Rev. Dr. William J. Barber Joins "Fast For Families" Immigration Reform Action at National Mall

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE November 12, 2013   For More Information:  Rev. Dr. William J. Barber, II, President, 919-394-8137                      Atty. Jamie Phillips Cole, Public Policy Coordinator, 919-682-4700   For Media Assistance:  Laurel Ashton, Field Secretary, 828-713-3864   Rev. Dr. William J. Barber of North Carolina’s NAACP Forward Together Moral Monday Movement Joins "Fast for Families" Immigration Reform Action at National Mall Rev. Barber Says Both the Constitution and Faith Should Compel Congress to Swiftly Act to Create Fair Pathway to Citizenship for Millions of Aspiring Americans   DURHAM- Renowned scholar and leader, the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber, II, will join hundreds of faith, labor and civil rights leaders on the National Mall today for a time of prayer and fasting for immigration reform. Inspired by scripture and the examples of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Gandhi and Cesar Chavez, participants are fasting to raise awareness about the moral crisis caused by our nation’s broken immigration system. A diverse coalition of members of Congress, immigrant families, labor leaders, civil rights organizations and others are expected to participate.   "The book of Isaiah, Chapter 58, commands us to cry aloud against injustice, and it is in this spirit that I and hundreds of others from across the nation are engaging in prayer and fasting," said Barber. "We aim to bring a prophetic witness to the halls of power, to awaken the consciences of politicians who refuse to act and to send a clear message that Congress must act swiftly to pass an immigration reform bill."   Rev. Dr. Barber, who serves as president of the North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP and its more than 100 branches and chapters, is the leader of North Carolina’s Forward Together Movement. The Forward Together Movement carried out more than 20 "Moral Mondays" protests and civil disobedience actions throughout North Carolina this year in response to a wave of regressive and extreme public policy. Rev. Dr. Barber will join the "Fast for Families" event at 3:00 pm and lead a prayer vigil with fasters at 6:00 pm tonight.   "With 1,100 mothers, fathers and children deported from our country every day, immigration reform is the moral issue of our times," said Barber. "It’s a moral issue when families are torn apart by deportations, forced to live in the shadows and marginalized to second-class status. Every major religious faith demands that we treat the stranger and the immigrant with the same love, respect and decency that we do our own flesh and blood. A nation of immigrants certainly can do no less than this."   Organizers are urging lawmakers to take up immigration reform before the end of the year. They are prepared to fast as long as possible.   "Both our Constitution and our religious faith compels us to action. We will not rest until Congress passes a reform bill that builds a path to citizenship for millions of aspiring Americans."   ###   Founded in 1909, the NAACP is the nation’s oldest and largest civil rights organization. Its members throughout the United States and the world are the premier advocates for civil rights in their communities. The NC Conference of NAACP Branches is 70 years old this year and is made up of over 100 Adult, Youth and College NAACP units across the state, convenes the more the 150 members of the Historic Thousands on Jones Street (HKonJ) Peoples Assembly Coalition, and is the architect of the Moral Monday & Forward Together Movement.

 

 

 

FW: Uranium in Denver … " & "FW: Ohio Action Circle Blog… for Immigration" & "FW: Sensible Immigration Reform" & "FW: From Gwangju to Illinois to Arizona, we rise for justice!" & "FW: Important Ohio calls to action, WH Press release, OCHLA alert …"

FYI to people outside Ohio – Munsup

· FW: Ohio Action Circle Blog… for those interested in Ohio Immigration Issues

· FW: Sensible Immigration Reform

· FW: From Gwangju to Illinois to Arizona, we rise for justice!

· FW: Important Ohio calls to action, WH Press release, OCHLA alert and more …

· FW: fair turnaround Re: Uranium’s Human Toll

From: Staigers, Tina [mailto:Tina.Staigers@ochla.state.oh.us]
Subject: Ohio Action Circle Blog… for those interested in Ohio Immigration Issues

A group of community leaders that are part of the immigration dialogue have begun a blog called the Ohio Action Circle.

