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Sheila Jackson Lee: “The Congressional Black Caucus will be pivotal” in immigration reform.
On February 4, the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) held its first meeting on comprehensive immigration reform. Representative Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) made critical points in the meeting that are oftentimes missing from the debate.
On these points about the issue of where we can come together and where there are distinctions is to raise the factor of how serious and difficult this process may be, the Congressional Black Caucus will be pivotal in its role. One, because it is the conscience of this Congress. Two, because we have the uncanny ability of seeing from a broader perspective with what we have gone through in our lifetime, what our communities go through. We’ve seen discrimination and we are sympathetic and sensitive to how we can help others.
The support from the CBC should not surprise anyone. More African Americans who voted in the last presidential election support a process for legalizing undocumented immigrants than Latino voters do. In a November Gallup Exit poll, 81% of African Americans support immigration reform compared to 77% of Latino voters. An interesting piece of information that is constantly overlooked by the media and especially by our politicians.
In a press release, Caucus Chair Rep. Marcia Fudge (D-OH) outlined key concerns for comprehensive immigration reform:
- Advancing legislation and policies that lead to comprehensive immigration reform.
- Providing a voice for undocumented immigrants of African descent within the comprehensive immigration reform debate.
- Addressing issues of mass detention and unjust criminality of immigrant populations.
- Ensuring policies that are aimed at improving conditions within low-income and vulnerable communities are not averted by comprehensive immigration reform legislation.
The most striking piece is the issue of mass detention. Oftentimes, under the guise of the “rule of law” immigrants are racially profiled, unconstitutionally placed in detention centers for extended periods of time and denied access to legal counsel. While private prison corporations are allowed to profit from human suffering, many families are unjustly separated in the meantime. Rarely if ever do we hear these issues addressed. Instead, we hear the same predictable rhetoric that places emphasis creating a “pathway to citizenship” for undocumented immigrants in exchange for increased funding for border security. It will be interesting to see what level of involvement the CBC will have in the next few weeks on immigration reform. It will be even more interesting to see if the CBC can garner enough attention to these critical issues that have beleaguered the immigrant community for far too long.
Public domain photo from Wikimedia Commons.
6 Comments
Black Agenda Report:
http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/why-nobody%E2%80%99s-paying-attention-black-folks-these-days
Dear Ms. O:
I’ve not seen your byline here before, but I hope to encourage you to keep posting here.
I am thrilled to see someone focus on educating American Hispanics to look very, very closely at black Americans’ experience with the racist right.
American Hispanics need to know that American conservatives are racist to the core, and doing deals with them must be undertaken extremely carefully.
Thank goodness folks like Sheila Jackson Lee manage to hang on in this political environment!
That’s what I was thinking, bigchin.
This is a good thing the CBC is doing. I’m not going to knock them for it, but something’s not quite right.
Is the CBC going to spend the whole eight years of Obama helping him make sure he doesn’t give those who will always despise him an excuse to say he is playing favorites for African Americans? When will these legislators try to pressure him on the crushing economic situation post-housing meltdown, which hit African Americans disproportionately hard? And you want to talk about mass detention: how about the mass detention of Black Americans in the form of mass incarceration?
I am fully aware of the issue of mass incarceration. It is a very serious problem. Harry Belafonte did an EXCELLENT job of raising the issue during his NAACP Spingarn Medal speech. It’s an issue that remains invisible to mainstream media.
Nevertheless, I am trying to encourage people to start connecting the dots. If we start to build a coalition that recognizes the intersectionality of oppressions then maybe we can start to see some progress. As a black immigrant myself the similarities that I see between communities of color and immigrant communities are striking. Mass incarceration/detention affects all people of color.
Thank you for the encouragement! And I absolutely agree with your comment about Sheila Jackson. Interestingly enough, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus makes no mention about the criminalization of immigrants in its principles for immigration reform. I really hope folks will start listening to what Sheila Jackson, Hakeem Jeffries, Karen Bass and many others have to say on this issue. It is very important.
Rereading my comment I see I wrote poorly.
When I wrote “you want to talk about mass detention”, I just meant “you” rhetorically, meaning anybody, not you personally Marybeth. I apologize for appearing to lecture you, when I really appreciate your informative post.
My frustrations with the timidity of members of Congress in dealing with the full range of the country and planet’s problems remains!