The National Alliance of Latin American and Caribbean Communities (NALACC), the leading network of Latin American immigrant-led organizations in the United States, called the exclusion hypocritical, unfair, and counterproductive.

“On a yearly basis, hard working immigrants to whom our obsolete and dysfunctional immigration law system has denied them legal permanent residency status, pay billions of dollars in Federal, State, Social Security and Medicare taxes. However, in spite of their well documented contributions, these workers and their tax paying relatives are denied justice and equality under the law,” stated Oscar Chacón, NALACC Executive Director.

“Different levels of government have no problem collecting taxes from everyone. However, our government denies tax-paying immigrant workers who lack immigration status their fair share of tax rebates, and by doing so limiting the expected outcome of the economic stimulus checks,” continued Mr. Chacon. According to economists, undocumented immigrants contributed $428 billion dollars to the nation's $13.6 trillion gross domestic product in 2006 alone. Contributions from sales taxes, property taxes and excise taxes (such as the gas tax) paid by undocumented workers, are significant, they also add.

These are examples of how this policy affects real-life families: 1) a head of household in Rancho Cordova, CA, filed jointly with his wife, but because she is in the process of becoming a permanent resident she does not have a SS number. They will not receive the stimulus check; 2) a U.S.-born citizen in Chicago, IL, filed jointly with her fiancé hoping to receive at least $600, but she too will not receive a check; 3) a permanent resident living in Compton, CA, filed his return, did not include his wife, but he included a child who does not have a valid SS number. Instead of the $900 he expected to receive, he will receive nothing.

Angela Sanbrano, NALACC president, added: “It is a false assumption that undocumented immigrants do not pay taxes. In California, the tenth largest economy in the world, immigrants pay approximately $4.5 billion in state taxes each year; their federal tax contribution is more than $30 billion annually. If the Bush Administration’s real objective is to stimulate the economy, not returning a well-deserved entitlement to immigrants misses a great opportunity to do so.”

California's Low-Income Gifted Students Get Ignored
"With schools under intense pressure from state and federal mandates such as No Child Left Behind to raise test scores of low-achieving pupils, the educational needs of gifted students -- who usually perform well on standardized tests -- too often are ignored, advocates say." Los Angeles Times.

NYPD Harasses High-Ranking Black Cop
The New York Police Department has gone on record to say the treatment of off-duty, Chief Douglas Zeigler, the head of the NYPD's Community Affairs Bureau and the highest uniformed black officer on the force, was "discourteous," but many civil rights advocates argue this is another incident in a string of incidents that proves, "something is wrong with our police department and their interactions with people of color." Newsday.

Originally published in The Nation

By Roberto Lovato

The toll this increasingly oppressive climate has taken on Mancha represents but a small part of its effects on noncitizen immigrants, especially undocumented immigrants, and other Latinos. Mancha and the younger children of the mostly immigrant Latinos in Georgia are learning and internalizing that they are different from white--and black--children not just because they have the wrong skin color but also because many of their parents lack the right papers. They are growing up in a racial and political climate in which Latinos' subordinate status in Georgia and in the Deep South bears more than a passing resemblance to that of African-Americans who were living under Jim Crow. Call it Juan Crow: the matrix of laws, social customs, economic institutions and symbolic systems enabling the physical and psychic isolation needed to control and exploit undocumented immigrants.

To read more.

Yesterday was Israeli Independence Day; the 60th year of Israel’s existence. For some Israelis and Zionists, the day celebrates the birth of statehood for a people long without a land. But for me, as for many other’s, Israeli Independence Day is not a day of celebration but one on which to remember and reflect on violence, racism and the need for solidarity.

Observed in May 15th, the Nakba (Arabic for Catastrophe), is the day of commemoration of the 60 year long dispossession and systematic displacement of Palestinians that continues in the form of brutal military violence and the relegation of Palestinians to live in unlivable zones like the open air prison that Gaza has become. Israeli Independence day marks the anniversary of the beginning of this catastrophe.

This day reminds us of what happens when the identities of those with power and privilege become the basis of political organization. The result can be nothing but to create a racist polity. In the United States, when race is the organizing, animating substance of nation building, we see devastating effects. Whether in the context of immigration policy that excludes and criminalizes immigrants of color or inequitable and unforgiving criminal justice policies that construct black people as threats and incarcerate them, nations cannot be built on racist conceptions of belonging. When they are, we see the destruction of families, livelihood and senses of self.

In the Israeli context, Palestinians living inside of the 1967 Israeli borders, those who were not displaced after the Nakba in 1948, face debilitating racial disparities and exclusion. Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza are dehumanized to the point where Gaza is sealed off and made into a prison and in the West Bank, people’s homes and farms destroyed.

What is needed now is a heightened sense of solidarity. Around the world people are raising their voices in commemoration of the Nakba and in support of a just solution in Palestine and Israel. For me, this can only come when countries are not predicated on a racially exclusive notion of who belongs but open their doors and tear down their walls. This will be as true in Palestine and Israel as it will be here in the United States

As evidence, Clinton cited an Associated Press article "that found how Sen. Obama's support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me."

