Minneapolis, MN – On Jan. 12, immigrant rights activists protested outside the Hennepin County jail, demanding that Sheriff Stanek stop using the jail as a deportation machine. More people are deported from the Hennepin County jail than from any other jail in the state.

The protest was organized by the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAc). MIRAc’s No More Deportations campaign is targeting Sheriff Stanek, demanding that he change policy in the Hennepin County jail to stop cooperating with the ‘Secure Communities’ deportation program, by ceasing to honor ICE hold requests. Jail-based deportation programs like Secure Communities are the main source of deportations and separation of families, which have reached record numbers, with well over a million deportations in the last four years.

When people are booked into county jails, they are now run through a national Secure Communities database and ICE flags people they want to interview. So even if a person is arrested without cause and isn’t charged with anything (as happens quite commonly with Latino, Black and Native people in Hennepin County), they still go through the booking process and can end up getting deported.

It’s not mandatory for county jails to hold people extra time (at the local jail’s cost)for ICE to come interview them, so many county jails around the country are deciding to stop honoring ICE’s hold requests. Most significantly, the California attorney general recently declared that jails statewide will no longer have to cooperate with ICE hold requests. Many counties in other states are also making the same decision, as they don’t want their local jails to be turned into conveyer belts to ICE’s deportation juggernaut.

Sheriff Stanek has a long history of antagonizing people of color and immigrants. Before he was sheriff, he admitted to racist conduct when he was an officer. He pushed for the state to adopt harsh anti-immigrant policies. He also antagonized progressive political movements like Occupy Homes, using heavy-handed tactics to carry out foreclosures, and he was in charge of the repressive police response to the Occupy Minneapolis encampment in People’s Plaza, which was on Hennepin County property, last year.

MIRAc’s No More Deportations campaign will continue to target Sheriff Stanek to stop deportations in Hennepin County jail. The next protest targeting Stanek will be Saturday, Feb. 16 at 9:00 a.m. in front of the jail at 4th Avenue and 5th Street in Minneapolis.

#MinneapolisMN #deportations #MIRAc #NoMoreDeportationsCampaign #SecureCommunities #SheriffStanek

Recently controversy around 287(g) has grown. In 2010 Kennesaw State University student Jessica Colotl, who at the age of 21 was targeted for being of Mexican origin, by being pulled over by a university police officer and arrested for driving without a license. Jessica's family, friends and members of the community decided to stand up and fight back – their efforts resulted in Jessica having an extended stay in the U.S.

Other immigrants have not been as fortunate. ICE and local agencies using 287(g) are out of control and are directly responsible for thousands of children, who are U.S. citizens, being thrown and forgotten in foster care when their parents are deported. These families may never again have the opportunity to reunite. Mexicano, Central American and Chicano families have been especially hard hit.

When many of us heard 287(g) was going to go up for renewal in 2013, many of our own towns and cities decided to spread the word and come together against it. Enough was enough! The pueblo (people) united and together we fought against the racist oppression 287(g) had brought upon us and we won! ICE announced on Dec. 21, 2012 that it would not be renewing 287(g).

While we are very happy to hear our direct efforts against 287(g) led to its scrapping, we know that this law itself is not what oppresses us. As always, our oppressors find ways to continue oppressing us and it is up to us to continue fighting back.

One way in particular that police and racist community members continue their targeting against immigrants and oppressed nationalities is Secure Communities (S-Comm). While 287(g) gave local police the power to ask people about their immigration status on the streets, Secure Communities just moves that profiling into the jails, forcing local jails to act as ICE agents by scanning everyone who’s booked into a jail for any reason through a national database. As 287(g) has been phased out, Secure Communities has ramped up dramatically and is now being imposed in local jails in the whole country.

S-Comm is responsible for a large number of deportations now, as local jails have been turned into deportation assembly lines. So now if racist local police want to harass immigrants, they just have to arrest someone (for whatever reason or even without a reason), and once they’re booked into the local jail and scanned in the national database, ICE can get their hands on them and the person can be deported even if they are never actually charged with or convicted of any crime.

Our battles are not over. And while we are celebrating the demolishing of 287(g) today, the struggle continues to end the Secure Communities deportation program and all similar programs that continue to tear apart immigrant communities.

#TampaFL #deportations #287g #ImmigrationAndCustomEnforcementICE #SecureCommunities

Los Angeles, CA – Immigrant rights organizations staged a press conference here July 12, to demand that Sheriff Lee Baca stop cooperating with the ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) ‘Secure Communities’ program. The Secure Communities program has resulted in the repression of thousands of immigrants. The press conference was organized by the National Day Labors Organizing Network. Participants included representatives from CARCEN Day Labor Center, ACLU, Pomona Day Labor Center, Southern California Immigration Coalition (SCIC) and CHIRLA.

