Category: Safety Net

🤯☠️🤮👎 POLITICOS’ “BIPARTISAN” LIES & FEAR MONGERING ABOUT IMMIGRATION MAKES THINGS WORSE! — “Rebuilding the U.S. immigration system to be both functional and humane requires dismissing harmful myths and inflammatory rhetoric in favor of truth and facts. Here’s the truth!” — The Vera Institute Of Justice ⚖️ Reports! 🗽

Erica Bryant
Erica Bryant
Associate Director of Writing
VERA Institute of Justice
PHOTO: VERA

Erica Bryant, Associate Director of Writing:

https://www.vera.org/news/debunking-the-lies-politicians-say-about-immigrants

As critical elections approach, voters are being bombarded with harmful myths, misrepresentations, and outright lies about people who are immigrants. More than 45 million people living in the United States were born elsewhere. Despite their proven contributions to communities nationwide, people seeking office call them “invaders” and make campaign promises for the “largest domestic deportation operation in history.” Inflammatory talking points about “border security” and the “migrant crisis” come from candidates across the political spectrum.

What is missing from this rhetoric is simple: the truth. The United States has failed to align its immigration laws and practices with 21st-century realities, leaving a system that is cruel, dysfunctional, and widely criticized. Bringing the country’s approach to immigration in line with the needs of the moment and building an immigration system that is both functional and humane will require serious effort. False information distracts from the solutions that we know work.

Here’s the truth.

It is perfectly legal to request asylum. People who come to the United States border to ask for help are not breaking the law.

Asylum is a form of protection that allows people to remain in the United States and avoid deportation back to a country where they fear persecution or harm because of their identity, religion, or political beliefs. Under both U.S. and international law, people who face danger in their homelands have the right to go to other nations to seek safety and to have their requests for asylum considered.

Asking for asylum is not a “free ticket” into the United States.

Applying for asylum is a long and complex process. Asylum cases completed in fiscal year 2019 or later took an average of 5.2 years to resolve, according to unpublished analysis of government data conducted by Vera. Currently-pending removal cases have been on the docket for an average of 1.9 years. Dangerous conditions around the world have forced record numbers of people to flee their homes and seek safety. This increase in need, exacerbated by a decades-long lack of investment in infrastructure and capacity to humanely process asylum claims, has created an enormous backlog in processing requests. Vera’s unpublished analysis of government data showed that, as of January 31, 2024, there were 3,353,199 cases pending removal proceedings in the United States.

Undocumented people have far lower crime rates than U.S. citizens.

Political candidates often falsely link undocumented people to crime in the United States. Yet an extensive study of crimes in all 50 states and Washington, DC, from 1990 to 2014, found that undocumented immigration does not increase violent crime. A study of arrests in Texas found that, relative to undocumented people, U.S.-born citizens are more than twice as likely to be arrested for violent crimes, 2.5 times more likely to be arrested for drug crimes, and more than four times more likely to be arrested for property crimes. Another study in Texas found that the criminal conviction rate for undocumented immigrants was 45 percent below that of native-born Texans. Immigrants of any legal status are typically found to be less involved in violence than native-born Americans.

Undocumented people pay taxes and help prop up social security by paying into the system—without receiving benefits.

Undocumented people pay an estimated $31 billion dollars in federal, state, and local taxes each year, including billions of dollars into a social security system from which they can draw very few, if any, benefits. The Social Security Administration (SSA) itself estimated that it collected $13 billion in payroll taxes in 2010 from workers without documentation, while only disbursing about $1 billion in payment attributable to unauthorized work. In a 2013 report, SSA estimated that “earnings by unauthorized immigrants result in a net positive effect on Social Security financial status generally. . . . We estimate that future years will experience a continuation of this positive impact on the trust funds.”

Virtually no fentanyl has been seized from people seeking asylum.

Fentanyl overdoses are increasing in the United States, and real solutions will require investments in treatment and preventative health care infrastructure. Instead, far too many politicians seek cheap political points by falsely blaming people seeking asylum at the southern border for this serious problem. In fact, virtually no fentanyl has been seized from people seeking asylum. In 2023, 93 percent of fentanyl seizures occurred at official border crossings or legal checkpoints. Nearly all of these seizures involved people permitted to cross the border, and more than 70 percent were U.S. citizens.

People with pending immigration cases show up to their court hearings.

Evidence clearly shows that, over the past two decades, most immigrants have shown up for the immigration court hearings that determine whether they have legal standing to remain in the United States. They do not slip into the country and disappear, as some political leaders claim. In fact, those who attend immigration court outside detention, on what are known as “non-detained” dockets, almost always continue to appear for their hearings when they are able to secure legal representation. There is no need to confine people in costly and inhumane immigration prisons.

Not all people at risk of deportation cross the border without documentation. Visa holders, long-term permanent residents, and even U.S. citizens are at risk.

While the spotlight often shines on people who cross the southern border without documentation, there are many ways that people can face the threat of deportation in the United States. Indeed, there are 22 million people in the United States who are at risk of being separated from their families and sent to countries where they may face danger. Tens of thousands of children who were adopted from outside the United States, for example, do not have documentation and are vulnerable to deportation because their complex citizenship paperwork was improperly filed. Additionally, more than one million people were brought to the United States as children by parents who entered the country without documentation or overstayed their visas. And, in 2022, more than 850,000 people from countries around the world overstayed their visas, making their continued presence in the United States unauthorized. Lawful permanent residents, current visa holders, and even U.S. citizens have been subjected to the risk of deportation and forced to defend their right to remain home with their families and in their communities.

Many people at risk of deportation actually have a legal right to remain in the United States—but are deported anyway.

Unlike in criminal court, people facing deportation in immigration court are not entitled to an attorney if they cannot afford one. Immigration attorneys can cost thousands of dollars, making them unaffordable for many. As a result, people seeking asylum, longtime legal residents, parents of U.S. citizens, and even small children are forced to appear in immigration court without an attorney to protect their rights. This makes it much more likely that they will be deported, even if they could have established a legal right to stay in the United States. The Fairness to Freedom Act, which was introduced in Congress last year and would establish a right to federally funded attorneys for all people facing deportation, would help fix this injustice.

Immigrants participate in the labor force and start businesses at higher rates than the native-born population.

One in six people in the United States workforce are immigrants. In fact, immigrants participate in the labor force at a higher rate than the U.S.-born population. Immigrants are also more likely to start businesses than native-born U.S. citizens. Furthermore, millions of people in the United States are employed by immigrant-founded and immigrant-owned companies.

People in the United States view immigration as a positive that benefits the country, and they support protections for people fleeing danger.

The majority of the public believes that immigration brings benefits to the United States, including economic growth and enriching culture and values. Nearly three-quarters of people polled said that people immigrate to the United States for jobs and to improve their lives, and more than half say that the ability to immigrate is a “human right.” Multiple polls show that the majority of people in the United States support protections for people who are trying to escape persecution and torture in their homelands. According to one Pew Research Center poll, 72 percent believe that accepting civilians trying to escape war and violence should be an important goal of U.S. immigration policy.

The United States has much work ahead to reform its dysfunctional and often cruel immigration system. This November, and beyond, voters need to reject lies that demonize immigrants and demand policies that treat each person with dignity and fairness, no matter where they were born.

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Erica’s “spot on” last sentence is certainly worth repeating:

This November, and beyond, voters need to reject lies that demonize immigrants and demand policies that treat each person with dignity and fairness, no matter where they were born.

While migrants might be the “easy target” of politicos and nativists, because they are vulnerable and “the usual scapegoats” for problems created or fostered by those very politicos and nativists themselves, in the end we ALL are the targets of those who want to inflict gratuitous cruelty while destroying our precious democracy. 

As Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., said “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Each of us has a vested interest in “not looking the other way” while our fellow humans unfairly are stripped of their rights and humanity with “harmful myths, misrepresentations, and outright lies.” YOU could be “next on the list!”

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-22-24

Related posts:

  1. 🤮 THE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES ARE FEEDING US FEAR-DRIVEN BS 💩 ON THE BORDER (W/O Meaningful Pushback From the Complicit Media) — Get Some Constructive, Practical, Humane Alternatives From Rev. Craig Mousin and NIJC Policy Director Heidi Altman On The “Lawful Assembly” Podcast! 💡🗽😎⚖️
  2. 🇺🇸ROBERT REICH: THE REAL THREAT TO NATIONAL SECURITY IS TRUMP/MAGA BORDER BS 🏴‍☠️: ‼️”Since he entered politics, Donald Trump has fanned nativist fears and bigotry. Now he’s moving into full-throttled neofascism, using the actual language of Hitler to attack immigrants!”🤮
  3. 👏⚖️ TELLING IT LIKE IT IS! — Immigration Guru & Pundit Dan Kowalski Slams The Immorality & Intellectual Dishonesty Of The Viral “Border Debate” In Congress!
  4. 🇺🇸🗽⚖️😎 THERE’S STILL SOME INSPIRING NEWS TO REPORT: 1) CHICAGO PASTORS WELCOME BUSSES; 2) GW LAW CLINIC STUDENTS HELP NEW ARRIVALS; 3) W&M LAW CLINIC WINS 27 CASES; 4) NDPA STAR KIM WILLIAMS, ESQ, TRIUMPHS OVER GARLAND DOJ’S “NEXUS NONSENSE” IN 1ST CIR; 5) HRF’S ROBYN BARNARD CALLS OUT BIDEN’S THREAT TO TRASH ASYLUM; 6) CEO BILL PENZY LIKES & APPRECIATES IMMIGRANTS!

🇺🇸🗽THE U.S. ECONOMY IS FAR EXCEEDING EXPECTATIONS & MIGRANTS OF ALL TYPES HAVE BEEN OUTSIZED  CONTRIBUTORS! — Biden & Dems Want To Take Credit But Are Unwilling To Stand Up For The Rights & Humanity Of Those Driving Economic Success!

Border Detention
This is the “reward” that both parties have in mind for migrants who have helped our economy thrive through difficult times. Doesn’t seem right, smart, or rational! 
PHOTO: Public Realm

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/02/27/economy-immigration-border-biden/

Rachel Siegel, Lauren Kaori Gurley and Meryl Kornfield report for WashPost:

Immigration has propelled the U.S. job market further than just about anyone expected, helping cement the country’s economicrebound from the pandemic as the most robust in the world.

That momentum picked up aggressively over the past year. About 50 percent of the labor market’s extraordinary recent growth came from foreign-born workers between January 2023 and January 2024, according to an Economic Policy Institute analysis of federal data. And even before that, by the middle of 2022, the foreign-born labor force had grown so fast that it closed the labor force gap created by the pandemic, according to research from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.

Immigrant workers also recovered much faster than native-born workers from the pandemic’s disruptions, and many saw some of the largest wage gains in industries eager to hire. Economists and labor experts say the surge in employment was ultimately key to solving unprecedented gaps in the economy that threatened the country’s ability to recover from prolonged shutdowns.

“Immigration has not slowed. It has just been absolutely astronomical,” said Pia Orrenius, vice president and senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. “And that’s been instrumental. You can’t grow like this with just the native workforce. It’s not possible.”

