LatinaLista — True immigration reform may be several months away but there are signs that there is a new attitude in Washington about federal immigration enforcement procedures.
It comes as a result of Tuesday’s worksite raid by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at an engine plant in Bellingham, Washington. The raid netted the arrest of 28 people suspected of being undocumented.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano appears before House Homeland Security Committee.
(Source: AP)
On Wednesday, Janet Napolitano, Secretary of Homeland Security, was questioned by the House Homeland Security Committee about the raid.
To the surprise of the committee, Secretary Napolitano revealed that she had not been informed about the raid beforehand and was immediately ordering a review about the planning and scope of the procedure.
“She was not happy about it because it’s inconsistent with her position, and the president’s position on these matters,†said the official, who agreed to discuss the matter on condition of anonymity because the secretary had not authorized the conversation.
Secretary Napolitano’s actions in ordering a review is a good sign that the Obama administration is beginning to deliver on the promise that illegal immigration is a human rights issues as much as it is a legal issue.
There is nothing to say that both objectives cannot be attained but the arbitrary implementation of a questionable immigration policy of a failed administration is not an example to follow.
There are better ways and it’s refreshing to see that, in this respect, true change has arrived in Washington.
Comment(60)
laur
I hope you are right, Marisa, that true change has arrived. I am still doubtful on this.
Yesterday the Supreme Court heard the case of a Mexican man, Ignacio Flores-Figueroa, who used fake Social Security papers to be able to work. The federal government is accusing Mr. Flores-Figueroa of identity theft, the same way they accused Guatemalan workers in Postville, Iowa, last summer – many of whom spoke no Spanish let alone English, and did not know what a Social Security card is.
Why is the federal government still pursuing this Bush administration ploy? It was the Bush administration who began accusing people of felony identity theft when they used fake SS numbers. The Bush administration were the ones who pretended that paying into Social Security with a fake number, i.e. adding to the benefits of other people while never having the chance to receive any benefits oneself, is the same as stealing someone’s identity in order to empty their bank accounts and ruin their credit.
Why is that ploy still being pursued by the Obama administration’s Justice Department?
It appears that even extremely conservative Supreme Court Justices like Chief Justice John Roberts find this too absurd a concept to buy.
I am reserving judgment on change having arrived for my out-of-status friends. I will believe it when I see it. In the meantime we can’t stop pushing for a stop to the raids, for a stop to tearing apart families, for a stop to indefinite detentions in for-profit detention centers.
Horace
“Sec. Napolitano’s response to work site raid signals new attitude in immigration enforcement”
Yeah, confused and irrational. There are legal and ethical responsibilities that Napolitano must fulfill under the law that may be jeopardized by her willful negligence in her failure to enforce federal codes. I know that you wouldn’t understand Marisa, but regardless of how you ethnocentrics feel, she has sworn to uphold the Constitution and the laws of the land. Napolitano cannot just decide which laws she will enforce, as she’s subject to removal otherwise. Agency heads have no authority to nullify the law.
If ICE receives evidence of identity theft by employees of a company on a large scale and fails to take action, or worse employs written directives to ignore the law, that agency head may be arrested for obstruction of justice.
And despite the irrational inability of ethnocentrics to make the connection between employer arrests and the consequential firing of illegal workers, arresting employers puts them out of work. The more efficient ICE becomes at arresting employers, the greater likelihood millions of illegal aliens will self-deport. In short, people who think that changing the emphasis to putting employers in jail are idiots. No doubt those same people will eventually be marching in the streets to keep the boss men out of jail.
I can guarantee that if the Republicans in congress note dereliction on the part of Napolitano, they will sponsor court action to make sure that the Justice Department does its job.
It’s truly a sad period in our nation’s history when the opinion of a small but shrill special interest advocates governs the actions of our law enforcement agencies rather than our constitutionally enacted law.
Sandra
True change? Why do we need change in enforcement of our immigration laws anyway? We go after other law violaters. Why shouldn’t we go after immigration law violaters also including the illegal employees and the law breaking employers who hire them? What makes these two groups of law violaters so special that law enforcement shouldn’t be going after them?
Anyone who commits a crime should expect to be incarcerated and seperated from their families. It is about personal choices and accountability for them.
Horace
“Why is the federal government still pursuing this Bush administration ploy?”
Definition of Ploy: An action calculated to frustrate an opponent or gain an advantage indirectly or deviously; a maneuver: “A typical ploy is to feign illness, procure medicine, then sell it on the black marketâ€.
First of all Laura, if you’re going to use the English language, perhaps you should familiarize yourself with definitions of the words you would use. Ploy isn’t appropriate for the context in which you use the word. The president and our enforcement agencies aren’t using a “ploy” at all, just enforcing the law; the main function of government. How is that devious?
