Raids in Loveland

On July , 2008 ICE raided a concrete plant in Loveland Colorado and arrested 18 people. Those detained are being held in various different detention centers from Park County to Teller to Aurora.

It remains to be seen whether Immigration, Control and Enforcement will be pursuing criminal charges for "identity theft" or simply trying to bully people into signing their own deportation forms.

Some workers are being allowed to bond out. The families of those who could bond out have now spent all they have to bond the workers out. The workers cannot work while out on bond. Many of the families are without money to pay rent for August.

If you want to help, please send checks to:
Fuerza Latina Relief Fund
c/o First National BankP.O. Box 578
Fort Collins, CO 80522

These types of "enforcement" actions are meant to terrorize workers and their families. Why else would they have called in "air support" from the Border Patrol to arrest 18 people?

The raids do not change our broken system. Raids do not make people leave the United States.

Raids make it easier to exploit us all by making immigrant workers more vulnerable to exploitation and unsafe working conditions, lowering the bar of what is acceptable. Raids make people afraid to demand their labor rights, afraid to be a part of the community, afraid to speak with people they don't know. Raids divide us.

The question is Who do these raids benefit? Who gains from weakened worker's rights? Some of the answer is: consumers who want to buy more stuff for less money. Some of the answer is: those employers who are unscrupulous. A big part of the answer is: multi-national corporations who pit workers from all over the world against one another in a race to the bottom.

More info
Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition
News articles

Court Intrepreter Relates Injustices During Potsville Raids

Erik Camayd-Freixas, Ph.D. has 25 years experience as a court interpreter. He also teaches interpreting ethics. He felt that the injustices perpetrated on Guatemalan and Mexican immigrants during the Potsville immigration raid were so egregious, he had to report them.

Professor Camayd witnessed immigrants coming into court 10 by 10 to be arraigned. They were all, men and women alike, in shackles.

On Democracy Now Professor Camayd-Freixas reported

"here were many (immigrants) in that same predicament. They were basically begging to be deported. And, of course, what made this case unique was that, for the first time, at least in this scale, they were not being deported but actually criminally prosecuted and sent to jail for five months or more. And the fact that they did not have a right to bail and that if they wanted to plead “not guilty” they would have had to wait possibly longer, up to six or eight months in jail without bail waiting for a trial, made this situation very, very difficult to really say that there was justice done in many of these cases."

We have to ask ourselves

• Is this what we mean by justice? Families hungry, workers jailed without proper proceedings
  
• Has the government reflected our values: liberty, equality, justice, pursuit of happiness?
  
• How much longer will we uphold unjust laws?

To read the full report of the Professor's experience click here

May 1st Rally

The May 1st Committee
Convenes a Celebration
of International Labor Day

As immigrant workers we want to recognize and celebrate this day by having a festival to promote unity and tolerance. For this reason we insist on the following to create more unity and tolerance:

• NO to the expansion of the detention center in Aurora

• NO more racial profiling by the police and state Patrol

• NO more Deportations

• YES to documents and a path to citizenship for all

We invite the public to come
SHARE their poems, music and reflections at our open mic
HEAR music and speeches
SEE traditional indigenous dance

Date: Thursday, May 1st

Time: 4:00pm to 7:00pm

Location: Fletcher Plaza, 9898 East Colfax Avenue, Aurora

(Colfax and Elmira, In Front of Martin Luther King)

Flyer from the May 1st Committee

Detention to Expand

Being in the detention business has always been profitable. This has become particularly true for those detaining immigrants. The Geo ICE facility in Aurora will be expanding from 400 beds to 1100 at the end of this year and is projected to generate $30 million in revenue annually. 1

Meanwhile, a recent report issued by the Government Accountability Office states that Immigration officials are not exercising discretion in who they deport. The GAO states that the officials are arresting and deporting far more immigrants whose only offense is being here without documentation than those who have been convicted of crimes. 2,3

More beds won't encourage agents to use greater discretion. It will instead allow them to continue rounding up and separating families.

