Category: Uncategorized

“At the GOP state convention last night, the Temporary Platform Committee issued a three page platform proposal on immigration that includes identifying and expelling all illegal immigrants, denial of access to the courts to seek entry into the United States … the prohibition of social or healthcare services,” a barrier along the entire border, and expanded use of the National Guard.

Story and platform pdf at Harvey Kronberg’s Quorum Report

Rush transcript under “Read More” [rush transcript]

Border Security – We agree with the overwhelming majority of the American people who support “order on the border” as the primary principle in tackling the complex issues created by illegal immigration. The Party believes that all necessary physical, financial, legal, and technological means must be deployed immediately to stop the flow of illegal aliens, organized crime and potential terrorists across our borders.

The Texas Office of Homeland Security and Federal Drug Enforcement Officials report Texas has become the number one drug trans-shipment center in the nation and that powerful and ruthless Mexican organized crime groups now dominate the lucrative US drug and human smuggling market. In at least one documented instance the Mexican military entered Texas in support of organized drug trafficking operations. Therefore, we urge immediate and substantial increase of staffing and funding of the United States Border Patrol to secure our borders and protect our citizens. The Party encourages the expansion of Operations Strong Safety and Linebacker to reduce crime and increase security along the Texas border, and Operation Rio Grande which increases and coordinates law enforcement assets along the forty-five border counties.

The Party further urges the President to: 1) build a physical barrier along the entire length of our country’s border with Mexico, beginning with urban interface locations and appropriate monitoring 2) deploy the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (I.C.E.) within the U.S. to locate and secure all illegal aliens who have previously entered our country and expedite their return to their source country and 3) expand the use of the National Guard to secure our border.

Should the federal government fail to uphold its constitutionally mandated obligation to protect the border of Texas, we call upon the Governor and Legislature of Texas to take action.

Homeland Security — The Party urges the – Homeland Security Department to:

1. revitalize and adequately fund our national intelligence gathering capabilities;

2. continue to enhance the coordination of information and intelligence between various local, state, and federal agencies;
3. pass the information on to the local or state agency(s) to prepare to deter and defend against a risk once identified;
4. not violate the constitutional rights of the citizens of the United States;
5. provide for the adequate protection of high profile targets, such as refineries, nuclear power plants and national monuments;
6. enhance the security in use at our airports, navigable ports of entry, and other transportation terminals to prevent the use of transportation vehicles as a weapon against the United States;
7. use random selection and terrorist profiling as a criteria (sic) for determining persons to be searched at U.S. airports; and

8. establish and maintain the presence of armed guards and armed pilots on all commercial aircraft and the immediate authorization of the U.S. Navy and Coast Guard to board and search all vessels entering U.S. waters from foreign ports. We urge Congress to order the immediate training of airline pilots by qualified firearms instructors at reasonable fees for the protection of their aircraft against terrorist attack.

9. continue to use: Criminal Law Enforcement Investigators, Texas Highway Patrol strike teams, SWAT teams, aviation assets, Texas Department of Transportation, Texas Department of Criminal Justice tracking teams, Texas Rangers, Department of Public Safety strike teams, Game Wardens, local law enforcement, Civil Air Patrol wherever needed to conduct air and ground operations in support of Homeland Security; We commend Governor Perry for his initiative in utilizing these resources.

10. thoroughly inspect the contents of vehicles and containers coming across our borders, using rapid and accurate technology.

Legal Immigration – The Party believes that America has greatly benefited from immigrants who have legally come to this country to work and begin a new life reflecting American values and traditions.

We support:

1. systematic assimilation of legal immigrants into the American culture; baseline requirements for citizenship to include proficiency in the English language, study of American history and the American form of government;

2. development of a practical, limited, and temporary worker program that does not serve as an automatic path to citizenship;

3. firm and consistent enforcement of all existing immigration laws;

4. an immediate end to the practice of “chain migration”;

5. aggressive locating and deporting of aliens who have overstayed their visas;

6. establishing immigration quotas at levels that are sufficient to meet America’s needs;

7. [blank line in document, the next entry appears to contain two items]

8. An immediate end to the practice of allowing aliens “adjust status” by requiring them to “adjust” in the U.S. Embassy of their home country; and further, a waiver of the unlawful presence inadmissibility for those illegal aliens who register on their return trip to their home country while they legally wait for an immigrant visa. the cessation of the issuance of visas to individuals from foreign countries that sponsor terrorism;

