New York Times

Videos reveal Sotomayor’s positions on Affirmative Action and other issues

Judge Sonia Sotomayor once described herself as “a product of affirmative action” who was admitted to two Ivy League schools despite scoring lower on standardized tests than many classmates, which she attributed to “cultural biases” that are “built into testing.”

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below reposted from February

February 5, 2009
The pre -287 g “surge” is over in Gwinnett County. More than 900 illegal aliens found in county jail in just 26 days…ENFORCEMENT WORKS
Posted by D.A. King at 9:05 pm [Email the author] [Print This Article] [Email This Article] Edit this article
THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR HELP! WE ARE ALMOST THERE IN GWINNETT!

Keep the calls and letters going in – I will have to wait until tomorrow to call the Sheriff Conway and to e-mail him my thanks. I am off to do my HAPPY DANCE!

NEWS!

Below from the AJC!

More than 900 Gwinnett inmates to be deported

More than half had a previous criminal history

By ANDRIA SIMMONS

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Thursday, February 05, 2009

Federal immigration officials flagged for deportation 915 foreign-born inmates at the Gwinnett County jail during a 26-day surge that ended on Thursday.

Of the inmates identified as being in the country illegally, 489 had a previous criminal history, said Gwinnett County Sheriff Butch Conway.

Officials from the Gwinnett County Sheriff’s Department and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced the results during a joint press conference Thursday at the conclusion of a targeted enforcement effort that began Jan. 12.

Federal immigration officials worked in 15-person teams from 6 a.m. to midnight during that time frame to interview all the inmates and determine their immigration status. The inmates were charged with a range of offenses including murder, armed robbery, kidnapping, theft, traffic violations, and probation violation, said Larry Orton, assistant field officer director for the ICE Criminal Alien Program in Atlanta.

Gwinnett County is still waiting to hear whether it will be accepted into a federal program called 287(g) that would allow local jailers to begin deportation paperwork on criminal aliens, said Conway.

“I would like to see a program like this 24/7 at the Gwinnett County jail,” Conway said. “Gwinnett County is safer today because of this operation and the work these ICE agents did.”

Cobb, Whitfield and Hall counties and the Georgia State Patrol already participate in the 287(g) program.

Opponents say it would increase the likelihood of racial profiling and create distrust between law enforcement and immigrant communities.

Rev. Tracy Blagec, a spokesperson for Atlantans Building Leadership for Empowerment (ABLE), said she suspects many of the undocumented aliens in the Gwinnett jail committed only traffic violations.

“This is local enforcement trying to enforce something that should be corrected at the national level,” Blagec said.

She instead advocates federal measures that would speed the path to citizenship, allow more work visas and permit immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses. (NOTE FROM D.A. -IMMIGRANTS HAVE NO PROBLEM GETTING A GEORGIA DRIVERS LICESNSE – AND THEY DO NOT REQUIRE AMNESTY)

BY THE NUMBERS

Inmates flagged for deportation were charged with the following offenses:

Murder 13

Armed robbery 28

Kidnapping 11

Battery 15

Felony theft 34

Felony drug offense 154

Theft of motor vehicle 7

City or county ordinance violation 37

DUI 48

No driver’s license 226

Other felony 45

Misdemeanor probation violation 55

Felony probation violation 42

Rape 15

Child molestation 23

Aggravated assault 38

Family violence battery 12

Misdemeanor theft 30

Burglary 17

Obstruction 9

Hit and run 6

Homicide by vehicle 1

Other traffic 11

Other misdemeanor 37

Note: for inmates with multiple charges, only the most serious offense is listed.

Source: Gwinnett County Sheriff’s Department.

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Athens Banner Herald ( Georgia)

Forum: Time to pick sides on illegal immigration
By D.A. King Link to original column and comments HERE

Former Mexican president Vicente Fox unabashedly advanced his “new vision for North American prosperity” at a recent Kennesaw State University event along with Robert Pastor, author of the 2001 book “Toward a North American Community.”

Readers who have not yet heard they should adopt a “North American identity” may be surprised to learn of Fox’s proposals that we officially eliminate American borders and wave the white flag of surrender over the nation passed on to us.

Also, the United States should repeat the 1986 legalization program for the millions of aliens currently here illegally who didn’t wait for the officially borderless continent, insists the man who was president as millions of his countrymen fled the corruption and grinding poverty of Mexico for “El Norte.” More than 10 percent of Mexican-born people now live in the United States.

A little background:

As he has many times, in a 2000 interview on ABC’s “This Week,” then Mexican president-elect Vicente Fox hopefully predicted that by 2010, people would move freely across the border between Mexico and the United States.

His cure for illegal immigration from Mexico? Eliminate American immigration laws. End that old-fashioned American sovereignty and eventually “integrate” the nations of “North America.” Defined, defended borders are selfish and Americans live far too well.

“Is the dream of prosperity just for Americans or can it be shared with the rest of us?” Fox asks while he relentlessly pushes for the expansion of the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement to include people.

At the sparsely attended KSU event last month, Fox promised that without borders “the dreams of our founding fathers will be fulfilled with freedom and better distribution of the wealth.”

This longtime American is not the first to note Lenin and Marx were not our founding fathers.

In his autobiographical 2007 book “Revolution of Hope,” Fox boasts, “I proposed a ‘NAFTA Plus’ plan to President Bush and Canada’s Prime Minister Jean Chretien to move us toward a single continental economic union, modeled on the European example.”

For Americans, it would be alarming enough if Fox were a singular voice in the privileged and oh-so enlightened “post-American” ruling class.

He isn’t.

After Fox and George W. Bush were sworn in, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution ran an editorial accurately noting that “though neither Fox nor President Bush expects to dissolve the 2,000-mile border overnight, the Mexican leader clearly prefers sooner rather than later.”

The Atlanta newspaper went on to accurately announce that “Mexican President Vicente Fox envisions a North American economic alliance that will make the border between the United States and Mexico as unrestricted as the one between Tennessee and Georgia.”

Other editorial pages – including The Wall Street Journal’s – joined in endorsing the concept. The AJC recommended that “the ultimate goal of any White House policy ought to be a North American economic and political alliance similar in scope and ambition to the European Union.”

Fox is president no more, and Bush failed in his repeated attempts to legalize the illegal aliens who escaped U.S. Border Patrol agents.

The open-borders, amnesty-again agenda lives on, however. Under enormous pressure from Mexico and a coalition of big business and the corporate-funded ethnic lobby – and against huge resistance from the American people – President Obama has promised to push his own legalization legislation.

Allowing millions of illegal aliens into our country with an amnesty every 20 years or so is merely official open borders in slow motion. The rule of law upon which our nation was founded? Disposable, dated and inconvenient.

On the issues of “migration,” open borders and legalization, we all should be asking how large a population we want in what is now the United States, and remember that under the current interpretation of our Constitution, most people born on our soil are awarded the title, rights and benefits of “American citizen.”

Amnesty-again and a borderless North America would make the term – and the concept of sovereignty and republic – meaningless.

We all should pick a side.

• D.A. King of Marietta is president of the Georgia-based Dustin Inman Society, which is opposed to legalization for illegal aliens and open borders. The society’s Web site is www.TheDustinInmanSociety.org.

Originally published in the Athens Banner-Herald on Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Arizona Republic — Phoenix

Arizona cops may stop accepting Mickey Mouse Mexican IDs

A recent legal review revealed a Mexican identification card issued to more than 231,000 people in the Valley fails to meet Arizona traffic law, leaving some [illegal alien…. criminal] motorists subject to arrest during routine stops. — While the Mexican government billed the matricula consular card as a secure document for U.S. transplants, police agencies said the card is invalid…

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ReporterNews.com — Abilene, Texas

Man picked up by immigration 14 times

The resident of San Luis Potosi, Mexico has been picked up by U.S. Immigration and Department of Homeland Security thirteen times. — A Sunday stop by Senior Border Patrol Agent John Kinney III brought that total to 14, a number one official said isn’t unusual at all…

HERE

Reuters

U.S. private sector axes 532,000 jobs in May

U.S. private employers chopped more than half a million jobs in May, signaling job conditions remain tough and dashing some hopes the economy was not deteriorating as rapidly as thought, a report on Wednesday showed. — U.S. companies axed 532,000 jobs last month…

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From www.NumbersUSA.com Attrition through Enforcement

Mexican Central Bank Reports a Drop in Remittances
Thursday, June 4, 2009

The Mexican Central Bank reported an 18.7% drop in April in money sent from Mexicans working in the United States. The large drop is compared to remittances from a year ago, and the bank reports that it’s the largest single month drop since they began tracking the transfers.

Remittances have been dropping sharply since 2007, correlating with the U.S. recession and the end to the construction boom. Over the first four months of 2009, remittances overall have fallen by 8.7%. Roughly $1.8 billion was transferred from the United States to Mexico in April.

Economists said that several other factors are contributing to the drop in remittances. Fewer Mexicans are illegally crossing the border because of better enforcement and the lack of jobs. Also, those that are in the country aren’t working as much or are working for less. Another reason cited is that illegal aliens are paying taxes anticipating an amnesty.

“We are seeing the aggravation of all these trends,” Economist Eliseo Díaz González said. “With opportunities for employment in the United States shutting off, we cannot continue to export labor to the United States anymore. The prize for migrating no longer exists.”

For more on this story, see the New York Times.

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AP – Newsmax.com

Obama Reverses Bush Rule: Illegals Now Get Lawyers

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration has reversed a rule issued in the last days of the Bush administration that said immigrants facing deportation do not have an automatic right to an effective lawyer.

Attorney General Eric Holder says he is vacating the order, issued by predecessor Michael Mukasey, and instructing the Justice Department to study whether a new rule is needed.

Mukasey had issued a 33-page decision in January saying the Constitution does not entitle someone facing deportation to have a case reopened based upon shoddy work by a lawyer. Mukasey said the Justice Department does have the discretion to reopen such cases if it wishes to do so.

Immigrant rights groups had criticized the Mukasey decision.

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WABE – FM Atlanta

Renewed push for immigration reform
Charles Edwards

ATLANTA, GA
(2009-06-01) Next week, President Obama talks about immigration reform. Today, groups in Atlanta and across the country defined what it means to them.

WABE’s Charles Edwards reports
The national group, Reform Immigration for America, includes the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials. GALEO President Jerry Gonzales says doing something is better than nothing.

GONZALES: “If we don’t have a solution, essentially that’s a defacto amnesty and we want to make sure we move away from that situation to a workable, enforceable solution that keeps families together.”

Gonzales admits there are more than 10 million illegal immigrants in America. But he argues it should not take foreigners more than 10 years to immigrate legally. But opponents like D.A. King, who heads the Dustin Inman Society, don’t buy into such efforts.

KING: “Comprehensive immigration reform is code for amnesty again. It’s amnesty in ’86. It’s amnesty today. It’s amnesty tomorrow. It’s amnesty forever. The final goal is open borders.”

As for 1986, King is referring to the federal immigration reform act passed that year. King argues that law failed to curb illegal immigration.

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Activists launch immigration reform campaign
Associated Press
Tuesday, June 02, 2009
AOL IM

ATLANTA – Representatives from labor, faith, business and immigrants’ rights groups gathered Monday outside the Capitol to launch the Georgia arm of the national Reform Immigration FOR America campaign.

The Atlanta launch, attended by about 25 local activists, was one of more than 30 planned in 20 states Monday. The campaign is being launched nationally with a news conference Wednesday in Washington, the kickoff of a three-day summit expected to bring together 700 grass-roots advocates from 35 states.

“Our immigration system is broken and we need a practical, workable solution in order for us to move forward as a nation,” said Jerry Gonzalez, executive director of the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials, which is leading Georgia’s effort.

The campaign seeks comprehensive immigration reform that promotes economic opportunity and offers long-term solutions. Part of that, organizers say, is a path to citizenship for the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants already in this country.

Anti-illegal immigration activist D.A. King held a news conference at the Capitol right before the campaign’s Georgia launch. He urged stricter enforcement of immigration laws and argued for the deportation of all illegal immigrants.

“People coming into this country illegally understand that they are committing a crime and that if they get caught they will be deported,” he said. “For America, we must secure our borders. For America, we must enforce our immigration laws.”

Immigration is a hot-button issue in Georgia, which has seen its immigrant population grow rapidly in recent years and has some of the country’s strictest laws regarding illegal immigrants.

The campaign for immigration reform comes just before President Barack Obama’s scheduled bipartisan meeting on the issue June 8 with members of Congress.

“This is for us to start rallying and for us to start getting the debate going in local cities and communities before members of Congress from both parties start meeting next week to discuss immigration reform,” said state Rep. Pedro Marin, a Duluth Democrat who is one of few Hispanic state legislators.

The political climate has changed since Obama became president and Democrats took over control of both chambers of Congress, said Shuya Ohno, spokesman for the Washingon, D.C.-based advocacy group National Immigration Forum.

For that reason, he said, he’s more optimistic about success than in 2006 and 2007 when a bipartisan group in Congress tried to push through legislation that would have given illegal immigrants a path to citizenship.

“This time we’re united behind some common policy principles,” Ohno said. “This took a long time to build, but now the unity’s there.”

HERE