Please view it at: http://ohioactioncircle.blogspot.com/

I encourage you to go to the blog and click "follow" – this will help raise the blog higher on google searches, which will also help get the word out that it exists.

Thanks!  

Tina Staigers

Ohio Latino Affairs

Riffe Center – 18th Floor, 77 South High Street, Columbus, OH  43215
tina.staigers@ohio.gov  &   http://ochla.ohio.gov

From: Lane Anderson [mailto:andersonlane47@yahoo.com]
Subject: Sensible Immigration Reform

Letter to the Editor: Sensible Immigration Reform

http://www.noozhawk.com/noozhawk/article/051910_letter_to_the_editor_sensible_immigration_reform/

By Lane Anderson

Mark Cromer’s article makes the point that I and many other U.S. citizens are tired of being labeled “racist” for favoring a real solution to illegal immigration. I am not anti-immigrant or a racist.

After many years of traveling in Santa Barbara and the greater Los Angeles area by boat, bus and bicycle, I am convinced that illegal immigrants are our best citizens. The buses in Santa Barbara, Los Angeles and Orange County are usually majority Hispanic and, I think, majority illegal immigrant (there I go racially profiling, huh?). In most cases, there are more bicyclists who are probably illegal immigrants, and when I ride or walk in school zones, I see more folks that I would give this profile to walking their kids to school.

Since this is the behavior that can give us a future, they are my choice as citizens, but the irony is that if we legalize them, they will no longer be good citizens because they will get cars, get off the bus and bicycles, and drive their kids to school like most of us.

As someone who has worked in maintenance landscaping, restaurants and construction, I also understand that employers have used illegal immigrants to hold wages down in these trades and others. Millions of illegal immigrants hold jobs in these trades, and in meat packing and hotel trades as well. In fact, employers have all but ruined the meat-cutters/butchers union this way.

It is not true that these are jobs U.S. citizens do not want. Have you seen Thom Hartmann on this? It is the frozen wages that U.S. workers don’t want, not the jobs.

Construction framers and laborers make little more than I did 30 years ago in this work because employers can take advantage of illegal immigrants. The plan to allow illegal immigrants to keep the jobs will do little to restore the wages since supply and demand will still have about 12 million immigrants competing for the work.

In addition to having worked in most of the trades most impacted by illegal immigrants, I have spent a lot of time in the their homelands — Mexico, Guatemala and El Salvador. I was an international election observer last year in El Salvador, a country with more than a quarter of its citizens in the United States.

In a meeting with President Barack Obama, Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes replied to Obama’s pledge of immigration reform by asking for restoration of opportunity in El Salvador. He is aware that U.S. trade and aid policies have destroyed that opportunity and that immigration has been destructive to the social fabric of El Salvador, taking its most ambitious citizens, breaking up families and communities, depriving citizens of the right to vote in their homeland elections and leading to gangs because of the broken families.

I continue to think the only reform that will work for U.S., Mexican and Central American workers is reform that rebuilds the small enterprise and farming in the homelands of the immigrants. Obama promised to renegotiate NAFTA. He should do so and include CAFTA and examine foreign aid as well. We should use microloans to assist in this! A microloan equivalent to one visit to the emergency room, the only health-care option they have, would do it.

Lane Anderson, Santa Barbara

From: Hemi Kim [mailto:hkim@nakasec.org]
Subject: From Gwangju to Illinois to Arizona, we rise for justice!

NAKASEC Action Alert!

From the Streets of Gwangju to Illinois to Arizona,
We Rise for Justice

Illinois: Pilgrimage of Hope

In 1980, the people of Gwangju took to the streets to fight for democracy in the face of a US-backed dictatorship in Korea, risking their lives for democracy. 30 years later, we face a different type of oppression in Illinois with the threatened deportation of immigrant families that would separate parents from children, and friends from their loved ones. McHenry County’s Secure Community program would allow local police to enforce immigration law.
Similarly, Arizona state government is planning to profile people for their immigration status. This type of racial profiling is unacceptale and the spirit of Gwangju demands us to stand up to the fight. We need to do something to bring justice for immigrants. Six to seven activists from Chicago’s Korean American Resource & Cultural Center are participating in the 50-person pilgrimage being organized by several community groups. They will walk from Chicago to the Immigration Detention Center in Woodstock IL to call for an end to deportations of law-abiding immigrants and the inhumane separation of families. They preceded their journey with a presentation at the Chicago Freedom School. 

Support these activists as they set off on the pilgrimage to bring hope back to our families, communities, and nation.

What: Kick-Off for the Pilgrimage of Hope
When: Friday, May 21 at 9:30 a.m.
Where: St. Bartholomew’s Church, 4941 W. Patterson Ave., Chicago, IL 60641

For full the three-day schedule, click here

Please contact Young Sun Song at 773.588.9158 or youngsun@chicagokrcc.org for details.

Arizona: National Day of Action Against SB1070

In the wake of the passage of the egregious and deplorable SB 1070, our voice for justice is more important than ever.  SB 1070 is the most far-reaching anti-immigrant legislation the U.S. has seen in years.  It will allow police to stop and question people simply based on "a reasonable suspicion" that they are undocumented, detain individuals for not having proper identification, and criminalize individuals being present with a friend or family member who is undocumented.
With the signing of SB1070 in April, along with HB2281, which proposes to embargo funding for schools that include certain types of ethnic studies in their curriculum, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer is fomenting a climate of hate and intolerance that will have a devastating impact on Arizona residents, particularly immigrants and communities of color. 
Stand with Arizona’s immigrant community to say NO to these discriminatory laws that harm not only immigrants, but our nation as a whole.  A delegation from Los Angeles will be leaving by bus on the morning May 28; if you’re interested in joining, please contact Olivia Park at opark@nakasec.org or 323-937-3703. 

What: March to the Arizona State Capitol
When: Saturday, May 29 at 8:00 a.m.
Starting Point: Indian Street Park
(at E. Indian School Road and N. 3rd Street), Phoenix, AZ

The National Korean American Service & Education Consortium (NAKASEC) was founded as a consortium in 1994 by local community centers to build a national movement for civil rights and social justice. Those organizations include the Korean American Resource & Cultural Center (KRCC) in Chicago, IL and the Korean Resource Center (KRC) in Los Angeles, CA. NAKASEC is a member of APIAVote, Campaign for Community Values, Coalition for Immigrant Equity in Healthcare, Detention Watch Network, Fair Immigration Reform Movement (FIRM), Health Care for America Now, Health Rights Organizing Project, Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, National Coalition of Asian Pacific Americans for Community Development, National Council of Asian Pacific Americans, Reform Immigration FOR America, Rights Working Group, United We DREAM, and the We Are America Alliance.

From: Cavanaugh, Lilleana
Subject: Important Ohio calls to action, WH Press release, OCHLA alert and more …

Links and Excerpts …

As many of you know, the City of Columbus, under the direction of Mayor Coleman issued a ban on city travel to Arizona. Unfortunately, his stance has caused an overwhelming negative response and we, who are supportive of his actions need to call or email TODAY.  

614-645-7671, MAC@columbus.gov  – Best Wishes,   -Jason Paul Riveiro

http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2010/05/19/Columbus-mayor-bans-city-travel-to-Arizona.html?type=rss&cat=&sid=101

City ban on Arizona travel stokes immigration debate

But the decision brought swift calls for retaliation from supporters of the Arizona law, who insist the state is not targeting people based on race or ethnicity but simply reacting to a lack of federal action to enforce existing immigration laws.

Cleveland resolution (attached)

"Cleveland City Council overwhelmingly passed Resolution 675-10 (attached), calling on Congress to pass Comprehensive Immigration Reform and in opposition to the newly passed Arizona legislation.  A number of Council members spoke passionately about the issue, including Matt Zone , Jeffrey Johnson, Mamie Mitchell, Brian Cummins, Kevin Conwell, Joe Cimperman, Dona Brady, and Jay Westbrook.  Voting No:  Zack Reed & Mike Polensek." 

