Free Republic

ARLINGTON, Texas - A two-time “Teacher of the Year” in Arlington is now fighting to keep her job after allegedly telling a Hispanic student to “Go back to Mexico.” Barnett Junior High School math teacher Shirley Bunn has 24 years of teaching experience. But her career could end with what she called a moment of frustration. Bunn admitted she lost her temper on Sept. 30 while distributing Title 1 forms to her eighth grade students. According to public documents, a student who had a history of being disruptive repeatedly asked his teacher for a form printed in Spanish by saying,...

Republicans are demanding an apology Wednesday from President Obama's campaign manager after a tweet that they argue was insulting toward Latino Americans. Jim Messina, who is helming the president's reelection effort, tweeted a line from a column written by The Washington Post's Dana Milbank, in which he argues that Republicans will struggle to attract the Latino vote after coming out against the DREAM immigration reform act. "Line of the day from WAPO's Dana Milbank: 'The chimichanga? It may be the only thing Republicans have left to offer Latinos,' " Messina tweeted. But the comments drew rebuke from Republicans, who argued...

Newt Gingrich Press Availability Following Hispanic Leadership Event, South El Monte, California – February 13 2012 Newt Gingrich Campaign attended an Hispanic Leadership Event at the Cielito Lindo Restaurant in South El Monte, Following the event he held a brief press conference.

The Obama administration on Tuesday announced a new "public advocate" charged with listening to immigrants' concerns about its law enforcement policies — but Republicans said the position amounts to an official mouthpiece for illegal immigrants being deported.

Marco Rubio Says Some Conservatives ‘Harsh and Intolerable’ On Immigration By Liz Goodwin | The Ticket "For those of us who come from the conservative movement, we must admit that there are those among us who have used rhetoric that is harsh and intolerable, inexcusable," Rubio said at a conference for the conservative Hispanic Leadership Network. "We must admit, myself included, that sometimes we've been too slow in condemning that rhetoric." Rubio, a Republican senator to Florida who is often floated as a potential vice presidential nominee for the party in 2012, was interrupted by two protesters raising awareness about...

One thing was missed in Newt Gingrich's victory in the South Carolina primary: Conservatives embraced a pro-amnesty candidate without batting an eyelash. This should come as a wake-up call to those who've been pushing a hard-line anti-illegal immigrant position in the Republican Party. Granted, Gingrich didn't spend a lot of time discussing his position, which favors amnesty for those illegal immigrants who have been here for a long time, have deep family and community ties, and have paid taxes and avoided breaking other laws. But that's the point. He didn't have to spend a lot of time defending his position...

Romney and Gingrich Battle for Florida's Latino Vote Though Gingrich still lags Romney in support from the bloc, he appears to be gaining ground, especially among Cuban Americans. A Univision/ABC poll showed him with a 15-percentage-point advantage over Gingrich among likely Hispanic GOP voters. By Alana Semuels, Paul West and Seema Mehta January 25 Mitt Romney is defending an increasingly precarious position among Florida's Latino voters, a key voting bloc whose growth and diversity has complicated efforts to unify it behind one prospective nominee in Tuesday's Republican primary. Newt Gingrich opened the newest front against Romney on Wednesday by mocking...

MIAMI — Former House speaker Newt Gingrich on Wednesday mocked as an “Obama-level fantasy” Mitt Romney’s plan to deal with illegal immigration by encouraging “self-deportation.” Gingrich made the comment as he began a day of outreach to Florida’s Hispanic voters with an extensive interview on Spanish-language television and a speech at Florida International University in which he called for a more a forceful U.S. role in ending communist rule in Cuba, as well as an overhaul of U.S. economic policies toward all of Latin America. In an interview with the Univision network, Gingrich said it was unrealistic for millions of...

Gingrich: Romney shows no concern for 'Humanity' of illegals"..

Have you ever thought about that? How many times have you seen establishment types posit about how beautiful it would be to have a Romney/Rubio ticket? Even after Rubio has made it clear he isn't interested, I keep hearing it. It can be summed up in one word: Hispanic. The republicans have absolutely nothing in common with a conservative like Rubio, yet every time they mention his name, they always go off on a tangent about how he can win the hispanic vote. Because of his skin color?!?! Yep. The republicans are that superficial. It's that simple. They're in full...