Secondly, The president and his cronies cannot just decide not to enforce the laws as they are on the books, just because the mouse that roared (that’s you) shouts her screed. Our laws are the product of our legislative body, the Congress, reflecting the majority of the will of the people in whose interests they were enacted. Apparently you have some perverse concept, probably because you were sleeping in you civics and history classes, that the president is some kind of dictator that can just abandon our Code of Federal Regulations at will. I note that you are not alone in this however, as you are only one in thousands of advocates that are apparently ignorant of our democratic process. Perhaps it’s because of the past amnesties, where illegal aliens became citizens without benefit of the opportunity of actually learning what it means to be a citizen. Want someone who will overrule the will of the governed, where laws are enforced as long as they’re convenient to the dictator or a ruling class, go to a country like Venezuela or Cuba. You’d feel right at home.
Panchito
Horace
Many Hispanics are against these raids not because we don’t want the law to be enforced but because many of us feel that the government is only targeting one specific segment of the population.
I think White people would not like it if the Federal Government began a policy of raiding only “White neighborhoods” looking for meth.
The law needs to be color blind in order for it to be effective and respected by all of its citizens.
How many raids have been carried out in oriental restaurants or Irish dominated work sites in Boston?
Many of the waitresses at some of these Chinese restaurants can’t even pronounce the international word “Pepsi”.
Horace
“The law needs to be color blind in order for it to be effective and respected by all of its citizens.”
This is not true or advocates would be making there case that others should be deported as well. No, this is a case of a huge influx of Latinos who prevail upon the assistance of the millions that were part of an in earlier amnesty, people who subsequently sneaked the rest of their family over the border and now deny the legitimacy of our current immigration laws to send them back.
The law is color blind. The raids are the result of complaints of people who have had their identities stolen by people who’ve committed fraud or were at least complicit in it. The rest of America will not stand to be abused by violators of our laws just because you don’t like “your people” arrested for violating it. One cannot ignore that illegal aliens from South and Central America make up the majority and most visible part of the violators. To deny this and have us believe that this is not the case is to take us for fools.
laura
Panchito, I disagree with you completely. I do not want unjust laws to be enforced. Neither against Latina/os, nor against Chinese waitresses who can’t pronounce “Pepsi.”
American corporations have taken away people’s livelihoods here in the US, as well as in Central and South America, as well as in most poor countries around the world. Farmers lost their land because of American agribusiness. Workers lost their jobs when corporations moved their factories to the next place where workplace and environmental protections do not exist, and where people are willing to work for ever less wages.
American businesspeople and government officials know that millions lost their livelihood in Mexico as a result of NAFTA’s cheap corn imports to Mexico. They know that people would seek work wherever it was to be had in order to feed their families. They know that work was to be had on fields and in mills and slaughterhouses in the US.
So why did US immigration laws not provide for visas for the workers they knew would seek that work?
Very simple: because workers can be exploited much better if they are here without visas. If their coming is “illegal.”
These laws are just as evil as the German laws of the 30s forbidding Jews to work. They are as evil as the South African residence laws of the apartheid era.
I do not think these laws should be enforced. I think there needs to be a moratorium immediately – and then the laws need to be changed.
And fundamentally, the world needs policing of corporations and of greedy rich people so that workers can find their livelihoods at home – with their families – where most of them want to be. Including the Chinese waitresses who have a beautiful and rich language of their own in which “Pepsi” stands for an unhealthy and polluting commercial beverage.
Pietro
“How many raids have been carried out in oriental restaurants or Irish dominated work sites in Boston?
Many of the waitresses at some of these Chinese restaurants can’t even pronounce the international word “Pepsi”.
Panchito, this is a case of efficiency. It’s evident to anyone who’s been following this that ICE is raiding employers with large numbers of illegal aliens. The Latino illegal alien is typically employed in low skilled, large groups and is thus easier to detect. ICE is a relatively small force, so they have to maximize the efficiency of their agency. Raiding restaurants and pubs with small staffs would dissipate ICE efforts and wouldn’t produce a dent in the millions of illegal aliens in this country. I’m sorry, but I will not forgive Latino illegal aliens, who are as guilty as hell, just to give them equal opportunity for them to escape justice.
Sandra
Oh, for God’s sake Panchito, Latinos make up the largest majority of illegal aliens by far. It is called criminal profiling (likelyhood). Stop whining. If you are a Latino U.S. citizen why do you care anyway? Citizens have nothing to fear. You must be another one of those ethnocentrics protecting illegal aliens just because they happen to be ethnically like yourself. I am disgusted by that more than the illegal themselves.
laura
Plus, Panchito, there is an additional benefit of establishing international trade laws that protect workers’ rights and environmental safeguards all over the world. At that point people won’t have to leave their homes in order to take bad jobs in the US.
And at that point the racist dead-enders who post on Marisa’s site will have to do some of their own work – work in the slaughterhouses and the nursing homes and the cleaning companies and the fields in this country that now are populated by people from poor countries, because American corporations made it impossible for them to make a living at home.
I see some people like “Horace” spending a lot of time on this site – clearly he has no productive work to do – so I am looking forward to the day when people like him will have to do their own hard work.
And the young Guatemalan boys who are now picking the tomatoes and grapes he eats, will be able to stay at home and go to school and become engineers and doctors and marine biologists. And carpenters and farmers and schoolteachers.
