AP: Federal Raid Leaves Massachusetts Town A Mess

[Hissyspit]

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/I/IMMIGRATION_ARRESTS?SITE=FLTAM&SECTION=US

Mar 8, 3:34 AM EST
Federal Raid Leaves Mass. Town a Mess

By RAY HENRY
Associated Press Writer

NEW BEDFORD, Mass. (AP) -- Immigrants brought prosperity to New Bedford. They manned its lucrative whaling fleet, ran its textile mills and provided the muscle for the fishing boats that leave here daily for the Atlantic.

But this New England city, which occasionally gives a knowing wink-and-nod at its illegal immigrant population, found itself in turmoil Wednesday, one day after federal agents raided a leather factory and detained more than 300 undocumented workers. In the aftermath, dozens of young children were stranded at schools and with baby sitters. Anxious fathers learned how to feed infants with bottles. Friends and relatives crowded a church basement to scan a list for names of the missing.

"If you feel you don't want us here, just deport us and let us go," said Carlos Miranda, who begged to be reunited just hours before learning his girlfriend was released.

Gov. Deval Patrick said Wednesday that the children of the detainees - most of whom are from Guatemala and El Salvador - might not be receiving proper care. However, federal immigration officials insisted they coordinated with state social service agencies in advance to prepare for child care.

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[izzie]

1. and the people who owned the mill?

--

[Sherman A1]

3. That is the real question.

One supposes that they get off without even a slap on the wrist.

[SpiralHawk]

14. The owners are undoubtedly republicon cronies, and thus special

So please move along.

[saigon68]

15. Yes they are part of a Privileged class

Above the LAW

And soon to import a few more "REPLACEMENTS"

[izzie]

25. Rubs it in a little more when we see they were making military stuff

Even the DOD does not watch what it is doing.

[Donnachaidh]

6. the business owners who employed them are the REAL criminals

Watch -- they'll be crying for federal funds to *help them out* because of the sudden loss of their workforce. :sarcasm:

Let's help them -- how's about some stiff fines PER illegal employee, and jail time if you've hired 5 or more?

But that won't happen. We'll jail the people who can least afford it, and leave kids out in the cold - just to have a photo op that will be used in '08 to prove how *much* the Republican Party does for this country. :puke:

[druidity33]

8. the article says they were arrested... nt

[izzie]

11. If and I mean IF they were held in jail I am sure someone

took care of their children such as people from other countries. The Guardian also had some news on this. So nice it gets around and so much fun to know it was making military stuff. I guess we can make some stuff even if it is with third world people. $20 fine for talking and 2 min. bathroom brakes are 'good' for these people I guess.

[jackster]

21. IanDB1 has an earlier post

on the owners.... interesting

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=158x12081

[annabanana]

2. All over the country, immigrants are being detained.

Where are they being held? Perhaps in those facilities that we talked about here over the course of this past fall. (I have been searching for the threads....)

[Javaman]

18. REX-84. nt

[TomClash]

4. A las barricadas! nt

[bluerum]

5. Most of the detainees were women who had children and infants.

Social services people have had a difficult time re-uniting them.

The entire operation was inhumane and poorly conceived. Not unlike anything else done in the name of Bush.

[blondie58]

7. geez- this sounds just like what happened in Greeley CO

This was just what happened in Greeley back in December.

http://www.piconetwork.org/linkeddocuments/Swift-Raid.pdf

So, it is not like they didn't know what kind of trouble it might cause. Families were separated amongst the confusion.

I had heard that the raid was allegedly because of some stolen id's, but I don't think that they found much.

[jollyreaper2112]

9. Whaling fleet?

WTF? Since when does any American town have a whaling fleet left?

[TechBear_Seattle]

12. New Bedford was once a center of American whaling

That was a long time ago, of course, but the point remains: most of the men who worked as whalers were immigrants, and few of them had "proper" documentation.

