compiled by the El Reportero staff
Thomas Pérez, now confirmed by U.S. Senate as leader of the Civil Rights Division of the Dept. of Justice, is the second Hispanic-North American to lead the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice. Pérez as a former elected oficial, esteemed Scholar and trial attorney with the Department of Justice itself, brings a wealth of experience and skills to his new position as Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division. Pérez has been a leading voice on issues from immigration to racial disparities in the health care system, said a written announcement.
Housekeepers March to raise awareness of workplace abuses
Hotel Housekeepers marched at the Santa Clara Hyatt to raise awareness to workplace abuses on Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2009.
Approximately 350 hotel workers and housekeepers joined by women Leadership groups, students and clergy for an all day march from the Hyatt in Santa Clara to the Hyatt Regency and Grand Hyatt Hotels in San Francisco.
Marchers carried a 60-foot “Quilt of Hope” as a symbol of their solidarity with hotel and housekeeper workers across the nation.
The march was part of a seven-city tour in which marchers would draw attention to the Hyatt’s fi ring of housekeepers and replacing them with minimum wage workers in Boston. The marchers want to their efforts to bear witness to the Hyatt’s workplace abuses nationwide. California State Assembly member FionaMa joined in the march.
New Report tells of increased policing of immigrants
“Guilty By Immigration Status” – A new report reveals that immigration policing is causing a disturbing pattern of abuses and human rights violations that threaten the livelihood and safety of entire families, workers and communities.
Guilty by Immigration Status: A report on U.S. violations of the rights of immigrant families, workers and communities in 2008, calls for restoring due process and suspending detentions and deportations, and urges a thorough investigation into immigration enforcement practices.
The report was produced by HURRICANE, the Human Rights Immigrant Community Action Network, an initiative of the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (NNIRR). The report details how the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has built up over the last eight years an “immigration control regime,” whose goal is to deport everyone who can be deported.
According to the report, DHS is almost exclusively promoting the criminalization of immigration status to detain and deport people, often for minor offenses.
