are there flows of immigration,” said Carol Barton, executive director of community action at United Methodist Women.

Barton said a number of U.S. foreign policies have been directly responsible for the migration of people and displacement from their communities of origin.

Yet, Colin Rajah, coordinator for the Migrant Rights Programme for NNIRR, said the U.S. is not alone. There are global trends towards the criminalisation and exploitation of immigrants, he said.

“There’s more and more cooperation between the governments, especially when policing the borders,” said Rajah.

One clear example of the cooperation between Mexico and the U.S. with the Plan Merida to control drug trafficking in the southern border region with U.S funding, he said. He also cited the situation of countries like Libya and Italy, which currently has an agreement with the former for it to patrol its own borders.

“The global north, especially the U.S. and Western Europe, are using their economic and political power so they can get countries in the global south to police their borders and supply the migrant labour,” he added.

Rajah emphasised that grassroots groups in the U.S. need to be part of the international debate because much of it is shaping the way the country discusses immigration such as ideas as “managed migration”.

The term refers to immigration considered in the context of economic development for the receiving country and goes in line with the idea of temporary guest worker programmes, he said.

“Money can move in seconds just anywhere in the world, while people cannot,” said Liepollo Pheko from the Trades Collective based in Johannesburg, who spoke about the negative impacts of trade agreements on African countries.

“We should migrate with our humanity, with our dignity. We should migrate with our right to work, with our right to housing, our right to shelter, our right to freedom of expression, whatever it is that we reside with in our countries of origin,” she added.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, May 26 2010 (IPS)

It’s not the law yet, but for undocumented immigrants like Ismael Palafox and his family, SB 1070 is already a reality.

Ina and Stephen Welker witnessed the detention of Ismael Palafox, his wife and teenage son. Credit: Valeria Fernandez/IPS

Palafox was questioned by the Apache Junction Police in front of his family in connection with dumping trash in the wrong place and turned over to immigration authorities. He is now in the Florence Detention Centre facing deportation to Mexico.

“I can’t believe this is happening to us,” Socorro, his wife, told IPS in Spanish. “Why are they enforcing this law if it’s not in effect already? They’re abusing their power.”

The nightmare started on May. 22. It was a regular Saturday morning and Palafox was supervising yard work for Stephen Welker, a long-time acquaintance who lives in a remote area in the Arizona mountains. Palafox brought his wife and 13-year-old son. Palafox had sustained an injury on his right arm, severely limiting his movement, and needed his family to do the actual work.

After they were done landscaping, Welker asked Palafox, 41, to go with him to a deserted area three minutes away to dump the trims. On their way back, a private citizen, who had called the sheriff’s office, followed them. The sheriff left without asking any questions, Welker said, and decided to drive around the neighbourhood to see if they were still around. He didn’t want Palafox to be fined for something that was his idea.

When he returned, he said the Apache Junction Police had showed up at his doorstep asking questions about illegal dumping.

“I admitted to dumping, and that I’ve done it a dozen times, always with organic items,” said Welker, 57. “They said we’re going to give you a warning at this time. We are going to cite you but we will have to talk to your help. I said: ‘He had nothing to do with this, if you want to fine somebody you can fine me’.”

Then the officer told him there was reasonable suspicion to believe that Palafox was in the country illegally.

Ina Welker said Palafox’s 13-year-old son had to be an interpreter between his father and the police. They asked Palafox if he had a driver’s license from Arizona but he didn’t. They also asked him if he was illegally in the country. His son translated the question in between sobs.

“They were really pressuring him to say something,” said Socorro, 40. “They don’t have a heart, they saw my son crying and they didn’t care.”

Palafox was taken in one patrol car to the police station and his wife and son in another.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) released his wife and child for humanitarian reasons, she said.

“Unlike the police, they were compassionate,” she said.

But Ismael was taken to the Florence Detention Centre, where he faces deportation.

The police didn’t fine Welker for illegal dumping and didn’t file charges against Palafox. They didn’t file a police report on the incident either, which made it harder to trace exactly what happened, said Captain Thomas Kelly.

The new state law would allow local police departments to question someone over their immigration status for a civil offence like throwing trash on the street – similar to what happened to Palafox.

The current Apache Junction policy is to question people about their immigration status when they come into contact with the police for a serious crime, said Kelly. When asked if his officer violated the policy, he said the department would look into it.

Kelly said that Ismael volunteered the information that he was undocumented. And that he willingly agreed to be taken to the station for farther questioning by ICE about his immigration status. His wife and the Welkers tell a different story.

“Willingly?” she said. “I was there. We were told we have to go with them and that ICE was going to decide.”

Welker and his wife believe this was an unfair arrest and part of an anti-immigrant climate caused by SB 1070.

“They didn’t even see him dumping anything,” said Ina Welker. “I feel shame for how this unfolded, that this has to happen to people,” she added.

Welker had been critical of the new law in the past. She is Jewish and can’t help but to draw a connection to the persecution faced by her family in Nazi Germany.

Palafox’s wife is desperate. Her husband was in a construction accident last October, breaking his right arm and wrist. He had several operations and is still in pain.

“He can’t move his arm to even lift a spoon,” she said. “He is in pain.”

Cooperation between local police and immigration authorities is not new. For years several law-enforcement agencies in Arizona have worked in conjunction with ICE, turning over undocumented immigrants by contacting a call centre. But most agencies have policies focused on questioning people involved in serious criminal activities.

The Phoenix Police Department, the largest in the state, has a policy that protects victims and witnesses of a crime from being questioned about their immigration status. Officers are not expected to interrogate an immigrant for a traffic stop or a minor offence. And they have to call a supervisor for approval before they call ICE.

Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat who opposed SB 1070, arguing it would hurt community policing and discourage victims of crimes from contacting authorities, has been receiving a number of calls with similar stories. In some instances, they relate to U.S. citizens who were questioned about their immigration status by the police or harassed by other individuals who wrongly believed they were illegally in the country.

“We know this is in direct result of SB 1070,” she said. “People feel emboldened to behave like this.”

Sinema is encouraging others to come forth with their cases and document them to create a database that can help identify a pattern of practice in certain communities. She thinks the U.S. Department of Justice may choose to file a lawsuit against this law because it is unconstitutional and “because of some of the things we have already seen, even though there’s no lawful authority to apply it”.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Apr 21 2010 (IPS)

Protests and acts of civil disobedience are taking place in the southwest U.S. state of Arizona as it becomes the main battleground in a divisive struggle over illegal immigration.

Students chained themelves to the Arizona capitol building doors that lead into the governors tower to protest the bill. Credit: www.PhotosByJoseMunoz.com

Known as the “Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighbourhood Act”, the bill includes a number of provisions that go beyond authorising the arrest of undocumented immigrants on “reasonable suspicion”. It targets day labourers by making it a crime to look for work on the street, and would fine anyone who harbours or transports an undocumented immigrant, including family members.

Passage of the bill has sparked protests, rallies and phone calls to Republican Governor Jan Brewer urging her to veto it.

On Tuesday, nine students were arrested on charges of disorderly conduct after they chained themselves to the entrance doors of the capitol building in an act of civil disobedience against the proposed law. Authorities arrested them as soon as they said they wouldn’t leave until the governor took action on the law.

Meanwhile, a broad coalition of civil rights groups, businesses and religious leaders representing Arizona and other states delivered 50,000 signatures calling on Brewer to veto the legislation.

“It’s unfair, unjust, and pre-empted by federal law and unconstitutional,” said Eliseo Medina, president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). He called the bill an “unfunded mandate” that would strain police resources by forcing them to play the role of immigration authorities.

Critics argue the bill will bankrupt the state by subjecting police departments to lawsuits for engaging in racial profiling or for not enforcing the law. Currently, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, whose agency has been engaged in immigration sweeps on Latino neighbourhoods, faces lawsuits and an investigation by the Justice Department over civil rights violations.

“Do we want to force all police chiefs and sheriffs to follow Joe Arpaio’s lead?” said Mary Rose Wilcox of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors. “The bill’s intent is to enforce immigration laws through attrition. It seeks to make life miserable for immigrants and their families so they would self-deport. It is literally designed to terrorise immigrants.”

She said that it could also end up in arrests of Latino U.S. citizens based on the colour of their skin.

The city of Tucson was also the site of a number of protests. Early Tuesday afternoon, hundreds of people gathered outside the state government complex where the governor has her offices.

“We are planning to stay here until she vetoes or signs it,” said Angel Sanchez, 26.

Among the bill’s opponents are the National Day Labourer Organising Network, the Valley Interfaith Project, the Border Action Network and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

The ACLU is contemplating filing a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the bill, which delves into an area of law traditionally in the hands of the federal government.

Meanwhile, immigrant communities in Arizona are in shock. The announcement of an immigration sweep by Sheriff Arpaio and a recent large-scale enforcement action against smuggling networks by the federal government has increased community distrust in the local police.

“There’s immeasurable fear due to this law, it’s a cruel law,” said Pastor José Morales from the church Iglesia Impacto de Fe. “I wish the governor would step out of her desk and go to the schools and the community to see the terrible fear our children have, wondering when [authorities] are going to catch their parents, and in the hands of whom they’ll stay.”

Supporters argue that the absence of federal immigration enforcement has left the state to take matters into its own hands.

State Senator Russell Pearce, author of the bill, believes the government is “complacent” toward illegal immigration and his proposal would “take off the handcuffs of local enforcement” by allowing them to arrest people who are in the state illegally.

Pearce maintains that undocumented immigrants are draining Arizona’s education and healthcare resources, and taking the jobs of U.S. citizens.

“Even though the numbers of illegals have dropped in Arizona, there’s a rise in actual percentage of criminal illegals, those that have plead guilty to crimes in Arizona,” said Paul Babeu, president of the Arizona Sheriffs’ Association, and a supporter of the legislation.

What was a local debate has taken centre-stage in the U.S., with human rights groups coming to Arizona to denounce the legislation, and an uproar from the other side of the border as well.

Authorities in the neighbouring Mexican state of Sonora said that Arizona would become an unsafe place for Mexican tourists and others who cross the border daily to do business or go shopping.

“Arizona is no longer a safe place for them to go, because the police will stop you on the streets for not carry (sic) proper documentation,” said the president of the Sonora Congress, Eloisa Flores Garcia.

On Monday, Arizona’s federal Senators John McCain and Jon Kyl announced a 10-point plan that includes the deployment of 3,000 National Guard troops to the Arizona border. McCain, who had been an advocate for immigration reform, including legalisation, voiced his support for the Arizona bill.

On May 1, several groups are planning national marches and protests for immigrants’ rights. The Arizona bill could fuel the ire of people frustrated with the unfulfilled promises of immigration reform by the Barack Obama administration, but it could also inspire others states to follow suit and approve restrictive measures, said attorney Isabel Garcia, from the Coalición Derechos Humanos, a Tucson group that defends human rights.

