Supporting detainees and their families while rejecting Comprehensive Immigration Reform.

(edited 5am 4/1/14)

As noted in a recent post, I appreciate the critiques that have been shared with me about immigration reform and indigenous rights in response to my uncritical coverage  of the Puente hunger strike. I was directed to some pointed blog posts that examine the movement for ComprehensiveImmigration Reform from an indigenous perspective. The posts themselves, as well as the ensuing dialogue, were really helpful in explaining exactly what CIR is and how it may affect people indigenous to the border region.  These are the most pertinent ones:

 IN A BORDER WORLD: Colonization under the guise of “immigrant rights”
CIRCULAR MOTION: Why I'm Not Sold on the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Package
CIRCULAR MOTION: Their Dream is Our Nightmare: How the Prison Industry is Holding the Human Rights Movement Hostage

The ensuing conversation around the hunger strike and the potential it could reinforce passage of horrible legislation like CIR also reminded me that as much as I like to think I understand indigenous concerns, I really have no clue. I have no idea what it means to feel a sacred connection to land tended to by generations of my people - “my people” are the ones who immigrated here in droves and appropriated pretty much everything they came across on this continent for themselves and their heirs. What I’m so quick to offer to share with the world became “mine” only by way of genocidal practices and continued colonization of this region by my ancestors. Those ancestors aren’t all from the 19th century, either - it includes my beloved grandparents from Iowa, who helped settle Sun City in the 1970’s with the kind of nice old folks who perpetrate unspeakable violence on oppressed communities by voting for men like Joe Arpaio. Because they were here, my mother and I came and settled out here, too. 
 

Deeper in my genes I found the Pilgrims and Mormons - the leaders among them, even. Some people take pride in such heritage - my mother and grandmother even joined the Mayflower Society. I was mortified by what I found in my family tree, however - like the eyewitness account of William Bradford, first Governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, narrating and justifying the brutal slaughter of the Pequot in 1637. The ancestor that qualifies me as a “Daughter of the American Revolution” (should I choose to join) fathered another prominent settler, Brigham Young, responsible for considerable harm to indigenous people. And I grew up in the US Army, raised by a military intelligence officer who spent his life fighting Communism in other lands...really, as a kid I was pretty well-indoctrinated with the notion that the descendants of this nation’s founders had a special duty to rule the world, since only we could do it right. So, I guess it’s no wonder that as much as I try to shake my settler mentality, I both identify with the immigrant story and think that this territory I’ve come to inhabit is something that I have the right to even consider “sharing”. That was something of an awakening, realizing how entrenched that mindset is.
 

My angst about my family's legacy of colonization and complicity in genocide is for another post, though. This one is mostly to clarify what I think are a couple of factual errors about the hunger strike itself, and explain my support for the families and prisoners on strike, as well as my thoughts on the upcoming walk to Eloy. 

I had several conversations with Puente members this week about the criticisms that have been shared with me of the current immigrant rights movement in general, some of which seemed clearly directed at their group in particular (though Puente wasn’t identified by name in all the posts), which I summarize here. My take on the "Trail to end detentions" evolved as I worked on this post, so there are several concerns I have not yet discussed with Puente members or organizers.
  

Carlos Garcia, Puente's director, was out of town last week and I didn't ask people to articulate the organization's position in his absence - this post really just deals with the opinions of the friends I have who are a part of the Puente community. I do hope to have a conversation with Carlos  in the next few weeks: I'd like to hear his thoughts on the criticisms of indigenous activists who have raised them, as I believe those voices are vital to the dialogue about CIR and both migrant justice and indigenous rights.

 From my experience, Puente is driven by its members’ needs and wants and willingness to work. Most of those members are people who have been directly affected by arrest and criminalization, detention or deportation.  Yes, Puente is allied with Dreamers, but most of the people I know from Puente have loved ones who fail to fit into the neat “Dreamer” or “model immigrant” packages, and are disillusioned with what is really Comprehensive Immigration Reform, (CIR). Even if passed today and signed into law, the CIR proposal offered by the Senate and celebrated by organizations like The National Council of LaRaza and Fast 4 Families won’t improve the very real and desperate circumstances they face right now. For many the passage of CIR will only make their long “path to citizenship” more precarious, if not impossible. That's why they aren't fighting for CIR to be resurrected and passed in the House. 
 

Puente members' concerns about the criminalized migrants they love were marginalized pretty quickly early on; this si their push-back. I hope in the process of doing so, they help humanize other criminalized groups in this state as well, and shed light on the inherent violence of imprisonment and inhumanity of exile from one's family and community, whatever the reason such penalty is imposed. I do hope the families of AZ DOC prisoners take note and organize to fight back against the system, too – together, you could have so much power.

As for the pro-CIR organizations capitalizing on the attention Puente and similar actions around the country got: its my understanding that some tried their best to discourage Puente from that plan in the first place. While the Not1More campaign that Puente's hunger strike hashtagged under is run by the National Day Labor Organizing Network, that particular action at ICE in Phoenix wasn’t planned by NDLON or Dreamers as a stunt to promote CIR. It originated in the anguish of an area mother who decided to fast for her son's liberation, as every other attempt to free him had failed. This mother knew she couldn’t sit around and wait for CIR to help her - if anything, the passage of CIR would assure his permanent deportation. 
 

The other family members of prisoners facing deportation – most of whom had criminal records - organized around her, as did their loved ones in detention. As I understand it, that was part of an escalating campaign to push back against the national CIR promotions that threatened the many Puente members already affected by criminalization. Here in Arizona that's especially common because of racial profiling (not just by Arpaio's people, either) and Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery's decision to charge people arrested in workplace raids with as many felonies as possible - a practice Puente has drawn attention to and challenged more aggressively than anyone else in the community. 
 

CCA and ICE weren’t behind the release of Arturo Castenada, the one prisoner who was set free at the end of the strike, either - though it would have been a brilliant strategy, if they had been. The community had just finally managed to raise enough to bond him out. None of the prisoners in question have been released due to the hunger strike, in fact – and I'm not sure anyone really expected that they would be; they must have anticipated the probability of retaliation instead. 
 

