Taking a Stand in Alabama

This week Dothan, Alabama based "The 270 View" was proud to join with The Rights Working Group and two hundred and thirty-three religious, labor and civil rights groups to call on the Obama Administration to end immigration reporting partnerships with local police in Arizona, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, Indiana and Utah.

In a letter to Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano, the 233 organizations said the recommendations were intended to “ensure that Department of Homeland Security enforcement operations do not contribute to racial profiling and prolonged detention in Arizona and the other states that have passed recent immigration enforcement laws.” The groups urge that DHS must take concrete steps to ensure that the federal government is not helping police to engage in discriminatory policing. In addition to calling for a termination of these states’ immigration enforcement partnerships, the organizations called on DHS to:

Collect data to determine whether state and local police in the six states are engaged in racial profiling or illegal detentions.

Establish a centralized unit at DHS headquarters to review all immigration enforcement decisions to ensure DHS enforcement does not further racial profiling.

Give specialized instructions to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Support Center on how to respond to inquiries made by local police in the six states to prevent DHS from serving as a conduit for discriminatory policing.

Devote more resources to implementing its prosecutorial discretion policy robustly in the six states.

The 270 View's Dothan, Alabama based founder Bryan L. Holcomb stated "As an organization located in Alabama it was personally very important to me that I participate with these other groups in urging for state laws like Alabama's own HB 56 to be examined. The passage of this Alabama law created a partnership between DHS/ICE and state & local governments and local law enforcement agencies. The vast majority of these local governments and local law enforcement agencies had no input in the passage of this law and did not necessarily wish to indirectly become enforcers of a broken immigration system. Furthermore the very nature of this partnership between states like Alabama and the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement Agency creates an environment under which the potential for the denial of civil rights is very likely for certain minorities who it appears can now be legally discriminated against according to laws like Alabama's current HB 56."

Alabama's current immigration law (HB 56) is regarded by many as the nation's strictest anti-illegal immigration law. Under HB 56 Alabama has created a system under which undocumented immigrants are unable to interact with local and state Alabama government agencies in any way and for any purpose. This has effectively made an entire class of people into “non-persons” in the eyes of the law. For example, under this law if a person who was perceived by law enforcement to "look undocumented" was to call law enforcement for any reason they could be detained against there will until there citizenship was proven. This detainment and denial of basic civil rights could lead to large numbers of American citizens in states like Alabama being detained against there will until local courts or law enforcement decided to release them.

Part 3: Cuéntame, The Huffington Post and the Department Of Homeland Security

This story picks up at the conclusion of part two. Click on these links for part one or part two of this series.

A while after I had been unsuccessful in attempting to get the Federal Bureau of Investigations Atlanta office to look into the very questionable circumstances around the death of Roberto Medina, I was contacted about being interviewed by one of Robert Greenwald's Brave New Foundation's media campaigns. This interview was for the Cuéntame "Immigrants For Sale" video documentary series.

During this interview I was asked about the death of Roberto Medina while he was being detained at the private for-profit Corrections Corporation of America run detention center in Lumpkin, Georgia. Investigating the many still unanswered questions around his death was part of the documentary series Cuéntame went on to produce (the actual video is posted above). The founder of Cuéntame, Axel W. Caballero, also wrote about Mr. Medina's death and the Cuéntame produced video documentary that I was interviewed in for the Huffington Post.

At the time I did not understand the significance of having my name and story in part told on the Huffington Post. Later I would read a Reuters news service article by Mark Hosenbell that detailed how the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was regularly monitoring news organizations, social media, video & photo sharing sites and Internet forum sites to "collect information used in providing situational awareness and establishing a common operating picture." One of the websites specifically mentioned and confirmed by the United States government as being monitored was the Huffington Post. Other sites that the Department of Homeland Security listed as monitoring specifically covered immigration and the need for immigration reform. The report also states that secondary websites they found and went on to monitor from listed sites were not listed. A website like "The 270 View" would seem to fall into that category pretty easily as it could be considered as having been linked to a listed and confirmed government monitored site (The Huffington Post) and also covers information (immigration reform) that we now know that the United States government is monitoring.

In the next part of this series I will get into the actual investigation of myself and this blog by the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agency which is part of the Department of Homeland Security.

The United States Government Is Still Monitoring Those Who Stand Against Civil Rights Abuses

As we get ready to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr's birthday it is very disturbing and ironic to note that Reuters news service has just reported on how the United States government is currently engaged in a "Social Networking/Media Capability program." This program monitors blogs, forums and social networks. According to the Reuters story this has been going on for at least the past 18 months. Some of the blogs being monitored wrote about civil rights issues such as my own blogs detailed postings on the long overdue need for immigration and detention reform.

Many of you are probably aware that Martin Luther King Jr. himself was also investigated by the United States government. The government engaged in serious attempts to discredit Martin Luther King Jr. in response to the progress he was making towards African-American civil rights in this country as well as his speaking out against the Vietnam War. Now I'm not trying to imply that the work of any of these bloggers or news media outlets came even remotely close to the very important and huge contributions that Martin Luther King made to civil rights. I'm just trying to say that all these years later are government still apparently feels the need to investigate and monitor groups that challenge or report on issues like civil rights abuses.

Later today or tomorrow I will write about the Department of Homeland Security investigation into myself that I believe was part of this newly discovered monitoring program. I will also be sharing with you how I believe I came to the attention of this program.

The actual Reuters news story referenced above can be found here.