May 23, 2017

Photo: Upside Down World

passed a law seeking to address a statelessness crisis that has effectively stripped thousands of people off their Dominican nationality and with it,  denied them a range of human rights.

To: Texas Department of State Health Services
From: Marco Malagon, Princeton, Texas
Date: January 25, 2016

Last August, my wife and I were thrilled to become parents. As a proud a father, I am committed to making sure my child has more opportunities than I did growing up. But soon after his birth I found out that because I am undocumented, the state of Texas would deny my son – a U.S. citizen – his birth certificate.

And it’s not just my family: across Texas parents are struggling to get documentation for their children.

Sign to demand that the Texas Department of State Health Services stop denying birth certificates to children of undocumented parents.

Without a birth certificate, these children won’t be able to access basic services guaranteed to U.S. citizens. They can’t be enrolled in school and their parents can’t authorize medical staff to treat them in an emergency. This practice is designed to punish undocumented parents and make it harder for their children to access services they have a right to.

After much pushing I got lucky at the clerk’s office and they finally found a workaround for me to obtain the document. But many offices in Texas are not helping people in my situation; a friend of mine has a one year-old baby who still has no birth certificate. She’s worried about whether she’ll be able to enroll her child in daycare or how she will get health care for her baby.

This practice discriminates against US Citizen children and is unacceptable. The Constitution says that children born in the U.S. are granted full citizenship; it’s not up to Texas to deny that right.

Please sign my petition and demand that the Texas DSHS stop denying children of undocumented parents their right to fully-documented citizenship.

Sign the petition:
https://www.change.org/p/texas-department-of-state-health-services-stop-denying-our-children-their-right-to-a-birth-certificate

By David L. Wilson, Upside Down World
October 16, 2015

Texas officials have now found a way to circumvent the long-established understanding that children born in the United States are automatically U.S. citizens.

Over the past year some state officials have been refusing to provide copies of Texas-born children’s birth certificates to their undocumented parents. The Texas bureaucrats don’t try to deny that the children are citizens; instead, they simply demand that the parents produce certain types of identification documents—-documents which many unauthorized immigrants from Mexico and Central America are unable to obtain. The result is that the kids are being denied their rights as U.S. citizens—-including, in some cases, the right to enroll in kindergarten—-and may end up stateless.

This subterfuge must sound familiar to many Dominicans of Haitian ancestry. The current threat by the Dominican Republic to expel tens of thousands of Dominican-born Haitian descendants evolved over the past decade out of an unofficial practice very much like the one in Texas.[...]

Read the full article:
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/caribbean-archives-45/5495-us-and-dominican-immigration-policies-is-there-a-difference

Issues 2016: Immigration Reform and Race Relations

By Marist Poll
September 14, 2015

Immigration reform and race relations continue to be hot-button issues in the headlines and for the 2016 presidential campaign. When it comes to U.S. immigration policy, many Americans, including more than eight in ten Latinos, think that birthright should remain in place so that children born in this country receive U.S. citizenship, regardless of whether or not their parents are undocumented immigrants. Americans divide about whether or not the term “anchor baby” is offensive. And, a plurality of residents say undocumented immigrants should be deported which would eliminate the need for so-called “sanctuary cities.” Not surprisingly, a majority of Latinos consider the description “anchor baby” to be insulting, and about two-thirds support maintaining “sanctuary cities.”

On the issue of police-community relations, nearly two-thirds of Americans say minorities are treated the same as anyone else. However, one in four U.S. residents, including 31% of Latinos, believe authorities treat minorities more harshly.

What do Americans and Latinos think of the Black Lives Matter movement? When compared with another movement in the United States, the Tea Party, more Americans view “Black Lives Matter” positively. 37% of Americans have a positive impression of “Black Lives Matter” compared with one in four Americans who says the Tea Party conjures up positive feelings for them. [...]

Read the full article:
http://maristpoll.marist.edu/914-issues-2016-immigration-reform-and-race-relations/

Download the poll:
http://maristpoll.marist.edu/wp-content/misc/usapolls/us150826/Immigration/MSNBC_Telemundo_Marist%20Poll_National%20Release%20and%20Tables_September%202015_Immigration.pdf