Immigrants and Politics Blog

[KR: In the case of immigrants and transnationalism, the work of consulates is typically treated as from “above” and the activism of residents as from “below.” This story complicates the framework, of an individual consul who innovated beyond what the Mexican government may have envisioned.]

Outcry over consul’s removal in Santa Ana
Community leaders say Luis Miguel Ortiz Haro can’t be replaced and plan to protest. The Mexican government asserts that it’s a routine change.
By Jennifer Delson
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

December 14, 2007

The Mexican government has announced that it will remove Consul Luis Miguel Ortiz Haro from Santa Ana, provoking ire among community leaders who view him as an outspoken and unbending advocate for immigrants in Orange County.

Community leaders are collecting signatures to petition for his reinstatement and planning a trip to Mexico City to speak with government officials. They are also planning to protest when Mexico President Felipe Calderon visits Los Angeles next month.

Some residents in this largely Latino city say they have found in Ortiz Haro the sort of fiery leader the town has lacked in recent years.

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[KR: This story is not as much about politics, but it is a part of the immigrant impact on US society story that doesn’t get much attention in the public discourse today. This particular story is motivated by Citigroup’s decision to make Pandit its CEO.]

Seeking Leaders, U.S. Companies Think Globally
LOUISE STORY
New York Times
December 12, 2007

The corner offices of corporate America are increasingly being filled from every corner of the world.

Citigroup, the world’s largest bank, named Vikram S. Pandit, a native of Nagpur, India, as its chief executive on Tuesday. Mr. Pandit joins 14 other foreign-born chiefs who are running Fortune 100 companies.

The head of the Altria Group was born in Egypt, for example. PepsiCo’s is from India, the Liberty Mutual Group’s is a native of Ireland and Alcoa’s was born in Morocco.

Their numbers have jumped from roughly a decade ago; there were nine foreign-born chief executives on Fortune’s list of the 100 largest companies in 1996. But the size of the new group does not reflect a noteworthy change — they come from more far-flung countries now than then, when they were more likely to hail from Canada or Europe.

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[KR: This may be the year that Cuban Americans vote in majority for a Democrat as president. None of the news reports I have seen so far indicate why most of the GOP candidates changed their mind from September and agreed to appear in this debate. Also, the GOP candidates did not change their rhetoric too much on unauthorized/illegal immigration. Makes you wonder what the GOP primary would have been like had the Senate compromise plan passed this summer…]

Republican Candidates Firm on Immigration
By MICHAEL COOPER and MARC SANTORA
New York Times, December 10, 2007

CORAL GABLES, Fla., Dec. 9 — In front of what will probably be their most pro-immigration audience, Republican candidates toned down their rhetoric but told Spanish-language television viewers in a debate on Sunday that they would take strong measures to close off the country’s borders to illegal immigration.

The candidates were forced into a difficult balancing act by the debate, broadcast on Univision, as they tried to offend neither the Hispanic audience nor the Republican base many of them have tried to appeal to by taking a hard line on illegal immigration. The topic has led to some of the fiercest rhetoric in past debates.

Most of the seven candidates took a softer tone on Sunday, even as many spoke of working to eradicate illegal immigration. Some spoke of trying to send some of the 12 million people who are estimated to be in the United States illegally back to their native countries.

They sandwiched their remarks between gauzy paeans to legal immigration and the values of immigrants.