WEBVTT

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(inaudible) we need

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pepper and stun grenade
inside the (inaudible).

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[sil.]

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What if there were a law that allowed
the government to jail legal residents

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without bail and throw them out of the country without
the chance for a judge to weigh the facts of the case?

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What if the law also demanded

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that a person fleeing persecution be jailed
while waiting for their case to be processed?

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No one would believe there could be
such a law in the United States -

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a country built by
immigrants - but there is.

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In 1996, the US Congress passed

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sweeping new immigration laws, resulting in the
mandatory detention and deportation of thousands

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of the legal permanent residents
and political asylum seekers.

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We just like a dead person. We don’t know what’s
going on. When they come with this rule today,

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they come with another one tomorrow. They’ve
taken away my husband. They’ve taken away my…

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my children’s parent. It’s
uh… an extremely harsh law.

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I think harsh is actually a little bit
too mild. It’s the most frightening law

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that I’ve seen in 20 years of practice.
The new laws greatly expand

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the type of crimes for its legal
residents must be detained and deported.

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The laws are also retroactive, even
for crimes long since paid for.

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Crimes such as shoplifting, drunk-driving,

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check fraud, those crimes
now carry with them

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very serious ramifications.

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Legal residents and asylum seekers are currently
being held in jail across the United States,

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resulting in a multi-million dollar
industry in the detention of immigrants.

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These are cash cows. Umm… Their…
Their beds would not be filled

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where it not for the INS detainees. These
are serious money makers for them.

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Many politicians have capitalized

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on that feeling that we have to blame
somebody. So you build more prisons

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and you put people away, and if you can’t put them away,
then you’re gonna look at their immigration status

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and get rid of them.

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Xenophobia really is the
invoke racism of the day.

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We can blame what is wrong on the
immigrants instead of blaming ourselves.

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[music]

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On Labor Day weekend in 1998,
the immigration service

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in El Paso, Texas, initiated
Operation Last Call.

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This sweep led to detention and deportation
proceedings for more than 500 legal residents

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who had three or more DWI convictions.

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[music]

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They came in like, uh… it was before 7:00 in the morning, and they
came knocking on the door. I answered the door. And there were like,

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three police… three INS
officers and like, three police

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that I could see.

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And they said that, uh… you know, under the new law that I…
that I was eligible for deportation. So I turned myself in.

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The judge, you know, she talked to me and then she told
me that she didn’t feel right doing that at the time,

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especially with people like me, you know, that has
been living here in the United States for so long.

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But under the new law, you
know, she had to deport me.

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The immigration judge, in the past,
certainly before… before 1996 act,

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had more discretion with regard
to his or her handling of a case.

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Uh… The 1996 Act did remove a lot of that
discretion and… and made… oftentimes

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made removal mandatory in certain cases.
No discretion from the immigration judge.

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If you’re not a citizen of this country, they can
come to your house in the middle of the night,

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even if you’ve lived here all of your life as legal
permanent resident, they can come at 3am or 4am,

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arrest you,

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take you to immigration detention,
and hold you indefinitely

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until the process is complete
of deportation and removal,

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and send you to a country that you
haven’t been to, since you’re an infant.

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I’ve made all my life in here. I’ve been living
almost all my life, since I was five years old.

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You know, so I really don’t have anybody in Mexico.
You know, I don’t know how to start over there.

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So, actually, my family is gonna have to
stay here. And to be honest with you,

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I don’t know how we’re gonna make
it or how they’re gonna make it.

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Many head of households been… have been
deported, and families have lost their homes,

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have lost their cars, uh… have
had to move in with relatives.

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Umm… And a lot of young
children are also suffering.

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Okay, there. My name is Zoila Corral.

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And my husband is being detained in the…

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in the INS facility in El Paso.

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He was driving while intoxicated many
years before the law came in effect.

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We think it’s very unfair that
what happened many times ago

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is now effecting our family.

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Zoila Corral and her two daughters and son
have been seeing the effects of this law

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and also the mandatory detention policy,
because her husband has also been detained

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since January and it’s mid-June, and uh… she’s
not been able to really make much of a living

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with her income alone. The girls
have been Straight-A students,

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and their grades were falling for a while.
Uh… I think she’s a very strong mother.

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And because they see the dad regularly
and he keeps their morale high,

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I think that’s been helpful, but
without that kind of commitment

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to keeping the family together, I think the girls
would be quite psychologically damaged by this event.

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And I think they are already in that, they’ve begin
to see a psychiatrist and the school counselor.

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[non-English narration]

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He made a mistake and I know that.

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If they’ve broke the law, okay,
they punished him already.

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They have been punished and we accepted it.

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We have paid money.
They’ve taken our money.

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They’ve taken time from… from these people.

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And now they’re trying to take them
away from… from their… their families.

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Thousands of legal residents,

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like Zoila’s husband, have been suddenly reclassified
as aggravated felons and are now subjected

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to mandatory deportation.

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Retroactively, the bill says, if you were arrested for these offenses
back then, even though they were not considered that serious at the time,

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you are now, not only deportable, you’re
automatically deported, you have to be deported,

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there were no… no discussion.
Many of the 1996 changes

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to US immigration policy were part of
the anti-crime and anti-terrorism bills

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passed in the wake of the Oklahoma
City and World Trade Center bombings.

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These reforms were made shortly after the passage of
proposition 187 - California’s landmark anti-immigrant law.

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A lot of politicians got elected,

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a while back voicing anti-immigrant sentiments.
I mean, immigrants were the scapegoats.

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I mean, they were blamed for everything - bad economy
- blame the emigrants. You know - a lot of crime -

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blame the emigrants. So the environment was
right for passage of these kinds of laws

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at the expense of lawful permanent residents.
People who’ve lived here for years,

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paid taxes, worked hard, had
families and businesses.

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And I’m here today

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because I’m a fine example
of what’s going on out here.

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I’m about to lose my husband
because of unfair immigration law.

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America was built on immigrants.
Everyone here are immigrants.

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We all come from someplace else. I
am a citizen of the United States.

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And we’re asking your support here today to write
to your congressman or call to your congressman

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to help us to change these laws.

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There is a lot of people that have a lot of
derogatory things to say about immigrants period.

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They think, “We should all go back home”. But I
don’t necessarily consider myself an immigrant.

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I consider myself an American. The only thing that makes me a
German is the fact that I was born on German soil, that’s it.

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I was adopted in Germany
when I was five days old

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by two American citizens. So I’ve
been living here, since 1967.

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I applied for citizenship sometime in 1998.

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I got a letter in the mail from the Immigration and
Naturalization Service. I thought this was a letter

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telling me that I was going to get sworn in as a
citizen. When I opened up the letter and read

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that I was deportable, I thought it was
a joke. I really thought it was a joke.

