Yesterday, immigration advocates were vindicated as U.S. District Judge Susan R. Bolton struck down the most heinous provisions of Arizona's anti-immigrant bill, SB 1070, which takes effect today. In her ruling, Judge Bolton rejected the assertion of Arizona's lawyers that the statute was crafted to complement federal laws and insisted that the provisions interfered or directly conflicted with them. In her preliminary injunction, Bolton delayed the stipulations that require immigrants to carry papers and that banned them for soliciting employment in public places while the federal lawsuit proceeds. She also blocked officers from making warrantless arrests of "suspected" undocumented immigrants reasoning that it would violate the rights of citizens and legal residents and unduly burden federal resources and agencies, which would be asked to field...
Yesterday marked day 100 of the BP oil spill disaster, a crisis that has changed the lives of hundreds of thousands along the Gulf coast, and changed the way our nation looks at energy and the environment. While recent news about the capping of the gusher and scheduled completion of the relief wells brings hope, the last 100 days have been full of turmoil, anxiety, and pain for our friends and neighbors in the Gulf who have lost livelihoods and - for the families and friends of the 11 rig workers killed on April 20 - lost loved ones. With 100-200 million gallons of oil dumped into the Gulf and as much as half of that still uncontained, a daunting clean up task remains. Though...
Last month, the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH), made up of Cabinet-level Secretaries of US government agencies that deal with issues surrounding homelessness, unveiled a new strategy to combat the rising number of families, especially veterans, without a stable home. The plan sets out four objectives: "(1) Finish the job of ending chronic homelessness in five years; (2) Prevent and end homelessness among Veterans in five years; (3) Prevent and end homelessness for families, youth, and children in ten years; and (4) Set a path to ending all types of homelessness." The document sets out a number of other smaller goals, and includes 52 strategies meant to help national and regional agencies better collaborate. Of course, as with all proposals, as Nan Roman, President...
The Fair Sentencing Act passed in the House today, and since it already passed in the Senate back in March, it will now go to President Obama for his signature. This historic legislation will reduce the disparity between crack and powder cocaine sentencing, and also direct federal resources toward large-scale drug traffickers. The 100-to-1 sentencing ratio was instituted in 1986, in large part to combat the scourge of violence accompanied by crack cocaine usage in some of our nation's largest cities, and instead has unduly targeted low-level crack offenders: before today's changes, a person with five grams of crack received a mandatory sentence of five years in prison, while that same person would have to possess 500 grams of powder cocaine to earn the...
