In US, undocumented teen suicide sparks conservative backlash

By Paul Canning

The suicide of an undocumented Texan teen has sparked a backlash from American conservatives.

Last month 18-year-old Joaquin Luna Jr killed himself and left notes. His family says he had indicated that he was in despair at the failure of the DREAM Act, which would have offered him a path to becoming an engineer. They say that the notes explain the reasons for his despair.

Luna Jr rang his siblings before he shot himself. He told his half-brother Carlos Mendoza, 29, who lives across the street:

"My road is finished here. I'm going away."

Mendoza ran to him and broke down a bathroom door, but he was too late.

His mother said he told her:

"I'm never going to be the person I wanted to be. I'm never going to fulfill my dreams."

The notes were left in a bible taken by investigators before the family had seen them.

Following the funeral, Rep. Ruben Hinojosa (D-Texas) told Congress that Luna "took his life because he believed that he would never be able to fulfill his dream of becoming an engineer, earning his citizenship and leading a full and prosperous life in America."

Students at the University of Texas produced teeshirts and posters saying “I am Joaquin.” This echoed a famous Chicano-movement poem of the 1960s.

But the Hidalgo County sheriff, Guadalupe Treviño, said that Mr. Luna’s death had been ruled a suicide, but that investigators had not established a motive.

Sheriff Treviño said:

“I’m very disappointed that some folks, and even some of our elected leaders, have exploited and politicized this young man’s ill decision to take his own life, especially when we have found no evidence that points to any particular motive."

“Nobody knows why he did it. Only he knows for sure why he did what he did.”

Americans for Legal Immigration (ALIPAC), called the family's claim on Luna's motivation "a hoax by desperate and unscrupulous illegal immigrant invasion supporters." One ALIPAC administrator 'Jean' wrote of Luna Jr's death:

"The latest pro-amnesty salvo comes in the form of an act of cowardice ... The boy made a bigger mistake when he chose suicide over hard work."

Right-wing website Newsbusters claimed that 'CNN Helps Politicize Tragic Teen 'Dream Act Suicide''.
ALIPAC cited an investigator who told a local news station before they were released to the family that the bible notes did not mention either the DREAM Act or Luna Jr.'s undocumented status. But half-brother Diyer Mendoza says he was told of the letters contents by the investigation in the days after the suicide and says:

"I know he did it because of his legal status. I lived with him; I shared time with him. I know what I know."

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LGBT families not mention in new Obama immigration policy

Image by xtopher1974 via Flickr

Source: Washington Blade

By Chris Johnson

The omission of bi-national same-sex couples from recent guidance from the Obama administration is troubling advocates who fear the omission may mean LGBT families won’t be covered under new immigration policy.

The Department of Homeland Security issued guidance on Thursday to attorneys with U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement detailing which undocumented immigrants could be deemed a low priority and taken out of the deportation pipeline.

The guidance is the result of the announcement from the Obama administration in August that it will conduct a case-by-case review of about 300,000 undocumented immigrants facing possible deportation. Those who have been convicted of crimes or pose a security risk will be a higher priority for deportation, while those who are deemed lower priority will be taken out of the pipeline.

Administration officials have said they’ll weigh a person’s ties and contributions to the community and family relationships in considering which immigrants are low priority, and these criteria would be inclusive of LGBT families.

According to the New York Times, the process for determining which immigrants could be taken out of the deportation pipeline began on Thursday.

But in the guidance spelling out the details for this review, no mention of immigrants who are in same-sex relationships with U.S. citizens is enumerated among the categories of people who are listed as those who could be considered low priority.

Categories that are identified as low priority include immigrants who had enlisted in the armed forces or those who came to the United States under the age of 16 and are pursuing a college degree. Such immigrants would be eligible for citizenship under passage of the DREAM Act.

Other categories deemed low priority are those who older than age 65 and have lived in the country for more than 10 years and those who have been the victim of domestic violence.

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Queer, undocumented and unafraid: US DREAMers

Source: Huffington Post

By Julio Salgado

When the topic of gay rights arises, gay marriage and Don't Ask, Don't Tell are the go-to issues, but for some of us queers in the United States, immigration rights are a top priority.

