Free Republic

The pro-mass immigration Koch brothers’ network of billionaire, donor class organizations is cheering President Trump’s recent doubling down on supporting increasing wage-crushing legal immigration levels. As Breitbart News reported, Trump broke from his 2015, 2016, and 2017 “America First” commitment to reduce overall legal immigration levels to raise the wages of America’s working and middle class this week when he doubled down on a call for increasing legal immigration. “We need people in our country because our unemployment numbers are so low and we have massive numbers of companies coming back into our country,” Trump reportedly told the media this...

Latino leaders who went to bat for Jerry Brown in last year's campaign are now counting on the governor to help them pass bills supporting farmworkers and illegal immigrants. Latino census growth, the pending redrawing of political districts and the election of a Democrat for the state's top office create a confluence of opportunity not seen in years, activists say. "We are turning back the ugliness of a previous period, piece by piece," Nativo Lopez of the Mexican American Political Association said of the 1990s, when voters approved a ban on public benefits to illegal immigrants that later was deemed...

Immigrant-rights activist and former Santa Ana schools trustee Nativo Lopez was jailed in Los Angeles Thursday after being indicted by the grand jury there for eight felony counts alleging voter fraud. Los Angeles arrest records show that he was booked into the Twin Towers Correctional Facility, and is being held in lieu of $55,000 bail. Los Angeles District Attorney spokeswoman Sandi Gibbons said he faces a mental competency hearing on Aug. 6. The Mexican American Political Association, of which he is president, responded with a press release today. “Let it be known that he will be fasting in stance with...

A decades-old political organization that supports Hispanic candidates and fights anti-immigrant legislation has picked Pahrump as the site for its first Nevada chapter. The Los Angeles-based Mexican American Political Association moved to launch a Pahrump chapter shortly after the Town Board there approved an ordinance that declared English the official language, denied town benefits to undocumented immigrants and banned the flying of foreign flags by themselves. Association member Al Castaneda said the group originally planned to open its first Nevada chapter in Las Vegas, but the location was changed because of "this little situation" in Nye County's largest

LOS ANGELES Two national Mexican-American organizations are launching a "popular referendum" to collect the opinions of hundreds of thousands of Spanish-speaking immigrants both legal and illegal on immigration reform legislation pending in Congress. Starting late next week, the Mexican Brotherhood Latin America and the Mexican-American Political Association will begin distributing questionnaires in Spanish at churches, work sites and activist organizations in over 20 states with high concentrations of immigrants. "This will reveal what immigrants think, what they are willing to accept, fight for and reject," said MAPA President Nativo Lopez. The nonscientific surveys come on the heels of massive national...

They invoke the names of Martin Luther King Jr. and Cesar Chavez, but the hundreds of thousands of immigrants who have marched nationwide are not following one charismatic leader. Instead, they're loosely guided by Hispanic advocacy groups, churches and labor unions - organizations that have helped transform what began as isolated campaigns in major cities into a broad movement with a coordinated strategy. "It's a shared leadership among people who we don't even always know," said Nativo Lopez, president of the Mexican-American Political Association, a central organizer of rallies in Southern California. The young movement is still morphing, allowing both...

The head of the Mexican American Political Assn. on Tuesday called on Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to drop support of an ambassadorship for an owner of Ameriquest and urged him not to use the mortgage company's jet again. --snip-- In a letter to the mayor, MAPA National President Nativo Lopez said his group was "taken aback" by an article in The Times on Tuesday that detailed Villaraigosa's use of the Ameriquest jet and his letter of support to the Senate for the nomination of Ameriquest principal owner Roland E. Arnall as ambassador to the Netherlands. Lopez said his organization...

BOSTON - Gay-marriage supporters flooded into the Statehouse on Wednesday, countered by a smaller group of opponents, for a vote by lawmakers against a proposed constitutional amendment that would limit marriage to between a man and a woman. Early arrivals lined Beacon Street holding signs and banners. Hundreds more signs leaned against the Statehouse fence, and flats of bottled water were stacked in preparation for a long day of rallying and lobbying. People gathered in front the Statehouse and in front of the House chamber, where debate was to begin later Wednesday. The turnout was significantly lower than during last...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Advocates are asking Hispanics throughout the state to flex their economic muscle Friday by refusing to go to work, school or stores. The planned statewide boycott, organized by two Southern California advocacy groups, is a response to last week's repeal of a law that would have allowed undocumented immigrants to get driver's licenses. "Latino and immigrant communities don't have to roll over," said Edward Headington, a spokesman for the Mexican American Political Association, one of the organizers of the boycott. "It's saying that there is strength in numbers." At 11.9 million, Hispanics make up about a...

<p>After trouble with his plane, he misses out on winning the endorsement of the Mexican American Political Association.</p> <p>Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante had a choice Sunday: Arrive late at a Mexican-American political convention or attend a fund-raiser. He went for the money.</p>