Yet immigration remains an intensely polarizing issue in American politics. Fresh survey data from Gallup showed Americans now cite immigration as the country’s top problem, surpassing inflation, the economy and issues with government. A record number of migrants have crossed the southern border since President Biden took office, with apprehensions topping 2 million for the second straight year in fiscal 2023, among the highest in U.S. history. Cities like New York, Chicago and Denver have struggled to keep up with busloads of immigrants sent from Texas who are overwhelming local shelters.

. . . .

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Read the rest of the article at the link. 

There are also lots of practical ideas out here for fixing the asylum processing system and other helpful, humane border initiatives that don’t invest exclusively in expensive, cruel, and proven to ultimately fail “uber-enforcement only!” See, e.g., https://immigrantjustice.org/staff/blog/solutions-humane-border-policy.

Still, politicos of both parties and most media are on a completely different page, unhappily!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

02-28-24

Related posts:

  1. VICTORY DANCE! — ICE’S HOMAN SAYS CLIMATE OF FEAR HAS STEMMED BORDER CROSSINGS & PROVES UNRESTRAINED, ARBITRARY IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT WORKS! — “There’s no population that’s off the table,” he said. “If you’re in the country illegally, we’re looking for you and we’re looking to apprehend you.” — America Won’t Be Truly Safe Until The Last Cook, Gardner, Construction Worker, Nanny, Janitor, Tree Cutter, Mechanic, Handyman, Carpenter, Home Health Aide, Computer Programmer, Healthcare Worker, Lettuce Picker, Cow Milker, Landscaper, Lawnmower, Bricklayer, Roofer, Window Washer, Waiter, Sandwich Artist, Teacher, Minister, Coach, Student, Parent, Clerk, Fisherman, Farmer, Maid, Chicken Plucker, Meat Processor, Etc., Without Docs Is Removed And US Citizens Take Over All These Jobs!
  2. WASHINGTON POST: GONZO’S IMMIGRATION COURT “REFORMS” WILL CREATE “KANGAROO COURTS!” —Recent “moves to evaluate judges based on the speed with which they handle dockets that typically exceed 2,000 cases, rather than on fair adjudication, is a recipe for assembly-line injustice.”
  3. JAMELLE BOUIE @ SLATE: TRUMP, SESSIONS, MILLER & THE GOP RESTRICTIONISTS HAVE PUT GOOD OL’ 1920S RACISM AT THE FOREFRONT OF THEIR WHITE NATIONALIST IMMIGRATION AGENDA! –“What good does it do to bring in somebody who’s illiterate in their own country, has no skills, and is going to struggle in our country and not be successful? . . . That is not what a good nation should do, and we need to get away from it.” — J. “Gonzo Apocalypto” Sessions, Attorney General of the United States of America & Unapologetic White Nationalist With A Long History Of Racism!
  4. 🇺🇸ROBERT REICH: THE REAL THREAT TO NATIONAL SECURITY IS TRUMP/MAGA BORDER BS 🏴‍☠️: ‼️”Since he entered politics, Donald Trump has fanned nativist fears and bigotry. Now he’s moving into full-throttled neofascism, using the actual language of Hitler to attack immigrants!”🤮

🇺🇸😎 Raising Hope: Community Efforts to Empower the Next Generation — A Timely PSA By Diane Harrison –  Courtside Exclusive!

Diane Harrison
Image via Freepik

Raising Hope: Community Efforts to Empower the Next Generation

By Diane Harrison

Courtside Exclusive

February 2, 2024

In the evolving social landscape of our times, vulnerable children face an array of challenges that impede their growth and development. However, communities possess an extraordinary capacity to alter these trajectories through concerted efforts. This article, courtesy of immigrationcourtside.com, sheds light on the vital role community initiatives play in bolstering these children’s prospects and outlines various ways communities can extend crucial support and opportunities to them.

Fostering Growth Through Mentorship

Communities can profoundly impact the lives of vulnerable children by harnessing the power of local volunteer mentorship programs. Often hailing from similar backgrounds, these mentors provide more than just academic support; they act as beacons of hope by offering guidance and exemplifying positive life choices. Such personal interactions foster a nurturing environment, crucial for these children’s emotional and social development.

Expanding Educational Horizons

Education is a vital catalyst for change, and communities are essential in enhancing accessibility. Initiatives such as after-school programs and scholarships, notably those for online education, play a crucial role in this endeavor. These efforts spur academic growth and offer the necessary flexibility for children to balance their educational pursuits with other life aspects. Importantly, embracing a variety of educational paths opens up numerous career possibilities.

For instance, with a degree in psychology, students can gain a deeper understanding of human behavior, which is instrumental in numerous professional and personal contexts. By championing diverse educational opportunities, communities are essentially unlocking new potential and avenues for their youth, ensuring a future rich with possibilities.

Cultivating Creative and Recreational Spaces

Community-run workshops and clubs offer a sanctuary for exploration and learning. In these safe and engaging spaces, children can delve into arts, sciences, or sports, fostering both educational and recreational growth. These programs do more than just occupy children’s time; they cultivate skills, confidence, and a sense of belonging, integral to their overall development.

Uniting Through Fundraising

Fundraising is a powerful tool for communities to provide tangible support to vulnerable children. Through collective efforts in organizing fundraisers, communities gather essential resources and strengthen their communal bonds. Such events underscore the shared responsibility of community members in nurturing the younger generation, reinforcing the network of support available to them.

Creating Robust Support Networks

The establishment of support networks within communities is invaluable. These networks offer a range of resources, from basic necessities like food and clothing to educational materials and counseling services. By pooling resources and expertise, communities ensure both children and their families have access to the comprehensive support they require.

Prioritizing Health and Wellness

A child’s well-being is multi-faceted, encompassing physical, mental, and emotional health. Community-organized health and wellness initiatives address these aspects, including free medical check-ups and mental health counseling. Such initiatives demonstrate a holistic approach to child care, recognizing the importance of nurturing every aspect of a child’s health.

Enhancing Opportunities Through Scholarships

Community-funded scholarship programs embody much more than mere financial assistance; they signify a profound dedication to nurturing the aspirations of young, promising individuals. These scholarships open doors to educational opportunities for children facing challenging circumstances, playing a pivotal role in revealing and nurturing their inherent potential.

This support not only sets them on a trajectory toward success but also instills a sense of confidence and ambition. Moreover, these scholarships often inspire recipients to give back to their communities in the future, creating a cycle of empowerment and progress. Through these initiatives, communities actively invest in a brighter, more capable generation.

Strengthening Safety and Security

Ensuring the safety of children is a fundamental responsibility. Through neighborhood watch programs, safety workshops, and collaborations with local law enforcement, communities play a critical role in creating a secure environment for children. These measures protect children and provide them with the confidence and peace of mind necessary to focus on their growth and development.

The collective power of a community is a formidable force in shaping the lives of vulnerable children. Communities can empower these children through strategic initiatives in mentorship, education, creative engagement, fundraising, support networks, health and wellness, scholarship opportunities, and safety measures. Through these efforts, communities can help vulnerable children overcome adversity and pave the way for a future filled with promise and potential.

 

If you enjoyed this article, you can find more helpful content at immigrationcourtside.com!

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Thanks Diane! Hope is what keeps us going. Thanks for promoting it!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

02-02-24

Related posts:

  1. 🇺🇸🗽A JULY 4 SMORGASBORD OF PATRIOTIC MUSINGS ON THE STATE OF OUR 245-YEAR-OLD DEMOCRACY!
  2. 🇺🇸🗽😎 “Empowering Immigrant Entrepreneurs: A Blueprint for Success” — Another Great PSA By Diane Harrison Exclusively For “Courtside!”
  3. “Warren Buffett on Immigration Reform: Buffett feels that immigrants (including undocumented ones) have been and continue to be a key part of our prosperity — not a part of the problem.“
  4. JULIAN CASTRO: A Democrat With A Sane & Sound Immigration Plan!

🇺🇸🗽⚖️ ATTN NDPA ALL-STARS 🌟 — HERE’S YOUR CHANCE TO WORK IN A SENIOR LEVEL POSITION FOR ONE OF AMERICA’S PREMIER SOCIAL JUSTICE NGOs: AYUDA Is Hiring A Director Of Legal Programs! 😎

 

YOU can be on the team with these and other NDPA superheroes:

Paula FitzgeraldExecutive Director AYUDA
Paula Fitzgerald
Executive Director
AYUDA
Laura TraskDirector of Development & Communications AYUDA
Laura Trask
Director of Development & Communications
AYUDA

 

📣 Job alert! 📣 Ayuda is seeking an immigrant champion to become our next Director of Legal Programs and lead the continued expansion of our immigration legal services. 

If you share our mission of creating a world in which immigrants thrive, take a look at the full job posting and apply now: https://lnkd.in/e_yypNsk 

Please spread the word 💜

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Apply

Director of Legal Programs 

Washington, DC

Description

ORGANIZATIONAL PROFILE

Ayuda is a 501 (c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to providing direct legal, social and language access services, education, and outreach to low-income immigrants in the Washington, DC metropolitan area. Since 1973, Ayuda has provided critical services on a wide range of issues, in the process acquiring nationally recognized expertise in several fields including immigration law, language access, domestic violence and human trafficking. Ayuda has office locations in Washington, DC, Silver Spring, MD and Fairfax, VA.

WHY DO YOU WANT THIS JOB?

Because, just like everyone at Ayuda, you believe:

• In seeing communities where all immigrants succeed and thrive in the United States.

• In the overall success of our organization and all our programs.

• That families should be healthy and safe from harm.

• That all people should have access to professional, honest, and ethical services, regardless of ability to pay or status in this country.

• That diversity and equality make this country better.

WHAT WILL THIS JOB ENTAIL?

• Ensure the delivery of client-centered, high-quality legal services across Ayuda’s offices in DC, Maryland, and Virginia.

• Provide supervision to Legal Managers, and other positions as needed.

• Provide strategic direction for the legal program within Ayuda and lead the team towards meeting goals and objectives.

• Maintain and develop consistent practices and policies across legal programs.

• Oversee financial management of grants for the legal program, including client trust accounts for the low-bono fee-based services.

• Manage legal program budget, including overseeing the overall annual budget as well as providing support and oversight to Managing Attorneys on individual legal grant budgets (preparation, revisions, etc).

• Provide oversight to managers and support to Grants and Finance staff for grant management, including grant reporting and grant applications.

• Manage Ayuda’s delivery of low-bono fee-based immigration legal services.

• Collaborate with Ayuda’s Social Services and Language Access programs to ensure the provision of holistic services.

• Represent Ayuda in meetings with prospective grantors and donors to support Ayuda’ s fundraising efforts.

• Stay informed about legal changes and help to communicate legal changes and their significance to staff.

• Support Communications & Development team by drafting external legal updates and supporting participation in media interviews by legal team.

• Represent Ayuda and its clients at local and regional stakeholder, coalition, and advocacy meetings.

• Participate in Ayuda’s efforts to bring about systemic change on behalf of our clients.

• Represent the legal program as a member of Ayuda’s Senior Management Team, supporting organizational management and strategic planning and implementation.

