BAJI BLOG

Celebrate Black History Month: Read The Warmth of Other Suns

2012-01-30T06:06:00.000-08:00

February is Black History Month, and to celebrate Drop the I-Word and BAJI, are partnering and invite members of our communities to join us as we read Isabel Wilkerson's monumental book, The Warmth of Other Suns.

The book, newly available in paperback, chronicles the Great Migration, in which some six million black people migrated to cities in the north and west from the south's Jim Crow caste system between 1915 and 1970.

Current anti-immigrant rhetoric hinges upon dividing communities of color and explicitly pitting African Americans with roots in the south, against migrants today. It's important that we build bridges and continue to foster respect and knowledge about one another's experiences.

How to join in:

Buy The Warmth of Other Suns on Amazon or Indiebound for yourself and as a gift for loved ones.
Download the Discussion Guide for great topics and thought-provoking questions.
Like our Facebook page, where we'll be asking questions and guiding a discussion about the book.
Visit the Drop the I-Word blog each Wednesday in February to join in the conversation on key questions about the book.

About her book, The Warmth of Other Suns, Ms. Wilkerson told Colorlines.com:

"This book is not just about black people leaving the South, it's about the yearning of anybody who wants to make a life-altering change for something better, for which there's no guarantee of the outcome. I'm hoping that if nothing else, people take that from this book--that they will see that we're all, in this case, Americans seeking the American dream, and African Americans are no different from that. They all shared the desire, when they were participants in the Great Migration, of the immigrant heart--of someone leaving the only place they've ever known, for a place they've never seen, with no guarantees."

AFRICAN-AMERICAN LEADERS CALL FOR THE RESIGNATION OF SHERIFF JOE ARPAIO

2011-12-29T11:28:00.000-08:00

AFRICAN-AMERICANLEADERS CALL FOR

THE RESIGNATION OFSHERIFF JOE ARPAIO

African-American Leaders Respond to FindingsShowing Pattern or Practice of Wide-ranging Discrimination Against Latinos andRetaliatory Actions Against Individuals Who Criticized MCSO Activities

“Injusticeanywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapablenetwork of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects onedirectly, affects all indirectly.” Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in Letterfrom Birmingham Jail, 1963

PHOENIX,AZ – After reading thePress Release of the Department of Justice titled, “DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICERELEASES INVESTIGATIVE FINDINGS ON THE MARICOPA COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE,” datedDecember 15, 2011 and reading the letter from Assistant Attorney General ThomasE. Perez dated December 15, 2011 to Mr. Bill Montgomery, Maricopa CountyAttorney, African-American leaders unite with other justice-loving citizens andorganizations calling for the resignation of Sheriff Joseph M. Arpaio.

During a meeting with AssistantAttorney General Perez, as he briefed a diverse group of community leaders onthe afternoon of December 15, 2011, Dr. Warren H. Stewart, Sr., Senior Pastorof the First Institutional Baptist Church, Phoenix, Arizona, made the followingremarks, “This Department of Justice Press Release is like déjà vu. Fifty years ago this was happening to African-Americansall over the country and especially in the Deep South. All we have to do is to substituteAfrican-Americans for Latinos in this document and it reminds us of how Blackswere treated during the Civil Rights Movement era (and often continue to beprejudged because of skin color even today). . . . Those of us who believe injustice and the Constitution of the United States of America will not besilent. We must call for theSheriff’s resignation. We must speakto the powers that be, the Maricopa County Supervisors, and put pressure on themthat the Sheriff needs to go. Thisdocument is proof that we have become the Alabama of the 21^stcentury. It’s like Sheriff BullConnor has come to Arizona.”

According to the findings of theDepartment of Justice, Assistant Attorney General Perez remarked, “ . . . thisis the worst case of racial profiling seen in the U.S. in the last 40 years.” Therefore, we call for the resignation ofSheriff Joe Arpaio. We will not besilent! Although the Department of Justice plans to work with the MCSO tofix the unjust practices and problems existing in that office, we do not feelthat the problems noted in the findings of discriminatory policing, unlawfulretaliation and discriminatory jail practices can be corrected with SheriffArpaio remaining at the helm of the MCSO. He has been the unapologetic,“in-your-face” perpetrator of mean-spirited actions and attacks on members ofthe Latino community far too long. He has become a malignant cancer that must be removed if the bodypolitic of the MCSO is to ever become healthy and properly functioning again.

Millions of taxpayer dollars have beenwasted as a direct consequence of Sheriff Arpaio’s unfair, vindictive, arrogantattitudes and actions violating human and civil rights. Moreover, Arpaio’s victims have been fellow human beings created in theimage and likeness of God, regardless of their skin color, language ofpreference and national origin.

Consequently,we, African-American leaders, in the spirit of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. andCesar Chavez, join our Latino brothers and sisters, and persons of every race,ethnicity, creed, color, class and political persuasion who believe that we are“one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all” incalling for Sheriff Joseph M. Arpaio to resign.

CommunityLeaders Support List

Dr.Warren H. Stewart, Sr., Senior Pastor, First Institutional Baptist Church

WilbertNelson, State President, National Association for the Advancement of ColoredPeople (NAACP)

TheReverend Oscar Tillman, President, Maricopa County Branch of NationalAssociation for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)

PhoenixCity Councilman Michael Johnson

HenryM. Wade, Arizona Association of Real Estate Brokers

GeorgeDean, Executive Director, Greater Phoenix Urban League

PastorJames N. Harris, Jr., Moderator, Central District Missionary BaptistAssociation

ClovesC. Campbell, Jr., Arizona Informant Newspaper, Former State Legislator

MichaelBerry, National Association of Minority Contractors

FormerPhoenix City Councilman Calvin C. Goode

SenatorLeah Landrum Taylor, Arizona State Legislature

GeneBlue, Arizona Opportunities Industrialization Center

MelHannah, Chairman, African American Legislative and Leadership Council

BishopHenry L. Barnwell, Full Gospel International Fellowship

BishopHarvey T. Young, Arizona Churches of God in Christ

PastorJames N. Preston, Bethesda Community Baptist Church

SuperintendentFelton King, Emmanuel Church of God in Christ

PastorAubrey L. Barnwell, Senior Pastor, First New Life Missionary Baptist Church

BobBoyd, Chairman, Combined Fraternal Organization of South Phoenix

OpalTometi, National Organizer, Black Alliance for Just Immigration

Dr.George Brooks, Jr.

TonyaNorwood, Community Leader

GailG. Knight, Community Leader

MichaelWilliams, Educator

This week's Drop the I-Word Friday Friend is BAJI,

2011-12-16T13:42:00.000-08:00

Original post from Colorlines.com

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI) is an education and advocacy group comprised of African Americans and black immigrants from Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. BAJI's analysis emphasizes the impact of racism and economic globalization on African American and immigrant communities as a basis for forging alliances across these communities. BAJI is an endorser and great supporter of the Drop the I-Word Campaign.

Read Along with BAJI and Drop the I-Word

From December through February, Drop the I-Word will partner with BAJI and invite members of

our communities to read Isabel Wilkerson's monumental book, The Warmth of Other Suns. The book, newly available in paperback, chronicles the Great Migration, in which some six million black people migrated to cities in the north and west from the south's Jim Crow caste system between 1915 and 1970. Ms. Wilkerson told Colorlines.com:

"This book is not just about black people leaving the South, it's about the yearning of anybody who wants to make a life-altering change for something better, for which there's no guarantee of the outcome. I'm hoping that if nothing else, people take that from this book--that they will see that we're all, in this case, Americans seeking the American dream, and African Americans are no different from that. They all shared the desire, when they were participants in the Great Migration, of the immigrant heart--of someone leaving the only place they've ever known, for a place they've never seen, with no guarantees."

This is an exciting way to get involved in Drop the I-Word. Start now by buying The Warmth of Other Suns on Amazon or Indiebound for yourself and as a gift for loved ones. Then in January and February join Drop the I-Word and BAJI in the conversation on immigration. We will be offering opportunities on our website, blog, Facebook and Twitter to discuss.

We are looking forward to this project and are grateful to our Friday Friend BAJI for supporting Drop the I-Word and elevating the conversation about migration.

A New Day in Alabama

2011-12-16T10:51:00.000-08:00

Post by Opal Tometi, BAJI National Organizer

Last month I went to Alabama twice. As an organizer born andraised in Arizona – watching hateful SB 1070 copycat legislation spread throughout the US has been painful. Myself andmany other community members and allies throughout the nation organized tirelesslyto repeal SB 1070. And our work is still far from over. Now with copycat legislationsuch as Alabama’s HB 56 and Georgia’s HB 87 I know that we must be morevigilant than ever. And that’s why when NDLON invited me to join them and 50other organizers for a grassroots movement building training – the folks of BAJI said,“YES!” – because we’ve always known that whenthe fight for immigrant rights came to the south – African Americans wouldnot only be strategic allies for immigrants, but it also means that we too would befacing a nuanced threat to civil rights gains (suchas voter suppression) – and would need allies to fight with us as well.

This was my first time visiting Alabama and so I packed my scheduled tight not knowing that I'd be invited to return 10 days later. My week and was filled with lots ofactivities including meeting with community groups, activists, leaders, andgiving a presentation to Greater Birmingham Ministries and facilitating a workshopon Cross-Racialalliance building with new and seasoned community organizers, from Alabama,Tennessee, New Orleans, Florida and Georgia. This convening which the National Day Laborer OrganizingNetwork (NDLON) hosted was incredible and I’m certain those who were thereare those will change the course of history. The courage I witnessed,especially by those who don't have "documents" and have decided to fight for their right to remain in Alabama, and fight for their children’s future and their own dignity – leftme forever humbled.

As a child of immigrants from Nigeria I know the kind ofuncertainty and questions that parents must grapple with when making lifechanging decisions that may impact one’s family. However, Ialso know that there is a lot of joy and laughter that still can be found in thesemoments. And this was the case at the NDLON convening.

BAJI training with NAACP in Athens, Alabama

As a student of civil rights history I knew going to Alabama would have aprofound impact on me. A place with rich history and a legacy of resistinginjustice – I just knew that there was much that African American communitymembers would have to say about the kind of repression we are seeing at thehands of laws like HB 56. And they did. Many of the African Americans I metshared their personal accounts of civil rights struggle as well as familymembers migration to the North. This story of African migration (i.e. the GreatMigration) resonated with so many I spoke with that I shared a film at theNDLON convening called Up South African-AmericanMigration in the Era of the Great War so that Spanish speaking migrantscould have a better idea of the themes of history that they may find themselvesin. As well as find a new sense of empathy and connection with AfricanAmericans.

My second trip about a week later was focused around trainingsfor African American communities. I participated in a LeadershipSummit as a session facilitator at convened by Alabama New South Coalition,Greater Birmingham Ministries, AlabamaArise, Alabama AFL-CIO, AlabamaNAACP, and many others. The following day at the invitation of the NAACP Ifacilitated a 3-hour workshop about race, immigration ad globalization withover 20 NAACP branch leaders. Itwas phenomenal. Everyone truly understood the urgency of the time and currentcrisis and were certain that ‘the did not want history to repeat itself’. Manyof the participants were at the launch of RepealHB 56 campaign – the following day. The launch of Repeal HB 56campaign – which was held at the Historic 16^th Baptist Church,but preceded by congressionaltestimonies and smaller gatherings.

Launch of Repeal HB 56 Campaign - 16th Street Baptist Church

Black communities throughout the U.S. are taking note and joining the fight against anti-immigrant laws that legitimize hate and promote racial profiling. TheAFL-CIO even sent a black labor delegation to hear testimonies in Alabama. And evenwhile I was there I met many emerging student leaders and institutional advocates such as NAACP who’re committed to fighting for justice and repealing HB 56.

We at BAJI plan to return with more of our members inFebruary. We’ll help with the legislative push as well as with trainings tocontinue building a movement.

Lessons Learned from the Recall of Arizona State Senator Russell Pearce

2011-12-02T12:46:00.001-08:00

Post by Ahamad Daniels, BAJI Phoenix Committee, Transformation Facilitator and Life Coach

In the event you might have been living on another planetover the last year or so and the name Russell Pearce fails to resonate, sufficeit to say Arizona’s State Senator Russell Pearce is the chief architect ofSB1070, legislation that requires law enforcement to determine the immigrationstatus of anyone pulled over, detained or arrested if there is “reasonablesuspicion” that person is the country illegally. Many aspects of the law are onhold as the Obama administration fights it in court. As the election resultsnow stand, Republican Jerry Lewis will represent District 18. As for Pearce, hewill shoulder the dubious distinction of being the first sitting Senatepresident and the first Arizona legislator to lose a recall election.

Anti-immigrantextremism

“Anti-immigrant extremism is a political loser,” accordingto Frank Sharry, executive director of America’s Voice. “It mobilizes Latinovoters who want acceptance and respect, and it angers sensible Republicans,independents and Democrats who want their leaders to focus on bread-and-butterissues, not hot-button cultural issues.” And if Arizona is known for anything(with the possible exception of being the state that doggedly fought the Dr.Martin L. King, Jr. holiday) it is known for its stringent approach toimmigration. It has been Arizona’s approach to immigration that gave rise toThe Real Arizona Coalition. A group of organizations and individuals determinedto return Arizona “to the state they all love.” The Coalition’s approach was to facilitate a series of whatcame to be called, Arizona Immigration Solutions Conference.

