May 22, 2008

Mexico-linked ACLU: immigration raids are "terrorizing communities" (Joanne Lin)

Joanne Lin, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union - an organization collaborating with the Mexican government to possibly sue the U.S. government - on Monday appeared at a meeting of the Appleseed Foundation and said, in reference to local police playing a role in immigration enforcement under the 287g program:

"Local law enforcement has been given the green light to engage in racial profiling... Massive immigration sweeps are terrorizing communities across the country, including those who are U.S. citizens, permanent residents and other lawful workers... It's always been the ACLU's position that immigration is exclusively a federal law... Our view is that it's not the appropriate constitutional use of state and local power."

Ilya Shapiro of the Cato Institute is quoted as disagreeing with the latter claim. And, while it's not the best question I'd ask the ACLU, at least CNS asked something:

At Monday's briefing, Lin spoke about the federal lawsuit filed against the Department of Homeland Security and the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department by the ACLU and the family on behalf of Pedro Guzman, the Associated Press reported. Guzman is a mentally disabled man who was arrested for trespassing, had no identification and was deported to Mexico.

Guzman, who is a U.S. citizen, was found by relatives near a border crossing almost three months later. When asked by Cybercast News Service if Guzman was an isolated case or if the ACLU had statistics showing how many U.S. citizens are mistakenly deported, Lin said she did not have any numbers but suspected there were other such cases.

Discrediting the ACLU would go a long way towards doing something about this issue, and since they frequently make public appearances with Q&A sessions it's not that difficult. See the last link for some questions you can ask them on videotape.

Related:
Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA) tries tying ICE's hands on immigration raids; Mexico-linked ACLU cheers

Posted to Immigration2008a at May 22, 2008 01:18 PM