For two years, undocumented youth have been coming out of the shadows and using their status to empower themselves and bring attention to the Development, Relief and Education for Minors Act, better known as the DREAM Act.

The 10-year-old piece of legislation, which has seen its share of watered-down adjustments, would give undocumented youth who came to the United States at a young age a path to citizenship if they go to college or join the military.

There have been sit-ins, hunger strikes and countless calls to lawmakers to stop the deportations of undocumented students who have been in this country most of their lives. Oddly enough, a movement within this movement has surfaced.

You see, a lot of the young people at the forefront of this movement also happen to be gay.
Not only are these students proud to scream, "Undocumented and unafraid," but some have challenged the status quo even further by coming out as queer, undocumented and unafraid.

From 2010's Trail of Dreams, where three undocumented youth and a legal U.S. resident walked from Miami, Fla. to Washington, D.C., to the first-ever civil disobedience at the Tucson, Ariz. office of Sen. John McCain, undocumented gay activists have been key movers and shakers in actions that aim to bring attention to the DREAM Act.

At times, they risk death and deportation.

This was the case when Mohammad Abdollahi, who, along with undocumented students Yahaira Carrillo, Tania Unzueta, Lizbeth Mateo and legal U.S. resident Raul Alcaraz, participated in the Tucson action.

Abdollahi, an undocumented gay student from Iran, risked deportation to a country where homosexuality is punished with death. Undocumented queer activists Carrillo and Unzueta sat next to Abdollahi, and all three contemplated the possibility of being deported to countries they barely remembered.

Not all students have been openly gay from the beginning. Much like the late civil rights leader Bayard Rustin, some queer undocumented activists were asked to downplay their gay identities for the sake of their role in the movement.

When Felipe Matos and his boyfriend Juan Rodriguez participated in the Trail of Dreams, they had to keep their relationship a secret out of fear of alienating conservative groups supporting their cause.

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Video: LGBT immigrants 'come out' at US Netroots Nation conference

Source: CarlosDCblog



By Paul Canning

At America's annual giant progressive bloggers conference Netroots Nation over last weekend, a pre-conference of LGBT bloggers was told that the voices of LGBT immigrants are missing from their reporting.

Towleroad reported that a panel of queer immigrant activists "offered poignant personal recounts of the struggle they or other undocumented immigrants face in the United States."

Panelists included Tania A. Unzueta (Immigrant Youth Justice League and Association of Latino Men for Action), Reyna Wences (Immigrant Youth Justice League), Juan Rodriguez (Students Working for Equal Rights), and Felipe Matos (Presente.org and Students Working for Equal Rights).

The undocumented migrant Carlos A. Quiroz ('Carlos in DC') posted the above video, of the panelists, and wrote that the event had inspired him to 'come out' as undocumented.

Why telling: I had thought about blogging about my immigration experience for a long time, but fear and timing didn’t allow. One of the things that finally inspired me to do it was the campaign organized by undocumented youth for the Dream Act bill [which would have provided a 'path to citizenship' for those brought to the US as children], which sadly was rejected by the U.S. Senate last year.

Why now: I’m doing this not only because I want to become a productive citizen for this country, but also because this will have a positive impact for many others who are undocumented like myself, and because Immigration Reform should not be put aside even and especially in elections times.

...I cannot live in fear and depression any longer; because I deserve a life of dignity and respect, because I want to face whatever is necessary in order to achieve justice, because I’m unafraid. We can do this.

Here's video of the moment when he says this:

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In US, immigration activists fight deportation policy with social media

Image via CrunchBase

Source: Mashable

By Juan E. Gastelum

Walter Lara’s first tweet back in 2009 started with the words “I’m being deported.” Two years later, he lives in Miami, works legally, has a driver’s license and pays in-state tuition at Miami Dade College.

He is one of a few dozen young, undocumented immigrants who have avoided deportation and are now enjoying the benefits — even if only temporary — of being in the United States legally as a result of campaigns in which social media played a crucial role.

Social media platforms provide the means by which these youths, who call themselves Dreamers, can find each other without travelling or exposing their status. They appeal to supporters nationwide and petition en masse for extensions on deportation dates. They help garner the attention of politicians, lawyers and advocacy groups. And they get Dreamers’ stories out into the public sphere when the attention of the mass media is elsewhere.