Solutions conferences

"The goal of the conferences is to encouragepolicymakers to work from a solid base of facts and begin a seriouscommunity-wide discussion about the best ways to address this important issue,”said Todd Landfried, spokesman for Arizona Employers for Immigration Reform. “Theseconferences are not about whether employer sanctions or SB1070 are good or badlaws, it’s about whether they’re working. Making sure that our tax dollars arespent wisely and effectively is a fair expectation for citizens to demand oftheir government.” Well attended conferenceswere held in Phoenix, Prescott, Tucson, Mesa, and Yuma. Panel participants ranthe gamut from farmers who have felt the negative economic impact of SB1070 toa VP of the Salt Lake City Chamber of Commerce. For more information on theseconferences visit the Coalition’s website at

www.azeir.org/aisc/ .

Blacks are absent

The fact that few African Americans attended theseconferences is indicative of the glacial pace taken by many Blacks to identifywith the immigration movement. It is not unheard of to hear Blacks moaning,“They are taking our jobs!” “They,” of course are those coming across thesouthern border from Mexico.

It was not all that long ago Blacks were the “immigrants”accused of taking jobs from whites. Migratory routes that led to Detroit,Chicago, and New York found Blacks competing for jobs traditionally enjoyed bywhites. A willingness to work for less pay made Black labor more appealing to employers; all to thechagrin of white workers who found ways to let newly arriving Blacks know theywere not welcome; a far cry from the welcoming mat that was rolled out duringthe Maafa (enslavement).

Mexico to the rescue

Among the many provisions of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 was the lawthat required Blacks, who had escaped from their place of enslavement and foundthemselves in free states, to be returned to their captives; making itvirtually impossible for any enslaved Black man or woman to feel safe knowingthat at any moment a bounty hunter could capture and re-enslave them. A littleknow fact is that the Mexican government opened its borders to all escapedBlacks who were fortunate enough to find their way to Mexico.

Lessons learned

It has been said freedom is a constant struggle. Once attained, one canill-afford to sit back and enjoy its fruits without maintaining constantvigilance. The rights achieved by Blacks during Reconstruction were quicklydiminished with the arrival of the Rutherford B. Hayes Compromise of 1877,federal troops were pulled out of the South and the protection Blacks hadbecome accustomed to was no more. The Plessyv Ferguson Supreme Court decision of 1896 made “separate but equal” law andfurther contributed to the eviscerating of civil and human rights; de factorights that would not be fully attained again until the Civil Rights Acts of1964 and 1965.

The recalling of Senator Russell Pearce provides an opportunity forBlacks, Chicanos, and others who profess to love justice to sit down togetherand further assess what the individual and collective implications are. Such adiscussion should include a review of what our common interests are and what itwill take to realize them. It was the great Abolitionist Frederick Douglass whoadmonished, “Talking doesn’t solve all problems, but no problems can be solvedunless there is first some talking.”

Fighting against ICE's so-called "Secure Communities"

2011-11-03T17:47:00.000-07:00

It has been a year since BAJI's been involved in actions against S-Comm in Alameda County, and it has been a busy year!

BAJI, in coalition with organizations like, NNIRR, Causa Justa, MUA, CIPC, Interfaith Organizers, EBASE have held three community forums this year to educate Alameda County about S-Comm as well as a brown bag, for community organizers. We've worked with SFIRDC, to push for The Trust Act (AB 1081), a bill that would regulate S-Comm’s reach into our communities. And we have assisted in the formation of ACUDIR (Alameda County United in Defense of Immigrant Rights), a coalition dedicated to fighting for the rights of immigrants and against the criminalization of communities of color in Alameda County.

Photo Courtesy of DRUM NYC

S-Comm is important, because it is another connection between African American communities and immigrant communities. BAJI will continue to educate the Bay Area, about links between the prison industrial complex, the school to prison pipeline and immigration detention and policy. And we will connect community members to leaders who are working to change this!

Download our African Americans say No to S-COMM flier here.

Women & Migration - Building Bridges Between Black and Brown Communities

2011-11-03T17:38:00.001-07:00

BAJI, The Latina Center, Black Women Organized for Political Action (BWOPA), the City of Richmond Human Rights/Human Relations Commission, and the Neighborhood House of North Richmond are collaborating to organize a series of dialogues to address the tensions that exist between the Black and Latino communities. The first session called “Building Bridges Between Black and Brown Communities” took place on June 25. The second gathering was held on October 29. Building Bridges is a safe space for the healing and empowerment of women as agents of social change in their communities.

You can read the Richmond Progressive Alliance’s account of the June 25 gathering at: http://www.richmondprogressivealliance.net/Issues/OneRichmond.html#BBD-June11

BAJI Statement - In Support of Occupy Oakland and Occupy Wall Street

2011-11-02T05:38:00.000-07:00

Statement ofthe Black Alliance for Just Immigration

In Support ofOccupy Oakland and Occupy Wall Street

Theworld spotlight is on Oakland, California, a city that has historically beenrecognized for its strong resistance to injustice. From the Black Panther Party, to the Bay Area Free SouthAfrica Movement, to the Justice for Oscar Grant Committee, the people ofOakland and the Bay Area have stood on the right side of history time and timeagain. Today, as the OccupyOakland movement brings international attention to our city, the social justicemovement continues to be led by grassroots communities who have stood theirground against economic exploitation and police brutality.

TheBlack Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI), as an organization founded onracial equity, immigrant rights and economic justice, categorically condemnsthe forced removal of and police brutality perpetrated against Occupy Oaklandactivists. The Administration of Mayor Jean Quan, the first female Asian mayorof a major city in the U.S., elected with support from the diverse progressivemovement, has failed the people of Oakland.

Wesupport the Occupy Oakland movement and the Occupy Wall Street movement’sdemand for economic justice and endorse the occupation of public spaces to callattention to the gross inequalities in U.S. society. We condemn not only the growing national income inequalitybut also the racial inequality that leaves black and brown communities inpersistent poverty, with at least twice the unemployment rate as the generalpopulation. We denounce thescapegoating of African Americans, Latinos and immigrants of color, who make upa disproportionate share of the 99% living in poverty, for the economic crisiscaused by the banks and Wall Street.

Wecall upon the City of Oakland to cease all actions against the occupiers of OscarGrant Plaza (Frank Ogawa Plaza) as they use the public space to exercise theirrights of free speech and expression. We urge the Oakland Police rank and file to resist following orders thatperpetrate brutality and force against peaceful protesters.

Wecall upon progressive individuals and organizations, Labor unions and labororganizations, churches, synagogues and mosques, and all peace loving people tokeep the pressure up. OccupyEverywhere!

Occupy Wall Street!

Occupythe banks—Wells Fargo, Bank of America, CitiBank and other financialinstitutions—to demand the end to home foreclosures and investments inimmigrant detention centers. Boycott the Banks!

Occupy Washington!

Marchon Washington and occupy Congress to demand a public works program that createsliving wage jobs to repair our crumbling infrastructure and transform ouroil-dependent economy to a green economy. Demand that Washington tax the rich, restore the social safety net, andregulate financial institutions and big corporations.

Occupy Oakland and all U.S. cities!

Demandthat local and state governments stop the cutbacks in services and educationand tax the rich to pay for them. Demand an end to attacks on Occupy WallStreet movement and the end to police brutality. Support and encourage the economic localization movement thatdisconnects the stranglehold that the Central Bank and predatory global capitalismhas on our communities. Supportmunicipal ID cards that will better integrate undocumented immigrants intoOakland’s diverse community and will benefit small businesses through a locale-currency that circulates the earnings of a city’s residents within the citywithout any portion being siphoned off by the national corporations and the bigbanks.

BAJI heads to Georgia!

2011-10-27T09:54:00.000-07:00

Post by Opal Tometi, BAJI National Organizer

This summer wastumultuous for the migrant justice movement. As BAJI and allies across thenation took note and organized against a myriad of anti-immigrant legislation,policies and other attacks to racial justice and gains of the civil rightsstruggle – we realized that states in the south were under specific attack.

Georgia – historicallyimportant city for many reasons including its prominence in the civil rightsmovement and contemporary politics was a glaring flag for BAJI staff andmembers. We knew instinctivelythat when HB 87 passed in Georgia that we must respond.

And so we did – sending2 of our staff members to Georgia. BAJI Senior Organizer, Phil Hutchings, aveteran of the civil rights movement, SNCC and actively involved in severalcutting edge human rights movements and me, Opal Tometi, a Nigerian born andraised in Phoenix, Arizona who has been active in the migrant rights struggleand stop-violence against women movement for years.

We are grateful to haveconnected with several phenomenal individuals and organizations that are doingtremendous work in Georgia. Some who have been established for decades andothers more recently formed. We know that we didn’t know everything, but foundthat there are several who are working diligently to find solutions toGeorgia’s most pressing human rights infractions and social ills.

Of note we found peopleorganizing for justice for immigrants, people who were concerned aboutre-districting which if done incorrectly/immorally will further disenfranchisecommunities of color. This is of grave importance to note because Georgia is enroute to becoming a majority ‘people of color’ state. The demographics areshifting and there are those in power who have taken note and are working toensure their power.

The migrant justicegroups we met with were recently working on fighting the deportation of a SouthAfrican man who if deported may face death from opposition forces in SouthAfrica, others had been fighting a federal program called “Secure Communities”which is in fact a misnomer and essentially encourages racial profiling and makeslocal police share fingerprints with national immigration irrespective of the reasonsomeone Is incarcerated. Other elected officials and civil rights groups weregrappling with the fact that some state officials were calling for parolees totake the unfilled jobs in fields that that were usually held by migrant daylaborers.

We plan to go back toGeorgia and continue to learn, build relationships,and assist in racial justice and immigrant rights organizing efforts. We’ll besure to keep our friends and allies posted as we continue to build in the South.

Black Belt Power: African-Americans come back South, change political landscape

2011-09-28T21:00:00.000-07:00

Original post by Institute for Southern Studies

Much of the media buzz about the 2010 Census has focused on the role of Latinos and new immigrants in changing the face of the country.

It makes sense: According to the U.S. Census Bureau, about half of the nation's growth over the last decade was driven by growth in the Latino community, much of it in Southern states.
But equally influential in the South's rapidly-changing demographics is another story with a longer historical arc: The return of many African-Americans to Southern states after a decades-long exodus during the Jim Crow era.

The Great Migration of some 6 million African-Americans from the South from between World War I and 1970 is one of the most significant demographic upheavals in U.S. history. According to author Isabel Wilkerson, at the turn of the century 90 percent of all African-Americans were living in the South. By the end of the Great Migration, nearly half were living outside the South, mostly in the cities of the North and West.

The civil rights movement didn't end racism, of course, but it did change the South enough to entice many African-Americans to come back, igniting a reverse migration movement that continues to gain steam.

The result: According to the U.S. Census, the South's share of the black population -- 57 percent -- is now the highest it's been since 1960.* That's still less than the 90 percent mark before the Great Migration, but as the New York Times reported earlier this year, it's a dramatic change:
During the turbulent 1960s, black population growth ground to a halt in the South, and Southern states claimed less than 10 percent of the national increase then. The South has increasingly claimed a greater share of black population growth since -- about half the country's total in the 1970s, two-thirds in the 1990s and three-quarters in the decade that just ended.

The shift could significantly strengthen the political power of African-Americans in the South, especially in the historic Black Belt stretching from the mid-Atlantic to east Texas. Here's a map showing where the South's growing African-American communities are concentrated, according to the latest Census data:

A glimpse of the political force this represents was a href="http://www.southernstudies.org/2008/11/a-new-south-rising.html">seen in 2008, when record-breaking African-American turnout helped push Florida, North Carolina and Virginia into blue territory.
It's also seen in Georgia, the epicenter of the Black Belt, where the African-American community grew by more than 579,000 since 2000 -- the leading ingredient in making it the seventh-fastest growing state in the country.

The 2010 Census also offers a glimpse of how Southern African-American communities are changing. Atlanta echoes a trend found across the South and country, where suburban black neighborhoods are growing at the expense of the urban core. The New York Times notes that "just 2 percent of the black population growth in the last decade occurred in counties that have traditionally been black population centers."

African-Americans moving South also tend to be young: 40 percent of those moving to Southern states in the 2010 Census count were ages 21 to 40. Meaning that the political force of the latest phase of African-American reverse-migration South will be felt for years to come.

* The U.S. Census definition of "the South" includes Alabama, Arkansas, D.C., Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and West Virginia. The Institute for Southern Studies typically does not include DC, DE, MD and OK in its definition.

