Gloria Molina
The supervisor is L.A.'s 'first Latina'
PATT MORRISON, LA Times
Gloria Molina's life has been one of contradictions: the famous feminist politician from East L.A., the career policymaker/politician who still feels like an outsider. She can claim many "firsts," a lot of admirers and a lot of political foes. The first Latina elected to the Legislature, to the Los Angeles City Council, and the first woman and Latina elected to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, where she'll likely be until she is termed out in 2014. Her reputation is one of picking fights, but she also picks her fights -- killing a proposed prison in East L.A. in the 1980s, watchdogging cushy government pensions and perks and budget practices, and looking out for Los Angeles' poor, of which she was once one herself, the eldest of 10 kids of a poor Mexican immigrant. You may see her only in TV news clips, jabbing a finger on some point.
Once again you're the only woman on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors. Outside of having a bathroom all to yourself, what is wrong with this picture?
You can't measure where women are by what's going on here because the opportunities to run for this office are very limited. It's still a struggle, but there are opportunities for women. When I'm termed out [in 2014] and Zev [Yaroslavsky] at the same time, hopefully there'll be a real opportunity for women.
Ted Kennedy was someone you thought highly of. He was a great compromiser. You've said you don't compromise very effectively. Why is that?
Let's face it, you can't survive in this system [without] some compromise. But anything that compromises my own personal sensibilities and about certain issues, I just won't move. Sometimes I would rather lose than compromise. The East L.A. prison fight was exactly that. I had carried a package of about 12 bills [in the Legislature] on high school dropouts. The governor [George Deukmejian] asked me if I wanted him to sign them, and I said, "Absolutely," and he said, "We would like you to accept the prison in East L.A." I had to reject that, and he vetoed all of my [education] bills.
What did that teach you?
So many colleagues said, "Gloria, you have to cut your losses on this one, there's another day." But in my community this issue was so strong. I also felt betrayed by the political system. I think I made the right decision. I think that's also one of the reasons I have enjoyed a lot of support in my community.
Your name has been mentioned for Congress, even governor. Is this job the best fit for you?
This is a very good fit for me. It meets all of my personal needs about being a, quote, politician or policymaker, because of the range of issues -- children's issues, senior citizen issues, all aspects of government. I really don't think [Congress] would have been a good fit for me, working through the caucus, waiting for seniority opportunities, having to do the bidding of so many senior members in order to get opportunities. So this seat was just a perfect fit. I love what I do and I wish I could stay here forever, but it's just as well that I move on and find something else, hopefully not elective office.
How have you changed the culture of the board?
I think I've had a huge impact. Whether it is noticeable or not, I'm not sure. When I first arrived, it was very acceptable to allow the county administrative officer to basically operate everything. His recommendations were accepted; the department heads ran the departments with little or no questions. To me, the budget determines what your priorities are. And the board always let the CAO do the budget. There was a lot of rubber-stamping. I worked very hard to create a very different system, to ask questions. The other part is this ownership thing [about] money. My daughter was watching [me] on TV arguing with my colleagues, and she said, "Mom, why do you care? It's not your money." And I said, "It is, and I treat it like my money."
In the process, you've ticked off a lot of people, administrators. If you've made things better for the system, have you made it harder for you to operate in it?
Certainly I have had people refuse to give me information, and we've had battles. The sheriff [Sherman Block] was one of the first. I'd question what was going on and how the expenditures were made. Sheriff Block was a very tough guy to deal with. I said, "Sheriff, I don't tell you who to hire, where to send out the cars, how you handle anything -- there's only one thing I can do legally, and that's your budget. I want to understand your budget." Just asking the questions made him very angry. They eventually started fibbing to me. There was a deputy -- I barred him from this office. I don't need anybody to come in and not tell me what's going on. I didn't want to embarrass him; I just wanted him to tell the truth. That was the first struggle; it's still continuing.
One of your colleagues used the word "grandstanding."
Sometimes I have to take things public. When I first came here, on the pension issue, my colleagues, all of them, were very angry with me. Sometimes I have to go that far in order to make a point.
My colleague, Garrett Therolf, says it bugs you that reporters come to you for what you've called the "bitch quote" -- is that how you've been cast by the press?
Absolutely. Particularly in the L.A. Times, my name always has a lot of adjectives like "feisty" or "hostile" or "angrily." When Zev asks a question as aggressively as I do, it doesn't have those adjectives in front of his name. Granted, I get angry about some of our people and how badly they do certain things. I do know that's [my] reputation. I really even don't mind it. I'd love being sweet and nice all the time if I could, if I didn't care about all of this, but I do.
Los Angeles County is majority Latino; California soon will be. Is it time to begin redefining majority and minority?
We're going to be a majority, but what does that mean? If you still [have] the highest dropout rate and the most crime-infested neighborhoods and all those things, then it doesn't mean anything. It doesn't create anything unless you are empowering along the way. So, yes, we are more in numbers, but I don't know that we are effective enough collectively, as Latinos. We will not be the power majority at all because there's too many shortcomings in the Latino community for all kinds of reasons, unless we make the kind of dramatic changes to make sure that as you move up, you're going to have a healthier number of Latinos in every way -- health, education, financial independence.
Were you surprised at the huge reaction against your ordinance cracking down on illegally parked taco trucks?
Absolutely. The people who made it kind of a gag almost certainly don't know any of the issues. I had a taco truck in front of a school -- they wouldn't move, they just paid the citations and parents complained they were crossing with their children and couldn't see around them. I had no ability to move it out of there. We spent a lot of years negotiating -- "Come on, guys, move on" -- and they wouldn't do it. I remember getting a letter from someone in West Covina who said, "What is wrong with you? There's nothing better than going into East L.A. and having these wonderful tacos." [These] weren't people who had these trucks in their neighborhoods. Why is it they don't have them in Pasadena on Colorado Boulevard? Because they don't permit it. I've had good meetings with the loncheros and said, "I'm not trying to ruin your business." [But some operators are] urinating on lawns, making noise, they're there until 2 or 3 in the morning.
Ever eat from them?
Of course I did; I don't do it now -- someone would take my picture! I did it years ago.
You told NPR's "Story Corps" that you wanted to be a fashion designer.
We all have dreams, right? I loved old movies, I loved the fact that everything was so beautiful and perfect. How did Jean Harlow have this dress that flowed so beautifully? Then, of course, everybody asks you what you want to be when you grow up, and becoming a fashion designer was something I really wanted to do. I didn't know anything about being a lawyer or doctor. I read about Edith Head and Coco Chanel and this very glamorous life, and so I thought, "What a great career!" Little did I know I have no talent in that, none whatsoever!
Now you belong to a sewing group?
I'm a quilter. I make lots and lots of quilts. It has become an unbelievable passion for me. We meet every Wednesday. You have to have something besides this part of it [she gestures around the office]. I'm not great at it, but I love doing it.
You grew up the eldest of 10 children; your daughter is an only child. Do you think about how different her life is from yours?
Absolutely, every day, and it's troubling. One of the things that I worry about is that she has had a very easy go of it, and one of the things that was helpful to me was the struggle that I had, coming from a poor family. I think it inspired me to strive, and it has given me the courage to look at things very differently. Sometimes my daughter says things or does things that remind me of how comfortable she's gotten, and so it worries me. She's wonderful and strong and has so many wonderful values, it's just that -- her college was paid for, she had a car, she has a credit card. I appreciate my upbringing, I really do. I didn't appreciate it much [then], but I think it really helped me in the long run.
Is there one thing you wanted to fix when you came into public life that you haven't been able to?
The high school dropout rate. Right now I'm working on a foster-care project that has been, painfully, the only place I have any jurisdiction on educational attainment, for the most part. I traded it for an issue that was very significant: We still don't have a prison in East L.A., and East L.A. is the better for it. I made the right decision, but it is a regret.
patt.morrison@latimes.com. This interview was edited and excerpted from a longer taped transcript. Interview archive: latimes.com/pattasks.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Latinos still not at public policy making table
Opinion: Political tactics don't bring Latinos to the table
By Adrian Perez, Publisher, The Latino Journal E-News, August 24, 2009
Politics can become a frustrating component when it comes to major issues facing America today, like healthcare reform, immigration reform, and global warming. Unfortunately, Latinos, who should be playing a major role in each of these, are being left behind and included only in panels or other forms of focus groups that are usually comprised of the usual "Latino" experts. This has been especially evident in the last few years whenever any of these critical issues reach the nation's voters. By taking this approach, Latinos remain at the kitchen window of federal public policy making instead of sitting at the dinning table carving the turkey.
The proposed healthcare reform is actually a set of policies being formulated for all Americans by Congress and the White House to resolve the issue of the uninsured and uninsurable. But Latinos' medical issues are complex and require a separate legislative discussion to ensure it will work for us. This includes discussing language access, cultural eating habits, cultural healing remedies, and addressing the fear of the undocumented being deported when seeking medical care. Instead of being in the thick of policy development, Latinos are being asked what they need by individuals who are taking notes that are being deciphered to meet the needs of those formulating the policies. Such an approach continues putting the nation's largest minority group at a disadvantage.
The issue of immigration reform could have been addressed two years ago, had it not been killed by those legislators genuflecting to special interest groups. This was a well written bi-partisan piece of legislation that fits what the country needs today - providing an increased tax base and preservation of jobs. Instead, partisan politics killed it and is now causing renewed delays. Most political pundits predict this issue will be around in four years, when Obama will start his second term.
The environment has been harming Latinos physically and economically. This includes exposure to toxins in air, food and water, the lack of advisories in appropriate languages and mediums to educate Latinos on the dangers to possible exposure and Latino children being raised in areas considered the most polluted. Coupled with a water drought in California, the world's major provider of food that is so severe that Latino farm workers are out of work. So when the government tells these Latinos that global warming is real, it does not resonate since the main concern for many Latinos is to raise their children in a healthy and safe community and put food on the table.
If the White House and Congress really want Latino involvement in these policy areas, they need to create meaningful and integrated task forces to not only provide the focus group perspective, but to actually help write these public policies.
I appreciate your comments.
By Adrian Perez, Publisher, The Latino Journal E-News, August 24, 2009
Politics can become a frustrating component when it comes to major issues facing America today, like healthcare reform, immigration reform, and global warming. Unfortunately, Latinos, who should be playing a major role in each of these, are being left behind and included only in panels or other forms of focus groups that are usually comprised of the usual "Latino" experts. This has been especially evident in the last few years whenever any of these critical issues reach the nation's voters. By taking this approach, Latinos remain at the kitchen window of federal public policy making instead of sitting at the dinning table carving the turkey.
The proposed healthcare reform is actually a set of policies being formulated for all Americans by Congress and the White House to resolve the issue of the uninsured and uninsurable. But Latinos' medical issues are complex and require a separate legislative discussion to ensure it will work for us. This includes discussing language access, cultural eating habits, cultural healing remedies, and addressing the fear of the undocumented being deported when seeking medical care. Instead of being in the thick of policy development, Latinos are being asked what they need by individuals who are taking notes that are being deciphered to meet the needs of those formulating the policies. Such an approach continues putting the nation's largest minority group at a disadvantage.
The issue of immigration reform could have been addressed two years ago, had it not been killed by those legislators genuflecting to special interest groups. This was a well written bi-partisan piece of legislation that fits what the country needs today - providing an increased tax base and preservation of jobs. Instead, partisan politics killed it and is now causing renewed delays. Most political pundits predict this issue will be around in four years, when Obama will start his second term.
The environment has been harming Latinos physically and economically. This includes exposure to toxins in air, food and water, the lack of advisories in appropriate languages and mediums to educate Latinos on the dangers to possible exposure and Latino children being raised in areas considered the most polluted. Coupled with a water drought in California, the world's major provider of food that is so severe that Latino farm workers are out of work. So when the government tells these Latinos that global warming is real, it does not resonate since the main concern for many Latinos is to raise their children in a healthy and safe community and put food on the table.
If the White House and Congress really want Latino involvement in these policy areas, they need to create meaningful and integrated task forces to not only provide the focus group perspective, but to actually help write these public policies.
I appreciate your comments.
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Forest Service profiling Hispanics in national parks
Warning on possible pot growers called profiling
Associated Press
DENVER — An advocate for Hispanic rights says she was appalled to learn that the U.S. Forest Service is warning the public that campers who eat tortillas, drink Tecate beer and play Spanish music could be armed marijuana growers.
Polly Baca, co-chairwoman of the Colorado Latino Forum, says the warning is profiling and discriminatory. She says it could put Hispanic campers in danger.
A Forest Service spokesman had no immediate comment Friday.
The agency issued the warning Wednesday amid an investigation into how much marijuana is being cultivated in Colorado's national forests.
More than 14,000 irrigated marijuana plants were found in Colorado's Pike National Forest in July. Federal officials say they believe illegal immigrants were brought to the site from Mexico to tend the plants.
Associated Press
DENVER — An advocate for Hispanic rights says she was appalled to learn that the U.S. Forest Service is warning the public that campers who eat tortillas, drink Tecate beer and play Spanish music could be armed marijuana growers.
Polly Baca, co-chairwoman of the Colorado Latino Forum, says the warning is profiling and discriminatory. She says it could put Hispanic campers in danger.
A Forest Service spokesman had no immediate comment Friday.
The agency issued the warning Wednesday amid an investigation into how much marijuana is being cultivated in Colorado's national forests.
More than 14,000 irrigated marijuana plants were found in Colorado's Pike National Forest in July. Federal officials say they believe illegal immigrants were brought to the site from Mexico to tend the plants.
Latina school dropout rate 'alarming'
Report: Latina dropout rate 'alarming'
By OLIVIA WINSLOW, News Day, August 27, 2009
“Alarming numbers” of Hispanic girls are dropping out of high school nationwide, two advocacy organizations say in a report released Thursday that recommends an array of policy and educational changes to stem the trend.
“We want to make sure educators and policy makers really understand the particular barriers facing Latinas,” said Lara Kaufmann, senior counsel with the National Women’s Law Center and a co-author of the report produced with the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund. “They are the fastest growing group of female, school-aged youth.”
Kaufmann added many of the report’s recommendations — such as expanding affordable child care and early education programs and school initiatives to make students “college ready” — would not only benefit Latinas, but other at-risk students as well, including boys.
“It’s just there’s been a lot of attention to the crisis for boys, but not much attention to the crisis affecting girls,” she said. “We want to make sure they’re not left out of the solution.”
Women who don’t graduate from high school face grimmer prospects than men, Marcia D. Greenberger, co-president of the law center, said Thursday in a conference call with the media. Women “face a lifetime of lower earnings and higher rates of unemployment. Children of women who drop out are more likely to drop out themselves, thereby continuing the cycle.”
The report, “Listening to Latinas: Barriers to High School Graduation,” estimates the drop-out rate of Latinas at 41 percent in 2006. The report’s authors define dropouts as students who do not graduate in four years with a standard diploma, using a method that predicts student’s probability of graduating by looking at the average rate of success of groups of students progressing through each grade.
The New York State Education Department noted, however, that the graduation rate of minority students often improves in the fifth and sixth years.
The graduation rate of Hispanic students in New York who started ninth-grade in 2004 and graduated in June 2008 was 52.2 percent, while 16.8 percent dropped out and another 28.4 percent were still enrolled. The graduation rate for Hispanic females in New York was 58.1 percent in 2008, lower than all other females.
In its surveys of Latinas, the report said that while many had high aspirations — 98 percent said they wanted to finish high school and another 80 percent said they wanted to graduate from college — 34 percent did not “realistically” think they could achieve their educational goal.
Other barriers, the report said, include limited English proficiency; poverty; high pregnancy rates; gender and ethnic stereotyping; and undocumented immigration status. The report recommends legislation to enable “hardworking” students brought to the United States as children but are not yet citizens to have the opportunity to attend college.
Thomas O’Brien, principal of Brentwood High School, where nearly 70 percent of the 3,800 students are Hispanic, sees many of those issues playing out in his school.
“The most at-risk group were Latinas, definitely more so than the males,” O’Brien said, citing issues in the report. A priority is getting students with limited English ability proficient in the language.
A “huge problem,” O’Brien added, was some students’ undocumented status, which casts a dark shadow over their lives.
“Many of these kids who are undocumented have been here since they were toddlers... They consider themselves American. We are disabling our country by allowing this talent pool to go untapped,” O’Brien said.
By OLIVIA WINSLOW, News Day, August 27, 2009
“Alarming numbers” of Hispanic girls are dropping out of high school nationwide, two advocacy organizations say in a report released Thursday that recommends an array of policy and educational changes to stem the trend.
“We want to make sure educators and policy makers really understand the particular barriers facing Latinas,” said Lara Kaufmann, senior counsel with the National Women’s Law Center and a co-author of the report produced with the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund. “They are the fastest growing group of female, school-aged youth.”
Kaufmann added many of the report’s recommendations — such as expanding affordable child care and early education programs and school initiatives to make students “college ready” — would not only benefit Latinas, but other at-risk students as well, including boys.
“It’s just there’s been a lot of attention to the crisis for boys, but not much attention to the crisis affecting girls,” she said. “We want to make sure they’re not left out of the solution.”
Women who don’t graduate from high school face grimmer prospects than men, Marcia D. Greenberger, co-president of the law center, said Thursday in a conference call with the media. Women “face a lifetime of lower earnings and higher rates of unemployment. Children of women who drop out are more likely to drop out themselves, thereby continuing the cycle.”
The report, “Listening to Latinas: Barriers to High School Graduation,” estimates the drop-out rate of Latinas at 41 percent in 2006. The report’s authors define dropouts as students who do not graduate in four years with a standard diploma, using a method that predicts student’s probability of graduating by looking at the average rate of success of groups of students progressing through each grade.
The New York State Education Department noted, however, that the graduation rate of minority students often improves in the fifth and sixth years.
The graduation rate of Hispanic students in New York who started ninth-grade in 2004 and graduated in June 2008 was 52.2 percent, while 16.8 percent dropped out and another 28.4 percent were still enrolled. The graduation rate for Hispanic females in New York was 58.1 percent in 2008, lower than all other females.
In its surveys of Latinas, the report said that while many had high aspirations — 98 percent said they wanted to finish high school and another 80 percent said they wanted to graduate from college — 34 percent did not “realistically” think they could achieve their educational goal.
Other barriers, the report said, include limited English proficiency; poverty; high pregnancy rates; gender and ethnic stereotyping; and undocumented immigration status. The report recommends legislation to enable “hardworking” students brought to the United States as children but are not yet citizens to have the opportunity to attend college.
Thomas O’Brien, principal of Brentwood High School, where nearly 70 percent of the 3,800 students are Hispanic, sees many of those issues playing out in his school.
“The most at-risk group were Latinas, definitely more so than the males,” O’Brien said, citing issues in the report. A priority is getting students with limited English ability proficient in the language.
A “huge problem,” O’Brien added, was some students’ undocumented status, which casts a dark shadow over their lives.
“Many of these kids who are undocumented have been here since they were toddlers... They consider themselves American. We are disabling our country by allowing this talent pool to go untapped,” O’Brien said.
Texas Latino voters sue Democratic Party
Ruling favors Latino voters in Texas Democrat suit
By PAUL J. WEBER, Associated Press
SAN ANTONIO — Latino advocates are claiming victory over a federal court ruling that could put the complicated "Texas Two-step" presidential delegate system in jeopardy.
The decision Tuesday by a three-judge federal court panel in San Antonio favors Latino voters who say their vote was diluted during last year's intense Texas Democratic primary between Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Under the ruling, Latino advocates moved closer toward its goal of the Justice Department reviewing whether the delegate system violates the Voting Rights Act. The ruling, however, did not come out and require the Texas Democratic Party to seek federal pre-clearance.
The party says it is reviewing the court's opinion.
By PAUL J. WEBER, Associated Press
SAN ANTONIO — Latino advocates are claiming victory over a federal court ruling that could put the complicated "Texas Two-step" presidential delegate system in jeopardy.
The decision Tuesday by a three-judge federal court panel in San Antonio favors Latino voters who say their vote was diluted during last year's intense Texas Democratic primary between Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Under the ruling, Latino advocates moved closer toward its goal of the Justice Department reviewing whether the delegate system violates the Voting Rights Act. The ruling, however, did not come out and require the Texas Democratic Party to seek federal pre-clearance.
The party says it is reviewing the court's opinion.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Latino Senator's departure will impact GOP
AP Analysis: Martinez departure part of GOP schism
By LAURA WIDES-MUNOZ, Associated Press
MIAMI — Florida Sen. Mel Martinez's resignation closes the latest chapter in the Republican Party's tumultuous, decade-long effort to woo the nation's Hispanic voters.
The Cuban-American's impending departure could leave no Hispanic Republicans in the Senate and three in the House — compared to 21 Democrats in Congress — and a sense that the national GOP is at a major crossroads with the nation's fastest-growing demographic group.
Although most Hispanics outside of Florida have long leaned Democratic, the Republican Party earned the trust of many at the beginning of the decade by tapping into socially conservative, religious and pro-business sentiment. Martinez both rode and propelled that wave.
"He symbolized trying to reach out to Latinos and being more moderate," said Marisa A. Abrajano, a University of California, San Diego professor and co-author of an upcoming book on Hispanic political behavior in the U.S.
But the heated rhetoric over illegal immigration in 2006, followed by the loss of many Republican moderates, and most recently the GOP's failed opposition to Justice Sonia Sotomayor's Supreme Court nomination have helped drive away many Hispanic voters. Martinez, as senator and briefly as head of the party, tried to temper the anti-immigrant language, and he bucked his party by voting for Sotomayor, who is of Puerto Rican descent. Yet, in the end, few in Washington followed his lead.
"In the vast majority of their values, this party resonates with who I am — except they don't want me," lamented the Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, which represents more than 25,000 Hispanic evangelical churches across the country.
U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, R-Fla., said Hispanics have a natural affinity with the Republican Party's principles but acknowledged the GOP has a lot of work to do.
"Republicans have to be able to get the Hispanic community to focus on issues where Republicans have the right solutions — and these are critical issues: the economy being number one," he said.
Of course political fortunes rise and fall quickly. A Democratic failure to achieve meaningful health care or immigration reform or an economic recovery that doesn't help average Hispanics could encourage them to give Republicans another chance.
But experts say the GOP has good reason to be worried.
"One election and one resignation is not the end of an era, but it does signify tremendous problems in appealing to Hispanics in Florida, and nationwide," said Florida International University political science Professor Dario Moreno.
Diaz-Balart said the immigration debate hurt his party's relations with Hispanics because it "cluttered the communication waves."
"What they see on television is a local or a state official speaking very negatively about immigrants and then what they see is that that person is Republican," said Diaz-Balart, who like Martinez supports a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.
But Diaz-Balart said Republican leaders such as South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, who also voted for Sotomayor, are helping to put the party on a new path. He predicted if Democratic leaders allow an immigration bill to reach the floor, Americans will hear a very different tone from his party.
"Without any doubt how we handle that immigration debate is going to be very important," he said.
Republican National Committee Spokeswoman Gail Gitcho said voters are still recovering from election fatigue, but the GOP is working to expand its grassroots outreach to Hispanics and other minority communities through its state parties. "We certainly have to rebuild and expand the Republican Latino coalition," she said.
Still, Martinez's resignation is a reminder of just how empty the Republican party's bench of Hispanic leadership is outside of Florida, where the party maintains a strong presence, particularly among Cuban-Americans.
Congress' Republican Hispanic Conference now includes Diaz-Balart and two other veteran Cuban-American politicians from South Florida and a third-generation Portuguese-American from Central California — respected leaders but hardly representative of the nation's more than 45 million Hispanics, most of whom trace their roots to Mexico.
As for those vying for Martinez's job, former state House Speaker Marco Rubio, a Cuban-American, is the underdog against fellow Republican Gov. Charlie Crist. Crist has floated a couple of Hispanic names to temporarily fill the seat but has yet to appoint someone.
Those small numbers are a problem, said Arturo Vargas, executive director of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials.
"They need not just a Hispanic strategy but real Hispanic participation from within. How are they going to bring in new Hispanics into the party and help grow them as candidates?" Vargas said.
Martinez, a Cuban immigrant, was a county mayor and former President George W. Bush's housing secretary before winning his seat in 2004 as his party was on an upswing. That year, Bush won roughly 40 percent of the Hispanic vote thanks to heavy outreach and an absence of discussion about immigration. But by 2006, following bitter immigration debates — the party would later sponsor ads comparing Mexican immigrants to Islamic terrorists — the support plummeted. Martinez was tapped to head the RNC and turn things around.
He lasted less than a year, fighting with his party over its harsh immigration rhetoric and watching helplessly in 2008 as Republicans hemorrhaged even more Hispanic voters in states like Nevada, New Mexico, Texas and even Florida.
Martinez's last major act as senator was to support Sotomayor, casting one of nine Republican votes for the nation's first Latina Supreme Court justice. It was a symbolic final call to arms. In a passionate 2,500-word speech on the Senate floor — well beyond the standard statement of support — he systematically dissected his colleagues' criticism of her, particularly those related to her comments suggesting a "wise Latina" might reach better decisions than a white man who did not share her experiences.
"They can talk about her speeches, but they cannot talk about a single, solitary opinion in 17 years on the bench where that type of a view has been given life — where that type of a view has found itself into the pages of a single one of her opinions," he concluded.
Meanwhile, Rodriguez, the evangelical church leader, said that despite its promises of change, the party is simply banking that it can survive by winning back independent, non-ethnic, fiscal conservatives.
He is still waiting for a public apology for the vitriolic language of the immigration debates.
"I can tell you firsthand the Latino outreach on behalf of the Republican party is nil," he said. "The Republican Party has one incredible hill to climb. So my question is what are they waiting for?"
By LAURA WIDES-MUNOZ, Associated Press
MIAMI — Florida Sen. Mel Martinez's resignation closes the latest chapter in the Republican Party's tumultuous, decade-long effort to woo the nation's Hispanic voters.
The Cuban-American's impending departure could leave no Hispanic Republicans in the Senate and three in the House — compared to 21 Democrats in Congress — and a sense that the national GOP is at a major crossroads with the nation's fastest-growing demographic group.
Although most Hispanics outside of Florida have long leaned Democratic, the Republican Party earned the trust of many at the beginning of the decade by tapping into socially conservative, religious and pro-business sentiment. Martinez both rode and propelled that wave.
"He symbolized trying to reach out to Latinos and being more moderate," said Marisa A. Abrajano, a University of California, San Diego professor and co-author of an upcoming book on Hispanic political behavior in the U.S.
But the heated rhetoric over illegal immigration in 2006, followed by the loss of many Republican moderates, and most recently the GOP's failed opposition to Justice Sonia Sotomayor's Supreme Court nomination have helped drive away many Hispanic voters. Martinez, as senator and briefly as head of the party, tried to temper the anti-immigrant language, and he bucked his party by voting for Sotomayor, who is of Puerto Rican descent. Yet, in the end, few in Washington followed his lead.
"In the vast majority of their values, this party resonates with who I am — except they don't want me," lamented the Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, which represents more than 25,000 Hispanic evangelical churches across the country.
U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, R-Fla., said Hispanics have a natural affinity with the Republican Party's principles but acknowledged the GOP has a lot of work to do.
"Republicans have to be able to get the Hispanic community to focus on issues where Republicans have the right solutions — and these are critical issues: the economy being number one," he said.
Of course political fortunes rise and fall quickly. A Democratic failure to achieve meaningful health care or immigration reform or an economic recovery that doesn't help average Hispanics could encourage them to give Republicans another chance.
But experts say the GOP has good reason to be worried.
"One election and one resignation is not the end of an era, but it does signify tremendous problems in appealing to Hispanics in Florida, and nationwide," said Florida International University political science Professor Dario Moreno.
Diaz-Balart said the immigration debate hurt his party's relations with Hispanics because it "cluttered the communication waves."
"What they see on television is a local or a state official speaking very negatively about immigrants and then what they see is that that person is Republican," said Diaz-Balart, who like Martinez supports a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.
But Diaz-Balart said Republican leaders such as South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, who also voted for Sotomayor, are helping to put the party on a new path. He predicted if Democratic leaders allow an immigration bill to reach the floor, Americans will hear a very different tone from his party.
"Without any doubt how we handle that immigration debate is going to be very important," he said.
Republican National Committee Spokeswoman Gail Gitcho said voters are still recovering from election fatigue, but the GOP is working to expand its grassroots outreach to Hispanics and other minority communities through its state parties. "We certainly have to rebuild and expand the Republican Latino coalition," she said.
Still, Martinez's resignation is a reminder of just how empty the Republican party's bench of Hispanic leadership is outside of Florida, where the party maintains a strong presence, particularly among Cuban-Americans.
Congress' Republican Hispanic Conference now includes Diaz-Balart and two other veteran Cuban-American politicians from South Florida and a third-generation Portuguese-American from Central California — respected leaders but hardly representative of the nation's more than 45 million Hispanics, most of whom trace their roots to Mexico.
As for those vying for Martinez's job, former state House Speaker Marco Rubio, a Cuban-American, is the underdog against fellow Republican Gov. Charlie Crist. Crist has floated a couple of Hispanic names to temporarily fill the seat but has yet to appoint someone.
Those small numbers are a problem, said Arturo Vargas, executive director of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials.
"They need not just a Hispanic strategy but real Hispanic participation from within. How are they going to bring in new Hispanics into the party and help grow them as candidates?" Vargas said.
Martinez, a Cuban immigrant, was a county mayor and former President George W. Bush's housing secretary before winning his seat in 2004 as his party was on an upswing. That year, Bush won roughly 40 percent of the Hispanic vote thanks to heavy outreach and an absence of discussion about immigration. But by 2006, following bitter immigration debates — the party would later sponsor ads comparing Mexican immigrants to Islamic terrorists — the support plummeted. Martinez was tapped to head the RNC and turn things around.
He lasted less than a year, fighting with his party over its harsh immigration rhetoric and watching helplessly in 2008 as Republicans hemorrhaged even more Hispanic voters in states like Nevada, New Mexico, Texas and even Florida.
Martinez's last major act as senator was to support Sotomayor, casting one of nine Republican votes for the nation's first Latina Supreme Court justice. It was a symbolic final call to arms. In a passionate 2,500-word speech on the Senate floor — well beyond the standard statement of support — he systematically dissected his colleagues' criticism of her, particularly those related to her comments suggesting a "wise Latina" might reach better decisions than a white man who did not share her experiences.
"They can talk about her speeches, but they cannot talk about a single, solitary opinion in 17 years on the bench where that type of a view has been given life — where that type of a view has found itself into the pages of a single one of her opinions," he concluded.
Meanwhile, Rodriguez, the evangelical church leader, said that despite its promises of change, the party is simply banking that it can survive by winning back independent, non-ethnic, fiscal conservatives.
He is still waiting for a public apology for the vitriolic language of the immigration debates.
"I can tell you firsthand the Latino outreach on behalf of the Republican party is nil," he said. "The Republican Party has one incredible hill to climb. So my question is what are they waiting for?"
Hispanic group irritated by Limbaugh's false assumptions
Radio talk show host makes false assumptions against the largest and oldest Hispanic civil rights organization in the country.
PRESS RELEASE, August 21, 2009
Washington, DC – The League of United Latin American Citizens, the largest and oldest Hispanic civil rights organization in the country, wants conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh to take back his comments on his show today claiming that President Obama is lying about undocumented immigrants not receiving health care because why else would organizations like LULAC support health care reform.
“We want Rush Limbaugh to stop the lies about credible Hispanic civil rights organizations,” said LULAC National President Rosa Rosales. “If he had engaged in dialogue with us or read the proposed legislation he would have known and not falsified the facts. Limbaugh has insulted the largest and oldest Hispanic civil rights organization in the country.”
The majority of the Latinos in this country are United States citizens. Of the 45 million uninsured in this country, almost 16 million Latino Americans are uninsured.
Limbaugh asks why Latino groups are lobbying for health care reform bill if illegal immigrants aren't covered. Listen to the Audio here: http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/200908210019.
The League of United Latin American Citizens, the oldest and largest Hispanic membership organization in the country, advances the economic conditions, educational attainment, political influence, health and civil rights of Hispanic Americans through community-based programs operating at more than 700 LULAC councils nationwide.
PRESS RELEASE, August 21, 2009
Washington, DC – The League of United Latin American Citizens, the largest and oldest Hispanic civil rights organization in the country, wants conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh to take back his comments on his show today claiming that President Obama is lying about undocumented immigrants not receiving health care because why else would organizations like LULAC support health care reform.
“We want Rush Limbaugh to stop the lies about credible Hispanic civil rights organizations,” said LULAC National President Rosa Rosales. “If he had engaged in dialogue with us or read the proposed legislation he would have known and not falsified the facts. Limbaugh has insulted the largest and oldest Hispanic civil rights organization in the country.”
The majority of the Latinos in this country are United States citizens. Of the 45 million uninsured in this country, almost 16 million Latino Americans are uninsured.
Limbaugh asks why Latino groups are lobbying for health care reform bill if illegal immigrants aren't covered. Listen to the Audio here: http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/200908210019.
The League of United Latin American Citizens, the oldest and largest Hispanic membership organization in the country, advances the economic conditions, educational attainment, political influence, health and civil rights of Hispanic Americans through community-based programs operating at more than 700 LULAC councils nationwide.
Latina Senator pushes Port Security Act
Port Security Act goes to guv with unanimous, bipartisan support
PRESS RELEASE
SACRAMENTO – As ports nationwide compete with economic challenges, California’s cargo hubs are a signature away from making it easier to more accurately collect crime data used in qualifying for federal Homeland Security funds.
Such would be achieved under a Sen. Jenny Oropeza bill the state Senate sent to Gov. Schwarzenegger today on a unanimous, bipartisan vote.
“Previously, when cargo was stolen from a trailer, railcar or storage container at the ports, there was no standard way to classify this crime,” the Long Beach Democrat said. “Depending on the circumstances of the theft, it could be called a burglary, robbery, larceny, grand theft or a number of other felony charges. This lack of consistency made it difficult to tabulate the value and frequency of what was being stolen from our ports.”
Senate Bill 24 would permanently define cargo theft as a type of grand theft, by reauthorizing a 2004 law by Oropeza, Assembly Bill 1814, which created the original designation. Without action, the Port Security Act will sunset at the end of this year.
Oropeza cited several reasons law enforcement groups statewide support SB 24:
· In the four years following enactment of AB 1814, the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department received nearly $6 million in federal funding for port protection.
· Nearly 42 percent of international container trade enters the U.S. through the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, a major boost to the local economy.
· More federal funding to protect the ports allows for better security while ensuring the nation’s commerce moves freely and safely.
· The severity of the crime is in the numbers. Between 2006 and 2008, Los Angeles County sheriffs recovered more than $56 million in stolen property.
In addition, this legislation has been so successful the FBI is now considering tracking cargo theft in its Uniform Crime Report.
Sponsored by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, SB 24 supporters include the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department; the California District Attorneys Association; the California Peace Officers’ Association; the California Police Chiefs Association; the California Retailers Association; the California State Sheriffs’ Association; the Harbor Association of Industry and Commerce; the LAX Coastal Area Chamber of Commerce, the League of California Cities; the Long Beach Police Officers Association; and the South Bay Association of Chambers of Commerce.
SB 24 goes to Gov. Schwarzenegger with unanimous support from the Assembly and Senate. It has two Republican co-authors.
PRESS RELEASE
SACRAMENTO – As ports nationwide compete with economic challenges, California’s cargo hubs are a signature away from making it easier to more accurately collect crime data used in qualifying for federal Homeland Security funds.
Such would be achieved under a Sen. Jenny Oropeza bill the state Senate sent to Gov. Schwarzenegger today on a unanimous, bipartisan vote.
“Previously, when cargo was stolen from a trailer, railcar or storage container at the ports, there was no standard way to classify this crime,” the Long Beach Democrat said. “Depending on the circumstances of the theft, it could be called a burglary, robbery, larceny, grand theft or a number of other felony charges. This lack of consistency made it difficult to tabulate the value and frequency of what was being stolen from our ports.”
Senate Bill 24 would permanently define cargo theft as a type of grand theft, by reauthorizing a 2004 law by Oropeza, Assembly Bill 1814, which created the original designation. Without action, the Port Security Act will sunset at the end of this year.
Oropeza cited several reasons law enforcement groups statewide support SB 24:
· In the four years following enactment of AB 1814, the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department received nearly $6 million in federal funding for port protection.
· Nearly 42 percent of international container trade enters the U.S. through the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, a major boost to the local economy.
· More federal funding to protect the ports allows for better security while ensuring the nation’s commerce moves freely and safely.
· The severity of the crime is in the numbers. Between 2006 and 2008, Los Angeles County sheriffs recovered more than $56 million in stolen property.
In addition, this legislation has been so successful the FBI is now considering tracking cargo theft in its Uniform Crime Report.
Sponsored by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, SB 24 supporters include the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department; the California District Attorneys Association; the California Peace Officers’ Association; the California Police Chiefs Association; the California Retailers Association; the California State Sheriffs’ Association; the Harbor Association of Industry and Commerce; the LAX Coastal Area Chamber of Commerce, the League of California Cities; the Long Beach Police Officers Association; and the South Bay Association of Chambers of Commerce.
SB 24 goes to Gov. Schwarzenegger with unanimous support from the Assembly and Senate. It has two Republican co-authors.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Latino students show improvement
California students making slow but steady progress on state tests
By Dana Hull, Mercury News, 08/18/2009
Public school teachers are beginning the school year with a keen understanding of how well or poorly their students performed on standardized tests taken last spring—and the enormous challenge ahead to meet ever-tougher federal goals.
According to state test results released Tuesday, California's 6.3 million public school students are inching upward in English-language arts, math, science and history. Still, only 46 percent of students are considered "proficient" or "advanced" in math and only 50 percent are proficient or advanced in English-language arts. The federal government wants all students to be proficient by 2013-14 — an aggressive goal that many educators say is wildly unrealistic.
In Santa Clara County, the news is slightly better. Fifty-six percent of the county's 262,000 students are proficient or advanced in math, while 61 percent are proficient or advanced in English, according to scores on the 2008-2009 state tests known collectively as STAR.
But the Golden State's achievement gap — the academic chasm separating black and Latino students from their white and Asian peers — has barely budged, despite years of intensive efforts. Every year, students of all ethnicities do slightly better than in previous years, but the gap between them persists. And with many local schools cutting counselors and librarians, raising class sizes and scrambling for funds, some wonder if the achievement gap will worsen in the coming years.
"This achievement gap represents a loss of opportunity for students of color and remains a real threat to their and California's future success," said State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell.
Disproportionate share
A disproportionate share of students who fall below the proficient level are African-American or Latino.
Among African-Americans statewide, 37 percent are at least proficient in English — the same percentage as Latino students. The numbers are even worse for math, with just 30 percent of black students scoring at least proficient. Asians statewide scored 72 percent — a 42-point difference. The spread between the two groups (black and Asian) was 43 last year.
The scores are based on the California Standards Tests, a battery of multiple-choice tests administered every spring to public school students in grades two through 11. For each test, students are ranked in five cohorts: "advanced," "proficient," "basic," "below basic" or "far below basic."
Students in San Jose Unified and the Mountain View-Los Altos High School District are already sitting in their classrooms, and other local districts are opening their doors early next week.
By Dana Hull, Mercury News, 08/18/2009
Public school teachers are beginning the school year with a keen understanding of how well or poorly their students performed on standardized tests taken last spring—and the enormous challenge ahead to meet ever-tougher federal goals.
According to state test results released Tuesday, California's 6.3 million public school students are inching upward in English-language arts, math, science and history. Still, only 46 percent of students are considered "proficient" or "advanced" in math and only 50 percent are proficient or advanced in English-language arts. The federal government wants all students to be proficient by 2013-14 — an aggressive goal that many educators say is wildly unrealistic.
In Santa Clara County, the news is slightly better. Fifty-six percent of the county's 262,000 students are proficient or advanced in math, while 61 percent are proficient or advanced in English, according to scores on the 2008-2009 state tests known collectively as STAR.
But the Golden State's achievement gap — the academic chasm separating black and Latino students from their white and Asian peers — has barely budged, despite years of intensive efforts. Every year, students of all ethnicities do slightly better than in previous years, but the gap between them persists. And with many local schools cutting counselors and librarians, raising class sizes and scrambling for funds, some wonder if the achievement gap will worsen in the coming years.
"This achievement gap represents a loss of opportunity for students of color and remains a real threat to their and California's future success," said State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell.
Disproportionate share
A disproportionate share of students who fall below the proficient level are African-American or Latino.
Among African-Americans statewide, 37 percent are at least proficient in English — the same percentage as Latino students. The numbers are even worse for math, with just 30 percent of black students scoring at least proficient. Asians statewide scored 72 percent — a 42-point difference. The spread between the two groups (black and Asian) was 43 last year.