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said his home state could be "up for grabs" in the 2012 presidential election, due in large part to the growing numbers of Hispanic voters. "The demographics are clear that the Hispanic vote will play a major role in national elections," he said on CNN's "State of the Union." However, higher numbers of Hispanic voters does not guarantee Obama an edge according to McCain, who said his inability to meet some campaign promises on immigration makes that voting bloc competitive. The most recent GOP candidate went so far as to say New Mexico, Colorado, and even...

A former Texas Supreme Court justice whose appointment by Gov. Rick Perry led to accusations of racial pandering was part of a Federal District Court decision Thursday to issue a new voting district map for Texas that will likely overturn the map proposed by the Texas Legislature and is designed to create ethnic voting districts for Latinos. U.S. District Court Judge Xavier Rodriguez joined with another Latino justice from the three-justice federal panel — Clinton-appointee Judge Orlando Garcia — to issue the racially-drawn map, which has not yet been given final approval. Lawyers for the Democrats and Republicans were given...

<p>“I do not believe that the people of the United States are going to take people who’ve been here for a quarter of a century … [and] separate them from their families and expel them,” Gingrich said during a discussion about illegal immigration and border security. “I do believe we should control the border. I do believe we should have very severe penalties.”</p>

A former Texas Supreme Court justice whose appointment by Gov. Rick Perry led to accusations of racial pandering was part of a Federal District Court decision Thursday to issue a new voting district map for Texas that will likely overturn the map proposed by the Texas Legislature and is designed to create ethnic voting districts for Latino’s. U.S. District Court Judge Xavier Rodriguez joined with another Latino justice from the three-justice federal panel — Clinton-appointee Judge Orlando Garcia — to issue the racially-drawn map, which has not yet been given final approval. Lawyers for the Democrats and Republicans were given...

Anita Perry, the 59-year-old wife of Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry, has been very actively campaigning for him on her own all fall. Now, she's taken on a new assignment. Mrs. Perry has launched an online drive to recruit hundreds of volunteers for what she calls the Perry Strike Force. This would consist of Perry fans who would travel to Iowa and work across the state Jan. 2-4, getting out Perry caucus-goers to the hundreds of meeting sites on the evening of Jan. 3. (Don't worry, the BCS Championship Game is not until Jan. 9 this time.) "With over 1,700...

In his latest campaign ad, Texas Gov. Rick Perry calls himself an "outsider." "I want to force Congress to balance the budget, and if they don't, I say we cut their pay in half, send them home. Replacing one Washington insider with another won't change a thing. If you want an outsider who will overhaul Washington, then I'm your guy."

In defending his latest television ad, Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Friday continued his attack strategy against President Barack Obama and emphatically called him a "socialist." "Absolutely," Perry said in an interview on Fox News. "I think Barack Obama is a socialist." Conservative talk show host Bill O'Reilly was the latest to question the presidential candidate over the validity of his new TV ad, which claims Obama believes Americans are lazy. The spot, broadcast in Iowa and nationwide on cable, showed a clip of Obama saying, "We've been a little bit lazy, I think, over the last couple of decades."...

Texas Gov. Rick Perry has challenged the women conservatives love to hate — House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi — to a public debate next week. In a letter obtained by The Hill, Perry requested that the pair meet for a debate during Perry’s visit to Washington next week to compare the plan he rolled out this week to “Uproot and Overhaul Washington” with the current system. “I think it would be a tremendous service to the American public to see a public airing of those differences,” he wrote. “Let the people decide.” Perry’s challenge comes just days after his roll...

Link only, per FR posting rules

BETTENDORF, Iowa - An early copy of Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry's government reform speech shared with the Des Moines Register shows the Texas governor is planning to propose widespread changes for the federal government, including term limits on federal judges and Supreme Court justices, a part-time Congress, and laws criminalizing insider trading. The governor first previewed the reforms in a speech Monday evening at an event by the Scott County Republican Party, where he said, "Washington doesn't need a new coat of paint, it needs a complete overhaul." Today, he will deliver the details of his plan in a...

Taking a page from Ronald Reagan, Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Saturday sought to use humor to rebound from his much-noted debate flub earlier in the week. That flub, a 53-second brain freeze that was replayed endlessly on news shows, had him forgetting the name of the Department of Energy, the third federal agency he pledges to eliminate. So Perry was quick to cut off CBS’ Scott Pelley, one of the debate moderators in South Carolina, when he began a question, saying, “Governor Perry, you advocate the elimination of the Department of Energy. If you eliminate the Department of Energy...”...