HOW DO YOU KNOW IF YOU CAN DO THIS JOB?

Eligibility: Must be legally able to work in the United States and maintain proper work authorization throughout employment. Must be able to meet the physical requirements of the position presented in a general office environment.

Education/Experience:

• J.D. or L.L.M. degree from an accredited law school and licensed and in good standing to practice law in any U.S. state or territory.

• 3+ years of experience providing legal services to low-income immigrants (immigration, domestic violence/family law and/or consumer law experience preferred but not required).

• 3+ years of supervisory experience.

• Program management and leadership experience required.

• Experience working with low-income immigrant survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, human trafficking, child abuse/neglect or other forms of trauma.

Preferred Knowledge & Skills:

• Excellent written and verbal communications skills, flexibility, and good humor.

• Excellent judgment, calm demeanor even under pressure, strong work ethic, resourceful, and able to maintain confidentiality.

• Decisive, with ability to exercise independent judgment.

• Proven ability to develop and maintain and positive team environment and support staff morale and resilience.

• Ability to mentor, train and provide career path guidance to staff.

• Ability to work collaboratively in a team environment and to initiate and follow through on work independently.

• Excellent time management skills and ability to work in a fast-paced environment.

• Ability to adapt to changing priorities.

• Program evaluation and project management skills.

• Knowledge of a second language a plus, with Spanish language skills preferred (examples of other languages commonly spoken by Ayuda’s clients include Amharic, Arabic, Tagalog, French, and Portuguese).

SALARY AND BENEFITS:

The anticipated salary for this position is $125,000 – $140,000, depending on experience.

We are proud of the benefits we can offer that include:

• Platinum-level medical insurance plan 100% employer-paid.

• Dental and vision insurance 100% employer paid.

• Long-term disability insurance 100% employer paid.

• Life and AD&D insurance 100% employer paid.

• Pre-tax 401(k) with Employer match on first 3% of salary.

• Vacation Days: 21 days per year until year 3, 27 per year in years 3-7 and 33 days per year after 7 years employment. Employees begin with 3 days of vacation leave.

• New employees begin with 5 days of Health & Wellness (sick) leave and accrue an additional 5 hours per pay period plus emergency medical leave up to 12 weeks per year.

• 12 weeks paid parental leave/family leave.

• 24 days paid holidays and staff wellness days, including Winter Break the last week of the year.

• Job-related professional development fees (including annual state bar dues and professional memberships).

• Flexible work schedules.

This position is exempt for overtime purposes.

Employees with federal student loan debt may be eligible to apply for Public Service Loan Forgiveness through the Department of Education.  For more information, go to https://myfedloan.org/borrowers/special-programs/pslf.

TO APPLY:

Please apply with resume and cover letter.  Writing samples may be requested.

Applications will be considered on a rolling basis until the position is filled. If you have questions about this position, please reach out to us at HR@ayuda.com.

EQUAL OPPORTUNITY EMPLOYMENT STATEMENT:

Ayuda is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, or protected veteran status and will not be discriminated against based on disability.

We believe that a diversity of experiences, opinions, and backgrounds is integral to achieving our mission and vision. We celebrate diversity and seek to leverage the passion, energy, and ideas of a culturally diverse team.

Apply

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This is a spectacular chance to work with really dedicated professionals performing a meaningful mission to help migrants adapt, prosper, and obtain legal status in our DMV area while enriching and assisting our communities. It’s about working together to build a better America for everyone!

As I have mentioned before, I am a proud member of AYUDA’s Advisory Council. At our meeting held at AYUDA this week, I was surrounded by talented, dedicated folks, who, unlike the often biased and ill-informed politicos out to destroy our legal immigration framework, are committed to solving problems in a humane, creative, legal manner recognizing the humanity and talents of our migrant communities.

Among other things, I heard:

  • Busses continue to arrive in our area without warning and coordination from either the “sending states” or the Feds;
  • The overwhelming number of those arriving are forced migrants with strong asylum claims;
  • Many of the current arrivals are from Venezuela and Nicaragua, countries with repressive leftist dictatorships with established records of persecution and human rights abuses recognized and condemned by Administrations of both parties; 
  • Many arrivals, because of language problems and haphazard Government processing, do not understand how the asylum system operates;
  • Through information sessions, AYUDA and other NGOs are filling an information gap left by poor Government performance;
  • Despite the monumental efforts of terrific pro bono lawyers from across the DMV area (more needed) there is neither rhyme nor reason to the handling of these cases at EOIR and the Asylum Office;
  • Some cases are expedited, some are placed on slow dockets; 
  • There are no BIA precedents or useful guidance on the many recurring situations that should result in grants;
  • Different results on similar material facts are a continuing problem;
  • Delays and “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” by EOIR hinders pro bono representation.

These are the problems that Congress and the Administration could and should be solving! Instead, outrageously, they are focused on spreading dehumanizing myths and devising even more wasteful “enforcement only” gimmicks that are bound to fail and leave more devastation, trauma, and wasted opportunities in the wake! Human lives and human rights are neither “bargaining chips” nor “political props” in an election year! 

AYUDA
Americans are being bombarded by false messages of hate, fear, resentment, and dehumanization directed at out immigrant communities. That’s a HUGE problem for our nation of immigrants’ future! Fight back by joining AYUDA and becoming part of the solution!

AYUDA and other NGOs offer a chance to be part of the solution, save lives, and stand against the disgraceful failure of our Government to honor our legal commitments to asylum seekers and other migrants. Be a champion of migrants who make our “nation of immigrants” really great!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-19-24

⚠️ DISCLAIMER: The views expressed in this promotional recruiting message are mine and do not represent the position of AYUDA or any other entity!

Related posts:

  1. INCONVENIENT TRUTH: HALEY SWEETLAND EDWARDS @ TIME TELLS WHAT TRUMP, MILLER, COTTON, SESSIONS, & THEIR WHITE NATIONALIST GANG DON’T WANT YOU TO KNOW: Human Migration Is A Powerful Force As Old As Human History; It’s A Plus For Receiving Nations; It Won’t Be Stopped By Walls, Jails, Racist Laws, Or Any Other Restrictionist Nonsense; But, It Can Be Intelligently Controlled, Channeled, Harnessed, & Used For The Benefit Of The U.S. & The Good Of The Migrants! — “But to maximize that future good, governments must act rationally to establish humane policies and adequately fund an immigration system equipped to handle an influx of newcomers.”
  2. JULIAN CASTRO: A Democrat With A Sane & Sound Immigration Plan!
  3. 👏⚖️ TELLING IT LIKE IT IS! — Immigration Guru & Pundit Dan Kowalski Slams The Immorality & Intellectual Dishonesty Of The Viral “Border Debate” In Congress!
  4. 🗽⚖️ AS CONGRESS & ADMINISTRATION DITHER OVER GOP’S OUTRAGEOUS NATIVIST DEMANDS, LONG OVERDUE DUE PROCESS & STRUCTURAL REFORMS LANGUISH, LEAVING ASYLUM-SEEKING REFUGEES TWISTING IN THE WIND! — A Report On The Ever Growing EOIR Backlog From AP’s Giovanna Dell’Orto!

☠️🤮 PICKING ON KIDS & IMMIGRANTS — AMERICA’S FUTURE — IS LATEST “SPORT” FOR MORALLY CORRUPT GOP POLITICOS — “In the 18 months since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, Republican officials have had ample opportunity to prove they’re not merely antiabortion but also pro-child. They keep failing,” Says Catherine Rampell @ WashPost!

 

 

Catherine Rampell
Catherine Rampell
Opinion Columnist
Washington Post
PHOTO: Linkedin

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/01/11/republican-child-food-aid/

Catherine writes:

In the 18 months since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, Republican officials have had ample opportunity to prove they’re not merely antiabortion but also pro-child. They keep failing.

GOP politicians across the country have found new and creative ways to deny resources to struggling parents and children. Take, for instance, the summer lunch program.

Under a new federal program, children who are eligible for free or reduced-price school lunches can also receive food assistance during the summer. The policy, created as part of the bipartisan budget deal in 2022, gives eligible families $40 per month per child, or $120 total over the summer. It often works essentially as a top-up for food stamps, since these families must buy more groceries when their children lose access to nutritious school meals when classes go out of session. (It’s similar to a temporary program offered during the pandemic, though it’s much less generous.)

The federal government pays the entire cost of the benefits associated with this new food program and half the administrative costs. The program isn’t automatic, though; states had to opt in by Jan. 1.

Republican governors across 15 states chose not to, as my Post colleague Annie Gowen reported. Up to 10 million kids will be denied access to this grocery aid as a result.

Why have these governors rejected food assistance, even amid soaring grocery prices and pledges to help families strained by inflation?

Some states, such as Texas and Vermont, cited operational or budgetary difficulties with getting a new system running in time for this summer. These obstacles could presumably be surmounted in future years. In other states, GOP politicians expressed outright disdain for the program.

Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen, for instance, said of the new program, “I don’t believe in welfare.” A spokeswoman for Florida’s Department of Children and Families cited vague unspecified fears about “federal strings attached.”

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds suggested there was no point in giving this grocery assistance to food-insecure children “when childhood obesity has become an epidemic.”

Reynolds is apparently unaware that obesity is linked to a lack of reliable access to nutritious food and that children in food-insecure homes face a higher risk of developmental problems. This suggests withholding this nutritional assistance hurts not only the state’s children today but also its workforce tomorrow.

This is hardly the only time GOP politicians have worked to swipe food from the mouths of hungry children — and their moms.

. . . .

Indeed, if a version of a child tax credit expansion ultimately materializes — and it might in the next few days — that will happen only because Democratic lawmakers explicitly held those corporate tax breaks hostage in exchange for aid to poor kids.

Republicans keep assuring the American public that they really, truly care about helping women forced into bearing children even when they’re not financially or emotionally ready to do so. They claim they want to protect youngsters and invest in their financial future.

Time for the GOP to put its money where its mouth is.

*********************

Read Catherine’s complete article at the link.

I have previously blogged about the GOP’s cowardly war on the poor and America’s future generations. See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2024/01/03/☠%EF%B8%8F-⚰%EF%B8%8F-first-it-was-immigrants-then-women-lgbtq-election-officials-teachers-librarians-gops-latest-target-of-toxic-lies-cruelty-stupidity-hung/.

⚖️ EXPERT TO CONGRESS: FIX YOUR BORDER MESS, STOP PICKING ON ASYLUM APPLICANTS! — Ruth Ellen Wasem @ The Messenger: “Do they really think that raising the bar will deter people who are running for their lives?”