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America's 2010 immigration news in review

Source: ImmigrationProf Blog

It is time to review the top U.S. immigration news stories for 2010.  Here are my selections.

One of the headlines of a story posted early last January was “Is Enforcement Now, Enforcement Forever Winning?”  In reviewing the blog stories for 2010, I fear that the answer to this question is “yes.”  Still, we had some good immigration news.  

 1.     ARIZONA'S SB 1070:  The Arizona legislature, Governor Jan Brewer signs into law, and a district court strikes down (in large part) Arizona’s SB 1070. This fall, the Ninth Circuit heard oral arguments in the case and a decision is pending.  Arizona's aggressive immigration enforcement law caused a national and international buzz, with Arizona dubbed the "show me your papers state."

2.     CONGRESS FAILS TO PASS THE DREAM ACT:  After years of talk, and weeks of intense lobbying, Congress in December fails to pass the DREAM Act.

3.     CONGRESS FAILS TO PASS CIR:  After years of discussion, the U.S. Congress again fails to pass comprehensive (or any) immigration reform.

 4.     OBAMA DEPORTS MORE THAN ANY U.S. PRESIDENT IN HISTORY:  The Obama administration deported a record number (392,862) of noncitizens for the year, more than any President in U.S. history.
 
 5.     SHERIFF JOE DOES NOT GO:  Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, always controversial and under fire, remains in office despite conducting a reign of terror of Latinos in Arizona.
 
 6.     DEATH ON THE BORDER CONTINUES:   Increased border enforcement results in increased border deaths, with records set (and here).

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Who is behind America's 'grassroots' immigrant backlash?

Image by Campus Progress via Flickr 

Source: Phoenix New Times

By Terry Greene Sterling

On June 5, hundreds rallied at the Wesley Bolin Memorial Plaza in Phoenix in support of SB 1070, the harshest state immigration law in the nation, which had been signed by Governor Jan Brewer six weeks earlier.

The crowd of mostly middle-aged, working-class Anglos waved handmade signs blaring such things as:

"14 Million Jobless Americans; 13 Million Illegals, DO THE MATH, MR. PRESIDENT."

And:

"SB 1070 is not racist!"

It was a hot day. People were sunburned. Some wore American-flag shirts, American-flag baseball caps, or American-flag necklaces. Some carried American flags. They stood in the sun to hear a lineup of speakers deliver the same victory-themed message: Americans are under siege by hordes of illegal invaders who steal their jobs and suck up public benefits . . . and, in this economy, how much more can Americans be expected to endure?

The call-to-arms message: Enough is enough, rise up, get active, donate, vote, stop illegal immigration now — before it's too late.

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US Senate immigration framework includes LGBT binational families

Image by Matt Algren via Flickr

Source: Immigration Equality

A framework for comprehensive immigration reform, authored by Senators Harry Reid (D-NV), Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Robert Menendez (D-NJ), includes a call for an end to discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) binational families. The principles, which are meant to guide Congressional crafting of immigration reform legislation, specifically call for key provisions of the Uniting American Families Act (UAFA) to be part of a future reform bill.

Immigration Equality hailed the inclusion of the language, which would allow LGBT citizens and legal permanent residents to sponsor their foreign national partners for residency in the United States. Under current law, no such sponsorship is available. An estimated 36,000 face imminent separation or exile because of discriminatory immigration policies. UAFA is sponsored in the Senate by Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont, and in the House by Congressman Jerrold Nadler of New York.

“Today’s inclusive framework is an historic step forward for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender binational families,” said Rachel B. Tiven, executive director of Immigration Equality. “Now, it is time to turn these principles into laws. We will fight to ensure that the Uniting American Families Act is an indelible part of the immigration reform bill.”