Michaela
Janet Napolitano needs to be removed from office immediately and indicted on charges of treason and conspiracy to aid and abet illegal aliens into our country. She has made it clear by her pitiful performance as AZ governor that she does not take her oath to defend and protect AMERICAN citizens seriously. Americans are fed up with these traitors trying to run our country into the ground. Once it is proved Obama is himself an illegal alien usurper we can start by removing him and have a field day from there…Pelosi, Reid, Frank, Soros, Ayers, Clinton, Villaraigosa, Murguia, Solis, Garcia, Serrano, etc., etc. I get exhilarated just thinking about getting these pieces of trash out of office.
Horace
Laura said: “American corporations have taken away people’s livelihoods here in the US, as well as in Central and South America, as well as in most poor countries around the world. Farmers lost their land because of American agribusiness. Workers lost their jobs when corporations moved their factories to the next place where workplace and environmental protections do not exist, and where people are willing to work for ever less wages.”
Mexioc’s inability to compete with the rest of the world is not our responsibility. Mexico and other Latin American nations are big boys, and as sovereign nations they are responsible for the actions of their governments, to include negotiating treaties and regulating trade. Blaming trade competition problems on the U.S. is just a pathetic excuse to justify overruling our right to govern our immigration policies. I doubt that the Chinese would accept the idea that U.S. or the rest of the world’s citizens should have the right to invade their country because there losing in the competition. Your view that Mexicans have the moral right to enter the U.S. illegally and declare our immigration laws unjust is not shared by anyone except Latino advocates of illegal aliens.
laura
I said: “I see some people like “Horace” spending a lot of time on this site – clearly he has no productive work to do – so I am looking forward to the day when people like him will have to do their own hard work.
And the young Guatemalan boys who are now picking the tomatoes and grapes he eats, will be able to stay at home and go to school and become engineers and doctors and marine biologists. And carpenters and farmers and schoolteachers.”
It seems there are more of those racist dead-enders who have no productive work to do. They are posting all the time on this site.
And interestingly, Republicans are saying they want President Obama’s economic plans to fail. I’m not quite sure why, since they have driven the country so far into the ground. The only obvious reason I see is that if President Obama’s plan succeeds they will have to do some actual work too – even if it is much less hard than that of my undocumented friends who make their cushy lifestyles possible.
Don’t worry though, “Horace” and my other racist friends on this site: a little real work won’t hurt you.
Horace
Laura said: “And the young Guatemalan boys who are now picking the tomatoes and grapes he eats, will be able to stay at home and go to school and become engineers and doctors and marine biologists. And carpenters and farmers and schoolteachers.”
Sure, fruit pickers with no education are going to be the leaders of tomorrow. History has shown that people with little education just wind up dead-ending at menial jobs. Forgive me if I don’t accept the fact that these people are the saviors of the U.S. and are more deserving than citizens or legal aliens who our taxpayers would rather support. Aside from that, these invaders are the responsibility of their homeland government, not the U.S. taxpayer, as much as you’d like to tax everybody to pay for their education or make up for their deficiencies. You Latinos are an arrogant lot, but for the life of me, I don’t see anything special for you to be arrogant about.
Laura said: “And interestingly, Republicans are saying they want President Obama’s economic plans to fail. I’m not quite sure why, since they have driven the country so far into the ground.”
Actually, the same economic policies were in place under Clinton. Much of the problem involved people like La Raza who used their political clout to leverage no equity loans to people who would otherwise never receive one. I believe the code words for them were “underserved customers” who minority groups claimed were discriminated against just because they had no money to put down on a house and were bad credit risks. One only had to read the popular magazines to read where illegal aliens were being given loans, who were high risks to anyone but the predatory loan brokers. Read the news Laura, The most egregious anecdotes are of Latinos that were taken advantage by their own ethnic group’s brokers who knew how to do so because they knew the culture oh so well.
We’ve been a capitalist nation, but we’re now flirting with socialism under Obama. Socialism has been demonstrated to be a failure time and time again. Obama seeks to expand government spending at a time when it should eschew initiating new social spending programs and its consequential expanding of the government bureaucracy to oversee them. Even in good times escalating spending on non-productive social programs is a bad idea, but doing so during an economic disaster is just plain stupid. Obama is about to increase taxes on the most enterprising people in this country, the small business owners who employ most of the people in this nation. This will take capital out of the economy and discourage growth. What an idiot!
Of course you don’t understand, Laura, because your sources of information, second hand and biased at best, don’t want you to know, as it doesn’t serve their purpose, which is to demonize Limbaugh. If you and your idiot friends weren’t so mind numbingly stupid, Laura and had actually bothered to understand what Limbaugh said, you’d know that he was talking about hoping that Obama would fail in his effort to make the U.S. a socialist state.
Laura, you should try obtaining first-hand knowledge about the issues instead of letting people like Marisa be your interpreter. You’ll learn a lot more by bypassing the biased pundits.
Leslie
Laura, you said that “American corporations have taken away people’s livelihoods here in the US, as well as in Central and South America, as well as in most poor countries around the world. Farmers lost their land because of American agribusiness. Workers lost their jobs when corporations moved their factories to the next place where workplace and environmental protections do not exist, and where people are willing to work for ever less wages.”