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I skimmed at the first time and
it… it kind of took me off guard

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and I read it deeper, \"This is not right.

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What is this?\"

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Mary Anne was involved in a situation
back, I believe, on April 1998.

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Her boyfriend had gone out with another
woman. And at a tender age of 22,

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she got a little… little fight. She
pulled the other woman’s hair.

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Mary Anne received the suspended sentence of one year
probation for the incident. Since then, she said,

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\"No further problems with the law.\" When
I told friends and family about this

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that I was deportable because of
this 1988 conviction, they laughed.

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They were like, \"How in the world
can they make a law retroactive?

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How in the world can they deport somebody
who’s lived here for 33 of their 34 years?

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And how can they turn around and not give the judge’s
discretion or no due process, it’s ridiculous.\"

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She came at the age of two as a baby.

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She has gone to school, got a degree. She
got accepted to Georgia State University

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to work in a criminal justice program.
She has no ties to Germany.

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She does not speak the language. She has a child
who is sick. And She has to face the reality

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of permanent expulsion for
something that occurred years ago

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that was not a deportable offense. And
it’s just unimaginable that we have a law

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in… in America today that exists, that
operates like this. I consider myself

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one of the lucky ones, because I’m not
actually being detained. And my heart

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really does reach out to those individuals who have
been detained and they’re seeing the injustice

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in this lot ten times more than I am.

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[sil.]

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They are locking up people who had old crimes and
have served their sentences. They are locking them up

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in criminal facilities and treating them
as criminals when they are no longer

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to be treated as criminals. Regardless
of how much time they served

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or the determination by the State of the
Federal govt… by the state that they had

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uh… paid their debt to society, the law,

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the statute is very clear in the Immigration Reform
Act - \"Mandatory detention for all aggravated felons,

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all aliens convicted of
an aggravated felony.\"

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My name is Joe Velasquez and I
just got out of INS Detention.

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I was detained for a crime
that I committed 20 years ago.

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I couldn’t understand this because this is
something that I had already paid for in the past.

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And I had never gotten in trouble in the
last 20 years. I had no problems whatsoever

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and then all of a sudden, you know, I’m being
detained by… by INS. Over 20 years ago,

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Joe Velasquez was arrested at a party for directing an
undercover officer to a man who would sell him cocaine.

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As part of a plea bargain, Joe
received five years probation.

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In 1998, upon returning from a brief
visit to his ailing mother in Panama,

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Joe was rearrested at New
York International Airport

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and held for four months in a county jail.

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It was so far away. We go and see him and
it’s only during the week, at no weekend.

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And at that time we could spend 15 minutes.
So my son and I, we had a week after,

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we went up, and we seen him the first time

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and that was horrible. You have charcoal at the
legs, you have a chain wrapped around your waist,

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your handcuffs are handcuffed to the chain around
your waist. You’ve got the prison greens on

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and that the families all of a sudden after not
seeing their… their loved ones and then to see them

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under those circumstances, it is just a shock
that. You know, they… then they can’t understand,

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you know, what did he do to deserve this.
When I did see him the first time in court,

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when the woman said to me, \"Okay,
they come, they’re coming in.\"

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And umm… I looked

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and um… I looked at him and… I guess
I looked past and this is the woman

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she’s known there he’s there
and then I looked again,

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and I didn’t even know
him, then I… I lost it.

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All I kept saying is, \"I lived
with this man for 34 years

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and I don’t know him.\"

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Too hard. Every couple of weeks they would make us come
back for the court date. And all you wanted to do is

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just say, \"Listen, can I talk to somebody with
some intelligence?\" With some common sense

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and say, \"Listen, hold on a second. What are you doing here?\"
You know, this was 20 years ago. This didn’t happen last week.

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It wasn’t that… You know, he wasn’t
caught, you know, yesterday.

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You just wanted to talk to somebody who would have enough
brains to say, you know, what, he’s right. This is wrong here.

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There’s something’s wrong here. Because everybody we talk to, whether it
was friend, whether it was family, co-workers, bank patience at work,

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whether it was people that even he talked to while he was
incarcerated, every one of them said the same thing,

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the fact that, \"This is crazy, this is nuts. I can’t believe… You
know, you don’t belong in here. What are you doing in here?\"

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You know, they… They can’t do that. They can’t do
that. He married an American. He has American kids.

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And everyone said the same thing. And so we all said to them, \"They
can’t… They’re doing it.\" They’re doing it. They’re doing it.

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They’re doing it. They’re doing it.

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Joe’s lawyers were able to get him out of jail
in an unprecedented habeas corpus ruling.

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But while he was in INS detention, he lost
his family business, which burned down

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just before his arrest.
That was a… a totally shock

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when the store burned down. All of a sudden,
after 18 years of coming here every day,

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you know, I wake up every morning at 4:30, 5:00
o’clock in the morning, and… and I realize that

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I didn’t have a place to go to.
So our plans were

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to start rebuilding it in January.
Unfortunately, the… uh… since we didn’t know

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what the outcome would be and how long
I was going to be detained by INS,

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you know, we had to do something with it and a family that
had worked with me in the past who had some interest in it

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and they were willing to do what, you know, had to
be done, so we just signed the store over to them.

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Here’s my old bread man.

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There’s the kid that used to work for me,
Chuli(ph). There’re the ones that are

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gonna re-open the store. How’re you doing?
How’re you doing, Chu? All right. We’re going.

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Yeah. I got calls here when Joe’s
case was being tried from people

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in his community, \"How can they do this to him?\"
You know. Hello, Tom. How’re you doing baby?

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Hi, brother. Come on look at her. Fine.

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He was part of that community. So when the word was, would you come to Newark for a hearing,
we could fill up the courtroom. We could have probably filled up two courtrooms if we had

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chartered a bus. Some folks don’t drive.

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The immigration service found it politically
necessary to lock up anybody who might be deported

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because of the commission of a crime, whether or not
they had just been released from jail, whether or not

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they were a danger to the community,
whether or not they were a risk of flight.

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Wow! A lot… A lot of good memories in here, Chu. Yeah. They
feel that the statute says that Attorney General shall deport,

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and that means everybody.

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It’s our position that the new laws do
not require INS to pick these people up,

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because the law says \"Mandatory detention
upon release,\" and these are people

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who were released years and years ago. To be
reaching out in picking up people like this,

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what a waste of taxpayers’ money. I
mean, this makes no sense to me at all.

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I don’t think you wanna law enforcement agency deciding
which laws it will and which laws it won’t enforce.

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The fact is the statute is very clear,
uh… which… which Congress passed

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and the President signed
into… into law in 1996.

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When the Republic came to power at the ‘94 election, they
targeted welfare recipients, immigrants, and racial minorities.

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Essentially, what they wanted was a better class of
immigrants. You know, the Statue of Liberty says

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\"Give me your poor, your tired, your huddled masses.\" Umm…
Essentially, they decided the Statute of Liberty was…

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was… was dead wrong. And that what we needed
was uh… a higher class of immigrants.

