Author: mopress

By Susan Van Haitsma

A brief reflection posted on Susan’s makingpeace blog fits with our theme this Flag Day 2008. And Susan says it will be okay if we post it here, too.–gm

I’m glad that for another year, Austin is hosting the Republic of Texas Biker Rally and the Austin Pride Parade on the same weekend. As the years
go by, I hope there will be more overlap of people between the events.

Last month, my partner and I spent a weekend in Fredericksburg when there happened to be several biker rallies in the vicinity. We had a chance to talk with a group of bikers about their passion for the open road and biker culture.

I asked if they knew of any male-female biker couples who rode with the woman driving and the man sitting behind her. They responded with
quips like, “only if he’s sick and she’s taking him to the hospital.”

They said there are definitely more women riding solo at the rallies, but women just don’t drive with men on the back. One of the women in the group said she wouldn’t necessarily want a guy sitting behind her anyway.

But I’m going to hope some biker dudes decide that being a real man means
not being afraid to be the passenger for a change. Isn’t part of biker culture about freedom from convention?

Be a rebel, guys. Defy the biker status quo, and see how good it feels when a woman is doing the driving.

I was thinking about the issue of gender expectation and tradition in relation to the Pride Parade also. One of the families in our neighborhood is a household of two gay men and their 3 children, each born of a surrogate
mother and fathered biologically by one of the men.

As I observe my neighbors raising their children, I notice ways they take on more equal
parenting roles. The men are freed from the baggage associated with societal expectations and traditions of man-woman parenting couples. I
think their more naturally equal relationship gives all couples some cues for ways that parenting can be more equally shared.

So, thank you to all the parents, couples and individuals of all ages out there who show what equality means by living it. Whether you’re two men on a bike, two women, or a pioneering pair with a woman in the driver’s seat, you’re helping build a republic of Texas that we’ll be proud to live in.

By Nick Braune

I noticed that an activist friend of mine was quoted in an article, and the issues being raised seemed very important. I called Martha Sanchez at her office in Mission and asked for a quick interview. She is an organizer for La Uni*n del Pueblo Entero (LUPE).

Nick Braune: I noticed in the Rio Grande Guardian that you and Juanita Valdez-Cox, the LUPE director, have been meeting with police officials recently about enforcement practices. What is the problem you are trying to resolve?

Martha Sanchez: We met with the police chiefs of La Joya, Peñitas, and Palmview because we had received phone calls from our members with complaints of incidents where the police had stopped people for traffic violations and then called the Border Patrol. We are trying to let the police chiefs know that we are active advocates for our members. We also want to provide a dialogue between the police and members so that our members will not be afraid of them.

Braune: If I understand this right, you are hoping that the local police do not see their role as enforcing immigration laws. Is that a major issue?

Sanchez: We remind them of their real role to protect and serve, which is not to do the work of immigration. And we explain to them that when they act as immigration officers, they lose the confidence of the people, and these people will be less likely to call on the police when major crimes and emergencies happen.

Braune: What is the concern about driver’s licenses and the LUPE cards?

Sanchez: Many working people we advocate for don’t have an ID. We are offering our membership cards as an alternative; this way the police can identify the individual instead of simply calling the Border Patrol as some of the departments were doing.

Braune: I read in the Valley Morning Star today about Operation Streamline starting up near Brownsville, and I was shocked. The paper made it clear to me that it is a major Border Patrol sweep, and it is not just sending immigrants back home for being out of compliance in their paperwork. Operation Streamline intends to hit the undocumented with criminal charges and apparently intends to send many tens of thousands more to prison, for periods of up to six months, before deportation. And I loved Juanita Valdez-Cox’s comment in the Guardian that it would make the private jail companies rich. Any more comments on this Operation Streamline?

Sanchez: About Operation Streamline, we are asking this: Who is going to be making money on these jails? And we make the further point that we are all going to suffer with the shortage of workers. Who is going to pick the crops and who is going to clean the dishes in the restaurants? Who is going to take care of the children when we work outside of home? We hope that everybody knows we will have to pay more money for services if Operation Streamline takes hold. But the big issue is this: When the government slaps more and more people with criminal charges, this will make it impossible for these undocumented workers to ever have a chance of getting legitimate work papers, because they will then have a criminal record.

Curious about Operation Streamline?

An article in Harlingen’s Valley Morning Star on June 11 reports that the new policy intends “criminal prosecution of every migrant caught crossing the border without documentation,” and the article calls it a “zero-tolerance” deterrence policy. (I personally consider both “zero tolerance” enforcement and “deterrence” generally to be ethically problematic, but I’ll hold that thought.)

Although Operation Streamline has raised criticism in other places like Del Rio, the Valley Morning Star says that it is now hitting our Valley. “The Border Patrol rolled out the policy Monday along a four-mile stretch of Cameron County’s border with Mexico from Brownsville to Fort Brown.”

“Formerly, first time offenders were offered the option of voluntary deportation and were processed, put on a bus and sent back to Mexico within hours of their arrest.” But under Operation Streamline they will be “detained, sent to court, jailed for up to 180 days if found guilty, and then deported.”

In Del Rio where this policy was recently tried, one federal Public Defender, William Fry, was quoted as worrying about due process. “We get a case on Wednesday and the court expects us to be ready to go by Friday. That’s not enough time to adequately represent a client.”

I called Meredith Linsky, a Harlingen attorney practicing immigration defense law:

Braune: What did you think of the report in the Valley Morning Star?

