Councilmen Call On Obama To Suspend Immigration Deportations
LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Two Los Angeles City Council members joined with immigration rights activists Wednesday in support of a resolution urging President Obama to stop immigration deportations.
Councilmembers Gil Cedillo and Curren Price co-sponsored the resolution (PDF), which calls for the city to support "administrative action to suspend any further deportations of unauthorized individuals with serious criminal history."
The City Council was expected to amend the resolution to ask for the expansion of the deferred action program to all undocumented residents in the U.S. "until we have comprehensive immigration reform," according to a statement.
Deportations under the Obama Administration have risen to over 1,100 illegal immigrants per day, an annual average of nearly 400,000 since 2009.
Citing a 2009 report by the Department of Homeland Security which found only 11 percent of those detained for immigration violations were held for violent crimes, Cedillo said the White House and Congress must work together to address a "broken immigration system."
"We cannot sit idle until Congress decides to take up the issue of immigration reform," Cedillo said in a statement. "Joining 29 Congressional members, we ask President Obama to immediately halt deportations and grant deferred action to all undocumented Americans until immigration reform is realized.
"The President has an opportunity to make history on this issue."
California is home to approximately 10.3 million immigrants, of which approximately 2.6 million are unauthorized to live in the U.S., according to data cited by Cedillo and Price.
The resolution, which was introduced on Dec. 13, coincides with the United Nations International Day of Migrants.
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