And indeed, there were consequences. Prisoner organizers were placed in solitary and threatened with tube-feeding if a hunger strike dragged on. In fact, one hunger striker behind bars, Jaime Valdez, was deported in the middle of the 9th night, at the same time as the encampment at ICE was raided and the organizers on site were jailed. Despite Jaime’s deportation, the same families and prisoners continue to agitate.

 

Now, honestly,  I personally don't think that militarizing the border and offering migrants a "path to citizenship" - even if the path really led there - is the best solution for millions of people being forced from their homelands due to poverty and our exploitation of their labor, violence from the war on drugs, fallout from our decades-old war on communism, and so on – but then, I reject borders and nation-states in the first place, and advocate the overthrow of capitalism as the best solution to many of our social ills.  I'd like to see more local energy go into stopping further colonization, abolishing the border altogether, overturning NAFTA/aborting the TPP, and halting the development of the Sun Corridor – a critical piece of the CANAMEX superhighway which, along with CIR, will make the extraction of indigenous resources and the exploitation of desperate workers throughout the hemisphere all the more efficient - and destructive - in years to come. That would promote both migrant justice and indigenous rights.
 

Saying all that to detainees and their families in the middle of this struggle, though, is like talking prison abolition to prisoners who have been repeatedly assaulted in custody and are trying to get to safety, or who are dying for lack of medical attention – my ideal may be a great objective, but it doesn't help them survive the here and now. My role in relation to prisoners and their families when they fight the state on their own terms tends to be supportive - at the very least, I dont try to re-direct their actions or help the state invisibilize them. Rather, when prisoners and their families take action to make themselves seen and heard, they get my attention and respect - even if I dont completely agree with them. I hope they get yours as well. 

The Puente members I've met over the past few years are sincere, earnest people fighting incredible odds to reduce criminalization and incarceration while offering real support to prisoners and their families - that's where we connect the most, of course. Those who are fasting and walking and fighting today's deportation machine as best they can deserve better than to be dismissed as pawns or demonized as collaborators because the pro-CIR movement has exploited or tried to co-opt their actions. Nor is it necessarily their fault that the organization which has helped amplify their voices has such a complicated history and politic.  

That said, the organization Puente is still fair game for criticism.

I have issues with the name of this weeks' journey to Eloy ("Trail to End Deportations"), which seems to compare the experience of migrants with an explicitly genocidal forced march of indigenous people across the country so Anglos (from earlier generations of immigrants and colonizers) could claim their resources. It does seems to confirm that the struggle of the indigenous people from this region really doesn't register when Puente plans actions around immigration reform; I don't know how else to explain that.

And I have yet to hear a competing proposal for immigration reform - they wont advocate for CIR, as I explained, but I haven't heard anything from the organization taking a stand explicitly against it; it seems as if this campaign is limited to getting a stay for as many people as possible until CIR is passed, and wont address the other areas of concern raised by indigenous activists.  So I am conflicted again. I need to know more.

Whatever the White House does in the meantime, I see Congress at the end of this journey (during the height of the election season) taking up CIR and tweaking it a little to appease the Latino voting block, and maybe add a few more billion to border militarization without the national immigrant rights groups batting an eye...and that troubles me.  I have to agree with my indigenous comrades on this - I think we need to do everything we can to stop anything like CIR from passing. The Trail to end Deportations and the Not1More campaign is leading straight to CIR, regardless of whether or not it succeeds in its immediate aims. 

I'll let you know what I learn when I drop in on the walk to Eloy, and maybe have a chance to chat with Puente organizers a little more. They will be leaving Wednesday morning at 9am from ICE, and rallying Saturday at 10am in front of the Eloy Detention Center.

Below are links to indigenous voices on border issues, including the two blogs from above. 
Websites:

O'odham Solidarity Across Borders Collective

O'odham Solidarity Project

Circular Motion

In a Border World

Video:
Tohono O'odham and U S Border Patrol (youtube video)

Imaginary Borders, Real Obstructions (youtube video)

And these links come from chaparral respects no borders a really good blog on immigration issues.

Understanding Immigration Issues: Fliers and Articles

•  
• Chaparral: Invasion by Birth Canal? The fourteenth amendment ...
• Chaparral: What came first: the Racism or the Profit Motive?
• OCCUPATION OF BORDER PATROL HEADQUATERS DAVIS-MONTHAN AIRFORCE BASE, TUCSON, AZ
• OSAB: Movement Demands Autonomy: An O'odham Perspective on Border Controls and Immigration
• Reading up on O'odham border struggle
• Chaparral: The Best Immigration Law is No Law at All
• Chaparral: Freedom Not Reform: Native Struggle from Margin to Center
• Chaparral: Freedom, not Reform: If we don’t demand it, it can’t happen
• Chaparral: No Borders or Prison Walls
• Fear of a Milighan Planet
• Solidarity, Immigration, and Border Regimes
• Blood on the Line: Resistance, Empire, and
• The Political Economy of International Migration
• Immigration: A Nation of Colonists and Race Laws
• Concerned about Overpopulation?
• Immigrants Get One Camp, but which one is for you?
• CAROB flier for Border Security Expo
• Chaparral: Changing the Minds of White Folks Whose Anti-Immigrant Fears have been Manufactured
• Chaparral: Welfare for the Rich: Criminalized Migrants
• Chaparral: The Problem With "Illegal"
• Chaparral: Gender Borders and National Borders
• Chaparral: Federal Government Will Not be Maricopa County's Savior
• Chaparral: Breaking Down the Mexican Drug War
• Chaparral: 2007 Retrospective: The Local War on the Undocumented

 

PUENTE families to break their historic fast to end deportations.

This hunger strike at ICE in Phoenix these past two weeks has really been historic - don't miss it before the camp breaks down, if you haven't already been by. The president should be ashamed for having organizers arrested and one family's son deported in retaliation, but his administration's  cruelty and oppression has only made the PUENTE movement stronger.

If you have any idea how deeply members of this remarkable community love one another and labor for justice, you will do everything you can to celebrate with them as the hunger strikers break their fast at 5pm Monday evening, March 3 in front of Phoenix ICE. Their spirit of hope and resistance is infectious; they've convinced me that any evil empire can be overcome and a new world is possible if only we put our heads and hearts together and take action. 