1 BizJournal
2http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d0867.pdf
3http://www.gao.gov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-08-67

Action:TONIGHT

Fuerza Latina in Fort Collins has organized an amazing vigil and rally tonight at 6:30pm to support human rights such as those of activist Elvira Arellano. If you are interested in carpooling we'll leave at 4:oo pm from the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition's offices. Please contact Gina Millan at 303-893-3500.

Below is a strong op ed in the Fort Collins paper, the Coloradoan, which discusses the need for reform and invites people out to the vigil.

Those facing deportation are people
Kimberly Baker Medina

"Just as they have beaten at my door, they are beating at the door of thousands, forcefully separating children and parents and causing terror and suffering .... I believe in my heart that the people of this nation do not have hate in their hearts, they don't want to destroy our lives, our families and our communities. I accept what God has sent me to accept. But I ask of my community ... to join together with me and ask that we walk together for our dignity. I ask everyone of conscience and good will to join with us... the 12th of September."

These words were written by Elvira Arrellano, from the Chicago church where she sought sanctuary for a year to avoid deportation and separation from her son, a U.S. citizen. When she left the church in August to promote Sept. 12 as a day to speak out against deportations, she was arrested and deported, leaving her son behind.

Elvira's arrest is significant not because it is unusual, but because it is common, even here, in Larimer County. Locally, authorities send about 30 people monthly to Immigration and Customs Enforcement for deportation. Since the beginning of 2006, about 10,000 people in Colorado have been processed for deportation. Every person deported leaves someone behind.

David couldn't get his baby girl to eat after ICE took his wife. His three U.S. citizen children, a 6-month old breastfeeding baby, a 2- and a 5-year old, were crying and looking for their mother, who was deported two days after her arrest, without saying goodbye to her children.

Harriet, an 80-year-old widow, lost her granddaughter and two great-granddaughters when her grandson-in-law was deported and his family accompanied him. Before his deportation, Harriet looked forward to their daily visits. Now, she spends her days alone, missing her girls.

Lisa's husband was turned over to ICE for a broken taillight after living here for 13 years. As Lisa and her 7-year-old son, both U.S. citizens, packed up daddy's things, her son couldn't stop crying. "I don't want my daddy to go to Mexico," he sobbed.

A person is no less human because she or he lacks immigration papers. Deportations destroy children and families and communities. The people deported in our community are your neighbors, co-workers, members of your church and your children's playmates. The majority have committed no crime other than to have no immigration papers. They came here to escape persecution or hunger, or to unite with family. They become part of our communities, our families and our economy.

Current immigration laws do little more than cause suffering and injustice. They don't allow people to enter legally to work or be with family, or legalize their status. We must stop punishing families for dysfunctional laws and devise an immigration system that works for families and for America.

Fuerza Latina, together with families, faith and community organizations, will have a vigil at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday in Old Town Square in honor of Elvira and all families. Please join us.

Kimberly Baker Medina is an immigration attorney and a volunteer with Fuerza Latina. All of the people mentioned above are local residents of whom she has personal knowledge, whose names have been changed for privacy reasons. For more information about the vigil, contact Javier at 297-8951.

Support Elvira Arellano and Continue

Prayer Vigil to Denounce Elvira Arellano’s Deportation and Celebrate Her Courage
She Inspires Us to Continue!

WHEN: Tonight Wednesday, August 22
TIME: 6:00pm
WHERE: Iliff School of Theology
Parking in the Iliff lot on Iliff just West of University Blvd.
(use the intercom to say you’re there for this event to be let in)

We invite you to come to show your solidarity with Elvira Arellano and all of the other families in risk of separation because of our inhumane immigration system!

We will come together to offer prayers and gather strength for the road ahead.

Co-sponsored by the American Friends Service Committee, Coloradans for Immigrant Rights, Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition, HS Power and Light, and Iliff School of Theology among others.

