Judge blocks S Carolina ‘heartbeat’ abortion ban, but backers look to Supreme Court

Washington D.C., Jan 28, 2020 / 01:15 pm (CNA).- A Trump administration rule defining more low-income immigrants as a public burden may go into effect, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled this week. Catholic leaders decried the ruling, saying it will harm families’ ability to secure basic services and that it represents a radical departure from American traditions.

“We implore the administration to reconsider this harsh and unnecessary policy and rescind it in its entirety,” Sister Donna Markham O.P., president and CEO of Catholic Charities USA, said Jan. 27. “By allowing this harmful policy to go into effect, the administration imposes a chilling effect on access to basic services, creating fear among eligible individuals threatening family unity and stability.”

“We will be judged on how we treat the hungry, the homeless and the stranger among us and this decision signals a watershed change of course from the best moments of our American heritage of welcoming immigrants and refugees,” Markham said.

The rule change expands the criteria under which immigrants would be ineligible for a green card, encompassing those who use public benefits on a more temporary basis than the previous standards.

Catholic Charities USA said the rule harms families, targets legal immigrants, and could prevent families from securing basic nutrition and housing assistance.

The U.S. Supreme Court sided with the Trump administration in a 5-4 vote on Jan. 27 to overturn a nationwide injunction against the rule. The justices did not comment on the merits of the case. However, Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, issued a concurring opinion objecting to the use of nationwide injunctions.

The decision means the new rule can go to effect in every state except for Illinois, a separate case. The rule will still face legal challenge in several courts across the country.

Immigrant advocates and several states had challenged the rule, saying it would impose costs on the states and penalize immigrants who rely on temporary government assistance. They objected that it limited access to green cards for low-income immigrants seeking legal entry to the U.S. or seeking to remain legally.

The concept of a “public charge” dates back to at least 1882, when federal lawmakers wanted to ensure that immigrants were independent and would not burden public services.

Since 1996, government regulations had defined a public charge as someone who is “primarily dependent” on government assistance, meaning this assistance supplies more than half their income through cash benefits, such as the Temporary Aid for Needy Families or Supplemental Security Income from Social Security, CNN reports.

Previously, fewer than 1% of applicants were disqualified on public charge grounds.

Under the Trump administration rules announced in August 2019, “noncash benefits providing for basic needs such as housing or food” count towards consideration of whether a person would be a public charge. These include most forms of Medicaid, food stamps and housing vouchers.

An immigrant who received one or more designated benefits for more than 12 months in a 36-month period could be designated a public charge. Use of two kinds of benefits in a single month would count as two months, the New York Times reports.

Lawyers for the private groups challenging the rule cited Department of Homeland Security estimates that the rule will cause hundreds of thousands of households to forgo benefits for which they are eligible “out of fear and confusion about the consequences for their immigration status of accepting such benefits.” The Department of Homeland Security warned of increased malnutrition, especially for pregnant or breastfeeding women and their infants and children; increased prevalence of communicable disease; and increased poverty and housing instability, the lawyers said in their brief.

New York Solicitor General Barbara D. Underwood, whose state was among the plaintiffs to the legal challenge, said the new rule would “radically disrupt over a century of settled immigration policy and public-benefits programs.” The established consensus was that the phrase “public charge” was limited to mean “individuals who are primarily dependent on the government for long-term subsistence,” she argued.

U.S. Solicitor General Noel J. Francisco, who defended the rule, asked the Supreme Court to lift the lower court injunctions. He argued that the new rule was a permissible interpretation of the concept “public charge.” It is a lawful goal to discourage immigrants seeking green cards from using public benefits, and enjoinment of the rule would cause “long-term harm” to the government, he said.

Francisco said if any resident aliens not subject to the rule disenroll from benefits for fear they would endanger their immigration status, then “such disenrollment is unwarranted, easily corrected and temporary.”

