Here is why Shirl Mora James, President of SOMOS INDEPENDENTS left the Democratic Party and became an Independent voter in her own words below. Shirl is also a Civil Rights and Immigration Lawyer.
The Democratic National Committee must withhold funding from those Democratic politicians who voted in line with the bigot Rep. Steve King last Friday. We are keeping track of these anti-immigrant bigots. They need to remember that independent voters are rising across the nation and we are organizing.
She writes:
On June 6, 2013, U.S. Representative Steve King (R-IA) introduced an amendment to the Homeland Security Appropriations Bill, HR 2217, which stops funding for the Department of Homeland Security to process Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) applications and allow prosecutorial discretion to DREAMERS. Unbelievable, three U.S. Democratic Representatives, John Barrow (D-Ga.), Nick Rahall (D-W.V.), and Mike McIntyre (D-N.C.) supported and voted for King’s amendment to defund the DACA program. Are some of the Southern leaders in the Democratic Party becoming Dixiecrats like Senator James Strom Thurmond? Here is another fine example of why I went from being a Democrat to being an Independent. We must remember that five much needed Democratic Senators forsaken Hispanics and our community’s children in the last DREAM Act vote, by not supporting the passage of the DREAM Act. Now, we have three Democratic Representatives who have also forsaken our children/DREAMERS, once again. When will the Democratic Party, all stand-up for our immigrant children, including our LGBT immigrant children?
Apparently, the three Democratic Representatives that supported King’s amendment are confused. They say that they support “children and education,” but yet they vote for an amendment that cuts funding to allow our DREAM children to become legally presence DACA recipients.” This is the very reason why there are more Hispanic Democrats that are changing their political affiliation to the Independent Party. The Democratic Party needs to be reminded that they do NOT have the ‘Hispanic Vote’ all locked-up for the up-coming 2016 election and must start act accordingly. Yes, the GOP cannot control their extremists like Cruz, Sessions, Grassley, and King, who are currently helping the GOP to commit political suicide by their xenophobic actions against DREAMERS, CIR, and mixed-status families. But, if the GOP could exorcise the evilness out of their party and welcome Hispanics back into their fold, they could win the Presidency again, remember we voted Bush in.