Watch the new Restore Fairness documentary, “Checkpoint Nation? Building Community Across Borders”

2011-09-09T14:48:00.000-07:00

Originally posted by Restore Fairness Blog

Early one morning, Maria—then nine months pregnant—and her family were stopped by the police for no discernible reason. A special breakfast outing became a nightmare—and at one of the most intimate moments of her life, Maria found a team of immigration agents—not her husband—by her side.
Maria’s chilling story, which Breakthrough captured on a trip to the Mexico/Arizona border, is the centerpiece of “Checkpoint Nation? Building Community Across Borders,” a powerful new documentary that depicts the reality of post-9/11 racial profiling — as mandated by laws such as SB 1070 in Arizona, which are now being imitated and implemented nationwide — along with the new and strengthening alliances of diverse groups committed to racial justice.
Set in the U.S./Mexico border area near Tucson, Arizona, a region that sees more and more migrant deaths every year, the video explores the idea that the way to move forward is to find connections and build coalitions among between diverse groups of allies — including Muslim-, South Asian-, African-, and Latino-Americans; civil rights lawyers and media activists — that have identified with each other’s histories and united in the common goals of justice, equality, and respect for all.
“Checkpoint Nation?” was produced to complement the release of a new report and Week of Action around the 10th anniversary of September 11th spearheaded by Rights Working Group, a national coalition of more than 300 civil liberties, national security, immigrant rights and human rights organizations committed to restoring due process and human rights protections that have been eroded in the name of national security. The report, “Reclaiming Our Rights: Reflections on Racial Profiling in a Post-9/11 America,” will be released September 14th.
The groups that are featured in the video are ACLU of Arizona, Alliance for Educational Justice, Black Alliance for Just Immigration, Derechos Humanos, DRUM (Desis Rising Up and Moving), Funding Exchange, VAMOS Unidos
Denying fairness and justice to some puts all of our freedoms at risk. Ten years after September 11th, we must challenge ourselves to unite across our differences and reaffirm the real American values of pluralism, democracy, and dignity for all.
Watch the video and take action to stop racial profiling in your community.

Border Justice Delegation Prt. 3

2011-08-30T14:13:00.000-07:00

The final days of the delegation consisted of us traveling across the border and visiting a Comedor, which aids migrants crossing, by providing a hot meal, a phone and a roof. We crossed the enormous wall that continues to be built “dividing” Mexico and Arizona. We were searched trying to ENTER Mexico, not the US, as well as several miles away from the border, in the middle of the desert. I felt like I could be in a post-apocalyptic movie or the Occupied Territories.

By far, the most moving experience was listening to the Promotoras speak. The Promotoras, a group of organizer with Derechos Humanos were kind enough to wait for us despite out late arrival, due to a tire blow out. We heard from a woman whose husband and children were detained, while she was forced to give birth in the presence of ICE agents. After delivering she was given 10 days to recover and was deported with her new born, but she returned for her children. With a new born, this brave woman crossed the desert in seven days, to be reunited with her family. It made me ask myself, what parent would not do that? My parents would.

On the last day of the delegation, we visited the Tohono O’odham nation. There I saw how indigenous and desert customs are being destroyed. As mentioned in an earlier blog, the land of the Tohono O’odham spans across Arizona and Sonora, Mexico, and because of this the area is full of border patrol both on the border and further into Arizona. Indigenous people, by participating in traditional and everyday activities are subject to harassment and detention. What would you do if saw an elder and a child walking in an isolated desert? Would you offer them a ride? It is traditional for people living in isolated, harsh environment, especially desert to show hospitality to visitors. This hospitality can save lives, and is very important.

Now in Arizona, if you offer someone a ride out of the cold, rain or desert, you are subject to arrest. We learned of a woman who picked up two gentlemen in the middle of the night, in winter. She drove them to the nearest gas station and got them coffee. Unfortunately, a Border Patrol agent saw her and her vehicle was taken.

When are we going to make human life a priority? Why do we excuse abuse, discrimination, exploitation? We need to wake up and realize that what has, and is happening to us, is happening to others. Once we remember our history and join with immigrants, Mexican, Muslim, Nigerian, Haitian, then we will achieve community and freedom.

The same people, ideas, corporations, and justification that have been and continue to oppress African Americans and immigrants of color alike. I challenge African Americans to remember what they were taught, or do some research, or contact BAJI and learn about how you can connect with immigrants of color coming to the United States, and immigrants crossing the Border.

Border Justice Delegation Prt. 2

2011-08-30T13:53:00.000-07:00

The second day opened with presentation by Raquel Rubio-Goldsmith from the University of Arizona, Binational Migration Institute, explained further how border has become land of impunity. She spoke of the Tohono O’odham nation and the migration history of the people who live on this land. The Tohono O’odham nation spans across the Arizona and Mexico Border, and indigenous people find themselves subject to harassment, arrest and detention. For generations, the harvest has driven people to migrate across the border. For the harvest, people have always migrated across this “border”.

We saw first-hand, the impact of border policy when we visited the Office of the Medical Examiner for Pima County, where the remains of nearly roughly 200 migrants are processed each year. People commonly die from exposure, heat stroke, drowning, and injury. Nothing hit you more once you see these bodies. What happened and ends up of people’s mother, father, brother, sister, child. I commend Pima County for being the only county on the broader willing to process the remains of migrants and work with relevant consulate to identify them and notify family members.

The day continued with a visit to the Federal Courthouse to see Operation Streamline in action:

Operation Streamline is a Bush Administration program implemented in 2005 ordering federal criminal charges for every person who crosses the border illegally. In other words, it is a “zero tolerance” border enforcement program that targets even first time undocumented border-crossers. Instead of routing non-violent individuals caught crossing the border into civil deportation proceedings, Operation Streamline forces undocumented migrants through the federal criminal justice executed for misdemeanors punishable by up to 6 months in prison, and those who reenter after deportation may be prosecuted for felonies punishable by up to 20 years in prison. Under this fast-track program, a federal criminal case with prison and deportation consequences is resolved in 2 Operation Streamline is a Buys or less. “OPERATION STREAMLINE FACT SHEET July 21, 2009” ACLU and National Immigration Forum.

As fellow delegates mentioned, it is easy to look in this courtroom and think of slave auctions. 48 men and 2 women were shackled from wrist, to waist, to ankle. They were called by name and number and asked a series of arbitrary questions to look like justice was being served.

Beside the process being more theatrical than judicial, I was heartbroken to know that these
people endured desert heat, starvation, dehydration and border patrol, to then be put in chains, jailed and deported.

Border Justice Delegation Prt. 1

2011-08-30T10:07:00.000-07:00

Global events and economic policies have lead to increased migration globally. And the United States government has responded with militarization and low intensity warfare, in the guise of safety, security and management. And as a result, too many people are subject to punishment, exploitation and death. People crossing the Mexico/Arizona border encounter fences, hate crime, and the harsh desert because of lies perpetuated by the Department of Homeland Security, ICE and Border Patrol.

Working with the Black Alliance for Just Immigration, I can connect the suffering of African Americans to immigrants of color in the United States. But on August 11, 2011 I attended a Border I attended a Border Solidarity Delegation with DRUM and Vamos Unidos, with the aim of making concrete connections between the experiences of migrants crossing the US/Mexico Border to runaway slaves in the Underground Railroad. These crimes against humanity have similarities:

aid was given to runaway slaves by abolitionists, free slaves and slaves alike
aid if given to migrant by concerned individuals, organizations, and former migrants and their family.
runaway slaves had to cross of number of natural barriers, travelling in winter, mountains, rivers, suicide and avoiding slave catchers
migrants crossing the US/Mexico Border face similar struggles like, and many die due to exposure to the elements, suicide, border patrol agents, and injury.
Slaves and immigrants were and are the result of a global economy, and a global economic policy
Runaway developed networks and codes to navigate their journey and identify allies, migrants crossing the border have to do this today.

I was excited to join this delegation and see firsthand how these connections can be made, and who would help me make them.

After a long day of travel, I arrived at our delegation orientation. I met an amazing group of activists from New York, Phoenix, with DRUM (Desis Rising Up and Moving www.drumnation.org), Vamos Unidos (vamosunidos.org), and Alliance for Educational Justice (www.allianceforeducationaljustice.org), the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona (acluaz.org, ACLU) and Derechos Humanos (www.derechoshumanosaz.net). We introduced ourselves and shared our knowledge of the Border issues, what we hoped to learn and bring back from this experience. A theme emerged that was restated throughout the trip was education and solidarity. WE want to share issues on the Border with South Asian, Muslim, African American and student communities, in an effort to build solidarity in this movement. I believe everyone on this delegation believes that militarization and criminalization will not stop at the Border, but will and has moved into our respective communities.
Isabel Garcia, with Derechos Humanos then gave a brief presentation on the history of the Arizona/Mexico Border. She reiterated that these crimes against humanity have always taken place. She gave a historical, economic, political analysis of immigration in the country, focusing on Arizona. One can see, S-Comm., AB 1070, and E-Verify are not isolated policies. There are people, politicians and corporations tied to these decisions.

After our orientation I spoke briefly with Mary-Hope... African American ACLU is a part of the BAJI Advisory Committee in Phoenix. She shared with me, that she walked the migrant trail on the US/Mexico Border. And one night camping under the stars, she noticed the Big Dipper, and immediately she thought of the Underground Railroad. We share the same planet; we are the same species, being subject to the same Draconian laws. These connections have to be made. African Americans must see them and come to the conclusion that our liberty is bound in the liberty of others.

Black Foreign-Born Workers Have Highest Jobless Rate

2011-08-08T13:18:00.000-07:00

Original post by James Parks for AFL-CIO Blog

A new study dispels the myth that immigrant workers are taking good-paying jobs away from American-born workers. According to “The Low Wages of Black Immigrants,” released last week by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), black workers, whether they were born in the United States or in a foreign country, have the highest unemployment rate, period.

In the United States, the black unemployment rate in July was 15.9 percent, compared with an overall rate of 9.1 percent. The 12.4 percent jobless rate among black immigrant workers last year was slightly higher than for Hispanic immigrants (11.3 percent) and significantly higher than for white (7.4 percent) and Asian immigrants (7.3 percent).

At the same time, black workers, whether native-born or immigrant, earn significantly less than white workers, the report shows. This is especially true for men. U.S.-born black men earn 19.1 percent less than white men while black immigrant men from English-speaking Caribbean countries earn 20.7 percent less. Haitian men (33.8 percent less) and African men (34.7 percent less) do substantially worse than any other group.

All groups of black women have lower weekly wages than similar U.S.-born white women, but the size of the wage gaps is smaller for women than it is for men.

The report’s co-authors, Patrick Mason, economics professor at Florida State University, and Algernon Austin, director of EPI’s Race, Ethnicity and the Economy program, point out that it’s not a matter of education that cretaes the job and wage gap for blacks. In 2008, more than one-third of African immigrants (36.6 percent) had at least a bachelor’s degree, compared with 29.5 percent of whites. A higher percentage of native-born blacks (32 percent) had high school education than whites (30 percent), according to the study.

The EPI study follows a U.S. Labor Department report released last month that shows African Americans lag behind the rest of the nation in the slow economic recovery. Other studies show that blacks are disproportionately hurt by cuts in public employment and attacks on public workers.

Mason and Austin said their study makes it clear that:

because this disadvantage in the labor market affects both U.S.- and foreign-born blacks, it points to a problem that stems from race and not cultural background.

Read the full report, “The Low Wages of Black Immigrants,” here.

Pan African Women's Action Summit

2011-07-13T12:08:00.000-07:00

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI) and our sister organization, Priority Action Network (PAN) will be co-hosting a workshop at the Pan African Women's Action Summit on August 11th, 2011 in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

The Pan-African Women’s Action Summit (PAWAS) was created in 2005 to convene diverse black diaspora women to promote collaboration, networking, skill building, as well as personal health and wellness to strengthen the Pan-African Philanthropy Movement's capacity to impact the social and other issues that affect our communities.

Our workshop is entitled Beyond Us and Them: Sharing Our Stories, Healing Our Communities. Here's the workshop description:

It is a fact that the “black community” in this country is changing and is a lot more diverse than we assume. While the majority of the Black population is still African Americans – there are significant and increasing populations of Black immigrants that are adding challenging existing assumptions of the homogeneity in the “black.”

When then Senator Obama first announced his candidacy for the highest Presidency, much of the discussion among Black communities was the challenge in defining his identity. Clearly he is black and yet he is not of slave-ancestry; he was not “black enough” for some and too black for others. His identity as a man whose father is African, married to an African American made visible the profound need for race dialogue among diverse black communities. It also made visible both the commonalities and differences in the black community.

Statistics show that an estimated 5% of the Black population is made up of immigrants from Africa and another 12% of immigrants from the Caribbean. Yet, racial discourse is framed always within the black/white dichotomy and very little exists to have transnational conversations which bring race, culture, identity and history into our communities.

We at Priority Africa Network and the Black Alliance for Just Immigration have held several community dialogues that brought together diverse groups from Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean in the San Francisco/Bay Area. Lessons learned from these over the past five years have given insight into ways to bring much needed exchanges on the critical need to know one another’s history, to go beyond the assumptions of damaging stereotypes held on all sides.

This workshop will present one model on how to hold open and healing exchanges about the divisions that exist in the African diaspora community. As the number of Black immigrants increases in the coming decade, and there is increased visibility of the diversity of Black communities, the opportunity to learn and use these transformative ideas is critical. It will also highlight the role and power of diverse black women, and their allies, in building community across ethnic and racial lines.

On Jose Vargas and Real Immigration Stories

2011-07-05T13:43:00.000-07:00

Post by Renee Simms, BAJI Phoenix

Jose Vargas’s moving New York Times’ essay about how he came to the United States as a boy and how he has lived with the secret of his undocumented legal status is exactly the type of immigration story Americans should be telling. It’s a real story, about the personal decisions people make in order to have a better life. It’s not calculated political rhetoric like what we heard from Senator John McCain about immigrants starting wildfires in Arizona. It wasn’t a story intended to trigger fear or nationalism. Instead, Vargas’s essay was a story that we can all relate to since each of us, with the exception of indigenous Native Americans, is an immigrant to this country.

Each American has a story of how his or her family, for political and economic reasons, ended up away from an original homeland. We also have stories about our families’ migration within the United States. If I understand my family’s story of migration, I should be able to understand and sympathize with yours.

As a black woman, part of my migration history is the tale of my father who was born during the Great Depression in the Jim Crow south. He had seven brothers and sisters. His father left my grandmother to raise these eight children by herself. Because poverty, legislated racism and lynchings were accepted facts of life in the early 20^th century, my father left Atlanta, Georgia by train the very first chance that he got. Like millions of other blacks from 1915 to 1970, he moved to the urban north.

When my father arrived in Detroit in the 1950s, the city had a strong, post-war economy. By the 1980s when I was a teenager, Detroit was part of the declining industrial rustbelt and a community ravaged by the crack cocaine epidemic. The city that had attracted my father, would provide limited opportunities for me, and so in 1996, I moved west to Los Angeles, California.

I lived in L.A. during the second term of the Clinton presidency and the tech stock bubble. Many people were flush with cash during these years (or had access to easy loans) and a modest home in southern California could sell for $350,000 and upward. Because I was not flush with cash and couldn’t afford a home in California, I eventually migrated to the Southwest and then to the Pacific Northwest. My movement across the U.S. has been influenced by economic opportunities as well as cultural considerations like the racial attitudes within a community. I want to live in a place that is affordable, safe, that is tolerant of divergent viewpoints, that is ethnically diverse, and a place where I feel respected.

Immigration and migration have always been about our human search for a better life. That’s what Vargas’s essay makes clear and what this Times’ article about young blacks moving back to the south also makes clear. People will move to a place that promises a good life.

It’s in this spirit that the Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI) enters the immigration debate. BAJI seeks to raise awareness about the global economic systems and politics that force people to migrate in the first place. We know that immigration is not a small, national story about wildfires or workers who want to take American jobs. Immigration is a big, human rights story about economic opportunity, and the risks that people will take to attain that opportunity. The risks include separation from one’s family, crossing armed borders, or living in fear like Jose Vargas that someday you’ll be caught.

Black Immigrants Join the Debate

2011-05-26T16:02:00.000-07:00

Millions of African- and Caribbean-born people are missing from the immigration-reform conversation. A few of them tell The Root that they will not be shut out.

by Cynthia Gordon
Originally posted in the Root

On March 11, at a press conference on Capitol Hill, Tolu Olubunmi came out publicly as an undocumented immigrant for the first time.

"It's been nerve-racking because it puts me at a risk," the 30-year-old told The Root about her speech supporting Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin's (D-Ill.) reintroduction of the DREAM Act. The bill, which passed in the House last year but failed to clear the Senate, would provide a path to citizenship for undocumented youths like her, brought to the United States as children. "But I think you have to focus on the individuals to get away from the politics of an issue that's so divisive. Once you know that there are real people attached to the statistics, then you have to start working on real solutions."

Olubunmi, who was born in Nigeria, is also one of 3 million black immigrants in this country. Despite moving from Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America at a remarkable rate -- and despite an estimated 400,000 having undocumented status -- they are barely footnotes in an immigration-reform conversation that is usually framed as a Mexican-border issue. But in light of newer, smaller-but-growing communities, as well as recently granted protected status for Haitians in particular, black immigrants are becoming stronger voices, advocating for reform from their diverse perspectives.

Black Sojourners

According to a Population Reference Bureau report (pdf), about two-thirds of black immigrants to the U.S. are from the Caribbean and Latin America -- mostly Jamaica, Haiti and Trinidad -- with families that largely began settling in the United States from the 1960s through the '80s. More recently there's been a wave of African immigrants, with more arriving between 2000 and 2005 than in the previous decade. The top three countries from that continent are Nigeria, Ethiopia and Ghana.

Most black immigrants enter the United States legally, seeking education and job opportunities, either by joining immediate relatives who are U.S. citizens or by presenting student or tourist visas with an expiration date. Those who are undocumented often fall out of status by overstaying these visas.

As The Root noted in a previous article, Caribbean- and African-born blacks tend to be wealthier and more educated than other immigrants, a class difference that has kept many from joining Latinos in the immigration-reform movement. But in recent years, with more African and Caribbean people coming to the United States to flee political strife, civil violence and natural disasters, new groups are entering as refugees or asylum seekers. While only 3 percent of immigrants from Caribbean countries, mostly from Haiti, were admitted under the refugee category, nearly 30 percent of sub-Saharan Africans granted legal residence between 2000 and 2006 entered as refugees.

As these flows of people have come from countries like Somalia, Congo, Liberia and Haiti -- without the same educational resources allowing them to flourish -- many have run into trouble navigating a slow-moving and restrictive immigration system.

Who Gets In?

Although immigration from Africa and the Caribbean has grown rapidly over the past decade, having contributed to at least one-fifth of America's black population growth between 2000 and 2005 alone, there are anecdotal arguments that the process is infused with racism and works less efficiently for black people.

Sheryl Winarick, an immigration attorney in Washington, D.C., suggests that the largest hurdles for blacks in the immigration system, particularly those fleeing poverty or civil strife, usually arise from the economic situation in their countries. She explained that most visas require proof that an individual plans to return home after a temporary visit to the U.S.

"Anyone that's coming from a developing country has a harder time demonstrating their intent to just visit instead of staying permanently," she told The Root. "If you don't own a home or have a steady flow of income to go back to, then the government assumes you're more likely to want to stay here permanently and find work."

On the other hand, Phil Hutchings, an organizer with Oakland, Calif.'s Black Alliance for Just Immigration, which lobbies for immigrants' rights, believes that race is always in play. "It factors into whether you get through speedily or whether there's a lot of circumspection," he says.

"People who go against the norm of what Americans are 'supposed to look like' -- and that generally includes black people -- have more difficulty," he continues. "Also, a fair number of African immigrants are Muslim, putting them in a suspect category that makes it harder for them to come here."

An African Dreamer

For her part, Olubunmi says her challenges stemmed from a rigid policy that makes it impossible for undocumented immigrants to rectify their situation once they fall out of legal status. When she was 14, her mother brought her to Maryland from Nigeria to escape political instabilities. The plan was for her aunt, a U.S. citizen, to adopt her.

"The plan was never to be undocumented," she says, but the process hit a snag when her papers were filed late. It's a common mishap. "When you file your paperwork, officials could say that you missed a deadline by a week or two, but they don't actually respond to you for two or three years because of the backlog. People who are committed to doing the right thing get caught up, unbeknownst to them, in these basic flaws in the system. It's pretty easy to fall through the cracks."

Olubunmi graduated from high school at the top of her class and then from college, earning a chemical engineering degree. She anticipated filing her papers with a company that would hire her as an engineer, only to learn that she couldn't legally get a job. "The law says that if you're undocumented, you cannot adjust your status while living in the U.S.," she says. "I'd have to go to Nigeria to sort out the conflict; then, once I got there, it would trigger a three-to-10-year bar from returning to this country. But this is my home."

Since 2008, Olubunmi has volunteered with various advocacy organizations, working behind the scenes for comprehensive immigration reform and the DREAM Act in particular. "We're not asking for a free pass," she says, explaining that many would-be beneficiaries were brought over as babies or toddlers.

"People always say, 'Get in line.' Well, the DREAM Act creates a line," she says. "These students are saying that they will do whatever they have to, if it's going to college or serving in the military. They are just asking for an opportunity to prove themselves worthy of the country they love."

A Rising Haitian Voice

David Faustin, 45, says he had a smooth process coming to the United States from Haiti 22 years ago. He acquired his green card upon marrying his wife, who already had permanent residency, and became a citizen after 10 years of marriage. But as the pastor of a Washington, D.C. church with largely Haitian congregants, he has helped many of them through a far more difficult course.

When a devastating earthquake plunged the island into further despair in 2010, he was relieved by the Obama administration's decision to grant Temporary Protected Status for Haitians who had already been living in the U.S., allowing them to stay here legally and suspending deportations.

"The church brought in lawyers like Ms. Winarick to help people who were scared of applying for TPS because they were of unlawful status," he tells The Root. "They thought it was a way for immigration officials to know where they live."

This month, the Department of Homeland Security announced that it would extend TPS for Haitians, which was scheduled to expire in July, for another 18 months. The department also expanded it to include Haitians who came here up to one year after the 2010 earthquake. "Having protected status is helping a lot of Haitian people to not only make it here and contribute to the American economy, but also to send money to other people back home and help them survive," says Faustin.

Furthermore, it has empowered more Haitians to organize around immigration reform, partnering with immigrant-rights groups to build a powerful lobby. "In the past it was just the Hispanic community, but the Haitian community has become involved to advocate for what they would like to see happening for them," says Faustin, citing, for example, amnesty for immigrants who once had legal status but are now unable to resolve their position. "As soon as the government gave them TPS, Haitians decided to take advantage of the momentum."

Beyond the Border

Hutchings, of the 10-year-old Black Alliance, concurs that he's seen other black-immigrant organizations mobilize in recent years, including San Francisco's African Advocacy Network and Chicago's Pan African Association. "In different parts of the country, black immigrants have developed enclosed communities just to themselves," he says. "But at a certain point, a community realizes that it needs to reach out to develop allies and meet political officials. Their participation is really about people beginning to take responsibility for their own development in the United States."

Olubunmi is heartened to see more people from African and Caribbean countries speaking out. "The majority of undocumented immigrants are Latino, but it's important to recognize that there are different groups involved in this debate," she says. "I remember once watching Bush talk about creating a path for folks who 'come across the border.' Well, if a bill is written from that perspective, it wouldn't work for everybody."

Ultimately, she knows that a system that works for everyone will require action from Washington. "I'm a huge supporter of President Obama, but I am very disappointed that we haven't been able to get comprehensive immigration reform done," she says.

While she understands that Congress must act, as the president demanded in his recent immigration-policy speech, she maintains that he has executive authority to make some changes himself -- changes like stopping the deportation of undocumented "Dreamers."

Until then, Olubunmi is committed to lending her voice to the struggle, even if it now means going public with her own status. "If it will help to raise consciousness, if it will help make life easier for other people," she says with a quick, nervous laugh, "then I will lay myself at the altar."

Watch Full Episode: Mexico & Peru: The Black Grandma in the Closet

2011-05-17T15:14:00.000-07:00

Originally published in PBS Black in Latin America website

In Mexico and Peru Professor Gates explores the almost unknown history of the significant numbers of black people—the two countries together received far more slaves than did the United States —brought to these countries as early as the 16th and 17th centuries, and the worlds of culture that their descendants have created in Vera Cruz on the Gulf of Mexico, the Costa Chica region on the Pacific, and in and around Lima, Peru. Watch full episode.

Watch the full episode. See more Black in Latin America.

DWN: New Data Spotlights Influence of Private Prison Industry on Immigration Detention

2011-05-11T15:47:00.000-07:00

Originally posted by Detention Watch Network

As the largest for-profit prison company in the country, Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), prepares for its annual shareholders meeting, new data released today by the Detention Watch Network (DWN) sheds light on the growing influence of the private prison industry on the immigration detention system.

Drawn from a variety of sources, including the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Reading Room, and the Federal Lobbying Disclosure Act Database, the data reveals the companies most heavily invested in the business of immigration detention – CCA, The GEO Group Inc., and the Management and Training Corporation – and suggests increased lobbying activity over the last decade, both in terms of dollars spent and government entities targeted.

“For years, private prison firms have played a critical role in shaping public policy around immigration detention, pursuing the bottom line at the expense of basic civil rights and tax payer dollars,” said Emily Tucker, Director of Policy and Advocacy at DWN. “This data highlights deep corporate investment in the detention business, raising concerns about how the corporate profit-motive is fueling the expansion of the detention system as a whole.”

According to research by DWN, corporations have increasingly devoted resources over the last decade to lobbying for policies and programs that will increase their opportunities to do business with the government. Of the five corporations with ICE contracts for which official federal lobbying records are currently available, the total expenditure on lobbying for 1999-2009 was $20,432,000, with CCA ($18,002,000) and GEO ($2,065,000) as the top two spenders. Lobbying efforts targeted a wide range of government entities, indicating a comprehensive strategy for influencing policy and legislation.

Both CCA and GEO have come under increasing scrutiny in recent years, as a lack of transparency and accountability has led to multiple cases of abuse and mismanagement in their facilities, resulting in the termination of contracts in a few recent cases.