Pablo Alvarado, with National Day Labors Organizing Network, said the L.A. County jail under Sheriff Baca deports more people per year than Arizona’s Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Alvarado also said that when President Obama was looking to push Secure Communities, he wanted Sheriff Baca’s support, because Los Angeles is trend-setting city.

Carlos Montes spoke on behalf of the Southern California Immigration Coalition, demanding that Sheriff Baca stop collaborating with ICE and that Baca support the Trust Act legislation. The Trust Act, which already passed in the California Senate, allows local police to not honor ICE detainer requests. This would prevent the deportation of thousands of mostly Mexican immigrants.

Montes also stated that SCIC has been organizing against the police department’s car checkpoints and car impounds, and in support of street vendors. “The police/ICE collaboration causes the detention and deportation of immigrants for minor infractions like traffic violations or street vending, not serious crimes. Many of these police actions are in poor Mexican/Chicano and Black communities – which led to more racial profiling. This leads to distrust of local police for fear of detention and deportation and separation from families,” says Montes.

#LosAngelesCA #immigrantRights #CarlosMontes #ImmigrationAndCustomsEnforcementICE #SecureCommunities #SheriffBaca #SComm #NationalDayLaborsOrganizingNetwork

Minneapolis, MN – On February 18 more than 50 immigrants and supporters protested against a new deportation program imposed in Minnesota. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) imposed the controversial “Secure Communities” deportation program in all 87 Minnesota counties on February 7. The protesters gathered at People’s Plaza in downtown Minneapolis to denounce the program and call for an end to deportations. Over a million people have been deported in the last three years leaving massive numbers of separated children and families, largely as a result of deportation programs like Secure Communities.

The Minneapolis protest was organized by the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAc). The first speaker at the rally was Hennepin County Commissioner Gail Dorfman, who encouraged activists to continue to press to end Secure Communities and also spoke against the state legislature’s cuts to emergency medical assistance for immigrants. Susana De Leon of the National Lawyers Guild spoke about the effect of deportation programs like Secure Communities on the community and encouraged people to continue to organize to stop this program at the national level and county-by-county. Isaac Martin of MIRAc encouraged people to get invovled in MIRAc’s No More Deportations campaign which aims to stop Secure Communities and other ICE deportation programs in Minnesota such as the Criminal Alien Program.

After the speakers, the group marched across the street to the Hennepin County Detention Center, which is one of the jails where Secure Communities is now implemented. Protesters chanted and spoke out against Hennepin County Sheriff Stanek, who is in charge of the jail and pushed hard to get Minnesota to participate in Secure Communities. Immigrant rights activists are pushing for county sheriffs and county boards to stop cooperating with ICE’s requests to local jails to detain people for extra time (at the county’s cost) that ICE wants to take away for deportation, even after the local jail would have otherwise released them. Several counties across the country, including Santa Clara, CA, Cook County, IL and Washington DC, are now refusing to honor such ICE hold requests as a way to counteract jail-based deportation programs like Secure Communities that ICE has imposed on counties that don’t want to participate.

#MinneapolisMN #MIRAc #Deportation #MinnesotaImmigrantRightsActionCommittee #SecureCommunities

Minneapolis, MN – On Feb. 7, Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced that they imposed the highly controversial “Secure Communities” deportation program on all 87 counties in Minnesota. In response, the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAc) announced a protest on Saturday, Feb. 18 at noon. The protest will start at People’s Plaza (300 S 6th Street, Minneapolis) and then march across the street to the Hennepin County Detention Center, one of the jails where this deportation program is now activated. Hennepin County Sheriff Richard Stanek, the controversial figure who is in charge of the Hennepin County jail, pushed hard for Minnesota to participate in Secure Communities.

According to Isaac Martin of MIRAc, “This news is horrifying. This program would compromise community safety and separate families here in Minnesota. We call on county and local officials to refuse to honor ICE detainer requests and we call on President Obama to end the horribly misnamed 'Secure Communities'. This program just doesn't make any communities more secure, and in fact it makes immigrant and Latino communities much more insecure by separating hundreds of thousands of parents from their children.”