“This country is not the American Dream, it has turned into a nightmare. And this country denies that, by proclaiming itself as the most just country in the world when it comes to human rights, while we realise here (in Arizona) that is quite the contrary,” she added.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Mar 18 2010 (IPS)

Norma Tolsa-Garcia is a U.S. citizen but she fears new proposed laws in Arizona might force her and her family to move away from the state she grew up in because her husband is an undocumented immigrant.

Protesters outside the state capitol warned Gov. Jan Brewer that signing an anti-immigrant bill into law might be costly at election time. Credit: www.PhotosByJoseMunoz.com

While pro-immigrant groups plan a rally in Washington D.C. on Mar. 21 to push the Barack Obama administration to fulfill promises for immigration reform, the absence of federal action continues to leave the door open for tougher policies in Arizona, home to an estimated 300,000 undocumented migrants.

Two weeks ago, advocates from the PUENTE movement launched a caravan that has been crisscrossing the country to bring awareness about what they call a human rights crisis in the state. Several pro-immigrant rights groups are also applying political pressure to dissuade the governor from signing the new anti-immigrant measure in to law.

But the mere existence of the proposal is already provoking fear for families like Tolsa-Garcia’s.

“When I first heard about that law, I literally cried that day,” said the U.S. citizen who is married to an immigrant from Guatemala. “How do you choose who you marry?”

The couple has been married for seven years and has three children, ages one, four and six. Their combined income pays the mortgage on their home. Tolsa-Garcia was surprised to discover that there was little she could do to help her husband get a legal visa.

U.S. law required him to leave and apply for a pardon for having entered the country illegally. If he doesn’t get it, he would have to wait 10 years before reentering the U.S.

Because of the new proposed legislation, Tolsa-Garcia is afraid that her husband will be in constant danger of being detained by the police every time he goes to work or whenever they go together to the store.

“What if they stop us when we are going to church?” she said.

Her situation is shared by hundreds of thousands of mixed-status families in Arizona who have already been under pressure from stricter laws passed by the state in an attempt to regulate immigration issues.

Behind the scenes, conservative Republicans have toned down the broader aspects of the legislation that could impact family members to focus on those who smuggle immigrants.

But Carlos Galindo, a civil rights activist and founder of Moving Arizona Forward, an organisation to encourage civic participation, said the way this bill could be implemented is the problem.

In the past, local sheriffs, including Maricopa County’s Joe Arpaio, and prosecutors like Andrew Thomas have used laws aimed at human smugglers to convict immigrants who hire their services.

“My concern is that this law will lend itself to incorrect prosecution of individuals,” said Galindo, who also hosts a morning talk show on Radio KASA. “This law also allows government employees to ask for someone’s immigration status. We are talking about individuals who never got the legal training on how to determine the status of anybody.”

The issue of illegal immigration is a political hot potato in Arizona. Historically, Republicans have held the majority in the legislature, allowing for passage of most anti-immigrant measures. In the midst of an election year, many Republicans are expected to support this legislation.

But pro-immigrant rights activists are trying to persuade Republican Governor Jan Brewer that the move to sign the bill into law might be costly at election time.

On Monday, dozens of protesters with Moving Arizona Forward stood outside the state capitol holding signs with the message: “I vote, you veto.”

“She’ll be sadly remembered by children for signing a law against people that work. Sooner or later history would tell who did the right thing,” said Victor Hugo Preciado, one of the protesters.

The action was joined by national figure Rev. Miguel Rivera, chair of the National Coalition of Latino Clergy and Christian Leaders (CONLAMIC), who travelled to Arizona from Washington, and the co-chairs of the Arizona Latino Caucus.

“While we are preparing to rally in Washington D.C., I believe it’s important to send a message from areas like Arizona that are in the immediate need of comprehensive immigration reform,” he said.

The reverend is known across the country for leading a controversial national campaign against participation of undocumented immigrants in the census as a way to protest the government inaction to pass some form of legalisation.

Local politicians in Arizona like Rep. Ben Miranda, co-chair of the Latino Caucus, said that changes will only happen if Latinos turn out at the polls. As the state finds itself in the middle of a historic budget deficit, anti-inmigrant bills can only make matters worse, he said.

“The economic recovery of this country will rest with the immigrant population,” said Miranda.

But supporters of the legislation sponsored by Republican Senator Russell Pearce believe it would help the state lower the cost of providing healthcare and education to the children of undocumented immigrants.

Steve Montenegro, a Republican legislator, said it will untie the hands of local law enforcement by preventing any restrictions on the implementation of immigration laws.

“We have to remember one thing: that there’s millions of people, kids and families outside of the U.S. waiting to come legally, they’ve been waiting for 10 to 12 years. So we have to protect their right as well,” he said.

About the situation of mixed-status families like Tolsa-Garcia’s, he responded: “I’m not going to tell a parent how to raise its child, that’s going to be a decision within the family.”

But for Tolsa-Garcia, she faces a very difficult choice: stay and take the gamble of going through the emotional and economic toll of being separated, or take her family to a country that she doesn’t know.

“It’s basically restricting a U.S. citizen, saying you’re not allowed to marry who you want,” she said. “They need to rethink this. Those people who come here to work hard, they are the ones building houses, and companies, bringing food to the markets.”

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Mar 4 2010 (IPS)

When Maricopa County sheriff’s deputies raided Celia Alejandra Alvarez’s workplace and discovered her hiding place, she says they lifted her off her feet and slammed her face into a wall, causing injuries to her jaw and teeth. Later, in detention for having false documents, she says she was not given medical care.

Miriam Mendiola with her son Angel, who was born in a hospital while she was in custody. She said she was immediately shackled after her C-section. Credit: Valeria Fernández/IPS

Alvarez is not alone. Other immigrant women and mothers like her describe allegations of physical abuse and being shackled during childbirth while in the custody of the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who runs five county jails, is in the national spotlight for his crusade to have local police arrest undocumented immigrants and facilitate their deportation. But he is also the subject of a probe into civil rights violations, and a federal grand jury on abuse of power.

Advocates contend the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the sheriff’s office are equally to blame for the alleged violations occurring at the jails. They argue the cooperation between local police and immigration authorities has led to increased arrests of undocumented immigrants for minor offences.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the enforcement arm of DHS, has an agreement with Arapio known as 287(g) that allows jailers to place retainers on undocumented immigrants to transfer custody once their state charges are resolved.

ICE officials defend the agreement, reporting that 69 percent of immigrants detected through this programme in Maricopa have committed serious crimes. Among the categories included in “serious crimes” are people accused of forgery and identity theft – crimes connected with immigrants’ inability to present legal documents to work.

Part of the issue is that laws in Arizona related to employment are being used to “cast a wide net” across immigrant communities in order to deport people, said Victoria Lopez, an immigration attorney and immigrant rights advocate at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Arizona.

“This is sad. It’s a crime out of the necessity to feed one’s children, to live and function and take care of one’s family,” she told IPS.

That is what Alvarez did. She took on the false name of Francisca Perez Mendoza and got a job at a landscaping company for six dollars an hour. The mother of four children born in the U.S. was still nursing her three-month-old baby at the time of the raid.

On the early morning of Feb. 11, 2009, dozens of sheriff deputies wearing ski masks arrived at her job and arrested 60 workers.

“It was unfair the way they arrested us, it was like they were chasing rabbits,” said Alvarez.

She said after a deputy injured her jaw, one of them hit her with a clipboard for trying to speak to a family member who had also been detained.

Her experience only worsened when she was incarcerated in Estrella Jail.

The facility holds over 2,000 women at a time. According to estimates, about 10 percent are undocumented immigrants and 70 percent haven’t yet been convicted of any crime.

Alvarez was forced to strip in front of male guards and take off the religious garments she wore as a member of the Church of the Latter Day Saints to don the black-and-white-striped uniform used in the jail. She says that during her three months in the jail, she didn’t receive proper medical treatment or medicine to ease the pain of her injuries.

Maria del Carmen Garcia, a Mexican immigrant and mother of three, told a similar story. She has a pending civil lawsuit against the sheriff’s office.

Garcia, 46, was arrested when police come to her home to tell her not to put up yard sale signs around her neighbourhood. The officer decided to arrest her on forgery charges when she presented her identification.

She was only in Estrella Jail for five days when the charges were dropped for lack of evidence. But her nightmare began on the way out.

The incident happened on Mar. 11, 2009. Six deputies forced her to put her fingerprint on a form to be transferred to ICE and allegedly broke her arm. After that, she was locked in a room all night.

Garcia, a housewife who has been living in the U.S. for close to 20 years, was fortunate enough to have a criminal defence attorney assist in securing her release.

“Had I been deported, I wouldn’t be able to tell my story,” she said. “I promised all the other women in there that I would speak up.”

An internal investigation by authorities determined that her claims were “unfounded”, but did not dispute the fact that she was forced to put her fingerprint on the form.

An alarming problem for advocates is that “many people are traumatised, many feel very pressured by the conditions (in the jails) to sign voluntary deportations or to wave their rights to see an immigration judge,” said immigration attorney Lopez.

Undocumented immigrant women who enter the jail must await trial behind bars. They are denied bond under state laws and they are also held on a retainer to be turned over to immigration authorities after their cases are resolved.

This has resulted in situations where pregnant women had to give birth in detention, unlike other detainees who can be bailed out. The sheriff’s office practice is to shackle pregnant inmates during childbirth.

In October 2008, Alma Chacón, 35, an undocumented immigrant arrested during a traffic stop for having unpaid tickets, gave birth in a “forensic restraint”. The sheriff office said they used a 12-foot-long chain to restrain her. But she recalled that they shackled her hands and legs. She wasn’t allowed to hold her baby until she was released from immigration custody 70 days later.

“I hope that if I tell my story, they are finally going to change things,” she told IPS.

Last December, Miriam Mendiola-Martinez, 34, had a similar experience. The undocumented Mexican immigrant was arrested for using somebody else’s name to work in a department store for six years.

She said that she spent the last two months of her pregnancy in Estrella Jail being shackled every time she was transported and poorly fed. She had a Caesarian section at the hospital, but a deputy shackled her to the bed when she was still bleeding from her recovery.

“There wasn’t a reason for it, I couldn’t escape,” she told IPS.

Sheriff Arpaio plans to expand his immigration enforcement programme. He dismisses allegations of human rights abuses and says his officers have helped to identify over 33,000 undocumented immigrants that came to his jails in the past three years.

Currently, legislators in Arizona are working on a bill that would allow local police to arrest an undocumented immigrant for trespassing on state land. If it becomes law, the number of immigrants arriving at the jails is expected to increase.

In fiscal year 2009, ICE held more than 380,000 migrants in detention. About 60 percent of them were detained by local law enforcement through programmes like 287(g). More than half had no criminal record, according to a report issued by a former official at DHS.

Last October, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced a review of the detention immigration system to prioritise health, safety and responsibility. Part of the plan includes expanding agreements with local authorities to identify undocumented immigrants that come into the jails.