I’ve got news for you, Laura, this is a practice carried out by thousands of multi-nationals around the world, including those based in Europe who commonly do business in Latin America. There’s nothing illegal about it, as the environmental laws in each nation are the responsibility of the host nation. If Latin America weren’t so corrupt, an evident characteristic of your Hispanic culture, then these practices would not be permitted. Just what have you and your radical friends done for the people in SA to improve the plight of those who don’t migrate? As I suspected, nothing. You’d rather let those who stay suffer and make the American people spend gobs of money on your illegal alien friends than fix the problem at the root, which is SA.
By the way, you’re one of the most racist people I’ve encountered in this blog.
Horace
“It seems there are more of those racist dead-enders who have no productive work to do. They are posting all the time on this site.”
My wife and I earned over $150,000 last year. Is that considered a dead-ender’s income, Laura? What did you earn, or should I say, how much was your welfare check?
laura
Don’t worry, “Horace” and my other racist friends on this site: a little real work won’t hurt you. And real work is not measured by the money you get.
As for me and my work, my friend: I consider it in poor taste to brag about my income. Rest assured that it is good and that I work very hard to earn it.
laura
I said: “I see some people like “Horace” spending a lot of time on this site – clearly he has no productive work to do – so I am looking forward to the day when people like him will have to do their own hard work.”
Now I realize I must clarify further. The value of work is not measured by how much money you get. It is measured by the service you perform to your fellow human beings, and perhaps to your fellow creatures on this earth. And the more necessary, as well as the harder and more unpleasant the work, the more valuable is your service.
That is why the black lady who empties the heavy trash cans in the building I work is doing such valuable work. Without her service, our work would grind to a halt. That is why the people who grow our food are at the top of my scale of respect.
A person’s wages are actually often in inverse proportion to the value of their service. This is simply a convention of different societies: American high school teachers, who perform a critically important service, are paid poorly, while their German counterparts enjoy one of the best standards of living of professionals in that country.
Personally I happen to be extremely lucky in that I have the privilege of performing a necessary service in my work, and am also well remunerated.
And as for you, “Horace”, my friend: once your employer discovers how much spare time you have at your disposal to spend on spreading hate speech on the internet, they might begin to feel you are overpaid.
Liquidmicro
“That is why the black lady who empties the heavy trash cans in the building I work is doing such valuable work. Without her service, our work would grind to a halt.”
Are you saying that you wouldn’t take it upon yourself to remove the garbage if the “black lady” wasn’t there, that your work would halt?
You are aware that Horace just returned from being in Iraq right? Is that not a valuable service, protecting you from another attack?
As for you “performing a necessary service in my work, and am also well remunerated”, you must be the toilet scrubber since you won’t take out the garbage.
Horace
Laura said: “I said: “I see some people like “Horace” spending a lot of time on this site – clearly he has no productive work to do – so I am looking forward to the day when people like him will have to do their own hard work.””
Laura, who the hell are you to tell anyone that they’re spending too much time on this blog? I spend my time as I see fit and won’t brook foolish people like you telling me what I should or should not be doing with it. This is indicative of your imperial pretensions and that of other Democrats who wish to control thought and speech.
laura
“Horace” my friend, I simply note that you apparently have very much free time on your hands. The fact that you choose to spend it in spreading hate speech on the internet is, realistically, much more your problem than my problem.
Returning to the original subject: all work that supports the life of other human beings and other creatures is valuable and confers dignity on whoever is doing it. So the hunting of people who do our hardest work has to stop. The raids have to stop.
Panchito
Liquidmicro, I doubt Horace is or ever was a U.S. Soldier. Soldiers have respect for people of all ethnic backgrounds since their lives depend on each other. Furthermore, a Soldier’s salary is not that high – maybe his wife is the one that makes all the money and Horace is taking credit for it. Maybe Horace was a contractor. If he was, I’m not impressed by his salary since bus drivers get paid over 100k in Iraq. These contractors are generally desperate, low skilled workers who are willing to risk their lives for a job and better pay than they would otherwise earn at home. Does that sound familiar you imbecile of a man?
Sandra
It doesn’t matter what work an illegal alien performs, they have violated our immigration laws and don’t even have the right to work here.
laura
Hola Panchito, we don’t have to name-call anyone. And neither your worth, nor my worth, nor anyone’s worth is measured by the height of their salary. It is measured by the goodness of their heart and the strength of their ability to support the lives of all their fellow human beings.
Liquidmciro
Obviously Panchito, or is it Pendejo?? Since you haven’t been around here for long, might I suggest you do some research, better yet, ask Marrisa about Horace in the Military. Now since you have a problem with vocbulary and comprehension, I suggest you now go back and read what Horace stated My wife and I you do understand that that is a combined amount, right? As far as military pay, it is based on time in service and rank to include hazard pay and various other allotments. Now go learn something so I don’t have to further school you as I am not being paid for my service to make you any smarter.
