Daily Kos: "Many kids are scared of the Boogieman, but we fear ICE."

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/6/18/744012/-Many-kids-are-scared-of-the-Boogieman,-but-we-fear-ICE

by 4workers

(Digg this! Share this on Twitter - "Many kids are scared of the Boogieman, but we fear ICE."Tweet this submit to reddit Share This)

Thu Jun 18, 2009 at 10:30:43 AM PDT

The Bush administration's enforcement-only policy was an unmitigated disaster for workers. Administration officials became masters of misdirection, as ICE agents began conducting terrorizing worksite raids under the guise of meaningful immigration reform.

A new report just released by a National Commission on these raids (disclosure: a group founded by my union, the UFCW, after the raids) details the abuses of the Bush administration during these raids. It’s a must-read for anyone interested in real immigration reform.

* 4workers's diary :: ::
*

On December 12, 2006, the Bush administration conducted massive worksite raids at six Swift and Company meatpacking plants, rounding up, detaining and criminalizing thousands of workers at each plant for doing no more than reporting to work, no more than trying to earn a living.

The United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), the union that today represents the workers in those plants, established a National Commission on ICE Misconduct soon after. The Commission held five hearings on those and other raids, in cities across the nation. Now it has released a reporttelling the story of the human toll exacted by the Bush administration's enforcement-only policy, in the hope it will trigger a dialogue on immigration reform with our new administration.

It's the story of workers' terrifying ordeal, when ICE agents handcuffed them, denied their right to counsel or to meet with union representation, and didn't even have the decency to let workers use the bathroom or call their families. It's the story of workers held against their will, native born and immigrant citizens alike--all because the Bush administration had identified, out of the 12,000 people working at those Swift plants, 133 who were suspected of identity theft.

It's the story of misplaced priorities on national security. As Senator John Kerry, who spoke at a Commission hearing in Massachusetts, said of a raid there:

On March 6th of 2007, of all the dangers that were lurking in America...of all the threats being assessed by the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI, apparently, on that day, none were more insidious or challenging to us, or more menacing, than several hundred people, mostly women, in New Bedford who were making backpacks for the U.S. Army.


FULL story at link.