In response, human rights groups across the country launched the campaign “Dignity, Not Detention”. It denounces the expansion of detention and the increased role of local police in the incarceration of undocumented immigrants for minor offences.

“We don’t feel there could be any true reform of the detention system without taking a look at the use of local law enforcement and the number of people being swept up by it,” said Jacki Esposito, policy coordinator with Detention Watch Network (DWN), the group that is spearheading the campaign.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Jan 17 2010 (IPS)

Over 20,000 people marched in the streets of Phoenix Saturday in the first mass mobilisation of the year, calling for an end to the criminalisation of undocumented immigrants and the passage of immigration reform legislation.

Many families with children marched in the largest protest of Arpaio's criminalisation of immigrants in the history of Arizona. Credit: Valeria Fernandez/IPS

“We’re not going to allow him to continue to abuse us and treat us as if we were criminals, when we’re workers,” said Salvador Reza, an organiser for PUENTE, the movement behind the march. “The message is clear for the [Barack] Obama administration: You need to put a stop to Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s circus.”

The largest march to protest Arpaio’s criminalisation of immigrants in the history of Arizona came on the heels of a grand jury criminal investigation led by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) that is focusing on abuse of power by his office.

Arpaio is also the subject of a probe by another division of the DOJ on the use of racial profiling during his immigration sweeps.

The protest destination was a five-jail complex administered by Arpaio, including an outdoor jail known as “Tent City”, where hundreds of immigrants have been detained.

Celia Alejandra Alvarez, 29, attended the march. She was among the women who had been incarcerated in the jail following one of the sheriff’s raids of a landscaping business last February.

“The pain you live in there is shameful,” said Alvarez in a speech outside the jail in front of thousands of people.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a civil rights claim on behalf of Alvarez. She alleged deputies broke her jaw during her arrest and that she was denied proper medical care during the time she was detained.

Arpaio told IPS he wasn’t concerned about the grand jury investigation or the protests.

“I started out doing my job on this illegal immigration and I’m still doing it. The U.S. government agreed – they gave me 160 officers. If you want to blame anybody, why not blame Homeland Security that gave me all of this authority,” he said.

In February 2007, Arpaio signed a 287(g) agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) that allowed his deputies to act as immigration agents and placed retainers on undocumented migrants entering his jail.

Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano took away his street enforcement powers under a new agreement signed three months ago, but activists argue the programme should have been completely revoked.

“The wheels of government are moving too slowly on this,” said Reza. “They could come and take control of the jails and the sheriff’s office until the grand jury is resolved. If they don’t do that, the sheriff will continue to take advantage of people.”

For the migrants who marched, the call for Arpaio to be removed from office went hand in hand with a call for immigration reform.

“It’s enough of the raids. There’s so many murderers and thieves, why doesn’t he focus on catching them?” asked Rosa Delia Cruz, 55, whose son was arrested by a sheriff’s deputy after a traffic stop on his way back from work, and then deported.

“My grandchildren are afraid of going to school. They tell my daughter, ‘Mom, if that man [Arpaio] arrests you, where am I going to go?'” she added.

Jennifer Allen, executive director of the Border Action Network (BAN), a human rights organisation based in Tuscon, Arizona, said national immigration reform is the solution to put an end to Arpaio’s anti-immigrant crackdown.

“This march is important, not just for Phoenix, but it’s important for Arizona and the country as a whole. Because Arizona has been ground zero for anti-immigrant attacks at local levels, through our state legislature, to justify horrible policies for the rest of the country,” she said.

The march had national support, with organisers and caravans coming from California, Illinois and Washington, D.C. It also drew the participation of celebrities like the singer Linda Ronstadt, a native Arizonan.

“Arpaio thinks law in general doesn’t apply to him. It’s just pathetic. He’s supposed to enforce the law, not break it,” said Ronstadt, who walked the entire three-mile march.

She said his actions are “criminalising people that normally wouldn’t be interested in a life of crime in any way, shape or form.”

“They’re taking jobs that, by and large, Americans won’t take. Americans aren’t that interested in working 12-hour days under the blazing sun, picking lettuce or strawberries. So without Mexican labour, we can’t get food on the table,” she added.

A disturbance towards the end of the march ruined the peaceful protest for several immigrant families.

The Phoenix Police Department said that protesters started throwing bottles of water at police officers and assaulted a policewoman on a horse.

Witnesses said the officer threw pepper spray at the crowd, hitting marchers who weren’t involved in the incident. Several children were among them.

“They come with the horse on us and used gas. My child couldn’t breathe,” said Rocío Medina. Her daughter got cuts in her arm after being pushed by people running away from the pepper spray.

The police arrested four people on charges of assault.

Organisers of the event said the disturbances were caused by individuals not associated with their movement.

“We don’t want the actions of a very small number of people to overshadow a day that was about peace. We are asking for a full investigation into the incident, both with respect to the conduct of those who were accused of disrupting the march and the actions of the police,” said Chris Newman, an attorney for the National Day Laborer Organising Network.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Dec 23 2009 (IPS)

It is only a matter of days before Marcela Vázquez, an undocumented immigrant, leaves the southwestern U.S. state of Arizona for good. And before she does, she’s putting as much as she can up for sale – including her three children’s beds.

After a decade of living in the U.S. she will have to take what fits in the car.

“I’m going to take the risk of going back, because I can’t make it here with my three children,” said Vázquez, 33. All her kids are U.S. citizens.

Her husband, an undocumented worker, was detained in a traffic stop by the local police and deported just days later. She spent her 1,500 dollars in savings on paying an attorney that couldn’t help him.

As the end of the year nears, many immigrant families like Vázquez’s are making the decision to return to their homeland, driven away by Arizona’s tougher policies against undocumented immigrants.

The state continues to be the battleground for a divisive immigration reform debate across the United States. Over the last three years, a string of tough immigration laws coupled with increased police enforcement have pushed immigrant populations into the shadows. Many have lost hope on the chance of immigration reform.

A report by the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) estimated that the undocumented population in Arizona has decreased from half a million people to 300,000 based on U.S census data.

Mexican consular authorities in Phoenix processed 1,048 school transferring documents this year for the children of families who are returning to Mexico. The previous year it was 1,534, up from 330 on 2007.

Socorro Cordova, a spokesperson for the Phoenix Mexican Consulate, said that the number of people returning seems to have stabilised over the past two years. But many migrants are choosing to move within the United States to areas like New Mexico and Texas, where policies towards migrants are seen as more relaxed.

On Nov. 24, a new law took effect requiring all Arizona state employees to report on undocumented migrants applying for public benefits.

The chilling effect was immediate on immigrant communities that fear requesting basic health services like pre-natal care and immunisations.

Conservative politicians in the state, which currently faces a two-billion-dollar budget deficit, argue these measures are needed to reduce costs of healthcare, education and incarceration of undocumented migrants.

“What they’re trying to do is cause as much misery as possible so people will self-deport,” said Alfredo Gutiérrez, a former Arizona senator and editor of La Frontera Times.

For 2010, Republican legislators have vowed to push for new bills that would criminalise the undocumented by allowing any police department to arrest someone because of their immigration status.

“It’s tough here, but in Mexico it’s much worse,” said Maria Montoya, an undocumented mother of five children whose husband was deported. “The last thing you lose is faith. I hope [Pres. Barack] Obama does something for us.”

The immigration debate is expected to rekindle next year and state enforcement efforts might come to a halt if Congress approves a bill granting the legalisation of the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants that live in the U.S.

On Dec. 14, Congressional Rep. Luis Gutiérrez submitted the Comprehensive Immigration Reform for America’s Security and Prosperity Act of 2009 (CIR ASAP).

The bill includes border enforcement provisions, the strengthening of employer sanctions and the legalisation of the undocumented. They would be allowed to attain legal status if they prove that they have been working, pay a 500 dollars fine, learn English and have no criminal record.

It is expected that next year, New York Senator Chuck Schumer will introduce a bill that reflects the Obama administration’s approach to reform.

Despite the current administration’s promise to focus on migrants with criminal records, some observers point out that immigration enforcement will continue to get stiffer towards migrants who are rooted in the U.S.

A record number of 215,000 people detained in the country’s interior – not on the borders – have been deported during the Obama administration. And the numbers are expected to grow.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) projects it will deport some 450,000 migrants a year.

Immigration prosecutions are also up by nearly 16 percent, and they represent half of most criminal cases handled by the federal government, according to an analysis of Department of Justice data conducted by the Syracuse University.

The report indicates that about 22,000 of these prosecutions occurred in Arizona. They pertained mostly to migrants who were detained trying to cross the border illegally and were tried in mass hearings.

Chris Simcox, a former leader of the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps, a border watch group, and current candidate to the U.S. Senate in Arizona doesn’t believe the government is doing enough. He said the border continues to be unsecured and it would be a tough sell to convince the U.S. people to support any form of legalisation when unemployment is running high.

Many migrants think the stricter policies are a positive sign.

“I think they are making it tougher because we are coming close to getting amnesty, just like in the Reagan years,” said José Rivero, 38, an undocumented migrant. He was referring to the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 signed by Republican President Ronald Reagan granting amnesty to over three million undocumented immigrants.

“We waited this long, we can wait a bit more,” he said.

Some like Vázquez feel they no longer can wait around. Before she reaches the border, she needs to pass one more hurdle. Border Patrol agents may detain her Mexico-bound vehicle to ask about her immigration status, as part of a recent practice to detect migrants who have been living illegally in the U.S.

If that’s the case, her three children might be left stranded on the U.S. side of the border.

“We’ve hoped none of this would happen to us,” said Vázquez, who will be returning to Oaxaca, one of Mexico’s poorest states. “My children tell me they don’t want to go to a place they’ve never known.”

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Dec 4 2009 (IPS)

Arizona community activists and religious leaders are trying to mitigate fears over a new law that would require state employees to denounce undocumented immigrants.

Lydia Guzmán, president of the pro-immigrant coalition Somos America, speaks with the local Spanish TV station Univision 33 about the new law. Credit: Valeria Fernández/IPS

Authorities should realise that the confusion is endangering public safety, said Schwartz, because parents are afraid to take their children to the doctor even when this law shouldn’t affect them.

“This is particularly scary now that we’re in the middle of influenza season,” she added.

Arizona is considered a testing ground for immigration laws for the rest of the nation. Over the past five years, Republicans have enacted legislation that ranges from banning scholarships for undocumented students to denying bail to undocumented people charged with a crime.

HB 2008 – which took effect on Nov. 24 – requires state, city and any government employee in Arizona to report to immigration authorities any undocumented immigrants who request a public benefit. Government workers could face up to four months in jail if they fail to make a report.

The law also gives taxpayers the right to sue a state or city agency if they believe the law is not enforced properly.

While the new regulation doesn’t affect emergency healthcare, police and firefighter services, there’s growing concern and distrust.

“When it comes to my daughter’s health, I won’t play. I’ll take her to the doctor,” said José, an undocumented father whose daughter – a U.S. citizen – is getting treatment for a liver transplant.

