Re: <ChicagoMayDay> FW: Obama praises DREAM Act While Deporting Dreamers

[Neal...@aol.com]

DREAM Act Vote
Legalization for All Now!

The DREAM Act, short for the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act...In taking up this measure the White House and Democrats are once again attempting to hold undocumented youth hostage to government plans to use them as cannon fodder in U.S. wars of aggression. The Pentagon anticipates that passage will provide a yearly pool of 50-60,000 new youth for recruitment.

In an earlier effort, the bill was attached to a Pentagon funding bill, openly demanding that undocumented youth and those supporting them vote in favor of war funding. Now it has been presented as a stand-alone bill, with the White House and Democrats emphasizing its pro-military character. The Pentagon emphasized that the DREAM Act will expand “the market of high-quality patriotic youth, to the advantage of military recruitment and readiness.” The White House said passage would “give students who grew up in the United States a chance to contribute to our country’s well-being by serving in the U.S. Armed Forces,” or pursuing higher education. In some areas various pro-government forces organized rallies at the offices of military recruiters, calling for passage of the DREAM Act so immigrant youth could serve. Thus the drive of the youth and immigrant rights movement demanding Legalization for All Now! is to be diverted into the pro-war ditch of the Pentagon.

The DREAM Act does not address the demands of the youth and immigrant rights movement which recognize that No Human Being Is Illegal! To meet the rights of immigrant youth the government needs to be passing bills that guarantee the right to education for all and provide documentation for all. It is the rights of youth that must be addressed and advancing this fight is the path to securing education and documentation for all. Instead Obama and the Democrats are manuevering to secure a win-win situation for themselves, and a losing one for the youth. If the DREAM Act passes, Democrats will take the credit. If it fails, they can blame Republicans. And either way, their efforts to force the youth and those standing with them to support military recruitment will have been accomplished.

In addition, a main feature of the White House promotion of the DREAM Act is the demand for loyalty to the U.S. Many immigrants, especially the youth, are rejecting the values of the rich supporting imperialist war, exploitation and inequality. The immigrant rights movement, with its mass actions on May Day opposing war and defending worker and immigrant rights is playing a vital role in providing a different vision for the future — one where the rights of all are defended and where there are fraternal relations of mutual benefit with the peoples of the world.

The government’s promotion of the DREAM Act and the requirements themselves, are serving to impose the vision of the rich. As Attorney General Holder put it, passage of the DREAM Act will “establish a new generation of young people grounded in our nation’s finest traditions and its founding principles.” Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said: “Passing the DREAM Act will unleash the full potential of young people who live out values that all Americans cherish – a strong work ethic; service to others; and a deep loyalty to our country.”

This government demand for “deep loyalty” is being extended broadly and enforced with threats and repression of various kinds, like the massive raids and deportations against immigrants. Federal workers are also being targeted now for reading the Wikileaks releases and threatened with firing and jail if they refuse to be loyal to government dictate as to the public material they can and cannot read. Anti-war and pro-Palestinian activists are being branded as “supporters of terrorism,” and also told to submit and be loyal, or face jail. President Obama has emphasized, “Being an American is not a matter of blood or birth. It is a matter of faith. It is a matter of fidelity to the shared values that we all hold so dear.”

With all the promotion and mobilizing for the DREAM Act, the government is attempting to force the youth to abandon their values and anti-war stand for those of the government. It is an effort to split the youth from the workers, their parents, or to force all to accept the demand to serve in the military. It is a rotten manipulation of the just demands for the right to education and documentation for all that must be rejected. Loyalty to the rich and their wars brings the death, destruction, exploitation and inequality we are living today. Let us together instead step up the fight for our own vision, for our own anti-war, pro-people agenda.

http://usmlo.org/arch2010/2010-12/VR101217.htm#01

 

In a message dated 12/29/2010 12:03:18 P.M. Central Standard Time, rosi...@hotmail.com writes:

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To: laborex...@organizerweb.com
Subject: Obama praises DREAM Act While Deporting Dreamers
From: labore...@aol.com
Date: Thu, 23 Dec 2010 16:00:21 -0500

Citizen Orange

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Obama Praises DREAM Act While Deporting Dreamers Posted: 22 Dec 2010 09:07 PM PST President Obama publicly committed today to passing the DREAM Act in 2011. He called the recent vote blocking the bill in the Senate his "biggest disappointment." White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer said that grassroots activism will be essential to getting the DREAM Act passed. Hearing these comments, I had to scratch my head. I have seen a lot of grassroots activism around the DREAM Act over the last couple years. Some of the most intense organizing has come from communities fighting to keep individual Dreamers from being deported ... by President Obama's immigration enforcement agency, ICE. I have consulted on several such cases, and represented Dreamers directly in a few. In nearly every case I've seen, ICE fought tooth and nail to keep Dreamers locked up and get them deported. ICE attorneys often took harsh litigating positions with the goal of moving Dreamers out of the country as quickly as possible. ICE deportation officers often shut down requests to release Dreamers to pursue removal defense outside of detention. ICE wouldn't budge on Steve Li's case last month, refusing to release him from detention even after his case got national attention and support from Dreamers around the country. He would likely be in Peru right now if Senator Feinstein hadn't introduced a private bill in the Senate, which put an automatic hold on Li's deportation. In other cases, ICE refused to back down until a case got national media attention and the support of Senators. Mark Farrales is detained right now in California, waiting to be deported. He came to the U.S. when he was 10 after his father was shot by gunmen in the Philippines. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard and was working on his doctoral dissertation when he was arrested by ICE. Dreamer Saad Nabeel was deported earlier this year. His attempts to reenter the country have been rejected by the federal government. There have likely been thousands of Dreamers among the nearly 400,000 people that ICE deported in FY 2010, but the great majority of those stories never made it into the papers. Most of those thousands probably didn't even know they were Dreamers. It isn't that Obama's hands are tied in these cases by existing law. ICE has grudgingly exercised favorable discretion in limited cases, as it is the prerogative of the executive to do. Immigration policy is regarded by the courts as an area of foreign policy that happens to take place on domestic soil, and the other two branches of the federal government have ceded incredible discretion to the executive branch to execute the immigration laws as it sees fit. Too often as practicing immigration attorneys, my colleagues and I come up against an impregnable wall of executive discretion that is used to deport our clients. When will we find a president who uses this discretion to stop breaking up families instead of looking for more creative ways to deport people? Barack Obama has not been that president. Obama has the authority not to deport Dreamers, my guess is that he chooses to continue to fight to deport them because he is frightened of the political consequences should he not do so. The only way Obama can continue to praise the DREAM Act in public while deporting Dreamers behind the scenes is if the press doesn't put both sides of the story together. I hope that we as pro-migrant activists, organizers, lawyers, and bloggers can make this story heard so Obama feels real pressure from the other side of this issue for once.

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Dorinda Moreno, Fuerza Mundial / FM Global
Hitec Aztec Communications, Elders of 4 Colors 4 Directions

"Local/National/Global" <Community4Immigra...@yahoogroups.com>
"Arte Aztlan" <NetworkAztlan_...@yahoogroups.com>,

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