America's Voice Blog

Posted 12/09/09 at 12:07pm By Jackie Mahendra

Sotomayor, Supreme Court Use Term “Undocumented Immigrant” For First Time

SotomayorAmanda Terkel at Think Progress cites a New York Times article today, in "Sotomayor’s opinion marks the Supreme Court’s first use of the term ‘undocumented immigrant:’"

Yesterday, the Supreme Court “released its first four decisions in argued cases this term,” including one marking Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s debut. The case concerned “whether federal trial-court rulings concerning the lawyer-client privilege may be appealed right away,” to which Sotomayor said no. The New York Times notes one particularly noteworthy part of Sotomayor’s opinion:

In an otherwise dry opinion, Justice Sotomayor did introduce one new and politically charged term into the Supreme Court lexicon.

Justice Sotomayor’s opinion in the case, Mohawk Industries v. Carpenter, No. 08-678, marked the first use of the term “undocumented immigrant,” according to a legal database. The term “illegal immigrant” has appeared in a dozen decisions.

Terms like “illegal alien” and “illegal immigrant” are considered pejorative and offensive by immigrants rights organizations.

Culture Kitchen, a New York political blog, had this to say today about the term "illegal:"

Language matters in politics, especially in this digital age when repetition and redundancy are all what's needed to establish the use of a term as eternally acceptable in the mainstream. Case in point: "Illegal Alien" is a nativist, bigoted and even bordering on racist term that has become common parlance in mainstream media.

Click here to read more.
Posted 08/06/09 at 04:18pm By Paco Fabian

Si, Se Puede! Yes, We Did!

Sotomayor was finally confirmed today, which not only makes this a proud day for the Latino community, but a historic day for all Americans.

Unfortunately, what should have been a proud moment of bipartisanship was tarnished by the divisive votes of so many Republican senators who opposed Sotomayor. In fact, some right-wing organizations, such as the Americans for Legal Immigration Reform (ALIPAC), put the pressure on asking their supporters to call out "Republican Sell-outs" and oppose their Sotomayor votes. According to the Orlando Sentinel:

In the e-mail blast, the group told its followers to make "thousands of angry, yet proper and legal calls" to stop those senators --including Florida's Mel Martinez-- from voting for her, "because this is EXACTLY HOW THEY PLAN TO PASS AMNESTY NEXT!"

That sounds remarkably as if they're saying a capable judge shouldn't be confirmed because she's Hispanic.

The thirty-one Republican senators who voted against Sotomayor--after acknowledging her distinguished record--show that the GOP has yet to change its stripes and set aside partisanship in favor of progress. And considering the Republican Party's historic losses among Latino voters in the 2008 elections, you would think that GOP leaders would realize that they need to change course or risk further marginalization.

The GOP will have another chance to redeem itself when Congress considers comprehensive immigration reform later this year; if the Party continues its 'politics as usual' strategy, watch for further losses among Latino voters in 2010 and beyond.

Posted 07/21/09 at 01:35pm By Jackie Mahendra

Maddow Bulldozes Buchanan’s Vision of America’s Racial Past

Colbert may have tickled our funny bones last night, but Rachel Maddow set the record straight-- watch it:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Huffington post blogger Nicholas Graham reports in Maddow Demolishes Buchanan's Surreal Facts About America's Racial Past (VIDEO):

Several days ago, Rachel Maddow and Pat Buchanan had a heated debate about the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court and the fairness and necessity of affirmative action.

We tracked the debate here, here, and here. 

Click here to read more.
Posted 07/21/09 at 08:54am By Jackie Mahendra

Colbert Calls MSNBC’s Pat Buchanan A ‘Reverse Civil Rights Leader’

Steven Colbert - PatSteven Colbert wasted no time last night taking MSNBC correspondent Pat Buchanan's race-based attack on Sonia Sotomayor and making it absolutely laughable.

Huffington Post blogger Alex Leo has a great synopsis of the Colbert Report last night. He writes:

Stephen Colbert eviscerated Tom Tancredo, Pat Buchanan and Rush Limbaugh last night for claiming Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor is racist and that white men are being discriminated against.

He referred to Buchanan, who has been appearing on MSNBC all week claiming Sotomayor has "a lifelong resolve to discriminate against white males," as a reverse civil rights leader, and showed a clip of him saying, "White men were 100% of the people who wrote the Constitution, 100% of the people who signed the Declaration of Independence, 100% of the people who died at Gettysburg and Vicksburg." This, of course, prompted Colbert to say, "YEAH, where were the black guys during the Civil War? Come on, I'm not saying they all should have volunteered, just three fifths of them." 

It stands to be seen whether GOP leadership will side with this absurd brand of race-baiting politics or come to grips with the new political reality as we enter the upcoming fight for real immigration reform.

PS- watch the video here.