Please sign the families' petition here. And keep telling ICE to set their loved ones free at 202-732-3000.

from the PUENTE HUMAN RIGHTS MOVEMENT (March 2, 2014)

Join us this Monday at 5pm to celebrate our community in resistance, honor the leadership of the brave freedom fighters who have been on hunger strike, and plan together next steps in the fight against deportations.

Despite deportation, hospitalization, a police raid, and violent hate directed our way on a daily basis, we will come together Monday evening, as planned, to break bread with the hunger strikers as they end their fast.

While the hunger strike ends on Monday, our fight for justice for our entire community goes on, strengthened by the commitment and leadership of the hunger strikers inside and outside of Eloy Detention Center.

During the last two weeks, our community has faced many trials, but they are many of the same struggles we face in private every day. Our action has led many to take notice of the crisis of deportations, and to join us in lifting up the call to the President that it is his duty to take immediate action to halt deportations.

Please bring food to share (and a friend) if you are able.

Vengan este lunes a las 5:00pm para celebrar nuestra comunidad en resistencia, honrar el liderazgo de los luchadores por la libertad valientes que han estan en huelga de hambre, y planificar juntos los próximos pasos en la lucha contra las deportaciones.

A pesar de la deportación, hospitalización, una redada de la policía, y el odio violento dirigida a nosotros cada dia, nos reuniremos la noche del lunes, como ya planeabamos, para comer con los huelguistas de hambre, cuando terminan su ayuno.

Mientras que la huelga de hambre termina el lunes, nuestra lucha por la justicia para toda nuestra comunidad continúa, reforzado por el compromiso y el liderazgo de los huelguistas de hambre dentro y fuera del centro de detención Eloy .

Durante las últimas dos semanas, nuestra comunidad se ha enfrentado a muchas pruebas, pero son muchas de las mismas dificultades que enfrentamos en privado todos los días. Nuestra acción se ha llevado a muchos a tomar nota de la crisis de las deportaciones, y se unan a nosotros en el levantamiento de la llamada al Presidente que es su deber de tomar medidas inmediatas para detener las deportaciones.

Favor de traer comida para compartir ( y amigo ) si usted es capaz

Endangered prisoners: listening to queer, undocumented detainees.

Those of you who haven't been around PUENTE ARIZONA  these past few years have missed a real evolution. I neglect to write about them precisely because they're doing such an incredible job confronting the criminalization of decent people and the brutality of detention and deportation. PUENTE and their allies in the migrant justice movement have deployed a diversity of tactics against the system:  helping families fight the detention and deportation of loved ones; documenting human rights abuses; engaging in civil disobedience by locking down to deportation busses and prison gates; and waging simultaneous hunger strikes on both sides of the prison walls , for example. The movement to resist the prison industrial complex's death grip on immigrant families and communities in this region is so  well organized that it just hasn't necessarily been a voice I thought needed my help in particular to amplify or echo - they speak well enough for themselves, that is.

Among other things, PUENTE has organized a youth media collective which has been documenting the struggles of migrant families torn apart by raids, detentions, and deportations. They produce incredible protest art through their collective, PUENTE INK. Their community room has a wall full of  books banned from Arizona's public schools when Attorney General Tom Horne was State Superintendant, and convinced the legislature to put an end to classes and curriculum that he believed taught youth of color "to hate white people" - it's Arizona's Underground Library. There's so much happening at the place and in the community that is PUENTE - check them out yourselves. Swing by ICE on Central (just north of McDowell) where the hunger strikers are camping out - they'll tell you what it's all about.

I bring up PUENTE's work as I'm posting this article because it's been my observation that a number of undocumented LGBTQ young people are not just marginalized victims, as one may infer from below, but are respected leaders in the local migrant justice movement- many even risking detention and deportation in their efforts to liberate us all from this abusive system. Thus, the narrative of resistance to brutality in Arizona is also not one that can be written without them.

PUENTE human rights Activist Chela Chelinski 

Mural by Amelec Diaz (Phoenix ICE Rally, 2012)

Left Out of the Narrative: LGBTQ Undocumented Detainees

Sunday, 16 February 2014 00:00 By Erika L. Sánchez,  
Truthout | News Analysis 

Undocumented LGBTQ people are caught in a double bind of belonging neither in white mainstream LGBTQ narrative nor in the mainstream immigrant narrative. The consequences can range from difficult to deadly.
 
On Halloween of 2011, Eddy (who, for his personal safety prefers his last name not be disclosed), an undocumented immigrant from Chiapas, Mexico, living in Texas, was stopped by a police officer for passing a yellow light. Eddy, who has lived in the United States for most of his life, never imagined he would be in custody for 61 days because of a routine traffic stop.

Eddy says that he passed the sobriety test. But when he was asked for his license, he could not provide one because he was undocumented. When they reached the headquarters, he also demanded a blood test to further prove he was not driving under the influence.

After his arrest, Eddy says he was transferred to Harris County Jail, where he was held for 45 days. He was then taken to an immigration detention center in Houston. During the intake process, he says one of the questions was "Are you gay?" Because he answered yes, he says he was put in isolation for one week. The detention officials claimed it was for his own safety.

Other people were placed in solitary confinement because of aggressive acts or because they wanted to commit suicide. Eddy was placed there only because he was gay. "I think they put me there out of fear. That was unjustified," Eddy says. "It was the hardest moment of my life. I thought I was really going to go insane."
After his attorney contacted the warden, Eddy says that they removed him from isolation, and the warden warned him against having sex with anyone. According to Eddy, the warden said to him: "If you do get in trouble, we can't guarantee that we're going to protect you."

He remained in general population for three weeks until his blood tests came back and cleared him of driving under the influence. At that point, he was released on bail.

Eddy's experience, unfortunately, is not unusual. A 2013 report by American Progress found that many facilities place lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and queer (LGBTQ) immigrants in administrative segregation, or solitary confinement, supposedly in response to concerns of sexual assault and harassment. LGBTQ immigrants held in immigration detention facilities are 15 times more likely to be sexually assaulted than their heterosexual counterparts.