Meredith Linsky: I am greatly dismayed by the expansion of Operation Streamline. Our country has clearly made a priority of criminalizing immigrants and their efforts to seek work, opportunity and a better future. What would this country look like if this had been done to our parents, our grandparents and our great-grandparents? There needs to be some recognition of the push and pull effects of immigration. If we want to stop illegal immigration, we should invest in Mexico and Central America and punish the employers who provide jobs to undocumented workers.

Braune: The Border Patrol’s streamlined, “zero tolerance,” deterrence policy seems like a mess-maker to me. Do you agree?

Linsky: Yes, expanding law enforcement efforts like Operation Streamline causes needless suffering, including painful separation of families, and it will cost the American taxpayers millions of dollars. Although illegal entry is a crime on the books, the people who enter illegally are usually economic migrants and asylum seekers who come to this country seeking hope, promise and protection. America needs to recognize its own roots and find a legal way to meet the needs of employers and citizens from impoverished nations.

NOTE: a breifer version of this article first appeared in the Mid-Valley Town Crier.–gm

From email, June 17, 2008–gm

Federal immigration prosecutions continued their recent and highly unusual surge in March 2008, apparently reaching an all-time high, according to timely data obtained from the Justice Department by TRAC. The total of 9,350 such prosecutions was up by almost 50% from the previous month and 73% from the previous year.

The spurt in the prosecution of individuals charged with various immigration crimes is the result of “Operation Streamline.” Under this recently intensified administration policy, according to news reports and interviews with federal public defenders, the government has charged a rapidly growing number of undocumented aliens with various federal criminal charges, almost all in selected districts along the Mexican border. “Operation Streamline” began as a pilot project in December 2005 in Del Rio, Texas.

The data further show that virtually every one of the individuals referred by the investigative agencies for prosecution — 99% of them — are then being charged by the U.S. Attorneys, and that the resulting median or typical sentence is one month.

To read the latest TRAC immigration report, go to:

http://trac.syr.edu/immigration/reports/188/

Excerpt from Concurring Opinion of Justice Stevens in the March 25, 2008 ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court in the matter of Medellin v. Texas.

In today’s breaking news, Mexico is renewing appeal to the International Court of Justice (or World Court) to halt the U.S. executions of five Mexican nationals until their cases are reviewed to determine what impact may have resulted from their not having been advised of their rights to assistance from the Mexico consulate offices.

So far, Texas is refusing to acknowledge that a review of the denied rights is appropriate, because procedural rules require issues to be raised earlier. In March, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that neither the World Court nor the President of the USA can order Texas to adjust its procedures in relation to Mexican nationals on death row.

However, in a concurring opinion, excerpted below (with paragraph breaks added for readability), Justice Stevens argues that Texas still has good reasons to want to do the right thing and reopen the cases to assess the impact that Consular representation may have had.

Even though the [International Court of Justice’s] ICJ’s judgment in Avena is
not “the supreme Law of the Land,” U. S. Const., Art. VI, cl. 2, no one disputes
that it constitutes an international law obligation on the part of the United
States. Ante, at 8. By issuing a memorandum declaring that state courts should
give effect to the judgment in Avena, the President made a commendable attempt
to induce the States to discharge the Nation’s obligation.

I agree with the Texas judges and the majority of this Court that the President’s
memorandum is not binding law. Nonetheless, the fact that the President cannot
legislate unilaterally does not absolve the United States from its promise
to take action necessary to comply with the ICJ’s judgment.

Under the express terms of the Supremacy Clause, the United States’ obligation
to “undertak[e] to comply” with the ICJ’s decision falls on each of the States
as well as the Federal Government. One consequence of our form of government
is that sometimes States must shoulder the primary responsibility for protecting
the honor and integrity of the Nation.

Texas’ duty in this respect is all the greater since it was Texas that—by failing to provide consular notice in accordance with the Vienna Convention — ensnared the United States in the current controversy. Having already put the Nation in breach of one treaty, it is now up to Texas to prevent the breach of another.

The decision in Avena merely obligates the United States “to provide, by means
of its own choosing, review and reconsideration of the convictions and sentences
of the [affected] Mexican nationals,” 2004 I. C. J., at 72, ¶153(9), “with
a view to ascertaining” whether the failure to provide proper notice to consular
officials “caused actual prejudice to the defendant in the process of administration
of criminal justice,” id., at 60, ¶121.

The cost to Texas of complying with Avena would be minimal, particularly given the remote likelihood that the violation of the Vienna Convention actually prejudiced José Ernesto Medellín. See ante, at 4–6, and n. 1. It is a cost that the State of Oklahoma unhesitatingly assumed.4

On the other hand, the costs of refusing to respect the ICJ’s judgment are significant. The entire Court and the President agree that breach will jeopardize the United States’ “plainly compelling” interests in “ensuring the reciprocal observance of the Vienna Convention, protecting relations with foreign governments, and demonstrating commitment to the role of international law.” Ante, at 28. When the honor of the Nation is balanced against the modest cost of compliance, Texas would do well to recognize that more is at stake than whether judgments of the ICJ, and the principled admonitions of the President of the United States, trump state procedural rules in the absence of implementing legislation.

The Court’s judgment, which I join, does not foreclose further appropriate action by the State of Texas.

We agree with Justice Stevens that Texas is behaving badly in its stubborn refusal to give hearing to the rights of Mexican nationals. And as Justice Stevens warned, here we go again. Texas stubbornness is the cause of another appeal to the World Court.

To all this we only have one thing more to say: Texas, of all states in the USA, should assume moral leadership when it comes to respecting the international rights of Mexico and Mexican citizens.–gm