Activist Elvira Arellano Arrested and Deported

Immigration Control and Enforcement arrested Sra. Arellano as she was leaving a speaking event. She had been taking sanctuary in a church since last August with her son. Sra. Arellano decided it was time for her to leave that sanctuary in order to build momentum for a vigil in D.C. which will happen on September 12th.

Her arrest in front of her son and subsequent separation from him make me angry and sad. Elvira Arellano is a truly inspiring leader for human rights. She has risked her family and her livelihood to tell the truth about what it is like to be an immigrant in the United States.

While the anti-immigrant movement celebrates what they believe to be a defeat, I know that this vigil will gain momentum and power because of her sacrifice. I hope that she inspires all of us who are allies to realize how little we risk in the pursuit of justice and to do more.

There is a poll about her case and the plight of undocumented immigrants here. Please consider taking the poll. Write letters to the editor. And stay tuned for details on upcoming actions.

Please call the local Field Office to protest her arrest and deportation
Field Office Director, Denver
4730 Paris Street
Denver, CO 80239
Phone: 303-371-1067 or 5606
Area of Responsibility: Colorado, Wyoming

DHS: Dismantling Human rights and Security

The Department of Homeland Security released new "rules" today. Included within are:

• Expanded ("Delegated") search and seizure
  
• 31,500 new detention beds
• Biometrics at airports
  
• Sharing of all Motor Vehicle records with the federal government, especially photos (Wave to them on your next driver's license)
• The expansion of electronic verification of identification and access to more databases of personal information (REAL ID resuscitated)
• Narrowing of documentation which can be used for employment
  
• Further "cooperation" with local and state police forces
• 75 fifteen person teams to conduct raids
• Expansion of criminal penalties for employers
  
• Expansion of guest worker programs- both temporary and professional, but nothing for family VISAS
• Decreased rights for asylees/refugees (Forced repatriation to countries unwilling to accept returning immigrants)
• Elimination of due process in Voluntary Deportation proceedings
• Data sharing between Social Security and Department of Homeland Security
• Propaganda reports on a regular basis "State of the Border" addresses
  

And for integration they will be putting up a new web tool so immigrants can learn English online.

What do you think of these new rules?

Iris' Story

Tito Meza, my friend & comrade, is the Executive Director of Proyecto Hondureno, and housing & tenants’ rights activist for the Somerville CDC. He wants me to share this letter with you.

-Gabriel Camacho

Open Letter, 8-1-2007

Dear sisters, brothers, and friends of the immigrant community, I place this letter before you with the purpose of informing you regarding the arrest of my niece Iris Yaneth Meza and the resulting separation from her 3 year old daughter Arlette Meza.

As I had already written some of you, Iris was detained while walking on the street in the town of Burke- New York on Saturday July 28th 2007. Iris was looking for allergy medicine at the pharmacy when she was detained. I imagine that in a town of very few immigrants- her indigenous features gave her away.

After being taken into custody, she was asked where she lived, and taken to her apartment. Her apartment was searched and she was arrested along with her three year old daughter. Her daughter was immediately handed over to a DSS social worker and was quickly transferred to a foster mother- unknown to the child or the mother. The social worker notified our family and we were able to quickly mobilize to go to New York.

I am happy to say that Arlette is no longer in DSS custody- as of yesterday, July 31st, she is in our family’s home. Her mother however, continues in detention- awaiting a court date and presumably deportation.

At three years of age, Arlette does not understand what has happened with her mother. She repeats a phrase probably taught to her by her temporary guardians, “Mi mami is gone.” She repeats it frequently. Even though she is very healthy and in the loving care of our family, nobody can substitute the love and care given her by her mother day and night from the moment she was born in to this world. We are unsure of the effect this separation will have on Arlette.

The truth of the matter is that there is a continuation to this flagrant violation of children’s human rights. I can not help but ask myself: How may Arlettes are living trauma of forced separation from their parents? What do we do in the face of this generalized repression against our families? What do we do in the face of this state of terror that our families are being exposed to?