The scores are based on the California Standards Tests, a battery of multiple-choice tests administered every spring to public school students in grades two through 11. For each test, students are ranked in five cohorts: "advanced," "proficient," "basic," "below basic" or "far below basic."
Students in San Jose Unified and the Mountain View-Los Altos High School District are already sitting in their classrooms, and other local districts are opening their doors early next week.
Hispanic woman to lead GOP outreach in Florida
Central Florida Hispanic woman to lead Republican outreach
By Victor Manuel Ramos, Orlando Sentinel, Aug 19, 2009
A Hispanic woman from Central Florida was elected to lead a national Republican group that promotes the party's principles among Latinos, the party announced this week.
Alci Maldonado, of Lakeland in Polk County, was elected chair of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly, a group with about a dozen chapters in states with significant Latino populations.
The group promotes the idea that "Hispanic values are Republican values and vice versa," citing the party's inclination to support traditional family principles, entrepreneurship and strong national security as compatible with predominant beliefs in the community.
Maldonado, who headed the Florida chapter, will now oversee the work of the national group, which has worked to enlist Hispanic volunteers to support Republican campaigns here and elsewhere.
Maldonado said in a statement that she will work on what she calls "seven pillars" -- to improve communication, finance and fundraising, technology, grassroots activism, financial transparency, regional involvement and party unity among Hispanic Republicans.
“Every large state is as important as every small state," Maldonado wrote to supporters. "When we unite north and south, east and west, Washington State with New York, Florida and California, Texas and Michigan, we will fulfill our greatest potential; we will be the shining example to all other so-called grassroots organizations."
Florida party officials celebrated her election as sign of the party's appeal to Hispanics, despite losing many of their votes in the last presidential election.
Still, GOP members believe they can hold on to their substantial base in the state and grow elsewhere.
"Contrary to popular belief, the Hispanic Republican population continues to be strong and a growing demographic across the nation," said Belinda Ortiz, Hispanic outreach director for Republicans in Florida. "The election of Ms. Maldonado means Florida -- Central Florida specifically -- will have a greater influence on the organization’s national agenda."
Jim Greer, chairman of the Republican Party of Florida, said of Maldonado that "her impressive election, by a margin of nearly 60 percent, proves her reputation as a hardworking advocate of our values, as well as an outstanding Republican leader, within the Hispanic community and across the state."
By Victor Manuel Ramos, Orlando Sentinel, Aug 19, 2009
A Hispanic woman from Central Florida was elected to lead a national Republican group that promotes the party's principles among Latinos, the party announced this week.
Alci Maldonado, of Lakeland in Polk County, was elected chair of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly, a group with about a dozen chapters in states with significant Latino populations.
The group promotes the idea that "Hispanic values are Republican values and vice versa," citing the party's inclination to support traditional family principles, entrepreneurship and strong national security as compatible with predominant beliefs in the community.
Maldonado, who headed the Florida chapter, will now oversee the work of the national group, which has worked to enlist Hispanic volunteers to support Republican campaigns here and elsewhere.
Maldonado said in a statement that she will work on what she calls "seven pillars" -- to improve communication, finance and fundraising, technology, grassroots activism, financial transparency, regional involvement and party unity among Hispanic Republicans.
“Every large state is as important as every small state," Maldonado wrote to supporters. "When we unite north and south, east and west, Washington State with New York, Florida and California, Texas and Michigan, we will fulfill our greatest potential; we will be the shining example to all other so-called grassroots organizations."
Florida party officials celebrated her election as sign of the party's appeal to Hispanics, despite losing many of their votes in the last presidential election.
Still, GOP members believe they can hold on to their substantial base in the state and grow elsewhere.
"Contrary to popular belief, the Hispanic Republican population continues to be strong and a growing demographic across the nation," said Belinda Ortiz, Hispanic outreach director for Republicans in Florida. "The election of Ms. Maldonado means Florida -- Central Florida specifically -- will have a greater influence on the organization’s national agenda."
Jim Greer, chairman of the Republican Party of Florida, said of Maldonado that "her impressive election, by a margin of nearly 60 percent, proves her reputation as a hardworking advocate of our values, as well as an outstanding Republican leader, within the Hispanic community and across the state."
Census groups reaching out to Hispanic immigrants
2010 census groups reach out to illegal immigrants, Hispanics and blacks
Minority participation in count seen as key to more local dollars
By Oscar Avila, Chicago Tribune, August 23, 2009
The Spanish-language soap "Mas Sabe El Diablo" ("The Devil Knows Best") soon will treat viewers to more than the typical vixens and hunks.
A main character is set to become a census worker, a lackluster job more associated with tallying neighbors on the block than notches on the bedpost.
The Telemundo network sees the unusual casting not as a ratings grabber but as an awareness campaign underscoring concerns that the once-a-decade tabulation of the nation's population faces especially severe challenges in counting minorities and hard-to-reach communities in Chicago and elsewhere.
Since the 2000 census, the dismantling of Chicago Housing Authority developments and a wave of home foreclosures have scattered residents, including many African-Americans, throughout the six-county area.
Meanwhile, federal authorities have stepped up arrests of illegal immigrants, leading to worries that those residents will remain underground rather than report their presence to a federal census worker. Hence, the soap plot line, in which an unwed mother takes a census job and in the process educates her family -- and immigrant viewers -- about the government count.
"We're going wherever the viewers are, even though you're combining something that's a little different with the steamy telenovela," network spokeswoman Michelle Alban said.
In the midst of the challenges, the government agencies and non-profit groups that typically organize outreach are facing decimated budgets just months before the census takes place in the spring.
That means areas without money to undertake extensive outreach efforts might miss out on a helping hand to climb out of the recession because they will not get their share of about $400 billion in federal aid allocated each year strictly on population, such as unemployment benefits.
"In communities that fall short in their count, it's going to be a double whammy," said Robert Wharton, president of a Chicago non-profit and member of the volunteer committee that is helping Cook County promote the census.
The census forms will be mailed in late March, to be returned in April. Those who do not return the forms will receive visits from census takers later in 2010. But much of the battle is already being fought in block clubs, neighborhood meetings and church basements.
At the Rogers Park Community Council, a multiracial group of church members, immigrant aid workers and business owners recently brainstormed ways to reach one of the most diverse populations in the city.
Many of the participants reported that their own agencies have seen their staffs slashed, casting doubts on how much outreach they could really do. The community council wanted to print census-related T-shirts, but it couldn't raise enough money even for that.
Participants suggested a host of ideas -- murals geared to the homeless, multilingual mailers -- but agreed their biggest selling point needs to be that an accurate census count can funnel badly needed public money into communities.
"This is not a joke," Elizabeth Vitell, the council's executive director, told fellow participants. "This is a chance to do something where we will see results in our communities for years to come."
Nationwide, 65 percent of Hispanic residents and 60 percent of black residents returned census forms in 2000, compared with 78 percent of white residents, according to the General Accounting Office, ultimately leading to higher rates of being undercounted.
The consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers estimated that Cook County ultimately will lose about $200 million this decade because of undercounts in the 2000 census. Researchers estimated that Illinois will lose about $12,000 in federal funds over the next decade for each uncounted person.
In Chicago, philanthropists worried that government funding for census outreach will be insufficient have taken an unprecedented step to pay for outreach.
Ten foundations, including the Woods Fund of Chicago, Chicago Community Trust and Polk Bros. Foundation, will donate a total of $1 million in grants to non-profits that will be announced in early September.
Charles Boesel, spokesman for the Joyce Foundation, said participants had noticed troubling trends, including two months of delays in confirming a new Census Bureau director because of GOP concerns that he would promote sampling instead of official counts, a technique that critics call a political maneuver to boost the totals of undercounted minorities.
The new director, Robert Groves, was confirmed in late July but not before lawmakers had tried to eliminate hundreds of millions of dollars in census funding during the ongoing appropriations process.
Census officials say the budgeted $15 billion -- a record -- will be in place, including an increase in "Be Counted" sites, locations where residents can fill out forms if they aren't reached at home.
Also, the Census Bureau plans to send out forms in Spanish and English for the first time to neighborhoods with high immigrant populations.
In Illinois, the ongoing state budget wrangling has threatened funding for the New Americans Initiative, which promotes civics among immigrants and naturalized citizens. Flavia Jimenez, of the non-profit Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, said she is less optimistic now that her partners will be able to piggyback on the state-funded initiative to promote the census in ethnic communities.
Illegal immigrants are an especially hard-to-reach group, Jimenez said, because they do not want their status known to federal authorities. Likewise, if they are exceeding occupancy limits in their homes, they are afraid that municipal authorities will find out.
To combat those concerns, activists have emphasized that federal law prohibits the Census Bureau from sharing individuals' data with other government agencies, including Immigration officials.
In Cook County, the volunteer outreach committee has received only $150,000 from the county for outreach, compared with $500,000 the last time.
Albert Pritchett, the county's former chief administrative officer and chairman of the committee, said his group will need more funding to match the improved participation in the previous census.
"We recognize getting those funds is going to be more difficult this time around," he said, "but we think the costs are essential, especially when you look at what the return is."
oavila@tribune.com
Minority participation in count seen as key to more local dollars
By Oscar Avila, Chicago Tribune, August 23, 2009
The Spanish-language soap "Mas Sabe El Diablo" ("The Devil Knows Best") soon will treat viewers to more than the typical vixens and hunks.
A main character is set to become a census worker, a lackluster job more associated with tallying neighbors on the block than notches on the bedpost.
The Telemundo network sees the unusual casting not as a ratings grabber but as an awareness campaign underscoring concerns that the once-a-decade tabulation of the nation's population faces especially severe challenges in counting minorities and hard-to-reach communities in Chicago and elsewhere.
Since the 2000 census, the dismantling of Chicago Housing Authority developments and a wave of home foreclosures have scattered residents, including many African-Americans, throughout the six-county area.
Meanwhile, federal authorities have stepped up arrests of illegal immigrants, leading to worries that those residents will remain underground rather than report their presence to a federal census worker. Hence, the soap plot line, in which an unwed mother takes a census job and in the process educates her family -- and immigrant viewers -- about the government count.
"We're going wherever the viewers are, even though you're combining something that's a little different with the steamy telenovela," network spokeswoman Michelle Alban said.
In the midst of the challenges, the government agencies and non-profit groups that typically organize outreach are facing decimated budgets just months before the census takes place in the spring.
That means areas without money to undertake extensive outreach efforts might miss out on a helping hand to climb out of the recession because they will not get their share of about $400 billion in federal aid allocated each year strictly on population, such as unemployment benefits.
"In communities that fall short in their count, it's going to be a double whammy," said Robert Wharton, president of a Chicago non-profit and member of the volunteer committee that is helping Cook County promote the census.
The census forms will be mailed in late March, to be returned in April. Those who do not return the forms will receive visits from census takers later in 2010. But much of the battle is already being fought in block clubs, neighborhood meetings and church basements.
At the Rogers Park Community Council, a multiracial group of church members, immigrant aid workers and business owners recently brainstormed ways to reach one of the most diverse populations in the city.
Many of the participants reported that their own agencies have seen their staffs slashed, casting doubts on how much outreach they could really do. The community council wanted to print census-related T-shirts, but it couldn't raise enough money even for that.
Participants suggested a host of ideas -- murals geared to the homeless, multilingual mailers -- but agreed their biggest selling point needs to be that an accurate census count can funnel badly needed public money into communities.
"This is not a joke," Elizabeth Vitell, the council's executive director, told fellow participants. "This is a chance to do something where we will see results in our communities for years to come."
Nationwide, 65 percent of Hispanic residents and 60 percent of black residents returned census forms in 2000, compared with 78 percent of white residents, according to the General Accounting Office, ultimately leading to higher rates of being undercounted.
The consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers estimated that Cook County ultimately will lose about $200 million this decade because of undercounts in the 2000 census. Researchers estimated that Illinois will lose about $12,000 in federal funds over the next decade for each uncounted person.
In Chicago, philanthropists worried that government funding for census outreach will be insufficient have taken an unprecedented step to pay for outreach.
Ten foundations, including the Woods Fund of Chicago, Chicago Community Trust and Polk Bros. Foundation, will donate a total of $1 million in grants to non-profits that will be announced in early September.
Charles Boesel, spokesman for the Joyce Foundation, said participants had noticed troubling trends, including two months of delays in confirming a new Census Bureau director because of GOP concerns that he would promote sampling instead of official counts, a technique that critics call a political maneuver to boost the totals of undercounted minorities.
The new director, Robert Groves, was confirmed in late July but not before lawmakers had tried to eliminate hundreds of millions of dollars in census funding during the ongoing appropriations process.
Census officials say the budgeted $15 billion -- a record -- will be in place, including an increase in "Be Counted" sites, locations where residents can fill out forms if they aren't reached at home.
Also, the Census Bureau plans to send out forms in Spanish and English for the first time to neighborhoods with high immigrant populations.
In Illinois, the ongoing state budget wrangling has threatened funding for the New Americans Initiative, which promotes civics among immigrants and naturalized citizens. Flavia Jimenez, of the non-profit Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, said she is less optimistic now that her partners will be able to piggyback on the state-funded initiative to promote the census in ethnic communities.
Illegal immigrants are an especially hard-to-reach group, Jimenez said, because they do not want their status known to federal authorities. Likewise, if they are exceeding occupancy limits in their homes, they are afraid that municipal authorities will find out.
To combat those concerns, activists have emphasized that federal law prohibits the Census Bureau from sharing individuals' data with other government agencies, including Immigration officials.
In Cook County, the volunteer outreach committee has received only $150,000 from the county for outreach, compared with $500,000 the last time.
Albert Pritchett, the county's former chief administrative officer and chairman of the committee, said his group will need more funding to match the improved participation in the previous census.
"We recognize getting those funds is going to be more difficult this time around," he said, "but we think the costs are essential, especially when you look at what the return is."
oavila@tribune.com
Latino students' needs addressed
Focusing on the needs of Merced's Latino students
By DANIELLE GAINES, Merced Sun Star, August 22, 2009
Juan Sepulveda, director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans, was in Merced on Friday to lead a "community conversation" about the special needs of Latino students in Merced County schools.
Sixty-two percent of K-12 students in Merced County are Latino, while 38 percent of Merced College students and 30 percent of UC Merced undergraduates last fall were Latino.
"How many people knew about the White House Initiative before you were invited to this forum?" Sepulveda asked.
Four hands went up.
Still, there were 100 people in the room, ready to converse.
In the crowd was Merced College President Ben Duran, UC Merced Chancellor Steve Kang, County Superintendent of Schools Lee Andersen and several other area superintendents, school board members, teachers and parents.
"I thought it was excellent. It was a very concise and understandable explanation of the Obama administration's approach to education and it allowed the community to express their opinions on what is needed for effective educational programs," Andersen said.
At the start of the event, Sepulveda highlighted recent federal investments in education, which include a $12 billion investment in community colleges over the next decade.
"We know how important community colleges are to the fabric of our communities," Sepulveda said. "There aren't enough Latinos going to college these days. But when we do go, we start at community college."
Those who attended the forum were charged with creating a list of recommendations to improve education for President Obama. The recommendations will be typed, consolidated and eventually analyzed, Sepulveda said.
He and several staff members are visiting Latino communities to gain input prior to updating a new executive order to govern his office's work.
There were many common concerns from those who attended the Merced event, including the need for more outreach to parents, after-school activities to reduce gang involvement, college financial aid, and an education pipeline that would allow students in Merced County to move seamlessly through the primary, secondary and postsecondary systems here.
Sepulveda added that the worth of the forums are proved when community members bring up issues he does not expect.
Earlier in the day at a Fresno event, water issues became central to the discussion.
In Merced, one attendee thought schools and community groups could provide greater access to sports like soccer that are popular among Mexican Americans to keep kids safe after school.
"I'm not here to say what we are doing, because we don't know what we are doing," he explained. "We are here to ask the folks on the ground."
Representatives from the White House Initiative arrived in California on Sunday.
Other stops in the state include San Diego, Orange County, Los Angeles, Fresno, Sacramento and the Bay Area, spokeswoman Glorimar Nosal said.
The White House Initiative on Educational Excellence on Hispanic Americans was created by an executive order on Sept. 24, 1990, to improve federal efforts to promote quality edcuation for Latino Americans.
Reporter Danielle Gaines can be reached at (209) 385-2407 or dgaines@mercedsun-star.com.
By DANIELLE GAINES, Merced Sun Star, August 22, 2009
Juan Sepulveda, director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans, was in Merced on Friday to lead a "community conversation" about the special needs of Latino students in Merced County schools.
Sixty-two percent of K-12 students in Merced County are Latino, while 38 percent of Merced College students and 30 percent of UC Merced undergraduates last fall were Latino.
"How many people knew about the White House Initiative before you were invited to this forum?" Sepulveda asked.
Four hands went up.
Still, there were 100 people in the room, ready to converse.
In the crowd was Merced College President Ben Duran, UC Merced Chancellor Steve Kang, County Superintendent of Schools Lee Andersen and several other area superintendents, school board members, teachers and parents.
"I thought it was excellent. It was a very concise and understandable explanation of the Obama administration's approach to education and it allowed the community to express their opinions on what is needed for effective educational programs," Andersen said.
At the start of the event, Sepulveda highlighted recent federal investments in education, which include a $12 billion investment in community colleges over the next decade.
"We know how important community colleges are to the fabric of our communities," Sepulveda said. "There aren't enough Latinos going to college these days. But when we do go, we start at community college."
Those who attended the forum were charged with creating a list of recommendations to improve education for President Obama. The recommendations will be typed, consolidated and eventually analyzed, Sepulveda said.
He and several staff members are visiting Latino communities to gain input prior to updating a new executive order to govern his office's work.
There were many common concerns from those who attended the Merced event, including the need for more outreach to parents, after-school activities to reduce gang involvement, college financial aid, and an education pipeline that would allow students in Merced County to move seamlessly through the primary, secondary and postsecondary systems here.
Sepulveda added that the worth of the forums are proved when community members bring up issues he does not expect.
Earlier in the day at a Fresno event, water issues became central to the discussion.
In Merced, one attendee thought schools and community groups could provide greater access to sports like soccer that are popular among Mexican Americans to keep kids safe after school.
"I'm not here to say what we are doing, because we don't know what we are doing," he explained. "We are here to ask the folks on the ground."
Representatives from the White House Initiative arrived in California on Sunday.
Other stops in the state include San Diego, Orange County, Los Angeles, Fresno, Sacramento and the Bay Area, spokeswoman Glorimar Nosal said.
The White House Initiative on Educational Excellence on Hispanic Americans was created by an executive order on Sept. 24, 1990, to improve federal efforts to promote quality edcuation for Latino Americans.
Reporter Danielle Gaines can be reached at (209) 385-2407 or dgaines@mercedsun-star.com.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Latinos could win mayoral race in Massachusetts
Lawrence mayoral race draws field of 10
With Mayor Michael Sullivan prohibited from running again, 10 candidates are fighting to fill his chair.
By John Laidler, Boston Globe / August 16, 2009
Mayor Michael Sullivan is prohibited from running again by a city term-limits rule. A Sept. 22 preliminary will cull the field to two for the Nov. 3 city election.
The size of the field, the open seat, and the prospect that Lawrence could become the first Massachusetts community to elect a Latino mayor are all drawing a spotlight to the race. Six of the contenders are Latino, and for the first time in a city election in Lawrence, Latinos will make up a majority of voters - 57.4 percent.
Also fueling interest is the strength of the field, which includes a state legislator, seven current or former city councilors, a Marine Corps veteran of the Iraq war, and a longtime local teacher.
“Almost all of them are very well known, with a background in the city. It should be a very good race,’’ said Rafael Tejeda, the city’s bilingual elections coordinator, who expects strong turnouts in both the preliminary and final elections.
Latinos have won elective seats in several Massachusetts communities, including Boston, Chelsea, Holyoke, Lawrence, and Salem. But to date, none has won a mayor’s office, according to Giovanna Negretti, executive director of ¿Oiste?, a statewide organization that encourages and helps Latinos to run for office.
Negretti said the possibility that Lawrence could become the first city to elect a Latino to its highest office is “incredibly exciting.’’
“The important thing is to elect the best person who represents the interests of all the citizens in Lawrence,’’ she said. “But given that Lawrence is 70 percent Latino in population, it’s not a surprise we have six Latino candidates running for this very important position. We are proud of it and proud of Lawrence for coming so far politically.’’
Lawrence has had nine Latino mayoral candidacies in five elections dating to 1981. The closest to winning was Isabel Melendez, who captured 46 percent of the final election vote in losing to Sullivan in 2001.
This year’s mayoral contenders are four-term state Representative William Lantigua; city councilors David C. Abdoo, Patrick J. Blanchette, Marcos Devers, and Nilka Alvarez-Rodriguez; former councilors Nunzio Dimarca, Israel Reyes, and Julia Silverio; and first-time candidates Daniel B. Cotnoir, an Iraqi war veteran; and Pedro N. Payano, a Lawrence High School social studies teacher.
Devers lost to Sullivan in the final of the 2005 mayor’s race. He served as interim mayor for about two months in 2001. Dimarca ran for mayor in 1987 and 1991.
Adding spice to the race are past political relationships among the candidates.
Devers, for instance, unsuccessfully challenged Lantigua for state representative in 2006 and 2008 (In the 2006 race, Lantigua got Devers’s name removed from the primary ballot by challenging his residency status. Devers then ran a write-in campaign in the primary and the final.) Reyes, who lost a bid for state representative in 2000, was Lantigua’s 2002 campaign manager. Payano was on Devers’s 2005 campaign team.
The presence in the race of Cotnoir, who spent 10 months in Iraq, should also help spark interest. In what he says was an attempt to protect his house, Cotnoir in 2005 fired a shotgun in the direction of a crowd of noisy nightclub revelers - slightly injuring two of them - after he was struck by a bottle tossed through his window. In 2006, a jury acquitted him of two counts of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, saying he acted in self-defense.
One uncertain dynamic is what effect, if any, Blanchette’s tax difficulties might have on his candidacy. Blanchette confirmed this spring that the Internal Revenue Service had filed a tax lien against him after he had $9,000 in back taxes accumulated over three years. Blanchette said this week he is on a payment plan and will have the tax debt retired by the end of the year.
“Hopefully, it’s not an issue,’’ he said, adding that people “know me to be a man of my word, and the matter will be resolved.’’
Richard Padova, a professor of history and geography at Northern Essex Community College, said it is notable that 10 candidates have emerged at a time when “being mayor or being governor is a pretty thankless job. You have to cut, you have to do layoffs, and you take the heat, the brunt of people’s anger. Apparently, all these candidates feel they can pull the city up.’’
Padova believes the city’s finances are the top issue in the race, noting that with its heavy reliance on state aid, Lawrence will be particularly hard-hit by the additional aid cuts that are looming. He said with an uptick of certain types of crimes in the city, public safety is also a key concern with voters.
Education and the need for more planning, cleaner streets, greater transparency in city government, and more local jobs, are among other issues raised by candidates in interviews.
A common challenge for all of those running is how to stand out in a field of 10 contenders.
“In a crowded field, everyone drowns everyone else out,’’ Padova said.
With Mayor Michael Sullivan prohibited from running again, 10 candidates are fighting to fill his chair.
By John Laidler, Boston Globe / August 16, 2009
Mayor Michael Sullivan is prohibited from running again by a city term-limits rule. A Sept. 22 preliminary will cull the field to two for the Nov. 3 city election.
The size of the field, the open seat, and the prospect that Lawrence could become the first Massachusetts community to elect a Latino mayor are all drawing a spotlight to the race. Six of the contenders are Latino, and for the first time in a city election in Lawrence, Latinos will make up a majority of voters - 57.4 percent.
Also fueling interest is the strength of the field, which includes a state legislator, seven current or former city councilors, a Marine Corps veteran of the Iraq war, and a longtime local teacher.
“Almost all of them are very well known, with a background in the city. It should be a very good race,’’ said Rafael Tejeda, the city’s bilingual elections coordinator, who expects strong turnouts in both the preliminary and final elections.
Latinos have won elective seats in several Massachusetts communities, including Boston, Chelsea, Holyoke, Lawrence, and Salem. But to date, none has won a mayor’s office, according to Giovanna Negretti, executive director of ¿Oiste?, a statewide organization that encourages and helps Latinos to run for office.
Negretti said the possibility that Lawrence could become the first city to elect a Latino to its highest office is “incredibly exciting.’’
“The important thing is to elect the best person who represents the interests of all the citizens in Lawrence,’’ she said. “But given that Lawrence is 70 percent Latino in population, it’s not a surprise we have six Latino candidates running for this very important position. We are proud of it and proud of Lawrence for coming so far politically.’’
Lawrence has had nine Latino mayoral candidacies in five elections dating to 1981. The closest to winning was Isabel Melendez, who captured 46 percent of the final election vote in losing to Sullivan in 2001.
This year’s mayoral contenders are four-term state Representative William Lantigua; city councilors David C. Abdoo, Patrick J. Blanchette, Marcos Devers, and Nilka Alvarez-Rodriguez; former councilors Nunzio Dimarca, Israel Reyes, and Julia Silverio; and first-time candidates Daniel B. Cotnoir, an Iraqi war veteran; and Pedro N. Payano, a Lawrence High School social studies teacher.
Devers lost to Sullivan in the final of the 2005 mayor’s race. He served as interim mayor for about two months in 2001. Dimarca ran for mayor in 1987 and 1991.
Adding spice to the race are past political relationships among the candidates.
Devers, for instance, unsuccessfully challenged Lantigua for state representative in 2006 and 2008 (In the 2006 race, Lantigua got Devers’s name removed from the primary ballot by challenging his residency status. Devers then ran a write-in campaign in the primary and the final.) Reyes, who lost a bid for state representative in 2000, was Lantigua’s 2002 campaign manager. Payano was on Devers’s 2005 campaign team.
The presence in the race of Cotnoir, who spent 10 months in Iraq, should also help spark interest. In what he says was an attempt to protect his house, Cotnoir in 2005 fired a shotgun in the direction of a crowd of noisy nightclub revelers - slightly injuring two of them - after he was struck by a bottle tossed through his window. In 2006, a jury acquitted him of two counts of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, saying he acted in self-defense.
One uncertain dynamic is what effect, if any, Blanchette’s tax difficulties might have on his candidacy. Blanchette confirmed this spring that the Internal Revenue Service had filed a tax lien against him after he had $9,000 in back taxes accumulated over three years. Blanchette said this week he is on a payment plan and will have the tax debt retired by the end of the year.
“Hopefully, it’s not an issue,’’ he said, adding that people “know me to be a man of my word, and the matter will be resolved.’’
Richard Padova, a professor of history and geography at Northern Essex Community College, said it is notable that 10 candidates have emerged at a time when “being mayor or being governor is a pretty thankless job. You have to cut, you have to do layoffs, and you take the heat, the brunt of people’s anger. Apparently, all these candidates feel they can pull the city up.’’
Padova believes the city’s finances are the top issue in the race, noting that with its heavy reliance on state aid, Lawrence will be particularly hard-hit by the additional aid cuts that are looming. He said with an uptick of certain types of crimes in the city, public safety is also a key concern with voters.
Education and the need for more planning, cleaner streets, greater transparency in city government, and more local jobs, are among other issues raised by candidates in interviews.
A common challenge for all of those running is how to stand out in a field of 10 contenders.
“In a crowded field, everyone drowns everyone else out,’’ Padova said.
Latino education key issue for Obama team
Feds Tap into Latino Education Issues in San Diego
By Ana Tintocalis, KPBS.org, August 17, 2009
SAN DIEGO — Part of President Barack Obama's education team is traveling through California this week to talk about which reforms are needed to help Latino students. The first stop was in San Diego on Sunday at San Diego Mesa College.
Juan Sepulveda is the man behind what's called the White House Initiative on Education Excellence for Hispanic Americans. The initiative was created in 1990 under then-president George H.W. Bush. The Obama administration is now giving renewed attention to the effort by staging community forums across the state and country.
Sepulveda says the community input will help to drive reforms on a federal level. He says the president realizes reforming education begins with addressing the needs of Latino students.
“Part of it is just being honest,” Sepulveda said. “Being honest about what's happened not just since 1990, but even going back further and saying, ‘Where are we?’ This is important to us because the Latino community is the largest minority group in the country. And California, in particular, the largest numbers of the Latino community are here. So we know it's time for us to be more aggressive.”
Community members who took part in San Diego's forum talked about giving Latino families more access to quality preschool programs, the need for more Latino teachers in the classroom, and lifting financial aid restrictions on immigrant students. They also touched on more controversial topics including immigration reform as a means to help Latino families.
Overhauling the curriculum of school systems was also cited as a way to engage Latino students. San Diego Unified school board president Shelia Jackson says developing cultural connections in the classroom and through course work are sorely needed.
“(It requires) a different mindset,” Jackson said. “I think when we're educating teachers, we're not just educating them how to teach reading and teach math, but how to actually have cultural relevance. Where we say to the child, 'You're cultural foundation is very important, and it's valued.'"
The California visit follows community forums held in a number of other states. However, federal education officials say their eyes are focused squarely on California and Texas because they have the largest numbers of Latino students.
By Ana Tintocalis, KPBS.org, August 17, 2009
SAN DIEGO — Part of President Barack Obama's education team is traveling through California this week to talk about which reforms are needed to help Latino students. The first stop was in San Diego on Sunday at San Diego Mesa College.
Juan Sepulveda is the man behind what's called the White House Initiative on Education Excellence for Hispanic Americans. The initiative was created in 1990 under then-president George H.W. Bush. The Obama administration is now giving renewed attention to the effort by staging community forums across the state and country.
Sepulveda says the community input will help to drive reforms on a federal level. He says the president realizes reforming education begins with addressing the needs of Latino students.
“Part of it is just being honest,” Sepulveda said. “Being honest about what's happened not just since 1990, but even going back further and saying, ‘Where are we?’ This is important to us because the Latino community is the largest minority group in the country. And California, in particular, the largest numbers of the Latino community are here. So we know it's time for us to be more aggressive.”
Community members who took part in San Diego's forum talked about giving Latino families more access to quality preschool programs, the need for more Latino teachers in the classroom, and lifting financial aid restrictions on immigrant students. They also touched on more controversial topics including immigration reform as a means to help Latino families.
Overhauling the curriculum of school systems was also cited as a way to engage Latino students. San Diego Unified school board president Shelia Jackson says developing cultural connections in the classroom and through course work are sorely needed.
“(It requires) a different mindset,” Jackson said. “I think when we're educating teachers, we're not just educating them how to teach reading and teach math, but how to actually have cultural relevance. Where we say to the child, 'You're cultural foundation is very important, and it's valued.'"
The California visit follows community forums held in a number of other states. However, federal education officials say their eyes are focused squarely on California and Texas because they have the largest numbers of Latino students.
No more quotas on Hispanic immigrants
Immigration official says agents will no longer have quotas
LA Times, August 17, 2009
The head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced today that he has ended quotas on a controversial program designed to go after illegal immigrants who have ignored deportation orders and that he planned to make more changes to the program soon.
John Morton, who took over as head of the federal agency in May, said during a meeting with reporters in Los Angeles that the program needs to do what it was created to do -- target absconders who have already had their day in court.
“The fugitive operations program needs to focus first and foremost on people who have knowingly flouted an immigration removal order and within that category obviously we will focus first on criminals,” he said.
Beginning in 2003, the agency dispatched teams around the country to arrest and deport immigrants with criminal records and outstanding deportation orders. During widely publicized sweeps, armed agents showed up at homes and apartment buildings and arrested tens of thousands of immigrants.
Immigrant rights groups criticized the early morning raids, saying they divided families and resulted in the arrests of many who had no criminal records or deportation orders.
A report by the Migration Policy Institute this year showed that 73% of the nearly 97,000 people arrested by those teams between 2003 and early 2008 did not have criminal records. The report also showed that in 2006, the agency stopped requiring that two-thirds of those arrested be criminals and allowed the teams to include nonfugitives in their tally.
That same year, the teams were expected to increase their annual arrests from 125 to 1,000, the report said.
Morton said Monday that there is nothing wrong with targets but that hard quotas don’t make sense.
“I just don’t think that a law enforcement program should be based on a hard number that must be met,” he said. "I just don't think that’s a good way to go about it. So we don’t have quotas anymore.”
Morton said, however, that he would continue enforcing the law against immigrants who have fought their cases and lost.
“It is important that the system have integrity,” he said. “I am not signaling in any way that we are not going to enforce the law against noncriminal fugitives.”
There are 104 fugitive operation teams, up from 8 when the program started. The immigration agency received $226 million for the program this year, up from $9 million in 2003.
-- Anna Gorman
LA Times, August 17, 2009
The head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced today that he has ended quotas on a controversial program designed to go after illegal immigrants who have ignored deportation orders and that he planned to make more changes to the program soon.
John Morton, who took over as head of the federal agency in May, said during a meeting with reporters in Los Angeles that the program needs to do what it was created to do -- target absconders who have already had their day in court.
“The fugitive operations program needs to focus first and foremost on people who have knowingly flouted an immigration removal order and within that category obviously we will focus first on criminals,” he said.
Beginning in 2003, the agency dispatched teams around the country to arrest and deport immigrants with criminal records and outstanding deportation orders. During widely publicized sweeps, armed agents showed up at homes and apartment buildings and arrested tens of thousands of immigrants.
Immigrant rights groups criticized the early morning raids, saying they divided families and resulted in the arrests of many who had no criminal records or deportation orders.
A report by the Migration Policy Institute this year showed that 73% of the nearly 97,000 people arrested by those teams between 2003 and early 2008 did not have criminal records. The report also showed that in 2006, the agency stopped requiring that two-thirds of those arrested be criminals and allowed the teams to include nonfugitives in their tally.
That same year, the teams were expected to increase their annual arrests from 125 to 1,000, the report said.
Morton said Monday that there is nothing wrong with targets but that hard quotas don’t make sense.
“I just don’t think that a law enforcement program should be based on a hard number that must be met,” he said. "I just don't think that’s a good way to go about it. So we don’t have quotas anymore.”
Morton said, however, that he would continue enforcing the law against immigrants who have fought their cases and lost.
“It is important that the system have integrity,” he said. “I am not signaling in any way that we are not going to enforce the law against noncriminal fugitives.”
There are 104 fugitive operation teams, up from 8 when the program started. The immigration agency received $226 million for the program this year, up from $9 million in 2003.
-- Anna Gorman
Monday, August 17, 2009
GOP Senators lose Hispanic support
Just 31 votes to lose a constituency
By Ruben Navarrette, SignOn San Diego, August 12, 2009
During his recent HBO special, “Tall, Dark and Chicano,” comedian George Lopez tore a hole in the Big Tent. Incensed that 31 Senate Republicans had voted against Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination to the Supreme Court, Lopez informed the GOP that it would never again get the votes of Latinos. In fact, he said, given changing demographics, Republicans might as well get used to losing in the years to come because “you won’t win a . . . pie-eating contest.”
That’s harsh, but fair. Republicans know not what they did. They’re only fooling themselves if they think they won’t pay a price for their petty opposition to the nation’s first Latina justice.
Remember when Republicans used to say that people should take responsibility for their actions? Never mind. They didn’t mean it. Not when it comes to Senate Republicans trying to dodge responsibility for voting against Sotomayor. They might be able to stand behind their votes if they weren’t afraid that they were standing on quicksand. They’re terrified that Hispanics will be sore winners and take retribution at the ballot box — starting in 2010 and possibly lasting for decades.
In fact, Republicans are so desperate to avoid incurring the wrath of one of the fastest growing parts of the electorate that they’ve pulled a page from the Democrats’ playbook. The left is always trying to camouflage its true agenda with flowery rhetoric. Liberals talk about increasing Latino representation on the federal bench but then torpedo a highly qualified Latino Republican such as Miguel Estrada, President George W. Bush’s choice for the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. With the left, forget what they say and watch what they do.
It’s the same thing with the Republican senators who voted against Sotomayor. They say all the right things, before proceeding to do the wrong thing. Many of them went to great lengths to praise the nominee’s qualifications, then voted against her because, they said, they were concerned about her speeches or afraid that she was a judicial activist.
The critics need new material. You’d think the senators had never given a speech they wish they could take back. Sotomayor isn’t a judicial activist, as anyone who watched the confirmation hearings knows. But what if she were? She’d fit right in with her new colleagues on the Supreme Court. Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy flexed their judicial activism in the New Haven firefighters case and in earlier cases involving the expansion of executive power.
Here’s the real reason those Republicans opposed Sotomayor. They were catering to the white males who are still in the party and now account for most of its base. Those voters were miffed by the “wise Latina,” and they’re not about to vote for anyone who backed her. It’s also interesting that many of the senators who voted “no” come from states with large Hispanic populations, such as Arizona and Texas. You would think that they might worry about a backlash from Hispanic voters. But, it is also in those states that white voters are especially nervous about what they see as racially antagonistic rhetoric from Hispanics, who are coming to greater prominence because of changing demographics.
At the same time, by singing Sotomayor’s praises, Republicans must think that they covered their tracks. If they ever have to explain themselves, they can pull out a copy of their floor speeches and hope that no one bothers to look at how they actually voted.
First, the Republicans insult Sotomayor, as when Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma mistook the judge for Lucille Ball, telling her that she “had lots of ’splaining to do.” And now they’re insulting the intelligence of 48 million Latinos in the United States.
Christmas may be coming early for Democrats. After several generations of taking Hispanics for granted and offering little more than mariachis and salsa, how did Democrats get so lucky as to draw opponents who are so skilled at absolutely repelling this constituency?
Perhaps the biggest disappointment to many of us who like to believe in kinder, gentler Republicans is that Sotomayor’s opponents included none other than Sen. John McCain. During last year’s presidential campaign, McCain’s record of serving the Latino community far surpassed that of Barack Obama. Now, thanks to a historic nomination to the Supreme Court, and how badly McCain and his fellow Republicans bungled it, I’d say that Obama is all caught up.
Navarrette can be reached at ruben.navarrette@uniontrib.com.
By Ruben Navarrette, SignOn San Diego, August 12, 2009
During his recent HBO special, “Tall, Dark and Chicano,” comedian George Lopez tore a hole in the Big Tent. Incensed that 31 Senate Republicans had voted against Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination to the Supreme Court, Lopez informed the GOP that it would never again get the votes of Latinos. In fact, he said, given changing demographics, Republicans might as well get used to losing in the years to come because “you won’t win a . . . pie-eating contest.”
That’s harsh, but fair. Republicans know not what they did. They’re only fooling themselves if they think they won’t pay a price for their petty opposition to the nation’s first Latina justice.
Remember when Republicans used to say that people should take responsibility for their actions? Never mind. They didn’t mean it. Not when it comes to Senate Republicans trying to dodge responsibility for voting against Sotomayor. They might be able to stand behind their votes if they weren’t afraid that they were standing on quicksand. They’re terrified that Hispanics will be sore winners and take retribution at the ballot box — starting in 2010 and possibly lasting for decades.
In fact, Republicans are so desperate to avoid incurring the wrath of one of the fastest growing parts of the electorate that they’ve pulled a page from the Democrats’ playbook. The left is always trying to camouflage its true agenda with flowery rhetoric. Liberals talk about increasing Latino representation on the federal bench but then torpedo a highly qualified Latino Republican such as Miguel Estrada, President George W. Bush’s choice for the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. With the left, forget what they say and watch what they do.
It’s the same thing with the Republican senators who voted against Sotomayor. They say all the right things, before proceeding to do the wrong thing. Many of them went to great lengths to praise the nominee’s qualifications, then voted against her because, they said, they were concerned about her speeches or afraid that she was a judicial activist.
The critics need new material. You’d think the senators had never given a speech they wish they could take back. Sotomayor isn’t a judicial activist, as anyone who watched the confirmation hearings knows. But what if she were? She’d fit right in with her new colleagues on the Supreme Court. Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy flexed their judicial activism in the New Haven firefighters case and in earlier cases involving the expansion of executive power.
Here’s the real reason those Republicans opposed Sotomayor. They were catering to the white males who are still in the party and now account for most of its base. Those voters were miffed by the “wise Latina,” and they’re not about to vote for anyone who backed her. It’s also interesting that many of the senators who voted “no” come from states with large Hispanic populations, such as Arizona and Texas. You would think that they might worry about a backlash from Hispanic voters. But, it is also in those states that white voters are especially nervous about what they see as racially antagonistic rhetoric from Hispanics, who are coming to greater prominence because of changing demographics.
At the same time, by singing Sotomayor’s praises, Republicans must think that they covered their tracks. If they ever have to explain themselves, they can pull out a copy of their floor speeches and hope that no one bothers to look at how they actually voted.
First, the Republicans insult Sotomayor, as when Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma mistook the judge for Lucille Ball, telling her that she “had lots of ’splaining to do.” And now they’re insulting the intelligence of 48 million Latinos in the United States.