According to the report, solitary confinement can lead to a variety of psychological problems, including hyper-sensitivity to external stimuli, hallucinations, panic attacks, obsessive thoughts and paranoia.
Clement Lee, an attorney at the Immigration Equality Center who provides representation for LGBTQ asylum seekers, says that in some extreme cases, trans women are placed in solitary confinement for months at a time.

"Many detention centers don't know how to house trans people. They almost always segregate them according to gender assignment given at birth," Lee says. "Many of our transgender women [housed in men’s prisons] face increased danger of sexual violence from both staff and detainees." Lee says that the detention centers address these problems by putting people in administrative isolation.

These hostile environments can lead to depression and other emotional issues. In 2011, Jonathan Perez, co-founder of Immigrant Youth Coalition, decided to be purposefully detained to highlight the injustice of the Secure Communities Program. While in a detention center in Louisiana, he says he witnessed some of the more "feminine" men being harassed by fellow detainees. Perez says this experience caused him to become depressed and stay in bed all day. "I didn't want to face it," he says. "Whether we realize it or not, we experience out oppression all the time. In general, I think it's scary because you don't know what you're going to face in these places. It's inhumane to be detained."

In addition to harassment and isolation, another obstacle many LGBTQ-identified detainees face is lack of access to HIV medication. The National Immigrant Justice Center has found that HIV-positive individuals detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) were harassed and mistreated and had a difficult time accessing HIV medication.

Lee says that sometimes people who have HIV hesitate to disclose it out of fear, which can lead to a lapse in medication. These lapses can be deadly. In 2007, Victoria Arellano, a Mexican HIV-positive transgender woman, died after being denied her medication and medical attention at the detention center in San Pedro, California.

Some trans detainees are also not allowed to receive hormone therapy while in custody, particularly when they don't have a previous prescription. Immigration Equality has found that medical staffs at detention facilities don't screen for or evaluate the need for transition-related care. According to the group's web site, "Due to the increased stressors that detainees live under, even if an individual did not take hormones or struggled with their GID [Gender Identity Disorder] before entering detention, their experience in detention may lead them to experience more intense feelings of gender discordance and necessitate treatment."
"Hormones are integral to expressing their gender identity, and that's something they should be able to receive," Lee says.

Rachel Ann Lewis, assistant professor in the Women and Gender Studies Program at George Mason University, says that when it comes to asylum petitions based on LGBTQ identity, there is a real emphasis on visible performance of sexuality, which can also be dangerous while in detention. Many have to make the difficult choice to "perform" their gender identity or sexuality for their petition for asylum and risk being harassed in detention.

Collecting evidence of their membership to particular group can be dangerous and difficult for some LGBTQ detainees, Lee adds. Many asylum-seekers, for instance, lack evidence because they've made efforts to conceal their sexuality out of fear of persecution in their home countries.

In addition to the danger faced in detention centers, Lewis points out that asylum seekers cannot work, which forces many to be homeless. As a result, Lee says, many have to resort to criminalized conduct, such as shoplifting and sex work, to survive.

Lulú Martinez, who immigrated from Mexico City at the age of 3, also infiltrated a detention center as an act of civil disobedience. She says that queer undocumented people there are caught in a double bind of belonging neither in white mainstream queer narrative nor in the mainstream immigrant narrative. When it comes to immigration reform, she believes legislators should be "acknowledging a broader language that allows for more inclusion."

While immigration reform hangs in the balance, the issue of detention abuse is just as relevant as ever and LGBTQ activists must continue to fight for visibility. According to The Center for American Progress, the Department of Homeland Security currently holds more than twice as many immigrants in detention each day as INS did during the entirety of 1998.

Marcela Espinoza, an undocumented lesbian woman who participated in Dream 30, fled her home in Michoacán and petitioned for asylum in October 2013. She was detained in El Paso. She is requesting asylum due to "credible fear" because of her sexuality and the violence she witnessed in her home state.
"Sometimes we don't have visibility in these spaces," she says. "There's always a heteronormative way of talking about immigration," she says. "We need that visibility. We need to be talking about these things. That's what we're trying to expose.

PUENTE Hunger strike spreads through detention center.

Please support the hunger strikers by calling to have their loved ones released: 

Call Eloy at 520-466-4141 x 23200 ask for the warden's office to demand that the hunger strikers be released from solitary confinement, and that CCA recommend to ICE they be released from detention altogether:
 
Jaime Valdez (A# 201-288-309)
Elder Gomez-Lopez (A# 087-455-416)
Rosy Gallego (A# 205-930-728)
Margarita Gallego (A# 205-936-572)
Arturo Castaneda (A# 205-942-830)
J Cruz Lopez (A# 205-920-821)


Also call  AZ ICE 602-766-7030 and DC ICE at 202-732-3000 to tell them that the community demands the above prisoners be freed!

If you're in Phoenix, pay close attention to what's going down at ICE (2035 n central Phoenix), even try to make your support known there today - the cops have threatened to arrest people if they don't clear out. The hunger strikers and their supporters have every intention of staying, so this will be a show-down. Prepare to do some jail support, next.

CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE: Defying the anti-camping ordinance in the City of Phoenix.

PUENTE's Encampment at ICE,  as day 6 dawns. 

Photo by PUENTE

for immediate release // excuse cross-posting/

Contact: Caroline Picker, Puente Movement, media@puenteaz.org, 510-501-7276

Carlos Garcia, Puente Movement, carlos@puenteaz.org, 520-648-1697

Families on Hunger Strike at ICE React to CCA Punishment, Enter 7th Day with Reportedly 9 Detainees in Solitary Confinement

Monday marks the seventh day on hunger strike for six families with loved ones in detention in the Eloy Detention Center.  Since they began their fast on President's Day, they've received countless visitors at their encampment in front of the Phoenix ICE field office, including several hundred undocumented youth from the national United We Dream Network, pledging their support.

Yesterday, Sunday February 23rd, the hunger strikers travelled to Eloy to hold vigil outside of the Eloy Detention Center, in order to draw attention to what their loved ones are facing inside.  (see attached photos) Lourdes Hernandez, whose husband has been detained in Eloy for over 1 year after being racially profiled by the Phoenix Police Departmemt, says, "Without my husband home, my whole family has suffered.  My 20-year-old daughter has dropped out of school and taken two jobs to support us.  We are here to send strength to my husband and all the rest of the detainees to keep their hope alive: we will continue to fight until they are home with us."

