Homeland Security is disappearing thousands of immigrant workers from their homes and workplaces every week. Its agents are forcibly breaking up families, trampling civil liberties, and violating due process rights. They have attacked union worksites and day laborer centers and tried to bust union organizing drives. Raids, arrests, and deportations have become a regular feature of life in towns which not one year ago witnessed historic mobilizations for immigrant rights.

Supporters of immigrant rights need to regroup and think out how best to address this national crackdown.

Immigrants in Danbury have led the struggle in Connecticut, including the defeat of Mayor Boughton’s proposal in 2005 to deputize state troopers to deport immigrants. But Homeland Security has disappeared 23 immigrant workers from Danbury in 4 months. Mayor Boughton encourages the arrests and lends the resources of City Hall to terrorize the immigrant residents of Danbury.

Join forces from across the region to discuss an effective response to these ongoing attacks, and hear a panel featuring:

Speakers (List in formation):

• Ana Avendaño, Associate General Counsel and Director, AFL-CIO Immigrant Workers Program


• Anabel Pimentel and Reina Campos, Victims of Raids in the Swift Meatpacking Plant in Hyrum, Utah


• Lawyer for the Immigrants of Hazelton, Pa. from the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund


• Carola Otero Bracco, Director, Day Laborers Center, Mount Kisco, NY

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I'd like to thank Speaker Pelosi and Leader Hoyer for allowing each of us the opportunity to speak on this critical issue, and the co-sponsors of this resolution for their leadership.

The question before this chamber today is a simple one: Do we agree with the nation's military establishment, the country's foreign policy community, and popular opinion, and reject the President's wrongheaded plan to send 21,000 more troops into Iraq ? Or, do we remain silent, like past Congresses, and allow this potentially disastrous escalation to move forward? I think the question answers itself, and I am proud to rise today to register my strong opposition to escalating the war in Iraq.

I am joined on the floor this hour by several of my younger colleagues in the House of Representatives. Our unity is significant and should remind other Members of the House that we are discussing the fates of many young men and women - my classmates and friends - that are at this hour fighting and dying in a country halfway around the world. As younger members, we also serve as reminders that our duty here is to set policies that secure the safety of our country, not just in the coming months and years, but in the coming decades.

Mr. Speaker, I have never fought in a war. I have never shot another man on a battlefield, nor have I been wounded myself. I have been allowed the privilege of representing my constituents in this body because of the selfless bravery of the men and women of our Armed Services who have volunteered to go overseas and fight. And therefore it is my duty to thank them for their service, and to be their advocate here tonight.

The President is asking a cadre of our bravest men and women to go house to house in Baghdad to root out an insurgency, while he does virtually nothing to address the systemic causes of that insurgency. 100,000 troops may not be enough to do the job that the President is asking 21,000 to do - troop escalation in Baghdad hasn't worked in the past, and it won't work here. Through his actions, the President is putting our soldiers' lives at an unnecessary and unconscionable risk. There is a resolution in Iraq , but it is a political, not military resolution. We owe it to our soldiers, who have done everything we have asked them to do, to stand up to a President who has asked them to do a job that they cannot, and should not, do.

And beyond the duty we owe to the current generation of troops on the ground in Iraq, our responsibility also lies with the generations to come. I decided to seek a seat in this House at a young age because I know that the decisions being made within this chamber will have dramatic consequences in the world in which my future children and grandchildren will live. I came here to begin a conversation that acknowledges that what will make my future grandchildren safe is not a nation built on bullying - not a strategy based on scattershot military intervention - but a comprehensive foreign policy that combines American might with American humility.

We live in a world in which our own supposed allies foster extremism and violence among the most marginalized members of their society. At the same time, this Administration strangely views cultural and political global detachment as a virtue, rather than a weakness. This combination causes those that speak different tongues and worship different gods to look upon our great nation with undeserved derision.

This must change. We do that in three parts. First, we must pass this resolution. Second, in the coming days and months, we must redeploy our troops to home and to fights that are central to the war on terror such as Afghanistan . And lastly, we must begin to renew the multilateral spirit that once made this country great by proving ourselves to be both a strong America and a humble America .

Mr. Speaker, I stand in support of this resolution today.

A group advocating stricter immigration rules asked federal officials this week to conduct a criminal investigation of the city of Danbury and its residents for housing and employment policies that it believes promote illegal immigration and violate federal immigration laws.

The same group, the CT Citizens for Immigration Control (CTCIC), filed a complaint in 2005 with the U.S. attorney's office against Stamford Mayor Dannel Malloy and Bill Callion, the city's director of public safety, for authorizing "no-hassle" zones for day laborers in the city. That complaint is still pending, according to the U.S. attorney's office in Connecticut.

The group sent its latest request to the U.S. attorney for Connecticut, the U.S. Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Internal Revenue Service and the state attorney general.

"The city of Danbury has become one large illegal smuggling, employment and housing operation," Paul Streitz, founder and co-director of the group, said in a statement. "This is racketeering. It is coordinating various operations with one intent: to displace resident citizens with illegals."

• The so called "protest" in front of the Danbury News-Times that ONLY attracted 18 people out of a city of 70,000+.


• The so called anti-immigration forum which yielded UNDER 100 people out of a city of 70,000 (and what many considered nothing more than a xenophobic fundraiser for FAIR).


• The idiotic self-hyped "Stop the invasions" demonstration back in January 2006 that ONLY yielded 50 CTCIC members.


