Following Obama's announcement that DOMA is unconstitutional, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services decided to put deportation proceedings on hold concerning immigrant married same-sex couples. But this week, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services have decided to deport those couples. This is because the Obama administration said it must still support DOMA until it is repealed, which prevents U.S.-born individuals from sponsoring a foreign-born same-sex spouse. Which really sucks. To me the fact that they still have to support it sounds like complete BS, but then again Obama does have to follow the law and "what the people want." Representative Jackie Speier, a California Democrat, had this to say:
“USCIS had it right the first time. We should put a halt on the deportation cases of all married, LGBT binational couples who are currently being discriminated under the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). This unfortunate backtrack means more LGBT families will be ripped apart because our immigration laws only give protections to heterosexual couples.”
I completely agree. This story popped out to me among the throngs of gay rights blogs, news stories, and websites I get sent to my email every week because just this past weekend, me and Jill attended the Trans-forming Gender Symposium for our project right here on CU's campus, and one of the events we attended at the symposium was a film entitled "Esmeralda del Desierto." After the film, which is about an immigrant transgendered person trying to get to America to have her procedure done, we listened to a talk by a man who advocated that the immigrant rights social movement and the gay rights social movement need to work together. They currently rarely do, and he argued that it would benefit both groups in the long run if they shared ideas, successes, and failures. Maybe the USCIS should take a page out of his playbook.
(http://www.care2.com/causes/civil-rights/blog/house-lawmakers-chastiae-immigration-officials-on-gay-immigration-stance/)
Speaking of President Obama, Bill Maher has made a bold statement that I have also been thinking for a long time now: "Now that a Cheney, a McCain, and a Bush have come out to support gay marriage, it's your turn, Obama." Obama has said that his views are still "evolving" around gay marriage. I have always thought that Obama secretly completely backs and supports gay marriage but knew it wouldn't get him the presidency, so he hid it. But now I'm not so sure. More and more, it really seems like Obama is sort of struggling with this issue. Maher left these parting words: "Who are you waiting for? The state of Alabama? The Reverend Fred Phelps?" Ha.
(http://www.gayapolis.com/news/artdisplay.php?artid=7796)
This story also caught my attention this week. The NAACP is electing a new generation of leaders, who, in many cases, are not African American. These leaders say that broadening the NAACP's message to include civil rights for people of all races, including Latino issues and gay rights, is really what the organization is about. But others are saying that doing this would dilute the mission of the organization that was founded to represent African American people. I think it's great that NAACP wants to broaden their horizons, because it would include many more people within their mission. However, this might also be a problem because it would affect the strong identification that some black people feel for the NAACP. Black issues may get put on the back burner in some cases while the organization focuses on different issues. So I can see both sides of this.
(http://www.npr.org/2011/04/04/135121163/new-naacp-leaders-broaden-groups-mission)
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