Bible – Page 3 – immigrationcourtside.com

🤯 “CHRISTMAS @ THE BORDER 2023” — “The Prince of Peace,” A Poor Palestinian Jewish Outsider & Alleged Threat To The Powerful, Might Be Astounded By Trading Human Lives & Futures Of The Most Vulnerable For Bombs! — 2k Years Later, Folks Claim His Name Yet Mock His Humble, Merciful Message About Treating Fellow Humans With Kindness, Dignity, Respect! 🤯

Holy Family at the Border — Families arriving at the border today likely to find those in power parrot the words of Christ while ignoring his teachings about mercy, humility, humanity.
IMAGE: Sojourners

Todd Miller in The Border Chronicles:

https://www.theborderchronicle.com/p/the-modern-day-nativity-scene-a-concertina?r=1se78m&utm_medium=email

I am at the Stanton Street Bridge between El Paso and Ciudad Juárez, where one year ago I watched groups of people wade through the shallow water to “pedir posada,” the Spanish-language term used for Joseph and Mary asking for refuge in Bethlehem 2,023 years ago. This year, there are no people below me, at least not right now, and the Rio Grande is a greenish, contaminated trickle that will dry up completely just east of El Paso, and then be replenished by the Rio Conchos 200 miles downriver in Presidio, Texas. On the other side of the bridge, you can see that the holiday season is in full gear as the line of people entering the United States coming from Ciudad Juárez extends up to the top of the bridge, exactly above the river. Surrounding the river are the props of the modern-day nativity scene: coiling razor wire, 30-foot walls, Texas Army National Guard troops and their armored jeeps, armed U.S. Border Patrol agents in their green-striped trucks, drone surveillance, camera surveillance, biometric systems. Partially, this is the result of the most money ever put toward federal border and immigration enforcement (as we reported this year, 2023 was $29.8 billion, a record number, which adds to the more than $400 billion since 2003). Partially, this is because Texas’s spending on Operation Lone Star, courtesy of Governor Greg Abbott and his right-wing, un-Christian justification machine, which has added up to $4.5 billion over the last two years. And this has been the response of the United States for people “pidiendo posada” for 30 years since Operation Blockade/Hold the Line began a border-building spree that has not ceased: there is no room at the inn.

I think of that cold night on the ground in a stable that is depicted in so many places this time of year as I walk past shivering refugees in heavy coats sitting outside against the Sagrado Corazón church in El Paso a few blocks from the border. I am reminded of the hundreds upon hundreds of people arriving to the Arizona border, as Melissa reported on earlier this week. I am reminded of the young Guatemalan mother I met myself at the border wall in late November as she tended to her two-month-old under the 30-foot border wall. They had been waiting there for two days. The infant was sick, and the nights were cold. The rest of the group, from the coast of Guatemala, built a fire to keep warm. When were the wise men going to arrive, the kings, the angels? The humanitarians did arrive, as they do, day after day (see Melissa’s reporting on that). I am reminded of being in Bethlehem myself a few years back, visiting the Aida refugee camp of Palestinians, which was surrounded by a tall concrete wall that had an embedded “pill box,” or a tower where snipers could point their assault rifles located mere miles from that stable where Mary gave birth on the cold ground. The Christmas story is playing out all around us, as lawyer and anthropologist Petra Molnar pointed out for us just yesterday. Where Mary, Joseph, and the infant Jesus had to flee Bethlehem when King Herod started to wield authoritarian power, the long trek to Egypt fleeing persecution is happening right now, throughout the world, such as in the Darién Gap in Colombia and Panama, as discussed in Melissa’s two interviews with anthropologist Caitlyn Yates—one podcast in December, one in August. Or the equivalent might be in the Mediterranean, as we discussed with Lauren Markham last June after a ship capsized near Greece, killing 600 people, or the countless places across the world where people struggle with a huge enforcement apparatus, which Anna Lekas Miller wrote about in her book Love Across Borders. We have spent the year doing our best to give you insight into what is happening on our borders.

I love this time of year, December, because things start to slow down, the frenetic pace starts to wane. For me, this becomes a more reflective period. Yet this modern Christmas story is anything but reflective. On television sets, commercials remind us of the holiday spirit (and to buy as much as we can), and movies have heartwarming tales of people coming together. Yet hospitality is scoffed at in words and policy, no matter what president, no matter what political party. Melissa has reported time and time again about the dehumanizing rhetoric; earlier this week, she wrote about a Fox News reporter talking about invaders and invasions and “credible fear thresholds.” This discourse abounds, with stories of people “taking advantage of our asylum system,” and claims that the United States can’t absorb any more people. Did Mary and Joseph hear similar soundbites on their journeys?

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In these stories, we rarely hear about U.S. foreign policy, both historical and current. Take, for example, the Monroe Doctrine’s effect in Latin America: the centuries of upholding dictatorships, training generals, arming militaries—and, lately, creating border guards—and influencing politics, as well as the economic domination, in which corporate power and extractive industries enjoy a borderless world and can travel anywhere and take anything they want (see NAFTA, see CAFTA), from precious resources to cheap labor. Meanwhile, regular people—sometimes the very people displaced by corporate power—face harsher and harsher border regimes that extend throughout the continent. The same thing the Greg Abbotts of the world accuse undocumented people of doing here, corporate power is doing there. Studies have continually shown how a migrant labor force bolsters the U.S. economy in myriad, even critical ways (see, for example, the film A Day without a Mexican), yet border crossers get blamed for the big societal problems as if they had the power to set policy in corporate board rooms and in Washington. In the halls of power, debates stagnate over whether people are refugees or economic migrants—creating more divisions between the people most affected by the entrenched borders.

At the height of her pregnancy, Mary and Joseph walked for days, fleeing a Caesar Augustus’s occupying force—a story that resonates with more than 184 million people on the move today. I am reminded of my dear friend Irene Morales, a nun with the Madres of the Eucaristia, who I worked with two decades ago and who told me day after day—as we traveled through northern Mexico and the U.S. borderlands—that she saw Christ in the faces of people on the move. In the early 2000s, thousands of people were arriving to Altar, Sonora, to cross through the Arizona deserts. The people I talked to and interviewed were mostly from southern Mexico, and in many cases they were migrating because they could no longer make ends meet. From about 2002 to 2005, I talked to hundreds of people, and often it was parents thinking about their children, parents who talked about skipping meals for their children, wanting their children to get an education, or sometimes it was children on the move for a sick parent. So often it was a story of sacrifice at a time in a post-9/11 era characterized by a massive ramp-up on the border, with terrorism and migration blurring into each other at a policy level. “El rostro de Cristo,” Irene told me.

Stanton Street Bridge at sunset with a long line of people crossing from Ciudad Juárez to El Paso as is typical during the holidays. (Photo credit: Todd Miller)

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As I stand on the bridge in Juárez, where everything seems basically the same, I know a lot has happened over the last year, and we have covered much of it at The Border Chronicle. I, for one, have been following that contaminated river and have gone into Chihuahua to report on border water struggles for a forthcoming book, and I have shared some photo essays here. Melissa also wrote about Chihuahua earlier this year for The New Yorker, focusing on the epidemic of journalists assassinated in Mexico, which she summarized in The Border Chronicle. I feel so fortunate to work alongside Melissa, who not only wrote (and talked to experts) about the innards of this massive border fortification, whether it be the surge of wall building, deadly vehicle chases, Operation Lone Star, or Florida cops patrolling the border—and the right-wing rhetoric that so often propels it (not to mention the Elon Musk circus)—but also about people in border communities for inspiration and solutions such as border artists, a brilliant sidewalk school, or a doctor who spends his time treating border crossers (Doctor Brian Elmore also penned an op-ed for us). And that’s just a taste. This year, I had the opportunity to go to Yale and debate border enforcement, a humbling and educational experience, to say the least. As I wrote about my losing effort, some of the dynamics we constantly struggle with in this sort of border journalism were clearly revealed.

Much has changed over the last year, but—from what I can tell suspended between El Paso and Ciudad Juárez—much has remained the same. The border policy is the same, there is more money in the budgets, there is more money in as-of-yet-unpassed supplemental funding bills, there are more and more contracts for private industry. And now we have an election year. And, as we all know, during an election year, the border is a politician’s sacrificial lamb. So be prepared for a good dose of border theater, and we’ll be here with our coverage, commentary, interviews, and podcasts. The last thing I want to do is stand on that bridge a year from now and watch people wade through the trickling Rio Grande to “pedir posada” at a large gate at an even more fortified border wall in El Paso. That is, however, the likely outcome of 2024, and we will cover all of it. But we will also find the spaces where people are trying to make change, we will listen to the border communities, and we will document the humanitarian efforts. And trust me you, we will be looking in the places where there is generosity toward the stranger.

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

40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.’

Matthew 25:40

It’s very straightforward. Yet, somewhere between the Nativity and MAGAMike Johnson, the message got lost! The real “War on Christmas” and Judeo-Christian values is being conducted by those in powerful positions who disingenuously press for deadly, illegal, inhumane, dehumanizing treatment of forced migrants!

Thoughtful, practical solutions — more aligned with Judeo-Christian values — proposed by experts with first-hand experience with migrants and migration are arrogantly ignored by our leaders. See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2023/12/17/⚖️🗽-there-are-ways-to-harminize-harness-the-reality-huge-positive-potential-of-global-human-migration-they-are-neither-simple-nor-imm;

https://immigrationcourtside.com/2023/12/19/⚖️🤯👩🏽⚖️👨🏻⚖️-as-garlands-backlog-hits-3-million-way-past-time-to-clean/.

Even now, U.S. and Mexican leaders insist, contrary to evidence, that the answer to forced migration is more and harsher enforcement. See, e.g., https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwjGta3V66WDAxV8D1kFHU7ECn0QFnoECBcQAQ&url=https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-mexico-border-negotiations-956cbc7a92ac08572327533ce1572a2a&usg=AOvVaw0lxqJYakyq5Ocbm0VxiVld&opi=89978449.

To quote Colby King in today’s WashPost:

I read somewhere that God’s eternal promise of Christmas is a closeness with humanity, forgiveness of sins and a radical, unconditional love for all. We ain’t there yet.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/12/22/christmas-prayer-bethlehem-gaza-war-peace/

Colbert I. King
Columnist
Washington Post

Also lost in the rush to cruelty and “deterrence:” Individuals have a legal right to apply for asylum at the U.S. border regardless of whether they arrive at a port of entry. See, INA, section 208.

The so-called “illegal” crossings are driven largely by the USG’s failure to implement timely and fair screening and processing at ports of entry. Even so, many individuals cross nearby the ports and wait patiently, in an orderly manner, outdoors, often in harsh conditions, to be “processed” by CBP.

This is hardly a “law enforcement crisis.” It’s a humanitarian crisis that, despite warnings and plenty of constructive ideas from experts, Congress and the Executive have jointly failed to address in a reasonable and responsible manner.

How unserious are Congress and the Administration about addressing the situation at the border in a responsible manner? The increasing flow of asylum seekers is predictable, considering that it is part of a worsening worldwide refugee flow.