“ICE has called for sweeping changes in the immigration detention system,” said Tucker. “Yet they continue to partner with private prison firms that are part of the problem. We hope this research inspires further exploration into the relationship between prison corporations and the government at all levels. We need to reduce our dependence on detention and begin putting human rights over profits.”

For the full collection of data, visit: http://www.detentionwatchnetwork.org/privateprisons

The Detention Watch Network is a national coalition of organizations and individuals working to educate the public and policy makers about the U.S. immigration detention and deportation system and advocate for humane reform so that all who come to our shores receive fair and humane treatment. For more information visit www.detentionwatchnetwork.org

Black in Latin America-what did we learn?

2011-05-11T08:22:00.000-07:00

Post by Jean Damu, BAJI Steering Committee Member

Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s groundbreaking documentary, Black in Latin America, concluded lat night with forays into Mexico and Peru.

In Mexico Gates visited the town of Yanga, considered by many scholars the first town in the Western Hemisphere founded and administered by free blacks. Also he briefly examined Mexico’s national ideology of “mestizaje,” that body of thought that claims Mexicans have “solar blood,” or that Mexicans are a mixed race people.

Mestizaje equates closely to Brazil’s Lusotropicalism, ideologies that while on one hand argue for racial democracy, on the other hand deny the existence of racism and serve to make blacks invisible.

What was fascinating in Gate’s journey through Mexico was his encounters with adults who had no idea they were black until traveling outside Mexico; in one woman’s case to Cuba. It was there she made the connections between her families culture and African culture.

In Mexico, Gates discovered, there are plenty of remnants of African culture but only in small pockets are actual cultural holdovers in the form of music and dance still existent.

To this degree Mestizaje has almost totally erased positive images and forms of black culture and thus Mexico is the only Latin nation that has developed a truly national culture. All others, including and especially Cuba and Brazil, have folk cultures, which is why “Africanisms” (for lack of a better term) remain so strong there.

Gates, of course, doesn’t go into any of this and its complexity is beyond this brief review-but Gates should have made stronger connections between Mestizaje inMexico and Gilberto Freyre’s Lusotropicalism in Brazil.

Finally Gates took us to Peru, a center of Black culture almost totally isolated from the rest of the hemisphere.

Gates informs us that during the era of colonization, the population of Lima, Peru’s capital, was nearly 40% black. Today large pockets of blacks are scattered throughout the mountainous nation, and usually blacks are employed in industries that historically were reserved for enslaved Africans.

Gates encountered black women who were picking cotton. “It’s very hard work, but we have to do it,” said one. How much do they make? Five dollars a week.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, we were introduced to Monica Corillos, head of Lima’s Lundu organization, an organization dedicated to combating racism in Peru. Of all the personalities Gates interviewed in his four part series apart from Brazil’s aging Abdas Nascimento, Corrillos, who appears to still be in her twenties or very early thirties, was the most vociferous voice against racism encountered by Gates in Latin America.

“I think Peru is the most racist country in Latin America,” she said.

But Peru is the only Latin country that has apologized for its racist treatment of Blacks. Doesn’t that mean something?

Corrillos countered, “It’s not enough to apologize.” Policies must be implemented to give blacks access to jobs, education and material means, she said.

The encounter with Corrillos raises fundamental questions, but questions unasked by Gates, regarding race and racial identity in Latin America.

Why, for instance, has there never been in Latin America an organization similar in size and scope to the NAACP?

And finally returning to the question of questions, why do blacks in Latin America, consider themselves Latins who happen to be black, while African Americans consider themselves blacks who happen to be Americans? This question goes to the heart of the matter of racial formation in the Western Hemisphere, a question I have attempted to address in the attached article.

Gates should be congratulated for this documentary series on race. It was a courageous and highly insightful contribution to a most important gobal conversation.

Jean Damu is the former western regional representative for N’COBRA, National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America, and a former member of the International Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, taught Black Studies at the University of New Mexico, has traveled and written extensively in Cuba and Africa and currently serves as a member of the Steering Committee of the Black Alliance for Just Immigration.

AZ UPDATE: Governor Jan Brewer signs two misguided border bills

2011-05-08T20:25:00.000-07:00

Originally posted by Border Action Network

On Thursday, April 28th, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed SB1406 and SB1495 into law. SB1406 allows for the creation of a state-sponsored border fence, while SB1495 authorizes the Governor to establish an armed force known as the “Arizona State Guard” for any reason considered necessary.

“We are disappointed in Governor Brewer’s decision to set our state back even further,” said Jennifer Allen, executive director of Border Action Network, a human rights organization based in Arizona border and immigrant communities. “We are still reeling from the effects of SB1070 one year later, and instead of learning from that grave mistake, she continues to take Arizona down a path of costly self-destruction.”

SB1406 would construct a state-sponsored border fence using private donations and inmate labor. According to Allen, the law is prime for lawsuits from both the federal government and individuals because it not only encroaches on the federal government’s area of responsibility, but also because private citizens could sue over the use of their donations if they do not see the progress they want.

“Arizona is once again trying to take into their own hands what should be the responsibility of the federal government,” said Allen. “This self-chartered path will not only be ineffective, it will also be costly to the state and taxpayers since nothing in this law prohibits the use of taxpayer dollars.”

SB1495, in the wake of murder convictions against border vigilantes Shawna Forde and Jason Bush, is another ill-advised measure, Allen continued.

“Sending ill-trained and equipped individuals to our border will only result in further unnecessary violence,” said Allen. “And again, it puts our state at risk of losing thousands, if not millions, of dollars on liability and legal costs. After all the talk about the need to balance the budget, we have these two politically motivated, ill-advised measures that our state does not need and cannot afford.”

Border Action Network monitored these two bills during the entire legislative session, along with 28 others focused on immigration and border enforcement. A total of 12 made it to the Governor’s desk while 18 of them were defeated, including the infamous bills targeting birthright citizenship and Senator Russell Pearce’s “immigration omnibus” bill. In addition to a letter from dozens of CEOs opposing such legislation, people across the state took action against all 30 of these bills in various ways, including sending a total of over 90,000 emails to state legislators.

“We will continue to monitor this type of legislation to hold our legislators and elected officials accountable for the decisions they make,” said Allen. “Especially when those decisions are costly, dangerous, and detrimental to Arizona.”

USHRN on Boycott in Georgia over HB 87 - an Arizona SB 1070 Copycat

2011-05-06T10:22:00.000-07:00

US Human Rights Network's Ajamu Baraka discusses Georgia's HB 87 -- a draconian copycat of Arizona's SB 1070. Ajamu Baraka shares with Kali Akuno about the ensuing boycott if this bill becomes law in the state of Georgia and also explains why African-Americans should actively fight HB 87.

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration will promote and support a boycott of Georgia if HB 87 becomes law.

Re-post rom USHRN BLOG - Human rights group boycotts Georgia over immigration measure

By Jeremy Redmon

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
1:13 p.m. Tuesday, May 3, 2011

A human rights organization has canceled plans to hold its biannual conference in Atlanta this year amid calls to boycott Georgia because of a tough immigration enforcement bill that the state Legislature approved last month.

The U.S. Human Rights Network, a nonprofit organization based in Atlanta, had not booked a location yet for its three-day event but was expecting more than 600 people from across the country to attend the meeting in December, said a spokeswoman for the organization.

The meeting will be relocated to another state because of Georgia’s House Bill 87, the spokeswoman said. A new location has not yet been selected. The network, meanwhile, did not have an estimate for the economic impact its conference would have had for the Atlanta area.

Critics of HB 87 are hoping the network’s decision will be the first of many boycotts to be announced as they seek to pressure Gov. Nathan Deal to veto the bill. A spokeswoman for Deal recently confirmed the Republican governor plans to sign HB 87 before the end of next week.

“HB 87 is another sad apartheid initiative spreading throughout the country to create fear and exploit people in compromised positions,” said Ajamu Baraka, the U.S. Human Rights Network’s executive director. “Reactionary forces in this country are attempting to turn the clock backward to the 18th century by creating these laws.”

Supporters of the legislation say illegal immigrants are burdening Georgia's schools, hospitals and jails. And they point to a recent Pew Hispanic Center estimate that says Georgia is home to more illegal immigrants than Arizona, with 425,000 living here.

Like a law Arizona enacted last year, Georgia’s measure would empower police to investigate the immigration status of certain suspects. And it would punish those who transport or harbor illegal immigrants or use fake identification to get jobs here.

The Human Rights Network, which says on its website that its purpose is to build a human rights movement in the United States, plans to continue its boycott of Georgia until HB 87 is scrapped. Among the network's founding members are the American Civil Liberties Union, Amnesty International USA and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

Last week, the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau went on record opposing HB 87 over concerns that it could hurt the region's $10 billion tourism industry. The bureau's executive committee unanimously passed a resolution saying the measure is "unwelcoming" and could "tarnish Atlanta's reputation as one of America's most welcoming cities."

Atlanta's convention and tourism boosters are hoping Georgia won't suffer like Arizona, which lost dozens of conventions after that state enacted similar legislation last year. A spokeswoman for the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau said Tuesday that no Atlanta conventions have been canceled because of HB 87.

A spokesman for Deal issued a statement last week in response to the bureau’s resolution.

“Illegal immigration costs Georgia taxpayers hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars, each year at the city, county and state levels,” said Brian Robinson, Deal’s spokesman. “Georgia will treat everyone in our state with respect, and we want to encourage immigrants who settle in Georgia to go through the proper legal channels. Frankly, Georgia is leading the way by requiring that employers follow existing federal law. Look for other states -- who face the same challenges and costs -- to follow Georgia's lead."
Find this article at:

http://www.ajc.com/news/georgia-politics-elections/human-rights-group-boycotts-933522.html

Watch Full Episode: Brazil: A Racial Paradise?

2011-05-05T15:16:00.000-07:00

In Brazil, Professor Gates delves behind the façade of Carnival to discover how this ‘rainbow nation’ is waking up to its legacy as the world’s largest slave economy.

Watch the full episode. See more Black in Latin America.

Turning the Tide! This May - no more Arizonas!

2011-05-04T10:25:00.000-07:00

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration is happy to be part of the planning committee for the National Turning the Tide Summit in Alrington, Virginia. Critical times require collective action. On May 26 — 28th, the National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON), together with members of the Inter-Alliance Dialogue (IAD) network and other national partners, invite you to participate in a three-day Summit to Turn the Tide from the criminalization of migrant communities to a world of dignity and respect.

Check out the new video flier about the summit to learn more about the national gathering.

Visit http://altopolimigra.com to sign up for action alerts & updates on the national campaign to turn the tide from hate to human dignity. No more Arizonas!

Watch Full Episode of Black In Latin America: Cuba: The Next Revolution

2011-04-27T08:06:00.000-07:00

Full Episode: Cuba: The Next Revolution (originally posted on PBS)

In Cuba Professor Gates finds out how the culture, religion, politics and music of this island are inextricably linked to the huge amount of slave labor imported to produce its enormously profitable 19th century sugar industry, and how race and racism have fared since Fidel Castro’s Communist revolution in 1959.

*Please note that BAJI's 4th Teleconference on Black Perspectives in Migration will focus on Afro-Latino and Afro-Caribbean communities in the U.S. Please join us Thursday April 28th for this toll-free teleconference. More information here.

Watch the full episode. See more Black in Latin America.

Watch Full Episode of PBS's: Haiti & the Dominican Republic: An Island Divided

2011-04-20T08:57:00.000-07:00

Originally posted by PBS

Full Episode: Haiti & the Dominican Republic: An Island Divided

In the Dominican Republic, Professor Gates explores how race has been socially constructed in a society whose people reflect centuries of inter-marriage, and how the country’s troubled history with Haiti informs notions about racial classification. In Haiti, Professor Gates tells the story of the birth of the first-ever black republic, and finds out how the slaves’s hard fight for liberation over Napoleon Bonaparte’s French Empire became a double-edged sword.

Watch the full episode. See more Black in Latin America.

BAJI turns 5 years old!

2011-04-17T23:32:00.001-07:00

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration invites you to our 5th Anniversary Dinner and Awards Ceremony. Come celebrate 5 years of work in the community and help us recognize those who have helped to ignite a movement.

Founder Awards - Rev. Phillip Lawson and Rev. Kelvin Sauls
Ally Award - Priority Africa Network
Community Activist Award - Catherine Tactaquin, National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights
Community Activist Award - Pierre LaBosierre, Co-founder, Haiti Action Committee
Young Leaders Award - R.I.S.E. Immigration Research Team, Berkeley High School

Saturday, June 4, 2011
5:30 pm: Reception & Silent Auction
7:00 pm: Dinner and Program

Islamic Cultural Center of Northern California
1433 Madison Street, Oakland 94612

Tickets are $60. Please purchase at: http://bit.ly/BAJI5year
Facebook Event Page.

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI) is an organization founded in Oakland, California in 2006 to engage African Americans and other communities in a dialogue that leads to actions that challenge U.S. immigration policy and the underlying issues of race, racism and economic inequity that frame it.

BAJI is an education and advocacy group comprised of African Americans and black immigrants from Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. BAJI’s goals are: 1) to develop a core group of African Americans who are prepared to actively support immigrant rights; and 2) to facilitate the building of relationships and alliances between African American and immigrant communities around a range of social issues to further the mutual cause of economic and social justice for all.