Christmas may be coming early for Democrats. After several generations of taking Hispanics for granted and offering little more than mariachis and salsa, how did Democrats get so lucky as to draw opponents who are so skilled at absolutely repelling this constituency?
Perhaps the biggest disappointment to many of us who like to believe in kinder, gentler Republicans is that Sotomayor’s opponents included none other than Sen. John McCain. During last year’s presidential campaign, McCain’s record of serving the Latino community far surpassed that of Barack Obama. Now, thanks to a historic nomination to the Supreme Court, and how badly McCain and his fellow Republicans bungled it, I’d say that Obama is all caught up.
Navarrette can be reached at ruben.navarrette@uniontrib.com.
Hispanic groups will need to wait longer for Immigration reform
OPINION: Immigration reform may have to wait even longer
Obama says the issue won't be addressed until next year. But with midterm elections in 2010, it may have to hold until 2011.
The Denver Post, 08/16/2009
After promising that immigration reform would be a top priority this year, President Barack Obama now says it will just have to wait.
Even though some pro-immigration activists are upset, it's one campaign promise we don't mind him breaking.
For now.
Until tempers flared over health care reform during this hot August recess, immigration reform was the hot-button issue.
Passing the type of comprehensive reform that's needed will require not only the president's full attention, and his bully pulpit, but a willing Congress not easily spooked by angry opposition.
After taking on health care, climate change and the recession — and with his poll numbers dropping — not only is there no room left on the president's plate for immigration, we wonder if he has the political capital to push it through this year and if Congress has the fortitude to withstand more blowback.
Obama now says immigration must wait until 2010, but even that's problematic because of the mid-term elections.
Comprehensive immigration reform must deal with the 12 million to 15 million illegal immigrants already here. Granting them a pathway to citizenship, as Obama wants, would be seen as amnesty, and that would be difficult to deliver in an election year and during a recession with high jobless numbers.
"This is going to be difficult . . . ," he said last week. "There are going to be demagogues out there who try to suggest that any form of pathway for legalization for those who are already in the United States is unacceptable. And those are fights that I'd have to have if my poll numbers are at 70 or if my poll numbers are at 40."
Former President George W. Bush failed to get immigration reform through Congress. So far, Obama's vision of reform isn't too different from Bush's. It needs to include increased border security, a reasonable guest-worker program and a credible system to verify worker status.
Even though it's not optimal, 2011 may be the year to build a coalition to pass immigration reform.
Obama says the issue won't be addressed until next year. But with midterm elections in 2010, it may have to hold until 2011.
The Denver Post, 08/16/2009
After promising that immigration reform would be a top priority this year, President Barack Obama now says it will just have to wait.
Even though some pro-immigration activists are upset, it's one campaign promise we don't mind him breaking.
For now.
Until tempers flared over health care reform during this hot August recess, immigration reform was the hot-button issue.
Passing the type of comprehensive reform that's needed will require not only the president's full attention, and his bully pulpit, but a willing Congress not easily spooked by angry opposition.
After taking on health care, climate change and the recession — and with his poll numbers dropping — not only is there no room left on the president's plate for immigration, we wonder if he has the political capital to push it through this year and if Congress has the fortitude to withstand more blowback.
Obama now says immigration must wait until 2010, but even that's problematic because of the mid-term elections.
Comprehensive immigration reform must deal with the 12 million to 15 million illegal immigrants already here. Granting them a pathway to citizenship, as Obama wants, would be seen as amnesty, and that would be difficult to deliver in an election year and during a recession with high jobless numbers.
"This is going to be difficult . . . ," he said last week. "There are going to be demagogues out there who try to suggest that any form of pathway for legalization for those who are already in the United States is unacceptable. And those are fights that I'd have to have if my poll numbers are at 70 or if my poll numbers are at 40."
Former President George W. Bush failed to get immigration reform through Congress. So far, Obama's vision of reform isn't too different from Bush's. It needs to include increased border security, a reasonable guest-worker program and a credible system to verify worker status.
Even though it's not optimal, 2011 may be the year to build a coalition to pass immigration reform.
Latino legislator's exit weakens Florida
Martinez's exit to weaken Florida's political clout
BY LESLEY CLARK AND BETH REINHARD, Miami Herald, 08.16.09
WASHINGTON -- U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez's early retirement will leave the nation's fourth-largest state with a temp in a chamber that rewards seniority with power.
Martinez had planned to step down at the end of his term next year but said last week he'll leave office as soon as Gov. Charlie Crist appoints a replacement. Since Crist is running for the seat himself, he's expected to choose a stand-in entrusted to keep the seat warm until the November 2010 election.
In the meantime, key votes on healthcare reform, climate change and possibly immigration reform will be bearing down on Congress.
``At a time when there are going to be very significant decisions to be made, the junior senator from Florida will called on to participate in some close and controversial votes,'' said former Democratic Sen. Bob Graham, who represented Florida in Washington for nearly two decades. ``The person will be treated respectfully and have one vote like everyone else, but in terms of building relationships, building knowledge, and the ability to be effective, they will be limited. Everyone knows they are leaving the first Tuesday of January in 2011.''
Another former senator from Florida, Republican Connie Mack, said last week that he was ``extremely disappointed'' that Martinez was stepping down early.
``It would have been helpful to have had his voice and his experience on the issues that we're dealing with,'' Mack said.
On Friday, Crist said he would ask U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, former U.S. Attorney Bob Martinez and former Secretary of State Jim Smith to apply for the Senate seat, among others. Diaz-Balart has been in Congress since 1993. ``He's the one guy who would hit the ground running and not need a map to find the Capitol,'' said lobbyist Ana Navarro, a Diaz-Balart supporter.
VALUE OF SENIORITY
Many of the Senate's perks -- plum committee assignments, influential leadership posts -- are based on years of service. Martinez was a member of the minority party serving his first term, but he had built relationships in Washington as chairman of the Republican National Committee and as a member of former President Bush's Cabinet.
``Everything in the Senate is based on seniority. Mel had built up that seniority and now it's gone, so the next senator will come in at the bottom,'' said Dan Webster, a former Republican state senate leader favored by some social conservatives to replace Martinez. ``It's a loss for the state.''
Voting rights advocates say the resignation -- and the U.S. Constitution which calls for gubernatorial appointments to fill such vacancies -- highlight the need for special elections to fill Senate seats in such cases. One of the largest states in the nation will be co-represented by a senator who didn't win a single vote. By comparison, every vacancy in the House -- a body traditionally considered closer to the voters -- is filled by a special election.
``Even under the most benign of circumstances, a gubernatorial appointment robs the people of that state of the chance to have a say in who that person is,'' said Paul Fidalgo of FairVote, a group that supports a proposed constitutional amendment requiring elections for Senate vacancies. ``They don't come in with a mandate from voters. The political capital that comes from an election is absent.''
Gubernatorial appointments can also damage the public trust. In one extreme case, former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was impeached and ousted from office and faces federal charges of trying to sell the Senate seat vacated by Barack Obama. In New York, Gov. David Paterson was widely criticized for bungling the search to replace Sen. Hillary Clinton, while Vice President Joe Biden's successor in Delaware, Ted Kaufman, has been mocked as a ``placeholder senator'' to keep the seat available for Biden's son, Beau, who is serving in Iraq.
Florida hasn't had an appointed senator since 1946, when Democrat Spessard L. Holland stepped in after the death of Sen. Charles Andrews. Martinez's early departure to spend more time with his family means Florida voters will likely see a Senate seat change hands three times in 18 months.
PARTNERSHIP
Since he took office in Jan. 2005, Martinez and Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson have teamed up on a number of issues, including pushing for more money for hurricane research and fending off attempts to open the state's coastline to oil and gas production. Crist has warmed to offshore oil drilling, and if he chooses a like-minded appointment, Florida will lose its united, bipartisan front.
``Florida senators have to work together to get things done for the state,'' said Nelson spokesman Bryan Gulley. ``Graham and Mack were a good team, and Bill and Mel were a good team. We're hoping that will continue.''
In one of their last joint efforts, the two senators plan to interview candidates for eight coveted federal posts for Florida and make recommendations to the White House before the Senate reconvenes Sept. 8, Gulley said. In the Southern District, which includes Miami-Dade and Broward Counties, a new U.S. attorney, judge and marshal will be named.
Any bills that Martinez has introduced will lose their chief proponent, but Nelson is likely to take up three hurricane-related bills his colleague sponsored, along with three of his own hurricane bills, Gulley said.
More divisive issues, though, such as healthcare reform and climate change could thrust Florida's interim senator to center stage. The Democratic party's slender majority and illnesses among its members will continue to force leadership to turn to moderate Republicans to help carry out its agenda.
``The Democrats have 60 votes, but only on the edge of a knife,'' said Florida International University professor Nicol Rae, a former aide to Mississippi Republican Sen. Thad Cochran. ``Even if you're a senator low on the seniority pole, you could end up being influential. One vote in the Senate could be an important vote.''
At a cost to his own popularity, Martinez defied the party's base to champion legislation that would have allowed illegal workers to earn citizenship. Advocates say the loss of a key Republican ally will intensify the challenge of overhauling the nation's immigration laws.
The first Cuban-American senator, Martinez also encouraged his party to expand its outreach to the fast-growing Hispanic community. He recently warned his fellow Republicans that ``there were voices within our party, frankly, which if they continue with that kind of rhetoric, anti-Hispanic rhetoric . . . we're going to be relegated to minority status.''
PERSONAL STORY
Martinez often brought up his own experience of arriving from Cuba as a teenager to encourage critics to view immigration as a route to the American dream.
``He was somebody who approached the immigration issue as a compassionate conservative, which is something I think our party needs,'' said state Rep. Juan Zapata of Miami, who heads a nationwide group of Hispanic state legislators. ``The party is losing someone who could explain to the rest of us why it makes sense, and I think the fate of the Republican party is partly tied to how we deal with this issue.''
But Martinez himself suggested a hard slog on immigration, with or without his participation.
``I got my head banged around a little bit last time, and I know this is not an easy issue,'' he said in June after an immigration meeting at the White House with President Barack Obama. ``People walk away from it because it's tough.''
Herald/Times staff writers Steve Bousquet and Marc Caputo contributed to this report.
BY LESLEY CLARK AND BETH REINHARD, Miami Herald, 08.16.09
WASHINGTON -- U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez's early retirement will leave the nation's fourth-largest state with a temp in a chamber that rewards seniority with power.
Martinez had planned to step down at the end of his term next year but said last week he'll leave office as soon as Gov. Charlie Crist appoints a replacement. Since Crist is running for the seat himself, he's expected to choose a stand-in entrusted to keep the seat warm until the November 2010 election.
In the meantime, key votes on healthcare reform, climate change and possibly immigration reform will be bearing down on Congress.
``At a time when there are going to be very significant decisions to be made, the junior senator from Florida will called on to participate in some close and controversial votes,'' said former Democratic Sen. Bob Graham, who represented Florida in Washington for nearly two decades. ``The person will be treated respectfully and have one vote like everyone else, but in terms of building relationships, building knowledge, and the ability to be effective, they will be limited. Everyone knows they are leaving the first Tuesday of January in 2011.''
Another former senator from Florida, Republican Connie Mack, said last week that he was ``extremely disappointed'' that Martinez was stepping down early.
``It would have been helpful to have had his voice and his experience on the issues that we're dealing with,'' Mack said.
On Friday, Crist said he would ask U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, former U.S. Attorney Bob Martinez and former Secretary of State Jim Smith to apply for the Senate seat, among others. Diaz-Balart has been in Congress since 1993. ``He's the one guy who would hit the ground running and not need a map to find the Capitol,'' said lobbyist Ana Navarro, a Diaz-Balart supporter.
VALUE OF SENIORITY
Many of the Senate's perks -- plum committee assignments, influential leadership posts -- are based on years of service. Martinez was a member of the minority party serving his first term, but he had built relationships in Washington as chairman of the Republican National Committee and as a member of former President Bush's Cabinet.
``Everything in the Senate is based on seniority. Mel had built up that seniority and now it's gone, so the next senator will come in at the bottom,'' said Dan Webster, a former Republican state senate leader favored by some social conservatives to replace Martinez. ``It's a loss for the state.''
Voting rights advocates say the resignation -- and the U.S. Constitution which calls for gubernatorial appointments to fill such vacancies -- highlight the need for special elections to fill Senate seats in such cases. One of the largest states in the nation will be co-represented by a senator who didn't win a single vote. By comparison, every vacancy in the House -- a body traditionally considered closer to the voters -- is filled by a special election.
``Even under the most benign of circumstances, a gubernatorial appointment robs the people of that state of the chance to have a say in who that person is,'' said Paul Fidalgo of FairVote, a group that supports a proposed constitutional amendment requiring elections for Senate vacancies. ``They don't come in with a mandate from voters. The political capital that comes from an election is absent.''
Gubernatorial appointments can also damage the public trust. In one extreme case, former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was impeached and ousted from office and faces federal charges of trying to sell the Senate seat vacated by Barack Obama. In New York, Gov. David Paterson was widely criticized for bungling the search to replace Sen. Hillary Clinton, while Vice President Joe Biden's successor in Delaware, Ted Kaufman, has been mocked as a ``placeholder senator'' to keep the seat available for Biden's son, Beau, who is serving in Iraq.
Florida hasn't had an appointed senator since 1946, when Democrat Spessard L. Holland stepped in after the death of Sen. Charles Andrews. Martinez's early departure to spend more time with his family means Florida voters will likely see a Senate seat change hands three times in 18 months.
PARTNERSHIP
Since he took office in Jan. 2005, Martinez and Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson have teamed up on a number of issues, including pushing for more money for hurricane research and fending off attempts to open the state's coastline to oil and gas production. Crist has warmed to offshore oil drilling, and if he chooses a like-minded appointment, Florida will lose its united, bipartisan front.
``Florida senators have to work together to get things done for the state,'' said Nelson spokesman Bryan Gulley. ``Graham and Mack were a good team, and Bill and Mel were a good team. We're hoping that will continue.''
In one of their last joint efforts, the two senators plan to interview candidates for eight coveted federal posts for Florida and make recommendations to the White House before the Senate reconvenes Sept. 8, Gulley said. In the Southern District, which includes Miami-Dade and Broward Counties, a new U.S. attorney, judge and marshal will be named.
Any bills that Martinez has introduced will lose their chief proponent, but Nelson is likely to take up three hurricane-related bills his colleague sponsored, along with three of his own hurricane bills, Gulley said.
More divisive issues, though, such as healthcare reform and climate change could thrust Florida's interim senator to center stage. The Democratic party's slender majority and illnesses among its members will continue to force leadership to turn to moderate Republicans to help carry out its agenda.
``The Democrats have 60 votes, but only on the edge of a knife,'' said Florida International University professor Nicol Rae, a former aide to Mississippi Republican Sen. Thad Cochran. ``Even if you're a senator low on the seniority pole, you could end up being influential. One vote in the Senate could be an important vote.''
At a cost to his own popularity, Martinez defied the party's base to champion legislation that would have allowed illegal workers to earn citizenship. Advocates say the loss of a key Republican ally will intensify the challenge of overhauling the nation's immigration laws.
The first Cuban-American senator, Martinez also encouraged his party to expand its outreach to the fast-growing Hispanic community. He recently warned his fellow Republicans that ``there were voices within our party, frankly, which if they continue with that kind of rhetoric, anti-Hispanic rhetoric . . . we're going to be relegated to minority status.''
PERSONAL STORY
Martinez often brought up his own experience of arriving from Cuba as a teenager to encourage critics to view immigration as a route to the American dream.
``He was somebody who approached the immigration issue as a compassionate conservative, which is something I think our party needs,'' said state Rep. Juan Zapata of Miami, who heads a nationwide group of Hispanic state legislators. ``The party is losing someone who could explain to the rest of us why it makes sense, and I think the fate of the Republican party is partly tied to how we deal with this issue.''
But Martinez himself suggested a hard slog on immigration, with or without his participation.
``I got my head banged around a little bit last time, and I know this is not an easy issue,'' he said in June after an immigration meeting at the White House with President Barack Obama. ``People walk away from it because it's tough.''
Herald/Times staff writers Steve Bousquet and Marc Caputo contributed to this report.
GOP's wooing of Hispanics fraught with challenges
GOP's wooing of Hispanics fraught with challenges
Jane Healy, Orlando Sentinel, August 16, 2009
Certainly Republicans have not been helped by U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez's sudden resignation. In Florida, it's only the latest problem in the party's effort to attract and keep Hispanics in the fold.
Problem No. 1: Martinez's departure.
Cuban-Americans in Miami could not have been happy with Martinez's decision to quit early because he was homesick. For one thing, Martinez was the first Cuban-American ever to get elected to the Senate and was considered in many ways one of their own in Miami, though he lives in Orlando.
He, too, emigrated from Cuba at a young age and made his way to success in this country. But what's to make of his early, early departure, particularly when issues such as immigration reform have yet to get started under the Obama administration? The reform was one of Martinez's main goals, but now he won't even have a chance to influence its outcome when it comes up next year.
That's not the only major issue his departure affects, of course. The Senate has not weighed in yet on reauthorizing the mammoth transportation bill, which contains everything from roads to rail. Whether Florida will get its fair share continues to be a major sticking point. But it won't come up before senators until next year. That means his replacement will have to try to elbow his or her way into a debate that won't come up again for six years.
But as far as politics alone are concerned, Martinez's loss is more than just in the Senate race. President George Bush's political team pushed him to run in 2004 because it knew exactly what effect he would have — a huge turnout of Cuban-Americans in South Florida, who voted not only for Martinez but for Bush as well. That allowed Bush to concentrate on the Interstate-4 corridor without having to worry much about Miami.
It worked. Democratic nominee John Kerry got only 44 percent of the Hispanic vote in Florida against Bush.
Without Martinez on the ticket, among other things, that dynamic changed four years later. Barack Obama got 57 percent of the Hispanic vote.
Problem No. 2: The Castros' imminent departure.
Probably the biggest single factor that has kept Cuban-Americans in the Republican Party over the years has been Fidel Castro. Their hatred of the man and his policies has been a lightning rod for South Florida politics, something that decided presidential races. Before last year, it was almost impossible to win Florida unless you supported the anti-Castro polices of embargoes and travel restrictions. And Republicans, more so than Democrats, embraced those policies.
But the Castro regime can't last much longer. He is seriously ill, and his brother Raúl, now running the country, is almost as old as he is.
When the Castros go, so will a lot of that animosity.
Plus, Obama won Florida without kowtowing to hard-liners in Miami. That could be because Cubans are declining as a percentage of the Miami population. While they once were almost 90 percent of the Hispanic population, they are now only about two-thirds, with residents from other Latin American countries increasing in numbers.
Problem No. 3: Finding a new leader.
It doesn't appear that there is an heir apparent to Martinez as far as Hispanic leadership goes. Before Martinez, then-Gov. Jeb Bush actually filled that role. Married to a Hispanic and fluent in the language, he connected to Hispanics in a way almost no other governor has. He also understood the personal connections that many Hispanics seek.
Where is such a leader now? The Miami Cuban-Americans in Congress don't seem to have that stature.
One thing that Republicans can hope for is the Democrats' propensity for fouling things up for themselves — in this case, possibly taking the Hispanic vote for granted and driving it right back to the Republicans.
Contact Jane Healy at janehealy49@gmail.com. She'd like to hear about public officials who need their feet kept to the fire.
Jane Healy, Orlando Sentinel, August 16, 2009
Certainly Republicans have not been helped by U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez's sudden resignation. In Florida, it's only the latest problem in the party's effort to attract and keep Hispanics in the fold.
Problem No. 1: Martinez's departure.
Cuban-Americans in Miami could not have been happy with Martinez's decision to quit early because he was homesick. For one thing, Martinez was the first Cuban-American ever to get elected to the Senate and was considered in many ways one of their own in Miami, though he lives in Orlando.
He, too, emigrated from Cuba at a young age and made his way to success in this country. But what's to make of his early, early departure, particularly when issues such as immigration reform have yet to get started under the Obama administration? The reform was one of Martinez's main goals, but now he won't even have a chance to influence its outcome when it comes up next year.
That's not the only major issue his departure affects, of course. The Senate has not weighed in yet on reauthorizing the mammoth transportation bill, which contains everything from roads to rail. Whether Florida will get its fair share continues to be a major sticking point. But it won't come up before senators until next year. That means his replacement will have to try to elbow his or her way into a debate that won't come up again for six years.
But as far as politics alone are concerned, Martinez's loss is more than just in the Senate race. President George Bush's political team pushed him to run in 2004 because it knew exactly what effect he would have — a huge turnout of Cuban-Americans in South Florida, who voted not only for Martinez but for Bush as well. That allowed Bush to concentrate on the Interstate-4 corridor without having to worry much about Miami.
It worked. Democratic nominee John Kerry got only 44 percent of the Hispanic vote in Florida against Bush.
Without Martinez on the ticket, among other things, that dynamic changed four years later. Barack Obama got 57 percent of the Hispanic vote.
Problem No. 2: The Castros' imminent departure.
Probably the biggest single factor that has kept Cuban-Americans in the Republican Party over the years has been Fidel Castro. Their hatred of the man and his policies has been a lightning rod for South Florida politics, something that decided presidential races. Before last year, it was almost impossible to win Florida unless you supported the anti-Castro polices of embargoes and travel restrictions. And Republicans, more so than Democrats, embraced those policies.
But the Castro regime can't last much longer. He is seriously ill, and his brother Raúl, now running the country, is almost as old as he is.
When the Castros go, so will a lot of that animosity.
Plus, Obama won Florida without kowtowing to hard-liners in Miami. That could be because Cubans are declining as a percentage of the Miami population. While they once were almost 90 percent of the Hispanic population, they are now only about two-thirds, with residents from other Latin American countries increasing in numbers.
Problem No. 3: Finding a new leader.
It doesn't appear that there is an heir apparent to Martinez as far as Hispanic leadership goes. Before Martinez, then-Gov. Jeb Bush actually filled that role. Married to a Hispanic and fluent in the language, he connected to Hispanics in a way almost no other governor has. He also understood the personal connections that many Hispanics seek.
Where is such a leader now? The Miami Cuban-Americans in Congress don't seem to have that stature.
One thing that Republicans can hope for is the Democrats' propensity for fouling things up for themselves — in this case, possibly taking the Hispanic vote for granted and driving it right back to the Republicans.
Contact Jane Healy at janehealy49@gmail.com. She'd like to hear about public officials who need their feet kept to the fire.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Obama's immigration delay gives Latinos a pause
Immigration reform timetable gives Latino pause
By Elaine Ayala - Express-News, 08/16/2009
When President Barack Obama announced a timetable last week that puts off comprehensive immigration reform until next year, some advocates and other observers weren't surprised, given the still-struggling economy and the massive health care and energy bills ahead of the issue.
But while supporters of both the president and immigration reform put faith in its new promise — which as a candidate Obama had promised in 2009 — some advocates are sounding more doubtful.
Some fear that “comprehensive” will be dropped from “immigration reform,” and that the weight of other initiatives will result in more piecemeal approaches to overhauling the nation's immigration laws, widely viewed as broken.
“We still feel it's one of the top three priorities,” said Margaret Pulles, spokeswoman for the San Antonio-based Mexicans and Americans Thinking Together, or MATT.org.
“Come January, if we're not hearing something,” said Graciela Sanchez, executive director of the Esperanza Peace & Justice Center, “we'll have to make a push.”
“Reform is a priority in the Latino community,” said San Antonian Rosa Rosales, national president of the League of United Latin American Citizens. “I would strongly urge that Latino organizations push the issue that we need comprehensive immigration reform now.”
Obama “is not going to forget the immigrant community,” she added.
Advocates on the front lines of helping immigrant families torn apart by deportations aren't so sure, sounding more exasperated with a continued hard line from the Department of Homeland Security.
“I'm very concerned,” said Alejandro Siller, coordinator of Mexican American Catholic College's San Juan Diego Project, which provides services to immigrants and faith-based groups that assist them. “Raids continue because there is no solution.”
A comprehensive bill being drafted by Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., is likely to include border security, penalties for employers who hire undocumented workers and what MATT.org calls “a fair and realistic plan for integrating undocumented workers into a legal system of employment.”
What opponents call “amnesty,” supporters couch as “a pathway to citizenship” for the 11 million to 12 million unauthorized immigrants in the United States. Instead of harsh punishment or deportation, Archbishop José Gomez wrote in a column last week, immigrants should receive community service, or another punishment “that fits the crime.”
Immigrant advocates also want Congress to change immigration caps and visa limits they consider unreasonable.
Donna R. Gabaccia of the Immigration History Research Center at the University of Minnesota said the limits have contributed “to a sense that immigration is out of control.”
That the same number of visas is extended to both Nigeria and Mexico, for example, is not realistic, the historian said. And congressional loopholes for refugees and relatives of immigrants compound the problem, she said.
“People say immigrants should get in the back of the line, but there is no line. There are no visas or almost no visas for unskilled and semiskilled workers to wait in,” Gabaccia said. “The diminishing small number of visas guarantees illegality.”
Members of San Antonio's congressional delegation who back reform sound doubtful of passage, too, especially given 2010 elections.
Obama has said he's willing to move forward if the votes are there, said Rep. Ciro Rodriguez, D-San Antonio. “It doesn't look like we have the votes, in all honesty.” He said Congress might instead address reform “partially.”
Rep. Charles Gonzalez, D-San Antonio, agreed. However, he thinks the Senate will introduce a bill before year's end.
“One of the complications is that Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.), one of our champions, is not on the Senate floor,” Gonzalez said.
Obama's recent comments from Guadalajara, Mexico, were encouraging, Gonzalez added, because they indicate reform is still on his agenda.
But the congressman added that if a comprehensive bill isn't passed, “We'll try to do it piecemeal.”
He cited the Dream Act, introduced in March, which would extend permanent residency to immigrant students who came to the United States as children and have graduated from high school.
Gonzalez said more border security funds would be approved regardless of an immigration bill, and “a temporary workers program of some sort” will be addressed.
“We have certain windows,” Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, said. “Experience and history have told us if it's postponed to the following year, then you're talking about 2011.”
Even opponents of immigration reform say the Obama administration may just run out of time.
“These are all big initiatives he has taken on,” said Ira Mehlman of the Federation for American Immigration Reform. “There's a limit to how much you can get done.”
By Elaine Ayala - Express-News, 08/16/2009
When President Barack Obama announced a timetable last week that puts off comprehensive immigration reform until next year, some advocates and other observers weren't surprised, given the still-struggling economy and the massive health care and energy bills ahead of the issue.
But while supporters of both the president and immigration reform put faith in its new promise — which as a candidate Obama had promised in 2009 — some advocates are sounding more doubtful.
Some fear that “comprehensive” will be dropped from “immigration reform,” and that the weight of other initiatives will result in more piecemeal approaches to overhauling the nation's immigration laws, widely viewed as broken.
“We still feel it's one of the top three priorities,” said Margaret Pulles, spokeswoman for the San Antonio-based Mexicans and Americans Thinking Together, or MATT.org.
“Come January, if we're not hearing something,” said Graciela Sanchez, executive director of the Esperanza Peace & Justice Center, “we'll have to make a push.”
“Reform is a priority in the Latino community,” said San Antonian Rosa Rosales, national president of the League of United Latin American Citizens. “I would strongly urge that Latino organizations push the issue that we need comprehensive immigration reform now.”
Obama “is not going to forget the immigrant community,” she added.
Advocates on the front lines of helping immigrant families torn apart by deportations aren't so sure, sounding more exasperated with a continued hard line from the Department of Homeland Security.
“I'm very concerned,” said Alejandro Siller, coordinator of Mexican American Catholic College's San Juan Diego Project, which provides services to immigrants and faith-based groups that assist them. “Raids continue because there is no solution.”
A comprehensive bill being drafted by Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., is likely to include border security, penalties for employers who hire undocumented workers and what MATT.org calls “a fair and realistic plan for integrating undocumented workers into a legal system of employment.”
What opponents call “amnesty,” supporters couch as “a pathway to citizenship” for the 11 million to 12 million unauthorized immigrants in the United States. Instead of harsh punishment or deportation, Archbishop José Gomez wrote in a column last week, immigrants should receive community service, or another punishment “that fits the crime.”
Immigrant advocates also want Congress to change immigration caps and visa limits they consider unreasonable.
Donna R. Gabaccia of the Immigration History Research Center at the University of Minnesota said the limits have contributed “to a sense that immigration is out of control.”
That the same number of visas is extended to both Nigeria and Mexico, for example, is not realistic, the historian said. And congressional loopholes for refugees and relatives of immigrants compound the problem, she said.
“People say immigrants should get in the back of the line, but there is no line. There are no visas or almost no visas for unskilled and semiskilled workers to wait in,” Gabaccia said. “The diminishing small number of visas guarantees illegality.”
Members of San Antonio's congressional delegation who back reform sound doubtful of passage, too, especially given 2010 elections.
Obama has said he's willing to move forward if the votes are there, said Rep. Ciro Rodriguez, D-San Antonio. “It doesn't look like we have the votes, in all honesty.” He said Congress might instead address reform “partially.”
Rep. Charles Gonzalez, D-San Antonio, agreed. However, he thinks the Senate will introduce a bill before year's end.
“One of the complications is that Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.), one of our champions, is not on the Senate floor,” Gonzalez said.
Obama's recent comments from Guadalajara, Mexico, were encouraging, Gonzalez added, because they indicate reform is still on his agenda.
But the congressman added that if a comprehensive bill isn't passed, “We'll try to do it piecemeal.”
He cited the Dream Act, introduced in March, which would extend permanent residency to immigrant students who came to the United States as children and have graduated from high school.
Gonzalez said more border security funds would be approved regardless of an immigration bill, and “a temporary workers program of some sort” will be addressed.
“We have certain windows,” Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, said. “Experience and history have told us if it's postponed to the following year, then you're talking about 2011.”
Even opponents of immigration reform say the Obama administration may just run out of time.
“These are all big initiatives he has taken on,” said Ira Mehlman of the Federation for American Immigration Reform. “There's a limit to how much you can get done.”
Hispanic should replace Martinez, Gov told
Crist urged to pick Hispanic for Mel Martinez's Senate seat
Gov. Charlie Crist on Friday said he had asked three people to apply for the U.S. Senate vacancy so far.
BY BETH REINHARD AND TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA, Miami Herald
Under pressure to pick a Hispanic to replace U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez, Gov. Charlie Crist said Friday that U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart and former U.S. Attorney Bob Martinez are on the short list.
Mel Martinez, the first Cuban-born U.S. senator, announced last week that he would step down as soon as Crist chooses a replacement. Both the congressman and former U.S. attorney live in Miami and were born in Cuba.
Crist, who is seeking election to the Senate himself in 2010, recently drew criticism for opposing the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor, the first Hispanic justice on the Supreme Court. On Friday, the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials urged the governor to choose ``a qualified Latino or Latina'' to finish Martinez's term.
``We believe the appointment of Sen. Martinez's successor provides an opportunity to ensure that Florida's congressional leadership reflects the full diversity of the state,'' says the letter from the non-partisan group's executive director, Arturo Vargas.
Also on Crist's shortlist: former Secretary of State Jim Smith.
Crist said he will ask as many as seven people to fill out applications for the job.
The three Republicans he named Friday are not necessarily at the top of his list, he said.
``Obviously I think a great deal of all three of them or else I wouldn't have done that,'' he said on Friday, during a visit to Melrose Elementary School to emphasize swine flu prevention.
Diaz-Balart was elected to Congress in 1992 and previously served in the Florida House.
The news prompted speculation that Diaz-Balart's appointment would open up his congressional seat for Crist's GOP primary rival, Marco Rubio. Rubio, who would have to run for the seat in a special election, said Friday he's running for the Senate.
Martinez is a partner in the Coral Gables law firm of Colson Hicks Eidson.
He served as U.S. Attorney here in 1992-1993.
Miami Herald staff writer Lesley Clark contributed to this report.
Gov. Charlie Crist on Friday said he had asked three people to apply for the U.S. Senate vacancy so far.
BY BETH REINHARD AND TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA, Miami Herald
Under pressure to pick a Hispanic to replace U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez, Gov. Charlie Crist said Friday that U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart and former U.S. Attorney Bob Martinez are on the short list.
Mel Martinez, the first Cuban-born U.S. senator, announced last week that he would step down as soon as Crist chooses a replacement. Both the congressman and former U.S. attorney live in Miami and were born in Cuba.
Crist, who is seeking election to the Senate himself in 2010, recently drew criticism for opposing the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor, the first Hispanic justice on the Supreme Court. On Friday, the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials urged the governor to choose ``a qualified Latino or Latina'' to finish Martinez's term.
``We believe the appointment of Sen. Martinez's successor provides an opportunity to ensure that Florida's congressional leadership reflects the full diversity of the state,'' says the letter from the non-partisan group's executive director, Arturo Vargas.
Also on Crist's shortlist: former Secretary of State Jim Smith.
Crist said he will ask as many as seven people to fill out applications for the job.
The three Republicans he named Friday are not necessarily at the top of his list, he said.
``Obviously I think a great deal of all three of them or else I wouldn't have done that,'' he said on Friday, during a visit to Melrose Elementary School to emphasize swine flu prevention.
Diaz-Balart was elected to Congress in 1992 and previously served in the Florida House.
The news prompted speculation that Diaz-Balart's appointment would open up his congressional seat for Crist's GOP primary rival, Marco Rubio. Rubio, who would have to run for the seat in a special election, said Friday he's running for the Senate.
Martinez is a partner in the Coral Gables law firm of Colson Hicks Eidson.
He served as U.S. Attorney here in 1992-1993.
Miami Herald staff writer Lesley Clark contributed to this report.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Latino and Asian voter clout grows
Report cites Latino, Asian voting clout
By Juan Castillo | Austin Statesman, August 14, 2009
Latinos and Asians are demonstrating growing clout in the voting booth, says the Immigration Policy Center, citing new U.S. census data.
The center, an arm of the American Immigration Law Foundation, released a report this week which finds that the number of Latino voters increased by 28.4 percent (or 2.2 million) to almost 10 million in 2008.
The number of Asian voters increased by 21.3 percent, from 2.8 million in 2004 to 3.4 million in 2008, according to the report, “Latino and Asian Clout in the Voting Booth.”
The report, “Latino and Asian Clout in the Voting Booth,” also finds that in six of the nine states that switched from “red” to “blue” in the 2008 presidential election (Colorado, Florida, Indiana, Nevada, New Mexico and North Carolina), the number of Latino and Asian voters significantly exceeded Barack Obama’s margin of victory over John McCain.
In Texas, the ranks of Latino voters increased almost 11 percent, from 1.5 million to 1.69 million in 2008. One in five voters in Texas and California are Latino, the report says.
About one out of every 10 voters was Latino or Asian in the 2008 election.
The rise of the Latino vote and dramatic gains in the Hispanic population, particularly in Texas, have been the subject of much handicapping in the world of politics. For example, some analysts have speculated that Republican opposition to the nomination of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor could come back to haunt GOP candidates, because Obama won 67 percent support among Hispanic voters nationwide in 2008.
By Juan Castillo | Austin Statesman, August 14, 2009
Latinos and Asians are demonstrating growing clout in the voting booth, says the Immigration Policy Center, citing new U.S. census data.
The center, an arm of the American Immigration Law Foundation, released a report this week which finds that the number of Latino voters increased by 28.4 percent (or 2.2 million) to almost 10 million in 2008.
The number of Asian voters increased by 21.3 percent, from 2.8 million in 2004 to 3.4 million in 2008, according to the report, “Latino and Asian Clout in the Voting Booth.”
The report, “Latino and Asian Clout in the Voting Booth,” also finds that in six of the nine states that switched from “red” to “blue” in the 2008 presidential election (Colorado, Florida, Indiana, Nevada, New Mexico and North Carolina), the number of Latino and Asian voters significantly exceeded Barack Obama’s margin of victory over John McCain.
In Texas, the ranks of Latino voters increased almost 11 percent, from 1.5 million to 1.69 million in 2008. One in five voters in Texas and California are Latino, the report says.
About one out of every 10 voters was Latino or Asian in the 2008 election.
The rise of the Latino vote and dramatic gains in the Hispanic population, particularly in Texas, have been the subject of much handicapping in the world of politics. For example, some analysts have speculated that Republican opposition to the nomination of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor could come back to haunt GOP candidates, because Obama won 67 percent support among Hispanic voters nationwide in 2008.
Saving Hispanic education and environment discussed
Redford pitches preservation of Old West community, family values
Actor joins confab on how to save the region's environment.
By Mike Mcphee, The Denver Post, 08/14/2009
Denver » Democratic leaders gather in Denver to strategize ways to lasso voters in vital battleground
During a gathering of politicos, analysts and policy wonks at the Colorado History Museum on Thursday, celebrity Robert Redford wowed the crowd with his thoughts on how to save the West.
Sponsored by Project New West, the day-long gathering of several hundred people listened to lectures and discussed ways of expanding and solidifying the West's new-found political power.
Seated on stage in two leather chairs, Redford and U.S. Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., informally chatted about Redford's rise from movie actor to high-profile environmental champion.
"I think the New West should return to the Old West, when there was an emphasis on communities, on families and neighbors," Redford said, comfortable in bluejeans and a blue shirt. "It's time to think about what kinds of development we want, whether we want to develop more communities or subdivisions and sprawl."
Redford, who attended the University of Colorado at Boulder, said he became concerned about global warming as early as 1985 and favors a return to agriculture and the natural flow of rivers.
"Dams, all dams, should go away, the faster the better," he said. "The Colorado River today has only half the flow it used to have.
"Time and resources are running out for the West. Compromises are needed. I hope we wake up before we lose it for our children."
In his outspoken manner, Redford called the leaders of his home state, Utah, "retarded and no friends of the environment," although he had some praise for former Gov. Jon Huntsman, a Republican who recently resigned to become U.S. ambassador to China. Seated in the front row was Utah's delegation to the conference, including state Senate Minority Leader Patricia Jones.
He praised Colorado's Ken Salazar, a former U.S. senator and now secretary of the interior, for understanding the West and for having made "good, brave decisions."
"Salazar is very key among the new voices in Washington. He can make a huge difference. He's sitting in the catbird seat, but he'll be hit by the other side."
In a morning session, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada asked the gathering to keep the momentum going for Democratic candidates in the West.
"Now is the time to build on our successes, to build a deeper bench of candidates," Reid said. "For generations, prospectors, visionaries and entrepreneurs led Americans to the West. Now, the West is leading America.
"Presidential candidates were forced to understand critical Western issues (in 2008), water and land issues. They knew the road to the West Wing goes through the American West."
Another panel discussion on Hispanics and the New West showed that Latinos are the fastest-growing segment of the American population, but they are having trouble keeping their children in school and getting the vote out.
Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard, a Hispanic, said Latinos make up 30 percent of Arizona's population but only 6 percent of the voting population. New Mexico State Auditor Hector Balderas said the dropout rate for Latino students in New Mexico is greater than 50 percent.
In Colorado, Latino voters make up 12 percent of eligible voters, according to a 2008 report by the Pew Hispanic Center.
Actor joins confab on how to save the region's environment.
By Mike Mcphee, The Denver Post, 08/14/2009
Denver » Democratic leaders gather in Denver to strategize ways to lasso voters in vital battleground
During a gathering of politicos, analysts and policy wonks at the Colorado History Museum on Thursday, celebrity Robert Redford wowed the crowd with his thoughts on how to save the West.
Sponsored by Project New West, the day-long gathering of several hundred people listened to lectures and discussed ways of expanding and solidifying the West's new-found political power.
Seated on stage in two leather chairs, Redford and U.S. Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., informally chatted about Redford's rise from movie actor to high-profile environmental champion.
"I think the New West should return to the Old West, when there was an emphasis on communities, on families and neighbors," Redford said, comfortable in bluejeans and a blue shirt. "It's time to think about what kinds of development we want, whether we want to develop more communities or subdivisions and sprawl."
Redford, who attended the University of Colorado at Boulder, said he became concerned about global warming as early as 1985 and favors a return to agriculture and the natural flow of rivers.
"Dams, all dams, should go away, the faster the better," he said. "The Colorado River today has only half the flow it used to have.
"Time and resources are running out for the West. Compromises are needed. I hope we wake up before we lose it for our children."
In his outspoken manner, Redford called the leaders of his home state, Utah, "retarded and no friends of the environment," although he had some praise for former Gov. Jon Huntsman, a Republican who recently resigned to become U.S. ambassador to China. Seated in the front row was Utah's delegation to the conference, including state Senate Minority Leader Patricia Jones.
He praised Colorado's Ken Salazar, a former U.S. senator and now secretary of the interior, for understanding the West and for having made "good, brave decisions."
"Salazar is very key among the new voices in Washington. He can make a huge difference. He's sitting in the catbird seat, but he'll be hit by the other side."
In a morning session, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada asked the gathering to keep the momentum going for Democratic candidates in the West.
