FIGHT.

What you are not ubderstandig is the difference between the privelege t the Immigrant spouse and the right of the American sppouse. Americans must receive equal immigration right to sponsor a spouse. The entire focus of CIR is going to be on Immigration and immigrants and if we get in that way it will be absolutely the right thing to happen. But again CIR needs tpo be organic for us and NOT the focus of our advocacy AT ALL… Cant you see how muc we have lost for UAFA as a stand alone; and the fact that if we push it as a stand alone it will ultimately be more likelyu bto be included in CIR. This business of dual strategy is a fallacy for as long as we do nothing to keep on UAFA.
Please look out for more postings – they will include my suggestion for how e can make this happen. It is very clear to me.

“It may be a good idea to seize this momentum now to push UAFA as a stand alone. That will require addressing the following issues:-

1. Senator Feinstein:- wants to provide language for UAFA by working with Nadler. Senator Leahy et al – where the issues of a contractual nexus between partners is addressed. This may include a more onerous burden of proof, which I believe
binationals who have been together for years would be glad to provide;
2. After testimony at UAFA hearings the Senators specifically asked for information showing how
other countries get around the contractual nexus issue. Question
Has IE pursued any of this and if not do you plan to do so.
Melanie Nathan”

Again your words: “Find another way to make a difference. Do the work you say needs to be done. Work together with others who are making change.”

Hopefully you will find the courage to take back these words, as they fly very offensively in the face of everything I have done PRO BONO and still plan on doing. My writing on LGR has brought many more people to the issue –and I have received many personal emails in support of my stance. You would be surprised at how many and who agree with my standpoint and will not say it publicly. I respect their privacy and will never reveal who those people are.

I am currently looking at moratoriums and special visas for our binationals. I have been extremely creative and advocating to help people in the NOW, the people who do not fit the mould and are being turned away; I am doing a lot for one person who is the sole supporter of a family with small children.

Even if I were the only one visible dissenting voice, bottom line, I will not be manipulated into keeping quiet, through the misuse of words such as bickering, squabbling, whining, as being applicable to me when they are not. Perhaps words like that can be used for those who sit in the PJ’s on the couches doing nothing at all.

Martha I honor and respect the work you are doing. As you know I have worked and continue to work with others all the time; and not IE because they are not open to hearing any one else. I am not the only critic they have tried to silence. I will say though that I will continue to be a critic and vocal, because in truth it is necessary. I have no self serving motivation or anything to gain personally. In fact when my dad read about all the work I have been doing and noted the hours I spend, he asked : “Mel what are you doing this for; what are you going to get out of it?” All I want is to see justice and fairness – it goes to the very depth of my spirit and I will not rest until it is done. Please keep an eye out on LGR because I am srating a new Column that all will find interesting. You will see what it is at launch…..
We get a lot of readers here and I am going to continue impacting change ……

I support the work of Immigration Equality. They do things that I can never do from my home in exile 3,000 miles away from Washington. I am grateful that a small staff of committed and hard working people devote themselves every day to winning my right as a US citizen to live in my own country. I am in awe and moved by what they do.

From all the whining in our community, you’d think that Immigration Equality could just wave a wand and end discrimination in immigration, and is refusing to do so. IE cannot pass UAFA alone. It is going to take all of us in the LGBT and women’s communities, whether it is passed standalone or as part of another bill.

Melanie, I love you, but to me it’s real simple. If you don’t support the work of Immigration Equality, then don’t give them your money. Find another way to make a difference. Do the work you say needs to be done. Work together with others who are making change.

Thank you for posting my letter to you. I was already planning to do it myself this evening. I share something else with you here, that I sent to the deputy communications director of the National Immigration Forum this morning:

Attn: Shuya Ohno
Deputy Communications Director
National Immigration Forum
Washington, DC

Dear Shuya,

Here’s a copy of a letter I just sent out to Rich Stolz, that reflects my sentiments toward the new CIR news that EXCLUDES any solution in the proposed language, to the horrible and deliberate, religion-imposed, immigration problem that has almost destroyed my life and the lives of 80,000 to 200,000 bi-national couples. I’m a gay American national man, resident of West Virginia, who has a foreign partner who lives in the eastern European nation of Belarus, which is a dictatorship. We’ve been living in 2 countries for 6 years now, and the stress on us is destroying our lives. We trusted that Congressman Gutierrez had the integrity to include us in the language of the bill as he promised. But it seems otherwise. Our community will not accept promises by politicians. We must to see real action. Please take a moment, to read about some of the LGBT families destroyed by U.S. immigration law via the “Our Stories” link at the end of my letter to Rich Stolz. My and my partner Dzmitry’s brief story is included on that page.

Have a very nice week,

Madison Reed

De: Madison Reed
Asunto: VERY URGENT! Re: Act Now – Support Congressman Gutierrez’s Bill
Para: info@reformimmigrationforamerica.org
Fecha: jueves, 17 de diciembre, 2009 16:02

Good morning Rich,

I have withdrawn my support for Congressman Gutierrez’s bill, and have begun recommending this to friends, and through my blog, because I’m an American citizen who believed that I wouldn’t be thrown under the bus again by another Washington politician who uses gay and lesbian Americans for support, always promising us that our rights will included in this or that legislation, up until the time that the pen hits the paper, and then we’re dumped. Sadly this happened to LGBT Americans who have foreign partners, like myself, who were promised we would see LGBT bi-national immigration inclusive language appear be in CIR (from the Uniting American Families Act bill). Reports from early this week show just the opposite. We were again excluded. We’re being asked to believe everyone again, “not to worry,” that eventually we’ll be added. I don’t believe it, because I’ve seen how LGBT civil rights are always dumped.

So I have stopped supporting CIR as it is – not because I do not favor solving the immigration nightmare for all people affected. It is because it is extremely anti-American, rude, unjust and dishonest for me and an estimated 40,000 to 100,000 LGBT Americans, plus their foreign partners – our families – to be ignored in the CIR, after being told not to worry. I will also work as hard as I can to discourage others to support CIR, until I see the UAFA language appear in the CIR, with concrete promises from Congressman Gutierrez and others that this will never happen again.

Rich, will you take a moment to read “Our Stories,” to see just a few stories of the gay and lesbian Americans whose lives are being destroyed by discrimination built into the U.S. immigration law?

Madison Reed
Huntington, WV
http://imeq.us/our_stories/stories.html

This post was mentioned on Twitter by oblogdeeoblogda: The Gutierrez Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill -FAILS to include LGBT Families and ignores UAFA – http://bit.ly/6sA4ko via @AddToAny…

Thank you for writing this!! You have my complete support. I even called you today because I noticed what Immigration Equality had been doing to use the Tans for their own purposes. I received a fund raising letter from them yesterday that made my blood boil. They have the audacity to ask me for contributions and to tout the Tans? They’ve done nothing for me and Dzmitry, although last year I contributed to them, after learning about them helping them win an asylum case for a persecuted gay man. My score for Immigration Equality is BIG FAT ZERO.

We have our own bill, the UAFA (not the RFA, ENDA or CIR)! Let’s all get behind our own bill. Let’s tell our stories to the world, in face to face meeting with our representatives’ offices, and let’s allow Immigration Equality to go off into the sunset of CIR. They, like HRC, clearly represent bi-nationals only to the degree that they can use our suffering to promote their own interests, without doing anything substantively to help us. As for myself though, my situation and my partner’s situation is so weak now due to 6 years of drain on us, and absolutely zero hope for any possible solution that could help us, that I may not be able to continue the battle with all of you.

Have a nice evening,

Madison Reed