CAPS’s Guzzardi: Haitians Fertility Rates Should Be More “European”

Written by Rebecca Poswolsky

Rather unsurprisingly Californians for Population Stabilization (CAPS) have posted a blog that suggests Haitians should stop having children. Joe Guzzardi, CAPS senior writing fellow, wrote the clunkily titled blog, “Decades-Long Failed U.S.-Haiti Immigration Policy Continues.” In it he goes so far as to recommend that “Haitians’ goal should be to bring their fertility down.”

This is not the first time that anti-immigrant groups have commented on Haiti. After the devastating earthquake that ravaged the island, Mark Krikorian, director of Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), pathetically mused that “Haiti’s so screwed up because it wasn’t colonized long enough.”

Joe Guzzardi, for his part, is a writer for and the former editor of… Read more

Environmentalists Protest Two West Coast Growthbusters Film Premieres

Written by Rebecca Poswolsky

“I went to the UC Berkeley screening of ‘GrowthBusters,’ the new tongue-in-cheek film that links to the anti-immigrant movement on issues of population. I showed up with fliers that read “Growth Busted! New Film that promotes fear and bigotry,” Minnie McMahon, a concerned Bay area environmental activist, explained to me.

The film she and others were protesting is GrowthBusters, which premiered this fall in both California and in Oregon. In both locations film screenings were directly challenged by folks just like McMahon. Progressive environmentalists and social justice advocates who are actively questioning the link between necessary dialogue on limits to growth and the real interests behind films like GrowthBusters have been passing out fliers… Read more

Hundreds Turn Out to Support “Residents Against SW Ranches ICE Detention Center”

Written by Rebecca Poswolsky

With bold and colorful signs that read, “Protect Our Children,” and, “ICE stop destroying families,” over 250 residents of Pembroke Pines and the town of Southwest Ranches, Florida, attended a public meeting Saturday, November 5.

These residents, members of a group called Residents Against SW Ranches ICE Detention Center, came together to voice their opposition to the creation of a new immigration detention center in their area.

In front of local and federal police and prison administration, residents explained how they were concerned about the lack of transparency surrounding the proposal and planning of the detention center. Bill Di Scipio, a concerned resident, commented that community members have been fighting the detention… Read more

The $270,000 Question: How Long can Progressives for Immigration Reform Survive on Life Support?

Written by Rebecca Poswolsky

After the dismal, racially homogenous turnout at its recent conference, with the wildly erratic appearance of content on their blog, and without any real momentum or interest behind or in seemingly any of their work, the time has come to pose the following question—is Progressives for Immigration Reform (PFIR) finally, like so many Tanton Network front groups from the past, sinking into a demise of banal irrelevance and ineffectuality?

Unequivocally, we say, “yes.”

Last week, PFIR – anti-immigrant cohort of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) – held its 2nd National Conference on “Immigration, Conservation and the Environment,” which sucked-in a paltry twenty-five or so attendees. Compare this to PFIR’s conference… Read more

GrowthBusters, the film: where the Anti-Immigrant Overlaps the Environmental

Written by Rebecca Poswolsky

Last week anti-immigrant group Californians for Population Stabilization’s (CAPS) Senior Writing Fellow, Maria Fotopoulos, interviewed GrowthBusters documentary filmmaker Dave Gardner.  The interview, titled “Addicted to Growth,” promotes Gardner’s film, which is set to be released later this month.

GrowthBusters focuses on notions of limits to growth, water shortages, hunger, peak oil resources, and species extinction. The film also focuses on overpopulation as a key environmental concern. While limits to growth and discussions about resources, consumption, and population are all important discussions worthy of widespread participation, groups like CAPS – with their wildly controversial histories, leadership, and goals – are about far more than simply promoting open dialogue about such issues.

For… Read more

The Colcom Foundation: Bankrolling the Greening of Hate

Written by Rebecca Poswolsky

The Colcom Foundation not only funds prominent John Tanton Network groups such as the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), NumbersUSA, Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), U.S., Inc, and Progressives for Immigration Reform (PFIR), as it also funds environmental organizations external to the Network that are concerned with conservation and population stabilization.

The Colcom Foundation, based in Pittsburgh, PA, funds the above conglomeration of groups that are all members, again, of the John Tanton Network, i.e. the bulk of the anti-immigrant movement which was founded by and/or subsequently funded by white nationalist John Tanton. According to financial documents obtained by Imagine2050, from 2008-2010 Colcom donated over $25 million dollars to… Read more

Immigration

Writer on Environment and Population Topics has Racist Undertones

Written by Rebecca Poswolsky

Trying to control immigration numbers in the name of population stabilization can have dangerous consequences. Take, for example, Leon Kolankiewicz, a senior writing fellow

World “Anti-Immigrant” Day: the Skewing of World Population Day

Written by Rebecca Poswolsky

Hopefully on World Population Day (WPD) many environmentalists were paying special attention to groups that are trying to hijack population discussions, steering them straight for anti-immigrant stances. Even though WPD was just last Monday, July 11, the anti-immigrant movement has been busy

Immigration

Conservation Foundations Funding Anti-Immigrant Groups?

Written by Rebecca Poswolsky

Environmental funders should not participate in the funding of the anti-immigrant movement.  The Weeden Foundation for instance funds both the anti-immigrant movement and environmental groups. 

Who is the new President for Progressives for Immigration Reform?

Written by Rebecca Poswolsky

By Nina Masters and Rebecca Poswolsky

Meet Philip Cafaro, the new President of Progressives for Immigration Reform (PFIR).  PFIR, the spin-off of controversial anti-immigrant group Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), needed a new leader after William Ryerson recently stepped down.

PFIR has attempted to use progressive frames around conservation to lure environmentalists into the anti-immigrant movement.  This new change in leadership illustrates that PFIR is struggling to maintain its ties to legitimate environmentalists.  Although Cafaro, a professor at Colorado State University, teaches Environmental Ethics, he is closely aligned with the anti-immigrant movement and reductionist politics.

That is, he’s not “progressive” at all.