BAJI works to expose the ways in which racism and economic globalization have negatively impacted African American and immigrant communities alike, giving them common cause to fight together for economic and social justice for all peoples. BAJI’s strategy is to provide education and information to African American communities about the commonality of interests between African Americans and immigrants of color and to give technical assistance and training to leaders and organizers in communities of color.

In the past 5 years we've done various things including:

+ Led numerous “Conversations on Immigration” in local African American churches;

+ held public forums on Black Diaspora issues such as ‘Imprisonment of African Immigrants in Europe’;

+ Worked with various Inter-Faith initiatives around immigration and immigrant rights issues;

+ Active in Local May Day Immigrant Rights Demonstrations since 2006;

+Worked in local immigrant rights coalitions with Latino & Asian organizations;

+A major organization in the Oakland City I.D. card campaign ;

+ Collaborated with local groups working against car impoundments; for multi-language translation of Public documents; and most recently against the DHS-“Secure Communities” program;

+ Sponsored “Africa Diaspora Dialogues” between Africans and African Americans along with the Priority Africa Network; attempting to build unity along political and cultural lines;

+Collaborated with the Oakland Museum of California as part of the planning and publicity for the Museum’s “Africans in Mexico” Exhibition;

+Sponsored Tele-Conferences with prominent academics and activists on topical Black Diaspora issues;

On a the national and international level we've done the following:

+ Led campaigns to secure Temporary Protective Status for both Haitians and Liberians in the U.S.;

+ Active participant in both the U.S and World Social Forum processes 2007 -2011;

+ Founding members of the Pan African Network in Defense of Migrant Rights - participated in founding meetings in Bamako, Mali, Mexico City, Mexico and Dakar, Senegal;

+ Set up the Black Immigration Network (B.I.N.) as an advocacy network for Black Immigrants in the U.S.;

+ Led a delegation of Black Pastors to Phoenix, Arizona for the May 29^th Rally in 2010;

+ Participated in various national and state conferences on Immigration and related topics;

+ Along with the Coalicion de Derechos Humanos and the National Network for Immigrant & Refugee Rights, BAJI led the first all-Black delegation for a Tour of the Mexico/Arizona border in 2007;

+ Published 2 editions of the BAJI Reader;

+ Published the Report - Crossing Boundaries, Connecting Communities: Alliance Building for Immigrant Rights and Racial Justice. detailed case studies of 16 organizations from across the country that are forging effective cross racial alliances between immigrant and native-born communities in order to build power and win just policies and practices in their communities.

Reading Ethnic Studies

2011-04-11T13:33:00.000-07:00

Post by Renee Simmis

For some time in Arizona, the loudest voices in the immigration debate have been from people with anti-immigrant perspectives. HB 2281, the Arizona House Bill that would ban ethnic studies in k-12 schools, is the most recent legislation to target ethnic immigrant communities. But there are other more compassionate voices in Arizona.

Arizona Writers for Justice (AWJ) serves as a resource for writers working toward social justice. AWJ has recently organized literary readings around the discussion of HB2281 because AWJ believes that in the midst of political rhetoric, the actual stories of how people are living and understanding their realities gets lost.

On Friday, April 29th at 7 p.m., AWJ hosts "Reading Ethnic Studies" at Casa Libre en la Solana in Tucson. The event is $5.

"Reading Ethnic Studies" will be a literary presentation of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction that responds to the dialogue around Arizona's ethnic studies legislation. The readers include Tucson teachers and high school students, a recent winner of the Bellwether prize in fiction, an NEA Literature fellow, a slam poet, and a Cave Canem fellow. A question/answer period will follow the reading. The reading is a fundraiser for Save Ethnic Studies.

Come on out and participate in the discussion and reading. If you'd like more information about the event or AWJ, please go to casalibre.org or check out AWJ on Facebook.

Teleconference IV: The Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino Migrations to the U.S.

2011-04-08T05:44:00.000-07:00

Black Alliance for Just Immigration & Priority Africa Network present

Black Intersections on Migration – Teleconference IV

Thursday, April 28th 12 PST : The Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino Migrations to the U.S.

Janvieve Williams Comrie will discuss the historical, social and cultural dimensions of successive migration of Afro-Latinos/as and Afro-Caribbeans to the U.S. She will also shed light on the experience of these immigrants as they navigate the racial landscape of the U.S. society.

Janvieve Williams Comrie is the founder of the Latin American and Caribbean Community Center, she is dedicated to improving the conditions and opportunities for socially excluded and marginalized groups. Janvieve has worked throughout the Americas with communities on the ground and organizations to address the division and isolation faced by many of African descent and indigenous people, including low wageworkers, undocumented families and immigrants from Latin America and the Caribbean in the United States, by building a political and critical consciousness while using a human rights framework.

TO JOIN THE CALL:

1. Dial into the conferencing service

Toll-Free US/Canada: 1-866-931-7845

International Dial-in: 1-310-374-4949

2. Enter your conference code: 904167

Background to teleconference series: The United Nations has declared 2011 as the “International Year for Peoples of African Descent”. Ten years ago, landmark recommendations were made at the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in Durban South Africa. In a four-part series of teleconferences that looks at the span of Black presence in the U.S. over the centuries, we will examine the unique migration experiences of the African Diaspora within the context of U.S. history and the current debate over immigration. The series brings provocative frameworks and analyses into the discussion about race and immigration that are seldom considered.

Teleconference III Recording Available: New African Immigrants-Grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity

2011-04-04T08:31:00.000-07:00

On Thursday March 31st we held our 3rd national teleconference. On this call we listened to a presentation by Dr. Jackie Copeland-Carson moderated by Priority Africa Network Director, Nunu Kidane and then had a discussion with call participants. The conversation is entitled New Immigrants - grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity. If you missed this engaging teleconference please listen to it here -

Dr. Copeland-Carson discussed following topics.
- Figures of increase of African immigrants in the U.S
- Why is this significant, particularly for African American communities
- Understanding the importance of race and immigration as relates to African immigrants
- What are some of the important points to consider for organizers and social justice activists to increase outreach into African immigrant communities
- The need to develop a global Pan African consciousness

Please note that our next teleconference is Thursday April 28, 2011 at 12pm PST.

Teleconference: New African Immigrants-Grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity

2011-03-15T11:50:00.000-07:00

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration & Priority Africa Network present

Black Intersections on Migration – Series III of IV Teleconferences

Thursday, March 31: New African Immigrants-Grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity

Speaker: Jackie Copeland Carson, PhD, President Copeland-Carson and Associates and author of "Creating Africa in America: Translocal Identity in an Emerging World City".

Moderator: Nunu Kidane, Director Priority Africa Network

Dr. Copeland-Carson will speak on the following topics and more:

- Figures of increase of African immigrants in the U.S

- Why is this significant, particularly for African American communities

- Understanding the importance of race and immigration as relates to African immigrants

- What are some of the important points to consider for organizers and social justice activists to increase outreach into African immigrant communities

- The need to develop a global Pan African consciousness

Toll-free Dial-in (US/Canada): 1-866-931-7845

International Dial-in: 1-310-374-4949

Conference Code: 484457

Please RSVP by calling (510) 663-2254 or sending an email to teleconference@blackalliance.org

Speaker Bio

Trained as an anthropologist and urban planner, Dr. Copeland-Carson has worked for over 25 years as an executive, grant-maker, evaluator, or researcher for philanthropies, including the Pew, Lilly, Noyes and Northwest Area foundations among others. In addition to serving as vice president of The Philadelphia Foundation, she was the founding managing director and vice president for private philanthropy at US Bank’s Private Client Group. Currently she is founding principal of Copeland Carson & Associates, an international consulting practice providing program design, evaluation and related services to diverse philanthropies in the U.S. and abroad. A frequently sought after speaker and published author on a wide range of nonprofit sector issues, Dr. Copeland-Carson has also taught philanthropy to graduate students for the University of Minnesota and St. Mary’s University. Over her career, she has worked with several hundred foundations. Current clients include Bertelsmann Foundation, Grantmakers Concerned about Immigrants and Refugees, and the Ford Foundation among others.

Dr. Copeland-Carson holds two masters degrees, one in urban planning and the other in cultural anthropology, with a Ph.D. in anthropology all from the University of Pennsylvania. She has done fieldwork in Nigeria as well as numerous U.S. cities and rural communities. Her undergraduate degrees are from Georgetown University in literature and African studies. She also studied African history, culture, languages and religion at Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria.

An expert in community development, cross-cultural issues, immigration and emerging markets, Dr. Copeland-Carson’s most recent books and articles examine issues in diversity, evaluation, community revitalization, alternative finance, and transnationalism. She serves on the board of the African Women’s Development Fund and is founder and chair of the Pan-African Women’s Philanthropy Network.

Background to teleconference series:

The United Nations has declared 2011 as the “International Year for Peoples of African Descent”. Ten years ago, landmark recommendations were made at the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in Durban South Africa. In a four-part series of teleconferences that looks at the span of Black presence in the U.S. over the centuries, we will examine the unique migration experiences of the African Diaspora within the context of U.S. history and the current debate over immigration. The series brings provocative frameworks and analyses into the discussion about race and immigration that are seldom considered.

Examining Black History & Forging our Future —The Challenges of Migration and Globalization

2011-03-10T09:07:00.000-08:00

Post by Phil Hutchings, BAJI Senior Organizer

Practically every African American has been touched in some way by the great Black Migrations out of the Southern states between 1914 and 1960. Most everyone has a parent, grandparent, uncle, aunt or some family relative who was a participant in that historic migration. In the case of the author, my mother's family came from small towns near Memphis, Tennessee, while my father and his father migrated from Macon, Georgia. Both parts of my future family ended up in Cleveland, Ohio, where I was born.

But the migration continues. People have not stopped moving from place to place. Today the United Nations tells us that across the globe there are 230 million people not living in their country of birth, with 2/3 of them being from the continent of Africa. More people are migrating from one country to another, or within the same country than ever before in human history.

Some of these migrations are caused by wars, climate changes or chances for family reunification. But most of the migration in today’s world is caused by the forces of economic globalization and foreign aid policies based upon the privatization of resources for the wealthy, which has made making a living next to impossible in many countries of Latin America, Africa and Asia.

But migration is not only a geographical phenomenon, but also a psychological one as well. The late scholar Florette Migri in her book titled "Black Migration: The Movement North, from Myth to Man" reminds us that one of the byproducts of migrating was the inner transformation of people, i.e., changing notions of who they were and what they were capable of accomplishing.

Today in 2011, many years after the great migrations and now over 50 years since the glory days of the Civil Rights Movement, we see a situation where most African American communities in major cities and many small towns are worse off in many respects than they were in the past. Statistics on unemployment and underemployment, bad housing, poor schools, health problems, incarceration, and the widening racial wealth gap all paint a dismal picture of where we are today as a people.

And perhaps because of the above-mentioned statistics, African American migrations continue into the present time. Many Black people have made a "reverse migration” back to fast growing cities of the New South. Even in cities of the North and the West Coast, there is a pattern of black migration out of the old “inner-city neighborhoods" to mostly black suburbs outside the traditional city boundaries.

At the same time many newcomers from global migrations caused by economic globalization are increasingly moving into what were once majority Black communities. Historic black communities are increasingly dealing with people from all parts of the world, particularly from Mexico and other Latin American nations, along with peoples from Southeast Asia, the Caribbean and the Pacific.

Are there still "black communities" today? Where does "black space" exist now in the complex of U.S. metropolitan communities? Are these "newcomers" in our areas "competitors", "neighbors", or potential "allies"?

How to respond to these new challenges of the 21st century? This is the type of work the Black Alliance for Just Immigration deals with in its regular community and political work. There are no easy answers but we know that with the system as it is, that there will be no real progressive changes for anyone or any group unless we find ways to understand one another’s’ histories and issues and to blend our struggles together in a united front for social and economic justice and real community security.

Being that February was Black History, we look to creating our Black Future in the present. We stand on the shoulders of those migrants who came before us. Those ancestors of the post First and Second World War migrations who left all they had in the South to travel into unimagined experiences where the reception they often received was one of hostility and danger.

In their struggles, they were able to transform themselves and eventually the entire country as well. Their mass movement from the South to the North transformed the so-called “Negro Problem” from a Southern regional issue to a national issue. The fight against racism became more complex as we moved from rural areas to major metropolitan areas and into industrial sectors. Those who came before us met their challenges then and in this era of globalization, we can and must do the same.

Phil Hutchings is a veteran of the Southern Freedom Movement of the 1960's with the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee. Currently he is the Senior Organizer with the Black Alliance for Just Immigration based in Oakland, California.

The Black Community and So-Called "Secure Communities"

2011-03-02T13:27:00.000-08:00

Posted by Aja Minor, BAJI Program Associate

March 2, 2011

So-called “Secure Communities”, “S-Comm” or “In-Secure Communities” as it has been dubbed is the most recent attempt of ICE-DHS to control the immigration “problem”. This anti-immigrant program allows Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and local law enforcement agencies to share all fingerprints processed at local jails. This mandated sharing occurs regardless of the type of crime and even if the charges are dropped. The inaccurately named program, “Secure Communities” was said to have been initiated to target “level one” criminals (kidnappers, drug dealers, murders), but in practice has been successful in targeting jay-walkers, victims of domestic violence, mentally challenged citizens, and those who do not look “American”.