By the end of their first week, the hunger strike by those within the detention center had reportedly spread throughout the facility prompting Corrections Corporation of America, the private company that runs the facility, to retaliate against the fasters by placing them in solitary confinement.  Despite multiple phone calls expressing concern for the detainees, the company reportedly has placed nine of them in "the hole" as a disciplinary measure to prevent further participation in the hunger strike.

The detainees, some of whom have been in detention for over two years, are seeking their release so that they can fight their deportation orders from the outside instead of from continued incarceration in the hazardous conditions of the CCA facility.  

To schedule interviews with hunger strikers, please call Caroline at 510-501-7276

All photos by Barni Axmed Qaasim

 Photo 1: From Left to Right, hunger strikers Hermina Gallego, Jose Valdez, Lourdes Hernandez, and Anselma Lopez hold vigil outside of Eloy Detention Center.  Hermina's daughter and sister-in-law, Jose's son, Lourdes's husband, and Anselma's son are all detained inside.

 Photo 2: Anselma Lopez and her granson

PUENTE: Fasting for Families at ICE - NOT1More DEPORTATION!

For immediate release // excuse cross-posting //

Contact: Sandra Castro, Puente Movement, media@puenteaz.org, 323-493-2844

Phoenix Parents with Children in Detention Begin Hunger Strike for their Release, 

Call for Not1More Deportation

What: Not1More Deportation Hunger Strike Launch

When: TODAY, Monday February 7 at 5:00pm 

Where: In front of Phoenix ICE Field Office, 2035 N Central Ave

Who: Parents, Spouses, and loved ones of five people currently being held in the Eloy Detention center, members of Puente Arizona, supporters.   

Today, President’s Day, as faith leaders, immigrants, and supporters are praying for an end to deportations in front of the White House, 5 mothers are beginning a hunger strike, having exhausted all other routes to see their children released from the detention centers they're held in pending imminent deportation unless ICE uses its discretion in their cases as it's instructed to do.

Hermina Gallego, a hunger striker and participant in the civil disobedience prayer vigil in Washington, says, "I'm fasting for my daughter because she has been in detention for over 5 months. "My daughter is sick and she is not getting the proper treatment she needs. I am fasting because every day that my daughter is in detention is a day that her health is in danger.  If I don't do anything, she could die."   

Hermina’s daughter’s case highlights the urgent need for the President to take immediate action and stop record deportations. While it is undisputed that the President has the legal authority to expand the deferred action for childhood arrivals program and suspend deportations for all undocumented people, he has chosen not to do so thus far. Recent polls show the majority of Americans believe that the government's main focus should include the undocumented, not deport them.

Lourdes Hernandez, a fast participant whose husband has been detained for over a year after being racially profiled by Phoenix PD, says, "Most undocumented families in the United States have already lived through the risks of getting here and the dangers of the work we do. We've lived through days of unplanned hunger and now accept it willingly."    

Anselma Lopez, another fast participant whose son has been detained for almost 3 years, says, "If there is not room for us, mothers who miss our sons, at the center of this conversation, than we hope our empty stomachs change that conversation. Our sons' imprisonment hasn't been enough to get them to act. We hope our hunger strike will. If not, what happens to us will be on their hands."   

Hunger Striker bios available at http://puenteaz.org/fasting-for-families/hunger-striker-bios

Hunger Striker Bios

Lourdes Hernandez was on her way home from a evening Christmas party with her husband and three children when they were stopped by the police. Her husband, J Cruz, was wrongfully arrested for a DUI, without so much as a breathalizer test, an act of racist injustice that her daughters witnessed and have not forgotten. Lourdes and her two eldest daughters have done everything they can to defend J Cruz and bring him home: working extra hours to pay hundreds of dollars for lawyers, speaking out against the wrongful arrest, going door-to-door in their neighborhood for petitions to ICE. Seeing her 19 year old daughter working 80-hours a week and fearing that her youngest son will grow up without a father, Lourdes has now decided to fast for 14 days to bring her husband home. Lourdes explains, “My husband has been in detention for over 13 months. My children suffer every day that they are apart from him. My family is not complete without him, I need him home now. I am fasting so that everyone knows that I will put my body on the line to keep my family together.”

Maru Martinez is fasting for her  “big bear”, her eldest son and best friend, Arturo, was arrested for working, taken to jail, and threatened with deportation. She couldn’t sleep and after a few days, told her husband she thought she wouldn’t make it, thinking of taking her life. Coming to the Puente Movement, Maru has found hope, standing side-by-side other mothers in struggle fighting to bring home their children. Maru took her petition to the County Prosecutor, declaring that “working is not a crime”. She has made videos and petitions about her son, spoken at rallies not only for her son, but for all mothers to be reunited with their children, and demonstrated outside of ICE on Christmas, mourning a holiday without her son. When Maru goes to visit her son, they joke together, because they fight hard to keep each other’s spirits high, but in truth, Maru cannot accept seeing her son behind bars any longer. For the next two weeks, she will sit in front of ICE, hungry for justice, hungry to see her family reunited again. “We have to fight”, she says, “we will only win by taking the risk”.

Hermina Gallego and her family, including her daughter Rosy and her sister Margarita, left Mesa for Mexico when Hermina’s father was given one month to live. Hermina couldn’t abandon her father on his death bed. But in Mexico, the family faced violence and persecution, the reason they left in the first place. Returning across the border, Rosy and Margarita were detained. Rosy, a 20-year old DREAMer, is now in Eloy Detention Center, where lawyers say she could be for years. Hermina can’t wait that long. Rosy hasn’t even had the opportunity to finish high school, disrupted by her father’s death. The family has been through too much already, and Hermina is ready to take a daring move to defend her daughter’s life. Hermina explains, “I’m fasting for my daughter because she has been in detention for over 5 months. My daughter is sick and she is not getting the proper treatment she needs. I am fasting because every day that my daughter is in detention is a day that her health is in danger, if I don’t do anything she can die.”