9. screening potential immigrants for communicable diseases;

10. withholding federal funds from universities that give lower in-state tuition rates to immigrants on student visas, or refuse to cooperate with the foreign student tracking system;

11. designating Non-Citizens as such on their driver’s license to prevent voter fraud; further, to require that driver’s licenses expire on the same date of any visa;

12. requiring naturalized citizens to renounce their native citizenship and surrender their foreign passport; and

13. a tamper-proof identification and tracking system for all aliens, i.e. non-citizens and their dependents that would protect Hispanic, and other naturalized US citizens from job discrimination and unburden American businesses from the job of verification.

Illegal Immigration — No amnesty! No how. No way.
With growing impatience, the American people in overwhelming numbers have asked our government to secure our borders. They now demand it and we as a party agree with the American people. Illegal aliens have, by definition, committed a criminal act. The Party opposes illegal immigration, amnesty in any form, or legal status for illegal immigrants. The American people remember the broken promises of 1986 and will not be misled again.

We support:

1. an immediate end to the current “catch and release” policy of Homeland Security;

2. stiffer fines, criminal penalties, and an aggressive enforcement policy for those who knowingly employ illegal workers; and

3. expeditious hearings on deporting non-violent illegal immigrants held in prisons or jails;

4. suspending automatic U.S. citizenship to children born to illegal immigrant parents;

5. elimination of federal funding to cities that have “sanctuary” laws prohibiting local police from identifying and reporting illegal immigrants to fede

ral authorities;

6. empowering state and local law enforcement agencies with the authority, responsibility and resources needed to detain illegal immigrants within the course of their regular duties;

7. the rejection of non-verifiable foreign-issued cards, such as matricula consular as valid identification for official documentation purposes;

8. investigation and strict prosecution of agencies, businesses or persons involved in the production, distribution or acceptance of phony identification document;

9. elimination of day labor work centers;

10. elimination of all laws requiring hospitals to give non-emergency medical care to illegal immigrants;

11. elimination of social security benefits or government funding to illegal immigrants for education, housing and business loans.

12. legislation to prevent any foreign country and/or its citizens from using the judicial system of the United States to gain entrance to the U.S.;

13. strong document verification prior to the issuance of a Texas drivers license to anyone;

14. the withholding of federal highway funds from any state that issues drivers licenses to illegal aliens;

15. aggressive prosecution of persons involved in smuggling humans across our borders.

[end of rush transcript]

By Greg Moses

Weekend Editorial

A friend of the Texas Civil Rights Review writes that the terms honky, cracker, and white devil are “just as racist” as the n-word. Our friend is sick of hearing all these words and says it is time for everyone to move on.

Furthermore, writes our friend, the “power relations” excuse for tolerating the use of honky, cracker, and white devil is invalidated in the experience of poor and blue collar white folks who are just as disempowered as poor and blue collar people of color.

To comment on this article please go to the blog at gregmoses.net

In response, it is difficult to discourage anyone’s sickness at the use of these terms. If something makes one sick, then there is little else to say. Our friend is expressing a noble sickness that may be found in many worthy places, represented by the work of Alex Jones (InfoWars) and Morris Dees (SPLC).

To such worthwhile activists one doesn’t really want to say anything discouraging. If your sickness keeps you going, I’d rather have your sickness than not. It is after all a sickness that works to toss bigotry out of the system, and what could be unhealthy about such a sickness as that?

And yet, if I am not sickened, I am bothered by assertions that racism is a two way street, that all epithets are equal and that the Nation of Islam, the Shrine of the Black Madonna, or other “Black Separatist Groups” belong on the same map with white supremacist groups such as the Klan and Neo-Nazis.

Is it not possible to make alliance with the “tolerance” movement, yet warn that crucial distinctions cannot be dismissed?

As I argued in the Alex Jones essay, everything follows from where one begins. At the Texas Civil Rights Review we begin with a carefully chosen definition of racism.

For our purposes of analysis the Texas Civil Rights Review defines racism as an exploitative power relationship between two groups of people who are differentiated along racial or ethnic lines.