“But I feel between a rock and a hard place. If I get deported, then how am I going to care for her?” he told IPS.

Jazmin, an undocumented mother, hasn’t taken her son – again, a U.S. citizen – to see the doctor in three days because she fears she could be deported.

She’s also afraid of sharing her identity because she thinks immigration authorities might come after her since she has a pending application to renew the state healthcare insurance of her child.

Recently, she came in contact with a church group that is helping her.

Pastor Jesús Garza from the Assemblies of God church, “Centro de Alabanza Judá”, has been aiding dozens of fearful immigrant families to attend doctor appointments.

Civil rights attorney Daniel Ortega said pro-immigrant groups are fighting the fear with information through Spanish media.

“We’ve come to the conclusion that as long as people don’t admit that they are in the country illegally, they don’t have anything to worry about,” Ortega told IPS. And if they are undocumented immigrants, then they know they shouldn’t be applying for public or state benefits, he added.

Government agencies themselves have questions about how the law should be implemented. The Arizona Department of Administration requested a formal opinion from the Attorney General’s Office with over 13 questions about its enforcement.

Thursday, the Department of Economic Security (DES) that administers several of the benefits impacted, including food stamps and healthcare insurance known as AHCCCS, issued information to the media regarding procedures the law applies to.

“We’re going to continue enforcing state and federal law like we’ve been doing,” said DES spokesperson Steve Meissner. “Failure to produce documents is not admission that you’re in the country illegally.”

Supporters of the bill argue it follows the will of Arizona voters who in 2004 approved Proposition 200. The impact of the initiative, aimed at denying public benefits to undocumented immigrants, was limited to five programmes by an attorney general’s decision.

“Nothing changed, this is what the voters wanted,” said Republican Rep. Steve Montenegro. “We’re going through difficult economic moments in Arizona. We’re having to cut for so many different areas. It’s only correct to make sure that people that apply and receive benefits are qualified to do so,” he added.

Opponents of the law say it hurts the children of undocumented immigrants whose parents fear being deported if they request a benefit for their kids.

“I don’t believe that rhetoric, that’s what they always said. But the emergency rooms empty for a while and they’re filled again,” said Valerie Roller, a member of Riders U.S.A., a local organisation that opposes the legalisation of undocumented immigrants.

Roller also believes the children of undocumented immigrants born in the U.S. shouldn’t be entitled to become citizens.

Lydia Guzmán, president of the pro-immigrant group Somos America, is receiving concerned phone calls from social workers. They fear they could lose their job if they fail to denounce someone who is illegally in the country.

There is growing concern about migrants who are caught in the middle, like Jazmin.

“The help I need is not for me, it’s for my children,” the 24-year-old woman told IPS.

A number of legal challenges in the works might bring the law to a halt.

On Wednesday, the Arizona Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit asking for a stay on the law’s implementation filed by the Arizona League of Cities and Towns. The suit questioned the way the law was created. The association is deciding whether to file the challenge again in a lower court in the next two weeks.

Other groups like the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF) are getting ready to challenge the substance of the law.

“MALDEF and I are ready to file a lawsuit in the event there’s a denial of benefits that shouldn’t have been denied, or a prosecution of an employee who shouldn’t have been prosecuted,” said civil rights attorney Ortega.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Oct 28 2009 (IPS)

Arizona could become the first state in the U.S. to criminalise the very presence of undocumented immigrants.

Republican Senator Russell Pearce is pushing to pass a state law that would allow the police to arrest anyone on suspicion of being undocumented. Credit: Valeria Fernández/IPS

Arizona has been called a “laboratory for anti-immigrant laws” for the rest of the U.S. In 2007, the state adopted one of the country’s toughest employer sanctions laws for companies that knowingly hire undocumented labour.

The campaign in favour of the “Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighbourhoods Act” was launched after the federal government limited Maricopa County sheriff deputies’ powers to enforce immigration law.

The enforcement of immigration law is considered the purview of the federal government in the U.S., but Arizona has been at the forefront of efforts to grant local police the ability to detain and deport undocumented immigrants.

“The feds [federal government] have been absent, and now they took it a step farther by refusing to let other people do their jobs,” said Republican Senator Russell Pearce, who was crucial in the approval of the employer sanctions law.

Pearce believes local police have the inherent authority to enforce federal immigration laws. And so does Sheriff Joe Arpaio, one of the most controversial figures in the illegal immigration crackdown in Arizona.

That’s at least what he’s been claiming ever since the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) stripped his deputies of the powers to act as immigration officers in the community.

Arpaio had one of the largest forces in the nation deputised to enforce immigration laws on the streets and in the jails under an agreement with DHS known as 287(g).

John Morton, assistant secretary of Homeland Security, said Arpaio’s sweeps were not consistent with the priorities of the new revised programme, which involves the capture of undocumented immigrants who committed serious crimes.

The backlash among conservative politicians in the state was almost immediate.

“This is a corrective action taken because Washington refuses to correct our borders,” said J.D Hayworth, a former congressional representative and conservative talk show host who supports the measure.

The new initiative also got the support of the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association (PLEA), which represents over 2,000 police officers in the state.

However, the new legislation may not succeed at the State Legislature. During the last two years, similar versions where vetoed by then governor Janet Napolitano, currently the secretary of Homeland Security. This year also saw the failure of some 27 bills aimed at clamping down on immigrants.

But Senator Pearce hopes it will have a chance to get approved by Arizona voters in November 2010.

“People are starting to become aware of what’s happening, Americans are standing up,” said Pam Pearson, a supporter. “[Undocumented immigrants] can take their children back home with them, they should go home and come back correctly.”

In 2006, four ballot initiatives aimed at undocumented immigrants – including making English the official language of the state – succeeded with 70 percent of the public vote.

“We will defeat these bills in court,” said criminal attorney Antonio Bustamante. A fervent critic of Sheriff Arpaio, he said the proposal is clearly unconstitutional in trying to regulate an area that is reserved to the federal government.

So far most efforts to defeat this initiative in the courtroom have been rejected by judges and are undergoing an appeal process.

Currently, Arpaio is using some of the state laws at his disposal to continue to conduct raids in Latino neighbourhoods and businesses.

During his latest raid in a Latino neighbourhood west of Phoenix, his deputies arrested 66 people, about half of whom were suspected undocumented immigrants.

Most people were detained through traffic stops.

The sheriff created uproar after a comment he made during a press conference last week about the guidelines his deputies follow to question people on their immigration status.

“There are certain criteria. No identification, looking like they just came from Mexico, and they admit it. So that’s enough,” he said.

Arpaio is currently under investigation by the Department of Justice (DOJ) for allegations of racial profiling and abuse during his immigration crackdown.

“He’s mocking his own government and separating parents from their children in the process,” said Francisco Rojo, an undocumented immigrant who drove a bike to work during the day of the raid to avoid being pulled over. “I truly hope [President Barack] Obama will do something to stop him.”

Maricopa County Attorney, Andrew Thomas, is expecting quite the contrary.

“Arizona is leading the way in the fight against illegal immigration,” said Thomas.

He is expected to issue a local opinion as to whether or not local police can enforce federal immigration law, upon Sheriff’s Arpaio request.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Oct 8 2009 (IPS)

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, nationally known for his crackdown on undocumented migrants in Arizona, could have all of his immigration enforcement powers taken away by the federal government.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio says he will continue his immigration raids even if stripped of the federal powers to do it. Credit: Valeria Fernandez/IPS

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees enforcement of federal immigration laws, has not signed the new contract yet and has not confirmed whether or not it will continue working with Arpaio in any fashion.

But the self-proclaimed toughest sheriff in the country promised to continue his controversial immigration raids even if stripped of the federal powers to do it.

“I’m going to continue doing everything that I’ve been doing, now I’m free of the federal government,” he said during a press conference Tuesday.

The sheriff said that he will drive undocumented immigrants to the U.S.-Mexico border if immigration authorities refuse to take custody of them.

Arpaio’s agency has the largest number of deputies in the nation trained to enforce immigration laws. This has been possible through a 287(g) agreement signed in 2007 with DHS.

The use of the programme by Arpaio’s office has drawn national criticism by civil rights and pro-immigrant organisations that argue the sheriff’s deputies engage in racial profiling. Currently, the U.S. Department of Justice is conducting an investigation into those allegations and possible rights violations within the sheriff’s jails.

In one prominent case, Alejandra Alvarez, an immigrant woman, was detained in a landscaping company raid by sheriff’s deputies for working with fake documents. Her jaw was allegedly broken during the arrest. After three months in jail, she complained that she didn’t receive proper medical care for her injury.

In addition to charges of verbal and physical abuse, activists have also raised possible violations of Title 6 within the jails. That refers to an aspect of federal law that requires information and materials to be provided in English and other languages, such as Spanish, as a condition to receive government funding.

In July, DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano announced changes to the 287(g) agreements nationally, saying they will focus on the detection and apprehension of immigrants with a criminal record.

DHS gave all 66 participating agencies a 90-day-period to review the new contracts and sign them. The period is up on Oct. 14.

DHS would not comment on any pending agreements.

Pro-immigrant groups, locally and nationally, argue that the 287(g) programme doesn’t need to be mended, it needs to be terminated.

“With the problems Arpaio has within his jails, how can DHS allow him to continue to have these powers?” asked Salvador Reza, an activist from Puente, a pro-immigrant group in Arizona.

“Napolitano and President [Barack] Obama need to think it through and realise that the 287(g) agreements are going to bring more legal problems – and also lose them the Latino vote,” he added.

Reza said that pro-immigrant activists are planning a series of protests should the federal government sign a new agreement with Arpaio.

Local activists in Arizona are also alarmed at the implications of the continuance of the programme within the jails.

“The problem is that any police officer – regardless of the jurisdiction – who has anti-immigrant beliefs is going to find excuses to arrest Mexicans, Guatemalans and even Native Americans to bring them to the jails,” said Reza. “This is a problem that is happening already.”

Reverend Lianna Rowe of the United Church of Christ has been observing the situation in Maricopa County.

“It’s been proven that this is a very dysfunctional way to conduct law enforcement,” said Rowe. “It is really an unfortunate message that the federal government is willing to sacrifice members of our community.”

Rowe pointed out Arpaio has been going after immigrants who commit minor traffic infractions in order to deport them, when he could be focusing resources on capturing dangerous criminals.

Last year, the East Valley Tribune, a local newspaper in Arizona, published a report showing that Arpaio’s crackdown on illegal immigration was impacting the response times of his agency to emergency calls and the investigation of serious crimes. The report went on to win a Pulitzer Prize.

The outcome in Maricopa is being monitored very closely by national groups, because it could offer a glimpse of the role localities will play in immigration enforcement under the Obama administration.

“If DHS continues its relationship with Joe Arpaio, it is making a historic mistake by lending the full force and legitimacy of the federal government to a rogue cop certain to go down in history as a serial violator of civil rights and an enemy of the Latino community,” said Frank Sharry, executive director of America’s Voice, a pro-immigrant organisation in Washington, in a press release Tuesday.