Posted 07/16/09 at 10:18pm By Jackie Mahendra

Rachel Maddow Takes on ‘Uncle Pat’ Buchanan for Racial Sotomayor Attack

UPDATED: New Maddow video up top. AND it's "melanin" not "melatonin." Not enough coffee this morning... (H/T to Kai of KaiChang.net, who wrote: just fyi, "melatonin" is an animal hormone, I think you meant "melanin", the protein pigment which creates the "C" part of "POC" -- LOL!)

Rachel Maddow asks why "Uncle Pat" Buchanan is promoting a race-based attack on Sotomayor on MSNBC:

 

Kos, founder of the progressive blog Daily Kos, argued last night: 

And to remind people why Buchanan has been unhinged about Sotomayor all week:

We’re going to have 135 million Hispanics in the United States by 2050, heavily concentrated in the southwest. The question is whether we’re going to survive as a country.

Yes, Pat, the country will survive the increase in melanin...

The bigger question is whether MSNBC will continue to seek out Uncle Pat's sophisticated racial commentary.

Click here to read more.
Posted 07/15/09 at 01:31pm By Jackie Mahendra

Anti-Immigration Groups Show True Colors, Attack Sotomayor and NCLR

Sonia SotomayorJust in case Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) leading the attack on Sonia Sotomayor's alleged "racism" wasn't enough pot calling the kettle black, this just in.

In a press release,  ALIPAC, one of the nation's most vocal anti-immigration advocacy groups, takes a stab at Sotomayor's membership in NCLR (National Council of La Raza), a mainstream Hispanic equivalent to the NAACP.

Sonia Sotomayor is a member and supporter of the racist group La Raza which supports Amnesty and welfare benefits for illegal aliens," said William Gheen of ALIPAC. "Her membership in this racist group, along with her racist 'wise Latina' comments and her court decisions against the firefighters in New Haven, tells us that Sonia Sotomayor shows a pattern of bigotry that should not be welcomed on the Supreme Court!

So, apologies to the Center for Immigration Studies, but its head Mark Krikorian no longer wins the award for most absurd line of attack on the President's Supreme Court nominee. Nope, William Gheen clearly distinguishes himself there.

And in case you're wondering what NCLR is all about, and where they get their racist evil dollars, Rachel Maddow summed it up nicely for Tom Tancredo:

 

Posted 07/13/09 at 02:47pm By Jackie Mahendra

Sotomayor Watch: 3 Videos from Today’s Senate Judiciary Hearing and 1 Call to Action

Three videos to watch from today's hearing and a bonus (action) video from our friends at Presente.org.

First, a clip of Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI), who speaks during the opening day of Judge Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation hearing. Before the Senate Judiciary Committee, he challenges the popular Republican theme that a 2001 speech that Sotomayor gave on handling issues of race and gender make her a 'reverse racist'-- Watch it:

 
According to the Chicago Tribune:
Feingold said Monday that opponents who have seized upon that line are taking her comments out of context. He says the hundreds of opinions she has written suggest she takes a "cautious and careful approach" to the law.
Click here to read more.
Posted 07/13/09 at 11:44am By Jackie Mahendra

Hearings for Judge Sotomayor Commence: Which Way Forward for the GOP and Latino Voters?

Today kicks of the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings for Judge Sonia Sotomayor. In question is whether Sotomayor has what it takes to become the 111th Supreme Court Justice of the United States, as well as the first Hispanic and third female to serve in the nation's highest court of law. Stay tuned to watch it live right here:

 

 

As we noted last month:

In case you missed it, the race-based attacks on Presiden't Obama's Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, got very, very ugly.

Media Matters has chronicled the attacks from their news watch-dog perspective here. The group continues to point out the failure of the reporting on these attacks to put Sotomayor's comments in context. She has specifically been attacked for comments made in 2001 that her experience as a "wise Latina" would give her valuable experience as a judge. According to Media Matters:

When Sotomayor made the "wise Latina" comment, she was specifically discussing the importance of judicial diversity in determining "race and sex discrimination cases." Additionally, conservatives, including Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, have each acknowledged the significant impact their background and personal experiences have had on their judicial thinking.

Click here to read more.
Posted 06/01/09 at 06:43pm By Jackie Mahendra

New York Times, NPR Mock Race-based Attacks on Sotomayor

nprIn case you missed it, the race-based attacks on Presiden't Obama's Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, got very, very ugly last week.

Yesterday's editorial in the New York Times, Judging Sonia Sotomayor, stated it succinctly:

Some of Judge Sotomayor’s detractors seem uncomfortable with her Puerto Rican heritage. Tom Tancredo, a former Republican congressman, raged about her ties to the National Council of La Raza, calling it, absurdly, a “Latino K.K.K.” A writer on the National Review Web site fretted that the accent on the final syllable of Sotomayor might mean she is insufficiently assimilated. […]

Clearly, conservative groups and Republican elected officials see this nomination as a way to score points off wedge issues that excite their base. It diminishes everyone when a nomination process deteriorates into character assassination and ethnic intolerance.