"Now is the time to build on our successes, to build a deeper bench of candidates," Reid said. "For generations, prospectors, visionaries and entrepreneurs led Americans to the West. Now, the West is leading America.
"Presidential candidates were forced to understand critical Western issues (in 2008), water and land issues. They knew the road to the West Wing goes through the American West."
Another panel discussion on Hispanics and the New West showed that Latinos are the fastest-growing segment of the American population, but they are having trouble keeping their children in school and getting the vote out.
Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard, a Hispanic, said Latinos make up 30 percent of Arizona's population but only 6 percent of the voting population. New Mexico State Auditor Hector Balderas said the dropout rate for Latino students in New Mexico is greater than 50 percent.
In Colorado, Latino voters make up 12 percent of eligible voters, according to a 2008 report by the Pew Hispanic Center.
Hispanic student growth an issue in Las Vegas
West Las Vegas school discussion turns emotional
The Associated Press, 08/14/2009
LAS VEGAS—Some people who attended a meeting to discuss a new report that says segregation is becoming worse in the West Las Vegas neighborhood say they have heard it all before and now they want solutions.
The Clark County School Board discussed the report Thursday at its meeting.
University of California at Los Angeles researchers say elementary schools in the historically black neighborhood are in danger of segregation by language, poverty and race.
The neighborhood has a growing Hispanic population, and the UCLA study says about one in three students at six elementary schools have limited English skills.
Parent Andres Mendoza told the board the study reveals something that should have been learned a long time ago.
Board member Carolyn Edwards says the district needs to improve the schools' quality with a plan that can't take an entire year.
The Associated Press, 08/14/2009
LAS VEGAS—Some people who attended a meeting to discuss a new report that says segregation is becoming worse in the West Las Vegas neighborhood say they have heard it all before and now they want solutions.
The Clark County School Board discussed the report Thursday at its meeting.
University of California at Los Angeles researchers say elementary schools in the historically black neighborhood are in danger of segregation by language, poverty and race.
The neighborhood has a growing Hispanic population, and the UCLA study says about one in three students at six elementary schools have limited English skills.
Parent Andres Mendoza told the board the study reveals something that should have been learned a long time ago.
Board member Carolyn Edwards says the district needs to improve the schools' quality with a plan that can't take an entire year.
Hispanic human trafficking up says FBI
FBI: Human trafficking cases rise as Hispanic population grows in Arkansas
JON GAMBRELL Associated Press, August 14, 2009
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — The head of the FBI's Little Rock office says the number of human trafficking cases involving Hispanics has risen in Arkansas.
In an interview Friday with The Associated Press, Special Agent in Charge Thomas Browne said the cases often involve individuals brought to the U.S. for prostitution or as modern-day indentured workers. However, Browne says those caught up in the trafficking cases remain under the control of those who brought them into the country.
Arkansas has had one of the nation's fastest growing Hispanic populations in recent years. U.S. Census Bureau estimates put the state's Hispanic population at roughly 160,000.
Browne later spoke with Hispanic leaders as part of an event put on by the Mexican consulate in Little Rock.
JON GAMBRELL Associated Press, August 14, 2009
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — The head of the FBI's Little Rock office says the number of human trafficking cases involving Hispanics has risen in Arkansas.
In an interview Friday with The Associated Press, Special Agent in Charge Thomas Browne said the cases often involve individuals brought to the U.S. for prostitution or as modern-day indentured workers. However, Browne says those caught up in the trafficking cases remain under the control of those who brought them into the country.
Arkansas has had one of the nation's fastest growing Hispanic populations in recent years. U.S. Census Bureau estimates put the state's Hispanic population at roughly 160,000.
Browne later spoke with Hispanic leaders as part of an event put on by the Mexican consulate in Little Rock.
Friday, August 14, 2009
Hispanic advocate groups push for immigrant safety
South Texas advocate groups push for undocumented immigrants safety first
The Latino Journal E-News, August 10, 2009
June is the beginning of hurricane season in the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico, causing coastal communities to work with local, state and federal agencies in creating emergency evacuation plans to prevent human injury or death. In the Rio Grande Valley of south Texas, the fear for undocumented immigrants is not the threat of hurricanes, but the tactics being implemented by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), a major player in developing emergency plans.
Many of the estimated 150,000 illegal immigrants in this region of Texas live in unincorporated colonias that are known for lacking the proper infrastructure for any protection. Complicating any planning, Texas has a new law that goes into effect September 1 that will make it illegal to stay at home during a hurricane. It also gives county judges and city mayors the authority to arrest people who refuse to comply with evacuation orders.
To help address this concern, a group of south Texas advocate groups held a press conference in hopes of bringing attention to the no-win situation undocumented residents face. They are asking DHS to take a compassionate approach during an emergency evacuation. But the Border Patrol in the region says they will continue to do their job even during an emergency evacuation.
"An evacuation doesn't preclude us from doing our job," Agent John Lopez, Border Patrol spokesman for his agency's Rio Grande Valley Sector told reporters. "Border Patrol will work closely with local officials to ensure that everyone is safe."
The Border Patrol's position does not rest well with groups like the South Texas Civil Rights Project (STCRP), La Unión del Pueblo Entero (LUPE), Proyecto Azteca, and A Resource In Serving Equity (ARISE). They are asking DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano to step in and allow for the safe evacuation of persons living in the area and stop the spread of fear and confusion by enforcing immigration laws during evacuation and rescue efforts.
"The people we work with on a daily basis will not evacuate if this issue is not clarified, we foresee a major disaster," said Martha Sanchez, a community leader from LUPE. "Our message to the government is 'please think about it, please look at this issue and respond as soon as possible because we all want to be to be ready for hurricane season.' The message we get daily is 'be ready, be prepared.' Well, we cannot be prepared if the government does not clarify."
"Most people don't want to leave their homes because they're afraid of Border Patrol," said Sylvia Tavor, a tutor with A Resource in Serving Equality. Better known as ARISE, the organization helps Mexican immigrants adjust to life in the United States.
"The thing about natural disaster is that everybody has to be on the same page, so it's crucial that we have the opportunity to go out and educate people," said Corinna Spencer-Scheurich, an attorney with STCRP
The U.S. Border Patrol has stated Agents will conduct inspections and ask evacuees about their immigration status, an action that could create a traffic bottleneck. However, Lopez says the Border Patrol would not prescreen people's nationality at evacuation points. And illegal immigrants arrested at inspection checkpoints would be removed to a safe location before further action is taken.
The Latino Journal E-News, August 10, 2009
June is the beginning of hurricane season in the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico, causing coastal communities to work with local, state and federal agencies in creating emergency evacuation plans to prevent human injury or death. In the Rio Grande Valley of south Texas, the fear for undocumented immigrants is not the threat of hurricanes, but the tactics being implemented by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), a major player in developing emergency plans.
Many of the estimated 150,000 illegal immigrants in this region of Texas live in unincorporated colonias that are known for lacking the proper infrastructure for any protection. Complicating any planning, Texas has a new law that goes into effect September 1 that will make it illegal to stay at home during a hurricane. It also gives county judges and city mayors the authority to arrest people who refuse to comply with evacuation orders.
To help address this concern, a group of south Texas advocate groups held a press conference in hopes of bringing attention to the no-win situation undocumented residents face. They are asking DHS to take a compassionate approach during an emergency evacuation. But the Border Patrol in the region says they will continue to do their job even during an emergency evacuation.
"An evacuation doesn't preclude us from doing our job," Agent John Lopez, Border Patrol spokesman for his agency's Rio Grande Valley Sector told reporters. "Border Patrol will work closely with local officials to ensure that everyone is safe."
The Border Patrol's position does not rest well with groups like the South Texas Civil Rights Project (STCRP), La Unión del Pueblo Entero (LUPE), Proyecto Azteca, and A Resource In Serving Equity (ARISE). They are asking DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano to step in and allow for the safe evacuation of persons living in the area and stop the spread of fear and confusion by enforcing immigration laws during evacuation and rescue efforts.
"The people we work with on a daily basis will not evacuate if this issue is not clarified, we foresee a major disaster," said Martha Sanchez, a community leader from LUPE. "Our message to the government is 'please think about it, please look at this issue and respond as soon as possible because we all want to be to be ready for hurricane season.' The message we get daily is 'be ready, be prepared.' Well, we cannot be prepared if the government does not clarify."
"Most people don't want to leave their homes because they're afraid of Border Patrol," said Sylvia Tavor, a tutor with A Resource in Serving Equality. Better known as ARISE, the organization helps Mexican immigrants adjust to life in the United States.
"The thing about natural disaster is that everybody has to be on the same page, so it's crucial that we have the opportunity to go out and educate people," said Corinna Spencer-Scheurich, an attorney with STCRP
The U.S. Border Patrol has stated Agents will conduct inspections and ask evacuees about their immigration status, an action that could create a traffic bottleneck. However, Lopez says the Border Patrol would not prescreen people's nationality at evacuation points. And illegal immigrants arrested at inspection checkpoints would be removed to a safe location before further action is taken.
Democrats focus on Hispanic voters
Winning the West: Democrats Focus on Hispanic Voters
Stephanie Simon, Wall Street Journal, August 13, 2009
The Democratic strategists gathering today in Denver with a goal of consolidating a hold on the West heard from solar-energy boosters and rugged environmentalists and bolo-tie advocates and even actor Robert Redford, who regaled the crowd with his tales of standing up to oil and coal interests in the 1970s.
But in the end, the take-home message of the day boiled down to this: Think Latino.
“More than 60,000 Latinos in the United States are turning 18 every month,” said Lorena Chambers, CEO of a political consulting firm called Chambers, Lopez & Gaitan LLC. “We need to find out who’s communicating with them.”
Trends in the Latino community are undeniably good for Democratis.
The Pew Hispanic Center, a nonprofit and nonpartisan research firm, has been asking Hispanics since 2002 which party has more concern for them — or whether there’s any difference at all. For years, the findings were consistent: about 45% of Hispanics said the Democrats had their back. In 2008, that number suddenly spiked to 55%. Republicans earned a nod from just 6% of Latinos queried, according to Mark Hugo Lopez, who presented the Pew Center’s research to the summit.
Hispanics also played a signifcant role in boosting President Barack Obama to victory in several states. Nearly 40% of eligible voters in New Mexico are Hispanic, as are 13% in Colorado — both swing states that went blue in 2008. Perhaps the most notable shift, Lopez said, was in Florida. Four years ago, just 44% of Hispanic voters in Florida went for the Democratic presidential ticket. Last year, 57% did.
But Democratic success in this demographic is not a given, especially since young voters in general — and Hispanics in particular — tend to prize independence and shun party affiliation.
Hence the summit’s focus on voters with Mexican and Latin American heritage. “We want to get down to the deep and dirty of how to move Hispanic voters,” Chambers said. “[Because] we really want to keep winning.”
Though this was an intensely political gathering, the key strategy discussed as a means of wooing Latino voters didn’t have to do with TV ads or direct mailing or community organizing. Instead, the drumbeat focused on a long-term, societal goal: Work to boost education among Hispanics.
Today, out of every 100 Latino students, just 50 will graduate high school, just 6 will earn a college degree, and less than 1, on average, will get a post-graduate education. The Pew Hispanic Center’s research shows that the more educated Hispanics are, the more likely they are to engage civically — and the more likely they are to vote. That’s why New Mexico state auditor Hector Balderas, another panelist, cited his state’s high dropout rate as one of the most crucial issues for candidates to connect with if they hope to move Hispanic voters.
Balderas, who won statewide office in 2006 — when he was just 33, — also urged Democrats to groom more young Latino candidates. “When you do that, the language changes, the optics change, the issues change,” Balderas said. “Never underestimate the power of a young voice.”
His parting words of wisdom to the crowd of activists: “Do not be afraid of our communities.”
Stephanie Simon, Wall Street Journal, August 13, 2009
The Democratic strategists gathering today in Denver with a goal of consolidating a hold on the West heard from solar-energy boosters and rugged environmentalists and bolo-tie advocates and even actor Robert Redford, who regaled the crowd with his tales of standing up to oil and coal interests in the 1970s.
But in the end, the take-home message of the day boiled down to this: Think Latino.
“More than 60,000 Latinos in the United States are turning 18 every month,” said Lorena Chambers, CEO of a political consulting firm called Chambers, Lopez & Gaitan LLC. “We need to find out who’s communicating with them.”
Trends in the Latino community are undeniably good for Democratis.
The Pew Hispanic Center, a nonprofit and nonpartisan research firm, has been asking Hispanics since 2002 which party has more concern for them — or whether there’s any difference at all. For years, the findings were consistent: about 45% of Hispanics said the Democrats had their back. In 2008, that number suddenly spiked to 55%. Republicans earned a nod from just 6% of Latinos queried, according to Mark Hugo Lopez, who presented the Pew Center’s research to the summit.
Hispanics also played a signifcant role in boosting President Barack Obama to victory in several states. Nearly 40% of eligible voters in New Mexico are Hispanic, as are 13% in Colorado — both swing states that went blue in 2008. Perhaps the most notable shift, Lopez said, was in Florida. Four years ago, just 44% of Hispanic voters in Florida went for the Democratic presidential ticket. Last year, 57% did.
But Democratic success in this demographic is not a given, especially since young voters in general — and Hispanics in particular — tend to prize independence and shun party affiliation.
Hence the summit’s focus on voters with Mexican and Latin American heritage. “We want to get down to the deep and dirty of how to move Hispanic voters,” Chambers said. “[Because] we really want to keep winning.”
Though this was an intensely political gathering, the key strategy discussed as a means of wooing Latino voters didn’t have to do with TV ads or direct mailing or community organizing. Instead, the drumbeat focused on a long-term, societal goal: Work to boost education among Hispanics.
Today, out of every 100 Latino students, just 50 will graduate high school, just 6 will earn a college degree, and less than 1, on average, will get a post-graduate education. The Pew Hispanic Center’s research shows that the more educated Hispanics are, the more likely they are to engage civically — and the more likely they are to vote. That’s why New Mexico state auditor Hector Balderas, another panelist, cited his state’s high dropout rate as one of the most crucial issues for candidates to connect with if they hope to move Hispanic voters.
Balderas, who won statewide office in 2006 — when he was just 33, — also urged Democrats to groom more young Latino candidates. “When you do that, the language changes, the optics change, the issues change,” Balderas said. “Never underestimate the power of a young voice.”
His parting words of wisdom to the crowd of activists: “Do not be afraid of our communities.”
Latino advocates sue Texas Democratic Party
Lawsuit over Democratic Party delegates returns
By PAUL J. WEBER Associated Press, Aug. 13, 2009
SAN ANTONIO — A lawsuit borne from the intense Texas Democratic primary last year between Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton re-emerged in a federal court Thursday over Latino voters who say the were discriminated against by the delegate process.
A judge threw out the case last year, but an appeals court kicked the suit back to a three-judge panel that will weigh whether the complicated "Texas two-step" system of awarding delegates diluted Latino votes. Latino advocates filed the suit in May 2008 against the Texas Democratic Party.
Both sides now await a ruling following Thursday's hearing. The League of United Latin American Citizens of Texas claims the primary and caucus system should require pre-clearance by the Justice Department under the Voting Rights Act.
"If you think you have such a splendid history with minority voters, show it," LULAC attorney Jose Garza said.
Nearly all the delegates in the Texas system are apportioned based on Democratic voter turnout numbers in previous elections in state senate districts. For Latino districts, that meant low turnout in a 2006 gubernatorial election resulted in fewer presidential delegates in the 2008 primary and caucuses.
Latino districts in Texas favored Clinton, while black districts favored Obama. The lawsuit does not challenge which candidates got the delegates, but rather the formula for allotting them.
The Texas Democratic Party says the system is fair. Lawyers for the party said their case is bolstered by a U.S. Supreme Court decision in June that favored an Austin municipal utility district that sought to bail out of getting federal pre-clearance for changing its election procedures.
The Voting Rights Act case involved a political subdivision. Chad Dunn, a lawyer for the Texas Democratic Party, said the party does not meet that definition.
"After (that case), we can be fairly certain that you have to be a political subdivision," Dunn said during the hearing Thursday.
Garza said if the party's way of allocating delegates is fair, it should have nothing to worry about.
"How does it hurt them? What does it do to them?" Garza asked the judges.
Last year, U.S. District Judge Fred Biery ruled that the spirit and intent of the federal Voting Rights Act, which protects minority voters, was not violated, and he dismissed the suit. But in February, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans ruled that a three-judge panel — not one judge — should decide the merits of the case.
By PAUL J. WEBER Associated Press, Aug. 13, 2009
SAN ANTONIO — A lawsuit borne from the intense Texas Democratic primary last year between Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton re-emerged in a federal court Thursday over Latino voters who say the were discriminated against by the delegate process.
A judge threw out the case last year, but an appeals court kicked the suit back to a three-judge panel that will weigh whether the complicated "Texas two-step" system of awarding delegates diluted Latino votes. Latino advocates filed the suit in May 2008 against the Texas Democratic Party.
Both sides now await a ruling following Thursday's hearing. The League of United Latin American Citizens of Texas claims the primary and caucus system should require pre-clearance by the Justice Department under the Voting Rights Act.
"If you think you have such a splendid history with minority voters, show it," LULAC attorney Jose Garza said.
Nearly all the delegates in the Texas system are apportioned based on Democratic voter turnout numbers in previous elections in state senate districts. For Latino districts, that meant low turnout in a 2006 gubernatorial election resulted in fewer presidential delegates in the 2008 primary and caucuses.
Latino districts in Texas favored Clinton, while black districts favored Obama. The lawsuit does not challenge which candidates got the delegates, but rather the formula for allotting them.
The Texas Democratic Party says the system is fair. Lawyers for the party said their case is bolstered by a U.S. Supreme Court decision in June that favored an Austin municipal utility district that sought to bail out of getting federal pre-clearance for changing its election procedures.
The Voting Rights Act case involved a political subdivision. Chad Dunn, a lawyer for the Texas Democratic Party, said the party does not meet that definition.
"After (that case), we can be fairly certain that you have to be a political subdivision," Dunn said during the hearing Thursday.
Garza said if the party's way of allocating delegates is fair, it should have nothing to worry about.
"How does it hurt them? What does it do to them?" Garza asked the judges.
Last year, U.S. District Judge Fred Biery ruled that the spirit and intent of the federal Voting Rights Act, which protects minority voters, was not violated, and he dismissed the suit. But in February, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans ruled that a three-judge panel — not one judge — should decide the merits of the case.
Hispanics target of bad newspaper opinion
Opinion:
The San Jose Mercury News, 08/13/2009
To hear the Obamaites, those raucous crowds pouring into town-hall meetings are "mobs" of "thugs" whose rage has been "manufactured" by K Street lobbyists and right-wing Republican operatives.
Press secretary Robert Gibbs compares them to the Young Republicans of the "Brooks Brothers riot" during the Florida recount.
But is it wise for the White House to denigrate and insult scores of thousands with the fire and energy to come to town meetings in August and who appear to represent millions? Is this depiction fair or accurate?
Most K Street lobbyists could not organize a two-car funeral. They don't storm meetings. They buy friends with $1,000 checks. And if GOP operatives are turning out these crowds, why could they not turn them out for John McCain, unless Sister Sarah showed up?
The Obamaites had best wake up. Opposition to health care reform is surging, and Barack Obama's campaigning has gone hand-in-hand with collapsing support, just as George W. Bush's barnstorming did for Social Security reform.
There is an anger out there unseen since Ross Perot was leading Bush I and Bill Clinton in the presidential trial heats in 1992.
Who are these folks? Why are they angry?
In his essay "Decline of the American Male" in USA Today, David Zinczenko, editor of Men's Health, gives us a clue. "Of the 5.2 million people who've lost their jobs since last summer, four out of five were men. Some experts predict that this year, for the first time, more American women will have jobs than men."
Ed Rubenstein, who has written for Forbes, National Review and The Wall Street Journal, blogs on VDARE.com that if one uses the household survey of job losses for June-July, Latinos gained 150,000 positions, while non-Latinos lost 679,000. Guess who got the stimulus jobs.
Going back to the beginning of the Bush presidency, Rubenstein says that "for every 100 Latinos employed in January 2001, there are now 122.5. ... (But) for every 100 non-Latinos employed in January 2001, there are now 98.9."
Since 2001, Latino employment has increased by 3,627,000 positions, and non-Latino positions have fallen by 1,362,000. For black and white America, the Bush decade did not begin well or end well, and it has gotten worse under Obama.
African-Americans remain loyal, but among white folks, where Obama ran stronger than John Kerry or Al Gore, he is hemorrhaging.
According to the latest Quinnipiac poll, which showed him falling to 50 percent approval, whites, by 54 percent to 27 percent, felt Obama behaved "stupidly" in the Sgt. Crowley-professor Gates dust-up.
Fifteen straight months of job losses by non-Latinos explains the anger, but columnist Lowell Ponte raises an issue that may explain who is protesting health care reform.
Under the civil rights legal doctrine of disparate impact, used in the New Haven firefighters case, if tests for hirings and promotions consistently produce results disadvantageous to minorities, the tests are, de facto, suspect as inherently discriminatory, and the results are tossed out. New Haven canceled the promotions for firefighters when all but one of the firemen who passed the test were white and not a single African-American made the cut.
The city argued that New Haven was acting true to the letter of the Civil Rights Act, which says that tests that consistently produce a disparate and unfavorable impact on African-Americans must go.
Ponte applies the disparate impact doctrine to the trillion-dollar health care reform.
Who are the principal beneficiaries? The 47 million uninsured who will be covered. Who are the principal losers? The elderly sick who, in the name of controlling costs, are going to lose benefits, be denied care at the end of their lives and have their lives shortened.
For half of all health care costs are in the last six months of life, and cost control is priority No. 1.
Here is where the disparate impact hits. Among those who benefit most — the uninsured — African-Americans, Latinos and immigrants are overrepresented. Among the biggest losers — seniors and the elderly sick — well over 80 percent are white. Ponte quotes Fox News' Dick Morris:
"The principal impact of the Obama health care program will be to reduce sharply the medical services the elderly can use. No longer will their every medical need be met, their every medication prescribed, their every need to improve their quality of life answered."
Under Obamacare, adds Morris, "the elderly will go from being the group with the most access to free medical care to the one with the least access."
America is already divided ideologically and politically on health care reform. And with seniors having to sacrifice care, while the young are all insured, a generational divide is opening.
Now Nobel Prize-winner and New York Times pundit Paul Krugman writes in his "The Town Hall Mobs" column that, as did Richard Nixon's men, "cynical political operators are ... appealing to the racial fears of working-class whites."
Pulitzer Prize-winning black columnist Cynthia Tucker says 45 percent to 65 percent of all vocal opponents of Obamacare are motivated by racial hostility to a black president.
We are headed for interesting times.
The San Jose Mercury News, 08/13/2009
To hear the Obamaites, those raucous crowds pouring into town-hall meetings are "mobs" of "thugs" whose rage has been "manufactured" by K Street lobbyists and right-wing Republican operatives.
Press secretary Robert Gibbs compares them to the Young Republicans of the "Brooks Brothers riot" during the Florida recount.
But is it wise for the White House to denigrate and insult scores of thousands with the fire and energy to come to town meetings in August and who appear to represent millions? Is this depiction fair or accurate?
Most K Street lobbyists could not organize a two-car funeral. They don't storm meetings. They buy friends with $1,000 checks. And if GOP operatives are turning out these crowds, why could they not turn them out for John McCain, unless Sister Sarah showed up?
The Obamaites had best wake up. Opposition to health care reform is surging, and Barack Obama's campaigning has gone hand-in-hand with collapsing support, just as George W. Bush's barnstorming did for Social Security reform.
There is an anger out there unseen since Ross Perot was leading Bush I and Bill Clinton in the presidential trial heats in 1992.
Who are these folks? Why are they angry?
In his essay "Decline of the American Male" in USA Today, David Zinczenko, editor of Men's Health, gives us a clue. "Of the 5.2 million people who've lost their jobs since last summer, four out of five were men. Some experts predict that this year, for the first time, more American women will have jobs than men."
Ed Rubenstein, who has written for Forbes, National Review and The Wall Street Journal, blogs on VDARE.com that if one uses the household survey of job losses for June-July, Latinos gained 150,000 positions, while non-Latinos lost 679,000. Guess who got the stimulus jobs.
Going back to the beginning of the Bush presidency, Rubenstein says that "for every 100 Latinos employed in January 2001, there are now 122.5. ... (But) for every 100 non-Latinos employed in January 2001, there are now 98.9."
Since 2001, Latino employment has increased by 3,627,000 positions, and non-Latino positions have fallen by 1,362,000. For black and white America, the Bush decade did not begin well or end well, and it has gotten worse under Obama.
African-Americans remain loyal, but among white folks, where Obama ran stronger than John Kerry or Al Gore, he is hemorrhaging.
According to the latest Quinnipiac poll, which showed him falling to 50 percent approval, whites, by 54 percent to 27 percent, felt Obama behaved "stupidly" in the Sgt. Crowley-professor Gates dust-up.
Fifteen straight months of job losses by non-Latinos explains the anger, but columnist Lowell Ponte raises an issue that may explain who is protesting health care reform.
Under the civil rights legal doctrine of disparate impact, used in the New Haven firefighters case, if tests for hirings and promotions consistently produce results disadvantageous to minorities, the tests are, de facto, suspect as inherently discriminatory, and the results are tossed out. New Haven canceled the promotions for firefighters when all but one of the firemen who passed the test were white and not a single African-American made the cut.
The city argued that New Haven was acting true to the letter of the Civil Rights Act, which says that tests that consistently produce a disparate and unfavorable impact on African-Americans must go.
Ponte applies the disparate impact doctrine to the trillion-dollar health care reform.
Who are the principal beneficiaries? The 47 million uninsured who will be covered. Who are the principal losers? The elderly sick who, in the name of controlling costs, are going to lose benefits, be denied care at the end of their lives and have their lives shortened.
For half of all health care costs are in the last six months of life, and cost control is priority No. 1.
Here is where the disparate impact hits. Among those who benefit most — the uninsured — African-Americans, Latinos and immigrants are overrepresented. Among the biggest losers — seniors and the elderly sick — well over 80 percent are white. Ponte quotes Fox News' Dick Morris:
"The principal impact of the Obama health care program will be to reduce sharply the medical services the elderly can use. No longer will their every medical need be met, their every medication prescribed, their every need to improve their quality of life answered."
Under Obamacare, adds Morris, "the elderly will go from being the group with the most access to free medical care to the one with the least access."
America is already divided ideologically and politically on health care reform. And with seniors having to sacrifice care, while the young are all insured, a generational divide is opening.
Now Nobel Prize-winner and New York Times pundit Paul Krugman writes in his "The Town Hall Mobs" column that, as did Richard Nixon's men, "cynical political operators are ... appealing to the racial fears of working-class whites."
Pulitzer Prize-winning black columnist Cynthia Tucker says 45 percent to 65 percent of all vocal opponents of Obamacare are motivated by racial hostility to a black president.
We are headed for interesting times.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
GOP chasing Hispanic voters
Morning Fix: Republicans Go After Democratic Base in N.J.
Voices, Washington Post
National Republicans are going up with television and radio ads targeting two pillars of the Democratic base -- Hispanics and environmentally-minded voters -- in the New Jersey governor's race, a sign of their increasing confidence that they will beat Gov. Jon Corzine (D-N.J.) this fall and evidence of their effort to broaden the party heading into the 2010 midterm elections.
The environmental-themed television ad, which will run statewide on cable stations like MSNBC, CNN and HGTV, notes that "the Sierra Club says Jon Corzine has the worst environmental administration in New Jersey history" and goes through a laundry list of alleged Corzine misdeeds during his first four years in office from "weakening water quality standards" to "reductions in public open space."
The RGA will also sponsor radio ads targeted at New Jersey's Hispanic population, which come even as strategists of both parties ponder the potential damage done to the GOP by the "no" votes cast against Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor last week.
"Are things in New Jersey better or worse under Governor Jon Corzine's leadership?" asks the radio ad's narrator. "Most people in the Latino community say they're worse. In New Jersey, good jobs are hard to find. Jon Corzine told us his Wall Street experience would bring jobs, but unemployment is up ninety percent."
Mike Schrimpf, communications director for the RGA, said the messages of the new ad campaign are that "Jon Corzine has failed all the citizens of New Jersey" and that the RGA -- and former U.S. attorney Chris Christie (R) -- will go after every possible vote in this Democratic-leaning state.
Corzine spokeswoman Elisabeth Smith offered a different take. "As we've seen in recent weeks, the more New Jersey voters get to know Christie, the less they like him," said Smith. "No flashy advertising campaign can conceal a record like that."
A recent Quinnipiac University poll suggests that the RGA may find some fertile ground in their appeals to Democrats. Christie was winning nearly one in five (19 percent) Democratic votes in the survey while dominating among New Jersey's traditionally Democratic-leaning independents (64 percent to 28 percent).
The RGA would not release detailed expenditure information about their latest buy but the symbolism is clear: national Republicans view the New Jersey race as a chance to roll up a major victory in a blue state and, in doing so, send a message to party regulars and voters more broadly that GOP candidates can win even among traditionally Democratic groups.
As has been written about on the Fix and in any number of other places, demographic changes suggest that Republicans could be in the minority in Congress and out of the presidency for the foreseeable future if they cannot find ways to make inroads among Hispanics and other Democratic-leaning constituencies.
Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, the chairman of the RGA, said as much in a conference call with reporters Monday.
"When you lose and you rebuild from the bottom up, part of that should be make sure everybody who might be interested in being your coalition feels welcome and wants to participate," said Barbour.
Voices, Washington Post
National Republicans are going up with television and radio ads targeting two pillars of the Democratic base -- Hispanics and environmentally-minded voters -- in the New Jersey governor's race, a sign of their increasing confidence that they will beat Gov. Jon Corzine (D-N.J.) this fall and evidence of their effort to broaden the party heading into the 2010 midterm elections.
The environmental-themed television ad, which will run statewide on cable stations like MSNBC, CNN and HGTV, notes that "the Sierra Club says Jon Corzine has the worst environmental administration in New Jersey history" and goes through a laundry list of alleged Corzine misdeeds during his first four years in office from "weakening water quality standards" to "reductions in public open space."
The RGA will also sponsor radio ads targeted at New Jersey's Hispanic population, which come even as strategists of both parties ponder the potential damage done to the GOP by the "no" votes cast against Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor last week.
"Are things in New Jersey better or worse under Governor Jon Corzine's leadership?" asks the radio ad's narrator. "Most people in the Latino community say they're worse. In New Jersey, good jobs are hard to find. Jon Corzine told us his Wall Street experience would bring jobs, but unemployment is up ninety percent."
Mike Schrimpf, communications director for the RGA, said the messages of the new ad campaign are that "Jon Corzine has failed all the citizens of New Jersey" and that the RGA -- and former U.S. attorney Chris Christie (R) -- will go after every possible vote in this Democratic-leaning state.
Corzine spokeswoman Elisabeth Smith offered a different take. "As we've seen in recent weeks, the more New Jersey voters get to know Christie, the less they like him," said Smith. "No flashy advertising campaign can conceal a record like that."
A recent Quinnipiac University poll suggests that the RGA may find some fertile ground in their appeals to Democrats. Christie was winning nearly one in five (19 percent) Democratic votes in the survey while dominating among New Jersey's traditionally Democratic-leaning independents (64 percent to 28 percent).
The RGA would not release detailed expenditure information about their latest buy but the symbolism is clear: national Republicans view the New Jersey race as a chance to roll up a major victory in a blue state and, in doing so, send a message to party regulars and voters more broadly that GOP candidates can win even among traditionally Democratic groups.
As has been written about on the Fix and in any number of other places, demographic changes suggest that Republicans could be in the minority in Congress and out of the presidency for the foreseeable future if they cannot find ways to make inroads among Hispanics and other Democratic-leaning constituencies.
Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, the chairman of the RGA, said as much in a conference call with reporters Monday.
"When you lose and you rebuild from the bottom up, part of that should be make sure everybody who might be interested in being your coalition feels welcome and wants to participate," said Barbour.
Hispanic immigration reform can't wait
We Can't Wait for Change
Christine Neumann-Ortiz, Huffington Post, August 11, 2009
At a press conference with Mexico's President Calderón and Canada's Prime Minister Harper, President Obama responded to a question on the timeline for immigration reform by stating that immigration reform was a priority but would have to wait till 2010 after health care, energy, and financial regulation bills were passed.
This is a reversal of his campaign promise to pass immigration reform in 2009. Patience for 2010 is hard to come by when the new administration persists with an enforcement-only strategy that Obama criticized during the campaign trail. Both represent a betrayal to Latino voters who were a key constitutency in delivering the presidency and a majority of Democrats to the US Congress.
What President Obama and other Democrats fail to take into account is that the Latino community can't wait till 2010 for justice to arrive.
The escalation of human suffering continues: civil and human rights violations in detention facilities; families torn apart as armed ICE agents arrest loved ones in their home; increased hate crimes and racial profiling of Latinos; workplace abuses by unscrupluous employers; all of this and more have been a motivating factor for what Latinos expected in 2009: change.
Yet, where is the change? There have been some modest gestures: lifting a 5 year ban for legal immigrant access to S-chip and not including the faulty E-Verify program in the stimulus package (later included in federal contracts).
Yet the two central demands of the immigrant rights movement: stop the deportations and passage of humane immigration reform are nowhere in sight.
Shockingly, the Department of Homeland Security under Secretary Janet Napolitano's leadership continues to support and expand Bush-era enforcement strategies. Despite numerous reports documenting human rights abuses in detention facilities, DHS refuses to create enforcable, independent regulations of the detention system.
For-profit prisons and local and state jails continue to cash in from the criminalization and detention of immigrant workers and youth.
Other administrative reforms have also gone unheeded. DHS refuses to repeal 287G agreements that have led to a vigilante cowboy culture by local and state law enforcement, such as Arizona's Sheriff Arpaio, who has been charged with over a thousand civil rights violations.
DHS has been window dressing workplace raids by pushing I-9 audits; which hurt workers as much any workplace raid. Indeed, the latest "desktop raid" targetted a unionized meatpacking plant. As one immigrant worker observed, "in the fields they never raid; because you have to be truly desperate to work there."
Social Security No Match letters sent to employers, that have less than 1% effectiveness, have yet to be repealed.
It is clear that the Obama Administration has a political strategy that continues to cater to the most virulent xenophobic section of American society and a private prison and defense industry.
Legalization should not be postponed--in an economy that is largely based on consumerism, anything that puts money in the pockets of workers is a good thing. Legalization has been shown to raise wages, increase tax revenues, and encourage people to spend more.
If politicians make promises they don't keep-who should we believe?
We need to believe in ourselves and hold politicians accountable not just in the voting booth but in calls to their office, public forums and meetings. The need for visible protests that force the issue into the public eye cannot stop. Indeed, it must escalate.
Immigration was a losing electoral platform for Republicans in 2006 and 2008. If Democrats don't challenge the dehumanizing policies of the past and deliver humane immigration reform it will be a bankrupt electoral platform in 2010 and 2012.
Christine Neumann-Ortiz, Huffington Post, August 11, 2009
At a press conference with Mexico's President Calderón and Canada's Prime Minister Harper, President Obama responded to a question on the timeline for immigration reform by stating that immigration reform was a priority but would have to wait till 2010 after health care, energy, and financial regulation bills were passed.
This is a reversal of his campaign promise to pass immigration reform in 2009. Patience for 2010 is hard to come by when the new administration persists with an enforcement-only strategy that Obama criticized during the campaign trail. Both represent a betrayal to Latino voters who were a key constitutency in delivering the presidency and a majority of Democrats to the US Congress.
What President Obama and other Democrats fail to take into account is that the Latino community can't wait till 2010 for justice to arrive.
The escalation of human suffering continues: civil and human rights violations in detention facilities; families torn apart as armed ICE agents arrest loved ones in their home; increased hate crimes and racial profiling of Latinos; workplace abuses by unscrupluous employers; all of this and more have been a motivating factor for what Latinos expected in 2009: change.
Yet, where is the change? There have been some modest gestures: lifting a 5 year ban for legal immigrant access to S-chip and not including the faulty E-Verify program in the stimulus package (later included in federal contracts).
Yet the two central demands of the immigrant rights movement: stop the deportations and passage of humane immigration reform are nowhere in sight.
Shockingly, the Department of Homeland Security under Secretary Janet Napolitano's leadership continues to support and expand Bush-era enforcement strategies. Despite numerous reports documenting human rights abuses in detention facilities, DHS refuses to create enforcable, independent regulations of the detention system.
For-profit prisons and local and state jails continue to cash in from the criminalization and detention of immigrant workers and youth.
Other administrative reforms have also gone unheeded. DHS refuses to repeal 287G agreements that have led to a vigilante cowboy culture by local and state law enforcement, such as Arizona's Sheriff Arpaio, who has been charged with over a thousand civil rights violations.
DHS has been window dressing workplace raids by pushing I-9 audits; which hurt workers as much any workplace raid. Indeed, the latest "desktop raid" targetted a unionized meatpacking plant. As one immigrant worker observed, "in the fields they never raid; because you have to be truly desperate to work there."
Social Security No Match letters sent to employers, that have less than 1% effectiveness, have yet to be repealed.
It is clear that the Obama Administration has a political strategy that continues to cater to the most virulent xenophobic section of American society and a private prison and defense industry.
Legalization should not be postponed--in an economy that is largely based on consumerism, anything that puts money in the pockets of workers is a good thing. Legalization has been shown to raise wages, increase tax revenues, and encourage people to spend more.
If politicians make promises they don't keep-who should we believe?
We need to believe in ourselves and hold politicians accountable not just in the voting booth but in calls to their office, public forums and meetings. The need for visible protests that force the issue into the public eye cannot stop. Indeed, it must escalate.
Immigration was a losing electoral platform for Republicans in 2006 and 2008. If Democrats don't challenge the dehumanizing policies of the past and deliver humane immigration reform it will be a bankrupt electoral platform in 2010 and 2012.
Hispanics, Blacks gaining political clout in Florida
Seminole Democrats: Hispanic, black caucuses signal growing strength
By Rachael Jackson, Orlando Sentinel, August 12, 2009
Seminole Democrats recently started a Hispanic caucus and are forming a black caucus — steps that party officials say are showing how the party is gaining ground in a county long dominated by Republicans.
The Hispanic caucus — a group that meets regularly to advocate for the interests of Hispanic Democrats — was formed in June with Luis Pastrana as its president. Just five years ago, Pastrana said, he didn't think forming a caucus would have been possible.
"I don't believe that the political will was there," Pastrana said. Now, he said, as the county prepares for a bilingual ballot expected to be federally required in 2012, things are different.
Ever since President Barack Obama started campaigning, the county Democratic Party's fortunes have been changing. Membership is increasing, fueled by a list of volunteers the Obama campaign gave the local party. A year ago in July, a permanent office was opened in Altamonte Springs.
Chris Lomas, chairwoman of the county's Democratic Executive Committee, said the group used to feel like a club. Now it feels like a stronger force, she said.
Marian Williams, a state committeewoman who heads the Seminole Democrats' affirmative-action committee, said she hopes to set up a caucus for people with disabilities by October and one for veterans by February. The party will have an open forum about the black caucus Tuesday at the county library in Casselberry.
"There are many people who complain that they're not a part of the political process, and this gives them a chance to tie in," she said.
Pastrana said the Hispanic caucus will focus on changing Seminole County's commission to election by district rather than countywide. The current system, he said, makes it difficult for a Hispanic candidate to be elected.
In December 2007, 32.4 percent of registered voters in Seminole were Democrats, while 43.9 percent were Republicans. Today, 34.9 percent are Democrats and 41.1 percent are Republicans.
While Democratic leaders say membership in the local party organization has risen from about 60 people a year ago to 80 today, their grip on new registrants has slipped recently because more Seminole residents have been registering as independents. Among voters who registered in June, 186 were Republicans, 201 were Democrats and 263 were independents or did not list a party affiliation.
Seminole's Republican Party, which has been dominant since the 1980s, doesn't have caucuses. Jason Brodeur, chairman of the Seminole County Republican Executive Committee, said his organization isn't focusing on particular groups but is trying to reach out to voters in general by attending events and being visible.
Rachael Jackson can be reached at 407-540-4358
or rjackson@orlandosentinel.com.
By Rachael Jackson, Orlando Sentinel, August 12, 2009
Seminole Democrats recently started a Hispanic caucus and are forming a black caucus — steps that party officials say are showing how the party is gaining ground in a county long dominated by Republicans.
The Hispanic caucus — a group that meets regularly to advocate for the interests of Hispanic Democrats — was formed in June with Luis Pastrana as its president. Just five years ago, Pastrana said, he didn't think forming a caucus would have been possible.
"I don't believe that the political will was there," Pastrana said. Now, he said, as the county prepares for a bilingual ballot expected to be federally required in 2012, things are different.