On Sep. 28, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) sent a letter to President Obama calling for the termination of all 287(g) programmes across the country.

“The misuse of the 287(g) programme by its current participants has rendered it ineffective and dangerous to community safety,” read the letter.

It was signed by CHC chair Rep. Nydia Velázquez, a New York Democrat, and Rep. Luis V. Gutiérrez, a Democrat of Illinois.

“Although its stated purpose is to provide law enforcement a tool to pursue criminals, it is our experience that state and local law enforcement officials actually use their expanded and often unchecked powers under the program to target immigrants and persons of color,” the letter said.

Secretary Napolitano has been a longtime supporter of the use of 287(g) programmes in jails and prisons. While she was governor of Arizona, the state prisons signed an agreement with the federal government. The memorandum allowed jailers to determine the immigration status of prisoners before their release and turn them over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody, a department of DHS.

Regardless of what the federal government decides, Arpaio can still use state laws to arrest undocumented immigrants.

For the past two years, he has been conducting raids at workplaces thought the use of the state employer sanctions law. A state human smuggling law – known as the anti-coyote law – has allowed him to incarcerate migrants who hire smugglers to cross the border.

The sheriff and his supporters also argue he doesn’t need “permission” from the federal government to detain undocumented immigrants citing the 1996 immigration control legislation.

“If you’re not going to enforce 287(g), just take it away and let Arpaio enforce the state laws he has available,” said Gary Rose, a Phoenix resident and longtime supporter of Arpaio. Rose believes local law enforcement needs to help deport all undocumented immigrants because he feels they abuse public benefits.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX. Arizona, Sep 17 2009 (IPS)

The Maricopa County Sheriff's Office has slammed its door on a federal investigation into allegations of civil rights violations. But immigrant communities in Arizona have reopened them.

For the past year, protesters have gathered regularly outside Sheriff Arpaio's downtown Phoenix offices. Credit: Valeria Fernandez/IPS

Complaints of racial profiling in traffic stops, and physical and verbal abuse in the jails have mounted against the sheriff's deputies for the last couple of years. But tensions have escalated since Sheriff Joseph Arpaio signed an agreement with the federal government to enforce immigration laws.

The controversial 287(g) programme has been used to train 160 deputies in Maricopa County who conduct immigration sweeps in Latino neighborhoods and markets.

Last year, under the George W. Bush administration, Phoenix's Mayor Phil Gordon wrote a letter to the Justice Department asking it to initiate an investigation over concerns of racial profiling. In March of this year, under the leadership of a new U.S. attorney general, Eric Holder, the Justice Department launched a probe.

Arpaio refused to cooperate with the investigation, which he claimed was politically motivated.

"It only took them 60 days to come after me," Arpaio said. "Sixty days. It usually takes about two years to open up a letter in the Justice Department."

The time frame of the probe is unclear. An investigator who recently visited Arizona would not comment on the pending case.

"There are some tragic things going on inside those jails that most people ignore," said Kevin Gibbons, a local immigration attorney.

Gibbons represents Alejandra Alvarez, an immigrant woman who was detained in a landscaping company raid by sheriff's deputies for working with fake documents. Her jaw was allegedly broken during the arrest. After three months in jail, she complained that she didn't receive proper medical care for her injury.

"The investigation can be only as good as the information we're giving them," said Salvador Reza, a local organiser from the pro-immigrant movement PUENTE. "Testimonies are coming out, but some of the people who can be a witness to what happens in the jails are in Mexico now."

According to the line of questioning, some community activists believe it might extend to possible violations of Title 6 within the jails. That refers to an aspect of federal law that requires information and materials to be provided in English and other languages, such as Spanish, as a condition to receive government funding.

"He's not giving prisoners a proper translation of some of the proceedings that take place within the jails," said Pastor Magdalena Schwartz, of the Disciples of the Kingdom Free Methodist Church in Mesa.

The current investigation against the country's self-proclaimed "toughest sheriff" is not of a criminal nature – though some of his critics wished it was.

"We want the investigation to result in the pressing of charges against Arpaio, for intimidation, for violation of civil rights and also for criminal acts committed by his officers within his jails," said Reza.

Despite the recent visit by Justice Department officials, many remain sceptical about the overall impact of the investigation.

"As I understand it, there are two investigations. I have very little expectations of the civil rights investigation and the findings that he has violated civil rights," said Alfredo Gutiérrez, owner and editor of the online news site La Frontera Times.

"The other investigation has to do with their overall behaviour, the management of money and what their deputies have been doing in Honduras, and now it's falling apart," he said.

Gutiérrez was referring to questions raised about the use of RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organisations, a federal statute used to prosecute mafia and drug syndicates) funding or money seized from crime activities for training of the Honduran police.

"The reason we know this is because they keep asking us questions," said Gutiérrez, a former Arizona Democratic senator. "Their investigation has taken them in a direction we didn't anticipate."

For the past year, a steady group of people has been protesting outside Sheriff Arpaio's downtown Phoenix offices to bring attention to the plight of immigrant families impacted by his tactics. And some feel it's starting to pay off.

"We want to stop the injustices against us," said Victor Hugo Preciado.

Preciado believes the sheriff is only helping big corporations make money from immigrants being turned over for detention.

"We don't agree with what he's doing, separating families. I don't think it's the solution," said Alicia Samudio, 40, another protester.

The group organised by the PUENTE movement plans to continue the protest for as long as Arpaio is in office.

This is not the first time allegations of abuse within Arpaio's jails have come to light over the 16 years that the sheriff has been in office.

The best-known case involved the death of inmate Scott Norberg in a restraint chair in 1996. His family settled a lawsuit for 8.25 million dollars against the sheriff's office.

Nor is it the first time Arpaio's office has been investigated. The Justice Department started an investigation on 1995 that resulted in an agreement two years later to eliminate the use of restraining chairs and other tactics.

In 1997, Amnesty International condemned the mistreatment of pre-trial inmates in these facilities.

But this is the first time the accusations underscore the possible misuse of powers given by the federal government to enforce immigration laws within the jails.

Recently, the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office was sued by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on behalf of Julio Mora, a U.S. citizen and his father Julian Mora, a permanent legal resident, who alleged racial profiling.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Aug 14 2009 (IPS)

It has been two months since Katherine Figueroa has shared a meal with her parents. Both of them are undocumented workers that were arrested in a workplace raid last June by Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office here.

While President Barack Obama set forth new federal guidelines to focus on employers that break the law by hiring undocumented workers, local authorities in Maricopa County are going in the opposite direction – increasing the crackdown on employees.

Figueroa, a 9 year-old U.S. citizen marched Aug. 7 with dozens of other children to call for an end to the raids that are separating families. Since 2008, deputy sheriffs conducted 22 raids and arrested 264 workers.

To calls of “Obama, Obama we want our parents back,” the children walked in the hot Arizona summer from the jail were their parents are detained to the offices of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, in downtown Phoenix.

“He needs to stop the raids, is not fair what he’s doing to people,” said Figueroa who held a cardboard sign with the shape of a colourful orange and black butterfly. The Monarch butterfly – whose migration across Mexico and the U.S. is necessary for its survival – was the theme of the march.

“I want to tell Sheriff Joe Arpaio to let my parents alone and let them free. And get the people that are working out, and [instead] get the people that are killing others and robbing,” she added.

Figueroa was playing at an aunt’s house with a friend when she overheard the news of a raid in a carwash on TV. She ran to see the images and saw her father handcuffed with plastic zip ties. It broke her heart.

Her parents Sandra and Carlos Figueroa were among the 25 detained that day. They are facing identity theft charges for using false documents to obtain employment. They could be in jail up to six months until they have a trial, and afterwards face up to 2 years of probation.

Either way the result would be their deportation to Mexico.

Arizona has one of the toughest employers’ sanctions laws in the nation. Employers who are caught knowingly hiring undocumented workers can get their license suspended and be forced to shut their businesses down at the second offense.

But, since the law took effect in 2008 it has only been used to arrest employees.

Arizona is unique in many ways because it has gained ground as a state in the enforcement of immigration laws that are considered to be the purview of the federal government.

Recently, the U.S. Supreme Court established that immigrant workers cannot be charged with identity theft if they did not knowingly steal the identification number they used to work. But this does not impact Arizona, which has its own identity theft laws.

“Identity theft is a serious crime. Despite the fact that it seems the President of the United States and the U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security will shift their focus to only go after employers, I will continue to pursue all illegal aliens in business establishments who take away valuable jobs from U.S. citizens,” said Arpaio in a recent press release.

Workplace raids in Arizona are leaving immigrant families – with children often times born in the U.S. – in dire need of legal help and financial support, but there is no infrastructure to help them.

“I’m thinking how I’m going to buy diapers for my daughter,” said Maria, a 20-year old undocumented mother of an 8 months old baby whose husband was detained in one raid. Maria who is four months pregnant asked for her name to be kept anonymous.

“There wasn’t a real motive to arrest them. They were simply working to feed their children,” she said.

Some communities are organising carwashes and yard sales to fundraise. Others are finding help in local churches that are offering them a place to meet and organise from the grassroots.

“A lot of the families are not prepared for who would take care of the children,” said Sarah Myklebust, an activist from the Phoenix Repeal Coalition, a community group that is providing orientation and organising the immigrant families.

Another problem is that the families do not have enough to pay for legal fees, and the court has a lack of translators to help them understand the process, she said.

“There’s a real shortage of immigration lawyers that just can take on cases,” Myklebust stressed.

And then there are just the basic needs.

“It goes down to can’t afford food and rent, daily needs,” she said. “These are pregnant women who have been relying on their husband and don’t have enough to pay for ultrasound, or day to day things,” she said.

For the Figueroa’s it has been quite tough. The family members sold living room furniture to get money to pay part of the attorney’s fees for those detained.

The legal process has been confusing to say the least.

“I’m a little sad and confused,” said Sandra Figueroa during an interview inside the Estrella Jail, a detention facility for women. “The attorneys told me that if I wanted to be released I had to accuse my boss.” Figueroa said she received poor legal help. At one point one attorney suggested she got married to a U.S. citizen to get her legal documents, she recalled.

Arpaio’s worksite raids have not occurred without protest and controversy.

“I was for three months in jail and I never got medical attention,” said Celia Alejandra Alvarez, who was detained in February in a raid at a landscaping company. She could not breast feed her child. “He’s not only hurting us, he’s hurting our children.”

Her daughter Heidi Rubi Portugal – a U.S. citizen – joined other children in the march.

“I want him to stop stealing children’s smiles,” said the 11 year old. “I think Arpaio should be deported to Mexico so he can see how people suffer in Mexico, how hard it is for people to cross. It never occurs to him to ask: Why did you come? How many smiles you left behind.”

That it’s unlikely to happen. But there are some positive signs that the children’s wishes may come true.

Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office is currently under investigation by the Department of Justice over alleged civil rights violations.

America’s self-proclaimed toughest sheriff has attracted a lot of controversy by arresting immigrant drivers for minor offenses in Latino neighbourhoods. He has the largest force in the nation deputised to enforce federal immigration laws under a memorandum of agreement with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

His federal powers are currently on the line due to a recent directive issued by the Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano. The new guidelines for the so-called ‘287(g) programme’ participants mandate local police to focus on the apprehension of criminal immigrants and not those whose are illegally in the country.

Salvador Reza, an organiser from PUENTE – a local movement that is calling for an end to Arpaio’s practices – said he hoped the recent march “would touch his heart” provided that he had one.

“This is a form of child abuse,” said Buffalo Rick Galeener, a supporter of Sheriff Joe Arpaio who was among the few that counter protested the children’s march. “These parents are separating themselves from their children, when they could take them back to Mexico.”

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
MESA. Arizona, Jul 30 2009 (IPS)

A three-day widely publicised immigration raid by the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office left the city of Mesa like a ghost town. Small businesses closed. Workers stayed home to avoid being pulled over and questioned for documents.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio at a recent press conference. Credit: Valeria Fernández/IPS

“Children are afraid of being separated from their parents,” she added.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio has the largest police force in the nation deputised to enforce U.S. immigration laws. His raids in mostly Latino neighbourhoods have raised concerns over racial profiling – and prompted a call to end his 287(g) agreement with the federal government.

His latest controversial sweep happened weeks after Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano announced new guidelines to put the focus of the programme’s Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with local law enforcement on the capture of criminal immigrants.

But while some see the chances as a positive step, civil rights advocates argue they are minimal and cosmetic.

“We don’t see any new provision in the MOA directed to stop the sort of abuse and racial profiling that we see in Maricopa County, and that’s disappointing and disturbing,” said Omar Jadwat, staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Immigrants’ Rights Project.

The ACLU performed a side-by-side comparison of the old MOA with the new one through a public records request and found minimal changes.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) claims one of the most significant changes to the guidelines is that participating agencies would have to focus on the arrest of immigrants who committed serious crimes.

The new MOA includes three levels of “priorities” for suspected criminals. The highest level includes murderers and kidnappers. But it doesn’t say the police can’t arrest the low priority suspects, said Jadwat.

Civil rights activists are not the only ones concerned with the changes. Arpaio himself said he was “angry”, for quite different reasons.

If the new rules were to be applied strictly, he might not be able to arrest immigrants just for being in the country illegally. And that’s what he has mostly done.

It is estimated that 500,000 undocumented immigrants reside in Arizona.

During the past two years, he detained 258 undocumented immigrants in raids. Of those, 119 had committed a crime or civil offence and 110 were turned over to ICE because they were in the country illegally.

He has 90 days to decide whether or not he wants to sign a reviewed agreement under the new guidelines.

But he claimed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is already changing the game plan. He protested during the recent raid in Mesa, when one of his deputies was allegedly told by ICE to release three migrants. The men were illegally in the country and were passengers in vehicles pulled over for minor traffic infractions.

Tensions between Arpaio’s office and ICE became clear when DHS said his officers were never told to release the migrants, but rather were given the choice to question them.

“It’s sad that all at once you arrest people or detain them and then have to release them on the streets. It makes me angry to have to do that, knowing that these people are criminals and committed an offence by coming across the border illegally,” Arpaio said during a press conference.

Not everybody in law enforcement sides with Arpaio.

A report released in May by the nonpartisan Police Foundation criticised the 287(g) programme from diverting police resources for fighting crime and creating mistrust between officers and the immigrant communities they serve.

In Maricopa, Arpaio’s immigration sweeps have created the perception that other local police agencies will deport a migrant upon being contacted, even when the person is the victim of a crime.

“We don’t want any trouble. Calling the police is like expecting to be deported,” said Jesús Aguilar Saenz, an undocumented immigrant. “If you see something wrong, you rather shush about it.”

Arizona has some of the toughest policies in the nation regarding immigration. They include an employer sanctions law against companies that knowingly hire undocumented labour, which has been used as grounds to conduct workplace immigration raids.

“Arpaio doesn’t need 287(g) to arrest people. The Arizona criminal code has changed so drastically that he’s above and beyond the control of Napolitano,” said Aarti Shahani, a researcher with Justice Strategies and lead author of the report “Local Democracy on ICE”.

In the report, Shahani says police have been using immigration powers to go after corn-vendors and traffic violators without probable cause.

She believes it is clear the police don’t need immigration powers to go after criminals. But some agencies like Arpaio’s want them so they have the ability to detain someone who enters the country illegally but committed no other offence.

The bottom line for some immigrant activists is that the 287(g) programme needs to end. And the failure of the federal government to put an end to it reflects poorly on President Barack Obama’s promise to approve comprehensive immigration reform, they contend.

“If [Napolitano] wants to show good faith, she should have suspended the agreement [in Maricopa],” said Salvador Reza, a member of PUENTE a local pro-immigrant movement that opposes 287(g).

“Unless they implement immigration reform that works, what is going on right now is going to keep on dividing our families,” said Reza.

The 287(g) programme is named after a section of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigration Responsibility Act of 1996 allowing the federal government to deputise local law enforcement officers and jailers as immigration agents. Currently, 66 enforcement agencies in the nation have signed such agreements.

The recent changes announced by DHS respond directly to criticism of the programme in a March Government Accountability Office (GAO) audit of 29 agencies that have 287(g) agreements.

In the report, the GAO said that four local law enforcements agencies were arresting immigrants for minor violations like speeding, contrary to the objective of the programme.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
SAN JUAN, Jul 9 2009 (IPS)

Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination by President Barack Obama to the U.S. Supreme Court has turned her into a reason for national pride in Puerto Rico. But it has also added fresh fuel to the perpetual debate for self-determination of the people in the Caribbean island, which has been a commonwealth of the U.S. for over a hundred years.

Local artist Luis Rivera hopes Obama does "something radical" to revive the question of Puerto Rico's status. Credit: Judith Wolert-Maldonado

Sotomayor, 55, was born in New York to Puerto Rican parents. She has served as a federal district judge and for more than a decade now, she has sat on a federal court of appeals. Her story of success has become an inspiration to many boriquas – the indigenous name for people born in the island of Puerto Rico.

Her confirmation hearings are scheduled to begin on Jul. 13 at the Senate Judiciary Committee. If confirmed, she will be the first Latina to have a seat in the country’s highest tribunal. The court has made landmark decisions from de-segregation to abortion rights.

Puerto Ricans are following the process closely. Some women have even started to display pins that read “Confirm Sotomayor”.

“This has been a major event in our country, very flattering,” said Marcial Díaz, a Humacao resident who chose the Spanish word país, or country, to refer to the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.

Puerto Rico’s status as a commonwealth of the U.S. and whether it should become a state is a divisive issue for the local electorate.

Currently, Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens who can serve in the Army, but can’t vote in the presidential elections unless they live in one of the 50 states. They have a representative in Congress who can’t vote.

Expectations are high for a decision regarding the island’s status during the Obama administration. Any conversation in Puerto Rico about Sotomayor inevitably leads to that subject.

“We’ll have to see if he does something radical to resume the issue about the status of Puerto Rico,” said Luis Rivera, a writer and photographer who lives in El Viejo (Old) San Juan. “There’s just too much instability because of that.”

Despite the fact that Hillary Clinton won the Democratic primaries in the island, many are starting to see Obama as a “symbol of change and democracy”, he said.

Others view Sotomayor’s selection by the president with cautious optimism.

“It gives me a certain degree of anxiety. Before, people wanted sovereignty, but now they’re in love with Obama,” said Damery Burgos, an art professor in the city of Ponce who believes Puerto Rico should become an independent nation. “We need to remember that this is not a lifetime in the White House, it’s just a rental.”

Burgos thinks that if confirmed, Sotomayor would be in a unique position that would enable her to review or vote in favour of hearing cases related to Puerto Rico’s status.

“I know she wants Puerto Rico to have a more dignified position, but she’s been very smart by not locking herself into an opinion about Puerto Rico’s situation,” Burgos said.

Three years ago there was a lawsuit challenging Puerto Ricans’ lack of the right to elect the U.S. president. After a U.S. Circuit judge ruled against it, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear the case.

“The Supreme Court avoids the issue like the plague, when it was the Supreme Court that created the dilemma in the first place,” said Juan Torruella, a judge at the United States Court of Appeals for the first Circuit.

Torruella, a Puerto Rican, has been outspoken about the question of the status of the island from a jurist point of view, authoring a book “The Supreme Court and Puerto Rico: The doctrine of separate and unequal,” and several journals.

He indicates that it was precisely a series of Supreme Court decisions known as the Insular Cases that at the beginning of the 20th Century helped define the status of Puerto Rico. So is only the Supreme Court which has the power to reverse them, addressing matters related to its status and that of its people.

“One would think that having four million U.S. citizens that have less rights than the rest of the nation should be addressed,” he added.

But only time will tell which role Sotomayor could play if a case regarding Puerto Rico’s status comes to the tribunal, which position she would take and how much power she would bear as the new justice in town, said Torruella.

Currently, Congress is looking at the Puerto Rico Democracy Act of 2009, a resolution that would allow the U.S. federal government to start a process for Puerto Rico to decide about its status.

But the legislation for people like Hector Pesquera, a leader of the Puerto Rican Independent movement, “is just a montage” to pretend the government is actually doing something when they won’t change “the colonial status of Puerto Rico”.

Pesquera, a member of the National Hostociano Independent Movement, believes Obama’s election was of historical significance, equally to Sotomayor’s nomination. But he thinks the president would be limited when it comes to major reforms by the influences of the long-established military power residing in the Pentagon.

In the end, Pesquera and others recognise that Sotomayor’s nomination says more for Latinos in the U.S. than it does about the Puerto Rico-U.S. relations.

“She represents a victory for the Hispanic population and the Hispanic community and not only that, for female Hispanics who had such a tough one to get to the top,” said the journalist Ramírez de Arellano.

The reporting about her nomination has also revealed a lack of education and understanding on the part of the mainstream media of Puerto Rico’s relationship to the U.S., pointed out Ramírez de Arellano.

She was critical of the media referring to her as a daughter of immigrants when in fact Puerto Ricans are U.S. Citizens.

“America only thinks about people from Latin America in terms of immigrants,” Ramírez de Arellano said. “They don’t understand how far we have been woven into the framework of American society.”

Some boricuas simply hope this is a positive step to eliminate disparities and discrimination towards Latinos in the U.S.

“I just grew tired and left (the U.S.), there’s too much persecution against Spanish-speaking people,” said José Cruz Candelaria, a business owner in San Juan. “I hope she brings changes. After all, she has something for Latinos in her heart because she grew up on ‘arroz y habichuelas’ (rice and beans) like us.”