Even if the program was better at targeting level one criminals, it does not warrant the support of the African American community. Black communities in the United States, understand how entrenched in racism, the country’s institutions are. Black people (historically and currently) know what its like to be exploited in the workplace, to fear the police, and to be targeted and racially profiled. Speak to an elder, or someone who has worked with SNCC or Black Panther Party for Self Defense and they will tell you immigrants are being treated the same way we were ( and still are in many places). Speak with someone who is working to stop the gang injunctions in Oakland, they will tell you the tactics are the same. Speak with someone working to bring down the prison industrial complex, and they will tell you the same corporations lobbying to build more prisons are lobbying to build more immigrant detention centers.

“S-Comm” is one of the scariest tactics used by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. This programs scope is so broad and impacts everyone. Black communities need to stand, in solidarity, with immigrant communities. Only by working together can we ensure that we all have access to citizenship, education, employment and housing!

Teleconference II Recording Available - The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration

2011-02-28T14:10:00.000-08:00

On Thursday February 24th we held our 2nd national teleconference. On this call we listened to a pre-recorded interview with Isabel Wilkerson and held a live discussion. Unfortunately, Isabel was unable to join us due to a scheduling conflict, however we had a very engaging teleconference. In case you missed it you can listen to it here -

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Isabel Wilkerson who wrote the epic book, "The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration". We will then have a discussion about the impact of The Great Migration on the African American community and on the United States as a whole. We will also talk about parallels with immigration to the United States, a comparison that Ms. Wilkerson alludes to in her interview.

In her review of the book, Janet Maslin of the New York Times wrote, "Ms. Wilkerson works on a grand, panoramic scale but also on a very intimate one, since this work of living history boils down to the tenderly told stories of three rural Southerners who immigrated to big cities from their hometowns."

Be sure to join us again on March 31st and April 28th.

Teleconference III – Thursday, March 31: New African Immigrants—Grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity

Speaker: Jackie Copeland Carson, PhD, President Copeland-Carson and Associates and author of “Creating Africa in America: Translocal Identity in an Emerging World City”.

Teleconference IV – Thursday, April 28: The Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino Migrations to the U.S.

Speaker: Janvieve Williams Comrie, Executive Director, Latin American and Caribbean Community Center

All briefings are at Noon Pacific, 1PM Mountain, 2PM Central & 3PM Eastern

Toll-free Dial-in (US/Canada): 1-866-931-7845
International Dial-in: 1-310-374-4949
Conference Code: 707591

Please RSVP by calling (510) 663-2254 or sending an email to teleconference@blackalliance.org

HB 2191: The Arizona Syndrome Or another Arizona anti-immigrant law of white privilege

2011-02-21T08:44:00.000-08:00

By Arnoldo Garcia

This blog post has been re-blogged. The original post appeared here.

The Arizona legislature, dominated by white supremacists and anti-immigrant haters, continues leading the way to undermine if not gut the 14th Amendment. And everyone's rights are in danger.

The Arizona House just approved a bill that would not allow undocumented persons their day in court.

The East Valley Tribune in Arizona reported:

A House panel on Wednesday approved legislation designed to benefit one man: Cochise rancher Roger Barnett.

The measure would spell out that anyone who is in this country [SIC] illegally cannot collect punitive damages even after winning a lawsuit.

Voters already approved a constitutional amendment doing precisely that in 2006. But that came nearly two years too late for Barnett who was sued following a 2004 incident when 16 [SIC] illegal immigrants said the rancher illegally imprisoned them.

HB 2191 makes that ballot measure retroactive to the beginning of 2004.

Guilty by immigration status.

Arizona is not alone in its zealot anti-migrant, anti-Mexican, anti-human notoriety. From Prop. 200, approved in 2004 and that prohibits state public services to persons who can't prove their status in the U.S., to SB-1070, the anti-immigrant racial profiling law approved last year, at least 20 states are pursuing similar initiatives. Now, across the U.S., a person's rights are being trumped by their immigration status, race, color, class and gender. This is the new double standard: "guilty by immigration status." (NNIRR's HURRICANE initiative, working with community groups, documents the human rights abuses being committed by ICE, police and other government officials and private citizens, issued the report "Guilty by Immigration Status.")

While HB 2191 represents another low blow to our rights, it's is not just another law. The fact that a measure of this nature -- protecting Roger Barnett a rancher with a hate reputation that's a staple of the anti-migrant violence on the border -- would get this far is testament to the depth of the human rights crisis in Arizona. How far can the Arizona hate legislators drive a stake into the heart of the U.S. Constitution? HB 2191 is more evidence of the the new normal defined by a deepening anti-immigrant hate and vigilante vitriol.

Tit for tat: Even so, Arizona is the offspring of a big plan, Operation Endgame, fueling the national anti-immigrant pandemic. ICE operations against workers; the extension of federal immigration-police collaboration to every nook and cranny of the U.S. and the anti-immigrant hate are not passing fancies. And Arizona's Prop 200 was the offspring of California's Prop. 187. SB-1070 is the culmination of federal immigration-police collaboration programs and the militarization of immigration control and border communities. The U.S. will enlist the police force in every county by 2012 to take part in immigration control. Every county that abuts the border and every county in Texas and Arizona and about two-thirds of all counties in California are already part of the Department of Homeland Security's "Secure Communities, which allows police to share the fingerprints of everyone arrested with the DHS database....

These are not just flawed policies and laws. We are witnessing an emerging immigration policing regime that is criminalizing immigrants beyond recognition and using the shameless excuse of going after "criminals" to destroy everyone's rights -- citizens and non-citizens, immigrants and non-immigrants, working people and communities of color.

The Rise of the U.S. Immigration Policing Regime

HB 2191 may be just a shamefaced attempt to change the rules for a white rancher who was convicted of imprisoning migrants at gunpoint. While the legislator behind HB 2191 is ratcheting white privilege up a notch, HB 2191 whittles away our basic rights.

The recent conviction of Shawna Forde for the cold-blooded murder of Raul Flores and Brisenia Flores, his nine-year old daughter, is a small measure of long-overdue justice. Stopping HB 2191 would be a tiny sign of sanity in the Arizona legislature. But don't hold your breath waiting for the Arizona Senate to stop HB 2191. The cold-hearted Arizona Senate got cold feet and yanked yet another one of its worst case scenario bills, which would have allowed hospitals to ask persons for their immigration papers before helping them; they didn't have the votes to pass it.

The revolution is civil rights?

What are we going to do? How do you stop them from legislating hate, from continuing to build a policing regime with its own criminal justice and prison system exclusively for persons with immigration status? It's easy to say: we need push back on all the criminalization, which drives the hate movement, and demand that the 14th Amendment be defended and expanded, say with policies and measures that ensure that:

A person is innocent till proven guilty;
A person has the right to her day in court;
Racial, ethnic/national and religious profiling -- i.e. all forms of discrimination based on race, color, religious and political creed and belief, gender and class -- are illegal.

That would be revolutionary.

Come to think of it, this is the law of the land right now; but not in Arizona and dozens of others states and counties if we don't push back hard.

* Arnoldo Garcia works for the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights. For more information visit: www.nnirr.org

Labels: 14th Amendment, Arizona, border, hate violence, immigration, minuteman, NNIRR, Roger Barnett, vigilantes

Videos about African Migration from the World Social Forum

2011-02-18T14:00:00.000-08:00

Post by Opal Tometi, BAJI National Organizer

Our final days at the World Social Forum in Dakar, Senegal were a blur. With several meetings, workshops and other impromptu activities we just didn’t have time to capture it all on our blog. However, now that we’re back in the United States we are beginning to reflect on some of the highlights and have some videos we’d like to share with you.

The first is a short video with Mamadou Goita, the Director of IRPAD (Institut de Recherche et de Promotion des Alternatives en Développement), based in Mali. In this clip he briefly discusses the connections of environmental justice and immigration. An issue we are sure to blog about more in the future.

Our 2nd video is with Mary Tal, a courageous migrant justice organizer in South Africa. In this video she tells her personal story of migration and talks about how she’s helping women and their families in South Africa through support groups, advocacy and by providing other social services. Mary’s story is powerful and compelling as she explains how she cast off the shame of being a refugee, empowered herself and found her voice.

Whole World Women Association - South Africa from opal ayo on Vimeo.

2nd Teleconference next Thursday - Black Intersections on Migration

2011-02-18T13:55:00.000-08:00

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration and Priority Africa Network

Invite you to:

Black Intersections on Migration

National Conversations on African, African American,

Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino Migrations to and in the U.S.

A four-part series of teleconference briefings

on timely and critical analyses of migration, race, and identity.

The United Nations has declared 2011 as the “International Year for Peoples of African Descent”. Ten years ago, landmark recommendations were made at the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in Durban South Africa. In a four-part series of teleconferences that looks at the span of Black presence in the U.S. over the centuries, we will examine the unique migration experiences of the African Diaspora within the context of U.S. history and the current debate over immigration. The series brings provocative frameworks and analyses into the discussion about race and immigration that are seldom considered.

Teleconference II
African American Migrations--The Exodus from the U.S. South

Thursday, February 24, Noon Pacific, 1PM Mountain, 2PM Central ; 3PM Eastern

See event on Facbook - http://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=165679993481901

Speaker: Walter Turner, Professor, Social Science & Contemporary African Affairs, College of Marin, Kentfield, CA

Walter Turner will present his views on and analysis of the book, "The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration" by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Isabel Wilkerson. Ms. Wilkerson was invited to speak but was unable to participate due to scheduling conflicts.

In her review of the book, Janet Maslin of the New York Times wrote, "Ms. Wilkerson works on a grand, panoramic scale but also on a very intimate one, since this work of living history boils down to the tenderly told stories of three rural Southerners who immigrated to big cities from their hometowns."

Walter Turner is himself an author of "Oil for Nothing, Multinational Corporations, Environmental Destruction, Death and Impunity in the Niger Delta.” His commentaries have appeared in the Black Scholar and on Pacifica National News, Pambazuka News, Pacifica Radio and National Public Radio. He is also one of the authors of the book “No Easy Victories: African Liberation and American Activists over a Half Century, 1950-2000.” (Africa World Press 2007).

Toll-free Dial-in (US/Canada): 1-866-931-7845
International Dial-in: 1-310-374-4949
Conference Code: 707591

Please RSVP by calling (510) 663-2254 or sending an email to teleconference@blackalliance.org

Teleconference III – Thursday, March 31: New African Immigrants—Grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity

Speaker: Jackie Copeland Carson, PhD, President Copeland-Carson and Associates and author of “Creating Africa in America: Translocal Identity in an Emerging World City”.

Teleconference IV – Thursday, April 28: The Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino Migrations to the U.S.

Speaker: Janvieve Williams Comrie, Executive Director, Latin American and Caribbean Community Center

All briefings are at Noon Pacific, 1PM Mountain, 2PM Central & ; 3PM Eastern

Women from the Niger Delta at the World Social Forum

2011-02-09T15:16:00.000-08:00

Post by Opal Tometi, BAJI National Organizer

During my time at the World Social Forum in Dakar I've had the the most profound pleasure of meeting a delegation of women from the Niger Delta. For those who know me you know my family is from Nigeria and so social issues within the country are of particular importance to me. The delegation of Nigerian women from the oil rich region have been through a lot. From the pollution of their land, to lack of job opportunities, perpetual poverty, violence, sexual assault and the list goes on. The things that they have experienced are unimaginable yet they have the courage to speak out against them, assert their human rights and organize for justice. The delegation is a vibrant group, comprised of the most eloquent and inspiring women I have ever met. I'm constantly in awe of them as they share story after story of what they've been through and how they've taken their circumstances into their own hands.

I hope to be able to post more videos from their presentation online, but in the meantime I will share the following video clip that I shot with the Emem Okon the Executive Director of an Kebetkache Women Resource & Development Center.

In the video Emem explains the grassroots work that the women have been doing around environmental justice, women's rights, social and economic issues and alternatives in the oil rich region of the Niger Delta.

Please read the Detroit to Dakar blog for information about other workshops we attended during our 2nd day in Dakar.

The World Social Forum Workshops Begin

2011-02-07T18:35:00.000-08:00

Post contributions by Gerald Lenoir, BAJI Director, Nunu Kidane, Priority Africa Network Director & Opal Tometi, BAJI National Organizer

Today marked the first day of sessions of the World Social Forum in Dakar Senegal. The theme for the day was Africa and the Diaspora and featured a myriad of sessions highlighting issues of relevance to peoples of African decent. And although there was some confusion about locations for certain workshops we managed to find our way to 2 insightful sessions.

