SB1070: Legalistic Ethnic Cleansing

Arizona's illegal immigrants departure affecting businesses

Extremist legislators must be pleased their legalistic concoctions are producing a facto ethnic and social cleansing of the working poor Hispanics in our State.

SB1070 proponents and supporters are causing tremendous damage to the economy but they do not to care. In their zealotry they are leaving entire communities devastated and the economic impact of empty homes, apartments, shopping centers and school s will have ripple effect on the budget of the state and on everybody’s pockets sooner or later.

The extremist legislators and the governor are not pro business. Their efforts are not about the well being or economic empowerment of Arizona but pushing an extremist agenda of hate to eliminate an emergent and hardworking community for political gain.

Next time the State budget is on the super-red, you have to thank Russell Pierce, John Kavanagh, Steve Montenegro for the terrible mess.

Sounding the alarm bell

The first day I spoke publicly on Pierce's bills denying education K-12th to undocumented children was 3/25/10 on a panel organized by the Master Degree Program in Human Rights and Social Justice Studies. Back then it was not in the radar of most people, organizations and the media, but some academics at ASU West and me. Yesterday, I confirmed there are professional efforts being put into -potentially- challenge those horrific bills, like denying public education to undocumented children K-12 and the jewel of the crown of the hate mongers, denying citizenship to babies born to undocumented parents.

Read about the education bills here.

Does these bills sound anti-constitutional??? You bet.

Russel Pearce wants to transform the Arid Zone into a police state (SB1070) and a place who denies basic human rights to children as young as newborn (are you getting my messages, UNICEF, Amnesty International???)
I feel hopeless. Recent polls confirm the increased popularity of the proponents and supporters of SB1070 who are running for public office in the Arid Zone, which almost warranties the passage of more bills like the anti children rights bills that will make good people tremble around the world. Is there any hope for Arizona???

Summer Reading at the Arid Zone

My name is indexed between the words "cocaine and "coyote", and if you read the book where this comes from you will find the words immigration, borders, kidnappings, hope, fear and DREAM… My name is there because I live in the Arid Zone and because of "Illegal".

Terry Greene Sterling is an award winning journalist and now book author thanks to "Illegal, Life and Death in Arizona's Immigration War Zone" published by Globe-Pequot Press. I will start this comment fully disclosing my relationship with Terry: We became friends when she looked for me as a source of information for her book. However do not read Illegal to find me there. Read the book because it has vivid narrative and stories of immigration and the people affected by the broken system in Maricopa County, Arizona, ground zero of the immigration debate with interesting dispatches from the border towns. You would want to read the book to find the story of "Viri" the dreamer who I have the honor to befriend. Or you really want to know what Joe Arpaio is like when he talks to a group of core supporters and lowers his guard, or the people that crosses mental and political borders. The cheap politics of immigration who victimize us all. The good, bad and the people that are doing their best to survive.

Terry describes the effects of the anti-immigrants laws in the micro economy of the "tienditas -dollar stores- that cater to immigrants so you formulate your own conclusion on the effects on the macro- economy of the State. Reading the stories you will find Terry, intrepid journalist with insatiable curiosity and a special ability to build a comfortable environment for the people she interviews to reveal their most intimate secrets and thoughts. You will find that she loves and respects her profession.

Terry invites you to join her to a journey into the immigration underground and meet the people who are hunkering down expecting a better tomorrow. You will no be disappointed of the ride.

Order the book at my favorite bookstore Changing Hands.

Underwater Robotics, Education and the DREAM

Why do we spend a solid weekend around the clock working for an underwater robotics competition (NURC) for free??? Why do I put hours and hours of preparation of press releases, promotions, press kits and signs (that by the way are really awesome) weeks before the challenge??? Why do I work pro bono with these techies ???

Well, because this event showcases the work and talent of the Carl Hayden Robotics Team, and some of it's members may be undocumented and may be benefited by the passage of the DREAM Act. Don't ask, don't tell.