Alejandra Sanchez has been living in Arizona for 13 years. She is a mother of 5 children, 4 of them DREAMERS and one a United States Citizen. Alejandra is a DREAM Mom in Arizona which is a national organization dedicated on organizing undocumented mothers and families. Alejandra  has actively been organizing undocumented mothers and supporting the organizing efforts of her children for the last 3 years. Sanchez is a representative of the national DREAMERS Mothers.  Alejandra and her husband were stopped and arrested in by Border Patrol last month where they exercised their rights and were released within 8 hours. Alejandra has chosen to participate in the hunger strike because she is representing all the mothers who have children in detention centers and are too afraid to come out and fight for their freedom.

Anselma Lopez has been fighting to bring her son, Elder Gomez-Lopez, home from detention since he was picked up near the border two and a half years ago. Elder, the father of two young children, has several serious health conditions that are rapidly deteriorating and he is being denied appropriate medical care while in detention.  In 2000, he was shot in the stomach by gang members while living in Guatemala, leaving him with a colostomy bag.  He has severe and ongoing health issues, including gastritis, ulcers, and a stomach infection, all of which leave him unable to swallow solid food.  Anselma’s fight has been a dramatic and seemingly endless struggle to save her son’s life and ensure that her grandchildren have a father. Anselma has filed applications for asylum, plead for help from the Guatemalan consulate, told her son’s story, marched and protested and gathered thousands of signatures on her son’s petition over the last year and a half. Yet, Anselma still doesn’t know if she will ever see her son outside of detention again, knowing that he will be killed if he is deported to Guatemala. She is tired of seeing her son slowly die in detention without medical treatment, and is willing to risk her life to save her son. “Elder has been in detention for almost 3 years, I am fasting to bring him home. He should not spend another year in detention, his children and family need him home.”

Jose Valdez already lost one son when he was deported to Mexico and killed upon return. Now, Jose is afraid for the life of his youngest son, Jaime Arturo Valdez Reyes. For over a year, Jose has been struggling to bring his son home from detention after he was arrested for a DUI charge. Jose, his wife, and his brother have been marching, protesting, gathering signatures, and supporting other families, but ICE still won’t let Jaime return to their home. Jose’s wife is beside herself with the grief of losing one son and fearing the loss of another, “Do you understand what it’s like for a mother to lose her son? I go to work, I’m thinking about Jaime; I come home work, I’m thinking about Jaime.” Twice a month, Jose and his brother, Luis, visit Jaime in detention, and often worry when they notice his weight dropping and his energy slipping.  Jose says, “I am fasting for my son who is in detention. I am also fasting for the other men and women who sit in detention everyday awaiting to return to their families.”

Jovana Renteria is the legal director for the Puente Movement. Jovana has been a staff of Puente for over 5 years and has been committed to helping reunite families. Jovana is going to fast for 14 days because she has witnessed the suffering that families and detainees endure due to the broken immigration system. As an ally, Jovana believes that she must fast with the families to show her support and let the families know that they are not alone and to reaffirm that the community stands with them.

Support PUENTE Hunger Strike for NOT ONE MORE DEPORTATION!

PUENTE means bridge in Spanish, which is what these folks build - bridges to help eachother be more empowered and liberated. They've done amazing work recently helping community members get released from detention, stopping deportations, and publicizing the injustices of immigration raids, laws, and prosecutorial practices, particularly in Maricopa County.They have taken on the prison industrial complex most impressively, even locking themselves down in front of busses and to the gates of a detention center. Responding to the concrete needs of families, too, they did a fundraiser and purchased a van to make sure people can visit their imprisoned loved ones when detained in Florence pending hearings. THe art that comes out of PUENTE is moving and powerful, and they do their own silkscreening.

PUENTE can speak for themselves, though - below is their latest press release. I plan to be there to support them Monday - I hope other readers will turn out as well.  Below is the facebook link for the action.

 from their site:

"PUENTE Arizona is part of the global movement for migrant justice and human rights. As a grassroots community-based group Puente promotes justice, non-violence, interdependence and human dignity. Puente Arizona works to empower the community and build bridges by working collaboratively with various organizations and individuals."

-----from PUENTE (2/14/14)---

español abajo

Sometimes tactics and strategies are planned far in advance, developed and premeditated, other times it comes from a place that cannot be designed. In this case it comes from a mother’s will and community desperation, an expression of suffering and willingness to do anything to keep families together.

Most undocumented families in the United States have already lived through the risks of getting here and the dangers of the work we do. We’ve lived through days of unplanned hunger and now accept it willingly.

Starting on Monday February 17^th on Presidents Day, members of our communities will have our last meal and start a hunger strike, to demand Not One More Deportation. We will be in Front of the Phoenix ICE office 2035 N Central Ave Phoenix to demand the release and halt the unnecessary deportation of our loved ones.  We also wish to expose the most important piece missing from this debate, the human cost caused by the extraction of members from our community.

RSVP on Facebook to stay updated about ways you can support our hunger strike in person and from wherever you are

We’ve watched the debate in public and suffered in private. We have gone to bed with our arms empty, aching for our loved ones, and now it is time to make that suffering known to the world.  Anselma’s son, Elder, has been in immigrant detention for two years and is at the brink of deportation. It was her who in a community meeting said she had nothing else left but to sacrifice herself and her health for her son and to end all the suffering in our communities.

It will be a joint effort from families on the outside and detainees on the inside, detainees who not only risk their health by not eating but the punishment they will receive by guards while on Hunger Strike inside detention.

We have no one but ourselves to look too, this immigration debate continues to be a political game in which both parties are content with the status quo that they take to the polls for elections, cements a permanent underclass and creates a constant flow of profits.

Politicians may tell us to be patient. Advocates may say that our tactics threaten the debate. But if there is not room for us, mothers who miss our sons, at the center of this conversation, than we hope our empty stomachs change that conversation.

As long as we keep our suffering to our kitchen tables and half empty beds, they will keep their policies the way they are.  Our sons’ imprisonment hasn’t been enough to get them to act. We hope our hunger strike will. If not, what happens to us will be on their hands.

Join us, and support the Hunger Strike for Not1More Deportation!