“The LGBT community is committed to comprehensive immigration reform that includes everyone,” Tiven added. “Our community understands, all too well, the pain of being punished and singled out for who we are. Our solidarity with the larger immigrant community is deep, and our resolve to fix our broken immigration system is real. We will work for a bill that provides a path to citizenship for the undocumented, including those who are LGBT. Time is of the essence for those facing separation or deportation, and Congress must act, urgently, to pass humane, comprehensive reform.”‪

Immigration Equality also applauded the inclusion of the DREAM Act – a path to citizenship for undocumented students – in the principles released today. Earlier this week, DREAM activists who have walked from Florida arrived in the nation’s capital. Two of them, Juan Rodriguez and Felipe Matos, are also a couple, and have faced additional discrimination because of their sexual orientation. The outline also includes important provisions related to family unification, including ending the unconscionable backlogs that so many families face under the current system.

The group expressed dismay, however, over a proposal to implement a de-facto program for National ID Cards. Such a proposal, known as biometric identification, could be particularly troublesome for transgender immigrants, who struggle to get identity documents which match their correct name and gender.

“Immigration Equality,” Tiven concluded, “is working for a bill that protects LGBT immigrants who so desperately need reform. The path forward is about keeping families together and building a system that values our country’s unique and precious history as a nation of immigrants.”

Related articles by Zemanta

• Local City Councils Stand Up for LGBT Binational Families (pinkbananaworld.com)
• Out4Immigration Relentless in Pursuit of UAFA - Updates (lezgetreal.com)

The US immigration reform conundrum

Image by Korean Resource Center 민족학교 via Flickr

Source: The Advocate

By Kerry Eleveld

When thousands of marchers descend on the National Mall this Sunday to rally support for immigration reform, hundreds of them will be representing the LGBT population.

“Immigration Equality has registered 200 marchers and has also learned that an additional 100 LGBT advocates will be coming to D.C. by bus to join us at the march,” Steve Ralls, director of communications for the organization, said Tuesday. “We’re now expecting a contingent of more than 300, standing for LGBT immigrants and families on the National Mall.”

Immigration activists hope to impress upon Congress that they expect to see action taken on immigration reform this year, even as President Barack Obama declined just last week to commit to a time line.

In advance of the March For America, Democratic senator Chuck Schumer of New York and Republican senator Lindsay Graham of South Carolina are expected to unveil a bipartisan immigration bill this week that will serve as the lead piece of legislation on the matter.

For LGBT people, the immigration debate holds two concerns.

First, an estimated 12 million undocumented individuals live in the United States, roughly 600,000 of whom are LGBT (assuming that about 5% of the population is queer). Those individuals would benefit if an immigration bill laid out a path to citizenship, regardless of whether it included a provision for same-sex partners.

Second, an estimated 70,000 lesbian and gay couples in the country include one partner who is an American citizen and one partner who is an immigrant, according to the Williams Institute, a California think tank. While the immigrant partners in some of these couples have visas and green cards, about 36,000 of those couples include one partner who does not have a current option for obtaining residency — they may have temporary tourist visas or temporary professional visas or may be undocumented. Those couples would benefit specifically from the inclusion of the Uniting American Families Act, which would allow U.S. citizens and green card holders to sponsor their same-sex partners for residency.

But whether UAFA will make it into the Schumer-Graham (pictured) bill is an open question, as are a multitude of other considerations.

Schumer has a sizable LGBT constituency in New York and has traditionally maintained a strong record on LGBT rights. He also stated his full support for UAFA at last year’s hearing on the bill in the Senate Judiciary Committee.

“For those who question the morality of permitting same-sex partners to obtain immigration benefits, I believe we should value the sanctity of preserving the family structure in whatever form it may take and in providing compassion for all Americans who yearn to live with their family,” Schumer said last June. “This act incorporates the same principles that I believe should govern comprehensive immigration reform.”

But Schumer is also a political pragmatist and must produce a bill that can garner GOP support as well as the approval of a diverse coalition of groups that back reform but disagree on the content of the bill. Schumer's office did not return phone calls for this article.

Just how contentious the inclusion of LGBT families is remains to be seen.
Democratic representative Jared Polis of Colorado has been front and center in the House’s debate over immigration and immediately ticks off a list of considerations that are already provoking heated debate providing a normalization process for the undocumented population, including verification of people through biometrics, augmenting border security.

“Those issues are all more controversial than including same-sex families,” said Polis, who has nonetheless signed on as a cosponsor of the House's comprehensive bill, H.R. 4321, which does not include LGBT families.