Nor is this the first time that Catherine has forcefully and articulately spoken out against the GOP’s cowardly war on America’s most vulnerable. See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2019/09/06/catherine-rampell-washpost-trump-his-gops-cowardly-war-on-children-should-outrage-every-american-join-the-new-due-process-army-fight-to-s/.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-13-24 

Related posts:

  1. 🦃 TALKING TURKEY @ THANKSGIVING DINNER — Handy Facts About Immigration To Educate Those Who Bring Nativist Myths To The Dinner Table — An NILC Primer! — “[E]ach conversation contributes to building a more informed and compassionate society.“
  2. WOW, HERE’S A SURPRISE: MANY KIDS FLEEING VIOLENCE IN THE NORTHERN TRIANGLE KNOW NOTHING ABOUT BIDEN BORDER POLICIES — They Are Just Trying To Save Their Lives!
  3. ☠️🤯 WALLS: EXPENSIVE, DEADLY, INEFFECTIVE “TOOLS!”  — Why Does America Keep Building Them? — “Political Pathology” — New Rubric For Doctors Treating Border Injuries From Failed Deterrence! — “I feel like Americans have very little context for what’s going on in [Venezuela] and how desperate things are there.”
  4. ☠️🤮🤯 ‼️🆘 WARNING: TRUMP GOES “FULL HITLER” IN HATEFUL, UNHINGED VETERANS’ DAY RANT! — Why Aren’t The “Mainstream Media” & U.S. Voters Takng This Assault On Humanity, Decency & Democracy Seriously! 🤯

🏭 YES, WE CAN MANUFACTURE THINGS IN THE USA — THEY ARE DOING IT IN MAINE  — Asylum Seekers & Other Migrants🗽 Are A Key Part Of It — But, Bad Government Policies Promoted By GOP Restrictionists & Wobbly Dems Undermine Our Nation’s Future As a Manufacturing Powerhouse!🤯 

Rachel Slade
Rachel Slade
American Author, Editor, Journalist
PHOTO: Amazon

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/05/opinion/american-manufacturing-apparel-clothing.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

Rachel Slade writes in the NYT:

. . . .

That summer, I met Ben and Whitney Waxman, husband-and-wife co-founders of American Roots, who had been making all-U.S.-sourced clothing like hoodies and quarter-zips in Westbrook, just outside of Portland, Maine, since 2015. When the country hit pause, the Waxmans worried that demand for their wares would dry up. Without revenue to pay the rent on their factory space and their workers’ salaries, they knew that they’d lose their company in a few months.

To avoid that fate, they could make things the country desperately needed: masks and face shields. So the Waxmans asked their workers if they would be willing to return if they did all they could to make the factory safe. It was a big ask — vaccines were still a year away and information about how the virus spread was limited. In spite of the risks, every single employee said yes, energized by the idea that they could make a real difference at a moment of crisis.

The Waxmans shut down their factory to retool it for safe mask production. By that summer, they nearly quintupled their staff from 30 to 140-plus workers who were cranking out tens of thousands of American Roots’ custom-designed face masks for emergency workers and employees across the country.

Ben and Whitney had founded their company with a mission: to prove that capitalism and labor can work together to create community, good jobs and great products. They chose apparel making because it was fairly easy to get into and all components could be sourced domestically. All they needed was a few sewing machines and an army of workers willing to show up day after day. For these reasons, apparel manufacturing was one of the first industries to get offshored when tariffs were dropped following the signing of NAFTA in 1992. As a Maine native, Ben believed he was bringing back that lost industry — the state had once been a textile powerhouse — and through his mother, who had founded a locally sourced blanket and cape business, he had connections to get them started.

. . . .

I spent time on the shop floor and in the homes of their dedicated workers, many of whom are new Americans, who, with their families, had fled untenable, dangerous situations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Iraq, Angola and other countries, and had found themselves in Maine, eager to build new lives there.

While I was learning about the ups and downs of the textile and apparel industry, I was also introduced to labor history. Ben Waxman had spent a decade at the A.F.L.-C.I.O., the largest federation of unions in the country, representing 12.5 million workers, working closely with President Richard Trumka. During that time, he witnessed the impact of offshoring with his own eyes, standing shoulder to shoulder with factory men and women as their livelihoods were shipped abroad and their pensions dwindled.

Haunted by what Ben had seen, he and Whitney made sure their employees were unionized from the get-go, that their workers earned a living wage, and received health insurance, vacation time, and sick leave to care for themselves and their families. “Our company’s economic philosophy is ‘Profit over greed,’ ” he told me. “We have to make a profit, but it will never be at the expense of our workers, our values or our products.” In that way, the Waxmans were well positioned to attract and retain a work force in a tight labor market.

. . . .

But what do manufacturers really need to build a resilient domestic supply chain? Topping their wish list is universal health care, which would unburden small manufacturers of approximately $17,000 per worker with a family per year, allowing American companies to compete with foreign producers, especially the technologically advanced European factories which are attracting high-end brands looking to make quality products closer to home.

But we also need to talk about formulating a new industrial policy, just as Alexander Hamilton and George Washington did at the moment of the country’s founding. A manufacturing-first agenda, one not just focused on green energy production and chip manufacturing, would funnel government resources toward policies that manufacturers need to remain robust. That includes job-training programs, transportation infrastructure, research and development funding, sectorwide coordination and financing support in every industry. The policy would also take a hard look at tariffs and intellectual property laws to protect American innovation, and encompass broad, clear guidelines for collective bargaining and environmental standards.

Shifting this country back to making things requires cleareyed policy that would stimulate all kinds of production that would, in turn, lift up those abandoned by the new tech and service economy. But there are so many additional benefits. Manufacturing jobs pay better than average and require less education for entry than many other industries. Apprentices learn their craft by doing. Manufacturing also offers diverse opportunities for people who aren’t so inclined to sit in front of a computer eight hours a day. We’ll need programmers, machinists, inspectors, thinkers, inventors, tinkerers: people who enjoy building things and working closely with machines that move and learn.

. . . .

******************

Read Rachel’s full article at the link.

These are the things that “smart government” should be investing in for our future. Instead, politicos, including some so-called “fiscal conservatives,” are proposing outrageously expensive, cruel, counterproductive immigration enforcement gimmicks supposedly designed to discourage the very workers, innovators, entrepreneurs, and investors that American manufacturing needs, not to mention reducing the potential pool of eventual U.S. consumers. 

Repealing or undermining “Obamacare” — as many in the GOP advocate — is pure idiocy! Exactly the WRONG direction for America!

Sound like disconnects? That’s because they are! Ones that responsible voters should no longer put up with!

The GOP’s racist rants about asylum seekers, and the failure of some Dem politicos to push back hard, is bad for America. They fly in the face of two truths: 1) American benefits from immigration, and 2) many of the immigrants we need are already here or at our borders. Instead of thinking of ways to screen and welcome them, we are wasting money and resources trying to deport them, deny or delay their legal work authorization, and discourage them from coming.

A recent report by Don Lee in the LA Times put it very succinctly:

And that resurgence of immigration has not only given the U.S. a modest gain in total population but also done something far more vital for the economy: It has fueled the nation’s workforce in the last year.

https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2024-01-09/california-immigration-driving-population-labor-force-growth?utm_id=123161&sfmc_id=2413253&skey_id=eb7798068820f2944081a20180a0d3a94e025b4a93ea9ae77c7bbe00367c46ef

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-10-24

Related posts:

  1. VICTORY DANCE! — ICE’S HOMAN SAYS CLIMATE OF FEAR HAS STEMMED BORDER CROSSINGS & PROVES UNRESTRAINED, ARBITRARY IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT WORKS! — “There’s no population that’s off the table,” he said. “If you’re in the country illegally, we’re looking for you and we’re looking to apprehend you.” — America Won’t Be Truly Safe Until The Last Cook, Gardner, Construction Worker, Nanny, Janitor, Tree Cutter, Mechanic, Handyman, Carpenter, Home Health Aide, Computer Programmer, Healthcare Worker, Lettuce Picker, Cow Milker, Landscaper, Lawnmower, Bricklayer, Roofer, Window Washer, Waiter, Sandwich Artist, Teacher, Minister, Coach, Student, Parent, Clerk, Fisherman, Farmer, Maid, Chicken Plucker, Meat Processor, Etc., Without Docs Is Removed And US Citizens Take Over All These Jobs!
  2. 🇺🇸🗽💡THE VIEW FROM MAINE IS CLEARER! — Dan Kolbert Of Portland “Gets” What Politicos Of Both Parties Don’t — Migration Happens, Embrace It, Don’t Fear It!😎🇺🇸
  3. 🇺🇸🗽⚖️ ANOTHER VIEW, FROM DAN KOWALSKI @ SUBSTACK: “An Opportunity, Not a Crisis — Let them in. Give them work permits. Watch America thrive!”
  4. 🇺🇸🗽👍🏼😎MAKING AMERICA BETTER, FINALLY: “Mr. Biden has laid out an immigration program that would genuinely put America first.” (WashPost) — No Wonder GOP Anti-American White Nationalists Like Tom Cotton Are Apoplectic & Spouting Their Racist, White Elitist Nonsense!

☠️ ⚰️ FIRST IT WAS IMMIGRANTS, THEN WOMEN, LGBTQ+, ELECTION OFFICIALS, TEACHERS, LIBRARIANS — GOP’S LATEST TARGET OF TOXIC LIES, CRUELTY, STUPIDITY:  Hungry Kids! 🤮 “The announcements by Reynolds and Pillen seem almost tailor-made to validate the adage that for Republicans, ‘life begins at conception and ends at birth.’” 

Michael Hiltzik
Michael Hiltzik
Author & LA Times Columnist
PHOTO: X

http://enewspaper.latimes.com/infinity/article_share.aspx?guid=52a9eb75-c262-45a3-93e8-89f8e05a06b5

Michael Hiltzik writes in the LA Times:

Question: Is there anything more absurd than red state governors rejecting federal programs that directly benefit their constituents?

Easy answer: Yes. It’s the explanations they give to make their actions appear to be sober, responsible fiscal decisions.

The Republican governors of Iowa and Nebraska brought us the most recent examples of this phenomenon just before Christmas.

The issue in both states is a summer food program that provides $40 a month per child in June, July and August to families eligible for free or reduced-price school meals.

The program is known as the Summer Electronic Benefit Transfer Program for Children, or Summer EBT. Its purpose is to give the eligible families a financial bridge during the months when their kids aren’t in school.

The governors didn’t see it that way. Here’s how Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds justified her decision to reject the federal subsidy

for low-income Iowans: “Federal COVID-era cash benefit programs are not sustainable and don’t provide long-term solutions for the issues impacting children and families.”

Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen’s explanation was,

“I don’t believe in welfare.”

Both governors said their states already had programs in place to address food needs for low-income families, and that was enough.

It’s worth noting that the explanations by both Reynolds and Pillen are fundamentally incoherent. What does Reynolds even mean by calling the program “not sustainable”? It would be sustained as long as Congress continues to fund it, which is almost certain as long as Republicans don’t take control of both houses and kill it.

As for Pillen’s crack about “welfare,” he didn’t bother to explain what he believes is wrong with “welfare” as such; he just uttered the term knowing that it’s a dog whistle for conservative voters aimed at dehumanizing the program’s beneficiaries.

What makes these governors’ refusals so much more irresponsible is that the federal government is picking up 100% of the tab for the benefits; the states only have to agree to pay half the administrative costs. Their shares come to $2.2 million in Iowa and $300,000 in Nebraska, according to those states’ estimates.