Ever since President Barack Obama started campaigning, the county Democratic Party's fortunes have been changing. Membership is increasing, fueled by a list of volunteers the Obama campaign gave the local party. A year ago in July, a permanent office was opened in Altamonte Springs.
Chris Lomas, chairwoman of the county's Democratic Executive Committee, said the group used to feel like a club. Now it feels like a stronger force, she said.
Marian Williams, a state committeewoman who heads the Seminole Democrats' affirmative-action committee, said she hopes to set up a caucus for people with disabilities by October and one for veterans by February. The party will have an open forum about the black caucus Tuesday at the county library in Casselberry.
"There are many people who complain that they're not a part of the political process, and this gives them a chance to tie in," she said.
Pastrana said the Hispanic caucus will focus on changing Seminole County's commission to election by district rather than countywide. The current system, he said, makes it difficult for a Hispanic candidate to be elected.
In December 2007, 32.4 percent of registered voters in Seminole were Democrats, while 43.9 percent were Republicans. Today, 34.9 percent are Democrats and 41.1 percent are Republicans.
While Democratic leaders say membership in the local party organization has risen from about 60 people a year ago to 80 today, their grip on new registrants has slipped recently because more Seminole residents have been registering as independents. Among voters who registered in June, 186 were Republicans, 201 were Democrats and 263 were independents or did not list a party affiliation.
Seminole's Republican Party, which has been dominant since the 1980s, doesn't have caucuses. Jason Brodeur, chairman of the Seminole County Republican Executive Committee, said his organization isn't focusing on particular groups but is trying to reach out to voters in general by attending events and being visible.
Rachael Jackson can be reached at 407-540-4358
or rjackson@orlandosentinel.com.
Latino vote garnering interest by both parties
Clash for Latino vote in the Valley developing in governors race
By Tony Castro, Daily News, 08/12/2009
A Democratic gubernatorial clash has begun taking shape in the San Fernando Valley - with a possible split of the Latino vote - as City Councilman Richard Alarcon said this week he will support Attorney General Jerry Brown for governor even as state Sen. Alex Padilla helps lead the campaign of San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom.
The dean of the Valley's Latino politicians, Alarcon's support of the former governor's expected campaign would seem to put a damper on Newsom's effort to establish a foothold in Los Angeles and corner Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's ethnic base.
In an interview, Alarcon countered claims by the Newsom campaign that Brown, 71, is no longer relevant to Latinos who heavily supported him while he was governor from 1974 to 1982.
Alarcon also expressed confidence that Hispanic voters recognize Brown's contributions while mayor of Oakland and now as attorney general.
"The message to me is not what he did with Cesar Chavez but what he is doing right now," said Alarcon, who represents the Northeast Valley and has also served as a state legislator. "And I think that record, in addition to his historical work, is right up the alley of Latinos who, frankly, are reflective of all the consumers of California."
More than one in three Californians is Latino, and they likely will compose 15 to 18 percent of the voters in next June's Democratic gubernatorial primary, according to the Southwest Voter Registration Project.
The scramble for the Latino vote picked up after Villaraigosa's announcement in late June, just before beginning his second term as mayor, that he would not be a candidate for governor.
With Villaraigosa out of the race, Brown enjoys a huge lead in the polls among Latino voters, with 51 percent saying they would back him compared with to 22 percent for Newsom, according to polling by Sacramento-based JMM Research in June.
Brown, who has not officially announced his candidacy yet, has already built a commanding fund-raising lead over Newsom, according to campaign reports filed at the end of last month.
The former governor collected $3.5 million through the first six months of the year, more than twice Newsom's haul of $1.7 million.
Last month, the Newsom campaign began an intensive outreach to Latinos and Southern California voters, using Padilla to question the conventional wisdom among political experts that Brown would enter the race with a strong hold on the Hispanic vote.
Alarcon said criticism that Brown's connection to Latinos is outdated gives "short shrift to his immediate work" as attorney general such as cracking down on home loan modification fraud and ordering nearly 400 mortgage foreclosure consultant companies to post $100,000 bonds and register with his office or risk prosecution.
"Those are things that I think are pertinent to Latinos right now, and it's not like he did it 20 years ago and that people aren't going to remember," Alarcon said. "When you measure the track records of action in the last 10 years, I believe his actions stand far and away, with all due respect to the mayor, far beyond his."
Padilla, D-Pacoima, said he welcomed Alarcon's involvement in the gubernatorial campaign, even if it is on the other side.
"I think this is just indicative of how hard this campaign is going to be," said Padilla, who vowed to press his effort on Newsom's behalf.
Alarcon's entry into the gubernatorial mix gives Brown an immediate high-profile Latino surrogate with his own organization in the Valley and would appear to counter Padilla's role for Newsom.
"In some way it kind of evens itself out," said Jaime Regalado, executive director of the Edmund G. "Pat" Brown Institute of Public Affairs at California State University, Los Angeles. "But on a larger issue, it may be who has sowed the most roots in Latino L.A. and Latino California? And I think that's an issue to be reckoned with.
"I think Jerry is a lock with a good part of L.A. Latinos. It's Newsom's responsibility, through Alex, to try to carve away with some of those established (Latino) and also earn new voters."
Regalado and others said the division of Alarcon and Padilla into two different camps may also reflect a generational split - Alarcon representative of older Latino voters and Padilla of the newer ones.
James Acevedo, a veteran Valley political consultant and a Brown supporter, also said the idea of two of the Valley's Hispanic leaders seemingly at odds in the upcoming gubernatorial race reflects a new maturity among Latinos.
"I think this is another example of how the Latino leadership has progressed in such a way as to show diversity and we are not monolithic any more," Acevedo said. "There's diversity in our community even in how they endorse. I think it's very healthy."
By Tony Castro, Daily News, 08/12/2009
A Democratic gubernatorial clash has begun taking shape in the San Fernando Valley - with a possible split of the Latino vote - as City Councilman Richard Alarcon said this week he will support Attorney General Jerry Brown for governor even as state Sen. Alex Padilla helps lead the campaign of San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom.
The dean of the Valley's Latino politicians, Alarcon's support of the former governor's expected campaign would seem to put a damper on Newsom's effort to establish a foothold in Los Angeles and corner Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's ethnic base.
In an interview, Alarcon countered claims by the Newsom campaign that Brown, 71, is no longer relevant to Latinos who heavily supported him while he was governor from 1974 to 1982.
Alarcon also expressed confidence that Hispanic voters recognize Brown's contributions while mayor of Oakland and now as attorney general.
"The message to me is not what he did with Cesar Chavez but what he is doing right now," said Alarcon, who represents the Northeast Valley and has also served as a state legislator. "And I think that record, in addition to his historical work, is right up the alley of Latinos who, frankly, are reflective of all the consumers of California."
More than one in three Californians is Latino, and they likely will compose 15 to 18 percent of the voters in next June's Democratic gubernatorial primary, according to the Southwest Voter Registration Project.
The scramble for the Latino vote picked up after Villaraigosa's announcement in late June, just before beginning his second term as mayor, that he would not be a candidate for governor.
With Villaraigosa out of the race, Brown enjoys a huge lead in the polls among Latino voters, with 51 percent saying they would back him compared with to 22 percent for Newsom, according to polling by Sacramento-based JMM Research in June.
Brown, who has not officially announced his candidacy yet, has already built a commanding fund-raising lead over Newsom, according to campaign reports filed at the end of last month.
The former governor collected $3.5 million through the first six months of the year, more than twice Newsom's haul of $1.7 million.
Last month, the Newsom campaign began an intensive outreach to Latinos and Southern California voters, using Padilla to question the conventional wisdom among political experts that Brown would enter the race with a strong hold on the Hispanic vote.
Alarcon said criticism that Brown's connection to Latinos is outdated gives "short shrift to his immediate work" as attorney general such as cracking down on home loan modification fraud and ordering nearly 400 mortgage foreclosure consultant companies to post $100,000 bonds and register with his office or risk prosecution.
"Those are things that I think are pertinent to Latinos right now, and it's not like he did it 20 years ago and that people aren't going to remember," Alarcon said. "When you measure the track records of action in the last 10 years, I believe his actions stand far and away, with all due respect to the mayor, far beyond his."
Padilla, D-Pacoima, said he welcomed Alarcon's involvement in the gubernatorial campaign, even if it is on the other side.
"I think this is just indicative of how hard this campaign is going to be," said Padilla, who vowed to press his effort on Newsom's behalf.
Alarcon's entry into the gubernatorial mix gives Brown an immediate high-profile Latino surrogate with his own organization in the Valley and would appear to counter Padilla's role for Newsom.
"In some way it kind of evens itself out," said Jaime Regalado, executive director of the Edmund G. "Pat" Brown Institute of Public Affairs at California State University, Los Angeles. "But on a larger issue, it may be who has sowed the most roots in Latino L.A. and Latino California? And I think that's an issue to be reckoned with.
"I think Jerry is a lock with a good part of L.A. Latinos. It's Newsom's responsibility, through Alex, to try to carve away with some of those established (Latino) and also earn new voters."
Regalado and others said the division of Alarcon and Padilla into two different camps may also reflect a generational split - Alarcon representative of older Latino voters and Padilla of the newer ones.
James Acevedo, a veteran Valley political consultant and a Brown supporter, also said the idea of two of the Valley's Hispanic leaders seemingly at odds in the upcoming gubernatorial race reflects a new maturity among Latinos.
"I think this is another example of how the Latino leadership has progressed in such a way as to show diversity and we are not monolithic any more," Acevedo said. "There's diversity in our community even in how they endorse. I think it's very healthy."
Obama selling healthcare to Hispanic media
Obama Briefs Latino Media on Health, Immigration
Cristina Fernandez-Pereda, New America Media, Aug 11, 2009
Ten Latino news media outlets were invited last week to a roundtable discussion with Pres. Barack Obama at the White House. During the meeting, the president provided an update on health care and immigration reforms, the economic recovery efforts, education, H1N1 flu and his trip to Mexico.
Obama described the economic situation as "beginning to stabilize, now that we know that the GDP was even worse than we thought" back in January.
The president covered various issues affecting the country with specific details about the impact they've had in the Latino community. But he put particular stress on health care reform.
"Latinos are by far the largest group of uninsured,” Obama said. “Passing reform that addresses the vulnerability of this community is a critical pillar for a new economy." Given delays the legislation has faced and Congress’ summer recess, Obama explained to New America Media that it will take at least two months before any legislation is approved. After that, uninsured Americans might not enjoy the results of the reform for another two years.
"We have to make sure we have all the mechanisms and financial regulations so no one gets cheated," Obama said. "The health care system adds up to one sixth of our economy. It's a big system involving a lot of money and key parts."
"I want to see it done, like I wanted before I came into office, but we need the communities to mobilize and Congress to take risks and invest in it, too,” he said.
However, one of the limits to the reform is coverage for undocumented children, which could be especially critical in the case of a potential H1N1 flu outbreak. The president explained that it is not possible to provide coverage for undocumented immigrants and that the bills pending in Congress do not cover undocumented children.
Along with health care reform, Latinos are expecting new immigration legislation to be introduced in Congress before the end of the year. He told the Latino reporters that it will require both a bipartisan effort from lawmakers and a special push from the communities. [The following week, Obama announced after a two-day summit in Guadalajara with Mexico’s president and Canada’s prime minister that immigration reform will have to wait till 2010.]
Regarding the 287(g) program that allows law enforcement officials to investigate and arrest undocumented immigrants on civil and criminal grounds, Obama criticized those raids "that create a lot of publicity but don't solve the problem" of criminal activity and admitted that there's still work to do on that issue.
Obama said that all localities that want to extend the federal agreement with Department of Homeland Security need to reapply for it, and the government has set new rules and conditions they must meet.
"We want to focus only on justified raids and controls. We want a reform so the system works better and people are not forced into undocumented status," he said. "Some raids are less worried about dealing with criminals and more about workers, from now on it will have to be the other way."
Obama told the media that the government needed their help in getting out information on other critical issues, citing the H1N1 flu epidemic. Obama lamented that it was not getting enough publicity and that the White House has been monitoring its evolution in the Southern hemisphere. "The possibility that it becomes a very severe flu that kills a lot of people still exists," he said.
The president invited all reporters at the meeting to share with their audiences the information posted on the site flu.gov, which includes the latest developments about the epidemic, the work on flu vaccines and information for schools and families to fight the spread of the virus.
Cristina Fernandez-Pereda, New America Media, Aug 11, 2009
Ten Latino news media outlets were invited last week to a roundtable discussion with Pres. Barack Obama at the White House. During the meeting, the president provided an update on health care and immigration reforms, the economic recovery efforts, education, H1N1 flu and his trip to Mexico.
Obama described the economic situation as "beginning to stabilize, now that we know that the GDP was even worse than we thought" back in January.
The president covered various issues affecting the country with specific details about the impact they've had in the Latino community. But he put particular stress on health care reform.
"Latinos are by far the largest group of uninsured,” Obama said. “Passing reform that addresses the vulnerability of this community is a critical pillar for a new economy." Given delays the legislation has faced and Congress’ summer recess, Obama explained to New America Media that it will take at least two months before any legislation is approved. After that, uninsured Americans might not enjoy the results of the reform for another two years.
"We have to make sure we have all the mechanisms and financial regulations so no one gets cheated," Obama said. "The health care system adds up to one sixth of our economy. It's a big system involving a lot of money and key parts."
"I want to see it done, like I wanted before I came into office, but we need the communities to mobilize and Congress to take risks and invest in it, too,” he said.
However, one of the limits to the reform is coverage for undocumented children, which could be especially critical in the case of a potential H1N1 flu outbreak. The president explained that it is not possible to provide coverage for undocumented immigrants and that the bills pending in Congress do not cover undocumented children.
Along with health care reform, Latinos are expecting new immigration legislation to be introduced in Congress before the end of the year. He told the Latino reporters that it will require both a bipartisan effort from lawmakers and a special push from the communities. [The following week, Obama announced after a two-day summit in Guadalajara with Mexico’s president and Canada’s prime minister that immigration reform will have to wait till 2010.]
Regarding the 287(g) program that allows law enforcement officials to investigate and arrest undocumented immigrants on civil and criminal grounds, Obama criticized those raids "that create a lot of publicity but don't solve the problem" of criminal activity and admitted that there's still work to do on that issue.
Obama said that all localities that want to extend the federal agreement with Department of Homeland Security need to reapply for it, and the government has set new rules and conditions they must meet.
"We want to focus only on justified raids and controls. We want a reform so the system works better and people are not forced into undocumented status," he said. "Some raids are less worried about dealing with criminals and more about workers, from now on it will have to be the other way."
Obama told the media that the government needed their help in getting out information on other critical issues, citing the H1N1 flu epidemic. Obama lamented that it was not getting enough publicity and that the White House has been monitoring its evolution in the Southern hemisphere. "The possibility that it becomes a very severe flu that kills a lot of people still exists," he said.
The president invited all reporters at the meeting to share with their audiences the information posted on the site flu.gov, which includes the latest developments about the epidemic, the work on flu vaccines and information for schools and families to fight the spread of the virus.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Latinos know racial profiling
Ruben Navarrette Jr.: Latinos know racial profiling
Merced Sun-Star, August 10, 2009
If you think it's embarrassing for an African-American to have to identify himself to the police while in his own house, imagine how humiliating it is for U.S.-born Latinos to have to prove their citizenship in their own country.
With racial profiling in the news lately, it's worth noting that America's largest minority has to endure the practice, too — but with a twist. Not only, according to several studies, do Latinos get pulled over by police and have their cars searched at a higher rate than whites. They also sometimes suffer the indignity of having to prove that they have the legal right to even be in the United States.
Things get really insulting when the question is asked in the Southwest, perhaps in Arizona where some Latino families have lived for eight generations, or in New Mexico where Latinos trace their roots back 500 years.
There have been moments in history when things went haywire. The most infamous example is "Operation Wetback" in 1954, when the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service set out to remove 1 million illegal immigrants by sweeping Mexican- American neighborhoods and conducting random identification checks of anyone who looked Mexican. Many of those deported were U.S. citizens. Back then, the Border Patrol got help from local police agencies.
This ugly fad is making a comeback. Some local agencies are itching to play Border Patrol agent.
Not a good idea, according to police chiefs who recently urged Congress to bar local police from immigration enforcement. Updating recommendations by the leaders of more than 50 urban police departments, the chiefs — including John Timoney of Miami, Art Acevedo of Austin, Texas, and Art Venegas, formerly chief of the Sacramento Police Department — also urged that illegal immigrants be given legal status so that law enforcement can keep track of them.
A recent report from the Police Foundation, a nonprofit organization that spent a year meeting with police officials and community representatives from around the country, concluded that law enforcement works best when everyone stays within their jurisdiction.
According to the report, when local police carry out immigration enforcement, it often undermines — rather than preserves — public safety.
Once trust is eroded and word gets out that a community of immigrants won't talk to police — not even when they've been victimized — predators will seek them out, and crime will go up.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, a former Arizona governor, said recently that her department would revamp the controversial program that allows state and local police agencies to make immigration arrests. Napolitano wants to require the agencies to clear plans for immigration sweeps with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and coordinate with ICE agents before releasing information about such sweeps to the news media. She also wants to prevent agencies from arresting people whose only infraction is being in the country illegally. Sounds like a plan.
Merced Sun-Star, August 10, 2009
If you think it's embarrassing for an African-American to have to identify himself to the police while in his own house, imagine how humiliating it is for U.S.-born Latinos to have to prove their citizenship in their own country.
With racial profiling in the news lately, it's worth noting that America's largest minority has to endure the practice, too — but with a twist. Not only, according to several studies, do Latinos get pulled over by police and have their cars searched at a higher rate than whites. They also sometimes suffer the indignity of having to prove that they have the legal right to even be in the United States.
Things get really insulting when the question is asked in the Southwest, perhaps in Arizona where some Latino families have lived for eight generations, or in New Mexico where Latinos trace their roots back 500 years.
There have been moments in history when things went haywire. The most infamous example is "Operation Wetback" in 1954, when the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service set out to remove 1 million illegal immigrants by sweeping Mexican- American neighborhoods and conducting random identification checks of anyone who looked Mexican. Many of those deported were U.S. citizens. Back then, the Border Patrol got help from local police agencies.
This ugly fad is making a comeback. Some local agencies are itching to play Border Patrol agent.
Not a good idea, according to police chiefs who recently urged Congress to bar local police from immigration enforcement. Updating recommendations by the leaders of more than 50 urban police departments, the chiefs — including John Timoney of Miami, Art Acevedo of Austin, Texas, and Art Venegas, formerly chief of the Sacramento Police Department — also urged that illegal immigrants be given legal status so that law enforcement can keep track of them.
A recent report from the Police Foundation, a nonprofit organization that spent a year meeting with police officials and community representatives from around the country, concluded that law enforcement works best when everyone stays within their jurisdiction.
According to the report, when local police carry out immigration enforcement, it often undermines — rather than preserves — public safety.
Once trust is eroded and word gets out that a community of immigrants won't talk to police — not even when they've been victimized — predators will seek them out, and crime will go up.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, a former Arizona governor, said recently that her department would revamp the controversial program that allows state and local police agencies to make immigration arrests. Napolitano wants to require the agencies to clear plans for immigration sweeps with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and coordinate with ICE agents before releasing information about such sweeps to the news media. She also wants to prevent agencies from arresting people whose only infraction is being in the country illegally. Sounds like a plan.
Hispanics watch healthcare debate closely
Hispanics watching health care debate closely
By JULIANA BARBASSA, ASSOCIATED PRESS
OAKLAND, Calif. — Perched at the edge of an exam table, Delmira Maravilla is anxious for a check-up — and for a timeline on the president's promise of health care for all Americans.
She's paying out of pocket for the exam, and like one-third of Hispanics, the mother of nine doesn't have health insurance.
Latinos like this immigrant from El Salvador have much to gain if the legislation taking shape in Washington passes. Among the major ethnic groups, they are the least likely to have health coverage through work. And Hispanics often face language and cultural hurdles to getting good-quality health services. They're far less likely to have a regular health-care provider, and to get the kind of routine screening that prevents serious health problems.
Maravilla knows how easily her family's carefully calculated budget can be overwhelmed by the cost of health care: her 6-year-old daughter's recent fall against the edge of a table set her back a devastating $1,500 in emergency room bills. Any accident, any unexpected illness, can be catastrophic, she said.
"I would be so much calmer, less worried, if I knew I had health insurance for my family," she said. "Health problems happen to everyone, but it's too expensive for us who are poor."
Experts say health disparities among ethnic groups are great, with one in three Hispanics and one in five African-Americans not having health insurance, compared with one in eight whites. And as the recession deepens, the gap is growing along with rising unemployment and cuts to work-sponsored insurance.
"We can't have the status quo. It's just a disgrace. I don't know what other words to use," said Elena Rios, president of the National Hispanic Medical Association, a nonprofit group that represents Hispanic doctors.
Rios was among the advocates calling on legislators to consider measures designed to bolster care for Hispanics through preventive medicine, health education and increased diversity in the medical field.
Jane Garcia, the CEO of La Clinica de la Raza where Maravilla gets her checkups, sees the need for reform every time she makes her rounds.
About 71 percent of her patients are Latino; 44 percent are uninsured, and that number has been going up. New patients range from the recently unemployed to undocumented immigrants who can no longer get care in neighboring Contra Costa County, where supervisors squeezed by a budget shortfall voted to cut services to them.
"The number of people presenting for services are really overwhelming to the system," she said. "And more of them are coming in uninsured."
Although the House bill represents the most comprehensive effort to date to extend health care to all Americans, there is a significant segment of the population that will likely be excluded: illegal immigrants. Pressed by CBS News' Katie Couric about whether they should be covered, the president responded simply, "no."
Absent immigration reform and a path to citizenship, that would mean millions could be left out of the system. About 59 percent of the 11.9 million undocumented immigrants living in the United States have no health insurance, according to the Pew Hispanic Center.
Advocates are split on whether to hold out for reform that includes them, or support change that would help the majority of Hispanics.
"This has always been in the elephant in the room — all of our families are mixed, some documented, some undocumented," said Rios. "But we're so close to having health care reform. We'd be working against ourselves to let immigration issues stall the process."
Others, like Jennifer Ng'andu, deputy director of the National Council of La Raza's Health Policy Project, believe any plan that doesn't include undocumented immigrants won't last. They make up about 15 percent of the nation's approximately 47 million uninsured.
"If we don't talk about integrating communities that have been traditionally shut out, we're going to be talking about health care reform again in 15 years," said Ng'andu, who has been talking to legislators and to health care advocates on their behalf.
To proponents of greater immigration controls, allowing illegal immigrants to benefit from federally subsidized health care and insurance would go against enforcement goals by legitimizing their presence.
"They would have no incentives to leave," said Mark Krikorian, of the Center for Immigration Studies.
Undocumented immigrants are the majority of Rogelio Fernandez's patients at the United Health Centers clinic in Parlier, a town of approximately 12,000 whose population swells and dips with field workers following agriculture's planting, pruning and harvest seasons.
His clinic provides primary care on a sliding-fee scale and discounted medication to those who need it. But in this tough economy, he's seeing patients cut back on visits and on their medication because, without insurance, they can't afford them.
"Unless they are more inclusive, these proposals really won't help a lot of our patients," said Fernandez.
Studies show that inadequate access to regular, quality health care that meets their language needs has consequences. Hispanics are suffering disproportionately from chronic diseases such as diabetes and getting less preventive measures such as cancer screenings and obesity counseling.
Not taking care of this population now will have real costs in the future, said Rios. Hispanics make up 15 percent of the total U.S. population, but they represent 25 percent of children in preschools and kindergartens.
"We are at a time when we need change, or we're going to see an increase in obesity, diabetes, cancers, heart disease," said Rios. "It's not fair to them, to us, to the country."
By JULIANA BARBASSA, ASSOCIATED PRESS
OAKLAND, Calif. — Perched at the edge of an exam table, Delmira Maravilla is anxious for a check-up — and for a timeline on the president's promise of health care for all Americans.
She's paying out of pocket for the exam, and like one-third of Hispanics, the mother of nine doesn't have health insurance.
Latinos like this immigrant from El Salvador have much to gain if the legislation taking shape in Washington passes. Among the major ethnic groups, they are the least likely to have health coverage through work. And Hispanics often face language and cultural hurdles to getting good-quality health services. They're far less likely to have a regular health-care provider, and to get the kind of routine screening that prevents serious health problems.
Maravilla knows how easily her family's carefully calculated budget can be overwhelmed by the cost of health care: her 6-year-old daughter's recent fall against the edge of a table set her back a devastating $1,500 in emergency room bills. Any accident, any unexpected illness, can be catastrophic, she said.
"I would be so much calmer, less worried, if I knew I had health insurance for my family," she said. "Health problems happen to everyone, but it's too expensive for us who are poor."
Experts say health disparities among ethnic groups are great, with one in three Hispanics and one in five African-Americans not having health insurance, compared with one in eight whites. And as the recession deepens, the gap is growing along with rising unemployment and cuts to work-sponsored insurance.
"We can't have the status quo. It's just a disgrace. I don't know what other words to use," said Elena Rios, president of the National Hispanic Medical Association, a nonprofit group that represents Hispanic doctors.
Rios was among the advocates calling on legislators to consider measures designed to bolster care for Hispanics through preventive medicine, health education and increased diversity in the medical field.
Jane Garcia, the CEO of La Clinica de la Raza where Maravilla gets her checkups, sees the need for reform every time she makes her rounds.
About 71 percent of her patients are Latino; 44 percent are uninsured, and that number has been going up. New patients range from the recently unemployed to undocumented immigrants who can no longer get care in neighboring Contra Costa County, where supervisors squeezed by a budget shortfall voted to cut services to them.
"The number of people presenting for services are really overwhelming to the system," she said. "And more of them are coming in uninsured."
Although the House bill represents the most comprehensive effort to date to extend health care to all Americans, there is a significant segment of the population that will likely be excluded: illegal immigrants. Pressed by CBS News' Katie Couric about whether they should be covered, the president responded simply, "no."
Absent immigration reform and a path to citizenship, that would mean millions could be left out of the system. About 59 percent of the 11.9 million undocumented immigrants living in the United States have no health insurance, according to the Pew Hispanic Center.
Advocates are split on whether to hold out for reform that includes them, or support change that would help the majority of Hispanics.
"This has always been in the elephant in the room — all of our families are mixed, some documented, some undocumented," said Rios. "But we're so close to having health care reform. We'd be working against ourselves to let immigration issues stall the process."
Others, like Jennifer Ng'andu, deputy director of the National Council of La Raza's Health Policy Project, believe any plan that doesn't include undocumented immigrants won't last. They make up about 15 percent of the nation's approximately 47 million uninsured.
"If we don't talk about integrating communities that have been traditionally shut out, we're going to be talking about health care reform again in 15 years," said Ng'andu, who has been talking to legislators and to health care advocates on their behalf.
To proponents of greater immigration controls, allowing illegal immigrants to benefit from federally subsidized health care and insurance would go against enforcement goals by legitimizing their presence.
"They would have no incentives to leave," said Mark Krikorian, of the Center for Immigration Studies.
Undocumented immigrants are the majority of Rogelio Fernandez's patients at the United Health Centers clinic in Parlier, a town of approximately 12,000 whose population swells and dips with field workers following agriculture's planting, pruning and harvest seasons.
His clinic provides primary care on a sliding-fee scale and discounted medication to those who need it. But in this tough economy, he's seeing patients cut back on visits and on their medication because, without insurance, they can't afford them.
"Unless they are more inclusive, these proposals really won't help a lot of our patients," said Fernandez.
Studies show that inadequate access to regular, quality health care that meets their language needs has consequences. Hispanics are suffering disproportionately from chronic diseases such as diabetes and getting less preventive measures such as cancer screenings and obesity counseling.
Not taking care of this population now will have real costs in the future, said Rios. Hispanics make up 15 percent of the total U.S. population, but they represent 25 percent of children in preschools and kindergartens.
"We are at a time when we need change, or we're going to see an increase in obesity, diabetes, cancers, heart disease," said Rios. "It's not fair to them, to us, to the country."
Latinos in the Hudson Valley
Geographic Dispersion of Latinos in NY State
Hudson Valley Press, August 9th, 2009
ALBANY - While Hispanic New Yorkers who have left New York City to settle across the state have increased their education and earnings, large gaps persist or have widened compared to non-Hispanic whites, according to a new report by the University at Albany-based New York Latino Research and Resources Network (NYLARNet).
The report, "Changes in Socioeconomic Status - City Variations Among Latino New Yorkers, 2000-2005," said in recent years an increased geographic dispersion of Latinos throughout the Northeast region, frequently motivated by the search for a better community, has spurred growth in newer communities and decline in older ones and has not always resulted in positive outcomes. In New York City, the Puerto Rican population dropped by 6.2 percent between 2000 and 2005 (from 839,073 to 787,046 people).
The NYLARNet report, authored by UAlbany sociologist and researcher Christine E. Bose, compared census data for 2000 and 2005 and studied Latino migration to the selected high-population areas of Albany, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, and Nassau County.
The report found:
- While 25.3 percent of New York’s Latinos lived below the poverty level in 2005, Latinos had dropped from 3.2 times to 2.9 times more likely to live in poverty than non-Hispanic whites. However, considerable variation existed across the state: Latino poverty rates sharply increased in Buffalo (from 29.4 to 43.4 percent), but decreased somewhat in Nassau County (from 12.8 to 10.3 percent).
- Increased poverty was partly due to the rise in unemployment over five years both among whites and Latinos of either sex and in all locations. Latinos were 1.8 times more likely to be unemployed than whites: statewide, Latino unemployment rates increased from 7.9 to 10 percent, while non-Hispanic white unemployment increased from 4.0 to 5.4 percent.
- Latinos have increased their high school graduation rates in all cities in New York State for which there is comparative data, except in Buffalo, where graduation rates are holding steady. There is some variation, with low graduation rates in Rochester (56.7 percent) and relatively high rates in Nassau County (68.8 percent).
- Latino household incomes have increased over five years in all the cities for which there are comparable measures, and the Latino household average is $33,472. However, in Albany, Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse, Latinos have much lower household incomes, ranging from $18,301 to $20,559, reflecting both lack of job opportunities in upstate economies and fewer highly educated Latinos. These figures are near or below the 2005 national poverty level of $19,971 for a family of four.
Hudson Valley Press, August 9th, 2009
ALBANY - While Hispanic New Yorkers who have left New York City to settle across the state have increased their education and earnings, large gaps persist or have widened compared to non-Hispanic whites, according to a new report by the University at Albany-based New York Latino Research and Resources Network (NYLARNet).
The report, "Changes in Socioeconomic Status - City Variations Among Latino New Yorkers, 2000-2005," said in recent years an increased geographic dispersion of Latinos throughout the Northeast region, frequently motivated by the search for a better community, has spurred growth in newer communities and decline in older ones and has not always resulted in positive outcomes. In New York City, the Puerto Rican population dropped by 6.2 percent between 2000 and 2005 (from 839,073 to 787,046 people).
The NYLARNet report, authored by UAlbany sociologist and researcher Christine E. Bose, compared census data for 2000 and 2005 and studied Latino migration to the selected high-population areas of Albany, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, and Nassau County.
The report found:
- While 25.3 percent of New York’s Latinos lived below the poverty level in 2005, Latinos had dropped from 3.2 times to 2.9 times more likely to live in poverty than non-Hispanic whites. However, considerable variation existed across the state: Latino poverty rates sharply increased in Buffalo (from 29.4 to 43.4 percent), but decreased somewhat in Nassau County (from 12.8 to 10.3 percent).
- Increased poverty was partly due to the rise in unemployment over five years both among whites and Latinos of either sex and in all locations. Latinos were 1.8 times more likely to be unemployed than whites: statewide, Latino unemployment rates increased from 7.9 to 10 percent, while non-Hispanic white unemployment increased from 4.0 to 5.4 percent.
- Latinos have increased their high school graduation rates in all cities in New York State for which there is comparative data, except in Buffalo, where graduation rates are holding steady. There is some variation, with low graduation rates in Rochester (56.7 percent) and relatively high rates in Nassau County (68.8 percent).
- Latino household incomes have increased over five years in all the cities for which there are comparable measures, and the Latino household average is $33,472. However, in Albany, Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse, Latinos have much lower household incomes, ranging from $18,301 to $20,559, reflecting both lack of job opportunities in upstate economies and fewer highly educated Latinos. These figures are near or below the 2005 national poverty level of $19,971 for a family of four.
Republicans 'moon-walk' past Hispanics
OPINION: Tough Times for Republicans with Hispanics
by Roger Taylor, WKZO.COM, August 9, 2009
One more casualty of the Bush Administration, Florida Sen. Mel Martinez announced his resignation today. He had already announced his decision to not run for reelection. He told his staff straight forwardly that he wouldn’t be returning to Washington after the August recess.
This is interesting in Michigan why? This is interesting because Martinez is the only Hispanic Republican in the senate. The Republicans are losing a significant tie to the Hispanic community just when they most need to be bridge building. The resignation leaves just one Hispanic Senator, Democrat Robert Menendez of New Jersey.
Martinez has struggled with support due his strong support of President George W. Bush and his efforts to push an immigration bill that alienated many Republicans. He said that wasn’t the reason he quit but Sarah Palin said the same thing when she resigned.
First it was opposition to a Hispanic nominee to the Supreme Court and now having the only Hispanic Republican Senator quit. The bridge building to the Hispanic community doesn’t seem to be working out very well.
Cultural conservatives, who are obsessively focused on the Supreme Court, are embittered over the failure of Republicans to overturn Roe v. Wade in their decade of power and are straying. Devising a plan to keep cultural conservatives in line and make inroads into minority communities at the same time so far has eluded Republicans.
The conservative party in order to have a future has to find their way out of this conundrum or risk becoming a party limited to rural southern states and Indiana.
Roger Taylor hosts "The Roger Taylor Show" Saturday mornings from 6-8AM on 590 KZO. Watch LIVE on WKZO.COM or tune in to 590 KZO. Roger is blogging daily on WKZO.COM.
by Roger Taylor, WKZO.COM, August 9, 2009
One more casualty of the Bush Administration, Florida Sen. Mel Martinez announced his resignation today. He had already announced his decision to not run for reelection. He told his staff straight forwardly that he wouldn’t be returning to Washington after the August recess.
This is interesting in Michigan why? This is interesting because Martinez is the only Hispanic Republican in the senate. The Republicans are losing a significant tie to the Hispanic community just when they most need to be bridge building. The resignation leaves just one Hispanic Senator, Democrat Robert Menendez of New Jersey.
Martinez has struggled with support due his strong support of President George W. Bush and his efforts to push an immigration bill that alienated many Republicans. He said that wasn’t the reason he quit but Sarah Palin said the same thing when she resigned.
First it was opposition to a Hispanic nominee to the Supreme Court and now having the only Hispanic Republican Senator quit. The bridge building to the Hispanic community doesn’t seem to be working out very well.
Cultural conservatives, who are obsessively focused on the Supreme Court, are embittered over the failure of Republicans to overturn Roe v. Wade in their decade of power and are straying. Devising a plan to keep cultural conservatives in line and make inroads into minority communities at the same time so far has eluded Republicans.
The conservative party in order to have a future has to find their way out of this conundrum or risk becoming a party limited to rural southern states and Indiana.
Roger Taylor hosts "The Roger Taylor Show" Saturday mornings from 6-8AM on 590 KZO. Watch LIVE on WKZO.COM or tune in to 590 KZO. Roger is blogging daily on WKZO.COM.
Hispanic immigration reform to wait another year
At Mexico summit, Obama says immigration reform will have to wait
The president, noting he has 'a pretty big stack of bills' to deal with, says pushing through a bill to overhaul immigration is unlikely before 2010.
By Peter Nicholas, LA Times, August 10, 2009
Reporting from Guadalajara, Mexico -- Locked in a healthcare debate that is claiming much of his energy, President Obama acknowledged today that a push to overhaul the U.S. immigration system will have to wait until 2010 and even then will prove a major political test.
Obama suggested that it would be too ambitious to aim for an immigration bill that addresses such concerns as illegal immigration before the end of the year, at a time when he will be confronting "a pretty big stack of bills."
Speaking at the end of a two-day summit meeting here of North American leaders, Obama said his administration was meeting with lawmakers in an effort to come up with an immigration plan that would enjoy bipartisan support. "When we come back next year . . . we should be in a position to start acting."
As a candidate, Obama had said in July 2008 that he would make immigration "a top priority in my first year as president." But the economic crisis and realities of governing have forced him to re-examine how best to roll out his agenda.
Opponents of the existing immigration structure say they are dismayed by the latest timetable.
Frank Sharry, executive director of America's Voice, an advocacy group, said, "I think we'd be smarter to move on it this year.
"There's a real hunger on the part of the American public to make sure immigrants are legal, are working towards citizenship, are paying their taxes and not being used by bad-actor employers to undercut honest employers."
Obama said he was confident he would ultimately prevail in providing a road to citizenship for undocumented immigrants living in the United States. But previewing the struggle expected to get the bill passed, he said illegal immigration foes would put up stout resistance.
The president is encountering enormous difficulties in passing a healthcare overhaul -- an issue that evokes far less an emotional response than illegal immigration.
"Now, am I going to be able to snap my fingers and get this done?" said Obama, speaking on a stage alongside Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper. "No."
"This is going to be difficult; it's going to require bipartisan cooperation. There are going to be demagogues out there who try to suggest that any form of pathway for legalization for those who are already in the United States is unacceptable."
He added: "But ultimately, I think the American people want fairness."
peter.nicholas@latimes.com
The president, noting he has 'a pretty big stack of bills' to deal with, says pushing through a bill to overhaul immigration is unlikely before 2010.
By Peter Nicholas, LA Times, August 10, 2009
Reporting from Guadalajara, Mexico -- Locked in a healthcare debate that is claiming much of his energy, President Obama acknowledged today that a push to overhaul the U.S. immigration system will have to wait until 2010 and even then will prove a major political test.
Obama suggested that it would be too ambitious to aim for an immigration bill that addresses such concerns as illegal immigration before the end of the year, at a time when he will be confronting "a pretty big stack of bills."
Speaking at the end of a two-day summit meeting here of North American leaders, Obama said his administration was meeting with lawmakers in an effort to come up with an immigration plan that would enjoy bipartisan support. "When we come back next year . . . we should be in a position to start acting."
As a candidate, Obama had said in July 2008 that he would make immigration "a top priority in my first year as president." But the economic crisis and realities of governing have forced him to re-examine how best to roll out his agenda.
Opponents of the existing immigration structure say they are dismayed by the latest timetable.
Frank Sharry, executive director of America's Voice, an advocacy group, said, "I think we'd be smarter to move on it this year.
"There's a real hunger on the part of the American public to make sure immigrants are legal, are working towards citizenship, are paying their taxes and not being used by bad-actor employers to undercut honest employers."
Obama said he was confident he would ultimately prevail in providing a road to citizenship for undocumented immigrants living in the United States. But previewing the struggle expected to get the bill passed, he said illegal immigration foes would put up stout resistance.
The president is encountering enormous difficulties in passing a healthcare overhaul -- an issue that evokes far less an emotional response than illegal immigration.
"Now, am I going to be able to snap my fingers and get this done?" said Obama, speaking on a stage alongside Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper. "No."
"This is going to be difficult; it's going to require bipartisan cooperation. There are going to be demagogues out there who try to suggest that any form of pathway for legalization for those who are already in the United States is unacceptable."
He added: "But ultimately, I think the American people want fairness."
peter.nicholas@latimes.com
Sunday, August 9, 2009
Conference focuses on Hispanic crossings
Billions on border: Security, drug war to be debated at conference
By Brandi Grissom / El Paso Times, 08/09/2009
AUSTIN -- Congressional leaders traveled the nation, hosting hearings and ginning up political furor over illegal immigration, lax security on the southern border and drug violence in Mexico.
That was three years ago, when Texas Gov. Rick Perry, in a heated re-election battle, promised to use state dollars to bolster border security in the absence of federal action.
Since then, the federal government has spent more than $3.7 billion on border security, including building 700 miles of fence, beefing up patrols and helping Mexico fight drug cartels.
Texas has spent nearly $200 million on its own border initiatives, sending dollars to help local officers patrol the border, installing Web-based surveillance cameras and buying more helicopters and squad cars to track down criminals and undocumented immigrants.
As the spending continues, so does debate over how secure the border is and how the United States can keep the raging drug war from spilling north.
Those discussions will go on Monday and Tuesday at a Border Security Conference at the University of Texas at El Paso. Speakers will include U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who is to make a policy speech on border safety after a trip to Mexico with President Barack Obama.
Government officials and law enforcement agencies say the billions spent on border security have prevented crime and dammed the flood of undocumented immigrants from Mexico.
Civil-rights groups and scholars, however, question whether the initiatives have done anything to deal with the roots of complex causes that drive the drug trade and immigration.