Secure Communities is a deportation program run by ICE that operates in county and local jails. Under the program, anyone booked into jail for whatever reason has his or her fingerprints taken and run through a national FBI database to try to determine their immigration status. ICE flags people they think might be undocumented then takes them from the county jail to start a deportation process. The program has been the main culprit in the dramatic rise in deportations since President Obama took office. Under eight years of the Bush administration, 1.6 million people were deported. In contrast, after only three years of the current administration, there have already been 1.2 million deportations, a much higher annual rate.

The Secure Communities program claims to focus on deporting violent criminals. But since so many people that pass through county and local jails don’t ever end up getting charged with anything, and most are there for trivial or non-violent reasons, the vast majority of people deported under Secure Communities – more than 70%, according to data ICE was forced to release under a Freedom of Information lawsuit – are not criminals at all. Most immigrants that end up in the county jail are there because of things like being arrested due to being racially profiled while driving, not because they have done anything criminal.

Such racial profiling in traffic stops has been thoroughly documented in Minnesota via a study commissioned by the Minnesota legislature. The results of the resulting Minnesota Statewide Racial Profiling Study showed that:

“Law enforcement officers stopped Black, Latino, and American Indian drivers at greater rates than White drivers, searched Blacks, Latinos, and American Indians at greater rates than White drivers, and found contraband as a result of searches of Blacks, Latinos, and American Indians at lower rates than in searches of White drivers … These disparities are particularly large for Blacks and Latinos … The pattern for Blacks and Latinos existed in nearly every participating jurisdiction.”

This documented racial profiling, combined with the Secure Communities program, means that thousands of people who have done nothing wrong are getting pulled over just because they appear Latino or Black and then end up getting deported and having their families torn apart for no reason other than that they were driving to work and have dark skin. Once their fingerprints are run through ICE’s database via Secure Communities, they are likely to end up being deported even if they aren’t charged with or convicted of any crime.

When the program started, at ICE said the Secure Communities program was optional and that counties or states could opt out if they didn’t want to participate. So immigrant rights activists convinced several counties to vote to opt out of the program. In response, ICE changed the rules and declared that counties couldn’t opt out once their state had signed a contract for the program. Then activists convinced several states to vote to leave the program and ICE changed the rules yet again – voiding all the state contracts and announcing they would just implement the program themselves directly with county jails, against the will of states and counties that don’t want to participate.

The Feb. 7 announcement of imposing the program on all 87 Minnesota counties comes in that context. Minnesota was one of the few remaining states that hadn’t implemented the program in any counties. During last year’s state legislative session, Republican Senator Julianne Ortmann teamed up with Hennepin County Sheriff Stanek to try to sneak Secure Communities into a massive budget bill at the end of the legislative session. Immigrant rights activists were able to exert enough pressure so that Governor Dayton vetoed the bill and that section of the bill was removed. Now ICE has bypassed state leaders entirely, in an attempt to force local police and jails to act as ICE agents.

MIRAc is calling on President Obama to end the Secure Communities program nationally and is calling on Minnesota county sheriffs and county boards to refuse to honor ICE hold requests in the county jails. Currently, if ICE asks a local jail to hold someone past the time the local jail has finished their business with an individual, the jail then holds them for that extra time at the local jail’s own expense. Several counties across the U.S. – including Cook County, Illinois; Santa Clara County, California and Washington D.C. – are now changing their policies, so they will no longer cooperate with such unfunded ICE requests that lead to deportation. Such policy changes undercut jail-based deportation programs like Secure Communities and the “Criminal Alien Program”. Such changes in policy are spreading rapidly around the country in response to ICE’s repeated attempts to force cities and counties to massively deport people even when they don’t want to do so.

#MinneapolisMN #deportations #MIRAc #MinnesotaImmigrantRightsActionCommittee #SecureCommunities #SheriffStanek #SComm

Los Angeles, CA – Demanding “Stop SCOMM” and “No deportations,” members of the Southern California Immigration Coalition denounced Sheriff L. Baca at his annual prayer breakfast here, Jan 14.

SCOMM, which goes by the name “Secure Communities,” is the Immigration Custom Enforcement/police program that attacks poor and working class immigrants, mostly Mexican and Central American, who are caught up in traffic or other minor infractions.

SCOMM advocate Sheriff Baca wrote an editorial saying undocumented people do not have civil rights. His jails are under investigation for brutality against people awaiting trial and for corruption by Sheriffs deputies.

The protesters told Baca that they will not accept the detainment and deportation of thousands of their people by his police/ICE collaboration by SCOMM and 287g.

Protesters, including veteran Chicano leader Carlos Montes, whose home was raided by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s SWAT team May 17, 2011, demanded that Baca resign now.

The Southern California Immigration Coalition (SCIC) has been working with many groups who support these demands.