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
ARIVACA, Arizona, Jun 19 2009 (IPS)

Humanitarian aid groups trying to avert migrant deaths on the U.S- Mexico border are facing increased roadblocks in their mission. The hazards are not connected to a spike in drug cartels’ violence, but rather restrictions from the federal government.

Walt Staton, a volunteer with No More Deaths, was convicted for "knowingly littering" a national refuge by leaving water bottles for border crossers. Credit: Nick Oza/IPS

"We’re being intimidated and criminalised as humanitarians," said Walt Staton, a 27-year-old volunteer with No More Deaths, a humanitarian aid group.

Staton knows this firsthand. He was convicted on Jun. 3 by a 12-person jury of "knowingly littering" for leaving unopened water jugs on the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge southwest of Tucson, Arizona.

Arizona, the main gateway for undocumented migration into the U.S., is ground zero to a human rights crisis, according to border activists. In the summer, triple-digit temperatures in the remote Sonoran desert have caused a deadly toll.

Over the past decade, it is estimated that at least 5,000 men, women and children have lost their lives attempting to cross the U.S-Mexico border.

No More Deaths (NMD) has been providing help in the form of water and food to migrants. This June, for the sixth consecutive year, they set up a campsite 24 kms from the border with volunteers from all over the country.

Water can be a lifesaver in some of the most remote areas of the treacherous Sonoran desert, explained Steve Jonston, 64, a volunteer with NMD.

Daily, volunteers set up hundreds of gallon-sized water containers at drop points in some of the most heavily transited migrant trails. Once the jugs have been used, they recycle them.

By the time some of the migrants find them, they have spent from three to four days lost in the desert, Jonston said.

"To ticket Walt Staton for littering would be to ticket an ambulance for speeding," he told IPS.

But not everybody agrees on the approach.

"There’s other ways it can be done," said Michael Hawkes, elected director and manager of the Buenos Aires Refuge. "Just leaving the jugs there is like leaving trash, it is like a McDonald's happy meal in front of your yard, it is trash."

Hawkes said garbage left by migrants during their trek has been a challenge for preserving the 117,000 acres refuge. He believes Border Patrol beacons, which allow migrants to call for rescue, are more effective than putting water.

The refuge currently allows for at least two water stations set up in the area by another volunteer group. But Jonston argues that’s not nearly enough.

During the summer, temperatures reach up to 115 F (45 C) in the desert. Drinking as much as a gallon of water per hour might be necessary to survive, said Mario Escalante, a spokesperson for the Tucson Border Patrol.

"Most of the people attempting to cross don’t have a clue where they are, they’ve never been here before," said Escalante.

Smugglers lie to migrants, giving them the false hope that they’ll find water in the desert, he said. It’s not uncommon for them to abandon migrants to their own luck, he added.

Camila Chigo, 24, was barely conscious when the Border Patrol found her on a side road. The migrant from Chiapas, Mexico was lost and alone for four days and later spent three hospitalised for heatstroke.

"I almost died," said Chigo, who spoke with IPS in a migrant shelter after being deported to Nogales, Sonora. Her arms revealed scars and scratches from the desert vegetation.

Humanitarian activists claim that the increased fortification of the border through the construction of a fence and deployment of manpower is to blame for stories like Chigo’s.

"The border has been built in the most intentional way to use the desert as a deterrent, as a weapon that has cost thousands of lives," said Staton.

And extreme heat is not the only threat. As the business of human smuggling is getting more lucrative, migrants are often subject to kidnappings and women are exposed to sexual abuse and rape by border bandits.

Yet the Border Patrol in Tucson cites a decrease in the number of arrests this fiscal year –which began in October 2008 – as a sign of success of the border strategy.

Apprehensions are down from 235,800 in 2008 to 164,600 on 2009.

The death toll on the 262 miles of the Tucson border has increased from 79 fatalities in 2008 to 83 this year.

"The migrant death rate is going up. It’s not necessarily the total number of deaths, it’s the ratio of the number of people that are crossing and dying," said Rev. Robin Hoover, president of Humane Borders, a humanitarian group that provides water in the desert at 102 water stations.

Hoover claims increased enforcement is pushing people into more desolate areas, making it harder to reach them with aid. One of these main points is the Tohono O’odham nation land.

Mike Wilson, a Native American who has been leaving water tanks in the reservation, said that recently, tribal police officers told him to take them down.

"I respectfully declined," said Wilson, only to find out later that somebody had taken them away. Now he’s substituting them with gallon jugs.

Humanitarian aid volunteers claim things have gotten more difficult in the last four years.

In 2005, volunteers Shanti Sellz and Daniel Strauss were accused of human smuggling after attempting to transport a group of injured migrants to the hospital. The charges against them were later dropped. Their case was the catalyst for launching a campaign to bring awareness called "Humanitarian aid is not a Crime".

Staton’s is not the first case to go to court for littering charges.

In 2008, Dan Millis, another NMD volunteer, found the body of a 14-year-old girl from El Salvador in the desert. Motivated by the tragedy, two days later Millis was leaving water jugs around the migrant trails where he found her and was ticketed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. He refused to pay the 175-dollar fine and fought the littering misdemeanor charge on the grounds that humanitarian aid is not a crime.

The U.S federal attorney's office would not comment on Staton’s case since his sentencing is pending for Aug. 4. He could face one year in jail or up to 10,000 dollars in fines.

Staton is planning to go to seminary school by then to become a Unitarian Universalist minister. He hopes his story brings attention to the human rights crisis on the border.

In 2008, the Special Rapporteur to the United Nations issued a report stating that the United States has failed to adhere to its international obligations to make the human rights of migrants a national priority.

"It’s the responsibility of the people to come out and say we won’t let these people die," said Staton. "Maybe we can’t drive them somewhere, but we are just not going to let them die."

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, May 20 2009 (IPS)

Bad food is not the only reason thousands of mostly pre-trial detainees have been going on an intermittent two-week hunger strike in Arizona’s Maricopa County jails.

Relatives of inmates and members of the community have been holding candlelight vigils in support of those on hunger strike. Credit: Valeria Fernandez/IPS

“They are treated worse than animals,” said Daisy Rios, 22, the wife of an immigrant prisoner who has participated in the protest.

Arizona is ground zero for the nation’s divisive immigration debate. The border state is the gateway for half of all human and drug smuggling into the rest of the United States.

The Maricopa County jail system, administered by Sheriff Joseph Arpaio, holds about 9,000 inmates, 70 percent of whom are pre-trial detainees.

The country’s self-proclaimed “toughest” sheriff is famous for housing prisoners in tents, giving them pink underwear and feeding them what he claims are 30-cent meals. But he’s recently been in the spotlight of a national uproar over his tactics to crack down on illegal immigration by conducting traffic stops and raiding businesses.

The Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) is currently under investigation by the federal Justice Department over allegations of racial profiling and civil rights violations. MCSO is also the subject of a 30-year-old lawsuit over jail conditions, including the quality of the food.

Lydia Guzman, president of Respect/Respeto, a local organisation that documents civil and human rights abuses, has been visiting the prisoners.

“They’re tremendously organised,” she told IPS. Guzman met with mostly immigrant detainees who said the jailers intimidate them, they are not provided appropriate medical care and their food is rotten, stale and sometimes expired.

But immigrant advocates argue the issue at stake is more than just “nasty” food.

“It’s a whole series of dehumanising techniques by Sheriff Joe Arpaio and MCSO,” said Salvador Reza, organizer of the Puente pro-immigrant movement. “Especially now that a big number of the population is there because of their undocumented (immigrant) status.”

“They are not criminals, they are workers,” he added.

In a letter to a family member, one inmate wrote, “In the jails we have to tolerate bad food, put up with foul language used by the guards, and if we have something to say we stay silent for fear of reprisals.”

On Monday, Arpaio placed at least 4,200 prisoners in an indefinite security lockdown, alleging that Hispanic inmates were intimidating other detainees so they would refuse to eat. “I was concerned about inmates causing harm to other inmates,” said Arpaio. “We won’t tolerate violence in jails.”

The ongoing lockdown means detainees have to remain in their cells all day long, without being allowed to receive visitors – including their attorneys – or make any phone calls.

“It appears that they’re seeking to reduce any public, known complaints about the operations in the jails by locking people down and eliminating visitations,” said Dan Pochoda, lead attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in Arizona.

The ACLU is one party in a lawsuit against MCSO related to jail conditions. Pochoda said the ACLU is looking into the situation and might take legal action if it’s proven this is a form of retaliation against the inmates for joining the strike.

The first hunger strike started on May 2 after a nine-kilometre march that ended outside the Durango jail complex to denounce alleged abuse of immigrant women in the county jails. At least 200 women participated in Estrella Jail, according to a recent report by MCSO.

The march organised by Puente focused on the case of an immigrant woman whose arm was allegedly broken by jailers and another who was the subject of excessive use of force during a raid conducted by MCSO.

Currently inmates in three separate jail facilities are participating: Lower Buckeye Jail, Towers and Fourth Avenue Jail.

“We don’t believe that we caused this, however, by us demonstrating in front of the jail we brought courage to them who were planning to do it,” said Reza. “It surprised us, we had no contact with them at all.”

Arpaio holds the organisers responsible for being catalysts of the strike.

“It’s been escalating ever since,” he said. He also argued that the elimination of salt in the food, recommended by a dietician, could be instigating the discontent. A judge recently ordered that the food must comply with national standards imposed by the Department of Agriculture.

“They happen to be in a jail,” said Arpaio. “What are you supposed to do with those who are innocent, put them in the Hilton Hotel?”

Yet some county officials are raising concerns about the inmates’ health.

“People have been on a hunger strike for about the last two weeks off and on, and it is being held very quiet. I have asked two days ago for a health and welfare check,” said Mary Rose Wilcox, Maricopa County District 5 supervisor.

Wilcox, who is part of an elected governmental board that administers the county, has met with Justice Department investigators and will provide evidence about this situation in the jails for their probe into patterns of practice.

“This is a horrible precedent for the county. Unfortunately, he’s [Arpaio] an elected official and can dictate policy, but when it comes to health, we can intervene,” she said.

Outside the jails, family and community members have been holding candlelight prayer vigils in support of the prisoners on strike.

“What goes on in there is unbearable,” said Florencia Gonzalez, the mother of an inmate from Mexico. She said her son told his family that prisoners are held in small rooms with rats and roaches as they wait for long periods of time to be transported to court.

Ruben Silva, a 20-year-old who was released Tuesday night from the Fourth Avenue Jail, attested to that. “They overcrowd rooms that are 20 by 10 feet with 30 people,” he said.

“Upstairs (referring to a section of the jail) nobody is eating. They have some nasty food,” he said.

He said during the three days he was there for an unpaid traffic ticket, he only ate oranges. He was fed twice a day, and the meal consisted of two stale loafs of bread, peanut butter and often expired juice.

Silva heard about the hunger strike as soon as he entered the jail by word of mouth, but said that those who are participating are housed in a different area.