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They didn’t want the poor and… and the
huddled masses. They wanted that the rich

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umm… and… and the uh…
technologically sophisticated.

00:18:35.000 --> 00:18:39.999
Over half of all immigrants have few skills and
little education. They often depress wages,

00:18:40.000 --> 00:18:44.999
take jobs away from the most vulnerable among
us and end up living off the taxpayer.

00:18:45.000 --> 00:18:49.999
Admitting so many low skilled
immigrants makes absolutely no sense.

00:18:50.000 --> 00:18:54.999
There is an element in this society that
would like to eliminate immigration period,

00:18:55.000 --> 00:18:59.999
and can’t sell that program to enough votes, but
they can sell the notion of “criminal aliens,”

00:19:00.000 --> 00:19:04.999
whatever that means.

00:19:05.000 --> 00:19:09.999
We have a criminal alien deportation provision that eases the ability
of the United States without an additional hearing to deport a person

00:19:10.000 --> 00:19:14.999
who has completed a prison
term, who is an alien.

00:19:15.000 --> 00:19:19.999
Terrorists are raising money in this country today. They are using
that money to blow up children and innocent people. They hate America

00:19:20.000 --> 00:19:24.999
and all it stands for and they will
hurt us again and again and again.

00:19:25.000 --> 00:19:29.999
Criminal alien deportation improvements allowing for
district court judges to order the deportation of aliens

00:19:30.000 --> 00:19:34.999
convicted of federal crimes, not
just because they’re aliens,

00:19:35.000 --> 00:19:39.999
they are in the slammer for federal crimes, but
at the end of their term, they can get deported

00:19:40.000 --> 00:19:44.999
with expedition rather than go through
another and another and another hearing.

00:19:45.000 --> 00:19:49.999
I think people who didn’t
wanna be “soft on crime,”

00:19:50.000 --> 00:19:54.999
Republican or Democratic, and now we’ve had
some response from some offices that said,

00:19:55.000 --> 00:19:59.999
”I didn’t know that was in the bill. I’m not
in favor that. You voted for a congressman,

00:20:00.000 --> 00:20:04.999
but I didn’t know it was in the bill.” Usually when
politicians said, you know, \"They did it, they’re lying.\"

00:20:05.000 --> 00:20:09.999
But what happened here was the Republicans who run the
immigration committee, particularly Lamar Smith of Texas,

00:20:10.000 --> 00:20:14.999
who just… he’s a congressman, when he got
it very hard going any immigrants in,

00:20:15.000 --> 00:20:19.999
they changed that law in a very unfair way.

00:20:20.000 --> 00:20:24.999
In the judiciary committees (inaudible) Senate, when we voted on
this, we won, those of us who did not want this retroactivity

00:20:25.000 --> 00:20:29.999
and this excessive crisis. And then the bill goes to the
House Senate conference, well they never had a conference.

00:20:30.000 --> 00:20:34.999
The Republican and… The Republican
leaders of the house and the Senate

00:20:35.000 --> 00:20:39.999
on immigration just went off in a room privately and changed
it, and they did something that really violates the rules,

00:20:40.000 --> 00:20:44.999
because the… the language they
put in mandating deportation,

00:20:45.000 --> 00:20:49.999
splitting up families was rejected by both the House and
the Senate committees. They didn’t change it on the floor.

00:20:50.000 --> 00:20:54.999
We could have beaten without the vote. They did that
privately. Now, we knew that and we complained about it,

00:20:55.000 --> 00:20:59.999
but a number of people felt they had a vote for the overall immigration
bill, because it was called the anti-terrorism bill as well,

00:21:00.000 --> 00:21:04.999
and they kind of spooked people. Remember this is Oklahoma
City and all these terrible things have happened.

00:21:05.000 --> 00:21:09.999
So they used the terrorism issue to get people
to vote for uh… for an immigration bill

00:21:10.000 --> 00:21:14.999
that really did… did awful things. And those
awful things have been worked out in secret.

00:21:15.000 --> 00:21:23.000
[music]

00:21:35.000 --> 00:21:39.999
We think the law is working fine. I mean, in the end being
deported is an inconvenience. It’s not the same thing

00:21:40.000 --> 00:21:44.999
as a criminal punishment. You’re sending a
non-citizen back to his or her country of origin

00:21:45.000 --> 00:21:49.999
where they enjoy all the rights and privileges of citizens
in that country. But in the end, it is an inconvenience.

00:21:50.000 --> 00:21:54.999
And to hear some of the squawks about the ‘96 law, you
would think that uh… people are surprised at the idea

00:21:55.000 --> 00:21:59.999
that when a country exercises its right to remove people
that those folks are in some way inconvenienced, they are.

00:22:00.000 --> 00:22:04.999
Dan Stein’s group,

00:22:05.000 --> 00:22:09.999
the Federation for American Immigration Reform, is frequently
called upon by Congress to testify on immigration issues.

00:22:10.000 --> 00:22:14.999
FAIR has been financially linked in
the past with the Pioneer Fund -

00:22:15.000 --> 00:22:19.999
an organization which supports
research on Nugenix and racial purity.

00:22:20.000 --> 00:22:24.999
Look, let me tell you a secret.
Immigrants themselves

00:22:25.000 --> 00:22:29.999
don’t come here because they support
high immigration in the future.

00:22:30.000 --> 00:22:34.999
Why do we need 400, 500 million people, too
much prime beachfront property going begging?

00:22:35.000 --> 00:22:39.999
Is there a structural labor shortage? Are
we trying to build Napoleon’s grand army

00:22:40.000 --> 00:22:44.999
to go to war with Mexico? I mean, what’s the point of immigration? Might
have made sense when you were filling up a wilderness 200 years ago,

00:22:45.000 --> 00:22:49.999
but ideas appropriate to one age,
can be disastrous in the next.

00:22:50.000 --> 00:22:54.999
You have this process of blaming aliens,

00:22:55.000 --> 00:22:59.999
but usually that crops up
at times of unemployment

00:23:00.000 --> 00:23:04.999
or problems of some sort and the
anomalous aspect of the current process

00:23:05.000 --> 00:23:09.999
is that it’s cropping up at a time
when we never had it so good.

00:23:10.000 --> 00:23:14.999
Immigrants are generally a self-selected
group of very hard working people.

00:23:15.000 --> 00:23:19.999
Lazy people don’t immigrate. You don’t pick up and go to a country where
you don’t speak the language or you may not have any great connections,

00:23:20.000 --> 00:23:24.999
unless you… you’ve got a
certain amount of initiative.

00:23:25.000 --> 00:23:29.999
The fact that we now trade more, the capital moves
more quickly, is great. There’re more efficient,

00:23:30.000 --> 00:23:34.999
these markets are more efficient, consumers get
more choices. But the movement of capital,

00:23:35.000 --> 00:23:39.999
the movement of goods, the movement of
information and ideas, doesn’t mean

00:23:40.000 --> 00:23:44.999
you also have the movement
of people necessarily.

00:23:45.000 --> 00:23:49.999
In the global economy, immigration issues
have become more complicated than ever.

00:23:50.000 --> 00:23:54.999
While globalization may benefit wealthy countries, it
hurts local industries in the underdeveloped nations

00:23:55.000 --> 00:23:59.999
and encourages people to migrate.
The 1996 amendments

00:24:00.000 --> 00:24:04.999
discourage this movement of people. The amendments were
passed by an overwhelming majority from both parties.

00:24:05.000 --> 00:24:09.999
Thank you, gentlemen.

00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:14.999
The United States has a history of
ambivalence towards its immigrant heritage.

00:24:15.000 --> 00:24:19.999
In the 1920s, openly racist groups
- such as the Ku-Klux-Klan -

00:24:20.000 --> 00:24:24.999
successfully pushed for restrictions
on immigration by Asians,

00:24:25.000 --> 00:24:29.999
eastern and southern Europeans, and Jews.
In subtler language,

00:24:30.000 --> 00:24:34.999
the ‘96 amendments revived that spirit
of exclusion. The detention of people

00:24:35.000 --> 00:24:39.999
who arrive in the United States seeking political
asylum is nothing new, but the 1996 laws

00:24:40.000 --> 00:24:44.999
make detention mandatory.

00:24:45.000 --> 00:24:49.999
I come to United States in April ‘96. I come to Miami
International Airport, trust for political asylum.

00:24:50.000 --> 00:24:54.999
The day I arrived here, they
treated me so bad on airport.

00:24:55.000 --> 00:24:59.999
They charged that I’m a terrorist
just because of my religion.

00:25:00.000 --> 00:25:04.999
The judge dropped that charge that I’m a terrorist.
They give me charge as a misting. I am not a terrorist.

00:25:05.000 --> 00:25:09.999
But same time he denied
my political asylum.

00:25:10.000 --> 00:25:14.999
That was August 14, 1996.

00:25:15.000 --> 00:25:19.999
I was arrested at the airport,

00:25:20.000 --> 00:25:24.999
uh… because I was not having the proper documents, and
normally if you’re going to seek political asylum,

00:25:25.000 --> 00:25:29.999
you don’t have any documentation.
You know, with military regime,

00:25:30.000 --> 00:25:34.999
when they’re coming for you, you know, when they just come for you in
the middle of the night and then they pick you up and they kill you

00:25:35.000 --> 00:25:39.999
and no one hears of it. Also I’ve
to… I’ve to flee for my life.

00:25:40.000 --> 00:25:44.999
So I explained everything to the INS and they said the
laws in this country say that you have to see a judge.

00:25:45.000 --> 00:25:50.000
So they chained us at the airport and then
they sent us to prison, York County Prison.

00:26:15.000 --> 00:26:20.000
[sil.]

00:26:25.000 --> 00:26:30.000
[sil.]

00:26:40.000 --> 00:26:44.999
[sil.]

00:26:45.000 --> 00:26:49.999
You Yi Yang fled China, where
he faced serious reprisals

00:26:50.000 --> 00:26:54.999
for having three children.
Samuel from Ghana

00:26:55.000 --> 00:26:59.999
and Joseph from Liberia fled persecution for their pro-democratic
activities and spent nine months in a county prison

00:27:00.000 --> 00:27:04.999
before receiving asylum.
Manjit Mehmi from India

00:27:05.000 --> 00:27:09.999
is a member of a separatist Sikh movement and is
currently in his fourth year of INS detention.

00:27:10.000 --> 00:27:14.999
To be honest with you, I… I
couldn’t believe my eyes,

00:27:15.000 --> 00:27:19.999
because of being a student activist, I’ve always advocated
for America, that America is a democratic country,

00:27:20.000 --> 00:27:24.999
not until I came to this country and I realized
that, \"Look, they also have red tape democracy.\"

00:27:25.000 --> 00:27:29.999
You know, I ask myself, I mean, why?
I’m already in your territory

00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:34.999
and this same country is
good all over the world

00:27:35.000 --> 00:27:39.999
preaching democracy. Ask your government,
we show proper democracy, I’m pleased,

00:27:40.000 --> 00:27:44.999
and then when people are fighting for this same democracy
and they come to this country, you mistreat them.

00:27:45.000 --> 00:27:49.999
That sounds unfair. You know,
I told… I told the judge.

00:27:50.000 --> 00:27:54.999
When someone comes to the United States and
seeks asylum, they go into certain proceedings.

00:27:55.000 --> 00:27:59.999
Those proceedings, after the initial stages
and… can sometimes take a period of time

00:28:00.000 --> 00:28:04.999
from 60 days or several years.

00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:09.999
Our requirement is that we need to
detain them so that they are available

00:28:10.000 --> 00:28:14.999
uh… for the course of their proceedings.
The INS has a general policy

00:28:15.000 --> 00:28:19.999
that we try to be generous towards
people who are seeking asylum

00:28:20.000 --> 00:28:24.999
and not to treat them as
if they’ve violated a law

00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:29.999
or committed a crime.

00:28:30.000 --> 00:28:34.999
We were like caged animals. Like when you go to the zoo, see all these
animals in the cage, you see, you know, up and down. You have no way to go.

00:28:35.000 --> 00:28:39.999
Really it was terrible. It was
there, I felt I was in prison.

00:28:40.000 --> 00:28:44.999
I asked myself, \"What I’ve done?\" I talked
to one correction officer. He said to me,

00:28:45.000 --> 00:28:49.999
\"You came to this country without
proper documents.\" Then I asked him,

00:28:50.000 --> 00:28:54.999
\"So is my case so terrible

00:28:55.000 --> 00:28:59.999
more than somebody who has taken a gun and
shot some… some two, three people dead?

00:29:00.000 --> 00:29:04.999
Is my case serious like that?\" He said
the United States immigration laws says

00:29:05.000 --> 00:29:09.999
if somebody comes to your country
without proper documents.

00:29:10.000 --> 00:29:14.999
I mean, that’s tantamount to somebody who might
have killed or robbed a bank or (inaudible).

00:29:15.000 --> 00:29:19.999
So I kept quiet.

00:29:20.000 --> 00:29:24.999
I was… I try to be religious totally here.
I had beard, long hair,

00:29:25.000 --> 00:29:29.999
and I used to… use to do
that cloth on my head,

00:29:30.000 --> 00:29:34.999
but this people are making fun on me. Officers
used to call me, \"Hey, terrorist, get in the line.

00:29:35.000 --> 00:29:39.999
Terrorist go there.\" They called me mother…

00:29:40.000 --> 00:29:44.999
They called \"What the… on your head?\" They
make fun on me. And I never nothing to them,

00:29:45.000 --> 00:29:49.999
I never fight, never
disrespect nobody here.

00:29:50.000 --> 00:29:54.999
We’re very committed to the humane
treatment of asylum seekers

00:29:55.000 --> 00:29:59.999
to having fair and prompt adjudication
of asylum claims. And I guess,

00:30:00.000 --> 00:30:04.999
I’m proud to say that’s one of the
areas in which the immigration service

00:30:05.000 --> 00:30:09.999
and the United States has really improved
its processes over the last five years.

00:30:10.000 --> 00:30:15.000
And I believe we have an asylum
system that we can be proud of.

00:30:40.000 --> 00:30:44.999
I lost my three years here. My
dream was that I can be a doctor.

00:30:45.000 --> 00:30:49.999
If I can’t be doctor, I can be a nurse.
If I’m in the street this three years,

00:30:50.000 --> 00:30:54.999
I had one more year to become a registered
nurse. I never gonna get those three years

00:30:55.000 --> 00:30:59.999
any more in my life. I
lost those three years.

00:31:00.000 --> 00:31:04.999
I’m asking for political asylum that’s all.
I don’t want green card, I want nothing.

00:31:05.000 --> 00:31:09.999
When my problem gets solved, I’ll go back by myself. I
just want to stay here as a political refugee. That’s it.

00:31:10.000 --> 00:31:14.999
[sil.]

00:31:15.000 --> 00:31:19.999
After almost four years in INS
detention, the Chinese refugees

00:31:20.000 --> 00:31:24.999
from the Golden Venture were released
by special presidential decree.

00:31:25.000 --> 00:31:29.999
You Yi is now working as weaver and
awaiting his hearing for political asylum.

00:31:30.000 --> 00:31:34.999
We knew the uh… the pastor,
Pastor Joan Maruskin,

00:31:35.000 --> 00:31:39.999
that was involved with them and held the
vigil, over to jail every Sunday night.

00:31:40.000 --> 00:31:44.999
He was over there. So we told Pastor
Joan that when they got out of prison,

00:31:45.000 --> 00:31:49.999
we give one a job and that’s
how we landed You Yi.

00:31:50.000 --> 00:31:54.999
He walked in and uh… still we got no weaver,
umm… he got two piecing hands up the loom,

00:31:55.000 --> 00:31:59.999
put the one behind the other and tied a weaver’s
knot, same knot that we tie in America.

00:32:00.000 --> 00:32:04.999
He can do every procedural in a loom,

00:32:05.000 --> 00:32:09.999
prep work, mechanical work.
I mean, he can design.

00:32:10.000 --> 00:32:14.999
He can do just about anything. I don’t see
us being where we are today without him.

00:32:15.000 --> 00:32:19.999
I mean, if he has to go back to China, I… I… we’ll
be hard pressed to replace him with one person.

00:32:20.000 --> 00:32:24.999
I mean, you know, we did probably we have
to get five people to do what he does.

00:32:25.000 --> 00:32:30.000
[sil.]

00:32:45.000 --> 00:32:50.000
[non-English narration]

00:32:55.000 --> 00:32:59.999
With the textile industry, most of
your apparel is coming from overseas.

00:33:00.000 --> 00:33:04.999
I mean, here we’ve got a guy that knows
a lot. I mean, I’d… I’d hate like

00:33:05.000 --> 00:33:09.999
the devil to… to send him back to
China just to compete with him.

00:33:10.000 --> 00:33:15.000
I mean, and that’s basically
what they want to do.

00:33:25.000 --> 00:33:29.999
He had documents from China
that he brought from China

00:33:30.000 --> 00:33:34.999
uh… where they sterilized his
wife when his son was born,

00:33:35.000 --> 00:33:39.999
which was his third child. And just
in the last year, I understand that

00:33:40.000 --> 00:33:44.999
that’s been made grounds for asylum.
So we’re… we’re hoping,

00:33:45.000 --> 00:33:49.999
we’re got big a party… We like to get
his… his wife over here and his children.

00:33:50.000 --> 00:33:54.999
I mean, his wife would have a job here. She’s also
worked in textile. I mean… She ran umm… warping wheel

00:33:55.000 --> 00:33:59.999
like we have downstairs the big wheel, that’s what
she did. Umm… And that’s… that’s our hold up here,

00:34:00.000 --> 00:34:04.999
we need a warper. Thousands
of other immigrants

00:34:05.000 --> 00:34:09.999
who could be leading productive lives
remain in county jails in INS facilities -

00:34:10.000 --> 00:34:14.999
like the notorious Krome processing
center outside Miami, Florida.

00:34:15.000 --> 00:34:19.999
Krome’s 400 plus detainees include both asylum
seekers and legal residents awaiting deportation.

00:34:20.000 --> 00:34:24.999
I thought I died. I was in prison.

00:34:25.000 --> 00:34:29.999
That was the time I planned to kill myself. I’m
not gonna lie to you. But when I spoke to my son,

00:34:30.000 --> 00:34:34.999
he started crying, my oldest son. He
asked me dad, he said, if I do that,

00:34:35.000 --> 00:34:39.999
he won’t forgive me. That’s why I didn’t
do it. In the service processing centers,

00:34:40.000 --> 00:34:44.999
Krome, I think is the most famous. It’s very much like
any other detention facility, whether it’s a state

00:34:45.000 --> 00:34:49.999
or federal institution, no one gets in,
no one gets out. We sort of model it

00:34:50.000 --> 00:34:54.999
on the bureau of prisons. And
so far as there’re dormitories

00:34:55.000 --> 00:34:59.999
and there’s a given period
of recreation every day.

00:35:00.000 --> 00:35:04.999
Krome has had a great many problems over the years. About
six months ago, when the American Bar Association visited,

00:35:05.000 --> 00:35:09.999
Krome was - and I’m quoting
the ABA - a complete disaster

00:35:10.000 --> 00:35:14.999
in virtually all of the standards. I mean, they didn’t even know what
the standards were, let alone were they trying to implement them.

00:35:15.000 --> 00:35:19.999
These facilities that are designed
for short-term detention only,

00:35:20.000 --> 00:35:24.999
yet, many, many detainees have been there
for months on end. I’ve represented people

00:35:25.000 --> 00:35:29.999
who’ve been in INS detention for three and four
years. In fact, we just represented one INS detainee

00:35:30.000 --> 00:35:34.999
who was released after
nine years and 45 days.

00:35:35.000 --> 00:35:39.999
From apprehension to removal,

00:35:40.000 --> 00:35:44.999
our average length of stay in the state of
Florida is 19 days. Again, each case is unique

00:35:45.000 --> 00:35:49.999
and each case is… is going to be different. But if you take all
of our detainees in the time from apprehension to removal,

00:35:50.000 --> 00:35:54.999
it breaks down to approximately 19 days
each. I have 32 months now in INS.