Sandra
You are the imbicile Panchinto for resorting to the race card and insults of a law abiding Americans who merely want our immigration laws enforced.
I could give a rat’s behind that immigration law breakers take risks coming here. Laws are laws and they are obligated to abide by ours. Where is you and Laura’s support for your fellow U.S. citizens and our laws rather than illegal foreigners? That is IF you are citizens yourselves. Are you both Hispanic? Why is it that it is mostly Hispanics who are snubbing their noses at our laws? Does your ethnic heritage trump your loyalty to your own country? You know damned will if these were millions of illegal Chinese you would be singing a different tune. Your racist attitudes disgust me!
Horace
Panchito: “Liquidmicro, I doubt Horace is or ever was a U.S. Soldier. Soldiers have respect for people of all ethnic backgrounds since their lives depend on each other.”
Soldiers have respect for their fellow soldiers, black, brown or white and civilian citizens who respect this country and it’s laws. Illegal aliens, by their very presence, and their apologists, aiders and abettors have shown disrespect for both and are consequently not deserving of respect themselves. It’s evident that, with few exceptions, this blog is frequented by many supporters of illegal immigration who have never served their country in any capacity, be it civil service or as service men and women and have little respect for our criminal justice system. They are internationalists, without capacity for loyalty to the nation as a whole, who see themselves as saviors of the world at the expense of their countrymen.
Panchito
Liquidmicro,
I served 5 years in the Marines and 22 years in the Army so don’t waste your time trying to educate me on military pay and allowances. You must be a real looser if the best you can do is toot someone elses horn.
Panchito
Laurita,
If our worth is measured by “the goodness of our hearts” then Sandra, Horace, and Liquidmicro are worthless. I’m very glad you and I are not like them.
Liquidmicro
Oh Panchito, from one fellow soldier to another, I suggest you go hide in your bunker before the enemy gets you. I’ll stay on the front lines, problem is I don’t trust you to cover me, and you know just how much trust is needed in the military from one another.
What I suggest to you and Laura, is cut the race card, Laura pulled, I simply pointed it out. You thinking your the big man calling me names like a child, I stooped to your level and dumbed things down so you and Laura could understand them, and this is all you can come back with? Your sympathy act doesn’t work as this is not a moral issue.
Sandra
And I will ask again where is the “goodness in your heart” for your fellow Americans, Panchito and Laura? You find it admirable to extend that only to illegal foreingers at your fellow American’s expense? You are the heartless ones!
laura
Hola Panchito, racismo es feo y para mi los racistas son muy feos. Y muy ignorantes. Pero quien sabe que ellos tambien tienen un pedazito de bueno en el corazon que un dia despertara … Hay que seguir con respeto y amor por los demas. Y hay que apoyar los amigos que no tienen sus derechos – todavia no.
MaryElizabeth
Im glad they stopped the raids. Here is one of the things that disturb me about the prior administration. Does anyone here know that the nations largest private immigration prison operators are privately owned. The federal government pays these corporations $180 a day per person detained. Corrections Corporation of America and the Geo Group housed almost 20% off the immigrants detained. This is big business! Part of this lucrative business was the construction of detention centers. In February 2006, the Army Corps of Engineers awared a $385 million contract for constructing immigration detention centers to Kellogg Brown and Root, the HALLIBURTON subsidiary that was criticized for overcharging the PENTAGON for its services in IRAQ.(e.g. cooking, contruction, power generation, and fuel transportation). Its really sad…but that is were our tax dollars have been going. To detain an immigrant for 2 weeks it cost $2,520 dollars. A month costs us $5,040 dollars. Does anyone here get it? Jails should be for rapists, murderers, kidnappers….Not workers!! We need jails to be government operations. Never! should they be private industry!
MaryElizabeth
Sandra,
You are disgusted by Panchito who happens to be a US Marine who has given a great portion of his life dedicated to defending our country and our flag and you have the nerve to insult him because he doesnt want his relatives, friends and neighbors harrassed by racial profileing. I am Italian American and the daughter of a World War 2 Veteran and find people like you offensive when you cant even respect a war veteran!
Sandra
His military service has nothing to do with it! It is what he is advocating in his civlian life that i oppose to!!!
Sandra
It costs a lot of money to run jails and prisons to incarcerate violaters of other crimes too. They are a necessary evil to protect innocent citizens and to prevent us from becoming a country of chaos and anarchy.
MaryElizabeth
OK, Sandra…so why flood our prisons with undocumented workers rather then real criminals. Sometimes they detain undocumented workers for months waiting for deporation. At $180 a day does it make sense to detain them. A six month detention could cost Americans tax dollars over 30K per person. Your plan for immigration reform is economically unrealistic. You have more of an obsession for an undocumented worker than you do for a human trafficker or a rapist. You support a failed immigration system and want more of the same. Meanwhile our schools are flooded with drugs. We have children liveing in fear that their moms and dads could be deported and you idiolise people like Dobbs and Coulter that force feed us dome and gloom without real solutions that change the system. People are tired of your rhetoric and shallow thoughts that are sending our country down the drain.
