FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Election Day — November 5, 2013,
Communications
National Mexican American Voter Group Blasts DREAM Activist / NIYA and Latino Rebels; We Support Reps. Cuellar and Gutierrez For Kicking Out Pseudo Activists From Office
Phoenix, AZ — Founders of DreamActivist.org via Mohammad Abdollahi and Prerna Lal have no agency or authority to speak on behalf of Mexican American voters. Somos Independents is a national group of key swing registered independent voters led by Mexican American women. We believe in voting on the issue — not Party politics. That said, it appears DreamActivist.org and the National Immigrant Youth Alliance (NIYA) are spreading more misinformation with regard to (TX-D) Representative Henry Cuellar and (IL-D) Representative Luis Gutierrez. Rep. Cuellar was the first to kick out DreamActivist / NIYA pseudo immigrant activists out of his office, and we later learnt Rep. Gutierrez kicked out the same supporter last week. We applaud the actions of Reps. Cuellar and Gutierrez.
Shirl Mora James, Civil Rights and Immigration lawyer also co-founder of SOMOS INDEPENDENTS formerly Tequila Party states:
“DreamActivist.org leaders and their actions are similar to tea party tactics when it comes to immigration reform because both extremist groups and their actions are hindering the passage of comprehensive immigration reform that will benefit all Americans.”
Co-founders of DreamActivist via Prerna Lal and Mohammad solicit donations. Authorities say no such thing as legal coyote work.
Here are the facts:
1) Pseudo immigration activists wanted to kill comprehensive immigration reform and solicited thousands in the name of “legal coyote” work.
2) One of the lawyers via David Bennion did not discourage the DREAM 9 self deport cause and gave guidance and legal advice to DREAM 30. Bennion is related to the Mitt Romney family and even went so much to say in an oped how Mormons can teach immigrants. David Bennion who is guiding these groups led by an Iranian and Fijian immigrant has been one of Obama’s most vocal critics regarding immigration, but was not as vocal against Mitt Romney’s self-deportation views and receiving advice from Kris Kobach(who is the legal architect behind many of these anti-immigrant laws). We believe Bennion was not objective and as vocal against Mitt Romney because of family ties. More importantly, David Bennion supports unreasonable open border views and he should not support chasing pipeline dreams knowing full well the Republican-led House of Representatives will not stand for this.
3) Mohammad is quoted in news stories for wanting to bring back all 1.7 million undocumented deported immigrants. This is unreasonable and Republicans will not stand for this.
4) DreamActivist/NIYA’s efforts wasted more American tax payer dollars in our already bloated detention centers with their publicity stunts.
5) Dream 9 / DreamActivist and NIYA supporters have been working with A.N.S.W.E.R. who is listed in ADL’s top 10 anti-Israel groups and Mexican Americans have been repudiating that tie.
6) Leaders of DreamActivist are of Iranian or Fijian descent and they do not have any agency to speak on behalf of Mexican American voters. Mexicans make up almost 70% of the entire Latino population pie and we take issue with Mohammad and Prerna who have tried to hijack the immigration rights movement that affects millions of Mexicans.
7) Mohammd Abdollahi who has been much of the media face to Dream9 and Dream30 is from Michigan. He does not live in a border state. Prerna Lal is currently living in Washington D.C.
We sought the advice of nationally syndicated radio show host and political analysit via Carlos Galindo where he encouraged following the money and motives of the above forementioned pseudo immigration activist groups.
Below are reactions from Arizona immigration rights activists.
Angel Garcia, Arizona Immigration Rights Advocate:
The author (Mo) insinuates that the Honorable Mr. Gutierrez is unable to understand the struggles of an undocumented Mexican immigrant simply because he is an affluent Congressman, or maybe he is implying it is because he is Puerto Rican. Either way this is a failed argument and has no logic. What makes me laugh is the author of the article is himself not of Mexican descent. I find it funny the author fails to see the irony in attacking someone for ‘exploiting’ Mexicans when the author of this article is engaging in the same behaviors. How many non-Mexicans has NIYA or DREAM ACTIVIST asked to self-deport? I can understand why the author would support self-deportation, because I have on more than one occasion seen this author post anti-American sentiments. If you hate America so much then how about you self-deport and stop making money off the backs of the people who want nothing more to be a part of the ‘American Dream.’
Viva Ramirez, Chicano Activist / Former Arizona Voto Latino Director:
Comments released by Dreamactivist.org today re Congressman Luis Gutierrez amount to little more than a flailing ideological tantrum through which they demonstrate once again that they possess only a vague, elementary understanding of the way this country works. They proceed to alienate Gutierrez (and every other voting American in earshot) by saying he couldn’t understand them, and then they say he wasn’t their Champion anyway.
Lou Show, Founder of First Jewish Chicano Show in the Nation:
Mohammed Abdollahi is an embarrassment to the Undocumented community, advocating actions that give the community a black eye. No Right Leaning legislator (and there’s a lot of them) is going to be as convinced of the humanitarian argument to stop breaking families apart than by the economic argument of recognizing the Undocumented as a positive, tax-paying, human resource . . . so these tricks of convincing a Dreamer to leave the country and try to get back in is akin to asking someone to fall on their sword. Abdollahi is on record with the goal to prevent the passage of CIR and his organization’s actions are nothing less than irresponsible. I applaud Illinois Representative Guiterrez for distancing his office from NIYA and Community Disorganizer Mohammed Abdollahi.
Gail Mokry Shoultes, Arizona Immigration Rights Activist states:
“I’m happy to learn that Rep. Luis Guiterrez has denounced the practices of DreamActivist. A man of his caliber shouldn’t fall for the amateurish stunts of people who’s agenda is to derail CIR.”
Richard Hornos, a South Carolina Immigration Rights Activist reacted and states:
“I think he opened his eyes on time. I can see comments where people are surprised.”
Haime Badillo, a California Immigration rights Activist states:
“I’m glad to see Rep. Gutierrez pay attention to people’s voices regarding the pseudo immigration activists. Such good actions are reflected in a very positive way within the CIR movement. The ideals should be focused in the good faith of the people and Justice.”
Thurman Williams, a Kansas supporter of Immigration Rights states:
“It’s important that those who did the actual work to get immigration reform on the agenda more than a decade ago, reclaim it from those who would co-opt it for an agenda unrelated to the people who have lived and worked as model United States Citizens over those who advocate for predators of children to remain here.”
Mohammad does not have any agency to speak on behalf of the Mexican American community, and we take issue with him making a mockery out of President Obama and Democratic offices. His agenda can be disastrous to the years of immigration reform we have all been working for. More importantly, his leaders and cohorts have been telling reporters the Tea Party Republicans are not the real enemy to CIR efforts and we believe that is not true considering Senator Ted Cruz (Tea Party favorite) has not supported fixing the broken immigration system via the Gang of Eight CIR bill. We also want to condemn the acts of Puerto Rican American Julio Varela, of Latino Rebels (now working with Al Jazeera) in what we perceive as his cheerleading with regard to the dastardly immigration deeds conducted by DreamActivist and NIYA when Mohammad wanted to “creatively and productively kill” CIR.
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Somos Independents is a national group of key swing independent registered Independent voters led by Mexican-American women who support bipartisanship in our government that will help solve tough issues. We know the immigration issue is a federal matter and we rely on our Congress to fix the broken immigration system soon with legal immigration reform.