To further ensure us that her comments were not meant to be divisive Clinton adds, "These are the people you have to win if you're a Democrat in sufficient numbers to actually win the election," she said. "Everybody knows that."

Jerome Armstrong says on MyDD.com in Clinton's defense,

Now, when Barack Obama made his claim about the "typical white person", it didn't mean anything, he was just talking generalities; and the same thing with Clinton here, but even less so [but a 'gaffe' in the same manner]. Clinton clarifies that she's talking about working Americans that Obama is not doing well with, which are typically white, and she's "ugly and divisive"? This is a lame stretch. In fact, had she had not clarified it to say "white Americans" it wouldn't have been a true claim, because Obama is doing very well among black working Americans.

The New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) filed a lawsuit against the NYPD in federal court on behalf of a New York Post crime reporter who was the victim of racial profiling. Despite the fact that the Post ran an editorial (h/t Stereohyped) that claimed racial profiling was not a growing problem, Leonardo Blair, 28, a Jamaican immigrant was harassed by police when walking to his car in the Bronx last year.

Blair's case comes as the NYCLU releases a study of police shootings from 1996 to 2006 that reveals, "New York City police officers fire their weapons far less often than they did a decade ago, a statistic that has dropped along with the crime rate."

The New York Times reports that officers hit their target only a third of the time, and they are more often shooting at someone who is not returning fire. The article also points out the NYPD's precision when shooting animals is better than with humans. "When they fire at dogs, roughly 55 percent of shots hit home. Most of their targets are pit bulls, with a smattering of Rottweilers and German shepherds."

If you need any more proof that police treat Black men worse that dogs, check out the video of Philadelphia police beating three robbery suspects.

In a series called "America-Hating Black Preacher," Darrin Bell compares the media's reaction to Martin Luther King in 1968 to the response to Rev. Wright in 2008.

Go to the Candorville archives for the entire series.

The most recent strips after the jump.

FBI Investigates Indiana Cross Burning
An interracial couple found a cross burning on their lawn early Friday morning. The Southern Poverty Law Center sees the crime as intimidation, but the FBI investigation continues. Indianapolis Star.

First Aid Goes to Myanmar
In Myanmar, the ruling military junta has given the US permission to fly in relief supplies to the survivors of cyclone Nargis. Officials from Thailand mediated between the US and the junta, which mistrusts American intentions. Euronews.

Border Patrol Arrests Leaving Immigrants
"U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers have been setting up checkpoints, boarding buses destined for Mexico and pulling off people who don't have proper documentation." Los Angeles Times.

That’s the sign that a group of freshmen will see when they walk through the doors of the Delaware Academy for Public Safety and Security in Wilmington, Delaware on a fall day in 2010.

As the brainchild of several lawmakers and a 72 year-old Jarhead, hand-to-hand combat expert, and Judo coach extraordinaire, the school will train young men and women (mostly from the “inner city”), for a wide variety of first responder Homeland Security jobs.

The school’s curriculum is designed to prepare kids for careers as prison guards, SWAT teamers, paramedics, demolitionists, and firefighters; you know, all the jobs that don’t necessarily require a high school degree and which you can qualify for after a two-week course.

This “innovative” plan has garnered support from Delaware’s Senate Minority Leader, House speaker, and many of our favorite organizations from the prison-military-industrial complex. They claim that their plan will not only grant every parent’s wish of seeing their kids read weapons manuals instead of Hemingway, but it will also help keep their children from succumbing to a life of “apathy or crime.”

The agreement guarantees: (1) fair prices of at least 20% lower than the norm set by industry leaders like Western Union and MoneyGram; (2) adoption of socially-responsible screens on investments to ensure that resources do not foster further displacement of communities; (3) a customer service framework that values transparency, respect and non-discrimination; and (4) a commitment to genuine community reinvestment that allocates up to 10% of its pre-tax profits to sustainable development projects identified by local communities.

TIGRA's director, Francis Calpotura says, “Today signals a new day for immigrants and their families around the world. A company has stepped up to say ‘We understand your aspirations. We are committed to your communities.’ and is willing to back this up with their money.”

Photos by Jorge Rivas

Could it be that the color of my skin, a dark chocolate shade, tells people where my societal and economic status ought to be? I used to think it was just me, but maybe it’s really not.

In the Los Angeles Times, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar points of the parallels between the 1968 Olympics and the upcoming summer games in Beijing.

Here we are 40 years later and we are once again about to send our young athletes overseas to compete in games while we send our young soldiers overseas to fight in war. And, as before, there is a social agenda attached to the Olympic Games.

On CL.com, we are also conducting a survey of ColorLines and Racewire readers. This is your opportunity to talk back to us. Let us know what you like, what you don't, and what you think we should be doing.

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Check out these short audio interviews from May Day in Washington DC. Featured interviews include immigrants, activists, filmmakers, and hip hop artists.

Check out some of these interviews here:

* Nicola Wells, organizer with FIRM - Fair Immigration Reform Movement, with a shout-out and a welcome

* Eugene, student at Howard University highlights the intersections between communities of color and immigrant communities

* David Thurston, from the New Sanctuary Movement, on the faith community and immigration issues.

More interviews here.

For MVL photos from across the country