Pitzer in the News 2006-2007 Academic Year

Professor Jose Calderon in the News

Protesters march in Pomona
Activists rally against sweeps targeting illegal immigrants
By Monica Rodriguez, Staff Writer
Inland Valley Daily Bulletin
Article Launched:01/27/2007

POMONA - A group of about 200 people marched through downtown Friday calling for an end to recent immigration sweeps.
Day laborers, college students, clergy and others walked from the 1600 block of West Mission Boulevard to Gordon Street chanting slogans and holding signs in both English and Spanish.

Among the marchers was Roberto Aguila of Pomona, who is here illegally and works as a day laborer.
The general construction worker said he joined the march because the sweeps are unfair and he would like the nation's leaders, including President Bush, to address the immigration issue.

"President Bush must realize there should be legalization soon so people can get driver's licenses and identification cards and go out on the street without fear," he said.

Aguila said he came here from the Mexican state of Jalisco in 1992. He has returned to his native country twice but found he needed to come back.

"There is work (in Mexico) but the wages are low and the cost of everything high," he said.

The starting and ending points of the march were symbolic, said Jose Calderon, president of the Latino-Latina Roundtable of the San Gabriel and Pomona Valley, one of the event's organizing groups.

The parking lot between a fast-food restaurant and the Pomona Economic Opportunity Center, also known as the Pomona Day Labor Center, is where four laborers were reportedly arrested Jan. 20 by federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, Calderon said.

The final destination of the marchers - a small grassy area on Mission and Gordon - is next to a building where the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has an application support center.

Once at the rally site, the marchers were met by three members of the Minuteman Project.

Cherie Wood, who lives on the edge of Pomona, said the the actions of the federal agents were aimed at criminals.

"The sweep was very specific and targeted murderers, rapists and people who have been in and out of jail," she said.

The sweeps didn't seek to capture women, children or the elderly, Wood said.

"ICE is here because they're protecting the citizens of the United States of America," Wood said.

Dee Barrow, of Upland, another member of the Minuteman Project, objected to people speaking in Spanish and the negative impact she said undocumented immigrants have had on the country.

Rally speakers included Pomona resident Maria Morales, who spoke a few words before becoming choked up with emotion.

The mother of two said her husband was picked up by agents Jan. 20 as he was headed to work. She said he hasn't committed any crimes.

Now she is worried about how she'll support her U.S.-born children - one a 9-month-old girl with Down syndrome.

"I have hands. I can work, but how do I work and take care of my little girl?" she said in Spanish after leaving the stage.

Morales said her husband called her Sunday morning from Tijuana after being deported.

During the rally, $740 was collected and given to Morales.

Some speakers, including Calderon, said they believe federal officials used the sweep as an excuse to arrest others who haven't committed a crime.

"Their strategy is to say they've only arrested criminals," he said. "But they are arresting people on the street."

Calderon called for a comprehensive immigration reform package that provides legal status for undocumented immigrants rather than one that creates a guest-worker program.

Walk and rally organizers, met with Mayor Norma Torres prior to the event.

Torres said Friday afternoon she is in favor of local, state or federal law enforcement agencies arresting people guilty of crimes - such as sex offenders, drug dealers and murderers.

"We have zero tolerance for crime," she said.

However, she began making calls to federal authorities when it was brought to her attention they may have randomly stopped people for whom they didn't have arrest warrants.

Federal immigration officials in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., assured her the random sweeps did not take place, Torres said.

"I'm concerned that a lot of rumors are going around," Torres said. "I'm concerned because then people don't go to school, they don't go to work, they don't go about their business."

Pomona police Capt. Kevin Rogan said the march was conducted in an orderly fashion and no arrests were made.

Nota de La Opinión
Jornaleros cuestionan redada

Exigen que se suspendan arrestos y deportaciones que califican de ‘inhumanas’

Alejandro Cano
Sabado, 27 de enero de 2007
POMONA.— Coreando el clásico "Sí se puede" y portando pancartas que decían "Luchemos juntos" y "Dios bendiga a la raza", cientos de residentes marcharon ayer por las calles de Pomona en repudio a las recientes redadas implementadas por las autoridades federales desde el fin de semana pasado.
Decididos a detener lo que han calificado como un "ataque a la comunidad", alrededor de 300 manifestantes partieron desde el centro de trabajadores de la ciudad, donde supuestamente se registraron cuatro detenciones, hasta los alrededores de la oficina de inmigración, donde exigieron un alto a las deportaciones de "gente inocente".

"Las autoridades dicen que implementaron un operativo para deportar a criminales, pero en el proceso se llevaron a gente trabajadora, personas que en muchas de las veces son el único sustento para sus familias. Es sólo una estrategia más para cometer redadas libremente", expresó José Calderón, profesor del Colegio Pitzer, de Claremont. "Estamos cansados de abusos en contra de la comunidad; las redadas deben de parar inmediatamente".

Pese a que varios miembros del Proyecto Minuteman hicieron acto de presencia y en ocasiones se enfrascaron en fuertes discusiones con algunos de los participantes, la manifestación fue pacífica y ordenada.

Pablo Alvarado, director de la Red Nacional de Jornaleros, hizo un llamado a los funcionarios de gobierno a unirse en la lucha y detener "de una vez por todas las deportaciones", las que considera como "inhumanas".

"Como representantes de la comunidad, el gobierno debe de ejercer presión a las autoridades de inmigración para devolverle a Pomona y otras ciudades la tranquilidad que gozaban antes de las redadas", indicó Alvarado. "No sé qué deban hacer, pero algo tienen que hacer en favor de la comunidad".

Guillermo Suárez Medina, abogado y activista, sugirió que los alcaldes y concejales de las ciudades donde se registraron las detenciones deben exigirle a la Oficina de Control de Inmigración y Aduanas (ICE) una moratoria que detenga las deportaciones de personas sin antecedentes delictivos u órdenes de deportación.

"Detener a indocumentados que han violado la ley es una cosa y deportar a cualquier otra persona sólo porque sí, es otra. Mientras las autoridades continúan su operativo llamado Devolver al Remitente, la ciudadanía debe estar tranquila", expresó Medina. "Aunque sean operativos diseñados para reducir la violencia, causan alarma y pánico entre la comunidad".

La manifestación se realizó minutos después de que Norma Torres, alcaldesa de Pomona, se reunió a puertas cerradas con Norma Bonales-Garibay y Eril Saldaña, representantes de ICE, para averiguar la razón exacta de su presencia en Pomona.

Torres fue informada que ICE implementó el sábado pasado dos operativos para tratar de detener a dos sospechosos de violar las leyes federales en dos diferentes locaciones. Sin embargo, decenas de testigos oculares aseguran que ICE detuvo a cuatro indocumentados en las afueras de un restaurante de comida rápida mientras intentaban encontrar trabajo.

"Por un lado escucho que sólo vinieron a buscar a criminales y por otro que se llevaron a gente trabajadora. Como haya sido, lo cierto es que la gente está asustada. He escuchado que hay personas que no están saliendo a las calles ni enviando a sus hijos a la escuela por miedo a ser deportados", comentó Torres. "A pesar que nosotros no tenemos el poder de decirles lo que tienen que hacer a las autoridades federales, sí podemos asegurarle a la comunidad que estamos buscando una solución que suspenda las detenciones", agregó.

Durante la manifestación, María Morales, esposa de Joel Morales, arrestado mientras se dirigía a su trabajo y luego deportado, compartió su experiencia y recibió 740 dólares de parte de los allí presentes.

"No sé qué hacer, necesito a mi esposo en casa. Tengo a mi hija de 9 meses con síndrome de Down y no tengo trabajo. Este dinero que la gente me dio, pienso usarlo para pagar el coyote. Mi esposo tiene que regresar. Como dice el dicho, ‘aquí estamos y no nos vamos y si nos echan pues regresamos’", concluyó la señora Morales.

Speakers call for other ways to help illegal immigrants
By Will Bigham, Staff Writer
Inland Valley Daily Bulletin
Article Launched:01/28/2007

CLAREMONT - Dolores Huerta, a leading Latino rights activist who in 1962 co-founded the United Farm Workers Association with Cesar Chavez, said she opposes a May 1 nationwide boycott that would mirror last year's "Day Without an Immigrant."
Huerta, speaking Saturday at a pro-amnesty Latino rights conference at Pitzer College, said a repeat boycott could lead to participating workers losing their jobs, students being expelled and fines levied against labor unions.

She instead proposed a march on April 29 that would feature immigrant children, which would send a message about how immigration laws affect families.

"This year let's be more positive, instead of negative," Huerta said.

The 77-year-old activist's anti-boycott remarks, echoed by several other immigration-reform advocates at the conference, resulted in moments of awkwardness during a session intended to create a strategy for achieving legalization of the country's estimated 12 million illegal immigrants, most of whom are Latino.

Representatives from the March 25 Coalition, which last year organized the 500,000-person march in downtown Los Angeles and the May 1 boycott, distributed fliers during the event to try to rally support for a repeat boycott effort.

Taking Huerta's lead, most of the 150 students and activists in attendance responded coolly to the coalition's proposal.

The March 25 Coalition hopes to build support for a May 1 boycott before a Feb. 3-4 conference at Loyola Law School in downtown Los Angeles, which will discuss plans for this year's May Day protests.

"I think we have to question whether (a boycott) is effective," said Jose Calderon, a Pitzer College sociology and Chicano studies professor who helped organize the conference. "Whether it had any economic effect is a real question."

The conference, sponsored by the Latina/Latino Roundtable and San Gabriel Valley/Inland Empire chapter of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, attracted Latino activists who will play a central role in crafting strategy for this year's amnesty legislation push.

Huerta said 2007 was the ideal year to pursue legislation to achieve legalization because of the Democratic takeover of Congress after November's midterm elections.

"Let's get comprehensive immigration reform out of the way in 2007, then it can be avoided during the election year," she said. "It's a win-win."

Though immigration issues dominated discussion at the conference, other ideas were floated as well.

Calderon proposed pressuring lawmakers to allow illegal immigrants to vote in school board elections, because children of illegal immigrants can legally attend California public schools.

GUEST COLUMN
Nothing more than immigration raids
Article Launched:02/03/2007

In the recent "sweeps" that have resulted in the arrests of more than 760 immigrants, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials claim that their enforcement is only aimed at targeted fugitives who have overstayed their visas or have ignored deportation orders.

Yet, numerous eyewitness and news media accounts report that this is not fully the case.

The San Francisco Chronicle newspaper, in a Jan. 23 article, reported that ICE agents, in addition to the so-called 119 immigrant criminals that they targeted in Contra Costa County, "also picked up 94 other undocumented immigrants they encountered in the process."

Timothy Aiken, deputy director of ICE in San Francisco, commented, "We want to go after the worst of the worst; we go after people who have ignored a judge's order - but we can't be blind to someone who doesn't have lawful status in the U.S. ... We wouldn't be doing our job if we ignored these people."

By their own words, immigration officials admit that they are picking up people randomly as part of their "Operation Return to Sender." They can call these actions what they want and try to hide under the cover that they are only out to get fugitives, but the reality is that ICE officials are also carrying out "raids" which are creating a climate of fear and tension in our immigrant communities.

In an article by the Associated Press on Jan. 23, where reporters rode along for the first day of the "sweeps" in Orange County, they reported that the agents "fanned out to houses in Anaheim and Santa Ana" and that the criminal fugitive that they arrested was merely a 29-year-old undocumented immigrant "wanted for a driving-under-the-influence conviction." At a second stop where the agents were looking for a "convicted rapist" (that had moved out weeks before) they, "instead, arrested six men who could not provide legal papers."

Locally, we have various eyewitness accounts where immigration agents have used the pretext of going after so-called "convicted fugitives" to stop and detain people randomly. For example, the husband of Pomona resident Maria Morales, a mother of two children, was picked up off the street as he walked to his job. In an incident at a fast food place on Mission Boulevard, ICE agents claim that they went to the area in search of a "criminal." Eyewitnesses, instead, saw them go after immigrant workers randomly who were looking for jobs in that area.

Similar reports emerged from residents at an apartment complex in Pomona where, under the pretext of looking for a "fugitive," agents began to knock on doors and arrest individuals randomly.

These types of actions are confirmed as occurring in other parts of California by Jerry Okendo, president of a Northern California chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens. He is quoted in the Chronicle as criticizing ICE agents for carrying out "sweeps" in the cities of Concord and Richmond without "properly identifying themselves" and carrying out arrests without search warrants.

According to Okendo, ICE agents "were sweeping through apartment complexes and picking up anyone who could not provide proof they were living in the United States legally."