In situations of apartheid and segregation, racism is most clearly depicted. One group exploits another and you can see which group is doing the exploiting. Apartheid and segregation are clear examples of racism, but they are not the only examples.

Sometimes I hang out at tables where people who come from different racial or ethnic heritages chide each other about being Irish, Italian, German, Jewish, Black. We could even imagine a situation where the jabs escalate into fist fights. Here we have plenty of work to do on tolerance, but is this racism?

In order to analyze whether any racism accompanies this bigotry, one must ask: do we find a relationship of exploitation between the ethnic or racial groups involved?

Notice how I can do quite a bit of work on tolerance without having the racism question come up. And this is where I find our friendly correspondent, along with Alex Jones and Morris Dees. Unless we introduce the consideration of racism in just the way we have offered it, all intolerance will be of equal unworthiness. Honky and the n-word; the National Alliance and the Nation of Islam.

But now we ask if racism is relevant to the context of history as we find it today? If we classify populations along racial and ethnic lines do we find between any resulting groups an exploitative relationship? Or to be more blunt about it, do we find living evidence of white power?

The discussion about what we find can be quite a long one, but in the end we ask, do you bring to your analysis of Civil Rights a premise that there is in fact an exploitative relationship between the Anglo population of the USA and other groups of color or ethnicity?

Nor should we forget in the context of Civil Rights law the significant extension of the problem along gender lines: do we find an exploitative relationship between men and women?

Add to the general logic of the problem classes of people who may be counted as disabled, gay-lesbian-bi-trans, or elderly, and we complete a short list of “isms” where collective relationships of exploitation may be asserted. At the Texas Civil Rights Review, we assert exploitation in all theses cases.

Back to the issue of racism in the USA, we assert that there is an exploitative relationship such that when white folks are considered as a class and compared to Black folks, we see a relationship of ONGOING exploitation.

Does this mean that exploitations can only be classified along racial or ethnic lines? No. If regardless of race or ethnicity you compare classes of poor and working folks to classes that have middle incomes and management jobs, then you also have a relationship of exploitation by all means. And if you compare either of these groups to classes of people who actually own major forms of wealth, then again exploitation is difficult to deny.

Simply as a matter of classification, the poor white subject may be counted among many exploited classes, especially if she is working class, woman, lesbian, disabled, and elderly. But when considered strictly along lines of race, she also participates in a class that has exploitative power. How much benefit she derives from membership in the white collective might make for an interesting discussion.

At this time (because who knows what we will learn tomorrow?) the Texas Civil Rights Review asserts that when all interesting examples have been fruitfully explored for their nuance and contradiction, one problem will remain at the end of the day. We will return to a world of white power or white supremacy. This is the usual meaning of racism here.

If your analysis begins somewhere else, your conclusions will follow your premises. One may do great work for tolerance based upon quite different foundations than the one explained above. Many conclusions that follow from a foundation of strict tolerance will also be found here. But we also assert some differences.

If there is an ongoing exploitative relationship in white supremacy, then there are parties who find themselves in predicaments of self-defense. The Black Panther Party for Self Defense put forth a name that we can understand perfectly. The party’s fate also taught us how it can be considered quite subversive to speak so plain. Talk about intolerance; see how they died. The self-defense posture when named for what it is becomes a lightning rod in a thunderstorm. For this reason, even people who deep down agree that folks are in a self-defense situation will for the sake of prudence deny it out loud and counsel against making it a battle cry.

But as I said up top, when people announce they are sick, there is little to be done but listen. And for some parties in the USA, there is an unshakable sickness that visits them under chronic conditions of white supremacy. One may advise them to seek a variety of treaments, but in many cases make no mistake that their sickness is no symptom of hypochondria.

You won’t find us encouraging the use of terms such as honky, cracker, or white devil here at the Texas Civil Rights Review, but when we hear those terms used (as I once heard ‘white devil’ at the Million Youth March in Harlem) you probably won’t find us astonished. And until the day comes when we can pull down the premise of white supremacy from our analysis, you will not find us arguing that the usage of these words among “Black Separatists” is to be equated with the usage of the n-word (or n-lover!) at a Klan rally.