See Governor Rick Perry's new ad for Iowa and discover how he lives by the values of hard work, faith, and family. 31 second TV ad at linked URL.

“You can put a program into place in which these individuals can be identified, and work visas in which they can move back and forth between their countries but not to become United States citizens,” Perry said. “And I think that’s where McCain, that’s where Romney, that’s where even Bush went wrong when they talked about the issue that, ‘we’re going to give amnesty to these individuals,’ and people just said, ‘no, we’re not.’” Perry didn’t elaborate on what such a visa plan would look like, saying only that authorities need to determine a better way to identify illegal immigrants...

Texas Gov. Rick Perry is sliding in the polls but he is not budging concerning his stance on college tuition for illegal immigrants in his state, according to New Hampshire's Union Leader. In an interview with the newspaper yesterday, Perry, who has come under attack from Republican presidential rival Mitt Romney for his position on the issue, defended the policy in Texas which permits some illegal immigrants to pay in-state college and university tuition. "We could kick these people to the curb and pick up their cost of being in our state through other sources, social programs up to and...

Many Republicans see Marco Rubio as a rising star who can help them win over the fast-growing Hispanic population, but the Florida senator says toned-down rhetoric on the hot-button issue of immigration would be more likely to bring those voters to the GOP. "The policies are important, but the rhetoric is sometimes the impediment," Mr. Rubio said in an interview. "Sometimes—and I'm not pointing fingers at anyone—the way the message is communicated is harmful and has hurt Republicans."

[embedded LINKS at source] Have you heard? “The government is subsidizing illegal immigration! The Texas DREAM Act grants amnesty! Illegal immigrants are going to college for FREE!” Hold your horses, folks. These statements, which are hurled at Gov. Rick Perry from both sides of the political spectrum, are simply not true. In-state tuition for illegal immigrants is a hard policy to argue because it rests on such a thin line between supporting education and rewarding law-breaking. Admittedly, the governor didn’t argue the case well when he said opponents of this policy “don’t have a heart.” (He’s since recanted that statement.)...

Tampa, Florida - If you're a student trying to earn a degree in anthropology, or even journalism, Governor Rick Scott says don't bother. He says if the state is to compete for the best jobs, he wants students focusing on science, engineering, and math. Governor Scott says Florida needs more graduates in high tech fields so companies will consider relocating to the Sunshine State. But he's being criticized for his idea to shift tax dollars away from liberal arts majors like anthropology and journalism. Natalie Odom is majoring in mass communications at the University of South Florida. She says, "I...

In previous debates, the adviser explained, Perry had tried to abide by time limits, leading some observers to say he seemed passive and withdrawn. Perry intended to make sure that didn't happen in Las Vegas. It didn't. The Las Vegas debate was Perry's fifth, but the first one in which Perry really showed up to play. That doesn't mean he won, doesn't mean he was particularly likable, doesn't mean he always had cogent answers. But it does mean that Perry, on the verge of being completely written off as a candidate, gave himself a chance to get back in the...

"Ninety percent of success is showing up," Woody Allen once observed. This helps explain why Herman Cain is soaring and Rick Perry has gone as flat as the Texas plains. Turn on a TV, and there is the former Godfather's Pizza CEO. From Fox and Friends to Face the Nation to The Tonight Show, the one-time chairman of the Kansas City Federal Reserve advances his message -- virtually everywhere but the Weather Channel. In the 18 days between the Sept. 22 and Oct. 11 Republican debates, Cain granted interviews to six broadcast-network programs, the Media Research Center reports, plus 18...

I have good news and bad news for conservatives. But the good news and the bad news are both the same thing: We have six very impressive, lifelong conservative candidates running for the presidency. They are the smartest candidates, the most principled candidates, the most patriotic candidates, the most persuasive candidates, and the candidates with the best ideas. The problem lies in the fact that conservatives do not have a single favorite candidate. They have six favorite candidates! And as long as they remain split between each of their six “favorite” candidates, they will eventually help nominate Mitt Romney —...

Minnesota Congresswomen and presidential candidate Michele Bachmann has become the latest politician to call for an impenetrable fence along the entire length of the border with Mexico. "President Obama has failed the American people by failing to secure the southern border," said Bachmann. "I will secure that border and that will be Job One." Statements like that may get some attention, but they are not practical. Don't take our word for it; take Rick Perry's. The Texas governor has been called a lot of things, but he's hardly a mushy liberal. Yet even this tough Texan sneers at calls for...