In the process of gaining custody of Arlette we went to visit the jail where her mother was detained. I spoke with my niece in the few minutes they allowed me and she said, “Uncle, please don’t let them take my daughter from me. If they deport me, I want to take her with me- if they let me, I want her to be with me. She has always been with me. She eats everything. She likes tortillas and frijoles. She only has one problem- she is allergic to mosquito bites.”

As the jail rules do not allow for physical contact I was not even able to give her a consoling hug as she cried saying, “Uncle, take care of my baby.”

Despite the fact that we were taking Arlette out of state and that her mother will face deportation, we were denied the request for mother and child to visit. There was an angry exchange between the guards and social workers- who advocated the need for Arelette to see her mother before leaving the state – to no avail. Arlette realized that something was going on and loudly stated, “Mi mami is gone!”

After as if she realized that this is where ICE had her mother detained and that she was near- she threw a huge tantrum- unable to express in words her protest to all the trauma she was being subjected to at her young age of 3 years.

She was taken from her normal world and placed in a world where everything was unfamiliar. She did not know the social workers, she did not know the foster parents who were caring for her, and she did not know us- her uncle and aunt who would assume her custody.

As we started our 5 hour journey from New York to Massachusetts, the pain of leaving my niece Iris Yaneth behind, in a prison, when she had not comitted any crime other than to have indigenous features and the abscence of a green card, was unbearable. We as adults forced back tears and anguish- and can only imagine- how Arlette felt- watching the distance grow as she sat in the car with people she did not know- knowing she was leaving her mother behind in a building with guards.

Brothers and Sisters, my reasons for sharing this letter with you goes beyond the situation affecting my niece. The reality is that like Arlette and Yaneth, there are thousands of our bothers and sisters subjected to this state of terror in the name of a law that is affecting the present, and future of our children and our families.

The United States is part of international treaties for children and human rights. The Unites Nations has passed many resolutions to protect children and human rights. Despite this, the former are the primary violators of children and human rights and the latter have become spectators of the abuses that are committed daily by immigration officials in this country.

It is time to do more! We must make our voices heard. If we continue to be quiet today, tomorrow we will be before the gas chambers, as happened in Germany.

-Tito Meza

Come out to the Vigil Tonight

The Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition is calling us to come out for a vigil tonight. The papers are saying 48 people were arrested in State Patrol round ups today, including a baby. Let's show support for the families who were driving today and those who've been left behind. It's time to decry the erosion of our civil liberties and the boundaries between federal and local police forces.

This is an opportunity to lift our ally voices and use them to speak in solidarity with those detained.

Come out and participate!

When: TONIGHT, August 1, 2007, 8PM

Where: Denver Inner City Parish

1212 Mariposa St.; Denver, CO

CIRC Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition

For Immediate Release: Wednesday, August 1, 2007

Contacts: Chandra Russo, 720-273-2022 Jordan Garcia 303-919-8798

ICE-Deputized State Patrol Terrorizes Immigrant Families
Colorado Advocates Demand Real Solutions,
Not Police-State Tactics

Prayer Vigil in Denver Tonight to Support Affected Families

(Denver, CO) On Tuesday, Colorado State Patrol officers arrested 48 immigrants on I-70 near the Eisenhower Tunnel in a concentrated round-up of immigrant families. The 48 included an infant identified as a U.S. citizen. The Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition (CIRC), a statewide alliance of over 80 organizations working to defend and advance the rights of immigrants, demands an end to law enforcement tactics which terrorize communities and violate civil liberties.

"It just seems as if we have become a police state," says Sister Nancy Crafton of Centro de los Pobres in Avondale, CO. "Our families are terrified. . .terrified. . .to go anywhere, even down the street. We are seeing a complete erosion of due process in this country."

"This round-up by State Patrol raises serious questions about who is being targeted for immigration questioning," adds Danielle Short of the American Friends Service Committee. "Regardless of who has traffic violations, certain races and ethnicities are clearly more vulnerable here."