One session we attended was a workshop on Intra-Africa Migration that featured a panel of academics, migrants and activists from West Africa that exposed the complicity of West African and North African governments in violating the rights of migrants. The North African countries--Mauritania, Morocco, Algeria and Libya have signed undisclosed bilateral agreements with European countries--Italy, Spain, Malta, Portugal and France to act as their border control agents. North African countries routinely deport Senegalese migrants to their home countries, with many violations of their human rights. Migrants from all over West Africa are deported to Mali without regard to their nationality. The migrants are often brutalized, robbed and dumped at the borders. In exchange for their services, the North African countries receive development aid and military aid from European countries.

Senegal has also signed agreements with some European countries to accept deported Senegalese migrants and to provide Frontex, the European Union border control agency, complete and free access to its territory. In exchange, Senegal receives an undisclosed amount of aid. Mali has refused to sign these types of agreements.

In addition, most member countries of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) do not abide by a protocol on circulation signed by all 16 countries in the 1980s. The protocol calls for freedom of movement throughout the countries. But migrants are regularly harassed, jailed and deported. And only seven countries honor the ECOWAS passport.

Ntamag Francois Romero, the director of the Association des Refoulés d’Afrique Centrale au Mail, or ARACEM (Association of Deported Central Africans in Mali), spoke about his work in aiding migrants expelled from North Africa. Over 100 migrants a month come to the ARACEM center for food and temporary shelter after being deported. They can stay for two weeks at a time until the next wave of deported migrants arrive. And the numbers are growing.

Another session we attended was on “Strategies for International Year for People of African Descent.” Doudou Diene, the former U.N Special Rapporteur on Racism on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance - was one of the key speakers. He spoke extensively on the process that led to the Durban Conference Against Racism in 2001 and the challenges related to the declaration and subsequent attempts towards the full implementation.

Also on the panel were Mareille Fanon-Mendes from France, daughter of Frantz Fanon and President of the Franz Fanon Foundation. She spoke passionately about the need to continue building on the foundations set in Durban, South African. She urged participants the world over to join the mobilization for the next gathering towards this that will take place in New York in September of this year. Following her was Jan Lonn, Secretary of the World Against Racism Network and Coura Mbaye Swedish Committee for the International Year for People of African Descent.

The day was truly rich and included several formal and informal conversations and meetings along the way. Every moment at the World Social Forum is an opportunity to learn. You never knows whom you are sitting next to until you take the time to introduce yourself and learn about their struggles and victories.

Here are some additional pictures from our day which concluded with a dinner reception hosted by Priority Africa Network for the Detroit to Dakar Delegation.

The World Social Forum Kicks Off with Historic March

2011-02-06T16:04:00.000-08:00

Posted by Opal Tometi, BAJI National Organizer
February 6, 2011

The World Social Forum has officially begun! With a whirlwind of smaller events, meetings and orientations leading up to today’s (Sunday February 6, 2011) opening ceremony in Dakar, Senegal everyone seems to be energized for this week's historic gathering.

Today, we marched through the streets of Dakar for about 3 hours, not including the time where people were able to listen to speeches. One of which was delivered by Bolivia’s celebrated President Evo Morales. There were people as far as the eye could see, and thousands of Senegalese participated throughout the day, including those who served as volunteers helping to answer questions, and who worked as security to ensure that the day went smoothly. It is estimated that well over 100,000 people participated in today’s march.

Along with our companer@s from Priority Africa Network, Grassroots Global Justice Alliance, and several other organizations we marched through the streets of Dakar chanting in solidarity and with much enthusiasm.

People waved banners and held signs representing movements from throughout the world and highlighting issues such as violence against women, police brutality, environmental justice and migrant rights, while other banners called into question the occupation of various lands, neocolonialism, economic exploitation, militarism and so much more. We saw and even befriended people from throughout the world - from Brazil to Palestine, Rwanda, Nigeria, Egypt and Japan! What seems most evident is that social movements around the globe are vibrant and people are working tirelessly toward social justice in every part of the world.

The march was just the beginning and we are hopeful that the sentiment of joy and justice, that permeated the air, will be one that carries us through the complex discussions, networking and strategizing that are sure to fill the week.

You can see some pictures from our day at the march on the our Flickr page.

Check out the program here to see the range of plenaries and workshops that will take place this week.

World Assembly of Migrants Concludes

2011-02-04T12:37:00.000-08:00

Posted by Gerald Lenoir, BAJI Executive Director
February 4, 2011

The World Assembly of Migrants wrapped up today but, from my point of view, left much to be desired. It is a complete misnomer to call it a "world assembly." First of all, the attendance was poor with only about 100 people. The overwhelming majority of migrants who were there were either from France or the French-speaking countries of West and North Africa. The rest of the world was left out of the process.

The "Charter of Migrants" that emerged from the process was so general as to be rendered useless. Although the initial draft was more progressive, after much tortuous debate and the consideration of amendments, the charter does not include any references to racism, the impact of economic globalization, the rights of indigenous people, and the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, and health access for people with HIV/AIDS and people with disabilities.

One participant argued that references to racism should not be included because we're all part of the human race. This was an especially blatant omission, since the conference was held on Goree Island, one of the main sites where the brutal, forced migration called the Transatlantic Slave Trade was launched. The same speaker also swayed many of the people present that the discrimination against LGBT people should not be included because this is a matter of "personal preference."

I was disappointed in the process and the outcome. I am not hopeful that the "Charter of Migrants" will be at all useful or usable.

On Sunday the World Social Forum will begin with a mass march. The workshops and plenaries begin on Monday. I will continue blogging about WSF until February 11.

World Assembly of Migrants

2011-02-02T15:48:00.000-08:00

Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Goree Island, Senegal

Posted by Gerald Lenoir, Executive Director, Black Alliance for Just Immigration

Nunu Kidane of Priority Africa Network, Colin Rajah of the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights and I traveled from Oakland, California to Dakar Senegal to attend the World Assembly of Migrants (WAM) on Goree Island and the World Social Forum (WSF) at the Cheikh Anta Diop University in Dakar.

A statue of freed slaves on
Goree Island donated by the
government of Guadeloupe.

Today, we took the 20-minute ferry ride to the infamous Goree Island where enslaved Africans were imprisoned, brutalized, led shackled through the "Door of No Return" and shipped en masse to the New World. We were there to attend the opening session of the World Assembly of Migrants. The Assembly was initiated by a migrant rights organization in France, Sans Papier (Without Papers) to provide the opportunity for migrants from all over the world to give input into the draft of the World Charter of Migrants. The opening session, attended by over 100 migrants, started with a panel that included the Mayor of Goree Island, a representative from WAM and a member of the leadership of the WSF leadership group.

The Mayor reminded us that the event was taking place on the spot where the first brutal forced migration of Africans took place. The WSF representative spoke about the importance of migrant rights as a central theme of the Social Forum scheduled to take place February 6-11.

Migrants from all over the world listen
to the opening panel presentations at
the World Assembly of Migrants.

The WAM speaker spoke to the need of the rights of migrant to be recognized. The draft charter, he said, builds upon the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Indigenous People. As an Austrian, he talked about the "wave of xenophobia sweeping across Europe." He indicated that process of input into the charter will make sure that it's ratified by the people and that it is a people's document. The aim is to get the charter ratified by United Nations.

The 2-page draft charter reads, in part:

"We Migrants declare to the world that: MIGRATION WILL BE A FREE AND WORTHY CHOICE FOR ALL AND IN EVERY CORNER OF THE PLANET..." (emphasis in the original document)

"...We are entitled to the same rights, recognized under exactly the same conditions as everyone else.

Denying this basic principle is a serious blow to humanity, a negation of Humanity. Laws, regulations and practices that do not respect this principle will disappear over time, a ghostly memory of less humanitarian times in the past.

Unequal access to development and well-being within countries and between countries can and should be avoided and are in fact a crime against Humanity. We must prevail over such disparities."

(To read the entire draft of the World charter of Migrants, go to www.cmmigrants.org.

Tomorrow, the day will be spent pouring over the draft document. There will opportunities for the migrants assembled to give their input. By the end of the day, the charter will be adopted by those assembled. On Friday, migrants, along with their allies, will consider the future of the charter. for many, the future for migrants is depending upon migrants themselves articulating their rights and, together with their allies, fighting for them.

My colleagues and I will continue to blog from the WAM and the WSF until February 11. For photos of today and throughout the week, go to Priority Africa Network's D2D - World Social Forum web page at http://d2dworldsocialforumdakar2011.blogspot.com/

Slavery As Immigration? Teleconference audio now Available

2011-01-29T10:47:00.000-08:00

Thanks to all who joined us for our first Teleconference in the series 'Black Intersections on Migration'. Our first Teleconference was entitled, Slavery As Immigration based on the work of Rhonda McGee.

You can listen to Rhonda McGee's presentation and teleconference discussion here:

http://www.priorityafrica.org/African_Immigrants.html

Slavery in America was a crime against humanity, a foundational wrong without equal in American history. In “Slavery as Immigration?,” Professor Magee continues her career-long effort to understand the deep impact of the foundational wrong of slavery on American law and social policy. A great-granddaughter of enslaved and segregated workers in the American South, Professor Magee seeks to open up a dialogue among African-American people about the aspects of the Black American experience of slavery and segregation that tell a particularly devastating kind of immigration story.

Her goal is not to minimize the significance of the Black experience as distinctive in American history – far from it. Instead, her goal is to call boldly for national reflection on the elements of the Black American experience that provide a founding plank for longstanding American immigration law and policy, including the importation and deportation policy of racially-identified, socially isolated and politically marginalized people for work at the bottom of the economic system.

Indeed, Professor Magee argues that the forced migration, internal displacement, and denial of citizenship strategies essential to chattel slavery were important components of America’s original immigration and citizenship policy, with legacies impacting immigration and citizenship law and policy to the present day. Further, she argues that the failure of Black Americans to understand the historical impact of slavery (and segregation) on immigration law and policy does more than constitute a gap in our understanding of the historical importance of slavery in America -- a gap we should address for the sake of our own enrichment. More practically, it keeps Black Americans on the periphery of critical debates about increasingly important issues within contemporary American politics – a position we ignore at our political and social peril.

Teleconference series: Black Intersections on Migration

2011-01-25T16:29:00.000-08:00

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration and Priority Africa Network

Invite you to:

Black Intersections on Migration

National Conversations on African, African American,
Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino Migrations to and in the U.S.

A four-part series of teleconference briefings
on timely and critical analyses of migration, race, and identity.

The United Nations has declared 2011 as the “International Year for Peoples of African Descent”. Ten years ago, landmark recommendations were made at the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in Durban South Africa. In a four-part series of teleconferences that looks at the span of Black presence in the U.S. over the centuries, we will examine the unique migration experiences of the African Diaspora within the context of U.S. history and the current debate over immigration. The series brings provocative frameworks and analyses into the discussion about race and immigration that are seldom considered.

Teleconference I
Slavery as Immigration?
Thursday, January 27, Noon Pacific, 1PM Mountain, 2PM Central & 3PM Eastern

Speaker: Rhonda Magee, Professor, University of Francisco School of Law

Slavery in America was a crime against humanity, a foundational wrong without equal in American history. In “Slavery as Immigration?,” Professor Magee continues her career-long effort to understand the deep impact of the foundational wrong of slavery on American law and social policy. A great-granddaughter of enslaved and segregated workers in the American South, Professor Magee seeks to open up a dialogue among African-American people about the aspects of the Black American experience of slavery and segregation that tell a particularly devastating kind of immigration story.

Her goal is not to minimize the significance of the Black experience as distinctive in American history – far from it. Instead, her goal is to call boldly for national reflection on the elements of the Black American experience that provide a founding plank for longstanding American immigration law and policy, including the importation and deportation policy of racially-identified, socially isolated and politically marginalized people for work at the bottom of the economic system.

Indeed, Professor Magee argues that the forced migration, internal displacement, and denial of citizenship strategies essential to chattel slavery were important components of America’s original immigration and citizenship policy, with legacies impacting immigration and citizenship law and policy to the present day. Further, she argues that the failure of Black Americans to understand the historical impact of slavery (and segregation) on immigration law and policy does more than constitute a gap in our understanding of the historical importance of slavery in America -- a gap we should address for the sake of our own enrichment. More practically, it keeps Black Americans on the periphery of critical debates about increasingly important issues within contemporary American politics – a position we ignore at our political and social peril.

Toll-free Dial-in (US/Canada): 1-866-931-7845
International Dial-in: 1-310-374-4949
Conference Code: 904167

Please RSVP by calling (510) 663-2254 or sending an email to teleconference@blackalliance.org

Teleconference II – Thursday, February 24: African American Migrations—The Exodus from the U.S. South

Speaker: Isabel Wilkerson, author, “Warmth of Other Suns: the Epic Story of America’s Great Migration” (Invited).

Teleconference III – Thursday, March 31: New African Immigrants—Grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity

Speaker: Jackie Copeland Carson, PhD, President Copeland-Carson and Associates and author of “Creating Africa in America: Translocal Identity in an Emerging World City”.

Teleconference IV – Thursday, April 28: The Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino Migrations to the U.S.

Speaker: Janvieve Williams Comrie, Executive Director, Latin American and Caribbean Community Center

All briefings are at Noon Pacific, 1PM Mountain, 2PM Central & 3PM Eastern