While it may be too late for Latino-KKK-Tancredo and She-Should-Change-Her-Name-To-Be-More-Anglo-Krikorian to change course, it's certainly not too late for Repbulican Party Leadership to chart a new direction on this and the coming debate about immigration reform, which has tended to spill over with exactly the same brand of hateful, race-based rhetoric.

In "America changes, GOP retrenches," kos (founder of Daily Kos) argues that the Republican Party needs a new strategy if it wants to survive in the face of rapidly-changing demographics:

Now, they're in the process of losing Latinos with their opposition to comprehensive immigration reform and Judge Sotomayor. And even Asians -- projected to be over 9 percent of the population by 2050 -- gave Obama a 62-35 margin in 2008. Without winning back some of those non-white voters, Republicans simply can't win. The numbers aren't there.

Yet rather than rethink their approach on issues of race, the GOP is doubling down on this policy of failure, staying the course toward electoral irrelevancy. Their continued opposition to comprehensive immigration reform, coming to a debate near you sometime later this year, will only reinforce what people will see during the Sotomayor confirmation process -- a Republican Party that hates anything brown, and panders to its angry white male base.

In a more humourous take on the whole Sotomayor attack absurdity, NPR chimed in with "The dipute over Habeas Porkus" on "Wait Wait... Don't tell me!"

You'll have to listen for yourself. 

Posted 05/29/09 at 05:40pm By Jackie Mahendra

NCLR Fights KKK Tancredo Attack, Tancredo “Not Sorry,” GOP Hispanic Outreach Team Convulses

Earlier today we asked, "Will Washington Republicans Repudiate Race-based Attacks on Sotomayor?"

Extremists in the anti-immigrant movement have become key mouthpieces in the race-based campaign against President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee, Judge Sonia Sotomayor. They have dropped the pretense that their opposition to immigration is grounded in high-minded principles. Instead, they are revealing an ugliness that is as blatant as it is offensive. Just yesterday, former Rep. Tom Tancredo attacked Judge Sotomayor for being a member of the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), a mainstream civil rights organization with a 40 year old history, by saying it's like a "Latino KKK."

While Tancredo has come out swinging again, even refusing to apologize on CNN, NCLR is going on the offense. They are demanding that Republican Party leadership say "enough is enough." Below is the petition, but the ask is simple: apologize, now - stand against the politics of division and fear.

Sign it here - demand better.

Here's what the petition says:

Condemn the Attacks on Latinos and Sotomayor, Now!

Required text:
(This text will be included in your message)
Chairman Michael Steele of the RNC
CC: Senator Mitch McConnell, Minority Leader
CC: Representative John Boehner, Minority Leader

Dear Leaders of the Republican Party:

We all know that Supreme Court nominations get political, even with nominees as qualified as Judge Sonia Sotomayor. Still, that does not mean politicians get a free pass to attack nominees solely on the basis of race or ethnicity.

Neither does it mean that politicians get a free pass to slander organizations that work to promote civil rights and justice for Hispanic Americans, thereby making America stronger.

During an interview about Judge Sotomayor yesterday, former Congressman and current anti-immigrant extremist Tom Tancredo, called NCLR 'a Latino KKK without the hoods and the nooses.' Describing how profoundly offensive this kind of smear campaign against Sotomayor and the nation's largest Latino civil rights and advocacy organization would be impossible. This outburst was reprehensible not only to Hispanics and communities of color, but to all Americans who want to put this ugly chapter of our history behind us.

Unfortunately, sadder still is that Republican leadership has failed to condemn these extreme statements; not one leader has repudiated the outrageous claims.

We, the undersigned ask you, Chairman Steele, to gather your fellow leaders of the RNC, and firmly condemn these statements as soon as possible. It is time to stand against the politics of division and fear and work together for a stronger America.

Thank you.

Tom Tancredo responds unsurprisingly:

And in case there was any doubt about how this relates to the revolting immigration debate of years past and (likely) months to come, this, from Ali Frick of Think Progress. Frick argues in "G. Gordon Liddy On Sotomayor: ‘Let’s Hope That The Key Conferences Aren’t When She’s Menstruating’":

Yesterday on his radio show, conservative host G. Gordon Liddy continued the right wing’s all-out assault on Judge Sonia Sotomayor. First, just like Tom Tancredo, Liddy slammed Sotomayor’s affiliation with the civil rights group La Raza — and referred to the Spanish language as “illegal alien“:

LIDDY: I understand that they found out today that Miss Sotomayor is a member of La Raza, which means in illegal alien, “the race.” And that should not surprise anyone because she’s already on record with a number of racist comments.

Click here to read more.

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