To get involved in the fight for immigrants rights and unite for an upcoming May 1, 2012 march and rally, come to SCIC meetings, which are held the 2nd and 4th Sunday of every month. For more information: www.immigrationcoalition.org.

#LosAngelesCA #deportations #SouthernCaliforniaImmigrationCoalition #287g #SecureCommunities #SheriffBaca #SComm

Los Angeles, CA – Sheriff Lee Baca was met by an angry protest, Dec. 18, as he arrived to speak at Village Church in West Lost Angeles. When he arrived, his car quickly sped off and he tried to get into the church via the back driveway. But young protesters ran and confronted him chanting, “Baca estamos en la lucha, alto a la Poli/Migra, alto a las deportaciones!”

Lupe Ramirez, a vendor, spoke about the Sheriff Department’s harassment of vendors near L.A. Metro stations and of vendors being deported after arrests for minor infractions – like vending.

The Community Service Organization (CSO) and Southern California Immigration Coalition organized this protest to express their anger that Sheriff Baca would be honored keynote speaker at an event sponsored by faith leaders.

Baca spoke on the topic of “Unity in Diversity.” Earlier this year, Sheriff Baca wrote a Los Angeles Times editorial saying immigrants shouldn't have civil rights. Sheriff Baca is a strong advocate of Secure Communities (SCOMM), the ICE/police program that has led to the detention and deportation of thousands of primarily Mexican and Central American working class immigrants.

The L.A. city council and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa have officially opposed SCOMM. Several major cities like New York, Washington D.C. and San Francisco have opted out of SCOMM.

The L.A. County Sheriff’s Department and Sheriff Baca are facing two investigations by the FBI for corruption and physical abuse by Sheriff’s Deputies of Blacks and Chicanos awaiting trial in the L.A.’s overcrowded county jails.

Alicia Alvarez, the mother of Johnathan Cuevas, killed unjustifiably by the L.A. county sheriffs, spoke to the media and protesters about the killing of her young son. She and her family have united with the grassroots immigrant rights movement to demand justice for victims of SCOMM and killings by the sheriffs. The L.A. county sheriffs have a long history of killing Chicanos; in the early 1990s the killing of Smokey Jimenez at the Ramona Housing Projects and David Angel Ortiz led to many protests and some reforms. The killing of famous Chicano reporter Ruben Salazar, on Aug. 29, 1970, during the Chicano Moratorium protest against the Vietnam War, is still a major controversy with the Chicano community.

The protest is part of an ongoing campaign to pressure Sheriff Baca to opt out of the Secure Communities ICE program. “Wherever Baca goes we will be there,” shouted the protesters.

Carlos Montes is a CSO (Community Service Organization) organizer. For more information: www.csosite.org

#LosAngelesCA #SecureCommunities #SheriffBaca

Starting in the heart of the historic Los Angeles district of La Placita, the militant march first headed to the Metropolitan Federal Detention Center, where the chants of, “Obama, escucha! Estamos en la lucha,” and “Esta es nuestra tierra, esta es nuestra lucha!” rang out. Speakers denounced President Obama for continuing to support Secure Communities (SCOMM). “‘Secure communities’ makes for the insecure communities of the Poli Migra,” said one demonstrator.

Carlos Montes talked about the FBI role in advocating for SCOMM and the current attack on anti-war activists. Loyda Alvarado, the rally emcee, spoke of the need to protest for immigrant rights on International Human Rights Day. Surita Patel, an attorney with Center for Constitutional Rights, talked about the lawsuit filed against Sheriff Lee Baca and the L.A. county sheriffs, demanding the release of data on how SCOMM had been used against immigrants. Miriam, a street vendor, spoke about how the L.A. sheriffs harass and constantly ticket street vendors trying to survive.

The march then headed to the Los Angeles County Central Jail. There, Pablo Alvarado, leader of the National Day Laborers Organizing Network, denounced SCOMM as a tool of ICE and local sheriffs to deport more immigrants. Dream Network students Jonathan and Isaac talked about their protest in Alabama at an ICE office and how they saw hundreds of immigrants crowded in ICE detention centers.

Also speaking at the jail, Erick Huerta spoke of the impact of SCOMM on undocumented students and youth who are left alone after their parents are deported. Gerard Lenoir, an African American activist with the U.S. Human Rights Network, express solidarity and condemned the racist anti-immigrant laws recently passed in Georgia and Alabama. A representative of the International League of People’s Struggle spoke of the plight of Asian immigrants from the Philippines. Day laborer Mariano Hernandez spoke of the constant harassment and fear of police when trying to work.