00:35:55.000 --> 00:35:59.999
So… They never say nothing to me,

00:36:00.000 --> 00:36:04.999
whether I’m bad behavior, I have good behavior.
They should review me. They should look my case.

00:36:05.000 --> 00:36:09.999
So, I should be fair to the law. The INS is not gonna do
nothing for us. I’ve been to four different institutions.

00:36:10.000 --> 00:36:14.999
I never spend no jail time, no prison time, but
I’ve been kept in jail for almost three years.

00:36:15.000 --> 00:36:19.999
Most people don’t have lawyers, most
people don’t understand the… the law

00:36:20.000 --> 00:36:24.999
and they get intimidated and caught. And the… the…
the government district attorney comes in and

00:36:25.000 --> 00:36:29.999
they’re doing their own thing. Faced with
a prospect of long-term incarceration,

00:36:30.000 --> 00:36:34.999
many detainees voluntarily sign a deportation
order just to get out of detention.

00:36:35.000 --> 00:36:39.999
Many of these detainees have
spent far longer in INS custody

00:36:40.000 --> 00:36:44.999
than they ever did in jail for the crime that they committed,
because the crime that they committed was so minor.

00:36:45.000 --> 00:36:49.999
You know, in fact, a lot of them are
spending time in jail for the first time

00:36:50.000 --> 00:36:54.999
after having been picked up by INS.

00:36:55.000 --> 00:36:59.999
If you see the tension on
people’s faces, it’s a time bomb.

00:37:00.000 --> 00:37:04.999
It’s like you’re doing your lifetime with INS,
because you don’t know when you’re going home.

00:37:05.000 --> 00:37:09.999
I don’t have the money to pay
$10,000 to $15,000 for a lawyer.

00:37:10.000 --> 00:37:14.999
In my fight… A lawyer told
me if I gave him 5… $7,000,

00:37:15.000 --> 00:37:19.999
he’d release me, 100% guaranteed.
I don’t have the money.

00:37:20.000 --> 00:37:24.999
That was two years ago.
I don’t have the money.

00:37:25.000 --> 00:37:29.999
It’s not as in a criminal case where the government will
if you’re unable to provide yourself legal counsel.

00:37:30.000 --> 00:37:34.999
Uh… No, these are
administrative proceedings,

00:37:35.000 --> 00:37:39.999
immigration removal hearings. They’re
administrative. Uh… You are advised of your rights,

00:37:40.000 --> 00:37:44.999
but the right to free
counsel is not one of them.

00:37:45.000 --> 00:37:49.999
In fact, only 11% of INS detainees are
able to obtain legal representation.

00:37:50.000 --> 00:37:54.999
Fighting their cases becomes even harder
when they are moved from jail to jail,

00:37:55.000 --> 00:37:59.999
as they often are, due to overcrowding.
They took me to Boston,

00:38:00.000 --> 00:38:04.999
from Boston to New Hampshire, from New
Hampshire to Rockingham, New Hampshire,

00:38:05.000 --> 00:38:09.999
from… from Rockingham, New Hampshire to Hillsborough,
then from Hillsborough to Panama City.

00:38:10.000 --> 00:38:14.999
People who are being detained in these
county jails far, far away from here,

00:38:15.000 --> 00:38:19.999
umm… don’t have access to their attorneys
and their families so that they can

00:38:20.000 --> 00:38:24.999
most effectively make their case for release. And some of the facilities
they have to buy stamps and envelopes and papers, to write their lawyers,

00:38:25.000 --> 00:38:29.999
to write the courts. We can’t
even talk to them by phone,

00:38:30.000 --> 00:38:34.999
because they can only make collect calls.
And uh… we can’t leave messages for them,

00:38:35.000 --> 00:38:39.999
because the jails don’t take messages from
their attorneys. Umm… They’re in a black hole.

00:38:40.000 --> 00:38:44.999
The INS has always housed the portion
of its detainees in county jails

00:38:45.000 --> 00:38:49.999
and private prisons. But
due to the 1996 laws,

00:38:50.000 --> 00:38:54.999
INS detainees are today the fastest growing
prison population in the United States.

00:38:55.000 --> 00:38:59.999
More than half are now held in correctional
facilities and are often mixed with criminals.

00:39:00.000 --> 00:39:04.999
The county jails want to keep those
beds filled with INS detainees.

00:39:05.000 --> 00:39:09.999
Besides what they’re making per person per
bed per day, people are forced to buy

00:39:10.000 --> 00:39:14.999
everything from Aspirin and Tylenol
to underwear and socks and T-shirts -

00:39:15.000 --> 00:39:19.999
I mean, you name it - and often at very inflated
prices. So these truly are money makers

00:39:20.000 --> 00:39:24.999
for the people running these county jails.

00:39:25.000 --> 00:39:29.999
[music]

00:39:30.000 --> 00:39:34.999
One of the largest concentrations

00:39:35.000 --> 00:39:39.999
of INS detainees on the East
Coast is in York, Pennsylvania.

00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:44.999
A small city steeped in colonial heritage, York
was the first capital of the United States.

00:39:45.000 --> 00:39:49.999
[music]

00:39:50.000 --> 00:39:54.999
Jailing immigrants is so lucrative that York County Prison
is building a new wing, specifically to hold INS detainees.

00:39:55.000 --> 00:40:03.000
[sil.]

00:40:10.000 --> 00:40:14.999
We’ve always had contact with INS
probably, since the last 15, 20 years.

00:40:15.000 --> 00:40:19.999
They are not in the business of custody, they’re in corrections, and
that’s one of the problems, and that’s why it’s easier for them to lease

00:40:20.000 --> 00:40:24.999
whatever bed space they need. I would
say as far as institutions go,

00:40:25.000 --> 00:40:29.999
this one is fairly well run.
People with INS, you know,

00:40:30.000 --> 00:40:34.999
they probably do as well or better here than they’re gonna do
in any institution in the country and that’s why they’re here.

00:40:35.000 --> 00:40:39.999
Thank you. The most
profitable, this is horrible,

00:40:40.000 --> 00:40:44.999
the most profitable prison
industry in our country

00:40:45.000 --> 00:40:49.999
is the detention of immigrants. Take a look down,
if they’re not in court, you take a peek in there.

00:40:50.000 --> 00:40:54.999
The county prison here is paid something
like $23 a day to detain a criminal.

00:40:55.000 --> 00:40:59.999
They’re paid $51 a day or more
to detain an INS detainee.

00:41:00.000 --> 00:41:04.999
Any money they don’t spend on
the immigrants becomes profit.

