Two years ago, we were deeply involved in the battle against Alabama’s HB 56, the harshest immigration law in the country. HB 56 was a self-deportation bill that relied on racial profiling to harass immigrants in the state. But, as Benjy Sarlin notes, today, HB 56 is in shambles: “Illegal...
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Today, the Senate confirmed former Department of Justice official Tom Perez as the next US Secretary of Labor by a 54-46 vote. Perez is the first-ever Dominican-American Cabinet appointee and the first Hispanic Cabinet member in Obama’s second term. We know Perez best from our days in Alabama shortly after the...
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When most of us think about Alabama and immigration, we think about Senator Jefferson Beauregard Sessions, Rep. Mo Brooks, State Senator Scott Beason and, of course, the viciously anti-immigrant law, HB 56, which Beason authored. But over the past several weeks, a very powerful pro-immigrant voice from Alabama has made himself heard: Rep....
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Yesterday, the Senate Gang of 8 introduced its long-awaited bipartisan immigration bill. Tomorrow, the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold its first hearing on the bill, with Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. The hearing will probably double as our first chance to see the anti-immigrant “Gang of Hate”...
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This week, NPR is airing a series of reports on the state of US immigration and the prospects for reform in 2013. In the latest segment, Debbie Elliott looks at Alabama’s worst-in-the-nation anti-immigrant law HB 56, which was first implemented just over a year ago and still has consequences...
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The Beloved Community Church in Avondale, Alabama has given Pulitzer Prize-winning Birmingham News columnist Joey Kennedy (who is often covered on this blog) its annual Incarnation Award, for his stance against Alabama’s anti-immigrant law HB 56. As the church said in its statement announcing the award: This year we...
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When Republicans in the North Carolina House of Representatives put together a special committee on immigration last year, the expectation was that we’d see ugly legislative recommendations along the lines of Arizona’s SB 1070 and Alabama’s HB 56 recommendations. But, a funny thing happened along the way – probably...
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Last night in Alabama, undocumented former Washington Post reporter Jose Antonio Vargas spoke at an Immigration Town Hall entitled “Do I Look ‘Illegal’?” and discussed Alabama’s HB 56 anti-immigrant state law as well as anti-immigrant sentiments like it around the nation. One of HB 56’s sponsors, state Sen. Scott...
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Oct 25, 2012
This time last year, Alabama had just begun implementing its worst-in-the-nation anti-immigrant law, HB 56, causing chaos in the state and forcing neighborhoods full of immigrants to flee. At the time, state senator and HB 56 sponsor Scott Beason rationalized the law as “a jobs bill,” one that would...
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