The marchers pointed out that Sheriff Lee Baca is a strong advocate of SCOMM, which has caused untold suffering for thousands of working class immigrants. Sheriff Baca was also called upon to resign because of the conditions in the L.A. County jails, which include the beating of prisoners and corruption, like sheriff deputies selling cell phones to prisoners. The FBI is investigating these charges against the sheriffs.

The march included members of the U.S. Human Rights Network, National Day Laborers Organizing Network, Southern California Immigration Coalition, Committee to Stop FBI Repression – L.A., Union del Barrio, International Action Center, Mecha de Santee HS, SGV Dream Network, CHIRLA, CARECEN, Pomona Day Labor Center, CLASE and others.

#LosAngelesCalifornia #LosAngeles #PoorPeoplesMovements #ICE #PeoplesStruggles #ChicanoLatino #WorkersAndGlobalization #SecureCommunities #SCOMM #Baca

Despite widespread opposition to S-Comm, the Obama administration has continued to insist on implementing it nationwide by 2013. Now it's clear that the FBI is playing a large behind-the-scenes role in pushing to make it mandatory and preventing counties and states from opting out of the controversial program.

The FBI's role in all this was exposed from internal documents and emails that the FBI was forced to release in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), the National Day Laborer Organization Network (NDLON) and the Cardozo Immigration Justice Clinic.

At first counties were told they could opt out of the controversial deportation program. Then after several counties voted to opt out of the program (which is implemented in county jails), they were then told that counties couldn't opt out individually because S-Comm was implemented via statewide contracts. Then Illinois, Massachusetts and California sought to withdraw from the program. As entire states started to opt out, the government changed the rules again and announced the program would be imposed nationwide and no states would be able to opt out. Now immigrant rights activists are calling for the program to be scrapped entirely.

S-Comm purportedly aims to deport immigrants who commit crimes, but in fact a large majority of the people deported under the program have committed no crimes or are only guilty of things like driving without a drivers license to get to work (immigrants are not able to get drivers licenses in most states).

The new documents reveal that FBI Assistant Director Jerome Pender expressed fears about the anti-S-Comm movement’s effect on the FBI’s relationship with states and localities and described the FBI’s position in the S-Comm controversy as “being stuck in the middle of a nuclear war.” Pender wrote: “I don’t see how we can use [fingerprint] data in a way the owner explicitly bans. This could cause the whole CJIS model [of information sharing between the FBI and states and localities] to implode.” (Email chain between Deputy Assistant Director of CJIS’s Operations Branch, Jerome Pender, CJIS Assistant Director, Daniel Roberts, Deputy Assistant Director, Stephen Morris, and other FBI officials, May 10, 2011, FBI-SC-FPL-00487-488).

So rather than backing off on their plan for massive biometric data collection, the FBI continued to ignore state and local governments' demands to limit the use of their data and instead continued to press for S-Comm to be mandatory and expanded data sharing to other domestic agencies and foreign governments.

According to the documents, the FBI “recognizes a need to collect as much biometric data as possible . . . and to make this information accessible to all levels of law enforcement, including International agencies.” Accordingly, it “continues to work aggressively to build biometric databases that are comprehensive and international in scope.” (Interoperability Initiatives Unit, FBI CJIS, December 2010, SC-FBI-FPL-1143-1159, at 1143.)

Jessica Karp of the National Day Laborers Organizing Network said, “The rise of the FBI’s surveillance system places all of our civil rights at risk ... It’s clear that the FBI and ICE’s pursuit of massive personal biometric data collection as a goal in itself tramples on the rights of individuals and states. Secure Communities needs to be ended before more are trapped in its dragnet.”

Anh Pham, an immigrant rights activist who is also involved in the Committee to Stop FBI Repression said, “‘Secure Communities’ criminalizes Latino immigrant communities and has separated over 100,000 families. Now we know the FBI was pushing this program behind the scenes. The FBI has also criminalized Arabs, Muslims and Palestinians since 911, and is now engaged in a grand jury witch hunt against anti-war and international solidarity activists too, trying to lock up dedicated anti-war activists under allegations of supporting ‘terrorism’. We need to unite against the criminalization of immigrants and activists across the board.”

An annotated index to the newly-released internal FBI documents on S-Comm is here: http://uncoverthetruth.org/featured/new-fbi-documents-released-11-10-11/

#MinneapolisMN #FBI #deportations #CommitteeToStopFBIRepression #SecureCommunities #NationalDayLaborersOrganizingNetwork

Saint Paul, MN – Amidst the flurry of budget cuts hastily pushed through on July 19 and signed on July 20 on the 20th day of the state government shutdown, immigrant rights activists claimed one victory and one defeat amidst the chaos.