Polis stresses that the effort must attract some GOP votes, but he still doesn't see UAFA as a deal breaker. “Many of the Republicans who would be likely to support immigration reform are also Republicans that have a moderate record on LGBT issues,” he said.

He also notes a plus side to incorporating LGBT binational couples. “UAFA absolutely attracts support from lawmakers who have significant gay and lesbian populations,” Polis said.

Indeed, Democratic representative Mike Honda of California has credited the inclusion of LGBT families with attracting extra support for his immigration bill, the Reuniting Families Act. When he first introduced the legislation in the last Congress, he started with just five cosponsors; but when Honda reintroduced the bill in 2009 with a provision for same-sex couples, he racked up 57 original cosponsors.

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Reform Immigration for America hits the iceberg on LGBT-immigration

Image via Wikipedia

Source: change.org - Feb 28

by Prerna Lal

Try convincing a bunch of (mostly) white gay bloggers that they should jump on the bus to immigration reform-ville -- even though said bus is driven and funded by an anti-same-sex marriage equality coalition that is hardly good friends with same-sex binational couples.

It's obviously not about to happen.

This weekend, Four Freedoms Fund funded yet another blogger briefing aimed at mainstream LGBT bloggers, set in the snowpocalypse of New York City. I thought I would have to miss the event due to a pneumonia diagnosis, but weighed down by responsibility and obligation, I decided to brave my friends at TSA, the weather, and the long flight from the t-shirt weather of San Francisco to the ice-winter of the East Coast. I survived; however, I am not sure if the bridge between the LGBT and immigrant communities that queer immigrant youth have worked so hard to build over the last couple years is still standing upright.

Representatives from the Reform Immigration for American (RI4A) campaign obliterated any semblance of unity between the mainstream LGBT community and the movement for immigration reform yesterday, dealing a major setback to themselves. They might as well have shot themselves in the foot.

For the purpose of damage control to immigrant rights, it's important to note that RI4A is an astro-turf, multi-million dollar campaign that does not necessarily represent the diverse voices of immigrant communities, and certainly not the immigrant grassroots. The mainstream white queer bloggers are also far from representative of all queers, and especially not queer people of color. We need to stop pretending that immigrant families do not include queer families and cease ignoring the intersections of these diverse communities, not least for the fact that citizenship is a traditionally violent mutable construct denied to queers, immigrants, and especially queer immigrants.

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US: Growing Calls for Immigration Reform That Leaves No Family Behind

Image via Wikipedia

Source: Huffington post

By Steve Ralls

Congress has promised to begin the process of reforming America's broken immigration system later this year. There is widespread consensus that reform is urgently needed, and a growing insistence among lawmakers that any reform effort must adhere to our nation's long-standing commitment to family unification. Under current immigration law, millions of families remain separated because of inexcusable visa backlogs, unnecessary bureaucratic paper trails and discriminatory policies that do not recognize lesbian and gay families for the purposes of equal immigration rights.

For all of those families, time is of the essence. Every day, loved ones are forcibly separated from each other. For too many, the American dream is one that cannot yet be shared with their spouse, sibling or significant other.

This Friday, Congress will hold two briefings which signal the beginning of immigration reform efforts. Those two events -- one focused on family immigration policies and one on the much-needed DREAM Act -- will also be a starting point to ensure that critically important components of reform, like young people and families, aren't left on the Congressional cutting room floor.

So it's no mistake, and welcome news, that Friday's family immigration event will include a voice from the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community, too. And in the days leading up to that event, Members of Congress are speaking out in the press about the need to ensure that LGBT families are not left behind.

Friday's conversation on family immigration issues will include Steve Orner, a gay American citizen whose Indonesian partner was forced to leave the country -- earlier this morning -- because Steve is unable to sponsor him for residency in the United States. Steve and his partner were forced to sell the home they bought together because, under U.S. immigration law, they do not qualify as "family."

That would be news to Steve's 88-year-old father, Allen Orner, who will travel from Connecticut to Washington on Friday to join his son on Capitol Hill and tell Congress how the American immigration system has ripped his extended family apart.