00:41:05.000 --> 00:41:09.999
And so around the country,
prisons vie for INS detainees,

00:41:10.000 --> 00:41:14.999
because they make money from them.
What we created with the expansion was

00:41:15.000 --> 00:41:19.999
we created eight dorms,
okay, with 48 beds each,

00:41:20.000 --> 00:41:24.999
capacity be about 1650.
Uh… And then we had uh…

00:41:25.000 --> 00:41:29.999
two custody blocks to the whole 80, which
is 160 custody beds were part of that.

00:41:30.000 --> 00:41:34.999
A lot is done to dehumanize them.

00:41:35.000 --> 00:41:39.999
They’re not mainly considered as people, they’re
considered as a means of profit for the prison industry.

00:41:40.000 --> 00:41:44.999
It’s a motive purpose room really
they use it for a number of things.

00:41:45.000 --> 00:41:49.999
They… They do have it for, uh… you know, inter-domination
services though. I’ll be glad when we’re done.

00:41:50.000 --> 00:41:54.999
I’m tired of construction. The INS
is currently renting 700 beds

00:41:55.000 --> 00:41:59.999
from York County to which it
pays $60 a day per detainee.

00:42:00.000 --> 00:42:04.999
However, the county’s actual
costs are just $38 a day.

00:42:05.000 --> 00:42:09.999
With the profit margin of
$22 per detainee per day,

00:42:10.000 --> 00:42:14.999
York County will earn $5.6 million
in profit for the year 2000 -

00:42:15.000 --> 00:42:19.999
as a result of its
relationship with the INS.

00:42:20.000 --> 00:42:24.999
People will ask you questions or…
or want to deal on a specific case

00:42:25.000 --> 00:42:29.999
that may be an exception. You know, somebody was incarcerated
because they did something 20 years ago, you know.

00:42:30.000 --> 00:42:34.999
I don’t worry about that. I have absolutely no control
over that. I don’t worry about on the local level.

00:42:35.000 --> 00:42:39.999
It’s not my job to decide who should be here. You know,
when they allow wardens to decide who should be there

00:42:40.000 --> 00:42:44.999
and how long, you know, person should be there, we’re all in
trouble. Umm… But, you know, that’s… that’s not a decision

00:42:45.000 --> 00:42:49.999
I’ve any control over and I don’t worry about what I’ve no control
over. I learned that a long time ago. If they are not going to house

00:42:50.000 --> 00:42:54.999
these people in York County, they’re mandated to detain them. They’re going
to house them somewhere else. They’re probably gonna pay more to do it,

00:42:55.000 --> 00:42:59.999
why not do it here and that was the reason
we did it. Unfortunately, there are a

00:43:00.000 --> 00:43:04.999
great many people who think, well, that’s…
this… if somebody has to detain them,

00:43:05.000 --> 00:43:09.999
so it might as well be us and we might as well have the
benefits. If we don’t do it, someone else will to do it.

00:43:10.000 --> 00:43:14.999
One of the things that troubled me the most
was one of our city council persons was asked

00:43:15.000 --> 00:43:19.999
if it was moral and right to make money
from the detention of asylum seekers.

00:43:20.000 --> 00:43:24.999
And he said, “It’s not my place
to decide what’s moral and right.

00:43:25.000 --> 00:43:29.999
It’s my place to make money for the county.”
It’s business. You know, it’s a large business.

00:43:30.000 --> 00:43:34.999
And… And that’s… that is what
makes it unique. If it was just

00:43:35.000 --> 00:43:39.999
operating the day to day operations of the prison, that
would be one aspect of it, but what we’re doing is,

00:43:40.000 --> 00:43:44.999
you know, we’re running, you know, a business. That’s
exactly what this is. It’s a custody business.

00:43:45.000 --> 00:43:50.000
[sil.]

00:43:55.000 --> 00:43:59.999
In the language of the INS, the men and women it
sends to county jails are not prisoners at all,

00:44:00.000 --> 00:44:05.000
but rather administrative detainees.

00:44:10.000 --> 00:44:14.999
At the Manatee County Jail in Florida, detainees wrote to
the INS complaining of mistreatment by local sheriffs.

00:44:15.000 --> 00:44:19.999
Upon learning of these complaints,

00:44:20.000 --> 00:44:24.999
on September 11th, 1998, jail
officials ransacked detainees’ cells

00:44:25.000 --> 00:44:29.999
and their personal belongings.

00:44:30.000 --> 00:44:38.000
[sil.]

00:44:40.000 --> 00:44:44.999
The ensuing protest of
outraged INS detainees

00:44:45.000 --> 00:44:49.999
was suppressed by masked members
of the sheriff’s riot squad.

00:44:50.000 --> 00:44:54.999
A basketball thrown at a guard
was cited as one justification

00:44:55.000 --> 00:44:59.999
for the scene you are witnessing.

00:45:00.000 --> 00:45:08.000
[sil.]

00:45:25.000 --> 00:45:29.999
Immigrants detained in the United States

00:45:30.000 --> 00:45:34.999
are probably the most voiceless
group of people that we have.

00:45:35.000 --> 00:45:39.999
Umm… They don’t speak this language.
They don’t know who to reach out to,

00:45:40.000 --> 00:45:44.999
and so it’s necessary for people who know of that
dilemma to tell the world about the injustices.

00:45:45.000 --> 00:45:49.999
I mean, it’s absolutely essential uh… that these
laws be uh… uh… be thrown out and changed,

00:45:50.000 --> 00:45:54.999
because they’re… I mean, the… the one word to describe
them is un-American. I mean, they’re completely,

00:45:55.000 --> 00:45:59.999
unequivocally a 100%
un-American, absolutely.

00:46:00.000 --> 00:46:04.999
And it’s… it’s far from anything resembling what
Jefferson or Madison or Hamilton or any of our founding,

00:46:05.000 --> 00:46:09.999
you know, uh… fathers or parents whatever
the word is would have called for.

00:46:10.000 --> 00:46:14.999
In response to the damage
caused by the 1996 amendments,

00:46:15.000 --> 00:46:19.999
community groups organizing around the country
have begun to lobby Congress to change these laws.

00:46:20.000 --> 00:46:24.999
[sil.]

00:46:25.000 --> 00:46:29.999
People have really become politicized
both about their lives, about laws

00:46:30.000 --> 00:46:34.999
and about the sort of social context that they live in. So they’re
not just gonna be victims. They’re gonna take some action.

00:46:35.000 --> 00:46:39.999
They’re gonna do something about it. Uh… Even if it
means, you know, sticking 10 people in a minivan

00:46:40.000 --> 00:46:44.999
and driving for 34 hours to get to Washington, DC,
and talk to representatives, talk to senators

00:46:45.000 --> 00:46:49.999
about the legislation. I mean, there’s
no other way to solve this problem.

00:46:50.000 --> 00:46:54.999
[sil.]

