"Illegally held against their will, denied access to telephones, attorneys and even bathrooms"

[annabanana]

http://www.union-network.org/UNIsite/Sectors/Commerce/Activities/UFCW_reaction_against_immigration_raids.htm

"Illegally held against their will, denied access to telephones, attorneys and even bathrooms"
UFCW reacts strongly against mistreatment of migrant workers during US government raids

Members of UNI Commerce affiliate United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW) have joined with community groups, civil rights leaders and immigrant rights activists to condemn abuse and misconduct by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents. Across the country, ICE enforcement teams have used unwarranted physical force to illegally detain workers in misguided attempts at enforcing failed U.S. immigration policies.

The national meeting today (16.08.2007) was held to hear workers' testimony, many of whom were illegally held against their will, denied access to telephones, attorneys and even bathrooms.

Joe Hansen: " Excessive show of force "

- The excessive show of force—the abusive conduct, the disregard for individual rights and the lack of concern for working families—it would make you think this incident occurred in a foreign country or in a distant era, said UFCW International President Joe Hansen in convening the meeting.

- But, unfortunately, the ICE raids happened in America's heartland in our times. It happened to America's workers. It happened to our fellow Americans, native born and immigrant.

Workers were denied access to telephones, bathrooms and legal counsel. Citizens and legal residents were denied the opportunity to retrieve documents to establish their legal status. Some were handcuffed and held for hours. Others were shipped out on buses.

FULL story at link

[OneBlueSky]

1. link doesn't work for me . . . n/t

.

[annabanana]

2. fixed, thanks. . . . eom

[PDJane]

3. For some reason,

I hear the hammer of jackboots.

I firmly believe that these outrages are to see just how much the citizenry will tolerate before they outright rebel, and I'm afraid that by the time there is a rebellion, it will be much too late.

[annabanana]

4. I am FURIOUS at our worthless media for not covering this...

CITIZENS were rounded up and caged.

[PDJane]

5. Citizens or not,

Those tactics are meant to tell people they are less than human. This is some of the stuff the nazis pulled, particularly that business of not letting people attend to personal hygeine and their children.

It says, I don't care who you think you are, you are nothing to those in authority.

By the way, Israel does this kind of thing too; humiliation and brutalization and separation......I think the US and Israel learned the wrong lessons from the Holocaust.

The fact that the media isn't covering it just proves that there is a corporate blackout.

[EFerrari]

8. It's terrorism, plainly. We should have known

when Junior declared a war on terror that he intended to terrorize US.

[annabanana]

6. oh friggety-kick. . . . .n/t

[EFerrari]

7. We've been saying for months this would happen.

:(

[Heidi]

9. Welcome to Greatest.

:kick:

[suffragette]

10. They are trying to erase the 4th Amendment, our constitutional

protection from such abuse of power.

They keep chipping away at it by using security as a smokescreen, in this in wiretapping, etc.
They preach fear, and they are the ones using fear to strip away our rights.

It's intolerable.

K&R

[High Plains]

11. Does no one put this in the context of anti-immigrant hysteria?

Hell, half this board wants to round 'em all up and ship 'em home. Actions like ICE did here are a necessary consequence of that policy. Are we happy now?

[guruoo]

12. They need to release the cooberating evidence ASAP

"The group will document what happened to union members during the raids,
expose abuse and misconduct and present the evidence to Congress."