The victory is that the Secure Communities deportation program was not included in the final Public Safety/Judiciary budget bill. This makes Minnesota one of the states that continues to refuse to implement the controversial fingerprint-sharing deportation program that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Obama administration are trying to implement nationwide. It was recently revealed that the program has a behind-the-scenes push from the FBI, which is hungry to universalize such programs that gather biometric data on as many people as possible.

The absence of the Secure Communities program from the Public Safety bill was a reversal from the version of the bill that passed at the end of the legislative session in late May. About a week before the Minnesota legislative session ended, Sen. Ortman ® snuck the deportation program into SF1143, an omnibus bill, with no debate, discussion or committee hearings, and it quickly passed with an unanimous 57-0 vote. Then just before the end of the session, Secure Communities was transferred into SF958, the Public Safety bill, which the legislature passed just before the session ended on May 23. However, on May 24, Governor Dayton vetoed SF958, along with all the other budget bills.

According to Anh Pham of the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAc), “Preventing Secure Communities deportation program from being implemented in Minnesota is a victory. Because of this, there will be fewer families torn apart over the next year. The No More Deportations campaign will continue working to stop the other deportation programs that are already separating families in Minnesota. Even one separated family is too many.”

The setback for immigrant rights this session is that the national E-Verify program was inserted into the State Government Finance bill. The new law says that any company with contracts with the state of Minnesota over $50,000 will need to use E-Verify to screen their workers for immigration status. In 2008 Governor Pawlenty implemented this same policy administratively through an executive order. When Dayton became governor last year, he decided to let this and another of Pawlenty’s anti-immigrant executive orders expire without renewing them. According to Anh Pham, “It was a step forward when Gov. Dayton let Pawlenty’s anti-immigrant executive orders expire. Now it’s a step back to have the unreliable and unfair e-verify program put into law in Minnesota. The Republican leadership and Governor Dayton shouldn't have done this.”

Battle over Cuts and Taxing the Rich Led to Shutdown

At the end of the regular legislative session in May, Governor Dayton’s vetoed all the Republican-crafted budget bills that contained severe budget cuts with no new revenue. Dayton instead favored an approach of keeping some budget cuts, but cutting less severely by raising taxes on the richest 2% of Minnesota. The Republicans wouldn’t budge from their all-cuts and ‘no new taxes’ pledge, protecting the richest 2% of Minnesotans from paying even a tiny bit more in taxes while the budgets for education, transit, health and human services programs are gutted. This impasse led to the state government shutdown on July 1.

In mid-July Gov. Dayton finally gave in to the obstinate Republicans, announcing he would accept their June 30 budget proposal made right before the shutdown. This led to a sudden and furious push by the governor and the Republican legislative leadership to hastily rewrite all nine budget bills behind closed doors, without debate or time for public review, at the special legislative session that Gov. Dayton initiated on July 19 with only a couple hours notice.

The Health and Human Services bill has severe cuts. Among other things, $58 million are taken from TANF funds designated for poor people. According to Linden Gawboy of the Welfare Rights Committee, “TANF is supposed to be used for poor families, but because they didn't tax the rich, they had to steal from the poorest of the poor.” Education, transit and other key services are not spared either.

One Front in the State-by-State Battle Over Immigrant Rights

In the absence of national immigrant rights legislation, battles are being fought state-by-state. Over the last few years, deportations that separate immigrant families have increased around the country to levels not seen even under the Bush administration. Secure Communities is a program that is responsible for a large part of this increase in deportations. States opt in to the ICE program, and then force counties to connect booking information from county jails to a federal database used by both ICE and the FBI. ICE claims that Secure Communities focuses on deporting “dangerous criminals”. But over 70% of the people deported under Secure Communities have not been convicted of any crime or have only been convicted of minor traffic-type offenses.

While harsh anti-immigrant laws are being passed in states like Arizona, Georgia and Alabama, immigrant rights activists have struck back against repressive ICE programs in other states. Specifically ICE and the Obama administration are on the defensive around the country about the Secure Communities deportation program. Illinois, Massachusetts and New York announced they want to get out of the program. California’s Assembly voted to allow it’s counties to opt out if they want to. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus came out against it as well as many other congresspeople. Dozens of counties and cities around the country have also tried to opt out of Secure Communities.

