Text and photos by Sarah Phelan
Remember how Mayor Gavin Newsom leaked a confidential City Attorney memo about the implications of Sup. David Campos’ proposal to extend due process to undocumented youth?
And how Newsom made everyone else wait two weeks before deigning to release said memo, even though he told the Guardian that he had every right to waive his attorney-client privilege and distribute the Campos memo to whomsoever he pleased?
Well, this week a number of folks are preparing to file complaints with the Sunshine Taskforce a) about the Mayor’s Office’s selective release of this memo and b) his office’s subsequent refusal to release any other communications related to the leak.
And today, a group of civil rights organizations released a legal brief that responds to City Attorney Dennis Herrera’s leaked memo on the city’s immigrant youth policy. (You can read the brief in full here.)
Also today, Sup. David Campos participated in a tele-press conference in which legal experts and professors explained why Campos’ proposed amendment, which has an Oct. 5 hearing before the Board of Supervisors’ Public Safety Committee, is legally tenable and defensible.
And along the way, Campos and these experts, who included Angie Junck of the Immigrant Legal Resources Center, Robert Rubin of the Lawyer’s Committee for Civil Rights, Julia Mass of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Northern California, Professor Bill Ong Hing of UC Davis Law School and Angela Chan of the Asian Law Caucus, succeeded in debunking a number of myths about the Campos amendment.
As the brief explains, the Campos’ proposal, “will allow immigrant youth to have their day in court and be heard by an impartial judge, ensuring due process is upheld for all of San Frnacisco’s youth,” “ensure that families are not torn apart because a youth is mistakenly referred for deportation,” “encourage cooperation between law enforcement and immigrant communities by reestablishing a relationship based on trust and therefore increasing public safety,” “lessen the risk that the city will be liable for racial profiling, unlawful detention and mistaken referrals of U.S. citizens and lawful immigrants for deportation,” and “bring the city’s juvenile probation practices into compliance with state confidentiality laws for youth.”
And as today’s brief further explains, the Campos proposal won’t prevent referral to ICE of youth who have sustained felony charges and won’t put the sanctuary ordinance at risk.
“The sanctuary ordinance has stood strong for twenty years, and the proposed amendment strengthens the ordinance by taking steps to bring the city’s practices more into compliance with state juvenile justice law,” states the civil rights brief, which was prepared by the Asian Law Caucus, Legal Services for Children, Lawyer’s Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, San Francisco Immigrant Legal & Education Network, and the San Francisco Immigrant Rights Defense Committee.
“In short, the legislation is a measured step in the right direction that will help restore accountability and fairness in the City’s treatment of immigrant youth.”
And as Campos told reporters today, his proposed amendment, “ is something we drafted very carefully in close consultation with the City Attorney’s office.”