Susan Welber, a staff attorney at the Legal Aid Society, opposed the new policy. She told CNN the policy aimed to exclude “as unworthy and unwelcome anyone who is predicted to receive even a small amount of food, health or housing assistance at any point.”

“We are very disappointed in the Supreme Court’s decision, and the irreparable consequences it will have for immigrants and their families across the nation, but we continue to believe that our legal claims are very strong that we will ultimately prevail in stopping this rule permanently,” she said.

In September 2018, when the initial changes to the rule were proposed, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops warned that the rule will be “very harmful to families” and cause fear among immigrant families who are “already struggling to fulfill the American Dream.” The proposed rule “further compounds strict eligibility guidelines already in place preventing many immigrants from receiving federal aid,” they said.
 

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Washington D.C., Dec 4, 2017 / 04:00 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A Senate tax reform bill passed Dec. 2, like its counterpart passed earlier by the House of Representatives, has “fundamental flaws,” according to a statement from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.  

The bill-reconciliation process, begun in Washington today, offers an opportunity for legislators to address the bills’ shortfalls, the bishops say.
 
“Congress must act now to fix the fundamental flaws found in both bills, and choose the policy approaches that help individuals and families struggling within our society,” said Bishop Frank J. Dewane of Venice, Florida, chairman of the U.S. Bishops’ Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development, in a statement released Saturday.

Dewane added that the bishops are reviewing the Senate’s final version of tax reform legislation. They will provide analysis and comments on key improvements they think are necessary to include in the bill’s final version.

Two separate versions of the tax reform bill were passed by the House of Representatives and the Senate. The versions differ on the specifics of some deductions and credits, and these differences will need to be reconciled before the legislature approves a final bill.

The bishops cautioned that the reconciled version should prioritize poor and struggling families and individuals.  “For the sake of all people—but especially those we ought, in justice, to prioritize—Congress should advance a final tax reform bill only if it meets the key moral considerations outlined in our previous letters,”  Dewane stated.

One proposed provision intended to aid struggling families was Senator Marco Rubio’s (R-Fla.) amendment expanding child tax credit, which did not receive enough support in the Senate to pass.

While the Senate version of the bill raised the child tax credit from the $1,600 proposed by the House to $2,000 for qualifying families, Rubio’s proposal would have expanded the tax credit to payroll taxes, meaning that even the poorest families would benefit from the provision. The plan proposed offsetting the costs of the expanded credit by reducing the typical corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 22 percent, instead of 20 percent, as the bill called originally called for.

David Cloutier, Associate Professor of Moral Theology and Ethics at the Catholic University of America, told CNA that proposals like Rubio’s tax credit highlight the moral issues at play in the tax bill.  Tax relief for families is intended to recognize “that families do important work for the common good, and so government should help them do that work,” he said.

While a high corporate tax rate can have “detrimental effects on the common good because it drives businesses out of the United States,” Cloutier said, Catholics need to carefully consider the needs of those who are struggling the most when making judgements on how to serve the common good.

He said that, in his opinion, “there’s a really strong argument” for extending a $2,000 credit to parents in the most pressing financial situations. “It can go a long way.”

Cloutier said that while “some kind of corporate tax cut,” might also benefit the common good, that “quibbling over 2 percent” is a much harder argument when the child tax credit, or similar proposals aimed at promoting the common good and helping those who are struggling most in society, hang in the balance.

In a Nov. 22 letter, the US bishops emphasized the principles of just tax reform. “A change in the tax code should not place families in a worse situation because they have welcomed the gift of life,” they said.

“Congress must take adequate time to analyze the complexities of these proposed reforms, and make certain that the nation does not further enshrine indifference toward the poor into law,” the bishops added.

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CNA Staff, Jul 23, 2020 / 02:16 pm (CNA).- The statue of Christopher Columbus outside of Worcester’s Union Station will remain, the city council decided Tuesday, citing the need to respect the local Italian community despite a spate of vandal attacks on statutes of historic figures and a wave of critical commentary on American monuments.