[amandabeech]

28. Back in the whaling days, we had a much lower population and

there were very few laws curtailing immigration. Essentially, the immigrant had to be healthy, at least by the time Ellis Island opened in NY. However, that was 1880, and I believe that heyday of whaling was earlier. There were simply no papers to be had in those days.


Also, the original mill workers were young women from poor New England farms, not immigrants.

[Mass]

10. Patrick was on TV last night explaining that he was adviced by the Feds, but prevented

to inform the DSS sothat they could take adequate measures.

Results: last night, there were still plenty of families that have not been reunited, including young babies, and it seems the Feds are not doing any efforts to solve that.

As for the owners, they are out on bail and the factory continues to work (the Army needs its backpack, so who cares).

Other question, how did a company using mostly undocumented workers get a contract with the military?

[aquart]

13. I dunno. Do they donate Republican?

[karynnj]

16. That they were working on a military contract, is a very interesting question

It's hard to believe they made so little effort to make sure the babies and kids were ok. I guess when the Bush administration thinks of illegal aliens, they don't even think of people.

I liked Kerry's statement that you posted in the John Kerry group.

http://kerry.senate.gov/v3/cfm/record.cfm?id=270299
BOSTON - Senator John Kerry today released the following statement yesterday's immigration raid in New Bedford that left dozens of children stranded.
"Better preparation was urgently needed for the unintended consequences of yesterday's raid. Better cooperation and coordination with the Department of Social Services should have been included in the planning. There's no need to separate dozens of young children from their parents - many of whom are the sole caregivers -- without a back-up plan. That's a false choice that could have been avoided. The illegal hiring practices of companies that break the law should not twice victimize innocent children.

"It's incumbent upon all of us to act to address this situation. I am sending a letter to ICE seeking an explanation into why this happened, and demanding answers about what they're doing to address what those on the ground are describing as a humanitarian crisis in Southeastern Massachusetts."

Here's a link to his excellent letter.
http://kerry.senate.gov/v3/cfm/record.cfm?id=270300

[twiceshy]

17. Anyone ever work in a leather plant?

I used to do extermination (bugs, rats) at some leather plants on the North Shore (Boston area) and I can tell you it is hot, damp, smelly, nasty work in those plants. Most of those plants are long gone due to environmental concerns and foreign competition. Also I suspect it would be very hard to get our privileged kids to work in such an environment for pay that would allow the plant to make a profit. Truly, work Americans are unwilling to do. I guess I have some sympathy for the workers and the owners in this case. They are all trying to make a go of it against incredible odds.

[mr1956]

19. Doing jobs Americans don't want to do?

Given the recent news about how many impoverished Americans there are I cannot buy your argument about our "privileged kids". If factory owners recruited Americans for unskilled labor in the same way they recruit illegal immigrants I think they could find enough takers.

While I have sympathy for the workers I have none for the owners. They trot out that line about Americans not wanting the jobs and I don't buy it. We wouldn't take the jobs at the sub minimum wage and poor working conditions without fighting for the rights of the workers.

The whole situation is messed up and I fault a system that awards government contracts without even an iota of oversight.

[twiceshy]

20. You may have a point.....

But I seriously doubt you could recruit the "baggy-pants-down-to-their-knees" wanna-be gang bangers that inhabit my city. Much easier to have a couple girlfriends with babies on the dole and rotate from shorty to shorty. This sounds appalling, I know, but there is a lot of truth in it.

[PassingFair]

23. You're right.

You DO sound appalling.

We have a saying here on DU,

fool us once...er...we don't get fooled twice.

[Marrah_G]

27. The unemployed-underemployed are not all young wanna-be gang bangers

Alot of them are working class folks left behind as Mass lost our mill/factory base.

[amandabeech]

29. Read the link from the Massachusetts group.

The owner was living the good life on Beacon Hill and dressing in expensive clothing.

He wasn't just scraping by. His motive was pure greed.

At the Greeley plant and others, work has continued. Wages have been upped a couple of dollars and many U.S. citizens and permanent residents are applying. Given time and some decent advertising and recruiting, things will be fine.

