ACROSS THE LINES - Archive (2006-2020)

As an advocate for comprehensive immigration reform and a champion of immigrant rights, I am often asked how I can sanction the breaking of U.S. law. Clearly, the 12 to 15 million people living in the U.S. without documents broke the law when they entered the U.S. without authorization. Or, as is the case with an estimated 30 to 40 percent of the undocumented, they broke the law when they overstayed their visas. So, some people will ask me, “What is it about the word ‘illegal’ that you don’t understand?” The question merits an answer, but first requires a brief history lesson. When Congress passed the Immigration Reform and Control Act in 1986, one of the most contentious provisions was the one calling for employer sanctions. The U.S. Chambers of Commerce and other influential business lobbies opposed any such provision … until, that is, a simple phrase with a key word was inserted. The word was “knowing” and it appeared this way in the legislation: “It is unlawful for a person

A little more than a week ago, a 36-year-old woman I’ll call Sonia Rivera answered a knock on the door of her downtown San Diego apartment. Agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) told Rivera they were searching for a Mexican man suspected of criminal activity, who an informant had told them could be found at their address. After failing to find the subject of their search – Rivera insists she does not even know the man – the ICE agents asked Rivera to provide documents proving her legal residence in the United States. Unable to do so, Rivera was taken into custody, along with her three sons. The next day Sonia Rivera and her two teenage sons were deported to Mexico. Her youngest son, an 8-year-old U.S. citizen, was released into the custody of relatives residing permanently (and legally) here in San Diego. Another “mixed-status” family had been torn apart by the deportation of its undocumented members. Sonia Rivera and her family were victims of what Immigration

Published in the San Diego Union Tribune , January 29, 2010 As they do to people living elsewhere across the United States, the coming months present to those of us who call San Diego County home a once-in-a-decade opportunity to take an honest look at ourselves. I refer, of course, to the 2010 Census. From the time that Congress first mandated “the enumeration of the inhabitants of the United States” in 1790, Americans have understood that there is nothing more basic to our democracy than the notion that every individual counts. The decennial census gives us a chance to consider whether our democracy really works for all of us. But this will be a difficult year to obtain an accurate count all of the region’s residents. Because San Diego County is home to so many immigrant, refugee and cross-border households, it has been ranked by the U.S. Census Bureau as the 11th “hardest-to-count” county in the United States. Gaps of language and literacy are the most obvious obstacles to