Federal action
In the fall of 2006, after lawmakers finished their round of immigration and border security hearings, including one in El Paso, Congress approved the Secure Fence Act.
The legislation called for 700 miles of fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border to stop, or at least slow down, illegal crossings between ports of entry.
All but a small part of the fencing has been completed, despite a spate of lawsuits and protests, primarily in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas.
As of July 24, homeland security officials said, they had completed nearly 634 miles of pedestrian and vehicle barriers.
Along with the fencing, Congress and former President George W. Bush allocated money for 6,000 more U.S. Border Patrol agents.
The Border Patrol's budget has more than doubled since 2006, and the number of agents has soared from 12,300 to 19,600.
The fencing, the added manpower and technology upgrades have helped the agency better secure the border, said DHS spokesman Michael Reilly.
"Since we've been catching a lot of illegal aliens and shutting down a lot of smuggling routes É we've been catching more narcotics than ever before," he said.
At the same time, he said, immigrant apprehension numbers are falling.
In 2006, the department caught nearly 1.1 million undocumented crossers. As this fiscal year comes to a close, Reilly said, agents have caught about 470,000.
The downturn in the economy and lack of work opportunities contribute to the reduced traffic, Reilly said, but he said the border security initiatives were also a big factor.
Texas security efforts
Border-security efforts in Texas have focused primarily on manpower.
Lawmakers approved about $110 million for these operations for the 2007 and 2008 budget years. This year, they approved an additional $87 million to continue those efforts in 2009 and 2010.
Much of that money went to Gov. Perry to award as grants for border sheriff's departments to pay officers overtime to patrol the border.
The rest has gone to state law enforcement, including the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, to beef up their border forces.
With the grants, the departments have conducted so-called surge operations, increasing law enforcement presence in areas deemed hot spots for border-related crime.
Don Reay, executive director of the Texas Border Sheriffs Coalition, said 18 of the 20 counties in his organization have received about $12.5 million to conduct Operation Border Star from February 2008 through August 2010.
Reay said sheriffs know that the increased patrols have made border communities safer, because they get fewer calls from angry residents.
"If we're not hearing complaints about things, that's a good indicator something's going right," he said.
Crime reports in some rural areas, the sheriffs and Perry have said, have dropped about 60 percent because of border operations.
Katherine Cesinger, a spokes woman for Perry, said the border initiatives were intended to deter crime.
Deterrence was also the goal of Perry's Web-based border surveillance cameras. He gave the border sheriffs coalition $2 million to line the border with cameras so that anyone, anywhere with an Internet connection could troll for undocumented crossers.
The first year of the program, though, produced just 11 arrests and eight drug busts.
Perry has defended the cameras as a way to use technology to enhance border security where the federal government has failed to.
Perry's spokeswoman Cesinger said Perry has taken a "proactive approach" to border security.
"Border security is a fed responsibility, but a Texas problem," she said.
Is it all working?
Perry's border-security efforts have produced mixed judgments. Some, like the border sheriffs, have hailed the initiatives. Others, including civil-rights groups, have worried that they encourage racial profiling, discrimination and unnecessary law enforcement work.
Initially, reports from border sheriffs who received money for border operations showed that they caught far more undocumented immigrants than criminals.
The operation in El Paso involved vehicle checkpoints that sparked accusations of racial profiling and caused among immigrants as officers allegedly asked motorists for immigration papers.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Texas studied the most recent border effort, Operation Border Star. Earlier this year, the group reported that many departments involved in the operation used grant money to do routine police work, not to investigate border-related crime.
While some agencies, including the El Paso Police Department, produced a significant number of arrests, others reported very few. Instead, they reported issuing thousands of warnings and tickets for traffic violations.
And reports of racial profiling concerns are still coming in to the ACLU of Texas, said policy analyst Rebecca Bernhardt.
"The lion's share of the responsibility is on the lack of guidance from the state of Texas about how to target resources and make them effective," she said.
The Department of Public Safety has also faced heat for its use of border-security money. A state audit last spring showed the department had allocated millions in resources, including a helicopter and about 100 cars, that were meant for the border to other areas of the state.
Another audit, released last week, said that demands to put more state troopers in the border region were exacerbating a critical personnel shortage in the department.
Howard Campbell, a sociology and anthropology professor at the University of Texas at El Paso, who will be one of the featured speakers at the Border Security Conference, said the United States needed to rethink its approach to border security.
Military-style tactics of building barriers and installing more armed officers on the border, he said, ignore the root problems that cause illegal immigration, drug trafficking and the cartel wars in Mexico.
"It's sending the message to Mexico that the U.S. views the situation almost as if Mexico were a hostile enemy," Campbell said.
As long as American drug consumption continues and U.S. companies need cheap labor, he said, the demand for those resources will remain.
"We're deeply complicit," he said.
The United States, he said, would improve security by finding ways to allow workers to legally come to the country and by investing in prevention and treatment of drug addiction to reduce consumption.
Stephen Meiners, senior tactical analyst for Latin America at the Stratfor global intelligence agency, said higher prices for illicit drugs in the United States and indications that Mexican criminals are turning more to kidnapping and extortion for money are signs of some abatement in drug trafficking.
Security measures such as the fence, he said, could be factors. But it's hard to find evidence that security policies alone are driving those changes.
"This is not an issue that can be solved by law enforcement or by any one tool for that matter," Meiners said.
But slowing immigration numbers can be attributed primarily to economic conditions, he said.
There's no one "magic bullet" solution to the complex problems that plague the U.S.-Mexico border, Meiners said.
"There's a reason these problems have continued for decades," he said. "It's not easily addressed."
Brandi Grissom may be reached at bgrissom@elpasotimes.com; 512-479-6606.
By Brandi Grissom / El Paso Times, 08/09/2009
AUSTIN -- Congressional leaders traveled the nation, hosting hearings and ginning up political furor over illegal immigration, lax security on the southern border and drug violence in Mexico.
That was three years ago, when Texas Gov. Rick Perry, in a heated re-election battle, promised to use state dollars to bolster border security in the absence of federal action.
Since then, the federal government has spent more than $3.7 billion on border security, including building 700 miles of fence, beefing up patrols and helping Mexico fight drug cartels.
Texas has spent nearly $200 million on its own border initiatives, sending dollars to help local officers patrol the border, installing Web-based surveillance cameras and buying more helicopters and squad cars to track down criminals and undocumented immigrants.
As the spending continues, so does debate over how secure the border is and how the United States can keep the raging drug war from spilling north.
Those discussions will go on Monday and Tuesday at a Border Security Conference at the University of Texas at El Paso. Speakers will include U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who is to make a policy speech on border safety after a trip to Mexico with President Barack Obama.
Government officials and law enforcement agencies say the billions spent on border security have prevented crime and dammed the flood of undocumented immigrants from Mexico.
Civil-rights groups and scholars, however, question whether the initiatives have done anything to deal with the roots of complex causes that drive the drug trade and immigration.
Federal action
In the fall of 2006, after lawmakers finished their round of immigration and border security hearings, including one in El Paso, Congress approved the Secure Fence Act.
The legislation called for 700 miles of fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border to stop, or at least slow down, illegal crossings between ports of entry.
All but a small part of the fencing has been completed, despite a spate of lawsuits and protests, primarily in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas.
As of July 24, homeland security officials said, they had completed nearly 634 miles of pedestrian and vehicle barriers.
Along with the fencing, Congress and former President George W. Bush allocated money for 6,000 more U.S. Border Patrol agents.
The Border Patrol's budget has more than doubled since 2006, and the number of agents has soared from 12,300 to 19,600.
The fencing, the added manpower and technology upgrades have helped the agency better secure the border, said DHS spokesman Michael Reilly.
"Since we've been catching a lot of illegal aliens and shutting down a lot of smuggling routes É we've been catching more narcotics than ever before," he said.
At the same time, he said, immigrant apprehension numbers are falling.
In 2006, the department caught nearly 1.1 million undocumented crossers. As this fiscal year comes to a close, Reilly said, agents have caught about 470,000.
The downturn in the economy and lack of work opportunities contribute to the reduced traffic, Reilly said, but he said the border security initiatives were also a big factor.
Texas security efforts
Border-security efforts in Texas have focused primarily on manpower.
Lawmakers approved about $110 million for these operations for the 2007 and 2008 budget years. This year, they approved an additional $87 million to continue those efforts in 2009 and 2010.
Much of that money went to Gov. Perry to award as grants for border sheriff's departments to pay officers overtime to patrol the border.
The rest has gone to state law enforcement, including the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, to beef up their border forces.
With the grants, the departments have conducted so-called surge operations, increasing law enforcement presence in areas deemed hot spots for border-related crime.
Don Reay, executive director of the Texas Border Sheriffs Coalition, said 18 of the 20 counties in his organization have received about $12.5 million to conduct Operation Border Star from February 2008 through August 2010.
Reay said sheriffs know that the increased patrols have made border communities safer, because they get fewer calls from angry residents.
"If we're not hearing complaints about things, that's a good indicator something's going right," he said.
Crime reports in some rural areas, the sheriffs and Perry have said, have dropped about 60 percent because of border operations.
Katherine Cesinger, a spokes woman for Perry, said the border initiatives were intended to deter crime.
Deterrence was also the goal of Perry's Web-based border surveillance cameras. He gave the border sheriffs coalition $2 million to line the border with cameras so that anyone, anywhere with an Internet connection could troll for undocumented crossers.
The first year of the program, though, produced just 11 arrests and eight drug busts.
Perry has defended the cameras as a way to use technology to enhance border security where the federal government has failed to.
Perry's spokeswoman Cesinger said Perry has taken a "proactive approach" to border security.
"Border security is a fed responsibility, but a Texas problem," she said.
Is it all working?
Perry's border-security efforts have produced mixed judgments. Some, like the border sheriffs, have hailed the initiatives. Others, including civil-rights groups, have worried that they encourage racial profiling, discrimination and unnecessary law enforcement work.
Initially, reports from border sheriffs who received money for border operations showed that they caught far more undocumented immigrants than criminals.
The operation in El Paso involved vehicle checkpoints that sparked accusations of racial profiling and caused among immigrants as officers allegedly asked motorists for immigration papers.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Texas studied the most recent border effort, Operation Border Star. Earlier this year, the group reported that many departments involved in the operation used grant money to do routine police work, not to investigate border-related crime.
While some agencies, including the El Paso Police Department, produced a significant number of arrests, others reported very few. Instead, they reported issuing thousands of warnings and tickets for traffic violations.
And reports of racial profiling concerns are still coming in to the ACLU of Texas, said policy analyst Rebecca Bernhardt.
"The lion's share of the responsibility is on the lack of guidance from the state of Texas about how to target resources and make them effective," she said.
The Department of Public Safety has also faced heat for its use of border-security money. A state audit last spring showed the department had allocated millions in resources, including a helicopter and about 100 cars, that were meant for the border to other areas of the state.
Another audit, released last week, said that demands to put more state troopers in the border region were exacerbating a critical personnel shortage in the department.
Howard Campbell, a sociology and anthropology professor at the University of Texas at El Paso, who will be one of the featured speakers at the Border Security Conference, said the United States needed to rethink its approach to border security.
Military-style tactics of building barriers and installing more armed officers on the border, he said, ignore the root problems that cause illegal immigration, drug trafficking and the cartel wars in Mexico.
"It's sending the message to Mexico that the U.S. views the situation almost as if Mexico were a hostile enemy," Campbell said.
As long as American drug consumption continues and U.S. companies need cheap labor, he said, the demand for those resources will remain.
"We're deeply complicit," he said.
The United States, he said, would improve security by finding ways to allow workers to legally come to the country and by investing in prevention and treatment of drug addiction to reduce consumption.
Stephen Meiners, senior tactical analyst for Latin America at the Stratfor global intelligence agency, said higher prices for illicit drugs in the United States and indications that Mexican criminals are turning more to kidnapping and extortion for money are signs of some abatement in drug trafficking.
Security measures such as the fence, he said, could be factors. But it's hard to find evidence that security policies alone are driving those changes.
"This is not an issue that can be solved by law enforcement or by any one tool for that matter," Meiners said.
But slowing immigration numbers can be attributed primarily to economic conditions, he said.
There's no one "magic bullet" solution to the complex problems that plague the U.S.-Mexico border, Meiners said.
"There's a reason these problems have continued for decades," he said. "It's not easily addressed."
Brandi Grissom may be reached at bgrissom@elpasotimes.com; 512-479-6606.
Hispanic undocumented left to fend for selves
Undocumented immigrants face uncertainty during hurricane evacuations
By SPENCE KIMBALL, Brownsville Heralds, August 07, 2009
SAN JUAN — Federal and state law could make it difficult for illegal immigrants to evacuate during a hurricane, said local nonprofit and community leaders during a public meeting Friday.
They gathered at the headquarters of La Union del Pueblo Entero — an immigrant advocacy group based in San Juan — to answer residents’ questions about U.S. Customs and Border Protection policy during hurricanes. The nonprofit agency provides social, educational and advocacy services to the poor.
The U.S. Border Patrol has stated it will continue operating its checkpoints in the event of a hurricane. That includes the Sarita and Falfurrias checkpoints, which are located on U.S 77 and U.S. 281, respectively. U.S. 281 is a designated hurricane evacuation route.
Agents will conduct inspections and ask evacuees about their immigration status, officials said.
"An evacuation doesn’t preclude us from doing our job," said Agent John Lopez, Border Patrol spokesman for his agency’s Rio Grande Valley Sector.
Local activists said inspections would encourage the Rio Grande Valley’s 150,000 illegal immigrants to ride out a hurricane in their homes to avoid deportation. Many illegal immigrants live in unincorporated colonias — areas that are particularly vulnerable to hurricanes due to the lack of adequate infrastructure.
"Most people don’t want to leave their homes because they’re afraid of Border Patrol," said Sylvia Tavor, a tutor with A Resource in Serving Equality. Better known as ARISE, the organization helps Mexican immigrants adjust to life in the United States.
But a new state law, which goes into effect Sept. 1, will make it illegal to stay at home during a hurricane. The law gives county judges and city mayors the authority to arrest people who refuse to comply with evacuation orders.
"It’s a Catch-22 situation of sorts," said Corinna Spencer-Scheurich, an attorney with the South Texas Civil Rights Project. "If people try to leave they can be deported. But if they stay, they can be arrested and deported."
Border Patrol inspections could create a traffic bottleneck, Scheurich continued. Lines could become long at checkpoints once the Valley’s illegal immigrants have no choice but to leave their homes.
"People will take risks," Scheurich said. "It could end in a Hurricane Katrina-type situation."
But Lopez said the Border Patrol would have extra personnel on hand to conduct inspections in a speedy manner.
"Border Patrol will work closely with local officials to ensure that everyone is safe," he said.
Lopez went on to say the Border Patrol would not prescreen people’s nationality at evacuation points. And illegal immigrants arrested at inspection checkpoints would be removed to a safe location before further action is taken.
Sheurich is unconvinced.
"The important thing for Border Patrol is to get away from exits and shelters," she said. "This is about human life, not law enforcement."
By SPENCE KIMBALL, Brownsville Heralds, August 07, 2009
SAN JUAN — Federal and state law could make it difficult for illegal immigrants to evacuate during a hurricane, said local nonprofit and community leaders during a public meeting Friday.
They gathered at the headquarters of La Union del Pueblo Entero — an immigrant advocacy group based in San Juan — to answer residents’ questions about U.S. Customs and Border Protection policy during hurricanes. The nonprofit agency provides social, educational and advocacy services to the poor.
The U.S. Border Patrol has stated it will continue operating its checkpoints in the event of a hurricane. That includes the Sarita and Falfurrias checkpoints, which are located on U.S 77 and U.S. 281, respectively. U.S. 281 is a designated hurricane evacuation route.
Agents will conduct inspections and ask evacuees about their immigration status, officials said.
"An evacuation doesn’t preclude us from doing our job," said Agent John Lopez, Border Patrol spokesman for his agency’s Rio Grande Valley Sector.
Local activists said inspections would encourage the Rio Grande Valley’s 150,000 illegal immigrants to ride out a hurricane in their homes to avoid deportation. Many illegal immigrants live in unincorporated colonias — areas that are particularly vulnerable to hurricanes due to the lack of adequate infrastructure.
"Most people don’t want to leave their homes because they’re afraid of Border Patrol," said Sylvia Tavor, a tutor with A Resource in Serving Equality. Better known as ARISE, the organization helps Mexican immigrants adjust to life in the United States.
But a new state law, which goes into effect Sept. 1, will make it illegal to stay at home during a hurricane. The law gives county judges and city mayors the authority to arrest people who refuse to comply with evacuation orders.
"It’s a Catch-22 situation of sorts," said Corinna Spencer-Scheurich, an attorney with the South Texas Civil Rights Project. "If people try to leave they can be deported. But if they stay, they can be arrested and deported."
Border Patrol inspections could create a traffic bottleneck, Scheurich continued. Lines could become long at checkpoints once the Valley’s illegal immigrants have no choice but to leave their homes.
"People will take risks," Scheurich said. "It could end in a Hurricane Katrina-type situation."
But Lopez said the Border Patrol would have extra personnel on hand to conduct inspections in a speedy manner.
"Border Patrol will work closely with local officials to ensure that everyone is safe," he said.
Lopez went on to say the Border Patrol would not prescreen people’s nationality at evacuation points. And illegal immigrants arrested at inspection checkpoints would be removed to a safe location before further action is taken.
Sheurich is unconvinced.
"The important thing for Border Patrol is to get away from exits and shelters," she said. "This is about human life, not law enforcement."
Hispanic sworn in to Supreme Court
Sotomayor sworn as first Hispanic on Supreme Court
Reuters, Washington Post, August 8, 2009
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Judge Sonia Sotomayor was sworn in on Saturday as the first Hispanic associate justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.
With her left hand on a Bible held by her mother, Sotomayor swore to "administer justice without respect to persons and do equal right to the poor and to the rich."
The oath was administered by Chief Justice John Roberts, who read the text from a piece of paper.
It was the second swearing-in of the day for Sotomayor, whose rise from an impoverished childhood in New York City to become only the third woman to serve on the high court was a key narrative of her confirmation hearings in Congress.
An earlier, off-camera ceremony was followed by a televised event in a conference room at the Supreme Court. Sotomayor's mother, Celina, and her brother, Juan Luis Sotomayor, stood beside her during the administration of the public oath.
(Editing by Alan Eisner)
Reuters, Washington Post, August 8, 2009
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Judge Sonia Sotomayor was sworn in on Saturday as the first Hispanic associate justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.
With her left hand on a Bible held by her mother, Sotomayor swore to "administer justice without respect to persons and do equal right to the poor and to the rich."
The oath was administered by Chief Justice John Roberts, who read the text from a piece of paper.
It was the second swearing-in of the day for Sotomayor, whose rise from an impoverished childhood in New York City to become only the third woman to serve on the high court was a key narrative of her confirmation hearings in Congress.
An earlier, off-camera ceremony was followed by a televised event in a conference room at the Supreme Court. Sotomayor's mother, Celina, and her brother, Juan Luis Sotomayor, stood beside her during the administration of the public oath.
(Editing by Alan Eisner)
LA to lose strong Hispanic supporter
Even the ACLU is sorry to see Bratton go
The LAPD chief, who has announced that he is leaving his post, has won high marks from community groups.
By Cathleen Decker, LA Times, August 9, 2009
William J. Bratton's announcement that he will soon leave his job as Los Angeles' police chief drew the expected murmurs of dismay from city officials last week. But another lament was enough to make Joe Friday sit up and take notice: It came from a historic LAPD nemesis, the American Civil Liberties Union.
"This is a terrible loss for the city of Los Angeles," said Ramona Ripston, the local ACLU executive director who lauded Bratton, even if she did not always agree with him.
Bratton's departure, Ripston said in an interview, will come in the midst of a "sea change" in the contentious history of policing in Los Angeles. Indeed, the chief's departure can be seen as a marker in the transformation of both the Los Angeles Police Department and the city.
For decades, Los Angeles and its cops have engaged in frequent shoving matches over power, with the LAPD often exhibiting bigger muscles. Now, both have changed.
The city where police relations -- bad ones at least -- were once largely black vs. white is now more Latino than anything else. The Police Department that once felt threatening to many residents is now riding a wave of popularity as it embraces the city that its most famous chief, William H. Parker, once tried to keep at arm's distance.
In some ways, recent chiefs have been a fun-house-mirror reflection of their times, the images somewhat distorted but still recognizable.
Parker served as chief from 1950 to 1966 -- it would have been longer had he not died in office -- and wrenched the LAPD into a modern, if pseudo-military, operation. He demanded discipline and wielded power as no other chief has since.
With Parker's assistance, the department was memorialized in the TV show "Dragnet," and in return the fictional cops' "Just the facts, Ma'am" demeanor enhanced the LAPD's image. But it was a sanitized view, with real-life complaints of police bias airbrushed out, just as the city ignored its festering racial splits.
Daryl F. Gates served almost as long as Parker -- 14 years, ending in 1992. His tenure was a roller coaster of euphoric good times -- like the peaceable 1984 Olympics, during which his troops made good on his demand that they offer a sunny face to visitors -- and horrific bad ones, like the beating of Rodney King and the 1992 riots. Gates' emphatic defense of his department led to open warfare with Mayor Tom Bradley, the City Council and the Police Commission.
Their feuds were in part a reflection of the city's roiling demographic change. In the 1970 census, taken four years after Parker died, Los Angeles was 60% white, 18% Latino and 17% black. By 1990, two years before Gates left, it was 37% white, 40% Latino and 13% black. As the city grew more diversified and more liberal, the image of the LAPD was stuck in the "Dragnet days" -- white and conservative.
"As the city divided into liberals and conservatives, whites and non-whites, the police began to be seen as taking a side," said Raphael Sonenshein, a Cal State Fullerton political science professor and author who has written extensively about Los Angeles.
Bratton's Los Angeles is even more Latino. Not incidentally, one of the major contretemps in his tenure was the 2007 May Day melee, in which officers beat and fired foam bullets at immigration protesters in MacArthur Park.
But his response was praised last week as one of the highlights of his seven years in Los Angeles. He disciplined top commanders and commissioned a report critical of the department's handling of the protest.
"He turned the tables 180 degrees" from the reactions of prior chiefs, said Fernando Guerra, director of the Leavey Center for the Study of Los Angeles at Loyola Marymount University. "That to me is the ultimate in community policing, where the community is given the benefit of the doubt first, and the police had to justify their actions."
Bratton's tenure demonstrated both the gift for community consultation that Parker abhorred and the touch of public relations that eluded Gates. But other forces have also been at work.
Voters in 1992 overwhelmingly approved a measure that limited a chief's tenure to two five-year terms and gave City Hall more power over the department's leadership. That had the effect, Sonenshein said, of making the department less apt to consider itself "an autonomous political force."
The department has also become more demographically in tune with the city. But its greatest claim on the hearts of city residents is its ability to deliver on their most basic demand: to cut crime.
With crime at the lowest levels in decades, city residents were glowingly supportive of the department in a Times poll this summer. An overwhelming majority of all ethnic groups--including those historically most resistant to praising the LAPD -- approved of both the department and the chief. The findings confirmed the diminishing number of complaints about the LAPD logged by outside groups.
"We used to get over 10,000 complaints a year," said the ACLU's Ripston. "In the last couple of years, it's decreased to a trickle."
Still, the comity is fresh and fragile, and much may rest on the approach taken by the new chief.
"There is some anxiety about what's next," Ripston said. "We would hate to see any steps backward."
cathleen.decker@latimes.com.
The LAPD chief, who has announced that he is leaving his post, has won high marks from community groups.
By Cathleen Decker, LA Times, August 9, 2009
William J. Bratton's announcement that he will soon leave his job as Los Angeles' police chief drew the expected murmurs of dismay from city officials last week. But another lament was enough to make Joe Friday sit up and take notice: It came from a historic LAPD nemesis, the American Civil Liberties Union.
"This is a terrible loss for the city of Los Angeles," said Ramona Ripston, the local ACLU executive director who lauded Bratton, even if she did not always agree with him.
Bratton's departure, Ripston said in an interview, will come in the midst of a "sea change" in the contentious history of policing in Los Angeles. Indeed, the chief's departure can be seen as a marker in the transformation of both the Los Angeles Police Department and the city.
For decades, Los Angeles and its cops have engaged in frequent shoving matches over power, with the LAPD often exhibiting bigger muscles. Now, both have changed.
The city where police relations -- bad ones at least -- were once largely black vs. white is now more Latino than anything else. The Police Department that once felt threatening to many residents is now riding a wave of popularity as it embraces the city that its most famous chief, William H. Parker, once tried to keep at arm's distance.
In some ways, recent chiefs have been a fun-house-mirror reflection of their times, the images somewhat distorted but still recognizable.
Parker served as chief from 1950 to 1966 -- it would have been longer had he not died in office -- and wrenched the LAPD into a modern, if pseudo-military, operation. He demanded discipline and wielded power as no other chief has since.
With Parker's assistance, the department was memorialized in the TV show "Dragnet," and in return the fictional cops' "Just the facts, Ma'am" demeanor enhanced the LAPD's image. But it was a sanitized view, with real-life complaints of police bias airbrushed out, just as the city ignored its festering racial splits.
Daryl F. Gates served almost as long as Parker -- 14 years, ending in 1992. His tenure was a roller coaster of euphoric good times -- like the peaceable 1984 Olympics, during which his troops made good on his demand that they offer a sunny face to visitors -- and horrific bad ones, like the beating of Rodney King and the 1992 riots. Gates' emphatic defense of his department led to open warfare with Mayor Tom Bradley, the City Council and the Police Commission.
Their feuds were in part a reflection of the city's roiling demographic change. In the 1970 census, taken four years after Parker died, Los Angeles was 60% white, 18% Latino and 17% black. By 1990, two years before Gates left, it was 37% white, 40% Latino and 13% black. As the city grew more diversified and more liberal, the image of the LAPD was stuck in the "Dragnet days" -- white and conservative.
"As the city divided into liberals and conservatives, whites and non-whites, the police began to be seen as taking a side," said Raphael Sonenshein, a Cal State Fullerton political science professor and author who has written extensively about Los Angeles.
Bratton's Los Angeles is even more Latino. Not incidentally, one of the major contretemps in his tenure was the 2007 May Day melee, in which officers beat and fired foam bullets at immigration protesters in MacArthur Park.
But his response was praised last week as one of the highlights of his seven years in Los Angeles. He disciplined top commanders and commissioned a report critical of the department's handling of the protest.
"He turned the tables 180 degrees" from the reactions of prior chiefs, said Fernando Guerra, director of the Leavey Center for the Study of Los Angeles at Loyola Marymount University. "That to me is the ultimate in community policing, where the community is given the benefit of the doubt first, and the police had to justify their actions."
Bratton's tenure demonstrated both the gift for community consultation that Parker abhorred and the touch of public relations that eluded Gates. But other forces have also been at work.
Voters in 1992 overwhelmingly approved a measure that limited a chief's tenure to two five-year terms and gave City Hall more power over the department's leadership. That had the effect, Sonenshein said, of making the department less apt to consider itself "an autonomous political force."
The department has also become more demographically in tune with the city. But its greatest claim on the hearts of city residents is its ability to deliver on their most basic demand: to cut crime.
With crime at the lowest levels in decades, city residents were glowingly supportive of the department in a Times poll this summer. An overwhelming majority of all ethnic groups--including those historically most resistant to praising the LAPD -- approved of both the department and the chief. The findings confirmed the diminishing number of complaints about the LAPD logged by outside groups.
"We used to get over 10,000 complaints a year," said the ACLU's Ripston. "In the last couple of years, it's decreased to a trickle."
Still, the comity is fresh and fragile, and much may rest on the approach taken by the new chief.
"There is some anxiety about what's next," Ripston said. "We would hate to see any steps backward."
cathleen.decker@latimes.com.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Latina legislator protects senior abuse
Sen. Oropeza measure goes into effect Jan. 1, 2010
Plan to help protect state’s senior citizens signed into law today by Gov. Schwarzenegger
PRESS RELEASE
SACRAMENTO – A plan by Sen. Jenny Oropeza, D-Long Beach, to enhance penalties against those who repeatedly abuse the elderly was signed into law today by Gov. Schwarzenegger.
“California’s senior citizens and their families will rest easier knowing that my new law will help protect them from abuse,” the Long Beach Democrat said. “Elder abuse for far too long has been a hidden, pervasive and deadly crime where out of 5 million recent cases, a shocking 84 percent went unreported.”
Effective Jan. 1, 2010, Senate Bill 18 will increase fines on those who abuse dependent adults and senior citizens 65 and older. Specifically, for second offenses, it would:
· Increase from $6,000 to $10,000 fines for those found guilty of placing an elder or dependent adult in situations where great bodily harm or death is likely.
· Increase from $2,000 to $5,000 the fine for those found guilty of placing an elder or dependent adult in dangerous situations not likely to cause death or serious bodily injury.
SB 18 has had broad, bipartisan support and was endorsed by the California District Attorneys Association; the California State Sheriffs Association; the California Commission on Aging; the Alzheimer’s Association; and various community and state organizations.
Plan to help protect state’s senior citizens signed into law today by Gov. Schwarzenegger
PRESS RELEASE
SACRAMENTO – A plan by Sen. Jenny Oropeza, D-Long Beach, to enhance penalties against those who repeatedly abuse the elderly was signed into law today by Gov. Schwarzenegger.
“California’s senior citizens and their families will rest easier knowing that my new law will help protect them from abuse,” the Long Beach Democrat said. “Elder abuse for far too long has been a hidden, pervasive and deadly crime where out of 5 million recent cases, a shocking 84 percent went unreported.”
Effective Jan. 1, 2010, Senate Bill 18 will increase fines on those who abuse dependent adults and senior citizens 65 and older. Specifically, for second offenses, it would:
· Increase from $6,000 to $10,000 fines for those found guilty of placing an elder or dependent adult in situations where great bodily harm or death is likely.
· Increase from $2,000 to $5,000 the fine for those found guilty of placing an elder or dependent adult in dangerous situations not likely to cause death or serious bodily injury.
SB 18 has had broad, bipartisan support and was endorsed by the California District Attorneys Association; the California State Sheriffs Association; the California Commission on Aging; the Alzheimer’s Association; and various community and state organizations.
Hispanic leader resigns Senate seat
Florida Republican Mel Martinez announces resignation from Senate
Martinez resignation
By Aaron Deslatte and Josh Hafenbrack, LA TIMES, August 8, 2009
Reporting from Tallahassee, Fla. -- Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) announced Friday that he would resign, ending months of speculation that he would not finish out his term and opening the door for Gov. Charlie Crist to name a replacement.
"My priorities have always been my faith, my family and my country. And at this stage in my life, and after nearly 12 years of public service in Florida and Washington, it's time I return to Florida and my family," Martinez wrote in an e-mail to friends and supporters.
He earlier had announced plans to retire in 2010.
Martinez's resignation means that Crist, the leading Republican candidate to succeed Martinez, will name someone to serve the remainder of the term. Martinez told reporters during a news conference at Orlando International Airport that he was "absolutely not" pressured to resign and that he trusted the governor to make the right decision in replacing him.
Crist, who holds a big lead in the polls, told reporters Friday that he would not appoint himself. Instead, he said, he would look for someone to keep the seat warm until the November 2010 election.
In brief remarks after a tour of MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Crist said: "We will undertake a very thorough, very comprehensive, thoughtful process" to fill Martinez's seat.
Earlier in the day, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said that he would remember Martinez as a gentleman, and he praised the Floridian's work on travel promotion legislation and immigration.
According to advisors to Martinez and Crist, candidates on the short list to fill out the Senate term include former Florida Secretary of State Jim Smith; former state House Speaker Allan G. Bense; former Sen. Connie Mack, Crist's political mentor; and former Gov. Bob Martinez, who served from 1987 to 1991.
Sen. Martinez's storybook journey into politics began in 1962, when he was one of 14,000 children brought out of Cuba in the Roman Catholic humanitarian effort called Operation Peter Pan. He went to law school, practiced in Orlando for 25 years, and eventually won election as Orange County chairman. President George W. Bush appointed him secretary of Housing and Urban Development in 2001, a post he would leave to run for the Senate.
But Martinez's stay in the chamber was rocky from the beginning. In his 2004 GOP primary against Bill McCollum, his staff put out a memo attacking McCollum for being a "darling of homosexual extremists" for supporting hate-crime laws.
Martinez would later distance himself from the attack and blame a staffer.
adeslatte@sun-sentinel.com
jhafenbrack@sun-sentinel.com
Martinez resignation
By Aaron Deslatte and Josh Hafenbrack, LA TIMES, August 8, 2009
Reporting from Tallahassee, Fla. -- Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) announced Friday that he would resign, ending months of speculation that he would not finish out his term and opening the door for Gov. Charlie Crist to name a replacement.
"My priorities have always been my faith, my family and my country. And at this stage in my life, and after nearly 12 years of public service in Florida and Washington, it's time I return to Florida and my family," Martinez wrote in an e-mail to friends and supporters.
He earlier had announced plans to retire in 2010.
Martinez's resignation means that Crist, the leading Republican candidate to succeed Martinez, will name someone to serve the remainder of the term. Martinez told reporters during a news conference at Orlando International Airport that he was "absolutely not" pressured to resign and that he trusted the governor to make the right decision in replacing him.
Crist, who holds a big lead in the polls, told reporters Friday that he would not appoint himself. Instead, he said, he would look for someone to keep the seat warm until the November 2010 election.
In brief remarks after a tour of MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Crist said: "We will undertake a very thorough, very comprehensive, thoughtful process" to fill Martinez's seat.
Earlier in the day, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said that he would remember Martinez as a gentleman, and he praised the Floridian's work on travel promotion legislation and immigration.
According to advisors to Martinez and Crist, candidates on the short list to fill out the Senate term include former Florida Secretary of State Jim Smith; former state House Speaker Allan G. Bense; former Sen. Connie Mack, Crist's political mentor; and former Gov. Bob Martinez, who served from 1987 to 1991.
Sen. Martinez's storybook journey into politics began in 1962, when he was one of 14,000 children brought out of Cuba in the Roman Catholic humanitarian effort called Operation Peter Pan. He went to law school, practiced in Orlando for 25 years, and eventually won election as Orange County chairman. President George W. Bush appointed him secretary of Housing and Urban Development in 2001, a post he would leave to run for the Senate.
But Martinez's stay in the chamber was rocky from the beginning. In his 2004 GOP primary against Bill McCollum, his staff put out a memo attacking McCollum for being a "darling of homosexual extremists" for supporting hate-crime laws.
Martinez would later distance himself from the attack and blame a staffer.
adeslatte@sun-sentinel.com
jhafenbrack@sun-sentinel.com
Hispanics will need to wait until 2010 for immigration reform
Obama sees early 2010 start on immigration reform
REUTERS, Aug 7, 2009
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said on Friday he expects Congress to overhaul the country's immigration system, an issue that fires up emotions on both sides of the political divide, by "early next year."
Speaking to Hispanic reporters at the White House, Obama said he hopes a bill for comprehensive immigration reform will be drafted by the end of this year.
Obama tapped Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano on June 25 to work with Congress to speed up immigration reform as senators warned another failed effort could doom chances for a generation.
Obama said he asked Napolitano to meet regularly with lawmakers to systematically work through a number of controversial issues, such as how to handle the 12 million illegal immigrants already in the United States and how to prevent future illegal immigration.
"We have convened a meeting of all the relevant stakeholders, and Secretary Napolitano is working with the group to start creating the framework for a comprehensive immigration reform," the president said.
Congress failed in 2006 and 2007 to pass immigration reform despite a push by former Republican President George W. Bush.
Earlier this year, Vice President Joe Biden said the U.S. economic slump and soaring unemployment made it a bad time to take on the issue.
Obama has been criticized for not following through on a campaign pledge to tackle the issue this year. He has urged the Democratic-controlled Congress to start pushing now to pass legislation.
Asked if an immigration bill would have enough votes to pass Congress, Obama said he did not know. He also noted as a further complication that next year is an election year.
Obama joked that his opponents had another reason to block his immigration reform effort: "There are many members of the Republican Party who think now that I am illegal immigrant," he said.
Anti-Obama activists have claimed that the president, the son of a Kenyan man and a U.S. woman, was born in Kenya and ineligible to be U.S. president.
(Reporting by Anthony Boadle, editing by Philip Barbara)
REUTERS, Aug 7, 2009
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said on Friday he expects Congress to overhaul the country's immigration system, an issue that fires up emotions on both sides of the political divide, by "early next year."
Speaking to Hispanic reporters at the White House, Obama said he hopes a bill for comprehensive immigration reform will be drafted by the end of this year.
Obama tapped Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano on June 25 to work with Congress to speed up immigration reform as senators warned another failed effort could doom chances for a generation.
Obama said he asked Napolitano to meet regularly with lawmakers to systematically work through a number of controversial issues, such as how to handle the 12 million illegal immigrants already in the United States and how to prevent future illegal immigration.
"We have convened a meeting of all the relevant stakeholders, and Secretary Napolitano is working with the group to start creating the framework for a comprehensive immigration reform," the president said.
Congress failed in 2006 and 2007 to pass immigration reform despite a push by former Republican President George W. Bush.
Earlier this year, Vice President Joe Biden said the U.S. economic slump and soaring unemployment made it a bad time to take on the issue.
Obama has been criticized for not following through on a campaign pledge to tackle the issue this year. He has urged the Democratic-controlled Congress to start pushing now to pass legislation.
Asked if an immigration bill would have enough votes to pass Congress, Obama said he did not know. He also noted as a further complication that next year is an election year.
Obama joked that his opponents had another reason to block his immigration reform effort: "There are many members of the Republican Party who think now that I am illegal immigrant," he said.
Anti-Obama activists have claimed that the president, the son of a Kenyan man and a U.S. woman, was born in Kenya and ineligible to be U.S. president.
(Reporting by Anthony Boadle, editing by Philip Barbara)
Friday, August 7, 2009
First Hispanic member of Supreme Court
Senate confirms Sotomoayor, first Hispanic on Supreme Court
By Thomas Ferraro, Reuters, Aug 6, 2009
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Judge Sonia Sotomayor won approval on Thursday to become the first Hispanic on the U.S. Supreme Court in a Senate vote that President Barack Obama said broke another social barrier.
The Democratic-led Senate voted largely along party lines, 68-31, to confirm Obama's nomination of Sotomayor for a lifetime appointment to the highest U.S. court. She will be sworn in on Saturday.
All the opponents were Republicans, reflecting the party's resistance to the Democratic president on several fronts, including his bid to overhaul healthcare.
Obama, who became the first black U.S. president six months ago, made no mention of the partisan split when he spoke after the vote but said the Senate had upheld American ideals of justice, equality and opportunity.
"They're ideals she's fought for throughout her career, and the ideals the Senate has upheld today in breaking yet another barrier and moving us yet another step closer to a more perfect union," Obama said at the White House.
Sotomayor, 55, a federal judge since 1992, will be the first Hispanic and the third woman to serve in the history of the 220-year-old Supreme Court.
Both parties praised her rise from a child born to Puerto Rican parents and living in poverty.
REPLACES SOUTER
In replacing retired Justice David Souter, Sotomayor is not expected to change the court's ideological balance. Souter sided with the liberal wing of the court, which in recent years often issued 5-4 rulings in favor of conservatives.
The appointment nonetheless underscores an effort by Obama to move the court to the left after eight years of rightward pushing by his predecessor, Republican President George W. Bush.
In opposing Sotomayor, Republicans risk a backlash from her fellow Hispanics, the fastest growing U.S. minority. Hispanics make up 15 percent of the U.S. population and voted by a two-to-one margin for Obama in the 2008 presidential election.
But Republicans seemed unconcerned. They said many Hispanics were conservatives and more interested in such issues as jobs and the economy.
Janet Murguia of the National Council of La Raza, a major Hispanic civil rights group, said: "This vote will matter -- and it will be long remembered."
Democrats hailed Sotomayor as fair-minded, but Republicans charged she lacked impartiality. Critics had zeroed in on her past comments that a "wise Latina" woman might reach a better decision than a white man.
At her confirmation hearing, Sotomayor offered no apology for the remarks. She said a jurist had to guard against internal prejudice.
The only senator who did not take part in the confirmation vote was Democrat Edward Kennedy, who has spent much of the year away from Capitol Hill, battling brain cancer.
(Additional reporting by Andy Sullivan, editing by Howard Goller)
By Thomas Ferraro, Reuters, Aug 6, 2009
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Judge Sonia Sotomayor won approval on Thursday to become the first Hispanic on the U.S. Supreme Court in a Senate vote that President Barack Obama said broke another social barrier.
The Democratic-led Senate voted largely along party lines, 68-31, to confirm Obama's nomination of Sotomayor for a lifetime appointment to the highest U.S. court. She will be sworn in on Saturday.
