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Shattered Dreams: The Story of a Historic ICE Raid in the Words of the Detainees
Virginia Gibbs and Luz Maria Hernandez
In May of 2008, the small town of Postville, Iowa, experienced an Immigration Raid in which nearly 400 Latino immigrant workers in the meat processing industry were arrested. The Postville Raid, the second largest in U.S. history, was the first and last of its kind. Instead of immediately deporting the undocumented, they were tried in groups of ten on charges of identity theft and then sent to jail for 5 ½ months. A group of 40 women were arrested but released with GPS monitors on their ankles so that they could care for young children, and were held in Postville for over a year during which they were not allowed to work to support their families. These are the life stories, told in their own words, of some of the workers who were affected by the raid. The immigrant families,with special emphasis on women and children, share the stories of their childhoods, the decision and the journey to “El Norte,” working at the meat processing plant, and the raid and its aftermath. These true stories vividly portray the fear, violence and harassment that is the lot of those who are “undocumented,” but also shows their strength of spirit in the face of poverty-stricken childhoods, dangerous border crossings, inhumane working conditions, and as they experienced the U.S. legal and penal system. -- Provided by publisher
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US Immigration Reform and Its Global Impact: Lessons from the Postville Raid
Erik Camayd-Freixas
An insider's account of the Postville case, this book gauges the raid's human, social, and economic impact, based on interaction with the main participants and interviews with local citizens and arrestees in the US and Guatemala. -- Provided by publisher
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Postville: La criminalización de los migrantes
Erik Camayd-Freixas
El 12 de mayo de 2008, 900 agentes del departmamento de Inmigración y Control de Aduanas fuertemente armados y con el apoyo de helicópteros, avionetas, agentes estatales y policia loal, arrestaron, esponsaron y encadenaron a casi 400 trabajadores indocumentados guatemaltecos y mexicanos de Agriprocessors, Inc., la fábrica destazadora y empacadora de carne kosher más grande de Estados Unidos. Erik Camayd-Freixas analiza en este cuaderno las implicaciones de tal acción en contra de los migrantes. -- Provided by publisher
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Postville, U.S.A.: Surviving Diversity in Small-Town America
Mark A. Grey, Michele Devlin, and Aaron Goldsmith
Postville is an obscure town in the northeast corner of rural Iowa where the nation’s largest kosher meatpacking plant flourished for more than a decade. As a result, unparalleled ethnic diversity sparked the curiosity of international media. But Postville’s momentum was stopped in its tracks on May 12, 2008, when Agriprocessors was crushed by a massive US Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid. More than 20 percent of the town’s population was arrested, a battery of criminal charges was levied against the company’s management and a disastrous immigration policy was exposed. The meatpacker’s ensuing bankruptcy contributed to the near economic and social collapse of the town. Today Postville is attempting to survive a near terminal blow. The lessons from Postville’s struggle provide urgently needed insights for small towns all across rural America undergoing rapid ethnic change in the face of new global economics and international migration. -- Provided by publisher
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Postville: A Clash of Cultures in Heartland America
Stephen G. Bloom
In 1987, a group of Lubavitchers, one of the most orthodox and zealous of the Jewish sects, opened a kosher slaughterhouse just outside tiny Postville, Iowa (pop. 1,465). When the business became a worldwide success, Postville found itself both revived and divided. The town's initial welcome of the Jews turned into confusion, dismay, and even disgust. By 1997, the town had engineered a vote on what everyone agreed was actually a referendum: whether or not these Jews should stay. The quiet, restrained Iowans were astonished at these brash, assertive Hasidic Jews, who ignored the unwritten laws of Iowa behavior in almost every respect. The Lubavitchers, on the other hand, could not compromise with the world of Postville; their religion and their tradition quite literally forbade it. Were the Iowans prejudiced, or were the Lubavitchers simply unbearable? Award-winning journalist Stephen G. Bloom found himself with a bird's-eye view of this battle and gained a new perspective on questions that haunt America nationwide. What makes a community? How does one accept new and powerfully different traditions? Is money more important than history? In the dramatic and often poignant stories of the people of Postville - Jew and gentile, puzzled and puzzling, unyielding and unstoppable - lies a great swath of America today. -- Provided by publisher
