CDIR Update No. 12

June 8, 2007

On the Defeat of SB 1348 in the U.S. Senate Vote

Los Angeles – “The Immigrant Rights Bill SB 1348 is Dead! Long Live the New Immigrant Rights Bill!”

The Coalition in Defense of Immigrant Rights (CDIR) and the Echo Park Community Coalition(EPCC) believed that the defeat of the current immigration reform bill in the Senate is just temporary.

For all immigrants, the failure to pass the bill is just tactical. The 12 million immigrants are very hopeful that a new immigration bill that will give them pathways to citizenship, that will maintain family reunifcation as a bedrock of the American policy and will be favorable for them will be enacted.

For the Republicans and their democratic allies, they are only prolonging their agony by not accepting the harsh realities. For all the years, they still ive in the past . They refuse to accept that by giving preference to security and keeping out the immigrants, their fundamental viewpoint is downright racist.

The US Senate yesterday, June 7, voted down attempts to stop the debates about SB 1348 and vote calling for a temporary guest workers program for 12 million “illegal immigrants.” The Senate voting ended with 49- 48 vote

The EPCC believed that the vote was a clear defeat for US President George Bush and the bipartisan group who formulated the “grand bargain.” For the republicans who won’t give an inch for immigration reforms it was a ”victory for sanity”.

The republicans clearly will not settle for anything less than making the so called “temporary guest workers program” permanen! But Democratic Senator Kennedy was still hopeful for the bill. He said “defeat is not an option.”

Meanwhile the Alliance for a Just and Lasting Peace in the Philippines (AJLPP) -USA through its national coordinator Mario Santos condemned CNN anchor and foremost anti-immigrant spokesperson Lou Dobbs who gloated and called the defeat of the bill,” a victory for the 280 million middle class of America who have been taken fore granted by liberal U.S. lawmakers.”

The AJLPP-USA with the CDIR and the EPCC cautioned both parties in rushing poisoned legislations that can never be swallowed by immigrants. Scrapping the family reunification law that has been the bedrock of U.S immigration policy can never be accepted by the 14 million Asian Pacific Islanders (API) and the Filipino American communities that will suffer from the racist and anti family provisions of the proposed new laws.

In the end, for the AJLPP, “the defeat of the proposal is still good because having no law is better than to have a bad law for all immigrants.”

For more information please call Al P. Garcia at (213)241-0995 or email@ cdir_usa@yahoo.com