"This has been devastating and very sad for the entire family," Allen recently said. "[Steve and his partner] bring such happiness to every gathering, cheerfulness to every event, as well as concern for anyone who is having problems. They are favorite uncles for the young people in our family. A loving, devoted couple, they bring much joy into our lives."

"Our family needs our missing spouse/son/brother/uncle back at the Thanksgiving table where he belongs," Steve's mother, Doris, added.

An estimated 36,000 LGBT binational families, like Steve's, are either already separated or facing separation soon.

That has led a growing chorus of lawmakers to publicly call for an end to discriminatory immigration policies that impact gay families. In two op-eds published this week in prominent Capitol Hill newspapers, three Members of Congress have called on their colleagues to join them in passing immigration reform legislation that will benefit all families, including LGBT families, too.

In Monday's issue of Roll Call, Congressman Mike Honda (D-CA), the lead sponsor of The Reuniting Families Act in the House of Representatives, wrote that the issue of inclusive reform is one that hits home for families across the country ... and in his home district, where Aung Moe and Vivek Jayanard are waiting for their wives to be able to obtain residency in the U.S. and Judy Rickard is preparing to leave the country in order to remain with her long-time partner, Karin."

Honda writes that "Judy Rickard will permanently leave America this November in an effort to keep her family together. Under U.S. law, she cannot be reunited with her partner, Karin Bogliolo, a UK national. Judy would have preferred to keep working at San Jose State University and sponsor Karin for residency in America, just as married heterosexual couples can. But U.S. law does not allow for that. Judy is taking early retirement from her 27-year employment at San Jose State. Facing reduced pension for the rest of her life, Judy is choosing Europe because our country will not let Judy and Karin live together. The result is a loss for my district and a loss for the university."

"In an effort to safeguard Aung's, Vivek's and Judy's families," Honda writes, "I reintroduced the Reuniting Families Act (H.R. 2709) in Congress to allow all Americans to be reunited with their families. I did so because I know that the more educated, legal and healthy immigrants become, the higher their income, the higher their taxes paid, and the fewer emergency and social services used.

"Furthermore, the more reunited immigrants are, and thus happier, the fewer dollars we lose in remittances to other countries."

"Failure to pass this legislation," the Congressman continues, "means failure to provide American workers with a critical support system. Families do together what they cannot do alone -- start family businesses, create American jobs and contribute more to this country's welfare."

"Failure is simply not feasible," he concludes. "We must seize every opportunity this year to get our economy back on track, and one clear way of doing so is to reunite America's workers with their families. The irony with anti-immigration sentiment, which fears a further recessed economy if liberal legislation passes, is that, in fact, it is more fiscally prudent to pass policy that legalizes, insures, employs, reunites and educates our immigrants."

And in today's issue of The Hill, Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) call on lawmakers to support their bill, The Uniting American Families Act, and include the measure in upcoming immigration reform bills.

"This bill would grant same-sex couples the same immigration benefits -- and responsibilities -- as opposite-sex couples, under the same existing legal framework," they write. "It is cosponsored by 22 senators and 117 members of the House of Representatives and has the support of a diverse coalition of businesses and civil rights organizations, including the NAACP, the American Bar Association and the Anti-Defamation League."

"We must change the law to end the gratuitous cruelty being imposed on Greg, Jaime and the thousands of other couples just like them around the country," the two continue. "We urge Congress to incorporate UAFA into the forthcoming comprehensive immigration reform. No immigration reform we enact can be truly comprehensive unless it also addresses this deprivation of the civil rights of bi-national families. There is no rational reason to continue this discriminatory treatment. It is long past time that Congress did something about it."

Those words are welcome news to Steve Orner's mom, who notes that, "[T]his is not just Steve and Joey's story. It's the story of tens of thousands of others caught in the same situation."

"I hope that when Congress realizes this discrimination is bringing such pain to families like ours," she added, "they will act to remedy the situation."

As Congress begins to debate immigration reform, all of our families -- gay and straight -- can stand together to ensure that none of us are left behind. If we do, Aung Moe and Vivek Jayanard can welcome their wives to the U.S., and Steve Orner can bring his partner back home.

It's a win-win situation that makes countless families' lives immensely better.