In return, 240,000 children in Iowa would receive a total of $28.8 million in benefits over the three summer months, and 150,000 Nebraskans would receive a total of $18 million. Sounds like a massively profitable investment in child health in those states.

The governors’ defenses smack of the same strained plausibility of those statements made by banks, streaming networks and other commercial entities that explain that their price hikes and service reductions are “efforts to serve you better.”

. . . .

*************************

Read the complete article at the link.

Cowardly, irresponsible GOP governors pick on poor kids and their families.  And, the other things that might lift families out of poverty:  higher wages, shorter hours, more childcare, better health care, educational opportunities, vocational assistance, family planning assistance —   the GOP opposes them all in their totally corrupt and disingenuous “race to the bottom.” 

Just look at the amount of money GOP politicos have wasted on cruel stunts and gimmicks intended and guaranteed to make the humanitarian situation worse!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-04-23

Related posts:

  1. VICTORY DANCE! — ICE’S HOMAN SAYS CLIMATE OF FEAR HAS STEMMED BORDER CROSSINGS & PROVES UNRESTRAINED, ARBITRARY IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT WORKS! — “There’s no population that’s off the table,” he said. “If you’re in the country illegally, we’re looking for you and we’re looking to apprehend you.” — America Won’t Be Truly Safe Until The Last Cook, Gardner, Construction Worker, Nanny, Janitor, Tree Cutter, Mechanic, Handyman, Carpenter, Home Health Aide, Computer Programmer, Healthcare Worker, Lettuce Picker, Cow Milker, Landscaper, Lawnmower, Bricklayer, Roofer, Window Washer, Waiter, Sandwich Artist, Teacher, Minister, Coach, Student, Parent, Clerk, Fisherman, Farmer, Maid, Chicken Plucker, Meat Processor, Etc., Without Docs Is Removed And US Citizens Take Over All These Jobs!
  2. JAMELLE BOUIE @ SLATE: TRUMP, SESSIONS, MILLER & THE GOP RESTRICTIONISTS HAVE PUT GOOD OL’ 1920S RACISM AT THE FOREFRONT OF THEIR WHITE NATIONALIST IMMIGRATION AGENDA! –“What good does it do to bring in somebody who’s illiterate in their own country, has no skills, and is going to struggle in our country and not be successful? . . . That is not what a good nation should do, and we need to get away from it.” — J. “Gonzo Apocalypto” Sessions, Attorney General of the United States of America & Unapologetic White Nationalist With A Long History Of Racism!
  3. 😰👹👺🏴‍☠️☠️⚰️🤮“DARKNESS ON THE EDGE OF TOWN” — Nicole Narea @ Vox With A Glimpse Of Trump’s Second Term: American Apocalypse — Dark, Ugly, Hateful, Violent, Dishonest, Exclusionary, Stupid, Racist, Diminished, Yet Very White & Privileged — Are People Of Color & Their Allies Really Going To Stand By & Watch While Their Past & Our Future As A Strong, Creative, Tolerant, Diverse, Humane Nation Is Written Out Of History By A Racist GOP & Its Totally Wacko Yet Dangerously Evil Cult Leader?
  4. 👹🎃HALLOWEEN HORROR 🏴‍☠️☠️🤮⚰️👎🏻REICHSREPORT: GRUPPENFUHRER MILLER REVEALS “REICHSPLAN” FOR EXTERMINATION OF IMMIGRATION, ASYLUM, REFUGE BY EXECUTIVE DECREE!  — “The Final Solution??”  — Parents, Protect Your Kids, Families, & Your Country From This Grotesque Un-American Monster!

🤡🤯AS AMERICA SUFFERS, THE GOP CLOWN SHOW ROLLS ON TOWARD OBLIVION!

Clown Parade
The GOP, in full regalia, heads for the U.S. House. PHOTO: Public Domain

Dana Milbank writes @ WashPost:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/09/22/gaetz-mccarthy-shutdown-house-gop-deadlock/

Martin Luther nailed his theses to a church door. Matt Gaetz displayed his in the men’s room.

Specifically, the congressman (or somebody) left a draft of his “Motion to Vacate” on a baby changing table in a restroom downstairs from the House chamber, where it was found by journalist Matt Laslo. “H. Res. __,” it began. “Resolved, that the Office of Speaker of the House of Representatives is hereby declared to be vacant.”

But Gaetz (R-Fla.) doesn’t need a resolution to “vacate the chair,” as a motion to remove Kevin McCarthy as speaker iscalled. For all practical purposes, the chair is already vacant.

It should have been obvious to all this week, if it wasn’t already, that McCarthy (R-Calif.) is speaker in name only, as his leaderless Republican caucus stumbles toward a government shutdown. Review some of the labels House Republicans hurled at each other over the last few days:

“Clown show.” “Clowns.” “Foolishness.” “Weak.” “Terribly misguided.” “Selective amnesia.” “Stupidity.” “Failure to lead.” “Lunatics.” “Disgraceful.” “New low.” “Enabling Chairman Xi.” “People that have serious issues.” “Pathetic.”

Amid the epithets, Republicans brought the House to another standstill. For the second time in as many weeks, hard-liners blocked the House from even considering a bill to fund the troops. Two days later, they blocked it for a third time. They also forced party leaders to pull from the floor their plan to avert a shutdown — a plan that would do nothing to avert a shutdown even if it passed.

Walking into yet another grievance-airing session among House Republicans this week in the House basement, first-term Rep. Richard McCormick (Ga.) remarked to a colleague: “I think we should call this the Dance of the Dragons.” That was a “Game of Thrones” reference to a civil war in which (spoiler alert) both of the aspirants to the Targaryen throne died, along with several of their children and most of the dragons. McCormick later developed the metaphor for me: “We have a lot of powerful people in one room who are ferocious,” he explained in part, and “it’s going to get even uglier.”

. . . .

********************************

Read Milbank’s full article at the above link.

Dana Milbank
Dana Milbank
Opinion Columnist
Washington Post

Remember, folks, the problem here is NOT “Congress,” as the so-called “mainstream media” would have you believe! No, it’s the GOP — the anti-American party of nihilism, insurrection, lies, and extremism! McCarthy COULD have had an agreement in hand long before now. all it would take is picking up the phone and working with Leader Jeffries and the Dems to come up with a reasonable funding proposal that could actually PASS the Senate! Indeed, McCarthy earlier cut such a deal with President Biden until he violated it under pressure from a few right-wing members of the GOP “wrecking crew” in an act of supreme cowardice (a McCarthy specialty) and total failure to pursue the common good.

Notably, when the House had a REAL Leader, Speaker Pelosi, there was no shutdown during the Trump Administration — even though there were plenty of issues (Dreamers being a key one) that some Dems would have liked her to “go to the mat” on. When the chips are down, Dems believe in governing; the GOP believes in destroying!

Upcoming generations who don’t want to live in a country where conspiracy theories, cruelty, misinformation, hatred, intolerance, false grievances, vengeance, dehumanization, greed, self-aggrandizement, racism, anti-semitism, grotesque fiscal and moral irresponsibility, misogyny, incompetence, and just plain stupidity replace democracy  and governing for the common good had better get energized and busy coming up with a strategy to remove GOP members from every elected position from the national level to local animal control officers. Otherwise, the majority of the next generations will face a bleak future in a nation trying to return to a past that never was with faux “leaders” who demonstrably can’t lead, and don’t even make a pretense of trying to do so.

The “forced birth party” shows little, if any, concern for the well-being of humanity once it has exited the womb! 

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

09-26-23

Related posts:

  1. 🏴‍☠️☠️🤮⚰️👎KAKISTOCRACY KORNER: SPOTLIGHT ON AMERICA’S MOST DANGEROUS HATE GROUP: THE RNC!
  2. VICTORY DANCE! — ICE’S HOMAN SAYS CLIMATE OF FEAR HAS STEMMED BORDER CROSSINGS & PROVES UNRESTRAINED, ARBITRARY IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT WORKS! — “There’s no population that’s off the table,” he said. “If you’re in the country illegally, we’re looking for you and we’re looking to apprehend you.” — America Won’t Be Truly Safe Until The Last Cook, Gardner, Construction Worker, Nanny, Janitor, Tree Cutter, Mechanic, Handyman, Carpenter, Home Health Aide, Computer Programmer, Healthcare Worker, Lettuce Picker, Cow Milker, Landscaper, Lawnmower, Bricklayer, Roofer, Window Washer, Waiter, Sandwich Artist, Teacher, Minister, Coach, Student, Parent, Clerk, Fisherman, Farmer, Maid, Chicken Plucker, Meat Processor, Etc., Without Docs Is Removed And US Citizens Take Over All These Jobs!
  3. 🤡CLOWN CAPITOL:  J.R. PRESIDES OVER GOP CLOWN SHOW HE HELPED CREATE — Empowering The Koch Bros, Suppressing Minority Votes, Enabling GOP Gerrymandering, Ignoring Invidious Racial & Religious Motives, Turning A Blind Eye To Lies & Pretexts, It All Contributed To The Arrogant Display Of GOP Dishonesty & Impunity Now On Public Display In The Senate! — Plus Bonus Friday Mini-Essay: “Profiles in Fecklessness”
  4. 😰👹👺🏴‍☠️☠️⚰️🤮“DARKNESS ON THE EDGE OF TOWN” — Nicole Narea @ Vox With A Glimpse Of Trump’s Second Term: American Apocalypse — Dark, Ugly, Hateful, Violent, Dishonest, Exclusionary, Stupid, Racist, Diminished, Yet Very White & Privileged — Are People Of Color & Their Allies Really Going To Stand By & Watch While Their Past & Our Future As A Strong, Creative, Tolerant, Diverse, Humane Nation Is Written Out Of History By A Racist GOP & Its Totally Wacko Yet Dangerously Evil Cult Leader?

😎👍 MAINE REJECTS  “BEGGAR THY NEIGHBOR” PHILOSOPHY IN FAVOR OF HELPING EVERYONE DO BETTER!

Op-Ed From The Portland Press Herald:

https://www.pressherald.com/2023/08/05/commentary-during-turbulent-times-maine-invests-in-its-people/

Commentary: During turbulent times, Maine invests in its people

During the latest legislative session, much was done to ensure that prosperity is within reach of all Maine citizens and residents.

BY LUISA S. DEPREZ AND LISA MILLER SPECIAL TO THE PRESS HERALD

The times in which we live are, and have been, difficult. Turbulence confronts us at every corner, upon every turn. Around us things are constantly changing – economically, politically, medically, socially. There is too often too little upon which to rely to attain and maintain a degree of certainty in one’s life.

As we emerge from the COVID pandemic, we find its effects lingering in large workforce and societal shifts: lost jobs, lost day care, essential care workers leaving the workforce, older workers retiring early or moving into part-time work to stay afloat, small businesses closing, women leaving jobs to care for young, sick and elderly family members, people moving to and from communities, and rents and housing prices skyrocketing. These effects persist; regaining some degree of stability will take time.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Luisa S. Deprez is professor emerita of sociology and the Edmund S. Muskie School of Public Service at the University of Southern Maine. Lisa Miller is a former legislator who served on the Health and Human Services and Appropriations and Financial Affairs committees. They are members of the Maine chapter of the national Scholars Strategy Network, which brings together scholars across the country to address public challenges and their policy implications.

