National Fast For Immigrant Justice

Please join us in fasting for immigrant justice on July 30, 2007.
A group fasting on that day will be meeting from 2-3pm at St. Peter's in the Loop, 110 W Madison, Chicago, IL.
Every Friday at 7:15am, nuns from the Sisters of Mercy order will be praying the rosary outside the Broadview Detention Center, located near the intersection of Lexington/Beach Streets in Broadview, IL.

ARUNA'S STORY

Aruna was  brutally beaten by her husband on numerous occasions.  Finally fearing for her life, she fled her native India, forced to leave behind her two children, and came to the United States.
She applied for political asylum, but her application was denied.  Aruna and others like her need your help.
Aruna’s case has been featured in the New York Times magazine, the Chicago
Tribune, the National Law Journal, and on National Public Radio.
Former Attorney General Janet Reno proposed regulations which would have included domestic violence as a basis for political asylum in our nation, but unfortunately the regulations were  never finalized.“Aruna’s Law” would codify the proposed regulation and make it a part of the Immigration and Nationality Act.
Aruna often cries herself to sleep, looking at the pictures of her son and
daughter. She knows that she cannot go back to India. She was unable to attend her father’s funeral. Please help her and the other immigrant victims of domestic violence.

For more information, please contact:
Coalition for Aruna’s Law
c/o Royal F. Berg
33 N.  La Salle, Suite 2300
Chicago, IL. 60602
312-855-1118



JOIN THE NATIONAL FAST FOR IMMIGRANT JUSTICE

Edith Rivas with her two children.  Photo by Paul Berg
 
 
 September 30, 2006 marked the tenth anniversary of the enactment of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act,
(IIRIRA), a heinous anti-immigrant and anti-family law.  IIRIRA has caused great  suffering and  irreparable  harm to U.S. citizen children across  the country, and has torn  countless families of U.S. citizens and immigrants apart.   IIRIRA mandates detention and deportation for whole classes of immigrants, without regard  to the hardships  that will be suffered. 
Edith Riva is a US citizen and mother of two young children. She filed a petition for her husband to obtain permanent residence in the US. When he went to Mexico for his visa appointment, he was told that under IIRIRA law he would have to wait in Mexico for ten years. His application for a waiver was denied. Edith cries herself to sleep every night and doesn't know what to tell her children when they ask "when is daddy coming home?"
If IIRIRA had not become law, Elivira Arrellano, a single mother of a U.S. citizen child, who has been given sanctuary in a church in Chicago, would have been able to apply in Immigration Court for permanent residence based on hardship to herself and her son, through a form of relief called Suspension of Deportation. IIRIRA eliminated this form of relief.


Elivira Arrellano and her 7 year old son Saul, a US born citizen in the Adalberto United Methodist Church, Chicago, IL.  Photo by Paul Berg

Left to right: Immigration attorney Rosalba Pina, immigrant activist Delores Huerta
and Elivira Arrellano. Photo by Paul Berg
 
Many of IIRIRA's harshest provisions are being applied retroactively, causing even more suffering. IIRIRA also precludes judicial review of many government decision, and bars millions of immigrants with U.S. citizen family members and with long residence in our country from returning to the United States for up to ten years, and in many cases for life!!! IIRIRA is cruel, inhumane, and draconian. It must be repealed!!
 
The National Fast for Immigrant Justice will call attention to the horrors of IIRIRA and put a human face on the suffering that this terrible law is inflicting on the most vulnerable among us. Participants in the National Fast for Immigrant Justice will donate the money they would have spent on food to organizations that fight for justice for immigrants, and will contact elected officials and let them know that they are fasting and why.
 
The  Chairperson of the National  Fast for Immigrant Justice is Delores Huerta, the co-founder with Cesar Chavez of the United Farm Workers Union (UFW).    September 30, 2006 also marked the 44th anniversary of the founding of the UFW.   Cesar would often take part in fasts to raise consciousness of the plight of migrant workers, and their struggle for justice. The National Fast for Immigrant Justice is dedicated to Cesar Chavez.  
 
 
For more information, please contact-
 
 
            Royal F. Berg               or              Rosalba Pina
          312-855-1118                                773-762-1200
                                                       rosalba@rosalbapina.com                



National Fast For Immigrant Justice
Please post how the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (IIRIRA) has impacted your own life.

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Posted by Paul Berg at 9/2/2006 12:43 PM | View Comments (9) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (0)