So one logical, obvious thing to do, rather than building walls, prisons, and installing barbed wire, would be to hire and “surge” more USCIS Asylum Officers to the Southern Border to screen asylum seekers for credible fear, perhaps even expanding operations to foreign territory.

According to USCIS, there were 1028 authorized Asylum Officer positions in September 2022. https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/outreach-engagements/Asylum-Quarterly-Engagement-Oct-6-22.pdf. One year later, in September 2023, that number hadn’t changed! And, remarkably, the number of those positions filled had had actually slightly declined from 78% to 74%. https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/outreach-engagements/AsylumQuarterlyEngagement-FY23Quarter4PresentationTalkingPoints.pdf. Talk about a disconnect!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-23-23

🤮☠️ AS CONGRESS ENGAGES IN TRUTH & REALITY FREE (NON) DEBATE ON HOW TO INFLICT MORE CRUELTY AND MAYHEM ON VULNERABLE ASYLUM SEEKERS, THE REAL IMMIGRATION PROBLEMS GO UNADDRESSED — “No Fair Day” Documents Continuing Abuse Of Kids In Immigration Court!

Stephen Miller Cartoon — Stephen Miller & Count Olaf. Despite promises to the contrary, the Biden Administration still channels Stephen Miller in its approach to kids in court. And, now they are working with GOP nativists and wobbly Dems in Congress to make things even worse, for kids and other asylum seekers!
Evil Twins, Notorious Child Abusers

A new “white paper” investigation from UCLA Center for Immigration Law and Policy documents shocking abuses already being inflicted on children Immigration Court even as Congress and the Administration look for more ways to strip asylum seekers of legal rights and human dignity:

https://law.ucla.edu/sites/default/files/PDFs/Center_for_Immigration_Law_and_Policy/No_Fair_Day_Children_in_Immigration_Court_White_Paper.pdf

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

This white paper provides a comprehensive assessment of the Biden

administration’s treatment of children facing removal in immigra-

tion court. While much attention has rightly been given to the Biden

administration’s border and asylum policy, less attention has been

paid to child-specific policies in immigration court. This matters

both because tens of thousands of removal orders have been issued

against children during the Biden administration, and because chil-

dren’s cases present unique legal issues—including most obviously

that children generally bear little, if any, legal responsibility for the

situations in which they find themselves.

We find that the Biden administration took important steps at the

outset to protect children in ways the prior administration did

not. The decision to exempt children from the border expulsion

policy known as Title 42 was particularly significant in this respect.

However, for children who were permitted to enter the system and

ordered to appear for proceedings in immigration court, the Biden

administration has largely continued the policies of previous admin-

istrations. Those policies have utterly failed to protect the rights of

children in court.

These failures are all the more striking because they have continued

even as the administration has signaled support for the principle

that children deserve legal representation in immigration court as

a matter of basic fairness. Department of Homeland Security Sec-

retary Mayorkas—the nation’s foremost immigration enforcement

official—has repeatedly stated that he does not believe children can

receive fair removal hearings without legal representation, even as

prosecutors under his purview have proceeded with thousands of

such hearings and obtained thousands of removal orders against

unrepresented children through those grossly unfair processes.

The administration’s policies toward children in immigration court

have far-reaching impacts. In the first five months of Fiscal Year 2022,

almost one third of all new cases in immigration court involved chil-

dren, including tens of thousands of children under the age of five.1

Some of these children are “unaccompanied” because they arrived

1 TRAC, One-Third of New Immigration Court Cases

Are Children; One in Eight Are 0-4 Years of Age

(Mar. 17, 2022), https://trac.syr.edu/immigration/

reports/681/.

NO FAIR DAY: THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION’S TREATMENT OF CHILDREN IN IMMIGRATION COURT 3

alone, while others are in “consolidated proceedings” with their fami-

lies. The immigration system, and the Biden administration, has failed

both. Many of these children proceeded without counsel, and a huge

number of children have been ordered removed for failure to appear.

We explain why these two policies—the imposition of in absentia

removal orders against unrepresented children and the failure to

provide counsel—are unlawful, and we provide recommendations

for how the Biden administration can remedy this crisis.

. . . .

It should be obvious that immigration court proceedings are far too

complex for children to navigate without legal representation. As

Secretary Mayorkas acknowledged earlier this year, “a nine-year-old

child cannot navigate the immigration system.”44 Attorneys General

under the Obama administration made similar statements, as had

the government’s own expert in litigation challenging the failure to

provide counsel for children several years ago.45 Prior to that conces-

sion, one supervisory immigration judge was extensively ridiculed

for stating his view that he could teach three- and four-year-olds to

understand immigration law and represent themselves in immi-

gration court.46 Yet, despite the obvious absurdity of that view, the

Biden administration’s immigration courts—like the immigration

courts of all prior administrations—recognize no age below which

children cannot proceed without a lawyer in court.

. . . .

CONCLUSION

Despite taking some strong symbolic and practical steps in its early

days, the Biden administration has failed children in immigration

court under its watch. In the last three years, Immigration Judges

have issued removal orders against tens of thousands of children in

violation of basic due process principles. Though the administration

has not enforced most of those removal orders, nothing will stop a

future administration from doing so without ever providing those

children a fair day in court.

But there is time to reverse course. We urge the administration to

adopt the concrete recommendations laid out in this paper: prohibit

the issuance of in absentia removal orders against unrepresented

children; terminate the Dedicated Docket; and ensure legal represen-

tation for all children in removal proceedings. To do so would make

real the Biden administration’s promise of a fair and humane immi-

gration system for children.

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

Read the complete report at the above link.

This should be a fixable problem! Instead, Congress and the Administration are fixated on making things worse for children and other legal asylum seekers at the border. What’s happening in the Senate now is neither a “negotiation” nor does it have much to do with “national security.”

It’s mostly about bullying the most vulnerable while diverting attention from the failure of all three branches of Government to address human migration and human rights in an rational, lawful, and constructive manner.

Artificially inflating and manipulating “in absentia” order statistics has been a long-time practice of EOIR under Administrations of both parties. The DOJ and EOIR use their own unfair procedures to paint a false picture of individuals evading the system.

In reality, statistics show that the overwhelming majority of those able to secure representation and therefore understand the “system” want fair merits decisions on their asylum applications.

But, as many who, unlike Garland and his minions, have actually practiced in the dysfunctional Immigration Courts know, getting a timely merits hearing on meritorious, already-prepared cases can be “mission impossible” in a system wedded to “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” and lacking in dynamic due-process-focused expert leadership!

Additionally, “notice” problems at EOIR are endemic — now reaching the Supremes for the third time (after being blown out on the first two trips) in a “supreme dereliction of duty” by Garland’s DOJ. Haphazard notice procedures and endless delays are also major contributors to the abuse of children in Immigraton Court.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-18-23

😢 CRIES IN THE WILDERNESS: The Voices Of Experience & Reasonableness Are Being Drowned Out By Nativism, Butt-Covering, & Imagined Political Expediency In The One-Sided “Border Debate” Taking Place In The Senate!

Caitlyn Yates Fellow Strauss Center for International Law & Security PHOTO: Strauss Center — Caitlyn Yates
Fellow
Strauss Center for International Law & Security
PHOTO: Strauss Center

This podcast from Melissa Del Bosque of The Border Chronicle and Caitlyn Yates, who actually works with migrants in the Darien Gap, gives real life perspective on the humanitarian crisis and all the reasons why more cruelty, punishment, and deadly deterrence isn’t going to solve the flow of forced migrants. But, unhappily, policy makers aren’t interested in the voices of those who actually have experience with forced migrants, nor are they interested in learning from the forced migrants themselves — a logical — if constantly ignored — starting point for making sound policy decisions!

https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=373432&post_id=139696609&utm_source=post-email-title&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1se78m&token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjoxMDgxNTc5OTAsInBvc3RfaWQiOjEzOTY5NjYwOSwiaWF0IjoxNzAyMzkzMzIwLCJleHAiOjE3MDQ5ODUzMjAsImlzcyI6InB1Yi0zNzM0MzIiLCJzdWIiOiJwb3N0LXJlYWN0aW9uIn0.CSjTGVDSTEoVPMU3vd7l-vjE2t6LYzS6bfkSQ-qMOcU

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

In the Wilderness — Migration and human rights experts have excelled in court and academia. Yet, they have been consigned to wander the political wilderness, their wisdom, expertise, and real world solutions are routinely ignored or mindlessly rejected by both political parties.
Colmar – Unterlinden Museum – The Isenheim Altarpiece 1512-16 by Matthias Grünewald (ca 1470-1528) – Visit of Saint Anthony the Great to Saint Paul the Hermit in the Wilderness
Creative Commons

Four “takeaways” on what a consensus on migration should be:

Human migration is real;
Forced migration is largely beyond the unilateral control of any one nation;
Deterrence alone won’t stop migration;
More legal pathways for migration are necessary.

We’re a long way from that needed consensus right now!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-16-23

🗽 THIS BUDD’S FOR YOU! — Ex-Agent, Author, Border Expert Warns Dems Against Walking Into GOP Nativists’ “Border Trap!” — Once Again!🤯

FROM X:

Post

See new posts

Conversation

Charles Kuck reposted

I

Jenn Budd

@BuddJenn

A robust asylum system is essential to national security. A closed border is as dangerous as an open border. If you close the asylum system, they will just cross illegally. Republicans need the border out of control. This is a trap!

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

That’s it in a nutshell! Reality and practicality have nothing to do with it. It’s about the GOP creating chaos and fanning hate! Unhappily, Dems fall for it — every time! That’s why American democracy is on the ropes!

The Dems have ready access to the greatest “treasure trove” of real life expertise and truth about the border in history. Yet, they routinely ignore it and let themselves be “hoodwinked” by GOP nativists peddling lies, hate, and myths. It’s seriously undermining our democracy while squandering human lives and potential!

There’s deep irony in “national security” being disingenuously parroted by a party lead by a demagogue who encouraged actual insurrection against the U.S. Government! Yet Dems and the “mainstream media” fall for it! Gimmie a break!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-15-23

🤯 “DESPERATE PEOPLE DO DESPERATE THINGS!”

Rebecca Santana
Homeland Security Reporter
Associated Press
PHOTO: AP

https://www.theitem.com/stories/biden-and-congress-consiering-big-changes-on-immigration,408794

REBECCA SANTANA

Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) – President Joe Biden is taking a more active role in Senate negotiations about changes to the immigration system that Republicans are demanding in exchange for providing money to Ukraine in its fight against Russia and Israel for the war with Hamas.

The Democratic president has said he is willing to make “significant compromises on the border” as Republicans block the wartime aid in Congress. The White House is expected to get more involved in talks this week as the impasse over changes to border policy has deepened and the money remaining for Ukraine has dwindled.

Republican Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma, who is leading the negotiations, pointed to the surge of people entering the U.S. from Mexico and said “it is literally spiraling out of control.”

But many immigration advocates, including some Democrats, say some of the changes being proposed would gut protections for people who desperately need help and would not really ease the chaos at the border.

Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy, the top Democratic bargainer, said the White House would take a more active role in the talks. But he also panned Republican policy demands so far as “unreasonable.”

. . . .