Yet we now see a glimmer of hope, a light at the end of the tunnel. Definite improvements in the overall economy are emerging: unemployment rates are at a historic low, housing starts are increasing, the manufacturing sector has seen an increase in orders for the past few months, consumer confidence has risen dramatically, and inflationary pressures are subsiding.

Maine’s policymakers are now tasked with ensuring that Mainers share in that rebound – that families and communities can build new pathways to prosperity and well-being. Enhancing and promoting prosperity must be the primary concern of policymakers and elected officials.

Classic views of “prosperity” usually refer to economic success and building wealth. But broader definitions of prosperity include becoming or remaining strong and healthy and flourishing. In other words, thriving. Yes, individual initiative and responsibility is critical to building prosperity, but the assurance to do so is rarely achievable in the absence of government support. Nor is success sustained without such support.

Policymakers and state officials know this well, as seen in recent bills and initiatives that emerged from this past legislative session:

• Workers can take paid family leave to combat illness or care for a loved one.

• New child tax credits provide additional support to low-income families.

• Older Mainers will receive financial support for medical costs and property tax bills.

• Child care gets a boost through improved wages and broader subsidies.

• More affordable-housing initiatives were funded.

• A new business incentive program was created.

• A workforce training tax credit will help employers grow the skill level of Maine workers.

• Additional support for emergency food and shelter was funded.

These achievements should be celebrated as they will certainly contribute greatly to the rebound necessary for individuals, communities, and the state to regain some of the losses.

But there was much left undone to build prosperity for everyone. The Wabanaki nations are still denied rights and protections; immigrants continue to be denied access to MaineCare; health care costs are even more burdensome for an increasing number of Mainers; pay disparities by gender and race remain; agricultural workers continue to be exempt from basic labor laws; workers with low salaries remain ineligible for overtime, and corporate loopholes and tax-avoidance prevail, leaving communities to carry the load for citizen and community investments.

During this legislative session, many organizations and individuals lobbied tirelessly to ensure that prosperity is within reach of all Maine citizens and residents. Both Gov. Janet Mills and the Legislature responded with investment of tax dollars to help everyday people stay in their jobs or seek new ones, become healthier, and be more productive.

Political and moral philosopher J.S. Mill would argue that “societies tend to flourish when individuals have a wide scope for directing the course of their own lives.” Many of the bills passed by the Maine Legislature do just that. But more needs to come. We are not done.

************************
Governance for the common good is what it’s supposed to be all about!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

08-07-23

Related posts:

  1. 🇺🇸LOOKING FORWARD TO JAN 20: How The Biden Administration Can Reach Out To Rural America & Bring Our Nation Back Together! — Rural & Urban Areas Need Each Other To Maximize Growth & Prosper In The Future!
  2. MAINE’S BRIGHT FUTURE IN A GLOBAL SOCIETY DEPENDS ON ROBUST IMMIGRATION & WELCOMING ATTITUDES! — Professor Joseph W. McDonnell Writes In The Portland Press Gazette
  3. “Warren Buffett on Immigration Reform: Buffett feels that immigrants (including undocumented ones) have been and continue to be a key part of our prosperity — not a part of the problem.“
  4. O CANADA: TRUMP POLICIES AID CANADIAN LOBSTERMEN AT THE EXPENSE OF MAINE! — CANADA BRACES FOR INFLUX OF “TPSers” FLEEING US!

🤯 POLITICS: WITH THE ECONOMY THE #1 ISSUE, WHY WOULD VOTERS TRUST AN EXTREME RIGHT GOP PLEDGED TO DESTROY IT, INCREASE INFLATION, & PROVOKE A WORLDWIDE ECONOMIC CRISIS? — Tax Cuts, Slashing The Safety Net For The Most Vulnerable, Increasing Income Equality, & “Playing Chicken” With The Debt Ceiling Are A Recipe For Disaster! — C. Rampell @ WashPost

Catherine Rampell
Catherine Rampell
Opinion Columnist
Washington Post

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/10/18/gop-debt-ceiling-plan-financial-crisis-recession/

. . . .

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) and other Republicans have recently backed proposals to make the 2017 Trump tax cuts permanent, as well as to extend or expand several other corporate tax breaks.

Never mind that Americans think corporations already pay too little in taxes, according to many polls. Cutting taxes further is also likely to make inflation worse, for the same reason that Republicans argue that increased government spending can also make inflation worse: Giving people more cash to spend when there’s limited stuff to buy drives prices up.

The scariest part of the recently disclosed GOP economic agenda, however, has largely gone under the radar. It’s the plan to hold the debt ceiling hostage next year, which could easily precipitate a global financial catastrophe.

Republicans have withheld their support from raising the debt limit before, usually framing their hostage-taking as a commitment to fiscal restraint. But the debt ceiling has nothing to do with new spending; rather, it’s a somewhat arbitrary statutory cap on how much the government can borrow to pay off bills that it has already incurred, through tax and spending decisions that Congress has already made. Refusing to raise the debt limit is like going to a restaurant, ordering the lobster and a $500 bottle of wine, and then declaring yourself financially responsible because you skipped out on the check.

Actually, it’s worse than that.

. . . .

Forcing a debt limit crisis, as the world teeters on the verge of recession, is the opposite of what you would pursue if you cared about strengthening the economy. But no matter: Just look at the context-free polls! Surely, under GOP stewardship, the economy will be in good hands.

*******************

Read Catherine’s complete op-ed at the link.

Democrats try hard, if imperfectly, to solve problems for the general good. The GOP, not so much! Their focus is on lining the pockets of their “fat cat” funders, replacing “good government” with chaos,  and “beggar thy neighbor” policies. 

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

10-19-22

Related posts:

  1. CATHERINE @ WASHPOST “GETS IT!” — Why Are The Biden Administration & Some Dem Pols “Running Scared” From What Should Be A Big Win? — Many Of The Legal,Workers We Need Are Patiently Waiting @ The Border For Processing & Legal Admission — Dems Need To Stop “Shaking In Their Boots” & Start “Shaking Their Tails” To “Pre-Process” Refugees For An Orderly Restoration Of The Rule Of Law On May 23!
  2. 🇺🇸🗽👍🏼😎MAKING AMERICA BETTER, FINALLY: “Mr. Biden has laid out an immigration program that would genuinely put America first.” (WashPost) — No Wonder GOP Anti-American White Nationalists Like Tom Cotton Are Apoplectic & Spouting Their Racist, White Elitist Nonsense!
  3. @WASHPOST: CATHERINE RAMPELL SAYS IT WELL! — “Contrary to Trumpers’ claims, keeping our word to Afghan allies in trouble is wholly consistent with a philosophy that puts ‘America First.’ Indeed, it’s central to the entire operation.”  — Getting Beyond Bogus Racist Nativism To A Robust, Honest, Expanded Legal Immigration System That Treats Refugees & Asylees Fairly, Humanely, & Generously — As Assets, Not “Threats” — Is Putting America First!
  4. WASHPOST: Catherine Rampell Takes The Measure Of Stephen Miller’s Neo-Nazi View Of American Immigration History – Exposing A Lifelong Hater’s Knowingly False, Misleading & Existentially Dangerous Narrative!

GARY SAMPLINER @ WASHPOST — The DMV Can Turn Abbott’s White Nationalist Stunt Into A “Win – Win!” — It Requires A Durable Approach! — Don’t Expect It To Come From The Biden Administration!

Gary Sampliner
Gary Sampliner
Senior Consultant for Advocacy
Shoulder to Shoulder

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/09/dc-grateful-texas-migrants/?utm_campaign=wp_afternoon_buzz&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_buzz&carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F37e0c1d%2F631b9b1ff3d9003c58ca5081%2F598a8acf9bbc0f6826fe4cb8%2F50%2F67%2F631b9b1ff3d9003c58ca5081&wp_cu=565797071f2aa4e140538667638665f9%7CC0D6D8DF75AF4203E0430100007FC096

Opinion by Gary Sampliner

September 9, 2022 at 10:00 a.m. ET

Gary Sampliner is a director of JAMAAT (Jews and Muslims and Allies Acting Together) and a member of the Bethesda Jewish Congregation, which with Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church and the Maqaame Ibrahim Islamic Center is working to assist arriving migrants and asylum seekers. JAMAAT is a member organization of the Interfaith Immigration Coalition.

Gratitude might not be the reaction Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) was expecting when he began sending frequent busloads of migrants and asylum seekers to the greater D.C. area. But gratitude, warmth and a renewed sense of collective responsibility are the responses I have seen as D.C.-area organizations and faith communities (and, most recently, its government) have stepped up to welcome and support newcomers.

With Abbott’s bus initiative — a costly venture likely to be funded in large part by Texas taxpayers — we’ve seen an apparent strategy to inflict maximum pain on our region and score political points, using vulnerable people as weapons aimed at pressuring the Biden administration into taking more drastic measures to seal our nation’s southern border.

But, despite the deeply cynical nature of Abbott’s plans, we might actually owe him a debt of gratitude.

We know that providing transportation is one part of establishing a dignified reception system for people seeking safety, and we’ve witnessed repeatedly the long-term payoffs to our communities and nation when we offer support to those in need of refuge.

The D.C. area has been generous in welcoming migrants fleeing persecution. With community and government support, Virginia has been the third-highest recipient of recent Afghan refugees to the United States, and Maryland is not far behind. My own synagogue and the church and mosque with whom we share our building have been active in helping welcome Afghan refugees to the area since 2017. The Jewish-Muslim community organization I help to direct has been working to get other interfaith partnerships involved in similar efforts.

Afghan arrivals are not the only ones receiving a warm reception. With the help of some heroic community and faith groups — many of which are part of the Migrant Solidarity Mutual Aid Network — our area has mobilized quickly to welcome the migrants being bused here from the southern border. These tremendous efforts have demonstrated, yet again, the area’s commitment to extending welcome and hospitality to those in need.

As with the public-private, multisector approach used in Afghan and other refugee resettlements, we need all hands on deck to welcome new arrivals to the area. We need as many available resources as possible, including the support of local, state and federal governments, faith groups, nonprofit organizations and community volunteers.

It is heartening to see D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) now stepping up to the challenge and opportunity posed by the arriving migrants. On Thursday, she announced the establishment of an Office of Migrant Services, with an initial allocation of $10 million, to meet the needs of the migrants who are moving elsewhere or intending to reside here. As an official “Welcoming City,” D.C. government assistance should be an essential element of the response to welcome migrants to our region — especially considering that, as a majority of the D.C. Council has told Bowser, D.C. is expected to have a surplus of around $500 million in fiscal 2022 — even though D.C. has good reason to request Federal Emergency Management Agency reimbursement to help satisfy the overriding federal responsibility over immigration matters.

But the need for private and community support for the incoming migrants remains critical for their successful integration into our community. Though my organizations’ work with the Afghan community continues, we’ve begun to provide various types of assistance to the newcomers being bused here. We are pleased to see and strongly encourage fellow faith communities and groups around the area to join us in this important work of welcome and are pleased when they do. This is an opportunity to demonstrate the best of who we are in the face of unprecedented levels of forced dislocations worldwide.