The economy is in the toilet for those in the lower half of the income distribution. Nine dollars an hour looks pretty good in some places, unfortunately.

[sinkingfeeling]

22. My question: why does this factory have contracts with the military if they are breaking

the laws of the country? Why weren't the managers/owners of the plant arrested? No, it's always the immigrants that are arrested and the companies that keep getting the government contracts!

I'm so angry over this nonsense, I can't see straight!

BOSTON (Reuters) - Federal officials detained 350 suspected illegal immigrants at a Massachusetts factory that made supplies for the U.S. military in one of the biggest such raids in New England, authorities said on Wednesday.

The factory won millions of dollars in contracts from the U.S. Defense Department in recent years and officials said it came to rely on illegal workers to meet rapidly growing demand for its products.



http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN0720100620070307

[Marrah_G]

26. They were arrested and are facing jail time

I hope they rot there. Greedy fucking bastards who hired illegals for shit pay so they wouldn't have to pay fair wages, healthcare and follow labor laws. If they were willing to treat their workers like human beings then they wouldn't have a hard time finding workers in a place so down on it's luck like New Beford.

It's EXACTLY these situations that show why simply legaling current illegal workers will not work. Bastards like this do not want legal workers. Legal workers want too much....like fair treatment, living wages and healthcare.

[Thothmes]

31. Govt Contracts

Probably more widespread than we know. In the mid 90s, one of our ships was in overhaul on a small business set aside contract. While in dry dock for hull coating, INS busses pulled up to the dry dock and arrested every member of the sandblast contractor work crew. They were Koreans that were here illegally. To bad though, they were the only competent sub contractor the prime employed.

[slampoet]

24. This place might not have a contract for long after this

but also know that in New England and possibly elsewhere there is an odd and old kind of small town, small business, military contractor. Maybe they don't have even a majority of their accounts with the government, but they have had one thing they make for the military and sometime that has kept them in business for even 150+ years. I and friends of mine have temped enough to hear about government contracts for magnets, printing shops, rhinestones, scotch tape, and recording studio equipment.

My pure guess is that they are an old shop that makes some thing like horse tack better than the military can find it elsewhere and have done so for a while.

If you've ever been to New Bedford you might see why i don't think that any business there is a new one.


New Bedford is one of those New England towns that has been so burned out economically for so long that you have a hard time talking about it.

[Eugene]

30. Boston Globe: (Mass) DSS to check on detainees sent to Texas

DSS to check on detainees sent to Texas

Some workers' children may lack care, officials fear

By Raja Mishra and Brian R. Ballou, Globe Staff | March 9, 2007

NEW BEDFORD -- Massachusetts social workers will travel to a Texas detention center
to check on scores of workers from New Bedford accused of being in the country illegally.
They were flown there before Massachusetts authorities determined whether all their
children were receiving adequate care.

The development capped a day of sharp disagreement between Governor Deval Patrick
and federal immigration officials over the high-profile raid Tuesday at Michael Bianco Inc.
that netted 361 workers, most of them young and middle-aged Latino women. State
and congressional officials asserted yesterday to the Bush administration that the
detention of some of the workers was endangering their children.

Patrick, at a press conference, and later in a private conference call with Homeland
Security officials, protested the decision to fly 90 of the detained workers from
Massachusetts to Harlingen, Texas, before state social workers had a chance to
inquire about their child-care needs, potentially leaving many children with inadequate
care. Two young children were hospitalized yesterday for dehydration after their nursing
mothers were taken away, state officials said. Another 7-year-old girl called a state
hot line seeking her detained mother. It was unclear last night where their mothers were.

"What we have never understood about this process is why it turned into a race to the
airport," Patrick said. "We understand about the importance of processing; we get that.
But there are families affected. There are children affected."

-snip-

Full article: http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/03/09/dss_to_check_on_detainees_sent_to_texas