Richmond City Councilman John Marquez complained that ICE agents "were identifying themselves as police," helping to break up the good relations that he said had been established between the police department and the Latino community.

These raids are continuing to advance enforcement policies that criminalize immigrant families and anyone who supports them. We call on our elected officials to immediately carry out an investigation of the reported violations by ICE agents and urge that these raids be stopped until Congress can come up with a comprehensive immigration bill that can unite, rather than divide our communities.

- Jose Calderon is president of the Latina and Latino Roundtable of San Gabriel and Pomona Valley. He is a professor of sociology and Chicano studies at Pitzer College in Claremont.

Deportation's toll
Family torn by recent ICE sweep struggles to get by
By Monica Rodriguez, Staff Writer
Inland Valley Daily Bulletin
Article Launched:02/03/2007 12:00:00 AM PST

POMONA - The recent arrest of 338 undocumented immigrants across Southern California targeted those who had ignored deportation orders, criminals, fugitives and others.

But out of those arrests, about half, 159, involved random people who officials came across and found to be in the country illegally, but without any other criminal record, said Virginia Kice, spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

It appears Pomona resident Joel Baltazar Reyes, 27, was among those people randomly stopped by immigration officials.

Maria Morales said the father of her two younger daughters left home the morning of Jan. 20 and never returned.

The native of the Mexican state of Veracruz, who was in the United States illegally, was able to call Morales the next day from Tijuana after being deported.

He told Morales he was walking near Holt Avenue and Reservoir Street when a car pulled up by him.

The people inside the car then asked him if he had immigration documents, Morales said.

When he said no, Baltazar Reyes was arrested.

"They came up to him in a normal-looking car but he never imagined it was Immigration," she said in Spanish.

Baltazar Reyes calls Morales periodically.

"He's exasperated," Morales said. "He calls and asks about our daughter."

Morales has three daughters. Two are Baltazar Reyes' and the youngest, a 9-month-old, has Down syndrome.

Baltazar Reyes is the bread- winner for the family, and Morales is worried about making the rent payment and putting food on the table.

Morales said Baltazar Reyes hasn't had problems with the law of any type or with immigration officials.

Kice said that in the course of looking for specific people "it's not uncommon to find other immigration law violators."

When that happens, it is the duty of immigration officials to arrest the individuals, Kice said.

Pomona Mayor Norma Torres said city staff has gathered information involving the arrests of four other men near the Pomona Economic Opportunity Center, also known as the Pomona Day Labor Center, on West Mission Boulevard. That material has been referred to federal officials.

Late last week, Torres met with representatives of several immigrant-rights groups concerned about the ICE activities. She said she will help arrange a meeting with ICE officials and asked the representatives to provide questions and concerns they have so she can present them to federal officials.

"I would rather give it to them up front so they can come prepared to answer the questions," Torres said.

Jose Calderon, president of the Latino/Latina Roundtable of San Gabriel and Pomona Valley, said he and representatives of other organizations, including the Latino Student Union of the Claremont Colleges, and the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, are also working to arrange a meeting with ICE representatives within the next week.

The purpose of the meeting would be to create an avenue for communicating with ICE officials and "stopping what we consider raids," Calderon said.

It's when immigration officials make random arrests that the chances increase of civil rights violations taking place, he said.

When officials begin to arrest people who aren't fugitives and for whom they don't have warrants, those operations take on a new dimension, Calderon said.

"They should call it what it is - raids," he said.

Kice said before immigration agents go out to make arrests, they've completed research on the persons they will arrest to carry out the apprehension in a safe and effective manner.

When agents approach a person for whom they don't have a warrant, they do so because they have probable cause, she said.

"Our officers are trained," she said. "They have to have articulable facts that they must present."

The facts vary with each case, Kice said, but "it could be any one of different things."

All people who are in the country legally must have the documentation with them at all times that permits them to be in the country, she said.

If a person can't produce documents, agents will take that person to immigration offices where their immigration records will be looked up, she said. If the person is found to be in the country illegally, they'll be arrested.

If American citizens are detained, they'll be questioned to determine if they are in fact citizens of the country, she said.

In the weeklong mid-January ICE operation, 761 foreign nationals were taken into custody, many of whom have already been deported. In addition to the 338 arrested at large in Southern California, another 423 were arrested in county jails throughout the region.