The bottom line is this: If we want to continue to live up to our values, many more of us need to step up to assist the new arrivals. And if we can meet this challenge, we will set an example for the rest of our country to follow.

******************

One frequent mistake is to view this situation as “an emergency” or “temporary.” That leads to “short-term thinking” — throw some money at it, energize volunteers, and “hold the fort” until the so-called “crisis” subsides.

Problem is, money runs out, volunteers burn out or get called to pitch in on other issues, and the media turns its attention elsewhere. But, refugees and asylees will continue to come. 

And, the better we treat our new arrivals, the more who will develop ties here and choose the DMV as their U.S. residence. While nativists like Abbott view this as a “crisis” and an “invasion,” I agree with Gary that it’s a great opportunity for us and these migrants. We’ve lived the DMV area for almost 50 years. Most of the growth and prosperity over that time can be linked, directly or indirectly, to recent immigrants, both with and without documents!

In many ways, the situations in other countries that drive migration are worse than at any time since the end of the Cold War. And, it’s not getting better, at least in the short run. Meanwhile, our legal refugee and asylum systems remain a shambles, despite the Biden Administration’s promise to do better than the Trump White Nationalist kakistocracy.

For example, one  of the largest, probably the largest, flow of refugees in the Western Hemisphere is from Venezuela. And, contrary to the restrictionist blather, the vast majority of the six million who have fled Venezuela are NOT in the U.S. Colombia has received at least 1.8 million, where the U.S. has fewer than 350,000. 

But, there is no immediate prospect that most Venezuelans will return or stop coming. Nor is there any chance that countries like Colombia are going to “up their share” so that the U.S. can take fewer!

Yet, the Biden Administration has failed to provide consistent, helpful, guidance on Venezuelan asylum at either DHS or DOJ. An improved and better BIA, with expert judges committed to a proper application of asylum law, should have issued appropriate precedents that could have been a basis for getting tens of thousands of grantable Venezuelan asylum cases off the endless backlogs and on the road to green cards. 

But, Garland continues to mismanage asylum law at all levels. He employs unfocused politicos, unqualified Trump-era bureaucrats, and judges who got or retained their jobs under Sessions or Barr because of their actual or perceived willingness to unlawfully deny asylum. Nor has DHS implemented any semblance of the necessary, realistic, robust overseas refugee program for Venezuela, Haiti, and the Northern Triangle! 

Mayorkas has “beefed up” the TPS program for Venezuela. But, by its own terms, that’s not a long-term solution. They extended TPS for Haitians while denying recent arrivals their legal rights to seek asylum and inexplicably returning thousands to the dangerous, failed state without any process at all. It’s a farce — but one with ugly racial overtones and a horrible message! To say that Biden’s refugee and asylum programs are screwed up would be an understatement!

Refugee flows, including asylum, are both inevitable and continuing. They are an important, beneficial, and essential component of legal immigration.

Those seeking legal refuge can be forced largely into the underground system, as Trump tried to do; largely admitted in an orderly legal fashion as progressive experts urge; or there can be a haphazard “combination of the two” which is what we have now! 

Undoubtedly, refugees and asylees are good from America. They will get jobs, make contributions, and have families of U.S. citizens. The tax base and U.S. institutions will benefit. But, that’s the “long view.” 

In the short run, migrants need food, affordable housing, orientation, and education. Kids will need more teachers with specialized skills in a time of nationwide teacher shortage and politicized demonization of educators and administrators. School populations will increase. That takes money. Taxpayers and the politicians answerable to them are notoriously focused on the now, rather than the whenever.

So, the pressing issue is how to institutionalize, regularize, and fund successful migrant resettlement. In other words, how do we get from here to there in the absence of effective government leadership, planning, and funding – often on multiple levels?

I wish I had the answers. But, I don’t. We have to hope that Gary and others like him outside the dysfunctional government structure do! Because, ready or not, migration will  continue! See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2022/09/10/🇺🇸🗽👍🏼-immigrant-nation-teas-truth-wisdom-americans-views-on-immigrants-and-immigration-are-overwhelmingly-positive/.

Meanwhile, Texans might want to give the financial shenanigans of their corrupt, inept, so-called Governor a closer look! According to NBC, he’s spending an average of $1,400+ for each individual bussed from the border to DC. A commercial coach ticket is $200-300! https://www.nbcdfw.com/investigations/abbotts-border-buses-cost-1400-per-rider-taxpayers-could-be-stuck-with-bills/2993548/ 

Texans will have a chance to replace Abbott with a real Governor, Democrat Beto O’Rourke in November.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

09-11-22

 

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  2. ⚖️🇺🇸👍🏼🗽DEAN KEVIN JOHNSON’S SUCCINCT RESPONSE TO GREG ABBOTT’S PREDICTABLE SOUTHERN BORDER BS IS WORTH A READ! — PLUS: ARELIS HERNANDEZ OF WASHPOST WITH SOME MUCH-NEEDED TRUTH & PERSPECTIVE FROM THOSE ACTUALLY LIVING ON THE SOUTHERN BORDER: “We need more lawyers and judges, not more troops or technology.”
  3. ⚖️🗽MORE TRUTH ABOUT THE SOUTHERN BORDER FROM ONE OF AMERICA’S 🇺🇸 LEADING HUMAN RIGHTS EXPERTS: “Real Needs, Not Fictitious Crises Account For The Situation at US-Mexico Border,” By Donald Kerwin Center For Migration Studies
  4. HOW “AMERICA’S KILLER COURTS” PROMOTE “CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY” — HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH: TRUMP & HIS WHITE NATIONALIST SYCOPHANTS & TOADIES TOUT LAWLESS POLICIES THAT VIOLATE LEGAL OBLIGATIONS & HELP KILL, RAPE, TORTURE THOSE RETURNED TO EL SALVADOR — Supremes & Article III Judiciary Complicit In Gross Human Rights Violations! 

⚖️🗽🦸🏻‍♀️🎖 A TRUE AMERICAN HERO GETS HER DUE: FRANCES PERKINS WAS THE “MOTHER OF AMERICA’S SAFETY NET!” — By Professor Heather Cox Richardson — “She recognized that the ideas of community values and pooling resources to keep the economic playing field level and take care of everyone are at least as deeply seated in our political philosophy as the idea of every man for himself.”

Heather Cox Richardson
Heather Cox Richardson
Historian
Professor, Boston College
Frances Perkins
Frances Perkins (1880-1965)
U.S. Secretary of Labor (1933-45)
PHOTO: Public realm

Letters from an American

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August 13, 2022

Heather Cox Richardson

11 hr ago

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Since it seems clear we will be deciding whether we want to preserve the Social Security Act by our choice of leaders in the next few elections, I thought it not unreasonable to reprint this piece from last year about why people in the 1930s thought the measure was imperative. There is more news about the classified material at Mar-a-Lago, but nothing that can’t wait another day so I can catch this anniversary.

By the time most of you will read this, it will be August 14, and on this day in 1935, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act into law. While FDR’s New Deal had put in place new measures to regulate business and banking and had provided temporary work relief to combat the Depression, this law permanently changed the nature of the American government.

The Social Security Act is known for its payments to older Americans, but it did far more than that. It established unemployment insurance; aid to homeless, dependent, and neglected children; funds to promote maternal and child welfare; and public health services. It was a sweeping reworking of the relationship between the government and its citizens, using the power of taxation to pool funds to provide a basic social safety net.

The driving force behind the law was FDR’s Secretary of Labor, Frances Perkins. She was the first woman to hold a position in the U.S. Cabinet and still holds the record for having the longest tenure in that job: she lasted from 1933 to 1945.

She brought to the position a vision of government very different from that of the Republicans who had run it in the 1920s. While men like President Herbert Hoover had harped on the idea of a “rugged individualism” in which men worked their way up, providing for their families on their own, Perkins recognized that people in communities had always supported each other. The vision of a hardworking man supporting his wife and children was more myth than reality: her own husband suffered from bipolar disorder, making her the family’s primary support.

As a child, Perkins spent summers with her grandmother, with whom she was very close, in the small town of Newcastle, Maine, where the old-fashioned, close-knit community supported those in need. In college, at Mount Holyoke, she majored in chemistry and physics, but after a professor required students to tour a factory to observe working conditions, Perkins became committed to improving the lives of those trapped in industrial jobs. After college, Perkins became a social worker and, in 1910, earned a masters degree in economics and sociology from Columbia University. She became the head of the New York office of the National Consumers League, urging consumers to use their buying power to demand better conditions and wages for the workers who made the products they were buying.

The next year, in 1911, she witnessed the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire in which 146 workers, mostly women and girls, died. They were trapped in the building when the fire broke out because the factory owner had ordered the doors to the stairwells and exits locked to make sure no one slipped outside for a break. Unable to escape the smoke and fire in the factory, the workers—some of them on fire—leaped from the 8th, 9th, and 10th floors of the building, dying on the pavement.

The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire turned Perkins away from voluntary organizations to improve workers’ lives and toward using the government to adjust the harsh conditions of industrialization. She began to work with the Democratic politicians at Tammany Hall, who presided over communities in the city that mirrored rural towns and who exercised a form of social welfare for their voters, making sure they had jobs, food, and shelter and that wives and children had a support network if a husband and father died. In that system, the voices of women like Perkins were valuable, for their work in the immigrant wards of the city meant that they were the ones who knew what working families needed to survive.

The overwhelming unemployment, hunger, and suffering caused by the Great Depression made Perkins realize that state governments alone could not adjust the conditions of the modern world to create a safe, supportive community for ordinary people. She came to believe, as she said: “The people are what matter to government, and a government should aim to give all the people under its jurisdiction the best possible life.”

Through her Tammany connections, Perkins met FDR, and when he asked her to be his Secretary of Labor, she told him that she wanted the federal government to provide unemployment insurance, health insurance, and old-age insurance. She later recalled: “I remember he looked so startled, and he said, ‘Well, do you think it can be done?’”

Creating federal unemployment insurance became her primary concern. Congressmen had little interest in passing such legislation. They said they worried that unemployment insurance and federal aid to dependent families would undermine a man’s willingness to work. But Perkins recognized that those displaced by the Depression had added new pressure to the idea of old-age insurance.

In Long Beach, California, Dr. Francis Townsend had looked out of his window one day to see elderly women rooting through garbage cans for food. Appalled, he came up with a plan to help the elderly and stimulate the economy at the same time. Townsend proposed that the government provide every retired person over 60 years old with $200 a month, on the condition that they spend it within 30 days, a condition designed to stimulate the economy.

Townsend’s plan was wildly popular. More than that, though, it sparked people across the country to start coming up with their own plans for protecting the elderly and the nation’s social fabric, and together, they began to change the public conversation about social welfare policies.

They spurred Congress to action. Perkins recalled that Townsend “startled the Congress of the United States because the aged have votes. The wandering boys didn’t have any votes; the evicted women and their children had very few votes. If the unemployed didn’t stay long enough in any one place, they didn’t have a vote. But the aged people lived in one place and they had votes, so every Congressman had heard from the Townsend Plan people.”