Critics say the problem is that most people do not end up getting asylum when their case finally makes it to immigration court. But they say migrants know that if they claim asylum, they essentially will be allowed to stay in America for years.

“People aren’t necessarily coming to apply for asylum as much to access that asylum adjudication process,” said Andrew Arthur, a former immigration court judge and fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for less immigration in the U.S.

Some of what lawmakers are discussing would raise the bar that migrants need to meet during that initial credible fear interview. Those who do not meet it would be sent home.

But Paul Schmidt, a retired immigration court judge who blogs about immigration court issues, said the credible fear interview was never intended to be so tough. Migrants are doing the interview soon after arriving at the border from an often arduous and traumatizing journey, he said. Schmidt said the interview is more of an “initial screening” to weed out those with frivolous asylum claims.

Schmidt also questioned the argument that most migrants fail their final asylum screening. He said some immigration judges apply overly restrictive standards and that the system is so backlogged that it is hard to know exactly what the most recent and reliable statistics are.

. . . .

WHAT MIGHT THESE CHANGES DO?

Much of the disagreement over these proposed changes comes down to whether people think deterrence works.

Arthur, the former immigration court judge, thinks it does. He said changes to the credible fear asylum standards and restrictions on the use of humanitarian parole would be a “game changer.” He said it would be a “costly endeavor” as the government would have to detain and deport many more migrants than today. But, he argued, eventually the numbers of people arriving would drop.

But others, like Schmidt, the retired immigration court judge, say migrants are so desperate, they will come anyway and make dangerous journeys to evade Border Patrol.

“Desperate people do desperate things,” he said.

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

Ignoring both the powerful forces that drive human migration and folks who actually work with migrants at the border and in foreign countries seems like a totally insane way to “debate policy.” But, then, whoever said this “nativist-driven debate” on enhanced cruelty, dismantling the rule of law, and de-humanization is rational?

You can read Rebecca’s full article, with an “accessible” explanation of what’s at stake and what’s being proposed at the above link.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-14-23

🇺🇸🗽🙏 THANKSGIVING 2023: Asylum Seekers Give Thanks, Give Back, Deal With Trauma of Forced Migration

Happy Thanksgiving Vegan Turkey — Many turkeys are giving thanks for a vegan Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving from the “Courtside Family!”
By Cathy Schmidt

Ray Sanchez reports for CNN:

https://www.cnn.com/migrants-thanksgiving-new-york-city?cid=ios_app

. . . .

For many of the thousands of asylum-seekers from all over the world who have arrived in New York City in the last year, Thanksgiving is just another day – considering what they’ve been through. And what lies ahead.

The holiday is one more day to focus on immigrations papers, jobs to secure, a new language to learn, and a cold and sprawling city to navigate.

“We want to adapt to new traditions,” said Garcia, speaking Saturday at a Manhattan middle school where she and other migrants baked pumpkin pies they distributed to homeless shelters with the help of a nonprofit that provides free legal representation for children and families.

“We will always have Venezuela in our hearts. But we will need to adapt to new customs in order to survive here.”

. . . .

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

Read the full article at the link.

Survivors, contributors, adaptors, seeking the same universal human rights: safety, security, meaningful work, a better future! Don’t let the myths and fears bury the truth and humanity! Also, this article highlights the essential role of the many NGOs who have stepped up to make the system work, sometimes in spite of itself!

🇺🇸 HAPPY THANKSGIVING & DUE PROCESS FOREVER!

PWS

11-23-23

☠️⚰️🤮⚠️ DEMS MUST PREPARE FOR AN UNRELENTING DOSE OF THE “BIG LIE” ABOUT “OPEN BORDERS” FROM GOP WHITE NATIONALISTS — Don’t Expect Much Help Or Honest Reporting From The So-Called “Mainstream Media!” — “Loud fantasies are expansively covered, while life-and-death stories, like those of that infant and her mother, are seldom reported and, if they are, quickly disappear,” Says The Border Chronicle! — “Roger That!”

Border Death — This is a monument for those who have died attempting to cross the US-Mexican border. Each coffin represents a year and the number of dead. It is a protest against the effects of Operation Guardian. Taken at the Tijuana-San Diego border.
Tomas Castelazo
To comply with the use and licensing terms of this image, the following text must must be included with the image when published in any medium, failure to do so constitutes a violation of the licensing terms and copyright infringement: © Tomas Castelazo, www.tomascastelazo.com / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 3.0

https://open.substack.com/pub/theborderchronicle/p/the-open-border-farce?r=330z7&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post

The “Open Border” Farce

In 2023, there were record contracts for private industry on the world’s deadliest land border.

TODD MILLER

NOV 9

This article is a collaboration between The Border Chronicle and TomDispatch, a great outlet which has been looking at U.S. foreign policy, the military industrial complex, the “forever wars,” climate change, and many other topics since 2001.

On September 23rd, at about 2:30 a.m., a Border Patrol surveillance camera captured two people crossing the international boundary between Mexico and the United States on the outskirts of Nogales, Arizona. A Border Patrol vehicle arrived quickly, but not before one of them had fled back into Mexico. When an armed agent stepped out, dressed in a forest-green uniform, he found a 16-year-old girl from Mexico softly crying, while holding her month-old baby swaddled in a blanket.

The agent commanded her to get in the vehicle. As they then drove to the Nogales Border Patrol station, the girl, he later reported, tried to speak to him in Spanish through the security partition that separated them. Her tiny daughter, she was telling him, was in distress. Cameras showed that the vehicle stopped for all of 10 seconds before continuing. The agent later claimed he couldn’t understand what she was saying and that he wanted to find a fluent Spanish speaker at the station. He didn’t realize, he insisted, that the infant was struggling to breathe, though the child soon died.

This hellish story of suffering at our border is but one of hundreds of similar tales of horror from 2023. They illustrate a fundamental truth about that border: it neither is, nor ever was, an “open” one in the Biden years, nor does the president faintly have an open-border policy, though prepare yourself to hear otherwise — over and over again — in Trumpublican campaign ads next year. They’ll repeat what party officials are already saying all too repetitively: that “President Biden’s radical open borders policies” have created “the worst border crisis in American history.” (While those are the exact words of House Oversight Committee chair James Comer, similar sentiments are already being offered by countless members of the GOP.)

Comer’s claim is, of course, no less predictable than the hardships migrants like that girl are suffering as they try to reach this country. While such border narratives traffic in the unreal, what is real either isn’t effectively reported or gets lost amid all the politically motivated noise. Loud fantasies are expansively covered, while life-and-death stories, like those of that infant and her mother, are seldom reported and, if they are, quickly disappear.

Barely a week before that 16 year old was desperately trying to communicate to the agent in Spanish, the United Nations International Organization for Migration (IOM) labeled the U.S.-Mexico border the world’s “deadliest migration land route.” In 2022, a record 853 remains of dead border crossers were recovered (and this is the U.S. Border Patrol’s figure, which is even higher than the IOM’s), dwarfing the record of 568 set the previous year. Such numbers, the IOM stresses, are known to be distinct undercounts, leaving all too many families pining for lost loved ones.

But those border fatalities weren’t the only record breaker. Another was confirmed just a week after medical personnel at the Nogales station rushed to treat that girl’s baby. The number of border contracts issued to private industry also set a new record. Like those deaths, such contracts soared in fiscal year 2023 to $9.96 billion, instantly stripping the previous high, also set last year, of $7.5 billion.

And mind you, those gifts to industry were made from the highest budget ever (including in the Trump years) for border and immigration enforcement: $29.8 billion. So, don’t for a second think that the U.S. has an “open” border. In fact, it’s never been more fortified or — something few even bother to mention — more profitable, if you happen to be part of the border-industrial complex.

. . . .

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

Read the full article at the link.

Maybe it’s because the victims are “only migrants, mostly people of color” and therefore not considered to be “real human beings” by some in the media; maybe it’s because getting the real story about the border requires intensive digging, intellectual expertise, and perhaps some danger; maybe it’s because editors are in search of alarmist “sky is falling” myths about the “border apocalypse” to attract readers, viewers, and “online hits;” maybe it’s because of a false belief that truth is “boring” and “doesn’t sell!”

For whatever reason, the non-Fox networks (Fox is a primary purveyor of the “Big Lie” and the “Open Borders Fantasy”) and “mainstream media” do a really poor job on border reporting.

Those with even a passing familiarity with “talking heads” are no-doubt familiar with claims from nativist GOP politicos, righty reporters, and even some Dems about the mythical a “open borders!” None of these folks have recent experience helping asylum seekers trying to exercise their legal rights under domestic laws, international treaties, and our Constitution in a border system specifically designed to “discourage and deter” them, rather than identify and promptly grant the many legally sufficient claims for protection.

By contrast, when is the last time you saw real experts — folks like Clinical Professor Steve Yale-Loehr, former Deputy UNHCR and Georgetown Law Dean Alex Aleinikoff, CGRS Director Karen Musalo, HRF Refugee Programs Director Eleanor Acer, UC Davis Law Dean Kevin Johnson, NIJC Executive Director Mary Meg McCarthy, Immigrant Defenders Executive Director Lindsay Toczylowski, Rep. Hillary Scholten (D-MI) or any of the other huge numbers of highly articulate, well-recognized, “hands on practical experts” on human rights and asylum appear on the “talking heads” to throw some truth and real light on this important, nearly totally misunderstood and intentionally misconstrued, issue that GOP nativists have thrust to the forefront of the 2024 campaign?

Meanwhile, Dems should NOT be “running away” from the realities and essential benefits provided by robust immigration and the cruel wastefulness and immorality of Trumps’s proposed neo-Nazi “crackdown” on all forms of migration (although, disgracefully, some Dems are doing exactly that, thus playing into the hands of GOP nativists for absolutely NO return).

Here are some ideas from Simon Rosenberg at Hopium on Substack on how Dems can make immigration a centerpiece for success in 2024:

Trump Goes To War Against Immigration and Immigrants – It’s Another Big 2024 Problem For Republicans – Here at Hopium we talk about how “Abortion and Treason” will make it very hard for Republicans to win in 2024. It’s possible Trump is now adding a third item to that rancid list – mass deportation. From a new NYT article, Sweeping Raids, Giant Camps, and Mass Deportations: Inside Trump’s 2025 Immigration Plans:

Former President Donald J. Trump is planning an extreme expansion of his first-term crackdown on immigration if he returns to power in 2025 — including preparing to round up undocumented people already in the United States on a vast scale and detain them in sprawling camps while they wait to be expelled.

The plans would sharply restrict both legal and illegal immigration in a multitude of ways.

Mr. Trump wants to revive his first-term border policies, including banning entry by people from certain Muslim-majority nations and reimposing a Covid 19-era policy of refusing asylum claims — though this time he would base that refusal on assertions that migrants carry other infectious diseases like tuberculosis.

He plans to scour the country for unauthorized immigrants and deport people by the millions per year.

To help speed mass deportations, Mr. Trump is preparing an enormous expansion of a form of removal that does not require due process hearings. To help Immigration and Customs Enforcement carry out sweeping raids, he plans to reassign other federal agents and deputize local police officers and National Guard soldiers voluntarily contributed by Republican-run states.