• The racist "MexDonalds" survey, which was so flawed, misleading, and disgusting that 2 out of the 3 founding members disassociated themselves from Strietz.

Lawlor said he is concerned state police oversold Krayeske as a threat to their Hartford counterparts.

The legislation he and McDonald are proposing could prevent a re-occurrence by defining political dissidents versus threats; limiting the circumstances for surveillance on dissidents; ensuring that security briefings include reminders to respect constitutional rights; and creating a legislative oversight committee to review the procedures every few months, Lawlor said.

"The problem here is there was nothing about Ken Krayeske's history that would lead one to believe he's an actual, physical threat to the governor," Lawlor said. "The most he'd be a candidate for is heckling or trying to talk to the governor in the parade. I have no problem . . . if a cop stood next to him as the governor went by, asked him for ID or hassled him for a little bit. But they didn't. They arrested him on sight."

Lawlor and McDonald also are pursuing legislation to better control bail amounts and ensure they are not artificially inflated to detain individuals.

Boyle's memo to Rell does not explain why his bail was set at $75,000. Lawlor, a former prosecutor with the state's attorney's office in New Haven, said the amount is "ridiculous."

"Something extraordinary happened in the Krayeske situation where, by all accounts, it appears bail was used to deprive (him) of his liberty long enough to get past the governor's ball," McDonald said.

Lawlor said he has "anecdotal evidence" that such actions are becoming more routine in Connecticut.

What would you call a governor who proposed vast increases in spending on mass transportation and education, urged income tax increases, pushed for public campaign financing and signed a civil union bill for gays?

In any other state, the term would almost certainly be "Democrat," and probably "Liberal Democrat" at that.

Here in the old Land of Steady Habits, however, that record belongs to a Republican woman from a small town in an affluent, southwestern part of the state usually perceived as rather conservative.

M. Jodi Rell’s remarkably un-Republican approach to government has been baffling for politicians on both sides of the partisan divide.

Democrats, who had been giving lip service to public campaign financing, were shocked in 2005 when Rell announced she would back such a plan if the legislature agreed to reform its own campaign practices. It was Rell’s determination that eventually forced adoption of a landmark reform measure.

Many Republicans weren’t too happy with Rell’s action on campaign finance but they grudgingly went along, in part because it was clear how uncomfortable Democrats were at Rell’s unexpected tactics.

[...]

Her latest escapade — proposing huge education spending increases and a state income tax increase to pay for them — left GOP lawmakers reeling. Democrats seemed as bewildered, as if they’d fallen down a political rabbit hole and awoken in Wonderland, with Rell playing the role of Alice.

Take the reaction of state House Speaker James A. Amann, D-Milford, who has been urging increased spending on local education and calling for increased income tax rates for millionaires for years.

After Rell’s budget speech last week, Amann was angrily questioning Rell’s call to raise $1.3 billion in new state income tax revenue and wondering if the state really needed to spend that much on local schools.

Asked if Rell had pulled the rug out from Democrats again by co-opting some of their signature issues, Amann was verbally stumbling all over the place in his vehement denial.

"No, I think what (she) did, by blowing through the spending cap by a half billion dollars and throwing a billion dollars worth of income tax (increases) on the table, I think that rug is good cover for us," said Amann. "I think it will be more of a cover over our heads if we want to now discuss any increases in taxes or spending that we want to do."

So she’s done it to both sides once again, this mild-mannered "Betty Crocker" of Connecticut politics, who continues to look and sound like a buttoned-down Republican while doing all sorts of very Democratic things.

A federal immigration judge in Hartford had agreed to reopen Pereira's immigration case and release her from jail after her attorney, Michael Boyle, had filed a motion in Hartford Immigration Court on Tuesday. It described previous attorneys' errors that led to Pereira's arrest at her Danbury home last month.

The judge agreed with Boyle that Pereira and her husband Lima, who both started working with Hartford-based lawyers in the 1990s to gain legal status, did not receive a fair hearing before immigration officials.

After several errors and miscommunication by previous attorneys, immigration officials ordered both of them removed, Boyle said. Pereira and Lima say they were never notified of that decision.

Of all the states, Connecticut bears the higher average total tax burden. Now, in order to pay for her grand idea, Gov. Rell plans to increase the state income tax to 5.5%. I do recognize that local taxes may go down with the state government paying more of the education bills, but there still will undoubtedly be yet another tax increase.

State Republicans are generally appalled with the proposal; Genghis quoted one Democratic insider saying, “Republicans are going to have a heart attack.” Gov. Rell was elected on a platform of, among other things, common sense and fiscal responsibility. For example, she wanted (and still wants) to eliminate the car tax, because she thought it was illogical and was a way to reduce taxes. Her education proposal violates the ideas that she had promoted in her campaign, a move that is deceitful and dishonest.

[...]

Gov. Rell’s proposal will increase taxes and the size of our government, and I am by no means convinced that it will produce results. Her tax increase may seem insignificant, but it epitomizes a larger problem with our government. To make themselves notable, people in power often feel the desire to establish programs that affect the lives of their constituents, a tangible result of their leadership. Thus, the size of the government will continually grow, and with it taxes will increase and personal freedom will decrease. I had thought my vote for Gov. Rell would support an agenda that promoted, at least to some extent, libertarian concepts, like small government and few taxes, that resist this trend. Now that she is proposing something that the Democrats are enthralled with and Republicans are suspicion of, I am beginning to regret my vote.