FDR put together a committee to come up with a plan to create a basic social safety net, but committee members could not make up their minds how to move forward. Perkins continued to hammer on the idea they must come up with a final plan, and finally locked the members of the committee in a room. As she recalled: “Well, we locked the door and we had a lot of talk. I laid out a couple of bottles of something or other to cheer their lagging spirits. Anyhow, we stayed in session until about 2 a.m. We then voted finally, having taken our solemn oath that this was the end; we were never going to review it again.”

By the time the bill came to a vote in Congress, it was hugely popular. The vote was 371 to 33 in the House and 77 to 6 in the Senate.

When asked to describe the origins of the Social Security Act, Perkins mused that its roots came from the very beginnings of the nation. When Alexis de Tocqueville wrote Democracy in America in 1835, she noted, he thought Americans were uniquely “so generous, so kind, so charitably disposed.” “Well, I don’t know anything about the times in which De Tocqueville visited America,” she said, but “I do know that at the time I came into the field of social work, these feelings were real.”

With the Social Security Act, Perkins helped to write into our laws a longstanding political impulse in America that stood in dramatic contrast to the 1920s philosophy of rugged individualism. She recognized that the ideas of community values and pooling resources to keep the economic playing field level and take care of everyone are at least as deeply seated in our political philosophy as the idea of every man for himself.

When she recalled the origins of the Social Security Act, Perkins recalled: “Of course, the Act had to be amended, and has been amended, and amended, and amended, and amended, until it has now grown into a large and important project, for which, by the way, I think the people of the United States are deeply thankful. One thing I know: Social Security is so firmly embedded in the American psychology today that no politician, no political party, no political group could possibly destroy this Act and still maintain our democratic system. It is safe. It is safe forever, and for the everlasting benefit of the people of the United States.”

—

Notes:

https://www.ssa.gov/history/35actinx.html

https://www.ssa.gov/history/perkins5.html

https://francesperkinscenter.org/life-new/

Share

***************************

Perkins was an original “good government person,” unfortunately, an increasingly rare breed. She recognized that a strong, reliable government safety net promotes personal independence and achieving full individual potential.

Perkins Homestead
Frances Perkins Homestead
Damariscotta, ME
PHOTO: Francis Perkins Center

Perkins had strong Maine ties to her ancestral homestead in Newcastle, ME. It’s near our summer home in Boothbay Harbor, ME. A few years ago, Cathy and I had a chance to tour the homestead, now owned and maintained by the Frances Perkins Center in Damariscotta, ME.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

08-14-22

Related posts:

  1. 🇺🇸👍🏼😇HISTORY: LABOR DAY TRIBUTE: FRANCES PERKINS, GODMOTHER OF AMERICA’S SAFETY NET! 🥇❤️ — By Professor Heather Cox Richardson
  2. HEATHER COX RICHARDSON: The “Reopen America” Movement Has Been A Haven For White Supremacists & Neo-Nazis!
  3. “Warren Buffett on Immigration Reform: Buffett feels that immigrants (including undocumented ones) have been and continue to be a key part of our prosperity — not a part of the problem.“
  4. 🇺🇸🗽👍🏼😎MAKING AMERICA BETTER, FINALLY: “Mr. Biden has laid out an immigration program that would genuinely put America first.” (WashPost) — No Wonder GOP Anti-American White Nationalists Like Tom Cotton Are Apoplectic & Spouting Their Racist, White Elitist Nonsense!

😎👍🏼⚖️🗽NDPA INNOVATION: Superstar Professor 🦸🏼🌟Erin Barbato & UW Law Immigration Clinic Partner With School Of Education To Help Wisconsin’s Dreamers With A Practical, Comprehensive, Interdisciplinary Approach! — Introducing The “Center For Dreamers @ UW!”

Professor Erin Barbato
Professor Erin Barbato
Director, Immigrant Justice Clinic
UW Law
Photo source: UW Law

From the Winter 2021-22 issue of the U.W. Law Gargoyle:

https://gargoyle.law.wisc.edu/2022/01/14/center-for-dreamers-provides-holistic-support-for-daca-students/.

The UW Law School launched a new center to support Wisconsin’s DREAMers, an all-encompassing term describing individuals who have lived in the United States without official lawful status since coming to the country as a minor. The Center for DREAMers was awarded a grant through the Baldwin Wisconsin Idea Endowment, a competitive grant program that fosters public engagement and the advancement of the Wisconsin Idea.

Clinical Professor and Director of the Immigrant Justice Clinic at the Law School Erin Barbato, together with Erika Rosales of the School of Education, will lead the Center for DREAMers.

Erica Rosales
Erika Rosales
School of Education
University of Wisconsin, Madison
PHOTO: UW Law

The center will serve the approximately 11,000 DREAMers in Wisconsin, working with organizations to coordinate the provision of legal representation, mental and social services, and career and educational counseling to ease the burden of some of the uncertainty experienced by undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. as children.

Barbato, who teaches second- and third-year law students to represent individuals in removal proceedings and with humanitarian-based immigration relief, says the center will become an important resource for the community.

“The Center for DREAMers will bring together comprehensive resources for students that have DACA in Wisconsin,” says Barbato. “Currently, no organization in Wisconsin exists that has the capacity to serve the unique educational and legal needs of DACA recipients. We hope the center will serve this population in a manner that will allow them to fulfill their potential in a state and country they call home. We are honored to have the opportunity to serve this population so they no longer have to live in fear and one day they will have equity in educational opportunities as well as citizenship.”

As a part of its community-focused approach, the center provides outreach events and support on different campus and community locations, including the South Madison Partnership. A particular focus includes outreach to DACA communities throughout the state of Wisconsin, including bi-monthly information events.

The center’s mission also aligns with the Law School’s law-in-action tradition.

“The University of Wisconsin Law School is renowned for its law-in-action approach to legal education, and the Center for DREAMers aligns with that practical approach to learning and the pursuit of equal justice,” says Dean Dan Tokaji. “We’re grateful for the Baldwin Wisconsin Idea Endowment’s support for the center and are thrilled by the opportunities this will provide for our students and the community.”

Located in the Law School’s Economic Justice Institute, the center opened in October and began providing office hours and counseling services. Clinical law students in the Immigrant Justice Clinic play an instrumental role in the center’s work, says Barbato. Under her guidance, the students provide direct representation to people with DACA in renewals and may provide representation to people with DACA who are eligible for pathways to citizenship through family, employment, or for humanitarian-based reasons.

Posted in News & NotesTagged Volume 44.1, Winter 2021-22

*******************

Congratulations, Erin, my friend, on your continuing extraordinary leadership, creativity, and overwhelming commitment to achieving social justice in America. You are indeed an inspiring role model for America’s new generation of lawyers! So proud of what you and your colleagues are doing at my alma mater! Go Badgers!

Bucky Badger
Bucky Badger

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-25-22

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☹️THEY WORKED DANGEROUS JOBS, PUT FOOD ON OUR TABLES DURING THE PANDEMIC, & ARE MEMBERS OF A GROUP WHO PAID $9 BILLION IN U.S. TAXES — Their “Reward” Has Been A Short-Sighted “Slap In The Face” That Also Penalizes More Than 1 Million U.S. Citizen Children! — Julia Preston Reports For The Marshall Project

Julia Preston
Julia Preston
American Journalist
The Marshall Project

https://www.themarshallproject.org/2021/12/15/essential-but-excluded

https://elpais.com/internacional/2021-12-15/esenciales-pero-excluidos.html

Essential but Excluded

Immigrants put seafood on America’s tables. But many have been shut out of pandemic aid — and so have their U.S. citizen children.

By JULIA PRESTON and ARIEL GOODMAN

****************

Somewhat reminiscent of how the Chinese workers who were key to building the transcontinental railroad were “rewarded” with the Chinese Exclusion Act and more than a century of anti-Asian bias and hate that continues today.

See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2019/05/31/history-chinese-workers-made-america-great-by-building-the-transcontinental-railway-their-reward-from-a-racist-nation-deportation-exclusion-bias/

https://immigrationcourtside.com/2019/05/10/courtside-history-beyond-trumps-mythical-white-nationalist-nation-lets-see-who-besides-enslaved-african-american-forced-migrants-did-the-work-that-made-america-gre/

https://immigrationcourtside.com/2021/03/31/%f0%9f%a4%ae%e2%98%a0%ef%b8%8f%e2%9a%b0%ef%b8%8f%f0%9f%91%8e%f0%9f%8f%bbhistory-of-hate-misogyny-vilification-racist-hate-directed-at-asian-women-has-deep-roots-in-u-s-law-jessica/

☹️Unfortunately, America has a long unhappy history of mistreating, exploiting, and demonizing immigrants whose hard work, courage, and perserverance against the odds built our nation into what it is today! Old habits of bias, ingratitude, false racial supremacy, and vilification of “the other” — or at least the “perceived other,” since in truth we’re all important parts of the real America  — are hard to break. But, it would be a real boost for our nation and humanity if we could overcome the darker part of our past and move forward as one.

Thanks for sending this important piece my way, Julia!

🇺🇸🗽Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-17-21

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🌽🥔🍠🌶🥑FOOD MATTERS! — PORTLAND FOOD PANTRY CATERS TO IMMIGRANT, ETHNIC COMMUNITIES IN MAINE!  

Gillian Graham
Gillian Graham
Staff Writer
Portland Press Herald

https://www.pressherald.com/2021/11/21/a-portland-food-program-learns-what-foods-immigrants-in-need-want-most/

Gillian Graham reports for the Portland Press Herald:

During the five years Betsy Paz-Gyimesi has been working as an interpreter and engagement specialist for Spanish-speaking families in Portland schools, she has seen the same scene play out many times.

When they go for help to a food pantry, they’re offered food they will not eat. Some are afraid of canned foods because they believe they are dangerous. Others have cultural or religious needs that aren’t met by the American items on the pantry shelves.

Most of the families Paz-Gyimesi works with come from Central America, and they don’t all qualify for benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and other similar programs. Because there are few options for them at the food pantry, their children often rely heavily on schools for meals, Paz-Gyimesi said.

But that will begin to change next month as Wayside Food Programs in Portland launches a pilot program to better address food insecurity in immigrant communities by providing food packs customized to the needs and preferences of those receiving emergency assistance.

Working with leaders of immigrant communities, Wayside developed lists of basic pantry items they commonly use and a guide to their specific food preferences that can be used by other food programs, said Mary Zwolinski, Wayside’s executive director.

“Our hope is that it helps with the issue of food equity,” she said.

The pandemic, which has disproportionately impacted Maine’s racial and ethnic minorities, laid bare that the state’s existing emergency food structure was not adequately serving all of their needs. Some of the people most vulnerable to hunger didn’t access existing food programs. When they did, many did not find food – Jasmine rice, dried fish, pork-free products – that fit their cultural, religious and dietary restrictions and preferences.

. . . .

******************************

Nice effort! Maine has been a bastion of community cooperation, creative encouragement of, and positive interaction with immigrant communities! Seems like a good model that can be replicated throughout America. Read the full article at the link!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

11-22-21

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