The Worcester City Council voted 8-2 on July 21 to shelve a proposal that would have ordered the removal of the Christopher Columbus statue and its replacement with a different statue or memorial to honor the Italian community.

Councilor Candy Mero-Carlson, who claims Italian ancestry, moved to shelve the proposal. She cited the recent razing of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church and the closing of the cultural center there, the Worcester Telegram & Gazette reports.

“As someone who is Italian, that statue does represent our heritage,” said Mero-Carlson. “The Italian community has been through hell and back the last couple of years having lost their church and cultural center.”

“We don’t get the right to tell the Italian community what they should think about a statue,” she said. “Italians are proud people. We don’t get the right to tell them what to do with their statue; it should be up to the Italian community to decide. We get to make those decisions on who we are.”

The statue was donated to the city by Italian-American attorney Nunziato Fursaro in memory of his wife and erected in 1978.

Columbus has long been an American Catholic and Italian-American folk hero. They have seen his pioneering voyage from Europe as a way of validating their presence in a sometimes hostile majority-Protestant country and as the means by which Christianity reached the New World.

Columbus was long depicted as a symbol of exploration and discovery, critical for launching the encounter between Europe and the Americas. He was also a symbol of immigrants, and honors for Columbus drew opposition from nativist and anti-Catholic groups such as the Ku Klux Klan.

While Columbus never set foot in North America, the District of Columbia bears his name and he is the namesake of the Knights of Columbus, now the largest Catholic men’s fraternal organization in the world.

In recent decades, Columbus has drawn critical coverage. Some blame him for the launch of the transatlantic slave trade, and fault him for the enslavement and other mistreatment of some Native Americans under his command. Some critics blame him for the subsequent sufferings of Native Americans under Spanish rule, or under the rule of European colonists generally.

Councilor Sarai Rivera had introduced the failed proposal. She said the statue should be removed because of atrocities and devastation caused for indigenous people in the Caribbean, Central America, and North America.

Rivera identifies as Afro Taina and claims descent from the Taino indigenous people of Puerto Rico. She said she never participated in Worcester’s annual Columbus Day Parade.

“I could never go to celebrate someone who committed genocide on my ancestors,” she said, according to the Worcester Gazette & Telegram.

“Columbus is not about heritage. Columbus is about hate,” Rivera said to the council meeting, according to the Boston Globe. “And when you think about the amazing contributions the Italian community has done, even within our own community … that’s who we should be honoring. That’s who we should be talking about.”

The explorer had good relations with a Native American leader on Hispaniola. There, a Taino chief named Guacanagari aided Columbus after the wreck of his main ship the Santa Maria. Columbus adopted one of his sons. That son took the name of Columbus’ natural son, Diego, and accompanied Columbus on his final three voyages

In June the Worcester Columbus statue was vandalized with red paint, with the word “genocide” written on it. A Columbus statue in Boston’s historically Italian North End was beheaded.

This followed protests originally launched in response to the death of Minnesotan George Floyd, a black man, while he was being detained by Minneapolis police. Violence and vandalism, rejected by protest organizers, have caused massive damage to American cities.

Vandals particularly targeted statues of Confederate leaders, but also moved against statues of U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant, and Spanish missionary St. Junipero Serra, a major figure of early Californian history. Catholic churches and statues have also come under attack.

In Worcester the Columbus statue’s location at Union Station is owned and operated by the Worcester Redevelopment Authority, but the statue itself belongs to the city.

Councilor Kathleen M. Toomey also spoke against removing the statue.

“I feel very strongly that we need to respect each other and not tear each other down,” she said. “And when you start taking away other peoples’ symbols without having conversation, without trying to understand what things mean, I think that’s a problem.”

The proposal cannot be brought again for 90 days unless the city council agrees to to reconsider it.

The Italian American Alliance welcomed the shelving of the proposal, and voiced hope the city would “take special care to protect the statue against vandals.”

Worcester Mayor Joseph M. Petty recused himself from voting.

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