janet napolitano
Newswire: Parents Lose Custody Over Pot 8/19/11
In New York, hundreds of parents who have been caught with small amounts of marijuana have lost custody of their children. Janet Napolitano, the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, said Thursday that undocumented immigrants awaiting deportation that do not have criminal records will be allowed to stay in the U.S. indefinitely and apply for work permits. And the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services awarded Florida almost 2 million dollars to help the state sign up more children for health insurance.
Email this pageGRITtv: Rinku Sen: Arizona's Immigration Debacle
Last Friday, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed into law the country's most repressive immigration bill, SB 1070, which criminalizes undocumented immigrants and gives police the authority to demand papers from anyone they suspect of being undocumented. Though Brewer, a Republican who took over from Janet Napolitano when she left to become Obama's Homeland Security secretary, claims that there are protections in the bill to prevent racial profiling, it's hard to imagine a way that officers will decide from whom to demand papers that won't involve the color of their skin or the language that they speak. Rinku Sen of ColorLines and the Applied Research Center joins us to discuss the bill, the criminalization of immigrants, and what to do to fight back. Distributed by Tubemogul.
GRITtv: Salvador Reza: Fighting Sheriff Joe
Sheriff Joe Arpaio is a household name for all the wrong reasons. Known for accusations of racial profiling and immigration raids in Maricopa County, Arizona, Arpaio is held up as a hero by anti-immigrant groups but has created a climate of fear in his state, where the Latino community is afraid to call the police for common complaints for fear of deportation. Recently stripped of his federal authority to make immigration arrests, Arpaio continues to conduct raids and appears not to fear repercussions. Salvador Reza joins Laura for an exclusive interview on Arpaio's ongoing mistreatment of his community. Reza notes that the Obama administration has mostly made symbolic moves to control Arpaio, but in practice allows him to do whatever he wants. Thanks to Dennis Gilman for the video footage in this segment.
GRITtv: Aarti Shahani on Janet Napolitano's Law and Order Extremism
Aarti Shahani, founder of Families for Freedom, discusses a recent decision by the Office of Homeland Security and Janet Napolitano to recruit 11 additional localities into the federal program, known as ICE, that turns traffic cops and jail guards into deportation agents. Shahani says that Napolitano is in fact a law and order extremist and that the ruling wasn't a total surprise. But what does it mean for the Obama administration's immigration policy?