Thank you,

 The Hunger Strikers: Lourdes Hernandez, Hermina Gallego, Anselma Lopez, Jose Valdez, Jovana Renteria, and our loved ones currently in detention

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hay situaciones cunado tácticas y estrategias son planeadas por adelantado, desarrollado y premeditado, en otras situaciones viene de un lugar que no puede ser diseñado. En este caso viene de la voluntad de una madre y la desesperación de nuestra comunidad, es una expresión del sufrimiento y voluntad de hacer lo que sea para mantener nuestras familias juntas.

La mayoría de familias indocumentadas en Estados Unidos ya han vivido los riesgos al venir aquí y el riesgo del trabajo que hacemos. Nosotros hemos vivido por días si hambre no planeada y ahora la aceptamos por nuestra propia voluntad.

A partir del lunes 17 de Febrero  el Día de los Presidentes, miembros de nuestra comunidad van a tener su última comida y comenzar una huelga de hambre, exigiendo Ni Una Más Deportación. Vamos a estar en frente de la oficina de ICE en Phoenix 2035 N Central Ave, para exigir la liberación y parar la deportación innecesaria de nuestros seres queridos. También queremos exponer el pedazo más importante que falta en este debate, el costo humano causado por la extracción de los miembros de nuestra comunidad .

RSVP en Facebook para mantenerse informado acerca de las maneras en que puede apoyar nuestra huelga de hambre en persona y desde donde se encuentre

Hemos visto el debate en público y sufrimos en privado. Hemos ido a la cama con los estómagos vacíos, sufriendo por nuestros seres queridos, y ahora es el momento de hacer que el sufrimiento se conozca por todo el mundo . El hijo de Anselma, Elder, ha estado en detención de inmigración por los últimos dos años y está en el borde de la deportación. Fue ella quien en una reunión de la comunidad dijo que no tenía nada más, sino sacrificarse ella y su salud para su hijo y para poner un fin a todo el sufrimiento en nuestras comunidades.

Será un esfuerzo conjunto de las familias en el exterior y de los detenidos en el interior, los detenidos que no sólo arriesgan su salud al no comer, pero el castigo que van a recibir por los guardias, mientras que participan en la huelga de hambre en detención.

No tenemos a nadie mas que a nosotros mismos en que depender, este debate sobre la inmigración sigue siendo un juego político en el que ambos partidos están satisfechos con las cosas como son, beneficiándolos en las urnas, asegurando una subclase de personas permanente y creando un flujo constante de ganancias.
Los políticos pueden decirnos que seamos pacientes. Los que dicen hablar por nosotros en Washington pueden decir que nuestras tácticas amenazan el debate. Pero si no hay espacio para nosotros, las madres que pierden a nuestros hijos en el centro de esta conversación, entonces esperamos que nuestros estómagos vacíos cambian esta conversación.

Mientras mantenemos nuestro sufrimiento a nuestros hogares y camas medio vacíos, van a mantener sus políticas tal y como son. El encarcelamiento de nuestros hijos no ha sido suficiente para que ellos actúen. Esperamos que nuestra huelga de hambre lo hará. Si no es así, lo que nos sucede estará en sus manos.

Únete a nosotros, y apoya la huelga de hambre para Ni1Mas Deportación!

Gracias,

 Los huelguistas de hambre : Lourdes Hernández, Hermina Gallego, Anselma López, José Valdez, Jovana Rentería, y nuestros seres queridos en detención.

Bill Montgomery, migrant families, and the cruelty of his convictions...

PUENTE's sidewalk this weekend...

You know, people whose crimes were working, supporting their family, and contributing to another person's retirement account have not perpetrated the kind of harm on individuals or the community that we reserve higher felony designations, imprisonment and deportation for, so I don't understand how Montgomery's chosen course of action could possibly NOT be a racist abuse of prosecutorial discretion.

Lets get real: we took this region by brute force -  just as we keep it by inflicting violence against any who might challenge the reign of white supremacy here...By allowing Montgomery to do this unchallenged by all but those who are directly affected, we are permitting the undermining of all of our communities, ripping decent people away from their homes and loved ones for every reason except the pursuit of justice. 

Having massacred and kenneled nearly all the Indigenous people in the first few decades of our own invasion of the deep southwest, Arizona's war on Latinos is all about protecting the "right" of white settlers to continue to assert our dominance over this stolen land and its living creatures as if we were divinely entitled to do what we please with them. That is really at the core of what we still call "justice" in America - especially here -  and it makes me sick.


So, perpetrating racist violence in the name of law and order is what this is really all about, Bill.  I had hoped you'd be above the ego, politics, and defensive posturing alongside the other Good Old Boys here - it's such a shame to find you wallowing in the mud with Arpaio and his mad posse on this one...

Photo: Ivon Matamoros and her baby daughter

Arizona Prosecutions Bar Undocumented From Legalization

 New America Media

 News Report

 Valeria Fernández

 Posted: Mar 14, 2013

PHOENIX--Ivon Matamoros has been packing most of her baby daughter’s clothes and blankets to start a reluctant journey back to Mexico. Matamoros, 24, could be among hundreds of youth who qualify for a deportation reprieve under President Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). But she didn’t apply.

Matamoros didn’t think she would qualify because she has a felony on her record -- for working with false documents as a cashier and buser at a Pei Wei chain restaurant.

An immigration judge told her this was a “crime of moral turpitude” and that she would have to leave. He gave her a date to do so, willingly: March 21.

“The judge said it reflected badly on my character,” said Matamoros. “If I didn’t have that felony, I would have been able to qualify for DACA.”

Groups Denounce Raids, Prosecutions

As discussions ramp up in Congress to come up with a federal comprehensive immigration reform bill, pro-immigrant groups and attorneys in Arizona are denouncing the raids and prosecutions of workers like Matamoros, which could hurt their chances of becoming documented residents.

Most immigration reform proposals exclude people with criminal records; millions of workers currently using false documents to work on the United States could lose out if they get arrested.

Matamoros was among hundreds of unauthorized workers in Maricopa County who ended up in deportation proceedings as a result of business worksite raids carried out by Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Workers in her situation are being charged with multiple counts of identity theft, typically a Class 4 felony, and offered plea bargains to a lower charge, such as “taking the identity of another,” a Class 6 violation.