In response, ICE told states and counties that they can not opt out, but this just caused more states and counties to say they don’t want to participate. In damage control mode as more states abandoned ship, the Obama administration finally announced in mid-June that they would make minor reforms to the embattled program. But most activist groups see this as too little too late. Dozens of immigrant rights and civil liberties organizations jointly signed a letter to ICE director John Morton on July 20 condemning their inadequate review and reforms of Secure Communities, and instead demanding that a moratorium be called to halt the program entirely.

#SaintPaulMN #ICE #deportations #MIRAc #ImmigrationAndCustomsEnforcementICE #MinnesotaImmigrantRightsActionCommittee #NoMoreDeportationsCampaign #SecureCommunities #GovernorMarkDayton #governmentShutdown #everify

St. Paul, MN – On May 20, protesters from the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAc) and the No More Deportations campaign marched through the State Capitol chanting “‘Secure Communities’ divides families – no more deportations!” and “Immigrant workers are under attack – what do we do? Stand up fight back!” At the same time, several other progressive groups also protested noisily inside the capitol as the end of the session looms with unprecedented cuts and attacks on every front.

The immigrant rights protesters marched to Governor Dayton’s office to deliver a statement urging him to veto SF 1143, the Omnibus Data Practices Bill, until Republican Senator Julie Ortman’s amendment mandating participation in the “Secure Communities” deportation program is removed. On May 16, Sen. Ortman inserted the Secure Communities amendment in the bill without any committee hearings, debate or discussion and it quickly passed the Senate. As of the writing of this article, it has not yet been approved by the House.

MIRAc’s statement condemned Sen. Ortman’s move of sneaking the highly controversial Secure Communities deportation program into a larger omnibus bill at the end of the session without debate. The MIRAc statement calls on Gov. Dayton to veto the bill until the deportation program is removed, and says it’s a bad program that’s separating thousands of children from their parents. While the program is supposed to focus on deporting criminals, more than 70% of the people it deports are not convicted of any crime or are only convicted of minor traffic-type violations.

Although the Obama administration’s stated goal is to have Secure Communities implemented in all states by 2013, the tide seems to be turning against the program. Illinois just withdrew from Secure Communities, California is trying to renegotiate their agreement because of ICE’s dishonest conduct in forcing it on them; the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and other prominent legislators have come out against it; and increasing numbers of cities and counties are passing resolutions saying they don’t want it. The Secure Communities deportation program, along with ICE’s other main deportations programs, 287g and the “Criminal Alien Program” (CAP), have resulted in deportations rising dramatically under the Obama administration to record levels never seen even under President Bush.

Protesters on different issues unite in the capitol

As MIRAc stood outside the governor's office, some disability rights activists who were there with their own protest joined in with the immigrant rights chants. The immigrant rights protesters delivered their letter to governor’s secretary, then marched back through the capitol again. On the second floor of the capitol outside chamber where legislators were meeting, they joined with protesters for LGBT marriage equality who cheered as the immigrant rights protesters joined them. Together they chanted unified chants that applied to both issues: “Equal rights!” “Vote no!” and “Create jobs, not hate!” as the spontaneous solidarity energized both groups.

Inside the House chamber, the legislative session had erupted in chaos a few hours earlier when Republican legislators invited Pastor Bradlee Dean to lead the opening prayer for the day’s session. This was the day they were expected to vote to authorize an anti-gay referendum, so many people from the LGBT community and their allies were already mobilized to protest. Pastor Bradlee Dean launched into a partisan tirade, throwing the session into chaos. Dean was quickly indentified as a pastor who preaches that GLBT people should be put to death. The Republicans, who had been insisting that their marriage referendum proposal is not based on anti-gay prejudice or hate, left the session in disarray to caucus for an hour to figure out how to do damage control. They emerged with a contrite apology. But hours later, LGBT equality protesters were still chanting non-stop outside the chamber as legislators met inside, their powerful voices reverberating throughout the capitol. Their protest went into the night, and they plan to continue protesting non-stop as long as the legislature is in session.

Many union members were also at the capitol pressing legislators to focus on creating jobs, after having rallied earlier in the day. SEIU and other unions are planning a large rally at the Capitol on Saturday, May 21, and the public sector unions AFSCME and MAPE are calling on workers to descend on the capitol May 23 from 9:00 p.m. until midnight to have an overwhelming presence until the last second of the legislative session.

On all issues the demands are similar: telling the Republican-controlled legislature to stop the attacks and cuts, and demanding that Governor Dayton veto the legislature’s attacks and cuts.

#SaintPaulMN #deportations #MIRAc #MinnesotaImmigrantRightsActionCommittee #NoMoreDeportationsCampaign #SecureCommunities #GovernorMarkDayton

St. Paul, MN – On April 14, immigrant rights activists in Minnesota celebrated a victory as Governor Mark Dayton announced he would not pursue an Executive Order collaborating with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on deportations and enforcement programs.

