the Latino daily – Your Friday morning brief

FRIDAY, April 8, 2016


Good morning Taquistas!

I hope you weren’t expecting a quiet Friday to lead you into the weekend, because there’s lots of news to get this morning going. So stretch your back, get comfortable, let’s get to it.

►Remember the Somos America coalition?

Six years ago the coalition called for a boycott of the state of Arizona in response to the infamous SB1070 – the immigration enforcement law.

A big chunk of the law was rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court, except for the part that calls on police to question the citizenship of persons they detain when they suspect someone is in the country without authorization.

At the time Somos America called for the boycott and business leaders convinced state legislators to leave immigration matters to the federal government. And all was OK, in time the boycott was lifted and everyone was feeling better about the situation, until this past legislative session.

Fronteras reports that there are six bills in consideration that once again deal with immigration:

“While most of these bills are dead or not expected to advance— such as proposals to penalize sanctuary cities, or restrict state funds from supporting refugees or unaccompanied child migrants— a couple other bills could make it to Gov. Doug Ducey’s desk.”

So Somos America is threatening to do the boycott again.

The bills they don’t like are SB 1377, which calls for the harshest penalties and no chance for probation or plea deals for unauthorized persons convicted of certain offenses; and a bill that makes it easier for individuals to sue cities and law enforcement agencies that “fail to comply with SB 1070.”

Arizona civil rights activist Roberto Reveles said that “Tuesday night our community partners met in an emergency session and agreed to form a special task force to explore the feasibility of restarting the boycott.”

The group delivered a letter to Arizona Governor Doug Ducey in which they asked him for dialogue in order “to avoid a repetition of the economically disastrous SB 1070-era boycott.”
We’ll keep you posted.

Meanwhile, the boycott threat in Arizona led me to look into the influence of Latino businesses there . . .

Friday’s numbers

20 – The percentage of business owners in Arizona who are foreign-born.

123,000 – The number of Latino-owned businesses in Arizona.

10 billion – The amount, in dollars, that Latino-owned businesses contribute to the Arizona economy each year.

70 – The percentage of growth of Latino-owned businesses in Arizona between 2007 and 2012.

19,367 – The number of Latina-owned businesses in Arizona in 2007.

41,843 – The number of Latina-owned businesses in Arizona in 2014.

Source: Cronkite News

What’s going on at the DNC?

The big news is that Albert Morales, the DNC Latino engagement Director, quit. The news is compounded when you add that Ashanti F. Gholar, the Black outreach director, quit as well.

BuzzFeed puts the news in context: “The departures come at an inconvenient time — Hillary Clinton seems likely to soon secure the Democratic nomination, and the national convention is just months away. Three Democratic sources said the Clinton campaign, including senior staff, have expressed concerns with the depth and resources of the DNC’s Latino ground operation — and that was before Morales left.”

On the other hand, there are some political observers who say . . . READ MORE



[Photo by Tony Webster/Flickr]

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