On November 29, 2007, McDermott Will & Emery hosted a talk by John Trasvina, President and General Counsel of Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund.
The talk was in Palo Alto, CA and began at with a dinner of pasta, lasagna, and cheese bread.The attendance included StanfordUniversity undergraduate students.
The host was Lucy Koh, who is a partner at McDermott, and invited her husband and mother in law to the event.People can read more about Koh in the Asian American Bar Association newsletter for November 2007.The main sponsor of the event was the Asian Pacific Bar of Silicon Valley.
Trasvina was originally from San Francisco, graduating from LowellHigh School.He went to Stanford for law school.He worked in legislation in Washington, DC.He works for Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund in Los Angeles.The group works for the immigration rights of Latinos.
The focus of the group is on employment, access to education, housing.It is a national organization because now Latinos are living throughout the United States.The group works mostly in small towns where there is more likelihood of people being susceptible to poor work conditions, lack of voting rights, and other civil rights infringements.
Trasvina spoke about the recent hate crimes report from the FBI.The hate crimes report compiles the statistics on hate crimes from police departments.For 2006, there was a 25% increase for hate crimes against Hispanics.The report showed that 2/3 of the crimes were against people of Hispanic national origin.
Trasvina spoke of city and local ordinances against immigrants.There is the example of a petition in San Bernadino, CA that required landlords to get the immigration status of tenants and report the information to the local government.Judges have struck down local ordinances because cities do not have enforcement power.The constitution gives the federal government enforcement for immigration laws.
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