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/05/a_new_poll_says_ohioans_back_i.html

Ohioans back immigration reform, a new poll says: Robert L. Smith’s Global Village

To the surprise of immigrant advocates, Ohioans back sweeping immigration reform and are ready to engage in a debate they know could get ugly.

A poll released this week found that nearly 70 percent of likely Ohio voters would support a plan that brings illegal immigrants out of the shadows and makes them tax-paying citizens.

President Obama declared anew his anxiety about Arizona’s immigration law Wednesday, saying it has the potential to be "discriminatory" and promising that results from a Justice Department review will be made public soon.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-obama-and-president-calder-n-mexico-joint-press-availability

Remarks by President Obama and President Calderón of Mexico at Joint Press Availability

For the sake of our shared prosperity and security, we discussed the need for immigration that is orderly and safe, and we acknowledged that both our countries have responsibilities.  President Calderón is working hard to create jobs so that more Mexicans see a future of opportunity in their country. 

To fix our broken immigration system, I reaffirmed my deep commitment to working with Congress in a bipartisan way to pass comprehensive immigration reform.  And comprehensive reform means accountability for everybody:  government that is accountable for securing the border; businesses being held accountable when they exploit workers; people who break the law by breaching our borders being held accountable by paying taxes and a penalty and getting right with the law before they can earn their citizenship.  We’ve been working hard to get this done.  There’s a strong proposal in the Senate, based on a bipartisan framework, and it can and should move forward.

We also discussed the new law in Arizona, which is a misdirected effort — a misdirected expression of frustration over our broken immigration system, and which has raised concerns in both our countries.  Today, I want every American to know my administration has devoted unprecedented resources in personnel and technology to securing our border.  Illegal immigration is down, not up, and we will continue to do what’s necessary to secure our shared border.

And I want everyone, American and Mexican, to know my administration is taking a very close look at the Arizona law.  We’re examining any implications, especially for civil rights.  Because in the United States of America, no law-abiding person — be they an American citizen, a legal immigrant, or a visitor or tourist from Mexico — should ever be subject to suspicion simply because of what they look like.

o nothing for immigrant families, just provide false security on the border. Sign the petition opposing any immigration bill that doesn’t fix the problem! Take Action

Special Policy Alert:  Bill Prohibiting Workers’ Compensation to Undocumented Immigrations to Be Heard

and possibly voted on as soon as next Wednesday!!!

Senate Bill 238 would prohibit illegal and unauthorized aliens from receiving compensation and benefits under Ohio’s Workers’ Compensation Law. 

The bill is scheduled for a 3rd hearing, AND POSSIBLE COMMITTEE VOTE:

Tuesday, May 25, 2010 4:00 p.m. in the South Hearing Room of the Statehouse, Columbus.

This bill may be voted on by the FULL SENATE as soon next Wednesday!

We need you to:

1) Attend the Hearing
2) Testify
3) Contact your local Senator IMMEDIATELY regarding these bills!!!!!

To find your state Senators go to CLICK HERE (or go to http://www.congress.org/)– they have information on state level Senators (not to be confused with federal level Senators Brown and Voinovich).

---

From: Darla Reynolds-Sparks

Subject: Uranium’s Human Toll

Uranium’s Human Toll: Tragic Reminders of Mining’s Risks

A memorial dedicated to cancer victims last week at an old uranium mill in Monticello, Utah, served as a heartbreaking symbol of the dangers of canyon country’s new uranium boom. Today, nearly 600 of the mining town’s 2,000 residents have cancer. And a half-hour south of there — near Blanding, Utah — uranium from the Arizona 1 mine just north of Grand Canyon National Park is still being milled.