Willie, a woman who was released at the same time, and asked that her last name be withheld, also complained that she had to wait up to 15 days to receive her medication for high blood pressure.

“It’s just horrible the way they treat people in there,” she said. “Guards are disrespectful, they curse at you.”

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, May 5 2009 (IPS)

Broken arms, dislocated jaws, intimidation and vulgarities are part of the daily routine immigrant woman experience in Arizona’s Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) jails, human and civil rights organisations charge.

Close to 3,000 people marched to denounce abuse and intimidation of immigrant inmates by the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office in the border state of Arizona. Credit: Nick Oza

“The abuse of these powers within the jails is worse than in the street,” said Salvador Reza, an organiser with the pro-immigrant group Puente that has been monitoring the alleged mistreatment. “If we were able to stop torture in Guantanamo Bay, we should be able to do that in Maricopa County,” he added.

On May 2, Reza’s group organised a six-mile march to protest this situation from the offices of the sheriff in downtown Phoenix to the Estrella jail, a detention facility for women.

The march was in response to claims of abuse by an immigrant woman whose arm was allegedly broken by sheriff’s office guards, and a letter by 13 others who also denounced mistreatment within the same jail. At the protest, 43 women inmates launched a hunger strike to make their point.

“Please help us, we’re in a tunnel without end, treated like dogs,” reads the letter obtained by Respect/Respet, a local organisation that documents human and civil rights abuses. Among the signatories is an immigrant woman who claims the sheriff’s deputies broke her jaw during a workplace raid.

So far, Maria del Carmen Garcia-Martinez, an alleged undocumented immigrant, has been the only one to come out publicly with her story. She said that on Mar. 11, six guards at the Estrella jail broke her left arm when they forced her to put her fingerprint on a form she did not want to sign. The document was intended to transfer her custody from the jail to immigration authorities. Garcia, 46, did not receive treatment for her injury until 20 hours later.

She had been accused of showing a false driver license to the police. Prosecutors eventually dropped the charges.

“I know I’m not the only one, I met other women there who have gone through terrible things,” Garcia told IPS.

Lt. Brian Lee, a spokesperson for the sheriff’s office, said her allegations are currently under investigation. But he also stated that his deputies can use force to obtain a fingerprint on immigration documents that are required as part of their work with the federal government.

On May 1, the sheriff’s office received a visit by officials from the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security as part of the investigation. Human and civil rights groups are pushing for the revocation of Maricopa County Sheriff Joseph Arpaio’s 287(g) agreement with the federal government.

“Anybody can accuse me of anything like they are doing. I feel very comfortable with my position. We have nothing to hide,” said Arpaio. “I’m very comfortable with what I’m doing and we’re going to continue to do our job.”

Despite criticism, Arpaio – who has became a national face for the crackdown on illegal immigration – remains more popular among voters in Arizona than U.S President Barack Obama. A recent poll by Rasmussen Reports shows 68 percent of state voters have a favourable view of Arpaio, compared with a 53 approval rating for Obama.

“He’s arresting all the illegals. He’s the only elected politician that we have in our state that is really willing to enforce the law,” said Martha Payan, who is a member of American Citizens United, a group that opposes an amnesty for undocumented immigrants.

“The more influx of illegals that keep coming in here, Americans are losing jobs and wages are going down,” she said.

Unlike federal immigration detention centres, the jails administered by Arpaio are designed for people accused of serious crimes who are awaiting trial. But many undocumented immigrants end up in his custody for minor offences while they wait to be transferred to immigration authorities.

“The sad reality is that people are brutally mistreated in these jails,” said criminal defence attorney and pro-immigrant activist Antonio Bustamente. “The vast majority cannot tell anybody because they get deported.”

The attorney said he is aware of at least three people who claim they were assaulted and put in isolation when they refused to answer questions pertaining to their citizenship.

This is not the first time allegations of abuse within Arpaio’s jails have come to light over the 16 years that the sheriff has been in office.

The best-known case involved the death of inmate Scott Norberg in a jail-restraining chair in 1996. His family settled a lawsuit for 8.25 million dollars against the sheriff’s office.

Nor is it the first time Arpaio’s office has been investigated. The Justice Department started an investigation on 1995 that resulted in an agreement two years later to eliminate the use of restraining chairs and other tactics.

In 1997, Amnesty International condemned the mistreatment of pre-trial inmates in these facilities.

But this is the first time the accusations underscore the possible misuse of powers given by the federal government to enforce immigration laws within the jails.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has said the use of the agreement in this way has been an effective tool to remove undocumented immigrants from the country. In the past two years the sheriff’s office turned over 24,000 undocumented immigrants to immigration authorities that were detected by his jailers.

A recent report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), an investigative arm of Congress, said that ICE is not supervising the 287(g) programmes properly.

Another study by Justice Strategies, a national think tank, complained that local law enforcement has used these powers to arrest immigrants for minor traffic offences rather than to focus on serious criminals.

Janet Napolitano, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, said recently during a visit to Nogales, Arizona that her agency is conducting a review of the 287(g) clause. Napolitano introduced this programme when she was Arizona’s governor and has been a supporter of its use to detect undocumented immigrants in the jails.

“She thought she could set an example in Arizona and use this horrible example and stretch it across the nation,” said Zack De la Rocha, an activist best known as the former lead singer of Rage Against the Machine. The artist, who resides in Los Angeles, has joined the growing protest movement in Arizona.

“People are proving here that time and time again, wherever 287(g) is implemented the same horrible abuses occur: racial profiling, the stripping away of constitutional rights that protect both the undocumented and the documented,” he argued.

Excerpt:

By Valeria Fernández
PHOENIX, Arizona, Apr 21 2009 (IPS)

Thousands of people poured into the streets of Phoenix this past Sunday in one of several nationwide marches scheduled through May to pressure President Barack Obama to act on immigration reform.

Thousands of people marched on Apr. 19 through the streets of Phoenix in support of Pres. Obama's announced commitment to reform immigration policy this year. Credit: http://www.josemunozphotos.com

“We want the president to help us. He’s our only hope so we can come out of the shadows,” said Josefina Moreno, 52, an undocumented worker living in the U.S. for over 16 years who marched with her granddaughter.

The march had an extra sense of urgency for immigrants in Arizona like Moreno who live in fear of being deported by the local police and separated from their families.

Arizona has become ground zero for the nation’s divisive immigration debate. The border state is the gateway for half of all human and drug smuggling into the rest of the nation. A crackdown on immigrant workers by the local Maricopa County Sheriff has resulted in allegations of racial profiling that are currently being investigated by the federal Department of Justice.

“There’s been a lot of anti-immigrant sentiment here in Arizona. For people to come out today and demonstrate publicly that they’re ready to see changes testifies to their commitment and courage,” said Arturo Rodriguez, president of the United Farm Workers of America, a union that has been organising other marches across the country.

Similar rallies are expected during the next couple of weeks in Texas, California and New York to keep pressure on the new administration.

Advocates for immigration reform argue that bringing immigrants out of the shadows will lessen abuse of workers and improve wages. Most of them support some form of legalisation for the estimated 12 million immigrants that live in the country. Meanwhile, opponents blame illegal immigration for draining state coffers, increased healthcare costs, crime and taking away jobs from U.S. citizens.

“We’ll not stop and we will not rest until we have immigration reform in this country,” said Rodriguez.

Supporters of comprehensive reform might be in for a long fight. Some political observers argue the floundering economy and concerns about spillover violence from drug cartels coming from Mexico will colour the debate.

“I don’t think Congress should tackle it this year, we’re not ready,” Arizona senator Jon Kyl told IPS. Kyl sponsored – without success – an immigration bill in 2007 that included some form of legalisation for undocumented workers.

“The people who defeated it last time are going to have a good argument that we haven’t done everything we could do to secure the border,” he said.

On Monday, Kyl joined fellow Arizona Senator John McCain and Joe Lieberman, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, for a field hearing on border violence in Phoenix.

Phoenix’s status as the second-worst kidnapping capital of the world after Mexico City has fuelled fears of organised crime spilling over from the neighbour to the south into the interior of the United States.

During 2008, Phoenix police investigated 368 kidnappings, mostly related to drug activities and human smuggling.

Despite concerns of spillover violence from Mexico, law enforcement agents testified that most of it has been felt by undocumented immigrants or those involved in illegal trafficking, without affecting average residents.

Phoenix police chief Jack Harris estimated that over 100 drop-houses operate in the city on a yearly basis. Migrants are held captive in these houses by smugglers who threaten to kill them if their family doesn’t meet monetary demands.

“We need to find a way for these people to come legally. This is one of the most significant things Congress can do,” said Harris.

But opinions are split in Arizona over how to deal with the situation.

“It is time for the federal government to address the immense fiscal burden that border states are unfairly shouldering in combating illegal immigration,” said Arizona Governor Jan Brewer during the committee hearing.

The Republican governor believes the solution to curb the problems associated with smuggling would be to secure the border by adding 250 members of the National Guard. The idea is currently under review by the Obama administration for the entire border, said Secretary of Homeland Security (DHS) Janet Napolitano during a visit to Nogales, Arizona last week.

Immigration reform supporters are hopeful that Obama will revisit some of the more controversial measures from the previous presidency when it comes to immigration policies, such as delaying worksite raids of immigrant workers, and reviewing 287(g) agreements that allow local enforcement to implement immigration law.

During Obama’s recent visit to Mexico with his counterpart Felipe Calderón, immigration reform talks didn’t take centre stage as expected. Instead the focus was on border violence.

The U.S. has approved 400 million dollars as part of the Merida Initiative, a joint three-year venture with Mexico to help fight drug cartels.

Last week, Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano announced the appointment of Alan Bersin, a former Justice Department official, as the new “border czar” who will be responsible for confronting the problems related to drug violence and illegal immigration along the border.

“What Napolitano is doing is the right step. We need a stronger border,” said Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, a non-partisan pro-immigrant advocacy organisation based in Washington. Noorani also believes any reform plan should include a way to legalise undocumented workers.

Many border reform activists remain sceptical of an increased alignment of the Obama administration with previous policies to militarise the border.

“Border security has only brought us border insecurity,” said Isabel Garcia, attorney and director of Derechos Humanos, a border coalition that advocates for immigrant human rights.

Garcia argued that since border enforcement increased in the 1990s, Arizona turned into the nation’s funnel for human and drug smuggling. The policy drove hundreds of immigrants to desolate areas of the Sonoran desert, causing the loss of many lives, said Garcia.

Some observes believe Congress will not reach consensus this year on reform.

“This will be at their own political risk,” said Alfredo Gutierrez, former Arizona senator and editor of La Frontera Times, an online site focused on national immigration news.

Gutierrez pointed out the importance of Hispanic voters – a group for whom immigration reform is a priority – as crucial to the election of Obama in various battleground states.

“I think that he (Obama) is going to be reminded and Hispanic congressman that you can’t keep raising the expectations of the people and keep ignoring them,” he said.

Excerpt: