Daily Kos

Ajit Pai's FCC: 'Custom built for the business plans of Sinclair Broadcasting'

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 7:25 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 19:25

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD - FEBRUARY 23: Federal Communication Commission Chairman Ajit Pai arrives at the Conservative Political Action Conference at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center February 23, 2018 in National Harbor, Maryland. Pai was given the 'Charlton Heston Courage Under Fire Award' by the National Rifle Association during CPAC, the largest annual gathering of conservatives. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) — Thinking this is not where a nonpartisan public servant is supposed to be? You're right.

That FCC inspector general investigation in to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and whether he has been "improperly coordinating" with Sinclair Broadcasting on the conglomerate's efforts to buy Tribune Media looks like just the beginning of Pai's ethical problems. The guy's a corrupt little bastard. That includes showing up at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) last week, not something government officials should be doing.

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai was given the National Rifle Association's Charlton Heston Courage Under Fire Award at CPAC Friday. Accepting the award is almost certainly a violation of government ethics rules, according to Walter Shaub, who was director of the US Office of Government Ethics from 2013 to 2017. Pai has not publicly responded to the accusation.

It's actually Pai's problem with Sinclair, however, that's likely to be his big problem. Because, as Democratic FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel attests "All of our media policy decisions have one thing in common: They are all custom built for the business plans of Sinclair Broadcasting." And in reality, all of the major media policy votes they have taken directly benefit Sinclair.

They have voted to the Ultra High Frequency (UHF) discount that broadcasters used to get. UHF stations have largely disappeared since everything has become digital, and the FCC got rid of this discount in 2016. Pai's FCC reinstated it. Not at all coincidentally, Sinclair owns a mess of UHF stations. "It makes no technical sense," says Rosenworcel. "It benefits Sinclair Broadcasting."

In the old days, one company couldn't even own both a television station and a newspaper in the same city, but that's changed. Last November, the FCC voted to change ownership rules so that a single company can own two of the top four stations in any and every given market. Which means Sinclair already has or is in the process of getting two stations in the Des Moines, Seattle, Richmond, Salt Lake City, and other markets. In a related change, in December they got rid of a rule that a single company couldn't own TV stations that reached more than 39 percent of the U.S. population. That cap is gone, and the FCC may or may not impose a different cap. Also related, the requirement that a company maintain a commitment to its community by keeping studios in a city where it is licensed is now gone.

Twenty red states have nothing better to do with taxpayer money than sue over Obamacare—again

By Joan McCarter

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 7:05 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 19:05

WASHINGTON, DC - JUNE 28: Anti-Obamacare protesters wear masks of U.S. President Barack Obama and Grim Reaper as they demonstrate in front of the U.S. Supreme Court June 28, 2012 in Washington, DC. The Supreme Court is expected to hand down its ruling on the Affordable Healthcare Act this morning. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images) — They are all, still, that guy.

Because it will always be 2010 for Republicans in red states, and because they will always have to be fighting Obamacare in an election year, 20 states are suing. Again. Always. This time they are suing the Trump administration instead of the Obama administration, but it's still about Obamacare.

Wisconsin, Texas and several other red states said in a lawsuit filed today that since Congress repealed the individual mandate's tax penalty for not having coverage, that means the mandate itself—and the whole health care law — is invalid.
The GOP tax law "eliminated the tax penalty of the ACA, without eliminating the mandate itself,” the states argue in a complaint filed today in U.S. District Court in the Northern District of Texas. "What remains, then, is the individual mandate, without any accompanying exercise of Congress's taxing power, which the Supreme Court already held that Congress has no authority to enact."

Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton says that the goal of the suit is total Obamacare repeal, since Congress failed to accomplish that. Trump's Justice Department has not yet said whether it would defend the law in court. Spoiler alert: it probably won't.

Because eight years and millions of people successfully insured later, Republicans can't stand the idea that most people have access to affordable health insurance because of a government program—a program that a black president created.

Senate Republicans' Wall Street reform roll-back faces strong public opposition

By Joan McCarter

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 6:45 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 18:45

A person holds a 99 Percent button at the Occupy Wall Street protest September 17, 2012 on the one year anniversary of the movement in New York. AFP PHOTO/Stan HONDA (Photo credit should read STAN HONDA/AFP/GettyImages)

The march by Senate Republicans to try to undo everything good that happened at the hands of a Democratic Congress and White House is now trying to take us back to the bad old days that almost wrecked the global economy 10 years ago, and undo many of the regulatory reforms achieved under Dodd-Frank. It's being presented as regulatory relief to small and regional banks, but Wall Street reform leaders, including former Fed officials, say that it goes too far and will, in fact, "substantially reduc[e] the regulation of 25 of the 38 largest banks to which [enhanced prudential] standards now apply," as well as harm consumers.

The public apparently agrees with them, according to the latest polling from PPP. Their results show there are two simple reasons for the public's strong support for the regulations and distrust of the banks: "they think effective regulation of banks is needed to avoid another financial crisis, and they think big banks already have too much influence in Washington."

Fully 64% of voters think big banks and finance companies continue to require tough oversight to avoid another financial crisis. Only 25% think Congress went too far in regulating the financial services industry after the 2008 crisis.

Overall, 59% of voters support Dodd-Frank, the law Congress passed to regulate Wall Street after the 2008 financial crisis. Only 21 percent oppose it. And 20 percent are not sure.

Only 17% of voters support loosening regulations on banks with between $50 billion and $250 billion dollars in assets, to 67% who are opposed. Democrats (11/80), independents (15/63), and Republicans (25/54) are all strongly against that provision.

Only 22% support provisions to loosen the rules on mortgage lenders, to 65% who are opposed. There is a strong bipartisan consensus against that as well with Democrats (17/76), independents (18/64), and Republicans (33/53) in agreement it’s a bad idea.

Voters, many of whom never fully recovered from the 2008 meltdown, have strong feelings about the banksters. More than two-thirds (68 percent) of respondents say that lax oversight led to the crisis and nearly 8 in 10 (78 percent) say that "big banks and financial institutions have too much influence in Washington already."

That influence is not making them happy, and could be a salient 2018 campaign issue.

Trump appointee's conflict of interest forces labor board to toss anti-worker ruling

By Laura Clawson

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 6:25 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 18:25

NEW YORK, NY - DECEMBER 10: A construction worker holds up a sign as fellow workers carry empty caskets representing workers killed on a construction site during a rally in lower Manhattan to demand a safer workplace on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Thousands of workers, clergy, public officials and advocates attended the afternoon rally which ended at City Hall and demanded new measures to protect workers in the building trade in Manhattan. In 2015, 16 workers died while on the job at a construction site in New York City. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

A Trump appointee’s conflict of interest has bitten the Trump administration’s anti-worker agenda in the ass. The National Labor Relations Board has vacated its Hy-Brand decision after the agency’s inspector general said that board member William Emanuel should not have voted due to his conflict of interest.

Hy-Brand reversed an Obama-era decision which expanded rights for workers directly employed by staffing agencies or franchise owners—under Browning-Ferris, companies couldn’t escape responsibility for the workers in their factories or warehouses or restaurants just by making sure someone else signed the paychecks. If a company determined the terms and conditions of employment, it could be treated as a joint employer. That had major implications for the huge temp worker industry and for the heavily franchised fast food industry, too.

Emanuel voted on Hy-Brand despite his former law firm having been involved in the earlier case, and that vote and that conflict of interest proved a problem:

In a report issued Feb. 9, NLRB Inspector General David Berry said Emanuel should not have cast a vote overturning Browning-Ferris. While Hy-Brand involved different companies, Berry wrote that the way the NLRB handled it amounted to a “do over” in which the new case was “merely the vehicle” to reconsider the old one—which at the time was still pending in federal court. Berry said the issue revealed “a serious and flagrant problem and/or deficiency” in the NLRB’s handling of conflict-of-interest issues.

The order vacating Hy-Brand was issued by a 3-0 vote in which Emanuel didn’t participate, according to a statement Monday from the agency, which said the move was made “in light of the determination by the board’s designated agency ethics official that member Emanuel is, and should have been, disqualified from participating in this proceeding.”

“This is, so far as I’m aware, unprecedented,” said former NLRB chair William Gould IV, a professor emeritus at Stanford’s law school. “There is no decision on a matter of such high import that has been vacated based upon a breach of conflict-of-interest rules.”

Don’t doubt the determination of Trump appointees and the Trump administration generally to find ways to hurt workers—they’re likely to look for another chance at a do-over and the House has already passed a bill overturning Browning-Ferris—but it’s nice to see rampant corruption and conflicts of interest get in Team Trump’s way for a change.

Democrats flip 39th seat from red to blue with Connecticut special election win

By Carolyn Fiddler

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 6:10 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 18:10

What’s better than one Democratic special election pickup in a night?

Two. Two wins are better than one. And in Connecticut House District 120, Democrats just flipped their 39th state legislative seat of the cycle in Tuesday’s second red-to-blue flip (the first came in the New Hampshire House.) Democrat Phil Young won this seat 51-49 percent.

Young is a former town council member who quit his job as an executive chef to campaign full-time for this seat, which was vacated at the beginning of the year when the incumbent Republican resigned to become mayor of Stratford. Young, who will be the first Democrat to represent the district in 44 years, campaigned on three main priorities: increasing education funding, protecting the environment, and fighting the opioid epidemic (he lost two restaurant staffers to fatal overdoses).

This contest attracted outside help on both sides of the aisle; two local GOP mayors canvassed with the Republican, and House Minority Leader Themis Klarides also lent a hand. Young received help from state Rep. Joe Gresko, who represents the neighboring 121st House District, as well as endorsements from U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy and Rep. Rosa DeLauro.

Even in blue Connecticut, flipping a seat that had been in Republican hands for over 40 years is a significant achievement, and this win should only feed the dread building within the GOP. Democrats are winning elections in districts of every stripe, and Republicans everywhere should be very, very frightened this fall.

Granite State of Mind: With New Hampshire House win, Dems flip 38th seat of the cycle

By Carolyn Fiddler

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 5:55 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 17:55

Another Tuesday, another Democratic red-to-blue flip in a state legislative special election.

Specifically, it’s Democrats’ 38th pickup in a statehouse contest this cycle.

Tonight’s win comes in the New Hampshire House, where Democrat Philip Spagnuolo won a special election in House District Belknap-3, 54-46 percent. This marks a 19-point swing from Trump’s performance in this district in 2016; he won this district by a 54-41 margin. This is the fifth seat Democrats have flipped in the New Hampshire House this cycle, and it’s Democrats’ ninth win of the state’s 11 special elections.

Spagnuolo is a founding member of a community recovery center and a substance abuse recovery coach, and improving New Hampshire’s response to the opioid crisis is a high priority for him. However, voting rights was the main issue motivating his support from the left; Let America Vote spent $1,000 on digital ads for the Democrat, and America Votes Action Fund-New Hampshire spent $929 on pro-Spagnuolo direct mail.

This outside spending may have helped counter Republicans’ registration edge in this Laconia-based seat, where they outnumber Democrats 36-25 percent, with undeclared voters making up 39 percent of the city’s electorate. But Republicans fought to keep this seat red, even deploying Republican Gov. Chris Sununu to campaign on the GOP candidate’s behalf.

This New Hampshire race was the 80th state legislative special election of the cycle, and the data emerging from these contests continues to bring nothing but bad news for Republicans. Unless they can pull off a drastic turnaround in the eight remaining months of the cycle, the GOP is facing a world of hurt at every level of the ballot in November.

Working together, black women raise funds so black girls and non-boys can see 'A Wrinkle in Time'

By Kelly Macias

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 5:30 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 17:30

LOS ANGELES, CA - FEBRUARY 26: Director Ava DuVernay speaks onstage at the world premiere of Disney’s 'A Wrinkle in Time' at the El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood CA, March 26, 2018. (Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images for Disney) — A Wrinkle in Time premieres on March 9, 2018.

According to her family, 12-year-old Stormiyah Denson-Jackson loved to smile. Full of life, she enjoyed dancing, modeling, and was excited by math and science. Sadly, Stormiyah was also the victim of bullying by her classmates—often referred to as a “nerd” and routinely teased because of her academic interests. In January, Stormiyah was found dead in her dorm room at the SEED School in Washington, DC. It was ruled a suicide. Her family claims she chose to end her life because the bullying had become out of control.

Stormiyah is the inspiration behind the “A Wrinkle in Time Challenge” organized by the Sisters in the Storm collective. They are a group of black women across the United States, who are focused on community engagement work, specifically targeting black girls and non-boys. They use the term “non-boys” intentionally in order to be inclusive and affirm nonbinary gender identities. The purpose of their challenge is to raise funds to buy out theaters in eight U.S. cities so that black girls and non-boys can see the film A Wrinkle in Time for free and feel represented and affirmed—not just in STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) fields but also in their blackness.

In their own words about this challenge, the collective states:

There is a narrow image of Blackness in the social imagination, mired with stereotypes and white ascendant ideals about Black intellect, capability, and mobility. For Black women and girls, beliefs, about our Blackness — how it is allowed to look, what it is allowed to achieve — can never be divorced from beliefs about our gender. There is a social stigma about challenging these expectations and permissions, and it constantly impacts our experiences in the world, but never more significantly than when we are growing up, learning who we are, and deciding who we want to become.

We can actively combat this stigma and the systems that keep it alive, and we can do so by being intentional with uplifting every #RealMeg [referrring to Meg Murry, a black girl who is the main character in the movie], both in and out of the classroom. Not simply by normalizing the image of Black women and girls in STEM, but also and especially in helping to cultivate pride in their Blackness. Encouraging a strong racial identity significantly and positively impacts not only the academic performance, but also the self-esteem of Black girls. With this encouragement, they are “more likely to be academically engaged, curious and persistent.”

One of the members of the collective, Dr. Roni Dean-Burren, talked with Daily Kos by phone about why this campaign is important and how it came about.

Top 'adviser' or just top daughter? Ivanka Trump's South Korea trip is another White House sore spot

By Laura Clawson

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 5:05 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 17:05

WASHINGTON, DC - DECEMBER 14: Ivanka Trump attends an event where U.S. President Donald Trump spoke at the White House promoting the administration's efforts to decrease federal regulations December 14, 2017 in Washington, DC. The administration has vowed to remove two regulations for every single regulation added in an effort to reduce the amount of bureaucratic Òred tapeÓ. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

If there’s one thing this White House needs more of, it’s infighting. If there’s another thing it needs more of, it’s nepotism. And Ivanka Trump’s South Korea trip is the perfect Trump White House story, because it brings those two things together. Ivanka led the U.S. delegation to the closing ceremony of the Olympics, and while she was there, she held talks with South Korean President Moon Jae-in, highlighting the White House insistence that her presence was as a top White House staffer and not as the president’s daughter/de facto first lady.

"This isn't like going to Italy. The stakes are far higher and more complex," a person close to the President said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive subject of the Trump family.

The concerns of [chief of staff John] Kelly and others about Ms. Trump — who has little experience in government or diplomacy, and hasn't played a role in discussions about North Korea — were aired in private, according to people familiar with the matter. Kelly was advised by those closest to him that it would be a losing battle to oppose Ivanka as the delegation's leader.

If Kelly needed people close to him to advise him that it would be a losing battle to oppose sending precious Ivanka on a high-profile trip where she would boost Donald Trump’s sense of his manhood advantage over Kim Jong-un by being more photogenic than Kim’s sister, then Kelly’s intelligence has been as oversold as his judgment and integrity.

Ivanka, like her husband Jared Kushner, does not have a permanent security clearance. And yet ...

In her role as the delegation's leader, Ms. Trump oversaw a US senator, the White House press secretary, the de facto ambassador in Seoul and several members of the US military. She spoke on the delegation's behalf when the group arrived in South Korea, and was the honored guest for dinner at the presidential Blue House in Seoul.

Gee, why might some people in the White House think this was a bad idea?

But for all the “she’s there as a top aide, not a daughter, just look at her meeting with the president of South Korea” posturing from the White House communications shop, the minute a reporter asked her a hard question about her father’s pattern of sexual harassment and assault, Ivanka climbed on her high horse as daddy's girl and got all outraged.

Senate Democrats officially start fight to save net neutrality in Congress

By Joan McCarter

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 4:40 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 16:40

TOPSHOT - A protester holds up a sign supporting net neutrality against a plan by Federal Communications Commission (FCC) head Ajit Pai, during a protest on December 7, 2017 in Washington..Demonstrations in support of net neutrality are planned nationwide at hundreds of Verizon stores and other venues. / AFP PHOTO / Andrew CABALLERO-REYNOLDS (Photo credit should read ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP/Getty Images)

Campaign Action

On Tuesday, Senate Democrats introduced their legislation under the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to overturn the FCC's repeal of net neutrality rules. They've got 50 votes behind them and need just one more vote to pass it.

Senate Democrats have been raising support for the CRA since last year, but the Federal Register publication starts a 60-legislative-day countdown clock for voting on it. The bill goes to committee for consideration first, but after 20 days, a group of 30 senators can force the Senate to put it on the calendar. Markey and his co-sponsors have more than enough supporters to force a vote this way, but to pass the resolution, they need to win over one more Republican in addition to Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), who has already expressed support for the move.

Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) called for more Republican support in a Wired editorial today. "Just weeks after giving the wealthy and multinational corporations a massive tax break, Republicans are adding insult to injury by once again picking CEOs over citizens," he wrote.

One of those wealthy corporations is already salivating over their chance to start carving up the net. AT&T Senior VP Bob Quinn tries to say that the scheme they are going to be introducing immediately is simply "paid prioritization" that doesn't mean they are dividing the internet into slow and fast lanes. Which is precisely what he explains they'll be doing. But, he says, AT&T will be "enabling innovative new technologies like autonomous cars, remote surgery, enhanced first responder communications, and virtual reality services." All of that stuff of course has to have faster access, once it's paid for, to make sure internet traffic "directing autonomous cars, robotic surgeries, or public safety communications must not drop." Which would be maybe justifiable, except that the open internet order of 2015 that established net neutrality already provided a carve-out for those crucial services.

The CRA faces tough odds in both the House and Senate, but not insurmountable odds. This issue, so salient to so many people across party lines, is ripe for the 2018 midterm elections. It's just like Wall Street vs. Main Street and that Republican tax scam—a way for the Republicans to put their thumb on the scale for big corporations.

Let's keep up the fight against Trump's FCC and Big Cable. We can still stop them. Tell congress to oppose Trump FCC's plan to destroy net neutrality and the open internet.

Kentucky competes to be the worst state in the nation, will limit food assistance

By Joan McCarter

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 4:15 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 16:15

Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina volunteers

Kentucky's Gov. Matt Bevin (troglodyte) has another plan in mind for making life as miserable as possible for the state's poor. In addition to having to jump through regular hoops and spend hours documenting their employment in order to stay on Medicaid, they'll have to do the same now to get food assistance. The state is going to impose a three-month limit on Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits. After three months, many receiving assistance will have to prove they are working to be able to eat.

Since jobs are still hard to find in significant parts of the state, this change will result in loss of food assistance and harm to economic activity in already-struggling local communities. […]
By May, most of the 87,000 Kentucky adults without dependents will have to prove to the state that they work or engage in some kind of work activity such as school, voluntary employment and training programs provided by the state or workfare (a kind of unpaid internship, often with nonprofits). If they have not kept up 20 hours of work activities per week for more than three months at any point in the past three years they will become ineligible for SNAP benefits—a rule that has never been in effect for all of Kentucky since the time limit went into effect in 1998. In fact in most of the years since 1998, a large number of Kentucky counties have been under a waiver due to a persistent lack of jobs. […]

Reinstating the three-month time limit will be especially difficult for groups of Kentuckians facing special barriers. Racial and ethnic minority Kentuckians more likely to face discrimination in labor markets, Kentuckians lacking a high school degree or GED and those with criminal records all deal with added challenges to finding long-term employment with enough hours. This is especially true in rural parts of the state where job availability continues to shrink compared to urban parts of the state that have better recovered from the Great Recession. There are 77 rural Kentucky counties that have fewer jobs now than 10 years ago, and 23 of those counties have seen a greater than 20 percent drop in jobs.

Professor who first told Team Trump Russia had 'dirt' on Clinton goes dark

By Kerry Eleveld

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 3:50 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 15:50

TOPSHOT - US President Donald Trump and Russia's President Vladimir Putin shake hands during a meeting on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Hamburg, Germany, on July 7, 2017. / AFP PHOTO / SAUL LOEB (Photo credit should read SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images)

Remember that Maltese professor who met up with Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos in London in 2016 and told him the Russians had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton? Well, the "dirt" emerged, but the Maltese professor with Kremlin links Joseph Mifsud has gone underground... or worse. Buzzfeed writes:

His biography disappeared from one university where he taught and he quit his job at another university. His email and cell phones went dead. And politicians, colleagues, and journalists can't find him.

Neither can Anna, his 31-year-old Ukrainian fiancé, who says he is the father of her newborn child. And her story, snatched from the pages of a John le Carré novel, offers a glimpse at the human collateral damage of an intelligence operation in which the mysterious Mifsud was allegedly a central figure. [...]

BuzzFeed News first contacted Anna in October. She refused to talk then, saying her relationship with Mifsud was private. According to WhatsApp messages she later shared, she told the professor about BuzzFeed News’ attempt to speak to her — and in his very last WhatsApp message to Anna, Mifsud asked her not to talk to journalists.

Anna says Mifsud went dark right after Mifsud became a media fixation last October and hasn't even reemerged since the birth of their baby this year.

Anna and her trail of digital communications are now the source of new insights about Mifsud and his contacts, like Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

“He said, ‘I have dinner with Lavrov tonight. Lavrov is my friend. Lavrov this, Lavrov that,’” Anna said. “He even show me picture with Lavrov.”

Russia’s Foreign Ministry didn’t respond to a request for comment.

ICE document reveals agent noted targeted immigrant's 'involvement with anti-ICE protests'

By Gabe Ortiz

Tuesday Feb 27, 2018 · 3:25 PM PST

2018/02/27 · 15:25

LOS ANGELES, CA - SEPTEMBER 10: Thousands of immigrants and supporters join the Defend DACA March to oppose the President Trump order to end DACA on September 10, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. The Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program provides undocumented people who arrived to the US as children temporary legal immigration status for protection from deportation to a country many have not known, and a work permit for a renewable two-year period. The order exposes about 800,000 so-called âdreamersâ who signed up for DACA to deportation. About a quarter of them live in California. Congress has the option to replace the policy with legislation before DACA expires on March 5, 2018. (Photo by David McNew/Getty Images)

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials are denying that they targeted Maru Mora-Villalpando, an immigrant rights leader in Washington state, for her political activism and advocacy for both documented and undocumented immigrant communities, calling advocates’s claims “irresponsible, speculative and inaccurate.” ICE’s internal documents, however—obtained with the assistance of Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell—tell a different story:

An immigrant rights advocate targeted for deportation first came to the attention of authorities because she discussed her unlawful status in the country in an interview with a monthly newspaper last year, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official wrote in a newly released document.

But the official, Timothy Black, also noted her “extensive involvement with anti-ICE protests and Latino advocacy programs”—something her supporters said proves she was targeted for political reasons.

“In the form, Black, a deportation officer with ICE in Seattle, wrote that she came to the attention of his office after a monthly newspaper in Whatcom County, Washington, published an interview with her last June ‘wherein she stated that she is ‘undocumented.’ The officer wrote that her anti-ICE activism and Latino advocacy ‘should also be noted.’” It would be interesting to hear from Black why “Latino advocacy,” in particular, should be noted, but The Washington Post reports ICE “declined to make Black available for comment.”

Mora-Villalpando’s case had garnered the attention of U.N. experts, who in an extraordinary statement condemned the U.S. for “an increasing pattern of intimidation and retaliation against people defending migrants’ rights in the US.” Mora-Villalpando added she was “being put in deportation proceedings because of my political stance … this is a pattern of behavior which ICE is developing now under this administration.”

Newer
Older

RSS

Check out our slate of Daily Kos-endorsed candidates