Feb­ru­ary 4, 2009

The Peti­tion to Free Ronald DauphinLinda Dorcena Forry, Amy Good­man and IJDH Direc­tor Brian Con­can­non Jr. will be broad­cast on WBUR radio in Boston (90.9) this Sun­day at 8 PM. You can also watch it any­time on the web, click here.

Next Tues­day, Feb­ru­ary 10, the Haiti Sol­i­dar­ity Net­work of the North­eastClick here for more details.

 

Rep. Bar­bara Lee has intro­duced H.R.331

In Decem­ber, the Bush Admin­is­tra­tion resumed depor­ta­tions to Haiti. The depor­ta­tions had been halted in Octo­ber, because Haiti was reel­ing from the hur­ri­canes of August and Sep­tem­ber. Unfor­tu­nately Haiti is still reel­ing, from the hur­ri­canes and now from increased hunger as food that would have been ready for har­vest the last few months was destroyed in the storms. But the U.S. immi­gra­tion sys­tem keeps send­ing peo­ple back, often break­ing up fam­i­lies here to do so. See three good recent arti­cles from the Miami Her­ald: (Jan­u­ary 28), Haitians Snubbed Again in bid for TPS (Jan­u­ary 8), and Inhu­mane to Deport Haitians, Rep. Alcee Hast­ings (Op-Ed) ( Decem­ber 29, 2008).

We need to show the Obama Admin­is­tra­tion that deport­ing Haitians is one of the failed poli­cies of the past that he has pledged to reverse. A coali­tion of reli­gious, sol­i­dar­ity, labor, immi­gra­tion and Hait­ian orga­ni­za­tions in South Florida have put their heads together, and drafted a let­ter urg­ing Pres­i­dent Obama to imme­di­ately stop the depor­ta­tions. They are ask­ing all of us to sign on. The let­ter is below, please sign it at: http://www.petitiononline.com/TPS2009/petition.html.

To:  Pres­i­dent Barack H. Obama

Jan­u­ary 30, 2009

Pres­i­dent Barack Obama
The White House
1600 Penn­syl­va­nia Avenue
Wash­ing­ton, DC 20500
Fax: 202–456-2461
comments@whitehouse.gov

RE: The Admin­is­tra­tion Should Urgently Stay Depor­ta­tions to Haiti

Dear Pres­i­dent Obama:

Sincerely,

Mar­leine Bastien
Exec­u­tive Direc­tor
Fanm Ayisyen Nan
Miyami/Haitian
Women of Miami

Cheryl Lit­tle
Exec­u­tive Direc­tor
Florida Immi­grant Advo­cacy Center

Maria Rodriguez
Exec­u­tive Direc­tor
Florida Immi­grant Coalition

Ran­dolph P. McGrorty
Chief Exec­u­tive Offi­cer
Catholic Char­i­ties Legal Services

Win­nie Can­tave
Co-Executive Direc­tor
UNITE for Dignity

Jean-Robert Lafor­tune
Chair­man
Haitian-American Grass­roots Coalition

Fr. Regi­nald Jean-Mary

Preval Flo­real
Grace Hait­ian United Methodist Church

Sin­cerely,

The Under­signed