To ease the strain on ICE detention facilities, Mr. Trump wants to build huge camps to detain people while their cases are processed and they await deportation flights. And to get around any refusal by Congress to appropriate the necessary funds, Mr. Trump would redirect money in the military budget, as he did in his first term to spend more on a border wall than Congress had authorized.

In a public reference to his plans, Mr. Trump told a crowd in Iowa in September: “Following the Eisenhower model, we will carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American history.” The reference was to a 1954 campaign to round up and expel Mexican immigrants that was named for an ethnic slur — “Operation Wetback.”

The constellation of Mr. Trump’s 2025 plans amounts to an assault on immigration on a scale unseen in modern American history. Millions of undocumented immigrants would be barred from the country or uprooted from it years or even decades after settling here.

Such a scale of planned removals would raise logistical, financial and diplomatic challenges and would be vigorously challenged in court. But there is no mistaking the breadth and ambition of the shift Mr. Trump is eyeing.

Despite being inhumane and jawdroppingly cruel, this plan is now a major political problem for an already struggling Republican Party for at least three main reasons:

Raids and Mass Deportations Are Deeply Unpopular – We have decades of polling on the forced removal of the 10m+ undocumented immigrants (almost all of whom are employed and pay taxes) in the US, and it is wildly unpopular, perhaps even more so than “abortion bans.” One example – in the 2016 exit polls, in the election that gave Trump the Presidency, the American people choose “offer legal status” to “deported to home country” 70%-25%. Republicans may have a slight advantage on immigration issue right now, but mass deportation is seen as an extreme position by the American people (rightly so). It was so unpopular that the anti-immigration movement dropped mass deportation as a goal, moving to the softer “attrition through enforcement,” or “self-deportation,” political strategy more than a decade ago.

Trump’s plan is another sign of how extremism and extremists have overtaken the party of Lincoln and Reagan.

As I document here, since 2005, when the national Republican Party began adopting a far harder line on immigration (Reagan, W. Bush and McCain were all immigration reformers), the 4 battleground states of the Southwest, AZ/CO/NM/NV, have drifted away from the Republican Party, becoming far bluer. In the last 2 elections we’ve seen the best Democratic performance in that region since the 1940s and 1950s, and a reminder that Biden got within 5 points of Trump in Texas in 2020. In the heavily Mexican-American parts of the country in particular raids and mass deportations are wildly unpopular.

It Was A Plan Like This That Caused The Big Hispanic Protests Across the US in 2006 – In 2005 the Republican House of Representatives bucked their President, George W. Bush, and passed a bill that called for the rounding up and mass deportation of the 11m undocumented immigrants in the country. It was the moment when the party of the Sun Belt and the West went from pro-immigration to deeply restrictionist. Over the next year huge protests against this bill and mass deportation erupted across the US, and Republicans became so spooked that we were able to pass a “comprehensive immigration reform” bill through a Republican Senate in 2006. That bill, like the 2013 immigration reform bill we passed through the Senate, was never taken up by the Republican House and it died.

But those protests did something important politically – after years of Republican gains with Hispanics under W. Bush, Hispanics ran back into the arms of Democrats in 2006 and they have essentially stayed there ever since. In the 2006 midterms Democrats won 69% of the Hispanic vote, among our best performances in recent decades.

In the four Presidential elections leading up to 2006 Democrats averaged 47% of the vote, and in 2004 we lost AZ/CO/NM/NV. In the four Presidential elections since 2006 Democrats have averaged 51% and in 2020 we won AZ/CO/NM/NV at the Presidential level for the first time since 1940. As the Hispanic population has grown across the US and in these states, our net vote margin with Hispanic voters keeps increasing, even if we lose a few points in vote share. As I show here, in 2004 the net Hispanic vote margin for Democrats was about 700,000 votes nationally, meaning we won 700,000 more Hispanic votes nationally than Republicans. In 2020 that number was at least 4.5m net votes across the US, with this same dynamic playing out in each state with large Hispanic populations (except Florida of course).

My instinct is that whatever advantage Republicans had on immigration, and whatever small gains they had made with Hispanic voters in recent years, is now gone.

This Plan Will Wreck The American Economy – In a time of existing wide scale worker shortages, removing 10-15m workers from the American economy in a short period of time would be national economic suicide, and will be seen that way by the business community in DC and in the battleground states. It’s just totally insane and extremist policy no matter how you look at it, and I think it could become as much of a drag on the GOP brand as abortion is now.

For a party which has lost the popular vote in 7 of the last 8 elections, lost the popular vote to Democrats 51%-46% over the past 4, lost the 2018/2019/2020/2022 and 2023 elections, has deep performance issues across the country even in red states since Dobbs, embracing mass deportations seems like a colossal political error.

It is another reason why I think our goal in 2024 should be not just to win, but to really go on offense, get to 55, and make this election an historic repudiation of the worst and most dangerous political party in our history. We can do this people!

Onward/Adelante – Simon

Thank you for reading Hopium Chronicles By Simon Rosenberg. This post is public so feel free to share it.

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It’s critical to remember that migrants aren’t the ONLY target of Trump’s neo-Nazism — they might not even be the primary ones! You can guarantee that many US citizens and lawfully present non-citizens of color will be caught up in the dragnet and sent off to deportation concentration camps where due process is non-existent.

Others will simply avoid certain public places and activities for fear of being accosted. Still others will be forced underground because of fear of drawing attention to undocumented relatives or neighbors. Some U.S. citizens will fear voting, which indeed is a key part of the GOP plan to cement their “out of the mainstream” minority rule by suppressing suffrage! As those of us who adjudicated asylum claims know, many will fear reporting abuses or asserting rights to police who openly identify with their oppressors. Fear, despair, distrust, and resignation are key pillars of any authoritarian regime!

It’s attack on all people of color in America and those who might speak with an accent or dress differently from the GOP’s “White Christian Nationalist norms.”

How many of us carry around documentation proving that our parents were U.S. citizens? Notably, although occupational status is often menioned on U.S. birth certificates, citizenship status is NOT. It’s not hard to guess who will be “required” to “document” their parents’ citizenship by Trump’s internal security police!

Trump and the GOP are an existential threat to U.S. democracy, human progress, and American leadership on the world stage. Don’t let them destroy OUR country and take away YOUR rights!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

11-14-23

☠️🤮🤯 ‼️🆘 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! 🤯

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/11/12/trump-rally-vermin-political-opponents/

By Marianne LeVine

November 12, 2023 at 5:45 p.m. ET

Former president Donald Trump denigrated his domestic opponents and critics during a Veterans Day speech Saturday, calling those on the other side of the aisle “vermin” and suggesting that they pose a greater threat to the United States than countries such as Russia, China or North Korea. That language is drawing rebuke from historians, who compared it to that of authoritarian leaders.

“We pledge to you that we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country that lie and steal and cheat on elections,” Trump said toward the end of his speech, repeating his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. “They’ll do anything, whether legally or illegally, to destroy America and to destroy the American Dream.”

Trump went on further to state: “the threat from outside forces is far less sinister, dangerous and grave than the threat from within. Our threat is from within. Because if you have a capable, competent, smart, tough leader, Russia, China, North Korea, they’re not going to want to play with us.”

The former president’s speech in Claremont, N.H., echoed his message of vengeance and grievance, as he called himself a “very proud election denier” and decried his legal entanglements, once again attacking the judge in a New York civil trial and re-upping his attacks on special counsel Jack Smith. In the speech, Trump once again portrayed himself as a victim of a political system that is out to get him and his supporters.

Yet Trump’s use of the word “vermin” both in his speech and in a Truth Social post on Saturday drew particular backlash.

“The language is the language that dictators use to instill fear,” said Timothy Naftali, a senior research scholar at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. “When you dehumanize an opponent, you strip them of their constitutional rights to participate securely in a democracy because you’re saying they’re not human. That’s what dictators do.”

Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a historian at New York University, said in an email to The Washington Post that “calling people ‘vermin’ was used effectively by Hitler and Mussolini to dehumanize people and encourage their followers to engage in violence.”

“Trump is also using projection: note that he mentions all kinds of authoritarians ‘communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left’ to set himself up as the deliverer of freedom,” Ben-Ghiat said. “Mussolini promised freedom to his people too and then declared dictatorship.”

. . . .

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

Doubt the comparison? Check this out:

Nazi propaganda and “vermin”

In 1942, Adolf Hitler described Jews living in Germany as an “inferior race that multiplies like vermin.”

“The Nazis dehumanized the Jews. Nazi propaganda is replete with references to Jews as vermin, rats or parasites,” according to Harriet Over, a researcher in psychology at the University of York.

“We are still creating [monsters]. We see it in … Russian attitudes toward Ukrainians, in Hindu Islamophobia, and in American racism against Black people,” psychologist David Livingstone, a professor at the University of New England in Maine, told EL PAÍS.

It wasn’t just Germany.

In 1909, a U.S. satirical magazine, Puck, published a cartoon that showed Uncle Sam as a pied piper leading a group of immigrants from Europe. The immigrants were rats. Sending them off: smiling, well-dressed White men.

. . . .

https://themoderatevoice.com/trump-channels-hate-and-hitler-in-veterans-day-speech-tells-supporters-those-others-are-vermin/

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

I appreciate that Marianne LeVine of WashPost was one of the few “mainstream journalists” with the guts to make the painfully obvious connection and comparison between Trump’s insane threats and Hitler, Mussolini, and other horrible dictators!

Even so, it was only “page 2” news in today’s Post, apparently being of far less concern to her editors than the plans of Middle Eastern countries to “upend global sports!” Harkens back to 1936, when participating in Hitler’s “Aryan Showcase Olympics” was more important to the U.S. and other Western Democracies than protesting and condemning Hitler’s ongoing persecution of Jews!

There was a time in the not too distant past when use of racist, neo-Nazi language like Trump’s would have earned an immediate forceful condemnation from politicians across the political spectrum, from the media, and would have ended a candidacy. Now, it’s “just another day at the office.” Hate, lies, racism, and threats by a powerful national politician, a former President no less, cause barely a ripple in our national political dialogue. Not even front page news! Not covered at all by most “legitimate” news outlets! Yet the threat to our nation is real! Very real!

And, in case anyone still doubts the existential threat to American democracy and civilization itself posed by Trump and his anti-American followers, his “plans” include politicization of government, economic chaos, increasing global warming, and destabilization of the U.S. and world economies. See, e.g., http://enewspaper.latimes.com/infinity/article_share.aspx?guid=019284ab-7357-40c1-91c7-112654eb687a.

Deranged, false claims of being a “victim,” turning vengeance into a “holy quest,” dehumanizing enemies, uber race-based nationalism, presenting personal grievances as national priorities, and complete disregard for the common good were staples of Hitler’s National Socialism as they are of Trumpism! The question remains whether the U.S. will be able to stand up for democracy, reject Trumpism, and prevent a return to the horrific time of 1939! See also, https://immigrationcourtside.com/just-say-no-to-1939-how-judges-can-save-lives-uphold-the-convention-and-maintain-integrity-in-the-age-of-overt-governmental-bias-toward-refugees-and-asylum-seekers/.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

11-13-23

🏴‍☠️☠️ THE RIGHT IS AN EXISTENTIAL THREAT TO AMERICA! — TRUMP, HENCHMEN, PLANNING “NAZIFACATION” INCLUDING CONCENTRATION CAMPS, MASS DEPORTATIONS, SUSPENSION OF CONSTITUTION, STRIPPING CITIZENSHIP! – Immigrants & Muslims Will Be First Targets, But Not Last!