With respect to ethnic relations between Anglo and Hispanic, we deploy much the same logic here (although out of pure weakness I have a fondness for the term Gringo.) The Texas Supreme Court will celebrate the Fourth of July, then it will return to work on July 6 and decide once again how to place the education of poor and Hispanic children on the calendar of justice in Texas. They will take the date when equity arrives and they will either move
it up or push it back. If you don’t call that segregation or apartheid, what do you say?

And homophobia, too. It will be a great day for Texas politics if the homophobic amendment to the Constitution is defeated at the polls. But until then, please don’t tell me that homophobia is a two-way street.

I have to say, I’ve been working in the civil rights movement in Texas for more than a decade, and I’ve heard terms like cracker, honky, whitey, etc. used by activists, all the way up to the occasional Farrakhan-inspired “white devil.” Not that often, but often enough to know it’s not uncommon. The vast majority in the civil rights movement don’t think that way, but some do. I’m personally sick of it and consider it just as racist as the redneck who uses the “n-word,” a word, incidentally often routinely used by some of the same activists, who tend to be from the all-talk-no-action, let’s-whine-about-it crowd, not the folks actually getting stuff done.

I also don’t buy a lot of the stuff about differing power relations justifying bigoted rhetoric by minorites, either – it’s an argument 40 years dated. Very few folks are more disempowered in today’s political environment than a white redneck who routinely uses the “n-word.” To move away from a racist society, I think we have to quit apologizing for it, including racism within the civil rights movement.

Received via email May 31.

Grassroots Leadership Calls for Detention System to be Reformed to Prioritize Dignity and Release, Not Detention For-Profit

Austin, TX – Grassroots Leadership today expressed sadness and outrage at the alleged sexual abuse suffered by several immigrant women detained at the T. Don Hutto detention center in Taylor, Texas.

A prison guard employed by the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), a private, for-profit corporation under federal contract to detain immigrant women at Hutto, allegedly assaulted the women. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) disclosed the abuse to advocates on Friday afternoon. The CCA guard allegedly groped several women and solicited sex from at least one woman while transporting them to the airport for deportation.

The T. Don Hutto detention center is a private prison formerly contracted to detain immigrant families, including small children. Last August, in a victory for Grassroots Leadership and our allies, Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced that it would end family detention at Hutto as part of sweeping reforms to the detention system. The facility now detains women apprehended without children, many of whom are seeking asylum in the United States.

ICE has held up Hutto as a model detention center.

“We are saddened and shocked by this report of abuse,” said Bob Libal, Grassroots Leadership’s Texas Campaigns Coordinator. “While we were heartened that the administration took on reforming the U.S. detention system a year ago, this incident illustrates the inherent problems in an immigration detention system with no meaningful oversight. We hope that this latest news of misconduct in an immigrant detention facility will spur President Obama to action. His administration should should immediately take steps to scale back its growing and out-of-control detention system.”

The sexual abuse scandal is the latest in a series of such incidents at Texas detention centers. In 2007, a CCA employee was fired for inappropriate sexual contact with a female detainee who was held at the facility with her family. Earlier this year, a former Port Isabel Detention Center officer was sentenced to prison for sexual abuse of female detainees over a period of time in 2008.

In 2008, an expose by the WOAI news station in San Antonio reported sexual abuse of female detainees at the GEO Group’s South Texas Detention Center in Pearsall. Reports of sexual abuse against detainees have also plagued MTC’s Willacy County Detention Center.

“These reports show the vulnerability of detained immigrants, especially women, in ICE’s vast and largely private immigrant detention system,” said Donna Red Wing, Executive Director of Grassroots Leadership. “ICE should immediately re-evaluate its contracts with all private prison corporations, and speed the pace of reforms to its system. We are gravely concerned about the reality of women incarcerated for-profit and the impact of these closed corporate facilities on the lives, health and well being of women detainees.”

ICE’s release of information about the reported abuse before a holiday weekend also drew criticism. “ICE has touted its move towards transparency and accountability,” Libal said. “Releasing this report on a Friday afternoon before a long weekend and just hours after meeting with senior administration officials and key detention advocates at the White House is anything but transparent and accountable.”

“Immigration and Customs Enforcement should immediately stop the deportation of and release potential victims of sexual assault until a thorough investigation is completed,” Red Wing said. “ICE should also transform its detention system towards one that prioritizes release over detention for profit. That is the only way to ensure these tragedies do not continue.”