Earlier on April 5, Governor Dayton announced he would let two Executive Orders concerning immigration enforcement left over from former Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty expire and that he would spend about a week deciding whether to pursue any new executive orders regarding immigration.

The first order he let expire was Pawlenty’s order mandating employers with state contracts to check new employees using the E-Verify federal immigration database. The second order was one that directed state agencies to pursue cooperation with ICE to carry out deportations and other punitive enforcement wherever possible, including the Criminal Alien Program (CAP) and 287g agreements with the Department of Public Safety, among other things. CAP is responsible for many deportations in Minnesota and is implemented in the county jails. 287g is a program that trains police officers to act both as local police and as Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents.

When former Governor Pawlenty, who is now running for the Republican presidential nomination, announced the immigration enforcement executive orders in January 2008, it touched off a firestorm of protests and criticisms. Most considered the executive orders to be little more than divide-and-conquer political grandstanding in an election year, yet the orders had a real effect in making life more difficult for immigrants in Minnesota.

The Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee ( MIRAc) is waging a No More Deportations campaign which aims to stop Minnesota and its counties from collaborating with ICE deportation programs like CAP, 287g and Secure Communities. MIRAc put out a statement encouraging people to call Governor Dayton to demand that he not pursue any further collaboration with ICE on deportation or enforcement programs.

According to Niger Arevalo of MIRAc, “It’s good that Governor Dayton didn’t renew Pawlenty’s anti-immigrant executive orders. But this is just the beginning – immigrant workers are still being deported and families are being separated at an alarming rate in Minnesota and this has to stop now. The No More Deportations campaign wants to make sure that Governor Dayton does not implement the so-called Secure Communities deportation program. And we’re calling on the Hennepin County Board of Commissioners to vote to stop cooperating with ICE through the Criminal Alien Program. We encourage people to join our campaign to stop deportations in Minnesota.”

#SaintPaulMN #InJusticeSystem #ICE #MIRAc #ImmigrationAndCustomsEnforcementICE #MinnesotaImmigrantRightsActionCommittee #287g #CriminalAlienProgram #NoMoreDeportationsCampaign #SecureCommunities #GovernorMarkDayton

Minneapolis, MN – On Dec. 19 activists from the No More Deportations campaign brought their message to the New York Plaza shopping center on Lake Street in Minneapolis. In the Latino market, activists explained the campaign to weekend shoppers and signed up dozens of people on the petition to stop deportations in Hennepin County.

The No More Deportations campaign is an all-volunteer effort to stop deportations in Hennepin County. They are organizing community outreach and education activities like this to explain how immigrants can exercise their rights and be part of the struggle to stop deportations that tear apart families and communities.

Many shoppers stopped to listen as activists explained about the No More Deportations campaign. The campaign aims to stop Hennepin County Jails from cooperating with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) through the so-called Criminal Alien Program (CAP). The campaign also aims to block the so-called Secure Communities program from being implemented in Hennepin County. It’s not here yet, but the Obama administration wants to implement it nationwide by 2013. These programs, along with 287g, are responsible for the majority of deportations under the Obama administration.

Under the CAP program, during the jail booking process people are asked where they’re from, and if they’re immigrants their file is flagged so that ICE comes to interview them and possibly start the deportation process, even if the person is never charged with or convicted of a crime. Likewise, under the Secure Communities program, people are fingerprinted when they are booked into jail, and their fingerprints are run through a national database to see if they should be deported. County jails are not obligated to participate in these deportation programs. The No More Deportations campaign aims to convince the Hennepin County Commissioners to vote to cut off these programs.

At New York Plaza, four activists with the campaign did a street theater to demonstrate that immigrants should exercise their right to not talk to the police or let the police into their house without a warrant, because they could end up getting deported. Christian performed a spoken word decrying the government for its repression against immigrants and all oppressed people and Niger explained the Secure Communities and Criminal Alien Programs, encouraging people to get involved in the campaign to demand that the Hennepin County Commissioners stop these programs.

The No More Deportations campaign was initiated by the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAc), a Twin Cities-based immigrant rights group fighting for legalization and full equality for immigrants.

#MinneapolisMN #InJusticeSystem #MIRAc #ImmigrationAndCustomsEnforcementICE #Deportation #MinnesotaImmigrantRightsActionCommittee #CriminalAlienProgram #NoMoreDeportationsCampaign #SecureCommunities #CAP