Steve Schmidt on Substack:

https://open.substack.com/pub/steveschmidt/p/when-fascism-comes-to-america-it?r=330z7&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post

Christian nationalism is a grave threat to the United States and the American republic. There should be no ambiguity or dullness when it comes to understanding what it is — no matter how benign it may present itself. It is what lurks beyond the veneer that is terrifying. There, the evil is revealed and manifested.

The dogma is a perversion of Christ’s teachings that is antithetical to Christianity. More importantly, Christian nationalism is utterly opposed to democracy. Theocrats despise the United States. God‘s laws are beyond the reach of the American state, and Christianity is but one religion in the beautiful mosaic of American faith. It should always be noted that 600 generations of humans worshipped freely on the North American continent before the first European Christians came and killed them.

The US Constitution is the law of the land in the United States. Within it are the protections that safeguard our liberty. The freedoms of speech, dissent, conscience, worship and expression shall stand untroubled for as long as the great republic endures. We are within one calendar year of its possible end. We have arrived at a moment of grave crisis that cannot be ignored. The abyss that looked distant seven years ago is at hand.

Christian nationalism is incompatible with American democracy and pluralism. When political extremists take power in the name of God there is always death. Always.

I was pleased to participate in “American Theocracy: The Rise of Christian Nationalism,” a documentary released in January 2023. Please watch this clip below. I have shared it before, but the fire keeps building.

The separation of church and state and religious freedom are profoundly important foundational achievements of the American republic. The extremists who seek power in God’s name are not benign men and women. They won’t be deterred by setbacks in Ohio and other places. They are on the march, and they are demanding power whether it is handed to them or not.

I want you to read these words from yesterday’s The New York Times that make clear Donald Trump’s plans:

Former President Donald J. Trump is planning an extreme expansion of his first-term crackdown on immigration if he returns to power in 2025 — including preparing to round up undocumented people already in the United States on a vast scale and detain them in sprawling camps while they wait to be expelled.

The plans would sharply restrict both legal and illegal immigration in a multitude of ways.

Mr. Trump wants to revive his first-term border policies, including banning entry by people from certain Muslim-majority nations and reimposing a Covid 19-era policy of refusing asylum claims — though this time he would base that refusal on assertions that migrants carry other infectious diseases like tuberculosis.

He plans to scour the country for unauthorized immigrants and deport people by the millions per year.

To help speed mass deportations, Mr. Trump is preparing an enormous expansion of a form of removal that does not require due process hearings. To help Immigration and Customs Enforcement carry out sweeping raids, he plans to reassign other federal agents and deputize local police officers and National Guard soldiers voluntarily contributed by Republican-run states.

Let’s call these giant detention and deportation camps what they are intended to be. These are concentration camps. Specifically, they are to be American concentration camps. Dachau was the Nazis’ first camp in Germany.

What will the first American camp look like? There will no doubt be a first, and it will likely be the first to house the political prisoners rounded up under Trump’s invocation of the Insurrection Act. He has promised to invoke it at the instant he returns to power.

Please understand this: Trump is announcing his intentions. He means it. He is surrounded by scores of “little Eichmanns” ready to help him achieve his aims. He should be taken literally and seriously at all times.

The Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson is second in line to the presidency. He rejects the greatest American idea in history, which is the separation of church and state. The greatest American invention — the peaceful transition of power — is utterly dependent on the separation of church and state in this country.

Johnson denied the 2020 election results, lied about the election results, created the conditions for the insurrection of January 6th, voted to disenfranchise millions of Black votes after the insurrection and continues to insist Trump won the election, despite the claim being a combination of fraud, malice and weapons-grade nuttery. The hostility to democracy is deeply rooted within his religious fanaticism, which is unique amongst the various strains of fanatical faith that have always found a home in America because of our nation’s unique faith protections.

We have churches where people pick up rattlesnakes and kiss them to prove they are protected by God. Proof of sin is a bite to the face and a painful death. Bo and Peep of Heaven’s Gate convinced their followers that they were headed to the Hale-Bopp comet, and Jim Jones took his flock to doom in Guyana. There are cults and fundamentalists all over America, but there is only one strain that wants to control your life by controlling the powers of the state to administer God’s law. They are the American Taliban.

Mike Johnson has invented his own distorted version of history as if the events of the late 1780s-90s occurred 6,000 years ago.

The American Constitution is clear about the founders’ intentions and their descendants’ actions to preserve and expand those intentions. There is no room for theocracy in the American system. It was rejected at hour one. The desire to impose it on all of us by a man who believes people and dinosaurs co-existed at the beginning of time 6,000 years ago is never going to happen…or is it?

The most important thing to understand about theocrats is that they view political power as being mandated by God. In fact, many fanatics across America believe Donald Trump has been sent by him, and his opponents are demonically-inspired.

. . . .

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

We can’t ignore the very real threat that Trump and his GOP followers present to our democracy. Now is NOT the time for Democrats and independents to “go soft” on human rights and immigrants’ rights!

While not highlighted by Steve Schmidt (no relation) the NYT quote above, one of Trump’s initiatives will be to instruct Administration officials to violate the 14th Amendment by denying citizenship to those born in the U.S. based on their parents’ status! USG officials must take an oath to uphold the Constitution, but apparently Trump just plans to summarily fire any public servant who will not submit to his unconstitutional plan!

Those considering abandoning Biden because of his support for Israel should recognize the alternative — a rabidly anti-Muslim authoritarian bigot (who, ironically, has also been soft on those expressing anti-semitism and other purveyors of hate) who would happily try to punish them just for existing! See e.g., https://www.huffpost.com/entry/biden-gaza-israel-policy-trump-contrast_n_654eb574e4b0c9f246602f16.

Those who think that immigrants will be the only victims of Trump’s “Christian White Nationalism” should be clear about what the future would hold for almost all groups of “others” under his promised neo-fascist regime. See, e.g., https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trans-kids-flee-united-states-safety_n_654c44c7e4b088d9a74d2028.

It’s worth remembering that one of the first actions of Hitler’s Third Reich was to strip Jews of their German citizenship, a move that the complicit German judiciary approved and enthusiastically implemented! Who would have thought that nearly 90 years later, we would have a major American political party in thrall to a self-proclaimed fascist demagogue!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

11-12-23

🇺🇸⚖️🗽👍 STUDY INDICATES THAT WITH UNDERSTANDING & ASSISTANCE, MOST APPLICANTS WOULD PASS “CREDIBLE FEAR” — Why Are Politicos Ignoring Most Cost-Effective Solutions?

https://nmpoliticalreport.com/2023/11/07/pilot-program-more-than-90-of-asylum-seekers-pass-credible-fear-interview-when-given-help/

Susan Dunlap reports for NM Political Report:

An immigrant advocacy center found that when their staff were able to provide legal representation or help to immigrants facing credible fear interviews, the immigrant outcomes improved considerably.

Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, a nonprofit based in El Paso, released a report last week detailing challenges the organization’s staff found and recommendations for change and statistical data on individuals seeking asylum in the U.S. The nonprofit initiated a pilot project over eight weeks in the summer of 2023 in two New Mexico immigration detention facilities: The Torrance County Detention Facility and Otero County Processing Center along with the El Paso Processing Center. The project sought to provide participating asylum seekers legal representation or help in preparation prior to the migrant’s credible fear interview. They found that the participating asylum seekers had a 91.6 percent pass rate at the three facilities.

A credible fear interview is an important part of the immigration process for asylum seekers, advocates have said. Often, asylum seekers are placed into detention facilities where there is documented abuse before they are allowed a credible fear interview with an immigration judge. Advocates who work with asylum seekers have said that asylum seekers are often brought to a room to talk to the immigration judge over the phone. The conversation is not private and the asylum seeker is often not given time to prepare. Sometimes the asylum seeker is not provided a translator and not all asylum seekers speak Spanish or English. If the asylum seeker fails to convince an immigration judge of the danger they left behind, the asylum seeker is most likely to face deportation and are often returned to life threatening situations, advocates have told NM Political Report in the past.

. . . .

One recommendation to help solve the problem is for the creation of scholarship programs for community members with lived experience and building a community accreditation program that would offer community members with free training and job placement.

“This would also provide a cost-effective way of expanding legal services to meet demand, giving organizations like ours a more sustained means of providing quality legal services to a higher number of migrants,” the report states.

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

Read Susan’s complete article at the link.

Studies like this reflect a reality that experts have long recognized, but few politicos and media figures are willing to admit:

Many, probably the majority, of those arriving at the border have credible claims for asylum;
They won’t be “deterred” from coming by cruelty, punishment, negative, often racist, rhetoric, and ever more extreme, deadly, yet ultimately ineffective border militarization;
With competent representation and better adjudicators — those with demonstrated, recognized adylum expertise — at both USCIS and EOIR many more asylum claims can and should be granted in a timely manner;
Rather than more expensive, ineffective border militarization, harsh imprisonment (“New American Gulag”), and coming up with new immoral and illegal restrictions on asylum, the Federal Government should be investing in more rational and cost-effective measures such as:
- Training and approving more accredited representatives for arriving asylum seekers through programs like VIISTA Villanova;
- Assisting localities and NGOs with reception and resettlement services;
- Implementing better hiring practices and asylum training at the Asylum Office and EOIR;
- Granting more asylum cases in a timely manner at or near to the “initial encounter” level (something that the Administration empowered itself to do, then inexplicably “suspended” the program just when it was MOST needed);
- Developing better coordination, skills matching, and job training for those granted asylum;
- Investing in English Language Learning, vocational training, social work, and other integration and assimilation services in communities where refugees resettle (notably, this would also create good job opportunities — many at the “professional” level — for existing U.S. workers).

It’s past time to move beyond “open border myths” and come up with humane, productive, legal, and effective programs to deal with the realities of human migration at our border!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever, and great appreciation to all our veterans, past, present, and future!🙏👍

PWS

11-11-23

🤯 POLITICS: (SADLY) YOU CAN’T MAKE THIS STUFF UP! — Bess Levin @ Vanity Fair With The (Very) Low Down On MAGAMIKE!

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/10/everything-to-know-about-mike-johnson?utm_source=nl&utm_brand=vf&utm_mailing=VF_HIVE_102823&utm_medium=email&bxid=5bd67c363f92a41245df49eb&cndid=48297443&hasha=8a1f473740b253d8fa4c23b066722737&hashb=26cd42536544e247751ec74095d9cedc67e77edb&hashc=eb7798068820f2944081a20180a0d3a94e025b4a93ea9ae77c7bbe00367c46ef&esrc=newsletteroverlay&mbid=mbid%3DCRMVYF012019&source=EDT_VYF_NEWSLETTER_0_HIVE_ZZ&utm_campaign=VF_HIVE_102823&utm_term=VYF_Hive

Election Denial, “Sexual Anarchy,” Noah’s Ark: All the Mike Johnson Details We Regret to Inform You Of

By Bess LevinOctober 26, 2023

There’s a lot that’s concerning!