Last fall, the Center for Biological Diversity sued the Department of the Interior for letting the Arizona 1 mine reopen without updating decades-old environmental reviews. (The Interior Department shortcutting environmental reviews for energy corporations . . .  sound familiar?) And last week, while that litigation was pending, the Environmental Protection Agency cited that mine for operating without a radon permit — which Interior could have caught, had it required updated reviews. The Center’s Taylor McKinnon recently spoke to the risks of a new uranium boom and legislative efforts to blunt it on This American Land, an environmental news report now running on PBS stations nationally.  

Watch McKinnon on This American Land and learn more about our campaign against Grand Canyon uranium mining

From: nuspl@cox.net
Subject: fair turnaround Re: Uranium’s Human Toll

Here’s a bigger story. Short summary:

CONCERN OVER RADIATION LEVELS IN DENVER DRINKING WATER

Water providers raise alert over uranium pollution from mine
By Bruce Finley, The Denver Post, 05/20/2010

Uranium in drinking water sent to the city’s household customers increased to 1.2 ppb in April 2010 from 0.9 ppb in January, 2010. Upstream from Denver, in Arvada, reservoir water tested at 7.2 ppb before treatment. Upstream from the reservoir, the latest water-quality tests showed that Ralston Creek below Schwartzwalder mine carried as much as 390 parts per billion of uranium, which is 13 times higher than permissible.  Groundwater at the source — inside the mine — exceeded the standard by 1,000 times.

Colorado’s top water-quality overseer sent a memo May 10 to the mining regulators recommending swift action.
http://www.denverpost.com/ci_15121875

From: BG
Subject: Uranium in Denver, Arvada drinking water

I haven’t been to the link yet.  Just to let you know in case you haven’t seen the Denver Post on this.   Elevated radiation levels in drinking water not a good thing! 
Ideally –to put a kind of justice into that situation–  that drinking water would go only to those who profit from various sordid nuclear activities. 
A good reason for Oklahoma to stay from nuclear power. –which means right now we need to call Gov. Henry (405-521-2342) to veto SB 1668.  
Don’t people see the moral connections between using nuclear power and what happens all through the nuclear cycle, from mining through everlasting radioactive poison?
In Oklahoma, I fear the media  might not even report on contamination of our water….
http://www.denverpost.com/ci_15121875
BG

The Latest from Dr. Boyce on AOL Black Voices: Obama Compared To Sanford And Son, Immigration and More

Brought to you by The Great Gospel Speakers Bureau.  To join the  Your Black World Coalition, please visit YourBlackWorld.com.

Hey peeps,

I am in NYC this week shooting episodes of my AOL show, "Dr. Boyce Watkins on AOL Black Voices."  I admit that I’m a little drained, since I also did some work today on a series I’m doing for ABCNews.com on money and finance. But life is good, so I rarely complain. 

I wanted to let everyone know that I received a call the other day from Sonny Vacarro, a former Nike Executive who is responsible for the creation of the Air Jordan sneaker.  Sonny is backing a massive lawsuit against the NCAA for anti-trust violations and illegal use of athlete’s images on video games.  I want to make it known that I look forward to meeting with Sonny in person, as well as the lawyers involved in this case and I back it 100%.  I explained to Sonny that the NCAA’s recent $10.8 billion dollar TV rights deal further undermines the integrity of college sports by allowing old men to get rich off the sacrifices of young black men and their families.  Worst of all, they are not even being educated.

Our group, The Athlete Liberation and Academic Reform Movement (ALARM) stands behind this lawsuit.  I am sure I sound redundant by now for bringing this issue up on multiple occasions, but I am saddened to see HBCUs fall to the wayside while universities earn billions by unfairly restricting the labor rights of black families and making it illegal for them to negotiate fair contracts the way coaches can.  I spoke with Ben Jealous, National President of the NAACP and The Rev. Al Sharpton about the issue, and I will continue to persuade them to become involved in this fight.  It’s time for this madness to stop.

Be well and stay strong,

Dr. Boyce

www.BoyceWatkins.com

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