“Maricopa County is the only county that is doing these raids. They don’t have to do these raids--that is immigration’s job,” said Carlos Garcia, director of Puente, a pro-immigrant and human rights organization in Phoenix.

Puente organized a march this week to protest Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery for prosecuting these cases and charging undocumented workers with felonies that can lead to their deportation.

“Immigration reform starts at home,” Garcia stated. “If we don’t stop Arpaio and Bill Montgomery, the people from the 71 raids are never going to be able to obtain citizenship or any other legal status in the country because of the felonies.”

“Criminalizing the Community”

In February, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) and a group of immigration attorneys denounced Montgomery, alleging that he engages in discrimination for bringing charges against undocumented immigrants and essentially ensuring their deportation.

“This office will not engage in any sort of systematic effort to ensure people are deported from the U. S.,” said Montgomery in response during a press conference.

The county attorney acknowledged that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) provided his prosecutors their customary training on the types of charges that could have an immigration-related consequence for people.

Immigrant rights advocates argue that Montgomery could choose whether or not to offer plea deals that won’t have an immigration-related impact, but claim that he is deciding not to do so.

Montgomery, who has expressed support for SANE (Solution to Federal Immigration Reform), a comprehensive platform developed by the Real Arizona Coalition, said he is simply following the law.

But Garcia countered, “Bill Montgomery is speaking out of both sides of his mouth. On the one side he’s supporting the SANE platform and on the other, he is criminalizing the community. If he’s doing this, he is just as bad as Arpaio.”

Recently, Los Abogados Hispanic Bar Association asked Montgomery to explain what the group calls “unequal treatment” toward undocumented Latino workers.

In a letter to Montgomery, Los Abogados Board President Gaetano Testini wrote, “Over the last year, we have witnessed a marked change in the charges filed, the plea offers made and the negotiations entered into, with respect to this class of noncitizens.” The letter goes on to claim that Montgomery’s office “purposely provides plea offers that guarantee a noncitizen’s deportation from the United States and denies them their day in Immigration Court.”

Targeting Workers, Not Employers

The worksite raids began in 2008, after Arizona passed an employer-sanctions law meant to impose civil penalties on companies that knowingly hire undocumented workers. But Sheriff Arpaio and former County Attorney Andrew Thomas decided to use the new law to crack down on workers using false documents and charge them with identity theft.

Thomas said at the time that this was a strategy to ensure that a criminal record would keep undocumented immigrants from ever becoming U.S. citizens.

When Thomas –who was eventually disbarred in connection to alleged ethic violations--left office to run for the state’s attorney general, the interim county attorney Rick Romney discontinued the prosecutions.

Montgomery, though, began prosecuting people arrested in Arpaio’s sweeps, as soon as he took office, he said, in order to fight identity theft.

Although hundreds of workers were arrested in the 71 Maricopa County worksite raids, only three employers faced civil sanctions for knowingly hiring undocumented workers.

“I have to deal with these cases as I have them,” Montgomery said. “If I started seeking different resolutions just because I wanted to improve relationships with a particular part of the community, that would be the worst example of prosecutorial discretion I can imagine.”

When the raids started five years ago, many immigrant families didn’t know about the legal ramifications of pleading guilty to a Class 6 felony charge.

In some instances, undocumented immigrants who find themselves in deportation proceedings can apply for the cancellation of their removal, if they’ve been in the United States for more than 10 years and have a relative who is a U.S. citizen.

But that isn’t possible if they have a felony charge from working with false documents, explained immigration attorney Dori Zavala.

“When it comes to immigration, they say they don’t qualify because they have this crime of moral turpitude,” said Zavala.

Challenge to Felony Charges
Last year Zavala and her colleague, attorney Delia Salvatierra, decided to take their battle to the criminal justice courts by challenging these felony charges.

Zavala currently represents Miguel Venegas, an embroidery factory worker arrested with a dozen others on Feb. 8. Unlike Matamoros, Venegas now has a chance to fight against the felony charges.

“He is willing to do anything he can, because he’s been living here for 20 years,” said Venegas’ wife, Julia Ojeda, who joined the protest with the Puente group.

Ojeda said her husband was the main breadwinner for her and their three U.S.-born children.

“Sometimes the kids catch me off guard when they ask me when their dad will be released,” she said.

Zavala explained that the conditions in county jails for many of these workers, who have never been in a jail before, and their inability to afford an attorney often deter them from asserting their innocence.

“I took the plea because I couldn’t be in that awful jail anymore,” said Matamoros. “I didn’t know what was going to happen later.”

Several immigration attorneys have told Matamoros that her case is a “lost cause,” she said. She has accepted that she’ll have to go back to Mexico and leave her husband, Luis, behind so that he can support the family.

Matamoros was arrested on March 4, 2011, the day before her wedding was supposed to take place. She was finally able to get married four months later when she was released after paying bail of over $12,000—all of their savings.

Arguing to Stop Deportation
As an attorney, Zavala said immigrants like Matamoros have few options once an immigration judge orders the person’s voluntary removal.

But Zavala argues that ICE should grant people affected by these immigration sweeps a stay of their deportation, considering that the Department of Justice (DOJ) is suing the sheriff for alleged racial profiling involving traffic stops and worksite raids.

In its December 2011 findings, DOJ said the Criminal Employment Squad (CES) from the sheriff’s office “routinely raid businesses in a manner that harms innocent Latino workers.”

DOJ found, “Specifically, CES's deputies typically detain and investigate the immigration status of all employees at a raided worksite, whether or not the employees are listed in the warrant authorizing the raid.”

Zavala argues, “ICE should say any convictions coming from that should be considered differently.”

Matamoros is worried about returning to a country she hasn’t been in for almost a decade.
She worries about the violence in Mexico and about the type of health care her American daughter will get.

She wishes she’d had a chance to continue her education, rather than having to go to work.

If she’d gone to school instead of working, she wouldn’t have been arrested and charged with using false documents -- a felony that prevents her from being eligible for DACA now or any kind of regularization of her status in the future.

“We were just working to get ahead,” she said. “Families are being separated every day because of this.”