Drew Angerer/Getty Images

On October 25, after several weeks that saw dysfunction, chaos, humiliation, and anonymous threats to at least one lawmaker’s wife, Republicans finally elected a Speaker of the House to succeed Kevin McCarthy: Mike Johnson, a representative from Louisiana who has the distinction of being the least experienced Speaker in more than a century.

At the time of Johnson’s accession, a lot of Americans likely had no idea who he was; actual Republican senator Susan Collins, for one, told a reporter she didn’t know Johnson but planned to remedy that by googling him. And if you weren’t familiar with Johnson, you might’ve assumed that that was maybe even a good thing—that he was just a quiet Republican who hadn’t gotten wrapped up in the insanity plaguing the GOP over the last seven or so years. He didn’t have the name recognition of, say, Jim Jordan or Matt Gaetz, but perhaps that simply spoke to the fact that he wasn’t leading a series of absurd hearings in an attempt to take down Joe Biden; or bragging about being so devoted to Donald Trump that he answered his phone calls during sex. Maybe, you might have thought, he wasn’t someone you’d have to constantly worry about re: undermining democracy or trying to take away people’s rights.

Unfortunately, that is not the case with Johnson, who may not have been well known prior to being given one of the most powerful jobs in government but is very much someone whose extremist views and actions should keep you up at night.

Herein, a running list of the absolute most WTF things the new Speaker has said and done on everything from the 2020 election to abortion to LGBTQ+ rights and more.

Abortion

Johnson is proudly antiabortion. When Roe v. Wade was overturned last year, he called it “a great, joyous occasion,” later writing, “We will get the number of abortions [in Louisiana] to ZERO!!” As an attorney for the Alliance Defense Fund, now known as the Alliance Defending Freedom, he worked on efforts to shut down abortion clinics in the state. In Congress, he cosponsored legislation that would have banned abortions at about six weeks of pregnancy, i.e., a time when many people do not even know they’re pregnant. He’s beloved by the antiabortion organization Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, which has given him an A+ rating. In 2015, he blamed school shootings on abortion, telling writer Irin Carmon, “When you break up the nuclear family, when you tell a generation of people that life has no value, no meaning, that it’s expendable, then you do wind up with school shooters.”

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In some real Handmaid’s Tale shit, he declared during a House hearing that if women were forced to have more children, a.k.a. “able-bodied” workers, there would be more funding for Social Security and Medicare:

On at least one occasion, he declared that doctors who perform abortions should be sentenced to “hard labor”:

Oh, and like many antiabortion zealots, Johnson doesn’t seem to like contraception either.

LGBTQ+ rights

Hoo boy, where to start? Here are some things that Johnson has said about LGBTQ+ people, same-sex marriage, and gay sex between consenting adults:

“Your race, creed, and sex are what you are, while homosexuality and cross-dressing are things you do. This is a free country, but we don’t give special protections for every person’s bizarre choices.”

“You can call [homosexuality] sinful or destructive—ultimately it’s both.”

“States have many legitimate grounds to proscribe same-sex deviate sexual intercourse, including concerns for public health…safety, morals, and the promotion of healthy marriages.”

“Homosexual relationships are inherently unnatural and, the studies clearly show, are ultimately harmful and costly for everyone. Society cannot give its stamp of approval to such a dangerous lifestyle. If we change marriage for this tiny, modern minority, we will have to do it for every deviant group. Polygamists, polyamorists, pedophiles, and others will be next in line to claim equal protection. They already are. There will be no legal basis to deny a bisexual the right to marry a partner of each sex, or a person to marry his pet.”

“Experts project that homosexual marriage is the dark harbinger of chaos and sexual anarchy that could doom even the strongest republic.”

In his work as an attorney for the Alliance Defense Fund, Johnson also argued in court that same-sex couples should not receive domestic partnership benefits, and officially opposed the Supreme Court’s decision to decriminalize gay sex between consenting adults. In the Louisiana House of Representatives, he proposed a bill that critics say would have made it easier to discriminate against LGBTQ+ people. (In response, he claimed he was not a “bigot,” adding: “I know that I brought this bill for the right reason.”) Meanwhile, in Congress, he introduced a national bill seemingly modeled after Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law; voted against the 2022 bipartisan bill to codify gay marriage; and last year cosponsored a bill making it a crime to provide gender-affirming care to anyone under 18, despite the American Academy of Pediatrics backing such care.

“I would be hard-pressed to think of a worse member to be elected Speaker of the House,” Allen Morris, policy director for the National LGBTQ Task Force, told The 19th.

Separation of church and state

If you guessed that Johnson doesn’t believe in it, you guessed right. In April—as in, just a few months before he was elected Speaker—the congressman railed against what he referred to as the “so-called separation of church and state,” saying, “The founders wanted to protect the church from an encroaching state, not the other way around.”

In 2018, Johnson argued for prayer in public schools.

Evolution

In addition to blaming abortion for mass shootings, Johnson has also claimed that the teaching of evolution has played a part. In a 2016 sermon, he told the audience, “People say, ‘How can a young person go into their schoolhouse and open fire on their classmates?’ Because we’ve taught a whole generation—a couple generations now—of Americans, that there’s no right or wrong, that it’s about survival of the fittest, and [that] you evolve from the primordial slime. Why is that life of any sacred value? Because there’s nobody sacred to whom it’s owed. None of this should surprise us.”

In related news, a year prior, Johnson filed a lawsuit for an organization to receive tax subsidies to build a Noah’s Ark–focused theme park in Kentucky. “When the Ark Project sails, everybody will benefit,” he wrote in an op-ed, “even those who are stubbornly trying to sink it.” The Ark Encounter is operated by a fundamentalist Christian group that believes in creationism.

Climate

Where does Johnson, not exactly a man of science, land on global warming? Well, per The New York Times:

Representative Mike Johnson of Louisiana, the newly elected House Speaker, has questioned climate science, opposed clean energy, and received more campaign contributions from oil and gas companies than from any other industry last year. Even as other Republican lawmakers increasingly accept the overwhelming scientific consensus that human activity is dangerously heating the planet, the unanimous election of Mr. Johnson on Wednesday suggests that his views may not be out of step with the rest of his party.

A former constitutional lawyer, he does not sit on committees that decide the fate of major energy issues. But he has consistently voted against dozens of climate bills and amendments, opposing legislation that would require companies to disclose their risks from climate change and bills that would reduce leaks of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, from oil and gas wells. He has voted for measures that would cut funding to the Environmental Protection Agency.

In 2017, Johnson opined: “The climate is changing, but the question is, is it being caused by natural cycles over the span of the earth’s history? Or is it changing because we drive SUVs? I don’t believe in the latter. I don’t think that’s the primary driver.”

The 2020 election

By now you’ve likely heard that Johnson spent a significant amount of time and energy trying to overturn the 2020 election—an effort that included leading the amicus brief signed by more than 100 GOP lawmakers that asked the Supreme Court to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. Johnson also objected to the certification of Biden’s win on January 6; his arguments for doing so were adopted by a significant number of Republicans, leading the Times to call him “the most important architect of the Electoral College objections.” One day prior, per Politico, he told colleagues, “This is a very weighty decision. All of us have prayed for God’s discernment. I know I’ve prayed for each of you individually,” before pressing them to oppose the Electoral College results. Oh, and he was a Dominion truther:

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Where does Johnson stand on the 2020 election now? Before the floor vote, he refused to answer a reporter’s question about the matter, and after officially becoming Speaker, he did just the same:

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Not really the kind of endorsement you want these days

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Thank God the GOP is now free to get back to the important, not-at-all-made-up issues

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Elsewhere!

Could Mike Johnson, the New House Speaker, Undermine the 2024 Election?

NYT • Read More

North Carolina Republicans Approve House Map That Flips at Least Three Seats

NYT • Read More

Georgia’s congressional map violates Voting Rights Act, court finds

Politico • Read More

Donald Trump’s 2020 Cronies Appear to Be Ditching Him One by One

Vanity Fair • Read More

Democrats plot end run around Tuberville blockade of military promotions

The Washington Post • Read More

Blake Masters announces House bid in Arizona, forgoing another run for Senate

Politico • Read More

“Get the right cases to the Supreme Court”: inside Charles Koch’s network

The Guardian • Read More

CEO Morning Routines Are Bananas. So I Tried a Few.

WSJ • Read More

More Great Stories From Vanity Fair

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Go on over to the Levin Report at the above link to get all the gory (perhaps an understatement) details on America’s Retrograde Speaker!

MAGAMike often pretends as if the his interpretation of the Bible, not the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence, were our founding document.

But, believe it or not, the founding fathers were actually “revolutionaries,” not “reactionaries,” who overthrew tradition to arrive at a different place. In the process they incorporated what in those days were some “enlightenment” ideals to replace “traditionalist” regressive principles like the “divine” right of kings and a purely hierarchical society where there was no escape from the status assigned at birth!

One can debate the exact religious beliefs of the founders. But, they certainly foresaw a non-static society, open to change, and tolerating more than one viewpoint. They weren’t theocrats, and they weren’t wedded to the view that society can’t change and evolve to adapt to new norms and practical realities.

One could read the teachings of Christ as promoting love, kindness, tolerance, forgiveness, perspective, and siding with society’s outcasts. MAGAMike and his zealots appear to have a quite different “take.” That’s their prerogative. But, they shouldn’t be allowed to impose their peculiar, wayward views on the rest of us.

Faced with his first national tragedy, and a chance to show some real guts, leadership, and humane, common-sense principles derived from Christianity, all the self-professed “Man of God” and “protector of the unborn” (but “rejector of the born”) could muster was the same old trite “hearts and minds” garbage that flows from spineless GOP politicos. Compare MAGAMike with Rep. Jared Golden (D-ME) who apologized and changed his position to favor an assault weapons ban. See, e.g., https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwiJ35iN1puCAxVBk2oFHWs3CX8QvOMEKAB6BAgQEAE&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fpolitics%2F2023%2F10%2F26%2Fmaine-shooting-gun-control-laws%2F&usg=AOvVaw1NdJWXqX0pvd75g3dguKa_&opi=89978449.

Jesus would have valued assault weapons over human lives? Gimmie a break!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

10-29-23

🏴‍☠️🤮 “CHRISTIAN” WHITE NATIONALIST MAGAMIKE TAKES GOP TO NEW LOWS — Greg Sargent @ WashPost

MAGA Mike

By Bruce Plante

Republished under license

Greg writes:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/10/27/mike-johnson-great-replacement-theory-house-speaker/

Rep. Mike Johnson, the newly elected House speaker, has repeatedly flirted with what’s known as the “great replacement theory,” the idea that Democrats are scheming to supplant American voters with immigrants. The Louisiana Republican’s views show how fringe conspiracy theories have gone mainstream in the Republican Party at the highest levels of power.

“This is the plan of our friends on this side — to turn all the illegals into voters,” Johnson said at a congressional hearing in May 2022, gesturing at Democrats. “That’s why the border’s open.”