00:46:55.000 --> 00:46:59.999
CIEJ are gonna go to Washington today
to talk to our congressmen and senators

00:47:00.000 --> 00:47:04.999
and bring the pain and devastation

00:47:05.000 --> 00:47:09.999
uh… to their doors, to them that they
have inflicted upon these families.

00:47:10.000 --> 00:47:14.999
If my husband is deported, it
will be equivalent to his death,

00:47:15.000 --> 00:47:19.999
unless I go with him. And then I have to
choose between my country and my family

00:47:20.000 --> 00:47:24.999
and my husband. He’ll be exiled for life.
He’ll never be able to see his mother again.

00:47:25.000 --> 00:47:29.999
His mother lives here in the United States.

00:47:30.000 --> 00:47:34.999
Yeah, she’s 67. You know, she’s… Yeah, she’s 67 years old. He’s got five
brothers and sisters that live here in the States. They’ll never see him again,

00:47:35.000 --> 00:47:39.999
unless they can afford to come to him.
This just isn’t right.

00:47:40.000 --> 00:47:44.999
I don’t think that the American people are aware of
what’s really going on, because I know that each person

00:47:45.000 --> 00:47:49.999
that I explained the situation to, they
have no idea that this is going on.

00:47:50.000 --> 00:47:54.999
I think unless it affects you, you really don’t know. You
know, and I think that umm… when the laws were written,

00:47:55.000 --> 00:47:59.999
I don’t think that they were meant to
target the legal permanent residents

00:48:00.000 --> 00:48:04.999
who had done stuff 10, 15, 20 years ago.
This retroactively is so unfair,

00:48:05.000 --> 00:48:09.999
because it gives you a false sense of being
you assume that, you know, your life is okay

00:48:10.000 --> 00:48:14.999
and you’re moving on and so forth, and then they
come in just nab, just take you away and say,

00:48:15.000 --> 00:48:19.999
\"You know, we’re taking you because
it’s something you did 17 years ago.\"

00:48:20.000 --> 00:48:24.999
This is something that we should be scared
about. This is something that we as Americans

00:48:25.000 --> 00:48:29.999
should not accept just because
a few congressmen decided that

00:48:30.000 --> 00:48:34.999
umm… there are some uh… immigrants that commit
crimes, they decided to lump us all together

00:48:35.000 --> 00:48:39.999
into an aggravated felony and
everybody is being deported.

00:48:40.000 --> 00:48:44.999
I think this law is unjust, is inhumane

00:48:45.000 --> 00:48:49.999
and unconstitutional. And as an
American citizen, I’m here demanding

00:48:50.000 --> 00:48:54.999
that the law be changed.

00:48:55.000 --> 00:48:59.999
[music]

00:49:00.000 --> 00:49:04.999
Welcome to the 696 rally,

00:49:05.000 --> 00:49:09.999
here at a nation’s capital
in Washington, DC.

00:49:10.000 --> 00:49:14.999
We have people here from all over the country
who have come to make their voices heard.

00:49:15.000 --> 00:49:19.999
We have many members

00:49:20.000 --> 00:49:24.999
of the United States Congress.
We need to fix

00:49:25.000 --> 00:49:29.999
what this House of Representatives
and this senate did in 1996.

00:49:30.000 --> 00:49:34.999
We understand, just like you,
that this country was made great

00:49:35.000 --> 00:49:39.999
because of all of the different
people who came to it.

00:49:40.000 --> 00:49:44.999
We will restore the rights that this terrible bill 1996
took away. We will again start behaving in a civilized

00:49:45.000 --> 00:49:50.000
and decent manner.

00:50:00.000 --> 00:50:04.999
The richness and the
greatness of our country

00:50:05.000 --> 00:50:09.999
are the immigrant community,
all of the nationalities,

00:50:10.000 --> 00:50:14.999
all of our histories, all of the colors
of our skins, all of our neighborhoods,

00:50:15.000 --> 00:50:19.999
all of our communities. And this
rally is the beginning of an effort

00:50:20.000 --> 00:50:24.999
to fix ‘96 and make a better America

00:50:25.000 --> 00:50:29.999
with more opportunities, more
freedom, and more justice

00:50:30.000 --> 00:50:34.999
for all of the people that live in our country.
That is why we’re here. Justice! Justice!

00:50:35.000 --> 00:50:39.999
Justice! Justice! Justice! Congressional
support to change these laws

00:50:40.000 --> 00:50:44.999
seems to be building. However,
in the last session of Congress,

00:50:45.000 --> 00:50:49.999
no legislative action was taken.
Instead, members of Congress

00:50:50.000 --> 00:50:54.999
sent a letter to the INS asking why their regional
officers were interpreting the law so strictly

00:50:55.000 --> 00:50:59.999
and exercising no discretion. Two months later, the
Attorney General’s office replied to Congress.

00:51:00.000 --> 00:51:04.999
The letter states that the
INS is exercising discretion

00:51:05.000 --> 00:51:09.999
and will develop additional guidelines for its
officers. But that there is little else they can do

00:51:10.000 --> 00:51:14.999
until the laws are changed.
As legislators and the INS

00:51:15.000 --> 00:51:19.999
pass blame back and forth, deportations continue
daily and the number of people in detention

00:51:20.000 --> 00:51:24.999
continues to rise.

00:51:25.000 --> 00:51:29.999
[music]

00:51:30.000 --> 00:51:34.999
It’s just a basic violation of human rights. I just can’t
believe that… that in the United States of America,

00:51:35.000 --> 00:51:39.999
umm… we passed a law like this and… and we’re
implementing it and… and that we’re doing it,

00:51:40.000 --> 00:51:44.999
you know, without losing sleep over it. The most
central thing about our democracy obviously,

00:51:45.000 --> 00:51:49.999
uh… is the right to due process
of law, to freedom of speech,

00:51:50.000 --> 00:51:54.999
to not being hauled out of your bed in the middle of the night,
to getting some notice when there are charges against you.

00:51:55.000 --> 00:51:59.999
A lot of people in the US feel sort of
schizophrenic about their heritage, who they are,

00:52:00.000 --> 00:52:04.999
who they were, who their parents were, that kind of
thing. I think they’re… they’re really not seeing clearly

00:52:05.000 --> 00:52:09.999
what they need to… what they need to see to
be able to be to… to have a just society,

00:52:10.000 --> 00:52:14.999
and a just… and a just relationship with other people.
There’s no way that you can convince me that they meant for

00:52:15.000 --> 00:52:19.999
to break up families and to take loved ones and
put them somewhere where they don’t even know

00:52:20.000 --> 00:52:24.999
anything about the country. So I… I
think… I’m still a patriotic American

00:52:25.000 --> 00:52:30.000
and I do believe in my heart that these laws will be changed.
Yeah, I have that type of faith in the United States.