All the opponents were Republicans, reflecting the party's resistance to the Democratic president on several fronts, including his bid to overhaul healthcare.
Obama, who became the first black U.S. president six months ago, made no mention of the partisan split when he spoke after the vote but said the Senate had upheld American ideals of justice, equality and opportunity.
"They're ideals she's fought for throughout her career, and the ideals the Senate has upheld today in breaking yet another barrier and moving us yet another step closer to a more perfect union," Obama said at the White House.
Sotomayor, 55, a federal judge since 1992, will be the first Hispanic and the third woman to serve in the history of the 220-year-old Supreme Court.
Both parties praised her rise from a child born to Puerto Rican parents and living in poverty.
REPLACES SOUTER
In replacing retired Justice David Souter, Sotomayor is not expected to change the court's ideological balance. Souter sided with the liberal wing of the court, which in recent years often issued 5-4 rulings in favor of conservatives.
The appointment nonetheless underscores an effort by Obama to move the court to the left after eight years of rightward pushing by his predecessor, Republican President George W. Bush.
In opposing Sotomayor, Republicans risk a backlash from her fellow Hispanics, the fastest growing U.S. minority. Hispanics make up 15 percent of the U.S. population and voted by a two-to-one margin for Obama in the 2008 presidential election.
But Republicans seemed unconcerned. They said many Hispanics were conservatives and more interested in such issues as jobs and the economy.
Janet Murguia of the National Council of La Raza, a major Hispanic civil rights group, said: "This vote will matter -- and it will be long remembered."
Democrats hailed Sotomayor as fair-minded, but Republicans charged she lacked impartiality. Critics had zeroed in on her past comments that a "wise Latina" woman might reach a better decision than a white man.
At her confirmation hearing, Sotomayor offered no apology for the remarks. She said a jurist had to guard against internal prejudice.
The only senator who did not take part in the confirmation vote was Democrat Edward Kennedy, who has spent much of the year away from Capitol Hill, battling brain cancer.
(Additional reporting by Andy Sullivan, editing by Howard Goller)
Nevada Hispanics hit hardest by unemployment
Nevada Hispanics hit hardest by unemployment
Victor Calderon • Reno Gazette-Journal • August 6, 2009
Nevada had the highest unemployment rate among Hispanics in the country in the second quarter of 2009 and it’s projected to be higher by 2010, according to a report released late last month by the Washington, D.C.-based Economic Policy Institute.
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The Silver State had a 16.4 percent Hispanic unemployment rate, followed by California at 15.7 percent, the report found. Hispanics in Nevada were 1.7 times as likely to be unemployed as non-Hispanic whites, who had a 9.7 percent unemployment rate.
Overall, Nevada had an unemployment rate of 11.3 percent during the period.
The main finding of the report, titled “Unequal Unemployment,” was that African-Americans and Hispanics had a higher percentage of unemployment than non-Hispanic whites.
And unemployment projections show the number rising to a 17.8 percent unemployment rate among Hispanics by this time next year.
The Nevada Department of Employment Training and Rehabilitation does not keep statistics by ethnicity because people who file for unemployment do not have to give that information, said Mae Worthey, a spokeswoman for the department.
Unemployment in Washoe County is at about 11.8 percent in Washoe County, the highest since record-keeping began in 1976. The Hispanic population in the county is about 20 percent, according to U.S. Census figures.
Victor Calderon • Reno Gazette-Journal • August 6, 2009
Nevada had the highest unemployment rate among Hispanics in the country in the second quarter of 2009 and it’s projected to be higher by 2010, according to a report released late last month by the Washington, D.C.-based Economic Policy Institute.
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The Silver State had a 16.4 percent Hispanic unemployment rate, followed by California at 15.7 percent, the report found. Hispanics in Nevada were 1.7 times as likely to be unemployed as non-Hispanic whites, who had a 9.7 percent unemployment rate.
Overall, Nevada had an unemployment rate of 11.3 percent during the period.
The main finding of the report, titled “Unequal Unemployment,” was that African-Americans and Hispanics had a higher percentage of unemployment than non-Hispanic whites.
And unemployment projections show the number rising to a 17.8 percent unemployment rate among Hispanics by this time next year.
The Nevada Department of Employment Training and Rehabilitation does not keep statistics by ethnicity because people who file for unemployment do not have to give that information, said Mae Worthey, a spokeswoman for the department.
Unemployment in Washoe County is at about 11.8 percent in Washoe County, the highest since record-keeping began in 1976. The Hispanic population in the county is about 20 percent, according to U.S. Census figures.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Latinos protest deportation joke
Latino advocates protest Levy's deportation 'joke'
By SUMATHI REDDY, News Day, August 5, 2009
Outraged Latino advocates protested outside County Executive Steve Levy's office Wednesday, saying Levy's quip about deporting kitchen workers contributes to a climate where immigrants are attacked and even killed.
His staff maintained that the comment, made at a roast at Captain Bill's Restaurant in Bay Shore last week, was a joke and that he was poking fun at his own reputation. "This is political correctness run amok," his spokesman, Dan Aug, said in an e-mailed statement.
But advocates insisted the remark was not funny. Holding signs like "We need leaders, not jokes," and "Steve Levy can't stand the heat, so he wants to deport the kitchen," leaders of labor, civil rights and religious groups attacked Levy, many making reference to the fatal stabbing of Marcelo Lucero, an Ecuadorean immigrant killed in Patchogue last year in what authorities have labeled a hate crime.
"The death of Marcelo Lucero was predicted by the climate of hate that has been created here in Suffolk County for a number of years," said Luis Valenzuela, executive director of the Long Island Immigrant Alliance.
According to a report in Newsday, five people who attended last week's roast said that Levy asked an attorney who was ribbing him, a Canadian native, whether he was a U.S. citizen. After the attorney responded "yes," Levy reportedly said that was a good thing because, otherwise, "I'd have to deport you, like the guys back there in the kitchen."
Aug likened the roast to the satirical skits at a 2008 Press Club of Long Island show that poked fun at various ethnic groups. "Obviously, no one in attendance at the press club show walked away thinking that the presenters were literally promoting what they were parodying," Aug said in a statement. "Likewise, no one should believe that the county executive's comments at the roast were anything other than satire on his own political reputation."
Jose Avila, 40, of Brentwood, said he was tired of the "hate speech."
"I can hardly explain to my daughter why Marcelo Lucero is dead," he said. "Because he speaks Spanish, because he looks like me. . . . It could be me. This kind of language is why we have this problem."
Dafny Trizarry, president of the Long Island Latino Teachers Association, called Levy's remark "inappropriate."
"They set a tone and this is carried on to the classroom, when I have students saying to me, 'I don't like to hear the word immigrant because it has a negative connotation,' " she said. "This is . . . from our leadership.
"It comes from the top all the way to our classroom and our students."
By SUMATHI REDDY, News Day, August 5, 2009
Outraged Latino advocates protested outside County Executive Steve Levy's office Wednesday, saying Levy's quip about deporting kitchen workers contributes to a climate where immigrants are attacked and even killed.
His staff maintained that the comment, made at a roast at Captain Bill's Restaurant in Bay Shore last week, was a joke and that he was poking fun at his own reputation. "This is political correctness run amok," his spokesman, Dan Aug, said in an e-mailed statement.
But advocates insisted the remark was not funny. Holding signs like "We need leaders, not jokes," and "Steve Levy can't stand the heat, so he wants to deport the kitchen," leaders of labor, civil rights and religious groups attacked Levy, many making reference to the fatal stabbing of Marcelo Lucero, an Ecuadorean immigrant killed in Patchogue last year in what authorities have labeled a hate crime.
"The death of Marcelo Lucero was predicted by the climate of hate that has been created here in Suffolk County for a number of years," said Luis Valenzuela, executive director of the Long Island Immigrant Alliance.
According to a report in Newsday, five people who attended last week's roast said that Levy asked an attorney who was ribbing him, a Canadian native, whether he was a U.S. citizen. After the attorney responded "yes," Levy reportedly said that was a good thing because, otherwise, "I'd have to deport you, like the guys back there in the kitchen."
Aug likened the roast to the satirical skits at a 2008 Press Club of Long Island show that poked fun at various ethnic groups. "Obviously, no one in attendance at the press club show walked away thinking that the presenters were literally promoting what they were parodying," Aug said in a statement. "Likewise, no one should believe that the county executive's comments at the roast were anything other than satire on his own political reputation."
Jose Avila, 40, of Brentwood, said he was tired of the "hate speech."
"I can hardly explain to my daughter why Marcelo Lucero is dead," he said. "Because he speaks Spanish, because he looks like me. . . . It could be me. This kind of language is why we have this problem."
Dafny Trizarry, president of the Long Island Latino Teachers Association, called Levy's remark "inappropriate."
"They set a tone and this is carried on to the classroom, when I have students saying to me, 'I don't like to hear the word immigrant because it has a negative connotation,' " she said. "This is . . . from our leadership.
"It comes from the top all the way to our classroom and our students."
Parties fighting for Latino vote in Texas
Analysis: Latinos could be factor in GOP slugfest
By KELLEY SHANNON, The Associated Press, Aug. 5, 2009
AUSTIN, Texas — Republicans U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and Gov. Rick Perry are walking a tightrope heading into their primary, where the winner will emerge the front-runner for the governor's race in this decidedly red state.
On one side are Hispanic voters — a growing and influential bloc willing to listen to the GOP titans and one the candidates may need in the general election. On the other is a group that Hutchison and Perry cannot afford to anger: the Republican base of religious, largely white and conservative voters.
So they've done a two-step around Texas, showing up in majority-Hispanic parts of the state to appeal to those Texans while talking tough on guns, border security and other top issues for traditional primary voters.
Witness Hutchison at the Texas Association of Mexican-American Chambers of Commerce convention in McAllen last week. Only days before she had announced she would vote against Hispanic Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation to the Supreme Court.
She explained to tepid applause that she could not vote to confirm a judge who was not a firm supporter of gun rights. Balancing Texas gun owners against Hispanic pride? The GOP candidate chose gun owners.
But beyond the March 2010 primary, Republicans are still seeking to reach out to Latinos for years to come; hence, Hutchison's warmer response when she noted to the McAllen crowd that 30 percent of her proposed nominees for federal judgeships had been Hispanic. She emphasized her work as co-chairwoman of a coalition supporting colleges that serve Hispanic students and declared her respect for Democratic U.S. Rep. Ruben Hinojosa of South Texas and Republican U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez of Florida.
"It simply cannot be ignored," said Jerry Polinard, a political scientist at the University of Texas-Pan American. "Republicans have got to begin to peel some of these Latino voters away from the Democratic Party."
Perry also wants to score points with Latinos, who make up one-quarter of Texas' eligible voters and one-third of the population.
His aides cite his record of appointing 701 Hispanics to state boards and commissions — or 15 percent of his appointees — as the state's longest-serving governor. Spokesman Mark Miner said Perry's appeal to Latinos lies in his policies, such as assisting the private sector in job creation.
"The governor has always believed that the best policies will continue to generate support," Miner said.
Like Hutchison, Perry has traveled to predominantly Hispanic regions of Texas this year, talking up border security in El Paso and helping to open a Wal-Mart in Penitas in the Rio Grande Valley, where he praised the state's business climate.
As election season unfolds look for Hutchison and Perry to make more trips to South Texas, point out their prominent Hispanic supporters and perhaps purchase Spanish-language advertising. The campaigns won't yet discuss details of their tactics.
Hutchison wants to cut into Perry's reliable backing from social conservatives who traditionally dominate Texas' GOP primaries. Typically only about 650,000 of the state's 13 million registered voters cast ballots in the Republican gubernatorial primaries.
Attracting more Latino voters to the primary won't be easy.
Case in point: In the 2006 gubernatorial primary, in predominantly Hispanic areas of the state nearly three times as many El Paso County voters cast Democratic ballots for governor than cast GOP ballots. In Hidalgo County on the border, there were 15 times as many votes for Democrats for governor as there were for Republicans.
There's nothing to suggest a change in those trends yet for 2010, Polinard said, describing his Rio Grande Valley region as "the bluest part of the red state."
"This is not where they're going to win the primary election," he said.
Hutchison voted in favor of sealing 700 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border with barriers. Her aides say she has worked to make sure local officials are consulted by federal officials as the fence is built.
Perry has said he opposes a border fence, except in some urban areas.
He has talked tough about the need for border security and crackdowns on illegal immigration, though he has continued to support legislation he signed allowing illegal immigrant students to pay in-state college tuition and says he supports passage of a federal guest worker program for immigrants.
Perry and Hutchison both support stricter voter identification requirements — a Republican legislative proposal that Democrats say would prevent some minorities and the elderly from casting ballots.
As for Sotomayor, Perry's camp will say only that her beliefs are not in line with those a Supreme Court justice should have on issues such as gun rights. Miner wouldn't say that Hutchison is right with her opposition to Sotomayor and wouldn't say how Perry would vote if he were in the Senate.
Javier Martinez, general manager of a radio station in Del Rio who spoke with Hutchison at the Mexican-American Chambers of Commerce convention, isn't holding the senator's position on Sotomayer against her.
"She's a friend of Hispanics even though she's not voting for Sotomayor," he said.
But based on historic voting trends, neither Hutchison nor Perry is likely to have the upper hand among Hispanics, at least at the moment. That role could belong to the Democratic nominee.
Associated Press writer Christopher Sherman in McAllen, Texas, contributed to this report.
By KELLEY SHANNON, The Associated Press, Aug. 5, 2009
AUSTIN, Texas — Republicans U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and Gov. Rick Perry are walking a tightrope heading into their primary, where the winner will emerge the front-runner for the governor's race in this decidedly red state.
On one side are Hispanic voters — a growing and influential bloc willing to listen to the GOP titans and one the candidates may need in the general election. On the other is a group that Hutchison and Perry cannot afford to anger: the Republican base of religious, largely white and conservative voters.
So they've done a two-step around Texas, showing up in majority-Hispanic parts of the state to appeal to those Texans while talking tough on guns, border security and other top issues for traditional primary voters.
Witness Hutchison at the Texas Association of Mexican-American Chambers of Commerce convention in McAllen last week. Only days before she had announced she would vote against Hispanic Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation to the Supreme Court.
She explained to tepid applause that she could not vote to confirm a judge who was not a firm supporter of gun rights. Balancing Texas gun owners against Hispanic pride? The GOP candidate chose gun owners.
But beyond the March 2010 primary, Republicans are still seeking to reach out to Latinos for years to come; hence, Hutchison's warmer response when she noted to the McAllen crowd that 30 percent of her proposed nominees for federal judgeships had been Hispanic. She emphasized her work as co-chairwoman of a coalition supporting colleges that serve Hispanic students and declared her respect for Democratic U.S. Rep. Ruben Hinojosa of South Texas and Republican U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez of Florida.
"It simply cannot be ignored," said Jerry Polinard, a political scientist at the University of Texas-Pan American. "Republicans have got to begin to peel some of these Latino voters away from the Democratic Party."
Perry also wants to score points with Latinos, who make up one-quarter of Texas' eligible voters and one-third of the population.
His aides cite his record of appointing 701 Hispanics to state boards and commissions — or 15 percent of his appointees — as the state's longest-serving governor. Spokesman Mark Miner said Perry's appeal to Latinos lies in his policies, such as assisting the private sector in job creation.
"The governor has always believed that the best policies will continue to generate support," Miner said.
Like Hutchison, Perry has traveled to predominantly Hispanic regions of Texas this year, talking up border security in El Paso and helping to open a Wal-Mart in Penitas in the Rio Grande Valley, where he praised the state's business climate.
As election season unfolds look for Hutchison and Perry to make more trips to South Texas, point out their prominent Hispanic supporters and perhaps purchase Spanish-language advertising. The campaigns won't yet discuss details of their tactics.
Hutchison wants to cut into Perry's reliable backing from social conservatives who traditionally dominate Texas' GOP primaries. Typically only about 650,000 of the state's 13 million registered voters cast ballots in the Republican gubernatorial primaries.
Attracting more Latino voters to the primary won't be easy.
Case in point: In the 2006 gubernatorial primary, in predominantly Hispanic areas of the state nearly three times as many El Paso County voters cast Democratic ballots for governor than cast GOP ballots. In Hidalgo County on the border, there were 15 times as many votes for Democrats for governor as there were for Republicans.
There's nothing to suggest a change in those trends yet for 2010, Polinard said, describing his Rio Grande Valley region as "the bluest part of the red state."
"This is not where they're going to win the primary election," he said.
Hutchison voted in favor of sealing 700 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border with barriers. Her aides say she has worked to make sure local officials are consulted by federal officials as the fence is built.
Perry has said he opposes a border fence, except in some urban areas.
He has talked tough about the need for border security and crackdowns on illegal immigration, though he has continued to support legislation he signed allowing illegal immigrant students to pay in-state college tuition and says he supports passage of a federal guest worker program for immigrants.
Perry and Hutchison both support stricter voter identification requirements — a Republican legislative proposal that Democrats say would prevent some minorities and the elderly from casting ballots.
As for Sotomayor, Perry's camp will say only that her beliefs are not in line with those a Supreme Court justice should have on issues such as gun rights. Miner wouldn't say that Hutchison is right with her opposition to Sotomayor and wouldn't say how Perry would vote if he were in the Senate.
Javier Martinez, general manager of a radio station in Del Rio who spoke with Hutchison at the Mexican-American Chambers of Commerce convention, isn't holding the senator's position on Sotomayer against her.
"She's a friend of Hispanics even though she's not voting for Sotomayor," he said.
But based on historic voting trends, neither Hutchison nor Perry is likely to have the upper hand among Hispanics, at least at the moment. That role could belong to the Democratic nominee.
Associated Press writer Christopher Sherman in McAllen, Texas, contributed to this report.
Hamilton County will have 50 percent Hispanic students
Local school expecting 50 percent Hispanic enrollment
By: Kelli Gauthier, Times Free Press, Aug. 5, 2009
As Hamilton County students register today for classes, officials at East Side Elementary expect to see more Hispanics sign up than ever before.
East Side administrators project their school will be the district's first to enroll at least 50 percent Hispanic students, principal Emily Baker said. The actual number may even be greater than 50 percent, some teachers speculate, which would change the school's majority population from black to Hispanic.
"Three years ago the kindergarten classes became more Hispanic than black, and that trend has continued," Ms. Baker said.
HISPANIC POPULATION AT EAST SIDE
* 2006: 34 percent
* 2007: 43 percent
* 2008: 43 percent
* 2009: 44 percent
* 2010 (projected): 50 percent
Source: Tennessee Report Card
East Side is Hamilton County's largest English Language Learner site, which means that in addition to enrolling students from the immediate community, the school also takes in ELL students from other school zones.
Although the ELL population at East Side also includes students from countries such as Burundi and Iraq, nearly 90 percent of them are Hispanic, mostly from Guatemala, teachers said.
District officials also are projecting a nearly 58 percent increase in Hamilton County's overall ELL population.
Staff Photo by John Rawlston Beth Smith, left, and Leigh Stone, English to speakers of other languages (ESOL) teachers at Varnell Elementary, check lists of incoming students in their classroom on Tuesday afternoon.
Julie Legg, Hamilton County's new director of K-5 literacy and K-12 ELL programs, said last year the system had about 950 ELL students, and she expects to see at least 1,500 this year. She expects to see more Hispanics enroll, but also more German students whose families work for Volkswagen, she said.
"We're looking at this as an opportunity," she said. "What happens (Wednesday) will be very interesting. We've only got an idea of what to expect."
Ms. Legg said the district has removed some of the bureaucratic red tape that previously kept many Hispanic families from registering their children in school. The school district no longer is requiring parents to go to the system's central office off Bonny Oaks Drive to fill out specific paperwork.
"I do think that we are projecting a pretty significant increase in (the Hispanic) population this year," she said. "We're expecting about 100 kids to enroll that haven't ever enrolled previously."
Because the ELL department at East Side ran out of time to pre-register as many students as they normally do, officials have enlisted the help of bilingual employees from EPB and the nonprofit organization La Paz De Dios to help with today's registration.
Lead ELL teacher Marisol Jimenez also conducted training on Tuesday to teach other instructors at East Side how to assist parents who may not speak English.
When Ms. Baker became principal of East Side 13 years ago, her school had fewer than 500 students, most of them black, and only about 10 ELL students.
The growth she has seen in the Hispanic population has been steady, she said, which has made it easier for students and teachers to change and adapt.
"We've learned how to work with (ELL students) as they come, as opposed to going from one to 100 in one year," she said.
Staff Photo by John Rawlston Marisol Jimenez, lead Enlish-as-a-second-language (ESL) teacher at East Side Elementary, talks on Tuesday with kindergarden teachers Brittany Hobbs, left, Darcey Cavanaugh, and Melissa Dawson, right. When numbers are tallied from Wednesday's registration, East Side Elementary expects to have a student body comprised of 50 percent Hispanic-speaking students.
The overall culture of the elementary school is really no different with a majority of Hispanic students than it would be any other group, Ms. Baker said. Students have benefited from being exposed to other cultures, she said.
"Our kids have always been very, very accepting of each other. When the Hispanic students started coming in, they really took them under their wings and nurtured them," she said. "They have so much more in common than they're different."
By: Kelli Gauthier, Times Free Press, Aug. 5, 2009
As Hamilton County students register today for classes, officials at East Side Elementary expect to see more Hispanics sign up than ever before.
East Side administrators project their school will be the district's first to enroll at least 50 percent Hispanic students, principal Emily Baker said. The actual number may even be greater than 50 percent, some teachers speculate, which would change the school's majority population from black to Hispanic.
"Three years ago the kindergarten classes became more Hispanic than black, and that trend has continued," Ms. Baker said.
HISPANIC POPULATION AT EAST SIDE
* 2006: 34 percent
* 2007: 43 percent
* 2008: 43 percent
* 2009: 44 percent
* 2010 (projected): 50 percent
Source: Tennessee Report Card
East Side is Hamilton County's largest English Language Learner site, which means that in addition to enrolling students from the immediate community, the school also takes in ELL students from other school zones.
Although the ELL population at East Side also includes students from countries such as Burundi and Iraq, nearly 90 percent of them are Hispanic, mostly from Guatemala, teachers said.
District officials also are projecting a nearly 58 percent increase in Hamilton County's overall ELL population.
Staff Photo by John Rawlston Beth Smith, left, and Leigh Stone, English to speakers of other languages (ESOL) teachers at Varnell Elementary, check lists of incoming students in their classroom on Tuesday afternoon.
Julie Legg, Hamilton County's new director of K-5 literacy and K-12 ELL programs, said last year the system had about 950 ELL students, and she expects to see at least 1,500 this year. She expects to see more Hispanics enroll, but also more German students whose families work for Volkswagen, she said.
"We're looking at this as an opportunity," she said. "What happens (Wednesday) will be very interesting. We've only got an idea of what to expect."
Ms. Legg said the district has removed some of the bureaucratic red tape that previously kept many Hispanic families from registering their children in school. The school district no longer is requiring parents to go to the system's central office off Bonny Oaks Drive to fill out specific paperwork.
"I do think that we are projecting a pretty significant increase in (the Hispanic) population this year," she said. "We're expecting about 100 kids to enroll that haven't ever enrolled previously."
Because the ELL department at East Side ran out of time to pre-register as many students as they normally do, officials have enlisted the help of bilingual employees from EPB and the nonprofit organization La Paz De Dios to help with today's registration.
Lead ELL teacher Marisol Jimenez also conducted training on Tuesday to teach other instructors at East Side how to assist parents who may not speak English.
When Ms. Baker became principal of East Side 13 years ago, her school had fewer than 500 students, most of them black, and only about 10 ELL students.
The growth she has seen in the Hispanic population has been steady, she said, which has made it easier for students and teachers to change and adapt.
"We've learned how to work with (ELL students) as they come, as opposed to going from one to 100 in one year," she said.
Staff Photo by John Rawlston Marisol Jimenez, lead Enlish-as-a-second-language (ESL) teacher at East Side Elementary, talks on Tuesday with kindergarden teachers Brittany Hobbs, left, Darcey Cavanaugh, and Melissa Dawson, right. When numbers are tallied from Wednesday's registration, East Side Elementary expects to have a student body comprised of 50 percent Hispanic-speaking students.
The overall culture of the elementary school is really no different with a majority of Hispanic students than it would be any other group, Ms. Baker said. Students have benefited from being exposed to other cultures, she said.
"Our kids have always been very, very accepting of each other. When the Hispanic students started coming in, they really took them under their wings and nurtured them," she said. "They have so much more in common than they're different."
Are Hispanic nominations becoming too political?
Sotomayor's and other Hispanic nominations becoming politicized
By Adrian Perez, Publisher, The Latino Journal E-News
Today, the U.S. Senate will vote to confirm Judge Sonia Sotomayor as a member of the U.S. Supreme Court. Many of us believe she will receive 70 votes, enough to be confirmed as the first Latino to hold such a powerful and meaningful position. On Monday, many of us were surprised with Senator John McCain’s decision not to endorse Sotomayor. This is a Republican Senator who has appealed to the Latino community and has gained much respect and support from Latinos in his home state of Arizona.
In listening to his reasons for not supporting Sotomayor, McCain touched on several issues that need to be considered when selecting any candidate for the Supreme Court. This is a lifetime appointment and the ability to interpret the law and not make the law is a crucial factor. Yet, appointing members to the Supreme Court has become a politicized process that could threaten the true separation of powers.
It is true, as McCain stated in his speech, that Sotomayor had several of her decisions overturned by the Second Circuit in cases where she relied on foreign law rather than U.S. law, where she was found to have exceeded her jurisdiction in deciding a case involving a state law claim, where she tried to impose a settlement in a dispute between businesses, and where she unnecessarily limited the intellectual property rights of freelance authors. But, were these sufficient to create doubt in her approval as a Supreme Court Judge? No!
In justifying his decision to oppose Judge Sotomayor’s nomination, he brought up another Latino nominated by President George W. Bush, and who was eminently qualified to be a Supreme Court justice, but whose nomination was filibustered by the Democrats. It was the first ever filibuster to be used in determining the nomination of a Supreme Court Justice in American history.
It is unfortunate to see Republicans and Democrats playing politics with our lives in fixing the economy and considering health care reform. But it’s another thing for them to be playing political “chess” in the selection of Supreme Court Justices. The court’s role is to apply the law faithfully and not base decisions on political loyalty. It’s this aspect that threatens the separation of powers and should be all of our concern.
By Adrian Perez, Publisher, The Latino Journal E-News
Today, the U.S. Senate will vote to confirm Judge Sonia Sotomayor as a member of the U.S. Supreme Court. Many of us believe she will receive 70 votes, enough to be confirmed as the first Latino to hold such a powerful and meaningful position. On Monday, many of us were surprised with Senator John McCain’s decision not to endorse Sotomayor. This is a Republican Senator who has appealed to the Latino community and has gained much respect and support from Latinos in his home state of Arizona.
In listening to his reasons for not supporting Sotomayor, McCain touched on several issues that need to be considered when selecting any candidate for the Supreme Court. This is a lifetime appointment and the ability to interpret the law and not make the law is a crucial factor. Yet, appointing members to the Supreme Court has become a politicized process that could threaten the true separation of powers.
It is true, as McCain stated in his speech, that Sotomayor had several of her decisions overturned by the Second Circuit in cases where she relied on foreign law rather than U.S. law, where she was found to have exceeded her jurisdiction in deciding a case involving a state law claim, where she tried to impose a settlement in a dispute between businesses, and where she unnecessarily limited the intellectual property rights of freelance authors. But, were these sufficient to create doubt in her approval as a Supreme Court Judge? No!
In justifying his decision to oppose Judge Sotomayor’s nomination, he brought up another Latino nominated by President George W. Bush, and who was eminently qualified to be a Supreme Court justice, but whose nomination was filibustered by the Democrats. It was the first ever filibuster to be used in determining the nomination of a Supreme Court Justice in American history.
It is unfortunate to see Republicans and Democrats playing politics with our lives in fixing the economy and considering health care reform. But it’s another thing for them to be playing political “chess” in the selection of Supreme Court Justices. The court’s role is to apply the law faithfully and not base decisions on political loyalty. It’s this aspect that threatens the separation of powers and should be all of our concern.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Latino vote carefully analyzed
Obama, the GOP, and the Latino vote
Mark Murray, MSNBC, August 04, 2009
From NBC's Mark Murray
With the Senate beginning its debate on Sonia Sotomayor's Supreme Court nomination today, it's worth pointing out how stable Obama's support among Latinos has been since he became president -- even with his poll numbers falling back to earth.
In the Feb.-March NBC/WSJ poll, Obama's approval among Latinos was at 67%; in April it was 76%; in June it was 71%, and July it was 66%. These percentages are consistent with the exit polls from November, which showed Obama getting 67% of the Latino vote.
Video: Chris Simcox, founder of the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps, is challenging Sen. John McCain in next year’s senatorial primary. He joins a Morning Meeting panel to discuss the politics behind Sen. McCain’s refusal to support Sonia Sotomayor.
On the other hand, Republicans haven't made much progress with Latinos. In Feb.-March, the GOP's fav/unfav among Hispanics was 25%-41%; in April it was 26%-50%; in June it was 29%-48%; and in July it was 20%-41%.
Journalist Tom Edsall, writing for the Huffington Post, notes that the Republican Party's grievances against the Obama administration are having an effect with white Americans -- Obama's approval with this group has dropped from 54% in Feb.-March to 46% now in the NBC/WSJ poll -- but not with Hispanics or African Americans.
"It's all very reminiscent of the party's notorious Southern Strategy, which carried the GOP for decades," Edsall says. "But that strategy backfired spectacularly in the 2006 and 2008 elections, and there's no reason to think it will work any better in 2010 -- especially given the ever-growing importance of the minority electorate."
More: "In this respect, even if the GOP picks up a few House and Senate seats in 2010, many of the party's top analysts believe that it will remain mired in minority status through 2012 and beyond. Other analysts say it may even decline to the level of a minor regional party, with its only real strength in the South."
Mark Murray, MSNBC, August 04, 2009
From NBC's Mark Murray
With the Senate beginning its debate on Sonia Sotomayor's Supreme Court nomination today, it's worth pointing out how stable Obama's support among Latinos has been since he became president -- even with his poll numbers falling back to earth.
In the Feb.-March NBC/WSJ poll, Obama's approval among Latinos was at 67%; in April it was 76%; in June it was 71%, and July it was 66%. These percentages are consistent with the exit polls from November, which showed Obama getting 67% of the Latino vote.
Video: Chris Simcox, founder of the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps, is challenging Sen. John McCain in next year’s senatorial primary. He joins a Morning Meeting panel to discuss the politics behind Sen. McCain’s refusal to support Sonia Sotomayor.
On the other hand, Republicans haven't made much progress with Latinos. In Feb.-March, the GOP's fav/unfav among Hispanics was 25%-41%; in April it was 26%-50%; in June it was 29%-48%; and in July it was 20%-41%.
Journalist Tom Edsall, writing for the Huffington Post, notes that the Republican Party's grievances against the Obama administration are having an effect with white Americans -- Obama's approval with this group has dropped from 54% in Feb.-March to 46% now in the NBC/WSJ poll -- but not with Hispanics or African Americans.
"It's all very reminiscent of the party's notorious Southern Strategy, which carried the GOP for decades," Edsall says. "But that strategy backfired spectacularly in the 2006 and 2008 elections, and there's no reason to think it will work any better in 2010 -- especially given the ever-growing importance of the minority electorate."
More: "In this respect, even if the GOP picks up a few House and Senate seats in 2010, many of the party's top analysts believe that it will remain mired in minority status through 2012 and beyond. Other analysts say it may even decline to the level of a minor regional party, with its only real strength in the South."
Hispanic backlash not a concern for GOP Senators
GOP Senators Seem Unconcerned About Hispanic Backlash
28 Say They Will Vote Against the First Latina Supreme Court Nominee
By Paul Kane and Perry Bacon Jr, Washington Post, August 5, 2009
Senate Republicans have lined up in staunch opposition to the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, rejecting concerns about alienating the growing Hispanic vote.
Even before debate began Tuesday night, almost three-fourths of the Senate Republican Conference had already announced opposition to the first Latina ever nominated to the nation's highest court. The party's 2008 standard bearer, Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), joined the chorus of opposition this week, and no likely contender for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination has spoken in support of confirmation.
Sotomayor has the backing of every Senate Democrat and at least a half-dozen Senate Republicans, assuring her of confirmation by week's end. But the 28 already-pronounced no votes from Republicans would dwarf the single-digit opposition drawn by the two previous nominees from a Democratic president, Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer.
Most Senate Republicans say opposition to Sotomayor is a principled stand based on the belief that her public speeches reveal a personal bias in her judicial philosophy. Republicans have cited her views on Second Amendment cases, speeches she has given during her time as a federal judge and a key ruling on affirmative action -- all issues that are of sharp interest to conservative-base voters.
But some senators and Republican strategists worry that efforts to shore up support from conservative voters who dominate the GOP primaries could become a missed opportunity to extend an olive branch to Latino voters, who gave just 31 percent of their ballots to McCain last fall.
Even some of Sotomayor's opponents said they recognize the decision is fraught with some peril. "I don't feel happy about being against Sonia Sotomayor. I'm not happy about it," said Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), who has voted in favor of every Supreme Court nominee since he was first elected in 1976. "When I add up all the things that are wrong [with Sotomayor's record], I think it's the right thing to do, but it's not a happy day for me."
Republicans entered this confirmation battle holding just 40 seats and with Obama's approval rating above 60 percent when he nominated Sotomayor 10 weeks ago. They also entered the fray rejecting conservative commentators such as radio host Rush Limbaugh and former House speaker Newt Gingrich, both of whom labeled her "racist" for speeches suggesting that "wise Latina" judges would make better rulings than white male judges.
GOP senators began a two-pronged effort to personally compliment the nominee's background while also citing her rulings as grounds for opposing her, apparently hoping not to offend Latino voters or conservative activists.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Tuesday that her "wise Latina" speeches suggested that her empathy, a quality Obama said he wanted, would trump blind adherence to the law. He particularly criticized her joint ruling with other appellate court judges in a firefighters' case, which said that the town of New Haven, Conn., could reject the results of a promotion test based on the fact that few minorities scored well. In June, the Supreme Court overturned that ruling.
"Judge Sotomayor has impressed all of us with her life story. But if empathy is the new standard, then the burden is on nominees like her, who are chosen on that basis, to demonstrate a firm commitment to equal justice under the law," McConnell said.
With Obama's approval rating falling as he has become enmeshed in the health-care debate, Republicans have grown more comfortable opposing Sotomayor. Still, she already has twice as many votes from the minority party as Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. had after being nominated by in 2006 by President George W. Bush. Democrats also forced an unsuccessful filibuster vote on Alito, a move that Republicans are not forcing on Sotomayor.
Some Republican strategists warn that the tone of the debate and statements of personal praise for Sotomayor's hardscrabble upbringing in the Bronx will fall short with Latino voters, because the final GOP vote will appear so lopsided against her.
"Latinos see her as a symbol of Hispanic leadership in America," said Lionel Sosa, a Latino political strategist who has advised several presidential candidates on Hispanic outreach, including McCain. "If they vote against Sotomayor, it's a vote against Hispanic leadership in America. That's the way Latino voters will see it."
Others disagreed, saying there was little to be gained by trying to appease Latinos by voting simply based on ethnicity. "It is insulting that Hispanics would believe a Hispanic nominee must be approved solely because of her ethnicity and not on the merits of her achievements, impartiality and judicial philosophy," said Alex Castellanos, a Cuban American strategist who advises the Republican National Committee.
Some Republicans said there is no monolithic Latino vote, with only a few states in which Latinos make up a critical segment of ballots.
In a recent NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll, 58 percent of Hispanics favored Sotomayor's confirmation, 11 percent opposed her, and about 30 percent had no opinion. But the poll found continuing troubles for Republicans with Hispanics: Just 20 percent had favorable views of the Republican Party, while 41 percent had unfavorable views.
Several Republicans who will face GOP primary voters next year have opposed Sotomayor, including some from Sun Belt states with sizable Hispanic populations. McCain and Sen. Robert F. Bennett (Utah), both facing conservative primary challengers, are opposing her. Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, who is considered insufficiently conservative by some Sunshine State Republicans, announced he would oppose her nomination. Crist is running against former Florida House speaker Marco Rubio, who is Cuban American and also opposes Sotomayor, for the GOP nomination to succeed outgoing Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.).
Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R), running in a primary for the Texas governor's race, also announced her opposition to Sotomayor.
Where Republican primaries are already settled or the field is clear, conservatives have come out in support. Former representative Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), running unopposed for the nomination to challenge Sen. Arlen Specter (D), announced he would support Sotomayor if he were in the Senate.
Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.), one of the six Republicans who has said he will support Sotomayor, said the Supreme Court confirmation process had become akin to "Mideast politics," with the minority invariably opposed to the president's nominee as a way to appease its base.
"You're seeing what I'm afraid is the going to be the future. It's Mideast politics, and Mideast politics, when it comes to judging, will not serve the judiciary well in the long run," Graham said.
Polling analyst Jennifer Agiesta contributed to this report.
28 Say They Will Vote Against the First Latina Supreme Court Nominee
By Paul Kane and Perry Bacon Jr, Washington Post, August 5, 2009
Senate Republicans have lined up in staunch opposition to the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, rejecting concerns about alienating the growing Hispanic vote.
Even before debate began Tuesday night, almost three-fourths of the Senate Republican Conference had already announced opposition to the first Latina ever nominated to the nation's highest court. The party's 2008 standard bearer, Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), joined the chorus of opposition this week, and no likely contender for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination has spoken in support of confirmation.
Sotomayor has the backing of every Senate Democrat and at least a half-dozen Senate Republicans, assuring her of confirmation by week's end. But the 28 already-pronounced no votes from Republicans would dwarf the single-digit opposition drawn by the two previous nominees from a Democratic president, Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer.
Most Senate Republicans say opposition to Sotomayor is a principled stand based on the belief that her public speeches reveal a personal bias in her judicial philosophy. Republicans have cited her views on Second Amendment cases, speeches she has given during her time as a federal judge and a key ruling on affirmative action -- all issues that are of sharp interest to conservative-base voters.
But some senators and Republican strategists worry that efforts to shore up support from conservative voters who dominate the GOP primaries could become a missed opportunity to extend an olive branch to Latino voters, who gave just 31 percent of their ballots to McCain last fall.
Even some of Sotomayor's opponents said they recognize the decision is fraught with some peril. "I don't feel happy about being against Sonia Sotomayor. I'm not happy about it," said Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), who has voted in favor of every Supreme Court nominee since he was first elected in 1976. "When I add up all the things that are wrong [with Sotomayor's record], I think it's the right thing to do, but it's not a happy day for me."
Republicans entered this confirmation battle holding just 40 seats and with Obama's approval rating above 60 percent when he nominated Sotomayor 10 weeks ago. They also entered the fray rejecting conservative commentators such as radio host Rush Limbaugh and former House speaker Newt Gingrich, both of whom labeled her "racist" for speeches suggesting that "wise Latina" judges would make better rulings than white male judges.
GOP senators began a two-pronged effort to personally compliment the nominee's background while also citing her rulings as grounds for opposing her, apparently hoping not to offend Latino voters or conservative activists.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Tuesday that her "wise Latina" speeches suggested that her empathy, a quality Obama said he wanted, would trump blind adherence to the law. He particularly criticized her joint ruling with other appellate court judges in a firefighters' case, which said that the town of New Haven, Conn., could reject the results of a promotion test based on the fact that few minorities scored well. In June, the Supreme Court overturned that ruling.
"Judge Sotomayor has impressed all of us with her life story. But if empathy is the new standard, then the burden is on nominees like her, who are chosen on that basis, to demonstrate a firm commitment to equal justice under the law," McConnell said.
With Obama's approval rating falling as he has become enmeshed in the health-care debate, Republicans have grown more comfortable opposing Sotomayor. Still, she already has twice as many votes from the minority party as Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. had after being nominated by in 2006 by President George W. Bush. Democrats also forced an unsuccessful filibuster vote on Alito, a move that Republicans are not forcing on Sotomayor.
Some Republican strategists warn that the tone of the debate and statements of personal praise for Sotomayor's hardscrabble upbringing in the Bronx will fall short with Latino voters, because the final GOP vote will appear so lopsided against her.
"Latinos see her as a symbol of Hispanic leadership in America," said Lionel Sosa, a Latino political strategist who has advised several presidential candidates on Hispanic outreach, including McCain. "If they vote against Sotomayor, it's a vote against Hispanic leadership in America. That's the way Latino voters will see it."
Others disagreed, saying there was little to be gained by trying to appease Latinos by voting simply based on ethnicity. "It is insulting that Hispanics would believe a Hispanic nominee must be approved solely because of her ethnicity and not on the merits of her achievements, impartiality and judicial philosophy," said Alex Castellanos, a Cuban American strategist who advises the Republican National Committee.