The “open borders” trope is a lie, and while a few municipalities allow voting for noncitizens in local elections, in no sense do national Democrats have any such “plan” for “all the illegals.” As far as I can determine, no House speaker in recent memory has been quite as reckless and incendiary with this kind of language.

Johnson employs it regularly. He reiterated the claim in an interview this year with the right-wing outlet Newsmax, accusing President Biden of “intentionally” encouraging undocumented migration to “turn all these illegals into voters for their side.” On numerous other occasions, he has made similar charges, even declaring that Democrats’ express goal is the “destruction of our country at the expense of our own people.”

On immigration, as well as on abortion and gay rights, Johnson’s elevation is a triumph for the far right. It has been widely noted that Johnson doesn’t come across as a MAGA bomb-thrower, despite his extreme views. That’s true on immigration, too: He voices high-minded platitudes about how providing asylum to the persecuted is a noble ideal, but he’s a big booster of the wildly radical House GOP border bill that would functionally gut asylum entirely.

The pro-immigrant group America’s Voice, which tracks lawmakers’ positions on the issue, has not documented any comparable rhetoric in Johnson’s predecessor, Rep. Kevin McCarthy. “Johnson has gone farther than most of his Republican colleagues in elevating alarmist and dangerous rhetoric,” says Vanessa Cardenas, the group’s executive director.

Other predecessors, such as John A. Boehner and Paul D. Ryan, were supporters — nominally, at least — of reforms that would legalize large numbers of undocumented immigrants, though they ultimately failed to deliver. Not even Newt Gingrich, the most extreme House speaker of the modern era, went as far as Johnson, says Nicole Hemmer, author of a history of conservatism in the 1990s.

“Even at his most anti-immigrant, he spoke largely in fiscal and law-and-order terms,” Hemmer told me, while eschewing the “eliminationist rhetoric” at the core of great replacement theory.

Yet little by little, those more extreme ideas have penetrated GOP leadership circles. In 2021, Rep. Elise Stefanik (N.Y.), a top House Republican, charged Democrats with scheming to replace conservative voters with Democratic-leaning immigrants.

. . . .

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Greg Sargent
Opinion Writer
Washington Post

Read Greg’s full column at the link.

Bigot, racist, theocrat, misogynist, liar, election denier, anti-democracy zealot — “MagaMike” is the disgraceful embodiment of today’s extremist GOP. Just when we think that the GOP can’t sink any lower, they surprise us!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

10-28-23

😎 🇺🇸 HOPE FRIDAY: The Common Good W/ Robert Reich — Maine Prepares To Welcome More Refugees — Austin Kocher On Keeping Faith During The Age Of Trumpist White Nationalist Hatred & Lies!

From Robert Reich on Substack:

https://substack.com/redirect/2/eyJlIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly9yb2JlcnRyZWljaC5zdWJzdGFjay5jb20vcC9hLWZpbmFsLXdvcmQtYWJvdXQtdGhlLWNvbW1vbi1nb29kP3V0bV9jYW1wYWlnbj1lbWFpbC1wb3N0JnI9MzMwejcmdG9rZW49ZXlKMWMyVnlYMmxrSWpvMU1UZ3dNRGd6TENKd2IzTjBYMmxrSWpveE16YzFOemMyTnprc0ltbGhkQ0k2TVRZNU56YzRPVEEzTlN3aVpYaHdJam94TnpBd016Z3hNRGMxTENKcGMzTWlPaUp3ZFdJdE16WTFOREl5SWl3aWMzVmlJam9pY0c5emRDMXlaV0ZqZEdsdmJpSjkuNVlqTFo4OWZJMUVaalJQVWp4SlczejczbGY0bXpGNXRyN2V4WkQ1QkVuZyIsInAiOjEzNzU3NzY3OSwicyI6MzY1NDIyLCJmIjpmYWxzZSwidSI6NTE4MDA4MywiaWF0IjoxNjk3Nzg5MDc1LCJleHAiOjE3MDAzODEwNzUsImlzcyI6InB1Yi0wIiwic3ViIjoibGluay1yZWRpcmVjdCJ9.YI3yXyy6J0uje-L2r-wh7kLsh8LeAZQ2K9oq40sSau0?

. . . .

Many Americans today worry that our nation is losing its national identity. Yet the core of that identity is not the whiteness of our skin or our religion or our ethnicity.

It is the ideals we share, the good we hold in common.

That common good is a set of shared commitments. To the rule of law. To democracy. To tolerance of our differences. To equal political rights and equal opportunity. To participating in our civic life. To sacrificing for the ideals we hold in common. To upholding the truth.

We cannot have a functioning society without these shared commitments. Without a shared sense of common good, there can be no “we” to begin with.

If we are losing our national identity, it is because we are losing our sense of the common good. This is what must be restored.

As I’ve argued in these essays, recovering our common good depends on several things:

It depends on establishing a new ethic of leadership based on trusteeship. Leaders must be judged not by whether they score a “win” for their side, but whether they strengthen democratic institutions and increase public trust.

It depends on honoring those who have invested in the common good, and holding accountable those who have exploited it for their own selfish ends.

It requires that we understand — and educate our children about — what we owe one another as members of the same society. Instead of focusing solely on the rights of citizenship, we need also to focus on the duties of citizenship.

And it requires a renewed commitment to truth.

Some of you may feel such a quest to be hopeless. The era we are living in offers too many illustrations of greed, narcissism, brutality, and hatefulness.

I, however, firmly believe this quest is not hopeless.

Almost every day, I witness or hear of the compassion and generosity of ordinary Americans. Their actions rarely make headlines, but they constitute much of our daily life together.

The challenge is to turn all this into a new public spiritedness extending to the highest reaches in the land — a public morality that strengthens our democracy, makes our economy work for everyone, and revives trust in the major institutions of the nation.

The moral fiber of our society has been weakened but it has not been destroyed.

We can recover the rule of law and preserve our democratic institutions by taking a more active role in politics.

We can fight against all forms of bigotry. We can strengthen the bonds that connect us to one another by reaching out to one another. We can help resurrect civility by acting more civilly toward those with whom we disagree.

We can protect the truth by using facts and logic to combat lies.

We can help restore the common good by striving for it and showing others it’s worth the effort.

We have never been a perfect union. Our finest moments have been when we sought to live up to our shared ideals.

I worked for Robert F. Kennedy a half-century ago when the common good was better understood. Resurrecting it may take another half-century, or more.

But as the theologian Reinhold Niebuhr once said, “Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history.”

Thank you for joining me on this journey. I hope you’ve found these essays useful and even on occasion inspiring. I hope you’ll join me in carrying forward the fight for the common good.

***

Subscribers to this newsletter are keeping it going. If you are able, please consider a paid or gift subscription. And we always appreciate your sharing our content with others and leaving your thoughts in the comments.

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Kelly Bouchrd — Kelly Bouchard
Staff Writer
Portland Press Herald
PHOTO: Linkedin

From Kelly Bouchard in the Portland Press Herald:

https://www.pressherald.com/2023/10/17/maine-refugee-resettlement-numbers-expected-to-double/

. . . .

COMMUNITY OUTREACH IN MAINE

Despite the uncertainty, resettlement agencies in Maine are pushing ahead, preparing to welcome as many refugees as possible. To increase their chances of finding affordable apartments, they’re building a network of landlords willing to rent to newcomers and expanding resettlement efforts beyond Greater Portland, Lewiston-Auburn and Augusta-Waterville to Bangor and Brunswick, Ouattara said.

“We can settle people within 100 miles of Lewiston-Auburn,” said Rilwan Osman, executive director of Maine Immigrant & Refugee Services in Lewiston. “We have settled some families in Augusta, and we are exploring other communities.”

The State Refugee Advisory Council held four quarterly meetings last year to connect and support various community representatives in government, public safety, schools, social services and health care, Ouattara said.

“There are resources that are available from the federal government to assist communities that accept refugees,” he said.

At least half of the new arrivals last year had family ties in Maine, Ouattara said, while the other half were “free cases” that could be resettled more widely in the state but would require more support from agency staff. Transportation continues to be a challenge for many newcomers.

“The public transit system in Maine is still in development, so that can be isolating in some communities,” he said.

Helping refugees find jobs is a top priority for resettlement agencies, which provide financial assistance and case management support for up to 90 days after arrival and limited case management and employment services for up to 60 months.

“All the refugees that are coming have permission to work as soon as they are able,” Osman said. “Some have English skills, some don’t. If they have the necessary language skills, they can at least start entry-level work within 90 days.”

One refugee who is eager to get to work is Ahmed, a recent arrival from Somalia who also declined to give his last name. Ahmed, 58, attended a cultural orientation session Wednesday at the JCA. Through an interpreter, Ahmed said he has been reunited with his wife and six children after being separated from them for 21 years.

He also said he wants to be a good citizen and a taxpayer.

“I’m so grateful to be here,” he said. “My dream is to settle in and get work at a job in my skill range. I am a welder and I would like to work in the same industry.”

Staff Photographer Brianna Soukup contributed to this report.

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

Grace Benninghoff in the Portland Press Herald:

https://www.pressherald.com/2023/10/19/portland-mayoral-candidates-frustrated-with-federal-work-rules-as-asylum-seekers-look-to-start-new-lives/

. . . .

Pious Ali says people will keep coming though.

“America is a beautiful country and has a lot to offer the world and the people who come here, and so does Portland,” said Ali, who came to the United States from Ghana more than two decades ago.

Portland’s five mayoral candidates may be more aligned on this issue than any other. They all fundamentally see asylum seekers as an asset to the city, and they all want to see the wait time before they can work made much shorter. They all also feel a little bit helpless.

For years, Portland has welcomed these immigrants, who often undertake dangerous journeys to get here and then go through an arduous, sometimes yearslong process to get visas and work authorization.

. . . .

Zarro said that if it should turn out to be too big a legal risk to offer asylum seekers paid work before they got federal work authorization, he would like to build a more robust job training program so they would be ready to start work in local businesses as soon as their work authorization comes though.

“We have people who are coming here to better their lives and to better their communities. Maine stands to benefit significantly,” he said.

All the candidates also are keenly aware that Portland is in need of more young workers.

“We’re an aging state without enough people to fill the workforce,” Costa said.

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

Abstract of Austin Kocher, PhD’s article “Welcoming the stranger in Trump’s America: Notes on the everyday processes of constructing and enduring sanctuary:”

https://intellectdiscover.com/content/journals/10.1386/hosp_00050_1

Geographers have begun to explore the concept of ‘immigrant welcome’ as a framework for understanding the tension between spontaneous social support for immigrants and refugees and their subsequent restriction and criminalization by states. Overlooked in the emerging discourse on immigrant welcome is the rich literature in feminist geography that views the everyday practices of endurance, care and social reproduction as essential to, but often hidden within, more traditional, political and economic analyses of power. By focusing on the everyday practices of welcome within sanctuary church activism, I argue for more attention to the energy-intense work that is often excluded from official media and academic accounts, yet which is essential to understanding what makes welcome function or fail. I draw upon one in-depth case study of a sanctuary church in Ohio, where a woman has been living for a year and a half in public defiance of her deportation order. In addition to contextualizing this specific case within the broader policy and immigrant rights landscape, I focus on the spatial, material and relational processes that participants implemented to construct a ‘welcoming’ environment as well as observe the ways in which welcome fails to live up to its imagined potential. The case study provides important grounded insights into the material, relational and emotional processes of enduring sanctuary as a form of resistance to the US deportation regime and enduring sanctuary itself as an intensive socio-spatial form of existence.