The kids are amazing. The dedication of their teacher and mentors pay well. They work together seamlessly putting together the only challenge for underwater robotics in Arizona, the dry zone, and show their robots with pride.

The whole thing is a complex enterprise created by Fredy Lajvardi and a group of mentors and volunteers (under an organization called APASE) that work with devotion and many hours more to promote applied science and education.

There is a special effort to include minority students that may not otherwise have this opportunity if not were for APASE.

My whole family collaborates. I'm in charge of the pr and media relations, alpha male helps and mentors the junior team and M and R had their own team with middle school students for the Si Se Puede Foundation,

The National Underwater Robotics Challenge is a great event we look forward to provide educational opportunities for our dedicated dreamers and others that may not be included on this type of challenges if it were not for all of us. That way they can set up a competition for High Schools and others like the Jesuit High School at Carmichael, CA.

Education is the great equalizer, no doubt about it.

Please read press releases for NURC at the Critical Mass Communications site.

The Next Outrage

If you think SB1070, the law that makes a state crime being undocumented in the State of Arizona and seeks "attrition through enforcement", among other things is bad enough, wait to you read about what Russell Pearce is setting the stage for on next Legislative sessions. This proposals will target immigrant children as young as 5 years old:

SB2382

http://www.azleg.gov/legtext/49leg/2r/bills/hb2382h.pdf

Summary

Dept. of Education will collect data of students enrolled in public schools and charter schools whose parents cannot provide lawful legal status.

Each Dec 15 will submit reports. The Superintendent of Public Instruction shall withhold school district's appointment of state aid if a school district does not comply. The Superintendent of Public Instruction shall withhold the salary, bonus or both of any employee or school district that fails to comply.

SB2182

For the purpose of determining state aid to school districts and charter schools, the determination of Average daily attendance shall exclude children whose parents are unable to provide child's lawful presence in the United States.

http://www.azleg.gov/legtext/49leg/2r/bills/hb2182p.htm

The bills are technically dead but there is always the possibility of bringing them back in the next legislature (with different numbers). This is the tactic employed for parts and pieces of SB1070.

Those bills will try to challenge a Supreme Court Decision known as Plyler vs Doe.

Here is from Wikipedia:

Plyler v. Doe, 457 (1982), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States struck down a state statute denying funding for education to children who were illegal immigrants and simultaneously struck down a municipal school district's attempt to charge illegal immigrants an annual $1,000 tuition fee for each undocumented student to compensate for the lost state funding^[1]. The Court found that where states limit the rights afforded to people (specifically children) based on their status as aliens, this limitation must be examined under an intermediate scrutiny standard to determine whether it furthers a substantial goal of the State.

.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plyler_v._Doe

Plyler vs Doe is a supreme court decision that establishes:

If the State is to deny a discrete group of innocent children the free public education that it offers to other children residing within its borders, that denial must be justified by a showing that it furthers some substantial state interest. No such showing was made here.

According to the following piece, collecting data on the students and producing reports where the cost for the state is established, would be used to justify state interest.

Anti-immigrant former Congressman Tom Tancredo writes in an article called "The Next Arizona Earthquake" the arguments anti-immigrant activist will employ to challenge Plyler vs. Doe:

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=151021

"While it is true that the 1982 Plyler decision did forbid schools from denying a public education to children who are illegal aliens, the court did not say such a denial is unconstitutional. The court merely said Texas had not proved its case that providing that education placed an undue hardship on the public treasury.

That may have been true in Texas in 1982, but is it true in Arizona in 2010? Is it true anywhere in Texas, Arizona, California, Nevada, Colorado,Oklahoma, Utah or Georgia in 2010?

The only way to know the answer to that question is to first ask it. But to answer it requires asking for the school enrollment data. That's why Russell Pearce's SB1097 is so refreshingly revolutionary.

The Plyler decision did not forbid schools from collecting enrollment data. That is another myth promoted by the "immigrant rights" lobbyists."

Is this really going to happen??? Not for sure. It's a possibly scenario that we must be prepared to confront.