Statement against the Polimigra and in favor of full legalization

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Jorge Mujica

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Jul 19, 2009, 12:25:13 PM7/19/09

to 10demarzo, ChicagoMayDay

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

July 18, 2009

Media Contacts: Artemio Arreola: (847)338-5821

The Mexican-American Coalition for Immigration Reform, denounce Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano’s plans to expand the highly criticized 287(g) program to eleven new jurisdictions around the country. The program, authorized in 1996 and widely implemented under the Bush Administration, relinquishes, with no meaningful oversight, immigration enforcement power to local law enforcement and corrections agencies.

MXCIR is a national non-partisan leadership network formed by some of the most influential Mexican-American leaders in the United States, including key elected and appointed Mexican Immigrants in the government sphere (in states like Utah, Illinois, Ohio, Virginia, Michigan, etc.). MXCIR members also represent national and local Hispanic/Latino organizations, home-state associations, labor unions, Spanish-based media, and Mexican-business owners, among others.

We condemn and reject the expansion of this failed program that is clearly not in line with the reform promised by President Obama, and we are sad that dangerous measurements are being promoted by this administration.

Section 287(g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act trains and authorizes local officers to investigate, detain and arrest illegal immigrants on civil and criminal grounds; it also gives local officers the power and the tools to move illegal aliens toward deportation.

It grants access to the ICE database - an essential tool in identifying illegal aliens.

287(g) has been associated with serious civil rights abuses and public safety concerns.

As stated by ACLUs Immigrants’ Rights Project’s staff attorney Omar Jadwat, said, “No amount of tinkering with the 287(g) program is likely to solve the fact that it threatens public safety and undermines the basic guarantee of equal treatment by increasing profiling of people who look or sound ‘foreign.”

Local law enforcement agencies enrolled in the 287(g) ICE program increasingly perpetrate civil rights abuses against immigrants. Everyday, advocates hear stories of abuse of power and racial profiling like the ones perpetrated by the infamous Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, AZ. Also, new allegations of pretextual traffic stops and discriminatory law enforcement have arisen against Sheriff Chuck Jenkins in Frederick County, MD where individuals have been stopped for air fresheners hanging from rearview mirrors, “driving too slow” and for no reason at all just so they can be interrogated about their immigration status.

Preliminary data indicate that in some jurisdictions the majority of individuals arrested under 287(g) are accused of public nuisance or traffic offenses: driving without a seatbelt, driving without a license, broken taillights, and similar offences. Such a pattern of arrests suggest that local sheriff’s deputies are improperly using their 287(g) powers to rid their counties of immigrants, by making pretextual arrests that are then used to forcefully deport people.

We believe that giving local authority the power of deporting immigrants based on traffic violations leaves the community vulnerable to abuses, and produces “fear” among migrant communities that will be inhibited from contacting the police to report crimes.

WE DEMAND AN IMMEDIATE STOP OF THE EXPANSION OF THE PROGRAM 287(G) UNTIL A COMPREHENSIVE IMMIGRATION REFORM IS APPROVED BY THE CONGRESS.