© 2022 Intellect Ltd

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Read more about each of these inspiring efforts at the respective links above.

Compare what could be if folks put aside hate and worked together to solve human problems with the pathetic, totally selfish, inept, inane, yet existentially dangerous, “Clown Show” 🤡 in the GOP House Conference egged on by their “leader” — congenital liar, bully, insurrectionist buffoon, and criminal defendant Donald Trump.🤮

What’s missing is more dynamic, courageous, truth-based national leadership on immigration and human rights issues from Dems (although, to be fair, the bipartisan Maine delegation — and many Maine Republicans — appear to “get it”)! But, fortunately, that void hasn’t stopped members of the NDPA from “soldiering on” for the commn good and a better America!

A life saved is a life saved! Sometimes, we just have to focus on the daily victories we can achieve!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

10-20-23

😢🗽🇺🇸 HUMANITARIAN CRISIS DEMANDS HUMANE RESPONSE: GOP DEMAGOGUERY, DEM INDIFFERENCE TO SUFFERING WON’T GET THE JOB DONE! 🤯 NGO’s Once Again Step Up To Do The USG’S Job! — They Need Help! ⛑️

Immigrant Defenders posted this on LinkedIn:

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) continues to inhumanely release asylum seekers onto San Diego streets, often with little more than the clothes on their backs. #TeamImmDef, Lindsay Toczylowski, Margaret Cargioli, Melissa Shepard and Jesús Contreras Barajas, continues to join various non-profit organizations, grassroots groups and community members to receive asylum seekers with respect and help them reach their friends and family members all over the United States. Our dedicated team, in collaboration with our remarkable San Diego-based partners, is tirelessly working to continue to welcome migrants with dignity. We have welcomed more than 8500 asylum seekers in 13 days.

We need all levels of government, local and federal, to provide infrastructure and financial resources to help NGOs welcome with dignity.

If you want to help, please consider donating airline miles to Miles4Migrants. Please see the link in our bio to donate. Or donate directly to ImmDef at Immdef.org/donate.

#AsylumIsAHumanRight #WelcomeWithDignity

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Scandalously, rather than looking to solve this humanitarian crisis, the GOP seeks to punish victims of Government dereliction of duty and their humanitarian responders for asserting well-established legal rights! Talk about a party of lawlessness! Sadly, it’s no surprise since they owe homage to an insurrectionist “leader” who is a notorious fraudster, con man, and criminal defendant in multiple cases!

While resisting the GOP’s worst racist/nativist nonsense, the Dems’ approach has been largely to avoid talking about immigration and human rights, apparently believing that pretending like they don’t exist will make them go away. But, migration isn’t going away!

While we can to some extent control, channel, and optimize migration, irresponsible “zero tolerance/uber deterrence” policies will do little to stop reality in the long run. It will, however, eventually force more migration underground and cede policy control to smugglers, cartels, and other criminals.

At the same time, obsessing over deterring and deporting those who merely seek refuge and a chance to contribute to America will actually diminish the harder work of focusing on criminals out to turn border disorder and misplaced priorities to their advantage.

Neither party appears to have a realistic plan for the border, and the GOP actively seeks to make things worse! Meanwhile, not for the first time, NGOs, local communities, and compassionate individuals are left to pick up the slack!

Recently, the San Diego County Board showed the potential for bipartisan cooperation on the border.

//www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/border-baja-california/story/2023-09-26/county-declares-humanitarian-crisis-at-border-will-ask-federal-government-for-more-help

But, without a more realistic approach from the Feds — currently blocked by the GOP — local efforts are unlikely to succeed. And, that’s an avoidable humanitarian tragedy!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

10-02-23

🇺🇸🗽👩🏾‍🎓 INVESTING IN AMERICA’S FUTURE: MAINE MAKES EFFORT, WELCOMES NEW STUDENTS FROM ASYLUM-SEEKING FAMILIES! — “School leaders say the work can be challenging and puts a significant strain on resources, but it’s also a privilege to welcome new students into the community.”

Gillian Graham
Staff Writer
Portland Press Herald

https://www.pressherald.com/2023/08/28/schools-make-last-minute-push-to-prepare-for-new-students-from-asylum-seeking-families/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Daily+Headlines%3A+Hundreds+celebrate+return+of+Gray-New+Gloucester%2FRaymond+Little+League+team&utm_campaign=PH+Daily+Headlines+ND+-+NO+SECTIONS&auth0Authentication=true

Local schools make last-minute push to prepare for new students from asylum-seeking families

In Freeport and Sanford, schools have hired English instructors and made other adjustments needed to welcome dozens of new students.

BY GILLIAN GRAHAM STAFF WRITER

Maine welcomes students

Children catch bubbles Aug. 17 at a free barbecue organized by the Lewiston School Department to mark the end of its summer outreach program that provided numerous services for students and families. It also gave the School Department the opportunity to connect with students and parents, hand out schedules, sign students up and make connections before the start of school. Russ Dillingham/Sun Journal

With just a week to go before the first day of school, staff from Freeport schools headed to a local hotel to meet their newest students.

The 67 students, all from asylum-seeking families, had just moved to the Casco Bay Inn from the Portland Expo, where nearly 200 people had been staying in the temporary shelter before it closed. The families all decided to send their kids to Freeport schools instead of busing them to Portland to attend classes, said Jean Skorapa, superintendent of Regional School Unit 5 in Freeport.

“Our first goal is to get them enrolled and in a class,” she said. “That piece is done. Now we look at how to best serve their needs.”

The scramble to welcome new students and connect them with the services they need is becoming a familiar challenge in Freeport and other Maine communities where the families are settling.

For the past several years, school districts in southern Maine have had to make quick adjustments as they enroll dozens of students from asylum-seeking families, many of whom come from African countries and speak little or no English when they arrive. To meet their needs, they’ve had to hire more teachers for English learners, add social workers and support staff, and make sure translation services are in place to communicate with parents.

“For us, this is a new experience,” said Steve Bussiere, assistant superintendent in Sanford, where 38 students enrolled in May when their families arrived in the city. There will be 55 students from asylum-seeking families in Sanford schools this year, he said.

School leaders say the work can be challenging and puts a significant strain on resources, but it’s also a privilege to welcome new students into the community.

“We’ve had new Mainers with us over the past year and a half. They’ve made us a more well-rounded, diverse district,” Skorapa said. “They’re a wonderful addition to our school community and we welcome them with open arms and are thrilled to have them with us.”

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Read the complete article at the link.

Congrats to educational and political leaders in Maine for making the system work as it should! Immigrants becoming Mainers and settling down there is making a positive difference! Seems like the Feds, not to mention other states and localities, could use some of this same positive approach and enlightened, courageous leadership.

The Portland’s Press Herald’s Editorial Board echoed this view in an editorial published yesterday:

https://www.pressherald.com/2023/08/30/our-view-to-invest-in-immigrant-pupils-is-to-invest-in-the-future/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Daily+Headlines%3A+ACLU%2C+Maine+officials+reach+deal+on+lawyers+for+poor&utm_campaign=PH+Daily+Headlines+ND+-+NO+SECTIONS

Our View: To invest in immigrant pupils is to invest in the future

A big effort by Maine schools to accommodate English language learners will have a big return for their communities.

A new experience.

That’s how Steve Bussiere, assistant superintendent in Sanford, described Sanford schools’ addressing the needs of 55 new students from asylum-seeking families this coming school year.

It’s a new experience for the kids, too, and thanks to thoughtful, time-intensive efforts by Bussiere’s colleagues and other schools around Maine – hiring additional teachers to teach English to English language learners, hiring more social workers and more support staff and refining translation services so that school staff and administrators can communicate with new pupils’ parents – it can be a good experience.

The focus on multilingual learners requires a serious effort and will make a serious difference to our state.

Thankfully, the Maine Legislature expressed its understanding of that fact in July, including $3.5 million for the support of English language learners – via the English Language Learner Hardship Fund – in the special supplemental budget.

This valuable funding becomes available to schools at the end of October. Portland’s public schools will receive more than $784,000; Lewiston, $631,000; South Portland, $302,000; Biddeford, $192,000, Brunswick, $150,000; Saco, $110,000; Freeport, $109,000, and Westbrook, $93,000.

In Freeport, arrangements have been made for 67 new students who recently moved with their families from the temporary shelter at the Portland Expo to the Casco Bay Inn. Jean Skorapa, superintendent of Regional School Unit 5 in Freeport, struck a crystal-clear and exceedingly warm note earlier this week – sounding like many other Maine educators on the same subject in recent years.

“We’ve had new Mainers with us over the past year and a half. They’ve made us a more well-rounded, diverse district,” Skorapa said. “They’re a wonderful addition to our school community and we welcome them with open arms and are thrilled to have them with us.”

In other school districts, efforts such as these have been up and running for a while. According to our reporting Monday, Lewiston schools work with students who speak a total of 38 languages. The school district there has a multilingual center that works with families and offers vital help with paperwork and orientation. Portland has been supporting new students from asylum-seeking families for years; in July, we reported that one-third of the district’s roughly 6,500 students were multilingual.

The numbers make it clear as day: The downside risk of underfunding English language learning is now way too steep for these parts of Maine to run. Yes, there’s a moral imperative here; it is also a legal requirement of our public schools. We trust that, on the strength of existing work in this realm, the practice of funding multilingual learning education becomes just that – a practice. Rep. Michael Brennan, D-Portland, House chair of the Education and Cultural Affairs Committee, expressed his commitment to continue funding the program “in the coming years.”

Appropriate investment in these students fosters a sense of belonging, reduces the risk of pernicious, hard-to-close learning gaps and, as students find themselves better and better equipped to support their families locally, has wide-reaching benefits. To say nothing of what it means for school graduates of the future. On top of that, successive studies have shown that the teaching techniques that assist English language learners assist all students.

That’s not to say there won’t be hurdles to overcome. In recent days, tense and ugly anti-immigrant rallies in Manhattan, Staten Island and Woburn, Massachusetts, laid bare the style of racist, isolationist thinking that continues to oppose even the most commonsense steps towards integration and inclusion.

Our schools need more support, and they need it to be specific. The calls for increased attention to the new members of the student body need to be sustained in their volume and their clarity. It makes sense, at every level, to seize this opportunity to enrich our classrooms and our communities.

Kids are our future. It’s definitely worth the effort!

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Image depicts a child coming to the aid of another in need. Once we have climbed it is essential for the sake of humanity that we help others do the same. It is knowing that we all could use, and have used, a helping hand.
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White Nationalist Xenophobes like Trump, DeSantis, Abbott, & Ducey have abandoned Traditional Judeo-Christian values in favor of neo-fascism. But, the rest of us should hold true to our “better angels.”

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

08-31-23

Todd Miller in The Border Chronicles:

40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.’

Matthew 25:40

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