Sandra
Mary, you sure do make a lot of dumb assumptions about others, don’t you? Why are you so obsessed with Dobbs,etc. Where have I said I idolized and talk show host? How old are you?…12years old?
I am for incarcerating illegal aliens for only as short of time as necessary and then deporting them. Their situations with their families, they created themselves!
Immigrants should know that we will not tolerate them coming here illegally. The only way they will learn that is swift deportation by those who have already broken our immigration laws. If we didn’t have consequences for breaking any of our laws, no one would obey them. That sure leaves a pleasant thought, doesn’t it?
MaryElizabeth
Sandra, sticks and stones will break my bones but names will never…..you behave like the schoolyard bully and your name calling is immature. Do you actually think the system is deporting undocumented workers swiftly. Many of the current prison systems are privately owned industrys. It costs the taxpayers $180 dollars a day to detain a worker. A six month stay in their deluxe hotel could cost us in tax dollars over 30K and Im not even adding in the airline ticket and that is if they get deported. You dont see the fault in the system?? Immigration reform is the only way to CHANGE the system with a combined effort to secure the Borders. With a reasonable opened legal immigration system and all workers out of the shadows and documented we can then enforce labor laws with reason but the way it is now it has cost Americans their jobs and lifestyle. Look at what the administration of the last 8 years have cost us. Do we need to continue More of the Same. The Game here is your guys at the borders. “Lets see if we can catch you come in” and if you happen to make it through, “We have a really crappy job waiting for you on the other side”.
Liquidmicro
Another ignorant rambling by Mary. First you cite no source about the $180 a day, so I will cite one for you.
The National Imperative to Imprison Immigrants for Profit
and another
Jailed illegal immigrants cost taxpayers thousands
If you do the math it comes out to around $85 per inmate per day, nowhere near the $180 as assumed by Mary.
The rest of Mary’s argument is Open Borders propaganda.
Sandra
ME, my name calling is childish? Look in the mirror, race card puller. I retaliate when others start it!
MaryElizabeth
Actually Micro…Go read Daves article and you will see he posted the facts. It comes to $140 a day. Thats almost enough to have an accomadation at the Hilton Hotel….all paid for with our taxpapers dollar. That money could be used for all kinds of jobs. Green jobs, infrastruture jobs. Those are the kind of jobs us Americans like for our lifestyle. We dont want your friends to use it to detain workers that do jobs in meatpacking plants.
Liquidmicro
Actually Mary, Had you done any reading of Dave’s post, Broken Detention System Works Well for GEO, YOU would realize he never stated how much was spent per inmate per night, however in your comment you made an assumed amount of $140. Now, had you been able to read the links Dave links to in his post, you would have noted the following: It has a total capacity of about 62,000 beds. According to ICE, the daily cost to house a detainee at Tacoma is $95, and there are about 1,000 detainees in the facility at any given time. from the following link Activist Fights Detention Center Expansion. So, SORRY, your exaggerated and inflated usage of $140 is PROPAGANDA. Now, if you can’t argue with truth, then whats the point of lying on your part? To gain sympathy and play on emotions? To impose your morals on those of us who do not want them? To cheapen what it means to be a Citizen?
Liquidmicro
After re-reading Dave’s article he does state $141, but he fails to cite where that number came from. All the links he uses in that topic, only one shows an amount and that is what I posted previously. So, my point stands, you and Dave have failed to cite a source for your $140/$141 amount while at the same time failed to use the information provided by his own links.
MaryElizabeth
Again go read Daves article; he states $141 dollars a night!! Micro…like always you information is not correct. This is why many chose to ignore you.
MaryElizabeth
Its not cheap Micro and its a private owned facility. Most Americans do not make that in a day. If you dont agree with it why dont you post Dave and question it. I happen to think he is actually underestimateing the amount. I have seen a source that stated it was $180 a day but Im going with Daves statistics because Dave is always accurate. Hmmm now I finally figured you out. You are a supporter of the GEO company and their profits. I knew your obsession was not about Rule of Law. Cheapen what it means to be a citizen?? Detaining workers and abuseing them has Cheapened what it means to be an American!! Micro, Americans care about their taxdollars and they do not like to see abuse and torture. Dont you know that?? They dont want their money spent like that nor do they want to look like animals overseas. This money could go to creating good jobs.
Liquidmicro
Mary, as usual my point went clear over your head. Its clear you also do not know the laws regarding Deportable Aliens. If I was so for the GEO group, wouldn’t I be pushing the Tacoma Center to have more than 1000 beds filled when they could fill up as many as 62000?
I have seen reports for as low as $38 per day for the cost of a detainee, so I will use my estimates vs Daves. Even in his own links it states only $95, none of them state $141.
I guess I need to make my points much simpler so you can understand them. You are giving citizenship away to people who broke immigration laws, you would allow any and all to come here if they could make it without being caught. You would have them create false identities to gain for themselves. You fail to recognize the poor in our own country that compete with the Deportable Aliens for work. Wages are decreased along with benefits. You are under the impression we can hold billions on our grounds, yet I bet you believe in Global Warming and that the Border Fence impacts the environment, yet your hypocrisy comes out in wanting a larger population creating more economic impacts than any fence. California is already on water rations for this year, Southern California has to get its water from us up here in the north. LA is known already as the SMOG Capital of the Nation, but you want to keep bringing them in.
