Vol. 73/No. 17      May 4, 2009

Obama has made clear in previous statements that the 12 million undocumented workers living and working in the United States would face a series of obstacles before obtaining legal residency or citizenship.

“This is not going to be a free ride. It’s not going to be some instant amnesty,” he said to a town hall meeting in California in March. “What’s going to happen is you are going to pay a significant fine. You are going to learn English. You are going to the back of the line” to apply.

The last time this issue was addressed by Congress was in 2007, when sharp divisions within the ruling class prevented any immigration bill from becoming law.

At the end of February, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) cops arrested 28 immigrant workers employed at Yamato Engine Specialists in Bellingham, Washington. It was the first workplace raid conducted under the Obama administration. After one of the workers was deported, the 27 others were allowed to return to their jobs with temporary work permits that expire once the ICE “investigation” at the plant ends. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has made clear that other worksite “inspections” are continuing, and there will be no halt to arresting undocumented workers.

A study recently released by Seton Hall Law School documents the extent to which New Jersey cops have been harassing Latinos, using a state’s attorney general’s directive in 2007 authorizing them to ask about the immigration status of those they arrest. In the first six months after the directive was issued, the cops referred 10,000 people to ICE, but only 1,417 of them were charged with immigration violations. Many of the others were legal residents or U.S. citizens.

In Colorado, the Weld Country Sheriff’s Office authorized the seizure from a Greeley tax preparer’s office of thousands of tax returns filed by undocumented workers. Local authorities used these documents to accuse more than 1,000 workers of using fraudulent Social Security numbers. More than 60 of these workers were arrested and warrants issued to arrest 61 others.

On April 13, in response to a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union, a state judge issued a preliminary injunction halting any further investigation into the tax returns. The cases against those already in court are still being prosecuted.

In another development, a study by the Pew Hispanic Center reports that as of 2008 there are 4 million children of undocumented workers born in the United States, making them U.S. citizens, an increase from 2.7 million in 2003. One-third of these children were living in poverty in 2007 and 25 percent were without health insurance in 2008.
 
 
Related articles:
Chicago conference calls May 1 action
No deportations! End the ICE raids!
Union officials echo bosses’ ‘immigration reform’
Legalization for all immigrants! Join May Day actions!  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home