Gov. Rick Perry will win the GOP nomination for the presidency. Here's why. Mitt Romney is a certified RINO, a ruling class Republican of the type that spawned the Tea Party. There would be no Tea Party were it not for big government, country club Republicans like Mitt Romney. Herman Cain does not have the money or organization to go the distance, Newt Gingrich is too flawed personally, Michelle Bachmann is out of gas, and Ron Paul is and will always be a fringe candidate. Rick Santorum has yet to gain any real traction and that is unlikely to change....

Perry's opponents have unfairly painted the governor as relaxed on border security, and all too willing to give illegal immigrants a free ride. Presidential politics can be harsh sometimes, and some candidates are all too quick to foster erroneous lies about other candidates in the hope to plant seeds of doubt about how serious Perry is about border security. The ide Perry is soft on border security is just wrong. Ramshaw reports In 2005, Perry announced a $10 million state program to boost border patrols and upgrade radio systems along the border, installed hundreds of video cameras, and requested 1,000...

A little before dawn on a sticky summer night in June, one of Texas Gov. Rick Perry's Ranger Reconnaissance Teams was running a clandestine operation along the Rio Grande when its surveillance squad came across a Dodge Durango pickup truck loaded with bales of Mexican marijuana. Alone among his Republican rivals running for president, the Texas governor has a small army at his disposal. Over the past three years, he has deployed it along his southern flank in a secretive, military-style campaign that his supporters deem absolutely necessary and successful and that his critics call an overzealous, expensive, mostly ineffective...

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has been pressuring the National Park Service to locate sites related to the histories of women and minorities, particularly Latinos, which could be added to the National Register of Historic Places or otherwise preserved as parks or properties. According to the Washington Post: With the nation's Latino population booming and now the country's largest minority group, the Obama administration's top Hispanic official is concerned that the federal government is not giving enough attention to Hispanic history and culture. Salazar bemoaned the paucity of such locations: Less than three percent of all the national landmarks that we have...

Texas Lt. Governor David Dewhurst, a Republican, went rogue this morning on Houston's KTRH 740 radio. "I'm supporting Rick Perry for president. We agree on so, so many things. But on the case of in-state tuition, where folks are here illegally, I have a real problem," Dewhurst said. Dewhurst is running for the U.S. Senate to replace outgoing Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. This is a case of Dewhurst wanting to distance himself from the issue that has plagued Texas Governor Rick Perry with the conservative base of the G.O.P. Dewhurst is in a five-way race to win the Senate nomination...

According to the survey, which was released Monday, 28 percent of Republicans and independents who lean towards the GOP say they support Perry as their party's presidential nominee, with Romney at 21 percent. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is at ten percent, with Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, who's making his third bid for the White House, former Godfather's Pizza CEO and radio talk show host Herman Cain, and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, all at seven percent. The poll indicates that Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota is at four percent, with former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania at three...

A conservative political group is trying to attract a large population in New Mexico for the upcoming 2012 election Hispanics. The Hispanic Leadership network was in Albuquerque this weekend working on ways to sway Hispanic voters away from president Obama. In 2008, 67 percent of Latinos voted for president Obama, but the unemployment rate for Hispanics is now higher than the national average. ”This is unfortunately again, nothing more than a gimmick to try and put forward a Hispanic elected officials in the Republican party,” Javier Gonzales of the Democratic Party said. One political analyst says the Democratic Party is...

The number of Hispanic voters nationally and in New Mexico is growing at a faster pace than any other ethnic group, and that could spell trouble for the Republican party over the next 10 years, a political analyst with a business advocacy group said Tuesday. “Republicans are in trouble with Hispanics,” said Michael Davis, the Washington, D.C.-based vice president for political programs of the Business and Industry PAC. The party’s stance on immigration may not be bad policy, David said, “but the tone and language is extremely harsh and it drives away Hispanics.” Either party can improve its chances of...

(CNN) -- America's immigration system is broken, but only a bipartisan political movement can fix it, President Barack Obama said Monday. "The idea of doing things on my own is very tempting, I promise you, not just on immigration reform. But that's not how our system works. That's not how our democracy functions," Obama told the National Council of La Raza. Speaking at the organization's annual conference in Washington, Obama said passing immigration reform measures will require support from both sides of the aisle in Congress. "Let's be honest, I need a dance partner here, and the floor is empty,"...