As far as you “figuring me out” you are far from it, your assumptions and blatant hypocrisy is ignominious.
Liquidmicro
Daves info of $141, came from an article that is no longer available on the web, anywhere. That should tell you something right off the top. But you keep believing what ever Dave states, Mary. I gave you info from one of Daves links, a Washington Activist Group fighting on your side, yet you call my information incorrect and choose to ignore me, this must be another one of your half truth argument that doesn’t hold water. You need to fix that hole, your credibility is spilling all over the floor.
Liquidmicro
You lack the ability to think for yourself, Mary. You believe what you think to be accurate with out the ability to research on your own to find the information from all sides and then to make an objective decision. (I give you information from Daves links and from and Activist Group on your side and you still deny it) You make to many assumptions and accusations of people, which limits your ability to be taken serious or credible. But you keep on being the sheeple following blindly, eventually the ground disappears and you go over a cliff, all because you choose to be led around.
Now since you believe Daves article so much, please show us where on the ICE ISAP page it shows the following: Based on the amount budgeted for this fiscal year, U.S. taxpayers will pay about $141 a night – the equivalent of a decent hotel room – for each immigrant detained, even though paroling them on ankle monitors – at a budgeted average daily cost of $13 – has an almost perfect compliance rate, according to ICE’s own stats.
Heres the link: Alternatives to Detention
Here’s another link that states exactly what I state: North American Congress on Latin America According to its 2008 budget, the agency spends $95 per day to detain an immigrant in a facility, compared with $12 a day under ISAP.
So please, again, show where it is that I am incorrect in my information. About the only thing Dave has correct in his topic is that its cheaper to have Deportable Aliens on Ankle Monitoring in the ISAP program.
Liquidmicro
Here’s one for you Mary, did you know it is cheaper to house deportees in a private ran center than it is in a ICE ran center?
CCA Immigrant Detention: Immigration agency, contractors are accused of mistreating detainees
The savings are substantial: According to ICE, it cost $87.99 per day on average in fiscal year 2007 to hold someone at a contract detention facility, while it cost roughly $119.28 a day to house a person at an ICE-run facility.
So now, ICE is saving money by paying less to a private ran center, what say you? But wait, there’s more, you see the numbers again agree with my facts I provided earlier, $87.99 per day, not the $140/$141 of your inflated propaganda.
Liquidmicro
Here’s one even cheaper, look at this, its only $60 per day, what do you know. Look at the date of this article too, March 6, 2009 – 12:49pm.
Groups object to immigration detention in Va. town
ICA will get about $60 per day per detainee from the federal government, while the town will keep $2 each.
Do you now get my point, Mary, is it simple enough for you? Have I provided enough proof that my information is correct?
MaryElizabeth
Micro?? Are you sure you arent involved with the money makeing prisons?? Do you have money invested in this business?? You are defending them and I am suspicious that you may have a personal agenda in this. There are better things for our government to spend our taxpayers dollars on these days besides detaining workers, we can create more green jobs, fix bridges, repair our infrastructure. Micro there are more positive things you could be focuseing on and the truth is I ignore you because you are a paste, copy and post maniac…and yes I do believe you are intelligent but when you communicate with people you try to trip them up with that lets spin round in circles style to the debate with all those meaningless details that bore me. The fact is Micro…there are 11.7 million here and the longer we procrastinate reform the poorer we get because we have business running with an work force unprotected by labor laws.
Liquidmicro
You see Mary, you have difficulty comprehending my points, you have lost track of the argument, typical, if you can’t follow along, make accusations to appear intelligent.
Our tax dollars should be spent on many things, remember Obama said he was going to create or SAVE up to 3M jobs, Guards are part of that saving of jobs.
I try to get you to use factual information, not propaganda, the more lies you use to make an argument, the less credibility you have, but again my saying that earlier had no effect on you and you in turn resorted to more accusations. So meaningless details “bore” you? You need to keep in mind that “the devils are in the details”, you paint with such a broad brush, sweeping the details under the rug, that you can’t make a coherent argument. You are attempting to impose your moral values on the rest of us who believe the morality of the rule of law is fair to everybody already.
I have already shown that Illegal Immigrants fall under our labor laws, they have every right to sue an employer. CIR has nothing at all to do with our economy, since you say that it does, prove the statement.
Liquidmicro
Mary, the one spinning round in circles style appears to be you. Your many accusations fail to consider the other consequences of your statements. The laws of Physics applies here, every action has a reaction.
