WORLD WORLDWIDE FRANCE News Journal Update - (en) France, UCL AL #341 - Darmanin Law, An immigration law with moldy overtones (again) (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 In the fall, the Darmanin bill returns after several postponements; it

will finally be "debated" in the National Assembly despite the
accelerated procedure - which only allows one reading per chamber of
parliament. Emmanuel Macron recently confided to Le Figaro that he is
considering using 49.3 so as not to be burdened with "makeshift
majorities or blockages". The LR group, for its part, wants to toughen
the text, it has also already tabled two legislative proposals, one
notably seeking to change the constitution... everything is good for a
headlong flight towards fascism in the hope of attracting RN voters.

If the bill is adopted, it will be the twenty-first (21st!) law on
immigration since 1986. Part of a long line of destruction of
international asylum law, the right labor, rights of access to health,
family reunification, etc. But also the bill, part of the shift towards
regularization exclusively linked to work and therefore useful and
docile immigration – which can be sent back and moved according to the
needs of the labor market –, opens the vote on withdrawals, non-renewal
of residence permits - regardless of their duration (1 year, 10 years,
etc.) - on political grounds for "non-compliance with the principles of
the Republic". But what does the Darmanin bill contain?

Regularization through salaried work
The bill presents its great novelty of a map of "Professions in tension"
which seeks to match professions seeking to recruit in certain
departments with a foreign workforce which is already in a situation of
great exploitation and of vulnerability in the face of employers and who
will therefore be confined to certain jobs reinforcing the racist
stereotypes attached to them.

The 2024 Olympics will, for example, be the occasion for a major
recruitment of guards and security agents.

Bicycle delivery workers are targeted in the bill, with the ban on
registering as self-employed without a residence permit. In the greatest
calm, France continues - to compensate for our medical deserts in
particular - to plunder the qualified workforce of other countries with
lower average salaries.

On family reunification
Family reunification will also be attacked, gradually eroded by
increasingly strict conditions. It is a question here of increasing the
minimum income required for the applicant: until now it was necessary to
prove a minimum wage, it will now be a minimum wage + 20%, the same for
the living space, the number of square meters required to bring your
family is also increased. A large number of people will be de facto
excluded.

Against the government's racist projects, united campaigns allow a
stronger response from our camp. Paris, October 16.
Patrice Leclerc
The extension of double punishment
By "double punishment" we mean the addition, for foreigners, of a
removal measure in addition to a criminal conviction, breaking with the
right to reintegration once the sentence has been served. Until now this
measure was added during a criminal process, but now it extends to all
people liable to a prison sentence of 5 years (i.e. the majority of
offenses). Removal procedures, OQTF (obligation to leave French
territory) or ITF (ban from French territory) will see their challenge
deadlines shortened.

Justice on the cheap
Justice continues to be dismantled with the obstruction of the right to
legal aid, the end of collegiality - we go from three judges to one to
decide on a person's life -, the trivialization of the video hearing
sometimes in rooms adjoining the CRAs, far from the courts. The lawyers
explain to us that they must make the choice between being present
alongside their client, or being alongside the judge to convince him as
best as possible. For information, and according to Cimade, 42% of
decisions were taken by a single judge in 2022, due to the abuse of
accelerated procedures by prefects, including 27% without a hearing.

This attack on the right to asylum is also denounced in LGBTI activist
circles, in view of the rise of transphobia and more broadly of State
LGBTIphobia in many countries such as the United States or Russia,
forcing exile of a growing number of people. We see the creation of a
link between demands for the rights of LGBTI people, particularly trans
people, and the rights of foreign people, like the slogan of
Existransinter 2023 against the Darmanin bill.

A serious authoritarian and racist drift
Article 13 of the bill will simply allow fingerprints to be collected by
force in the event of arrest by the police. Until now, this represented
a crime and could be resolved in court, now with a simple appeal to the
prosecutor the police will have the authorization to be violent to
achieve their ends.

The desire of the bill to increase and facilitate expulsions in a logic
of reduction and choice of immigration against a backdrop of racism and
moral panics leads to racist and authoritarian measures with vague
concepts which risk leading to very dangerous interpretations depending
on the political and media contexts.

 From now on, obtaining the residence permit will be conditional on
respect for the principles of the Republic and its symbols (the national
anthem, mottos, secularism, the tricolor flag, certain symbols, etc.)
and can be withdrawn or not renewed in the event of non-compliance with
these, a trivialization of the extraordinary expulsion of Imam
Iquioussen. In a context of very strong Islamophobia up to the highest
level of the State, it is to be feared to see what will be considered
tomorrow as a non-respect of the principles of the Republic: is refusing
to be examined by a male doctor as a Muslim woman who wears the
headscarf will be likely to be reported?

Expulsion of exiles from the Étoile camp in Strasbourg on August 17.
Red Photo Library
Doesn't this open up the already well-trodden path of denunciation and
reporting against individuals who we perceive as dangerous and
radicalized? Following the Charlie Hebdo attacks, many children were
reported by teaching staff and found themselves in police custody 1.

We see at work a real "Laboratory of the worst", of what is reserved for
foreigners in view of the situations in which people find themselves
whose lives are punctuated by the goodwill of the prefecture, a before
-taste of what this racist and fascist government has in store for us
which destroys the rights of foreigners, the right to asylum then social
minimums, access to fair justice, to health...

This is what we see with the questioning of access to legal aid, to
State Medical Aid, with botched trials, with the legalization of the
detention of "minors under the age of 16 years old"...the list goes on.
The national campaign United Against Disposable Immigration and for a
welcoming migration policy (UCIJ) mainly led by Solidaires organizes and
gives major mobilization dates which it is up to us to take up and bring
into existence at the local level.

Some dates were difficult to re-appropriate outside the Ile de France at
the beginning of 2023 even if we saw the appearance of local inter-orgas
in a few cities, we now have a major challenge given the imminent
arrival of the project of law to organize ourselves, to make another
voice heard and to assert other values in this climate of racism and
white supremacism which is sweeping our country, stuffed with theories
of "great replacement" of political-media discourse. Ram (UCL Lyon) of
the Anti-racism Commission

https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Une-loi-immigration-aux-relents-moisis-encore
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