Obama on Monday will address the annual conference of the National Council of La Raza, a leading Hispanic civil rights organization, at the Washington Marriott Wardman Park.

He congratulated the graduating class of 2011, but one but one principal’s commencement speech actually offended some in the crowd. The graduating class at Whittell High School has only 30 students. Just a few weeks ago during graduation their principal gave an encouraging speech congratulating his students and their parents. “Class of 2011, I want to congratulate you for all your accomplishments this year,” said Principal Crespin Esquivel. He then said the same thing in Spanish, making sure his commencement speech could also be understood by his Spanish speaking parents and students who make up the second largest group of...

President Barack Obama’s administration is quietly offering a quasi-amnesty for hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants, while aiming to win reelection by mobilizing a wave of new Hispanic voters, say supporters of stronger immigration law enforcement. The new rules were quietly announced Friday with a new memo from top officials at the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency. The “prosecutorial discretion” memo says officials need not enforce immigration laws if illegal immigrants are enrolled in an education center or if their relatives have volunteered for the US military. “They’re pushing the [immigration] agents to be even more lax, to...

Leaders of a national Hispanic organization are criticizing President Barack Obama for skipping their annual conference for the third consecutive year after he promised as a candidate in 2008 that he would return as president. Some members of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials also are questioning Obama’s commitment to immigration reform, noting that deportations have increased under his watch — even as the administration intensifies its outreach for Hispanic votes. NALEO, which includes more than 6,000 Latino leaders who represent major blocs of voters in key electoral states, opens its annual conference Thursday in San Antonio.

Members of California's congressional delegation called on Gov. Jerry Brown Friday to join three other states in suspending participation in a controversial federal immigration enforcement program. The seven Democratic representatives acted after the Los Angeles City Council voted overwhelmingly this week to support legislation allowing local communities to opt out of the Secure Communities program and Sheriff Lee Baca, a strong proponent, qualified his support in a letter to immigrant activists.In recent weeks, governors in Illinois, New York and Massachusetts have sought to suspend or have declined to enter into Secure Communities participation agreements. When it was launched in 2008,...

Fat Supervisor Gloria Molina thinks it’s okay to spend $7 million of her discretionary funds on a Latino Cultural Center, but not okay to spend some money to keep beach restrooms open! She thinks “cranky morning joggers“ don’t deserve to have the bathrooms open. While blowing all this gas, she was arrogantly stuffing her fat mug with popcorn.

VAN NUYS - Immigration activists, officeholders and Christian leaders rallied at a San Fernando Valley church on Saturday, renewing angry calls for President Barack Obama to order a halt of deportations they say shatter the families of legal U.S. residents. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Rep. Howard Berman, D-Van Nuys, and immigration-reform proponent Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., were among the speakers at La Iglesia en la Camino (The Church on the Way) in what was billed as a bipartisan town-hall meeting. "When communities are terrorized by ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) raids, when nursing mothers are torn from their babies, when children...

In a vote that split down ethnic lines, the City Council on Thursday approved changing the name of Durango Boulevard in honor of civil rights activist and labor leader César Chávez. Though they all said Chávez should be honored in some meaningful way, none of the non-Latino council members — Ivy Taylor, Reed Williams, Elisa Chan and John Clamp — voted in favor of the proposal. The council's seven Hispanic members supported the initiative. Opposition vacillated from the pragmatic to the philosophical and included arguments that changing the street name would be too great a burden on residents and businesses,...

Fifty years after taking part in the Freedom Rides, Lewis issues a challenge for today's generation. ... JL: I would love to see more people, especially young people, get involved in this whole issue of trying to demonize the Latino population. Too many of our brothers and sisters are being racially profiled because of their background, last name or the language they may speak. The state of Georgia is copying the state of Arizona, and I think there will be other states to follow the same path. When you take on the immigrant population, you're taking on all of us....

While the idea of naming a U.S. Naval ship after labor leader Cesar Chavez has roiled some, California Democrat Sen. Barbara Boxer is thrilled that the activist will be receiving the honor. Boxer called Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus Tuesday to thank him for the decision. “I applaud Secretary Mabus for continuing the Navy’s rich tradition of naming these supply ships after pioneers, explorers and visionaries by honoring César Chávez, who worked tirelessly to promote fair working conditions and equal rights for all Americans,” Boxer said in a statement. “This is a fitting tribute to Chávez, who served in...