Whats really pathetic on your part is the simple fact that you can’t even explain how the $141 amount came about, yet you believe it and believe it to be under stated. So instead of pointing out the way in which that number was figured, you choose to say it now doesn’t matter, it’s money that could be spent on other things, without taking into consideration the people and their lives you would effect by denying them their jobs, the costs of then sub-sidising them with unemployment benefits, health care, re-education or training, the ability for them to pay their bills, which keeps the economy going, the benefits to the communities where these employees pay for things and the government payment to these communities, etc. You prefer to now place these people at the back of the line for any other job(s), and push forward those here working under false documentation above American Citizens and Legal Workers who have every right to be free to work without competition from workers here stealing a living. Until you propose solutions to all these other “details” your broad brush painting of the situation is mere feel-good propaganda. I want solutions, Mary, to all these other circumstances, and I want them to be fair to American Citizens and Legal Residents first.
MaryElizabeth
I was told that you try to pick apart people and try to question brain power. Well Micro? These prison jobs do not keep the economy going. They are not cost effective…and they are owned by the wealthy and well connected. Just like the cronies at AIG you can rest assure are tax dollars are going nowhere in the hands of these privately owned prisons. When you ramble on about reasons to continue the anti-immigrant wave you continue to feed the cronies with our tax dollars. Micro…stop protesting against CHANGE….you see we are tired of more of the same.
Sandra
It will always be necessary to incarcerate law violaters and that includes those in our country illegally. That is what a nation of laws is all about. If there are no consequences to be paid for one’s behavior then that behavior just continues. Liquid proved that detaining illegal aliens in a private facility is more cost effective than a federal facility.
There is no anti-“immigrant” wave. This is about those in our country illegally.
Liquidmicro
So you are blaming a business for holding a detainee, when the detainee was placed there by our Government. The business was paid by our Government. The business creates jobs and benefits communities.
HALL COUNTY: Immigration detention center to open, hire 162
The Nashville-based company has signed a five-year agreement with Hall County and the state to operate the center and will lease the former county jail. The agreement, which took about 10 months to complete, will provide Hall County with about $2 million annually for the lease, said Phil Sutton, assistant county administrator.
$2M per year just to the County and the state for just this one facility.
The company will hire correctional professionals in security, facility management, accounting, health services, human resources, business management, quality assurance and education, Grant said.
Openings will be posted soon on its Web page, she said, but those interested can visit http://www.ccajob.com to apply early.
The economic impact for Gainesville and Hall County should provide a lift in the sagging local economy, where unemployment was 8.3 percent in January.
CCA estimates a payroll of $7.5 million annually and has budgeted for about $350,000 in utility costs, Grant said.
CCA currently is employing 80 workers —- mostly local —- for a $4 million renovation of the old jail, Grant said.
I see a lot of help to Counties, states, and legal workers to include other local business. Do you think some of the Obama Stimulus money could be paying for this? I’ll bet it is. Isn’t this the CHANGE you voted for? Obama is getting the economy moving again by this, is he not? Don’t blame me for your inability to see how you got played by the Obama message. Obama is nothing but the same, just a different suit, same mind set.
Liquidmicro
Here’s another link, stating the same thing as previously>
Cities and counties rely on U.S. immigrant detention fees
The largest federal contract in the state is with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, whose 1,400-bed detention center in Lancaster is dedicated to housing immigrants either awaiting deportation or fighting their cases in court. The department received $34.7 million in 2008, up from $32.3 million the previous year.
Some smaller cities have seen their income rise much faster. Glendale received nearly $260,000 in 2008, triple what it got the previous year. In Alhambra, last year’s $247,000 was more than double the previous year’s payments.
For some cash-strapped cities, the federal money has become a critical source of revenue, covering budget shortfalls and saving positions.
Santa Ana’s Police Department, for example, expects as much as a 15% budget cut and has had a hiring freeze since October that has resulted in more than 60 sworn and civilian positions remaining vacant, Police Chief Paul Walters said. To offset reductions, Walters plans to convert two multipurpose rooms at the 480-bed jail into dormitory rooms this spring. That will accommodate an additional 32 immigrant detainees, which he expects will bring in $1 million more in revenue each year. He also hopes to get approval to raise the nightly price per detainee from $82 to $87.
“We treat [the jail] as a business,” Walters said. “The cuts could have been much deeper if it weren’t for the ability to raise money there.”
As you can see, it is a Federal Contract with Local communities to house detainees, which in turn does help the communities as the money covers many budget shortfalls in these counties.
MaryElizabeth
Obama is CHANGE and when it comes to Comprehensive Immigration Reform get prepared because CHANGE is coming and that’s because our immigration system is horibly broken. Ummmm, and don’t forget to tell everyone how the GEO group lobbyed their government contracts and George C. Zoley makes 5 million dollars a year as their CEO. Their staff consists of the bare minimal to keep their business going giveing the detained almost no medical treatment and conditions that are extremely inhumane, meanwhile the executive team get paid way over what our President Obama makes 400K a year. Our money can be used for jobs creating hybrid cars, more mass transit such as more rail, green jobs, jobs repairing our broken bridges rather than a witch hunt to detain workers.
Sandra
Enforcing ALL of our laws is totally necessary. What good would it do to allow law breakers to run freely around our country and claim that we need the money for other things instead. We have been able to fund it all and rightly so!
These aren’t just “workers”. They are foreign nationals here in violation of our immigration and labor laws. Nice try at sugar coating their status in this country but it doesn’t fly.
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