Some Republicans said there is no monolithic Latino vote, with only a few states in which Latinos make up a critical segment of ballots.
In a recent NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll, 58 percent of Hispanics favored Sotomayor's confirmation, 11 percent opposed her, and about 30 percent had no opinion. But the poll found continuing troubles for Republicans with Hispanics: Just 20 percent had favorable views of the Republican Party, while 41 percent had unfavorable views.
Several Republicans who will face GOP primary voters next year have opposed Sotomayor, including some from Sun Belt states with sizable Hispanic populations. McCain and Sen. Robert F. Bennett (Utah), both facing conservative primary challengers, are opposing her. Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, who is considered insufficiently conservative by some Sunshine State Republicans, announced he would oppose her nomination. Crist is running against former Florida House speaker Marco Rubio, who is Cuban American and also opposes Sotomayor, for the GOP nomination to succeed outgoing Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.).
Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R), running in a primary for the Texas governor's race, also announced her opposition to Sotomayor.
Where Republican primaries are already settled or the field is clear, conservatives have come out in support. Former representative Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), running unopposed for the nomination to challenge Sen. Arlen Specter (D), announced he would support Sotomayor if he were in the Senate.
Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.), one of the six Republicans who has said he will support Sotomayor, said the Supreme Court confirmation process had become akin to "Mideast politics," with the minority invariably opposed to the president's nominee as a way to appease its base.
"You're seeing what I'm afraid is the going to be the future. It's Mideast politics, and Mideast politics, when it comes to judging, will not serve the judiciary well in the long run," Graham said.
Polling analyst Jennifer Agiesta contributed to this report.
Latino political growth significant in California
Makeup of Calif. GOP lags state's ethnic diversity
By TOM VERDIN, Associated Press, August 4, 2009
SACRAMENTO, Calif. - A new Field Poll is showing how the California Republican Party has failed to keep pace with the state's evolving demographics over the past 30 years.
The survey, released Tuesday, illustrates the changing face of California and its electorate since 1978, providing a wide snapshot of a state in transition.
The California GOP has increased its share of Hispanics, blacks, Asians and others since 1978, but the changes have lagged shifts in the state's overall diversity.
Today, about 79 percent of Republican Party members are white, even as whites in California's overall population have dropped from 69 percent in 1978 to less than 43 percent.
The state GOP chairman says broadening the party's reach has become a top priority.
By TOM VERDIN, Associated Press, August 4, 2009
SACRAMENTO, Calif. - A new Field Poll is showing how the California Republican Party has failed to keep pace with the state's evolving demographics over the past 30 years.
The survey, released Tuesday, illustrates the changing face of California and its electorate since 1978, providing a wide snapshot of a state in transition.
The California GOP has increased its share of Hispanics, blacks, Asians and others since 1978, but the changes have lagged shifts in the state's overall diversity.
Today, about 79 percent of Republican Party members are white, even as whites in California's overall population have dropped from 69 percent in 1978 to less than 43 percent.
The state GOP chairman says broadening the party's reach has become a top priority.
Hispanic to lead the American Bar Association
AMERICAN BAR ASSOCIATION ELECTS
MIAMI LAWYER STEPHEN N. ZACK PRESIDENT-ELECT
PRESS RELEASE
CHICAGO, Aug. 4, 2009 – Miami lawyer Stephen N. Zack, a partner in the national law firm Boies, Schiller & Flexner, was elected as president-elect of the American Bar Association – the first Hispanic American to achieve that distinction. Zack will serve one year as president-elect before taking office as president in August 2010 at the ABA’s Annual Meeting in San Francisco.
The son of a Cuban mother and American father, Zack is focused on promoting civics education, the importance of inspiring a new generation of lawyers and ABA programs that advance access to justice for everyone in the United States. In addition, he will work to create a commission on Hispanic rights.
“I am proud to be the first Hispanic American slated to become the president of the ABA. This country is still a land of opportunity. I want to work as an advocate for access to justice – and also for the possibilities that can exist for all young students from all backgrounds.”
In his speech to the House of Delegates, Zack said he will focus on “two critical areas” of the legal profession – civics education and the high cost of legal education. He said these issues and the programs and strategies to address them will have “an impact on the profession and on future generations.”
In the coming year, Zack, who grew up in Cuba and has practiced law for more than 35 years, will work with other bar associations to develop a pilot program for an American Bar Academy to teach students about everything from making an opening statement to understanding the Bill of Rights. The goal is to eventually enroll a small group of students – half of which would be minority students -- from every high school in the United States to participate in an educational program over the President’s Day holiday weekend. Zack called on members of the ABA to get involved.
“Every last one of us will go in and teach these students. We can’t wait. We will begin to reach out to a new generation,” said Zack.
In addition, Zack said he is determined to push for a renewed focus on teaching civics education in the classrooms of America so that students truly understand why we have three separate branches of government.
“With every right that we have comes an obligation to understand those rights,” Zack said after quoting a study that revealed that most Americans cannot name the three branches of government.
His hope is that a renewed interest in civics and an understanding of the role of government will not only create a more informed citizenry, but also increase student interest in pursuing a career in law.
Zack said a law school education must be affordable for all, otherwise, “We will become an elitist profession at a time when we must look like the people we represent. We have an overriding obligation to make sure that a new generation can service the needs of all Americans.”
Prior to his selection as president-elect, Zack served from 2004-2006 as chair of the ABA’s House of Delegates, the 555-member body that debates and votes on issues that become official ABA policy. The chair of the House is the second highest elected office within the association.
More than three decades ago, Zack became an active ABA member not long after completing his law degree at the University of Florida. He is passionate about the mission of the ABA – serving the public and legal profession by “defending liberty and delivering justice as the national representative of the legal profession” – and believes that all lawyers have a special obligation to promote these goals and to speak out against the repression of freedom.
At the ABA, Zack has a long record of service. In addition to his serving as chair of the policy-making House of Delegates, recent activities have included being a member-at-large of the Long Range Planning Committee of the Board of Governors, member of the Advisory Committee to the chair of the House of Delegates, member of the Center for Racial and Ethnic Diversity, member-at-large of the Section of International Law and secretary of the American Bar Endowment.
Zack has served as a member of the House of Delegates since 1988, and was a Florida State delegate from 1997-2000. He is a former member of the ABA Board of Governors (1992-1995),
and was a board liaison to the Sections of Litigation and Dispute Resolution. In addition, Zack served as president of the National Conference of Bar Presidents, is a former chair of the Standing Committee on Bar Activities and Services, a former member of the Commission on the Judiciary in the 21st Century and a former chair of the ABA Latin American Council.
Zack is also a founding member of the Cuban American Bar Association and a life Fellow of the American Bar Foundation, which promotes justice through research on the law and its impact on society.
An active member of the Florida Bar Association, Zack has served as president of the association, president of the Young Lawyers Section and chair of the International Law Section. He was a member of the 11th Circuit (Miami-Dade County) Judicial Nominating Committee for the Southern District, the Federal Judicial Nominating Commission’s Board of Governors and a Florida Bar Fellow.
Zack’s civic activities in Florida include special counsel to Gov. Bob Graham, chair of the State Ethics Commission of the State of Florida and member of the Florida Constitutional Revision Commission. He chaired the City of Miami Beach Charter Review Commission and the Environmental Commission for the City of Miami. He is a former legislative aide to Rep. Claude Pepper and a former member of the Orange Bowl Committee and of the Public Health Trust.
Zack received his B.A. from the University of Florida, where he was elected to its Hall of Fame. He has been admitted to practice in Florida, New York and Washington, D.C.; the Supreme Court of the United States; the Supreme Court of Florida; the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit; and the U.S. District Courts for the Northern, Middle and Southern Districts of Florida.
With more than 400,000 members, the American Bar Association is the largest voluntary professional membership organization in the world. As the national voice of the legal profession, the ABA works to improve the administration of justice, promotes programs that assist lawyers and judges in their work, accredits law schools, provides continuing legal education, and works to build public understanding around the world of the importance of the rule of law.
MIAMI LAWYER STEPHEN N. ZACK PRESIDENT-ELECT
PRESS RELEASE
CHICAGO, Aug. 4, 2009 – Miami lawyer Stephen N. Zack, a partner in the national law firm Boies, Schiller & Flexner, was elected as president-elect of the American Bar Association – the first Hispanic American to achieve that distinction. Zack will serve one year as president-elect before taking office as president in August 2010 at the ABA’s Annual Meeting in San Francisco.
The son of a Cuban mother and American father, Zack is focused on promoting civics education, the importance of inspiring a new generation of lawyers and ABA programs that advance access to justice for everyone in the United States. In addition, he will work to create a commission on Hispanic rights.
“I am proud to be the first Hispanic American slated to become the president of the ABA. This country is still a land of opportunity. I want to work as an advocate for access to justice – and also for the possibilities that can exist for all young students from all backgrounds.”
In his speech to the House of Delegates, Zack said he will focus on “two critical areas” of the legal profession – civics education and the high cost of legal education. He said these issues and the programs and strategies to address them will have “an impact on the profession and on future generations.”
In the coming year, Zack, who grew up in Cuba and has practiced law for more than 35 years, will work with other bar associations to develop a pilot program for an American Bar Academy to teach students about everything from making an opening statement to understanding the Bill of Rights. The goal is to eventually enroll a small group of students – half of which would be minority students -- from every high school in the United States to participate in an educational program over the President’s Day holiday weekend. Zack called on members of the ABA to get involved.
“Every last one of us will go in and teach these students. We can’t wait. We will begin to reach out to a new generation,” said Zack.
In addition, Zack said he is determined to push for a renewed focus on teaching civics education in the classrooms of America so that students truly understand why we have three separate branches of government.
“With every right that we have comes an obligation to understand those rights,” Zack said after quoting a study that revealed that most Americans cannot name the three branches of government.
His hope is that a renewed interest in civics and an understanding of the role of government will not only create a more informed citizenry, but also increase student interest in pursuing a career in law.
Zack said a law school education must be affordable for all, otherwise, “We will become an elitist profession at a time when we must look like the people we represent. We have an overriding obligation to make sure that a new generation can service the needs of all Americans.”
Prior to his selection as president-elect, Zack served from 2004-2006 as chair of the ABA’s House of Delegates, the 555-member body that debates and votes on issues that become official ABA policy. The chair of the House is the second highest elected office within the association.
More than three decades ago, Zack became an active ABA member not long after completing his law degree at the University of Florida. He is passionate about the mission of the ABA – serving the public and legal profession by “defending liberty and delivering justice as the national representative of the legal profession” – and believes that all lawyers have a special obligation to promote these goals and to speak out against the repression of freedom.
At the ABA, Zack has a long record of service. In addition to his serving as chair of the policy-making House of Delegates, recent activities have included being a member-at-large of the Long Range Planning Committee of the Board of Governors, member of the Advisory Committee to the chair of the House of Delegates, member of the Center for Racial and Ethnic Diversity, member-at-large of the Section of International Law and secretary of the American Bar Endowment.
Zack has served as a member of the House of Delegates since 1988, and was a Florida State delegate from 1997-2000. He is a former member of the ABA Board of Governors (1992-1995),
and was a board liaison to the Sections of Litigation and Dispute Resolution. In addition, Zack served as president of the National Conference of Bar Presidents, is a former chair of the Standing Committee on Bar Activities and Services, a former member of the Commission on the Judiciary in the 21st Century and a former chair of the ABA Latin American Council.
Zack is also a founding member of the Cuban American Bar Association and a life Fellow of the American Bar Foundation, which promotes justice through research on the law and its impact on society.
An active member of the Florida Bar Association, Zack has served as president of the association, president of the Young Lawyers Section and chair of the International Law Section. He was a member of the 11th Circuit (Miami-Dade County) Judicial Nominating Committee for the Southern District, the Federal Judicial Nominating Commission’s Board of Governors and a Florida Bar Fellow.
Zack’s civic activities in Florida include special counsel to Gov. Bob Graham, chair of the State Ethics Commission of the State of Florida and member of the Florida Constitutional Revision Commission. He chaired the City of Miami Beach Charter Review Commission and the Environmental Commission for the City of Miami. He is a former legislative aide to Rep. Claude Pepper and a former member of the Orange Bowl Committee and of the Public Health Trust.
Zack received his B.A. from the University of Florida, where he was elected to its Hall of Fame. He has been admitted to practice in Florida, New York and Washington, D.C.; the Supreme Court of the United States; the Supreme Court of Florida; the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit; and the U.S. District Courts for the Northern, Middle and Southern Districts of Florida.
With more than 400,000 members, the American Bar Association is the largest voluntary professional membership organization in the world. As the national voice of the legal profession, the ABA works to improve the administration of justice, promotes programs that assist lawyers and judges in their work, accredits law schools, provides continuing legal education, and works to build public understanding around the world of the importance of the rule of law.
Monday, August 3, 2009
McCain tells GOP to court Hispanic voters
McCain to GOP: Reach out to Hispanics
Politico.com, August 02, 2009
Sen. John McCain warned that unless Republicans make a strong effort to reach out to Hispanics, the party will continue to be left behind. The Arizona Republican also said that under certain conditions he would work with President Obama on immigration reform.
“On the issue of the Hispanic voter, we have to do a lot more,” McCain said in an interview on CNN’s State of the Union. “We Republicans have to recruit and elect Hispanics to office. And I don't mean just because they’re Hispanics, but they represent a big part of the growing population in America. And we have a lot of work to do there.”
McCain, the last GOP presidential nominee, put himself squarely on one side of a Republican divide over how to approach Hispanic voters. Other party leaders, such as former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, have said the GOP’s strong stance on immigration has alienated the country’s fastest growing voting bloc – and that Republicans continue to tow that line at their own peril.
“I am of the belief that unless we reverse the trend of Hispanic voter registration, we have a very, very deep hole that we’ve got to come out of,” McCain said.
He also said that for the GOP to rebuild, Republicans need to reclaim the mantle of fiscal conservatism.
“We lost a lot of our base because they thought we had become big spenders and basically they were right,” McCain said.
A leading proponent of immigration reform efforts during the Bush administration that were foiled by conservatives in his own party, McCain said he would be willing to work with Obama on the issue.
But, McCain said, Obama would have to put forward an immigration policy that included a temporary worker program in order to win his help.
“That and securing the borders is what we're going to have to do, otherwise we'll experience failure again,” McCain said.
Politico.com, August 02, 2009
Sen. John McCain warned that unless Republicans make a strong effort to reach out to Hispanics, the party will continue to be left behind. The Arizona Republican also said that under certain conditions he would work with President Obama on immigration reform.
“On the issue of the Hispanic voter, we have to do a lot more,” McCain said in an interview on CNN’s State of the Union. “We Republicans have to recruit and elect Hispanics to office. And I don't mean just because they’re Hispanics, but they represent a big part of the growing population in America. And we have a lot of work to do there.”
McCain, the last GOP presidential nominee, put himself squarely on one side of a Republican divide over how to approach Hispanic voters. Other party leaders, such as former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, have said the GOP’s strong stance on immigration has alienated the country’s fastest growing voting bloc – and that Republicans continue to tow that line at their own peril.
“I am of the belief that unless we reverse the trend of Hispanic voter registration, we have a very, very deep hole that we’ve got to come out of,” McCain said.
He also said that for the GOP to rebuild, Republicans need to reclaim the mantle of fiscal conservatism.
“We lost a lot of our base because they thought we had become big spenders and basically they were right,” McCain said.
A leading proponent of immigration reform efforts during the Bush administration that were foiled by conservatives in his own party, McCain said he would be willing to work with Obama on the issue.
But, McCain said, Obama would have to put forward an immigration policy that included a temporary worker program in order to win his help.
“That and securing the borders is what we're going to have to do, otherwise we'll experience failure again,” McCain said.
Teachers try to oust first Latino AG
Commentary: Former AG humiliated once again
By RICK CASEY, HOUSTON CHRONICLE, Aug. 1, 2009
I was appalled to learn that former Houston lawyer and U.S. attorney general Alberto Gonzales will be teaching a course at Texas Tech.
Here is a man who has been unable to find steady work since being humiliated in front of a Senate Committee, forced out of his job as the nation's top government lawyer in disgrace, and made the butt of countless jokes by late-night TV personalities.
Hasn't he suffered enough?
Now he has to deal with a faculty of eggheads who have taken up a petition — at least 45 signatures so far — chastising Tech Chancellor Kent Hance (a former congressman who has the kindness to offer a helping hand to down-on-their-luck former government officials) for hiring Gonzales.
The petition calls Gonzales a poor choice as a teacher because he has “demonstrated significant ethical failings.”
The drafter of the petition is a philosophy professor whose ivory tower experience does not include standing between Dick Cheney and the U.S. Constitution.
Gonzales has to face a group of students who will snicker in his class on “Contemporary Issues in the Executive Branch,” in which, he told the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, he will discuss the accomplishments of the Bush Justice Department and the challenges facing the Obama administration.
One of the first online comments written by a student under a story in the student newspaper The Daily Toreador was: “If he can't recall the course material, will the students get a refund?”
It was a reference to the Senate hearings on the firing of seven U.S. attorneys, apparently for political reasons. Gonzales demonstrated a heroic inability to remember any role he may have had in the matter.
All of this, and the poor guy has to live in Lubbock.
Wait, there's more. In addition to teaching the one course, Gonzales will recruit Hispanic students.
This is important work. Just Thursday the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board issued a report saying the state is woefully behind goals set in 2000 for increasing Hispanic college enrollment. Hispanic enrollment increased by 54.5 percent from 2000 to 2008, but the base was so low that goals call for a much greater increase.
At Texas Tech, Hispanic enrollment grew 52 percent during that period, but the group still makes up only 12.9 percent of the university's enrolment.
Gonzales' résumé doesn't give much evidence of either teaching ability or recruiting skills, which may explain why he agreed to work for $100,000 — an insulting amount for your average ex-Cabinet member.
Chances are he would have demanded more if he understood what is involved in recruiting. Most humiliating is the prospect of attending scores of college fairs in which he will find himself in sweltering, jam-packed school gymnasiums pushing leaflets into the hands of acne-faced high school juniors.
Gonzales needs advice on how to play this game, so I recommend a lawyer from his birthplace, San Antonio.
Bill Avila, a former White House fellow himself, has been recruiting local students, mostly Hispanics, for Notre Dame for 25 years. In that time he's sent off more than 500 students, about two-thirds of them Hispanic.
“We go to all the fairs,” he said. “I went to Boerne, but my table was next to a beauty college table staffed by models. I didn't do so well.”
But Avila has braved such humiliations so successfully that Irish-American Notre Dame alumni in San Antonio have complained that they can't get their kids admitted.
Avila said he'd be happy to counsel Gonzales, even though he was a little taken aback by Alberto's $100,000 gratuity.
“The only perk I've received is that occasionally I can buy a football ticket for face value,” he said.
rick.casey@chron.com
By RICK CASEY, HOUSTON CHRONICLE, Aug. 1, 2009
I was appalled to learn that former Houston lawyer and U.S. attorney general Alberto Gonzales will be teaching a course at Texas Tech.
Here is a man who has been unable to find steady work since being humiliated in front of a Senate Committee, forced out of his job as the nation's top government lawyer in disgrace, and made the butt of countless jokes by late-night TV personalities.
Hasn't he suffered enough?
Now he has to deal with a faculty of eggheads who have taken up a petition — at least 45 signatures so far — chastising Tech Chancellor Kent Hance (a former congressman who has the kindness to offer a helping hand to down-on-their-luck former government officials) for hiring Gonzales.
The petition calls Gonzales a poor choice as a teacher because he has “demonstrated significant ethical failings.”
The drafter of the petition is a philosophy professor whose ivory tower experience does not include standing between Dick Cheney and the U.S. Constitution.
Gonzales has to face a group of students who will snicker in his class on “Contemporary Issues in the Executive Branch,” in which, he told the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, he will discuss the accomplishments of the Bush Justice Department and the challenges facing the Obama administration.
One of the first online comments written by a student under a story in the student newspaper The Daily Toreador was: “If he can't recall the course material, will the students get a refund?”
It was a reference to the Senate hearings on the firing of seven U.S. attorneys, apparently for political reasons. Gonzales demonstrated a heroic inability to remember any role he may have had in the matter.
All of this, and the poor guy has to live in Lubbock.
Wait, there's more. In addition to teaching the one course, Gonzales will recruit Hispanic students.
This is important work. Just Thursday the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board issued a report saying the state is woefully behind goals set in 2000 for increasing Hispanic college enrollment. Hispanic enrollment increased by 54.5 percent from 2000 to 2008, but the base was so low that goals call for a much greater increase.
At Texas Tech, Hispanic enrollment grew 52 percent during that period, but the group still makes up only 12.9 percent of the university's enrolment.
Gonzales' résumé doesn't give much evidence of either teaching ability or recruiting skills, which may explain why he agreed to work for $100,000 — an insulting amount for your average ex-Cabinet member.
Chances are he would have demanded more if he understood what is involved in recruiting. Most humiliating is the prospect of attending scores of college fairs in which he will find himself in sweltering, jam-packed school gymnasiums pushing leaflets into the hands of acne-faced high school juniors.
Gonzales needs advice on how to play this game, so I recommend a lawyer from his birthplace, San Antonio.
Bill Avila, a former White House fellow himself, has been recruiting local students, mostly Hispanics, for Notre Dame for 25 years. In that time he's sent off more than 500 students, about two-thirds of them Hispanic.
“We go to all the fairs,” he said. “I went to Boerne, but my table was next to a beauty college table staffed by models. I didn't do so well.”
But Avila has braved such humiliations so successfully that Irish-American Notre Dame alumni in San Antonio have complained that they can't get their kids admitted.
Avila said he'd be happy to counsel Gonzales, even though he was a little taken aback by Alberto's $100,000 gratuity.
“The only perk I've received is that occasionally I can buy a football ticket for face value,” he said.
rick.casey@chron.com
KC Latinos meet with White House staff
KC-area Latinos air concerns about education in forum with White House adviser
By JOE ROBERTSON, The Kansas City Star
Latinos continue to rise as the fastest-growing ethnic group in Kansas City-area schools, but too often they stand alone.
That was the message that Hispanic students and teachers wanted to deliver to the Obama administration, which last week sent a representative to the area to hear their concerns and ideas.
Alexis Gonzalez, a teenage student in the Park Hill School District, told how he and his friends tried to start an after-school Hispanic club. The attempt withered because it had no adult sponsorship.
The number of Hispanic students also is rising in the Hickman Mills School District, but teacher Susan Moreno said she was the only Hispanic teacher in her school.
“We need more Latino representation in education,” she said.
More than 100 people gathered Friday at Guadalupe Centers Inc., 1015 Avenida Cesar E. Chavez, to talk to Juan Sepulveda, the director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans.
Sepulveda, a Topeka native, said that what he heard would help shape the administration’s plans to improve schools.
“We’re feeling the hurt,” he said afterward. The Hispanic community needs “its best and brightest” to help schools keep up with the growing numbers and needs of Latino families.
Nationwide, about 20 percent of students in kindergarten through 12th grade are Hispanic, Sepulveda said. That number will grow because Hispanic children make up 25 to 30 percent of the children age 5 or younger.
Since the end of June, Sepulveda has led a listening tour that he expects will visit 35 cities in 18 states by the time it ends in September.
Sepulveda said he was hearing about the lack of Hispanic teachers, the need for more help for parents and the barriers in getting financial aid for college.
Many issues are complicated, such as the country’s ideological struggle over offering scholarships and in-state tuition to children of illegal immigrants.
But Sepulveda said he was excited by some of the ideas he has heard.
A man in Laredo, Texas, told Sepulveda that waiving taxes for teachers who worked in the toughest schools would be a good recruiting tool.
Something like that might be doable, Sepulveda said.
“People are putting out provocative ideas. We call it crowdsourcing. You throw the questions out to the whole population. We know that every one of these problems has been solved somewhere.”
To reach Joe Robertson, call 816-234-4789 or send e-mail to jrobertson@kcstar.com
By JOE ROBERTSON, The Kansas City Star
Latinos continue to rise as the fastest-growing ethnic group in Kansas City-area schools, but too often they stand alone.
That was the message that Hispanic students and teachers wanted to deliver to the Obama administration, which last week sent a representative to the area to hear their concerns and ideas.
Alexis Gonzalez, a teenage student in the Park Hill School District, told how he and his friends tried to start an after-school Hispanic club. The attempt withered because it had no adult sponsorship.
The number of Hispanic students also is rising in the Hickman Mills School District, but teacher Susan Moreno said she was the only Hispanic teacher in her school.
“We need more Latino representation in education,” she said.
More than 100 people gathered Friday at Guadalupe Centers Inc., 1015 Avenida Cesar E. Chavez, to talk to Juan Sepulveda, the director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans.
Sepulveda, a Topeka native, said that what he heard would help shape the administration’s plans to improve schools.
“We’re feeling the hurt,” he said afterward. The Hispanic community needs “its best and brightest” to help schools keep up with the growing numbers and needs of Latino families.
Nationwide, about 20 percent of students in kindergarten through 12th grade are Hispanic, Sepulveda said. That number will grow because Hispanic children make up 25 to 30 percent of the children age 5 or younger.
Since the end of June, Sepulveda has led a listening tour that he expects will visit 35 cities in 18 states by the time it ends in September.
Sepulveda said he was hearing about the lack of Hispanic teachers, the need for more help for parents and the barriers in getting financial aid for college.
Many issues are complicated, such as the country’s ideological struggle over offering scholarships and in-state tuition to children of illegal immigrants.
But Sepulveda said he was excited by some of the ideas he has heard.
A man in Laredo, Texas, told Sepulveda that waiving taxes for teachers who worked in the toughest schools would be a good recruiting tool.
Something like that might be doable, Sepulveda said.
“People are putting out provocative ideas. We call it crowdsourcing. You throw the questions out to the whole population. We know that every one of these problems has been solved somewhere.”
To reach Joe Robertson, call 816-234-4789 or send e-mail to jrobertson@kcstar.com
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Texas needs more Hispanics in higher ed
Report: Texas still lags in Hispanics in higher ed
The Associated Press, July 31, 2009
AUSTIN, Texas — Hispanic enrollment in Texas colleges and universities would need to almost double in the next six years to meet the state's goals by 2015, according to a new state report.
The staff report approved by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board on Thursday looked a progress toward goals adopted by the state in 2000. The board has long considered lagging Hispanic enrollment and graduation rates a major problem.
"Texas is not one of the highest-achieving states in terms of overall education attainment," Higher Education Commissioner Raymund Paredes said. "And Hispanics are the lowest-achieving of the three major ethnic groups in Texas."
The Austin American-Statesman reported Friday that the review found Hispanic enrollment had grown faster than that of blacks or whites but not fast enough to meet the state's goals. Nearly 129,500 more Hispanic students have enrolled in higher education since 2000, but another 309,000 would need to do so by 2015 to meet the state's goal of 5.7 percent of Hispanics enrolled.
Texas had about 367,000 Latino college students last year.
One problem is that too few Hispanic students graduate from high school, the report said. Only 54.2 percent of Hispanic seventh-graders in 1995 graduated from a Texas public high school, compared with 61.3 percent of all students, it said.
"Latino youth begin kindergarten far behind their peers," said Patricia Gandara, a UCLA professor of education. "Latino students require more investment by the state."
Officials pledged to address Hispanic achievement, as well as shortfalls in technology-related degrees, research funding and other benchmarks.
Texas has a goal of having 5.7 percent of each major ethnic and racial group in the state enroll in college by 2015. Last year, 5.4 percent of Texans were enrolled in public and private colleges and universities, up from 5 percent in 2000.
The proportion of blacks was the highest, at 5.6 percent, the report said.
The Associated Press, July 31, 2009
AUSTIN, Texas — Hispanic enrollment in Texas colleges and universities would need to almost double in the next six years to meet the state's goals by 2015, according to a new state report.
The staff report approved by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board on Thursday looked a progress toward goals adopted by the state in 2000. The board has long considered lagging Hispanic enrollment and graduation rates a major problem.
"Texas is not one of the highest-achieving states in terms of overall education attainment," Higher Education Commissioner Raymund Paredes said. "And Hispanics are the lowest-achieving of the three major ethnic groups in Texas."
The Austin American-Statesman reported Friday that the review found Hispanic enrollment had grown faster than that of blacks or whites but not fast enough to meet the state's goals. Nearly 129,500 more Hispanic students have enrolled in higher education since 2000, but another 309,000 would need to do so by 2015 to meet the state's goal of 5.7 percent of Hispanics enrolled.
Texas had about 367,000 Latino college students last year.
One problem is that too few Hispanic students graduate from high school, the report said. Only 54.2 percent of Hispanic seventh-graders in 1995 graduated from a Texas public high school, compared with 61.3 percent of all students, it said.
"Latino youth begin kindergarten far behind their peers," said Patricia Gandara, a UCLA professor of education. "Latino students require more investment by the state."
Officials pledged to address Hispanic achievement, as well as shortfalls in technology-related degrees, research funding and other benchmarks.
Texas has a goal of having 5.7 percent of each major ethnic and racial group in the state enroll in college by 2015. Last year, 5.4 percent of Texans were enrolled in public and private colleges and universities, up from 5 percent in 2000.
The proportion of blacks was the highest, at 5.6 percent, the report said.
GOP Candidate explains vote to Hispanics
Texas Sen. Hutchison explains no vote on Sotomayor
By CHRISTOPHER SHERMAN, Associated Press
McALLEN, Texas — U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas explained to a ballroom of Hispanic small business owners Friday that she would not vote to confirm the country's first Hispanic Supreme Court justice next week out of concern for protecting gun ownership rights.
The National Rifle Association has dubbed Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor "hostile" to the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.
Hutchison's explanation that she could not approve anyone for the federal bench who left any doubt about their absolute support for the right to bear arms earned a smattering of applause during her speech to the Texas Association of Mexican-American Chambers of Commerce annual convention.
The tepid response was eclipsed when Hutchison noted that 30 percent of nominees she had submitted for federal judgeships were Hispanic.
The rest of her speech touched on key small business issues: low taxes and affordable health care options.
At least once, Hutchison began a sentence with "If I'm elected governor," and directly criticized Gov. Rick Perry for his decision to not accept $555 million in federal stimulus money for the state's unemployment fund. Hutchison said it was a "mistake" and that the money could have offset an unemployment tax increase.
Hutchison announced Wednesday that she would leave her Senate seat this fall to campaign full time for governor. She has said she will formally announce her candidacy in August. The Republican primary, in which she would face Perry, is in March.
Marianne Martinez, of Austin, said she supports Sotomayor, but was not upset by Hutchison's decision not to vote for her confirmation.
"That's her decision," said Martinez, who had asked the senator for an autograph and posed for a photograph before the speech.
Alex Jimenez, chairman of TAMACC, said Hutchison's chances of attracting Hispanic votes in the gubernatorial contest will largely depend on how far she moves to the right to win what is expected to be a bruising primary with Perry.
"They'll be giving Democrats the best chance they've had in awhile," if they move hard right, especially if they spout anti-immigrant rhetoric, he said. TAMACC wants "people who are more balanced, more moderate."
Sotomayor is expected to be confirmed by the full Senate next week. Texas' junior senator, John Cornyn, voted against Sotomayor on the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier this week.
By CHRISTOPHER SHERMAN, Associated Press
McALLEN, Texas — U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas explained to a ballroom of Hispanic small business owners Friday that she would not vote to confirm the country's first Hispanic Supreme Court justice next week out of concern for protecting gun ownership rights.
The National Rifle Association has dubbed Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor "hostile" to the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.
Hutchison's explanation that she could not approve anyone for the federal bench who left any doubt about their absolute support for the right to bear arms earned a smattering of applause during her speech to the Texas Association of Mexican-American Chambers of Commerce annual convention.
The tepid response was eclipsed when Hutchison noted that 30 percent of nominees she had submitted for federal judgeships were Hispanic.
The rest of her speech touched on key small business issues: low taxes and affordable health care options.
At least once, Hutchison began a sentence with "If I'm elected governor," and directly criticized Gov. Rick Perry for his decision to not accept $555 million in federal stimulus money for the state's unemployment fund. Hutchison said it was a "mistake" and that the money could have offset an unemployment tax increase.
Hutchison announced Wednesday that she would leave her Senate seat this fall to campaign full time for governor. She has said she will formally announce her candidacy in August. The Republican primary, in which she would face Perry, is in March.
Marianne Martinez, of Austin, said she supports Sotomayor, but was not upset by Hutchison's decision not to vote for her confirmation.
"That's her decision," said Martinez, who had asked the senator for an autograph and posed for a photograph before the speech.
Alex Jimenez, chairman of TAMACC, said Hutchison's chances of attracting Hispanic votes in the gubernatorial contest will largely depend on how far she moves to the right to win what is expected to be a bruising primary with Perry.
"They'll be giving Democrats the best chance they've had in awhile," if they move hard right, especially if they spout anti-immigrant rhetoric, he said. TAMACC wants "people who are more balanced, more moderate."
Sotomayor is expected to be confirmed by the full Senate next week. Texas' junior senator, John Cornyn, voted against Sotomayor on the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier this week.
Latinos upset with GOP
Morris Latinos: We're upset with GOP
By MINHAJ HASSAN • Daily Record • July 30, 2009
A Senate committee's approval Tuesday of Judge Sonia Sotomayor, who was selected by President Barack Obama to serve on the Supreme Court, was a source of pride for many in the Latino community who also expressed disappoinment with the fact that only one Republican lawmaker supported her.
"Personally, I support the decision," said Xiomara Guevara, executive director of the Dover-based Morris County Organization of Hispanic Affairs, about the committee's majority approval. "The court needs to be reflective of the population. But it's not just race that matters. It's the qualifications. She has a proven record of following the law."
Guevara said she was hoping more Republicans would have come on board to support Sotomayor.
"I was disappointed," she said. "I was hoping it wouldn't come down to party lines. But you really can't do anything about it."
On Tuesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 13-6 to appoint Sotomayor to the highest court's seat that will be vacated by Justice David Souter, with all Democrats supporting her and all but one Republican, Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-S.C.), voting no.
Caryn Maxim, a local advocate on immigrant issues, also said she was pleased to see the support from some politicians for a Latina serving on the highest court.
"It would give some diversity on the court, which is much needed," she said, adding she was also disappointed with the lack of support from Republicans. "It is unfortunate they don't see the potential contributions she could make serving on the Supreme Court."
Many of the Republican lawmakers cited Sotomayor's past comments as indicators that she would not be impartial and would be an activist. Some cited a 32-word sentence she frequently used in speeches that suggested she would be a better decision-maker than her colleagues.
"I would hope that a wise Latina woman, with the richness of her experiences, would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life," the sentence reads.
One Republican lawmaker, Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, said, "Unfortunately, I'm not convinced that Judge Sotomayor will be able to set aside her personal preferences and prejudices."
Besides Graham, only a handful of the 40 Republican senators — Dick Lugar of Indiana, Mel Martinez of Florida, and Sue Collins of Maine — have said they intend to vote in favor of appointing her to the Supreme Court.
The full Senate is expected to vote on the appointment next week.
Diana Mejia, leader of Wind of the Spirit, said about Sotomayor; "She has a remarkable personal history and is a good example for a lot people, not just for Latinos."
Mejia said that while Republicans are entitled to vote for whomever they choose, she hopes party allegiance does not play as a strong role for individual lawmakers as much as finding the best-qualified person for the job.
The Associated Press contributed to this report. Minhaj Hassan: 973-267-9038; mhassan@gannett.com
By MINHAJ HASSAN • Daily Record • July 30, 2009
A Senate committee's approval Tuesday of Judge Sonia Sotomayor, who was selected by President Barack Obama to serve on the Supreme Court, was a source of pride for many in the Latino community who also expressed disappoinment with the fact that only one Republican lawmaker supported her.
"Personally, I support the decision," said Xiomara Guevara, executive director of the Dover-based Morris County Organization of Hispanic Affairs, about the committee's majority approval. "The court needs to be reflective of the population. But it's not just race that matters. It's the qualifications. She has a proven record of following the law."
Guevara said she was hoping more Republicans would have come on board to support Sotomayor.
"I was disappointed," she said. "I was hoping it wouldn't come down to party lines. But you really can't do anything about it."
On Tuesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 13-6 to appoint Sotomayor to the highest court's seat that will be vacated by Justice David Souter, with all Democrats supporting her and all but one Republican, Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-S.C.), voting no.
Caryn Maxim, a local advocate on immigrant issues, also said she was pleased to see the support from some politicians for a Latina serving on the highest court.
"It would give some diversity on the court, which is much needed," she said, adding she was also disappointed with the lack of support from Republicans. "It is unfortunate they don't see the potential contributions she could make serving on the Supreme Court."
Many of the Republican lawmakers cited Sotomayor's past comments as indicators that she would not be impartial and would be an activist. Some cited a 32-word sentence she frequently used in speeches that suggested she would be a better decision-maker than her colleagues.
"I would hope that a wise Latina woman, with the richness of her experiences, would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life," the sentence reads.
One Republican lawmaker, Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, said, "Unfortunately, I'm not convinced that Judge Sotomayor will be able to set aside her personal preferences and prejudices."
Besides Graham, only a handful of the 40 Republican senators — Dick Lugar of Indiana, Mel Martinez of Florida, and Sue Collins of Maine — have said they intend to vote in favor of appointing her to the Supreme Court.
The full Senate is expected to vote on the appointment next week.
Diana Mejia, leader of Wind of the Spirit, said about Sotomayor; "She has a remarkable personal history and is a good example for a lot people, not just for Latinos."
Mejia said that while Republicans are entitled to vote for whomever they choose, she hopes party allegiance does not play as a strong role for individual lawmakers as much as finding the best-qualified person for the job.
The Associated Press contributed to this report. Minhaj Hassan: 973-267-9038; mhassan@gannett.com
Texas looks for more Latino teachers
Arne Duncan's right: We need more Latino teachers
William McKenzie, Dallas Morning News, Jul 30, 2009
In Arne Duncan's speech this week to the National Council of La Raza, the education secretary did a good job highlighting the need to improve high school and college graduation rates for Latinos.
I think this is the second greatest challenge facing the country, behind getting the international religion-and-politics equation right so we don't blow each other up. I was glad to see Duncan take this issue on directly, and he raised a point at the end of his speech that I hadn't thought about: The nation needs more Latino teachers.
According to Duncan, twenty percent of all public school students in the U.S. are Latino. But only five percent of their teachers are Latino. He challenged La Raza, which has a very good record in promoting educational achievement, to encourage more Latinos to become teachers.
His assumption is that more Latino teaches will help more of the growing number of Latino students -- half of Texas public school students are Hispanic -- graduate from high school and college. About half of all Latinos drop out of high school, Duncan claims.
He cited in his speech the example of Thelma Melendez, a UCLA grad who once led a largely Latino district in California and who now heads the U.S. Department of Education's K-12 work.
I'd also throw in local examples like Tony Tovar, the former coach who's helping put the predominantly Hispanic Sunset High School in Dallas on a much better path. If all holds up, Sunset will earn the state's second highest-ranking for its academic progress last year.
No government can mandate growing more Latino teachers. This has to happen through the work of colleges making an effort to recruit and train more Hispanic undergrads, mediating institutions like La Raza taking this up as a cause and local districts continuing to hire more Latino educators. In the long run, this would help Latino students -- and states like Texas that depend upon them leading its economy in the future.
William McKenzie, Dallas Morning News, Jul 30, 2009
In Arne Duncan's speech this week to the National Council of La Raza, the education secretary did a good job highlighting the need to improve high school and college graduation rates for Latinos.
I think this is the second greatest challenge facing the country, behind getting the international religion-and-politics equation right so we don't blow each other up. I was glad to see Duncan take this issue on directly, and he raised a point at the end of his speech that I hadn't thought about: The nation needs more Latino teachers.
According to Duncan, twenty percent of all public school students in the U.S. are Latino. But only five percent of their teachers are Latino. He challenged La Raza, which has a very good record in promoting educational achievement, to encourage more Latinos to become teachers.
His assumption is that more Latino teaches will help more of the growing number of Latino students -- half of Texas public school students are Hispanic -- graduate from high school and college. About half of all Latinos drop out of high school, Duncan claims.
He cited in his speech the example of Thelma Melendez, a UCLA grad who once led a largely Latino district in California and who now heads the U.S. Department of Education's K-12 work.
I'd also throw in local examples like Tony Tovar, the former coach who's helping put the predominantly Hispanic Sunset High School in Dallas on a much better path. If all holds up, Sunset will earn the state's second highest-ranking for its academic progress last year.
No government can mandate growing more Latino teachers. This has to happen through the work of colleges making an effort to recruit and train more Hispanic undergrads, mediating institutions like La Raza taking this up as a cause and local districts continuing to hire more Latino educators. In the long run, this would help Latino students -- and states like Texas that depend upon them leading its economy in the future.
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