"It is a sad day to see the state of Colorado using the very limited resources it has to enforce federal immigration laws,"says Eddie Soto of Compañeros in Durango. "Our law-makers in Washington do not have the guts to tackle this issue and use our precious tax-dollars which should be spent on education and health care."

Stop the Raids

We demand that President Bush issue an executive order to end the raids.

Recent History of the Raids
Highlights from the Rally
Today we participated in a protest to end the Immigration Raids. It was a great experience and the 50 of us who were there were louder than a hundred people. The speakers were amazing. Hashim Malik from the Muslim American Society, Reverend Demmer of the Black Ministerial Alliance and Dora Medina of CIRC with Polly Baca from La Rasa as Master of Ceremonies.

While the protest had been planned for some weeks, another raid occurred in Greeley on Monday. The raid was much smaller and targeted, but it was still a raid.

We protested today to end raids that split families and target workers.

Here in Colorado we have experienced many raids and with increasing frequency. Each raid is smaller but seems designed to terrorize the community more.


9/20/2006 Buckley Air Force Base. 195 people are detained in the middle of the day.

12/06/2006 Greeley as part of an ICE action which occurred in six states. Some of the people detained and later deported were US citizens or legal immigrants who could not prove there status on the spot. Unless you carry your birth certificate with you at all times, you do not have acceptable proof of your status either. These raids occurred during the day, albeit early in the morning, at the factories. The employers were not penalized, although they later had to sell the factory in Greeley because they lost so much production because of the raids.

2/22/2007 The next raid occurred in Denver in the middle of the night. It targeted immigrants who worked cleaning restaurants and detained about 16 people. The raids happened at several locations and the names of those being detained were not released. The contractor and the restaurants weren't penalized.

4/17/2007 Then there was a raid in Center, CO at a potato packing plant. This one happened also in the morning. Again the names and locations of those being detained were withheld. Those detained were transported to Denver the next day.

5/24/2007 Pueblo. Raids in the middle of the night at the homes of immigrants. Immigrants report that three or four agents would enter the home and several more would wait outside. Immigrants report that the agents were rude and insulting and that they were not allowed to get dressed before being detained.

6/22-6/24/2007 Dillon. Officials strike in the middle of the day executing warrants at a few locations. They also begin questioning people on the street and detain several people including one from a bus stop and another who was selling ice cream from a cart.

7/10/2007 Greeley... again. Swift plant... again. Two people arrested and this time more quietly.

While the most recent raid appeared to have warrants for the two people arrested, the message is clear. You are not safe on the street, in your home, or at work anytime of day or night.

Even more disturbing is that the major papers in Colorado did not report on the raids in Dillon or Pueblo except to copy and paste the ICE release. The silence around the escalating tactics feeds indifference.

The raids are wrong because they violate human rights, because they do not address any of the underlying issues of immigration,

because they do not change the situation and because their intent is not to resolve the problems of immigration but to intimidate and terrorize people.

For those reasons we demand that President Bush issue an executive order to end the raids.

Dora Medina spoke about the dreams that immigrants bring to this country as well as the poverty and persecution they are escaping. She spoke about the immigrant contributions of hard work and cultural diversity. She challenged those who are anti-immigrant to invest the same energy in the helping the homelessness, the sick, the poor, the elderly and children.

















Hashim Malik spoke about the terror tactics of the raids and the hypocrisy of opposing these tactics in other countries while using them at home. He stated that the reason to oppose the raids is not a legalistic one, but a moral one. That all of us have an obligation to serve and defend those who are weakest among us.
















The Reverend Demmer spoke about the words that we use in the United States. That we have some of the most beautiful words and expressions for democracy, hope and peace. He read the words from the Statue of Liberty.

"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me.
I lift my lamp beside the golden door."

He spoke of the War in Iraq and how we claim to set all people free. He asked the government how it can claim to oppose terror abroad and enact it at home. He asked us if these words from the Statue of Liberty are empty symbols or if we still embody them.





We stayed here for two hours. Speaking, circling and chanting.
Two of my favorites

"No Justice, No Peace"

"What do we need ICE for? Lemonade"