DOMA at Brave New Films

Mitt Romney: Town Hall 12/21/07

2008-10-30T09:34:30Z

Mitt Romney
Town Hall
Rochester, NH 12/21/07

TRANSCRIPT:
MITT ROMNEY: I want to keep pornography off the screens in our homes, so the kids don't, uh, don't continue to be bombarded on the internet with pornography. [Applause] And finally I want our kids to learn a very important lesson. And that is before they have babies, they should get married. Marriage comes first. [Applause] And marriage is between a man and a woman.

LABEL: MR NH 12-21 (BH#36) IHESA - ClipB

To download a high res version of this clip, VISIT: issuealliance.box.net

To download the full campaign event, VISIT: issuealliance.box.net

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Day 366 - Candlelight Vigil

2009-01-09T02:30:29Z

This video was made for presentation at a Candlelight Vigil
Haverhill, Massachusetts
August 12, 2008

Created and Edited by Genesio Oliveira
©2008 Genesio J. Oliveira, Jr. All rights reserved.
---------------------------------------
The haverhill Gazette:

'I just want Junior to be able to come home'
By Joni Quinn
Staff Writer

Family and friends gathered at the home of Tim Coco and Genesio "Junior" Oliveira Jr. on Tuesday night for a candlelight vigil marking the one-year anniversary of the couple's involuntary separation.

Candles, one for each day they have been apart, glowed outside their home.

"Junior came here in 2002 on a tourist visa and, as they say, the rest is history," Coco told the gathering.

The couple met in Boston six years ago when Oliveira was visiting from Brazil. A long-distance romance began, and Oliveira returned to the United States. They were married in 2005, after the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled that denying same-sex couples the right to marry violated the state constitution.

But their marriage is not recognized by the federal government for immigration purposes, Coco said, leading the couple on a yearslong journey to get permission for Oliveira to immigrate here legally.

Coco said the couple have always believed in following and honoring the law. They started the process with immigration to keep Junior in the country in October 2002. After meeting with lawyers, the couple decided to seek political asylum for Oliveira.

"The State Department lists Brazil as one of the worst human rights offenders in the way they treat homosexuals. The government is very progressive, but the people of Brazil are not," Coco said.

Immigration officials denied the request for asylum. After the ruling was issued in 2006, the couple immediately appealed, Coco said.

In the meantime, in 2005, they married and made their home in Haverhill.

But they were forcibly separated in August 2007 when the Board of Immigration ruled against their appeal.

"They said he had to leave, calling it voluntary departure but if he didn't leave, they would have put him in jail," Coco said.

The couple have petitioned Department of Homeland Security. In March, the couple filed an "I-130 Petition for an Alien Relative," the same mechanism heterosexual couples use to gain recognition for immigrant spouses.

However, the couple expects that request to be denied based on the Defense of Marriage Act, a 12-year-old law that prohibits federal recognition of same-sex marriages.

The couple will wait for formal denial before challenging the portion of DOMA that prevents federal recognition of their marriage, bringing the case before the First Circuit Court of Appeals.

"We are legally married so we have standing. There have been cases before us where the couple was not married so neither had standing. However, we are, so we can claim we were deprived of a federal benefit," Coco said.

If the court rules against the couple, they plan to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

However, the couple are still looking for an administrative solution.

"Bottom line, there are so many illegals here and we did the right thing. It's a matter of compassion," Coco said.

U.S. Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey has the authority to overturn the Immigration Board of Appeals decision, Coco said. The couple hopes that will happen.

"My goal was not to be an activist and a hero for everyone else, even though they'd all like me to be. I just want Junior to be able to come home. This is a government-sponsored hate crime," Coco said.

For more informations:
www.reunitethisfamily.com

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Rejected by CNN

2009-01-09T02:30:29Z

I report promo is a SHAME.
International conglomerate Time Warner (owner of CNN) is apparently afraid of gay-themed programming. It rejected this video as part of its iReport promo contest. They must be trying to follow in the footsteps of higher ranked, but conservative, Fox News.
It is just one more discriminatory issue that my Family are dealing with the media, specially the big ones, in get our story out.

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ArmagedDOMA

2009-01-09T02:30:29Z

Why DOMA Must Fall

In 2002, same sex marriage was not yet legal in Massachusetts and any possible legal remedy related to marriage was not available. Genesio Oliveira "Junior" and Tim married March 3, 2005 as his case moved through the system. Despite the marriage, the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), signed into law by President Bill Clinton, prohibited Tim from sponsoring Junior as a permanent resident even though heterosexuals may do so.

The couple has begged for relief and has since exhausted all other potential remedies available to compel the U.S. government to enable Junior to return. Although the U.S. does not recognize the marriage under DOMA, it uses the marriage as a reason not to grant any other visa since the marriage is a reason why Junior might not leave the U.S.

With no resolution in sight, the couple has moved ahead with a head-on DOMA challenge. The aim is to topple that portion of DOMA that prevents Federal recognition of marriage and civil unions in those states where same-sex unions are legal. Before Federal courts may hear the matter, the couple's "I-130 Petition for Alien Relative" must be formally denied. The I-130 Petition is the same method used by heterosexuals to sponsor their spouses.

Alone in the Fight for Basic Fairness?

Here is the long delayed update to the story of my separation from Junior as a result of actions taken by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

First, some background. Junior was never an "illegal alien." Six years ago this year, Junior filed a petition for asylum with what was then the U.S. Immigration and Nationalization Service (INS). He made this filing before the end of the six-month stay authorized by his visa, thus keeping him "in status" in the eyes of immigration law. There are many reasons why the asylum application should have been granted.

As the law allows, Junior received his Social Security number and work authorization while his case made its way through the system. As the Department of Homeland Security was formed and Bush made ideological appointments, the government grew increasingly unfriendly to our cause. Even the U.S. State Department changed its longstanding position on a key issue bolstering the asylum petition.

Finally, during the Justice Department hiring scandal, a conservative ideologue was appointed to hear Junior's case. As the Washington Post reported June 11, last year:

The Bush administration increasingly emphasized partisan political ties over expertise in recent years in selecting the judges who decide the fate of hundreds of thousands of immigrants, despite laws that preclude such considerations...

...another failed tax court nominee, Francis L. Cramer, a former campaign treasurer for Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.), was appointed as an immigration judge. Cramer's bid for a seat on the tax court foundered after the American Bar Association's taxation section wrote a rare letter to the Senate Finance Committee, saying: "We are unable to conclude that he is qualified to serve."

Cramer was then hired by the Justice Department's tax division and was briefly lent to the department's Office of Immigration Litigation. Ashcroft approved him as an immigration judge in March 2004. The Government Accountability Office, a legislative watchdog, criticized the appointment, saying, "Converting a Schedule C [political] appointee with less than 6 months of immigration law experience to an immigration judge position raises questions about the fairness of the conversion."

Judge Cramer denied the asylum application and his decision was upheld by a single judge of the Board of Immigration Appeals. Junior was ordered to "voluntarily" depart the U.S. within 60 days and he complied with that order last August.

Since last year, we have exhausted all other potential remedies available to us to compel the U.S. government to enable Junior to return.

I also sadly report that the allies we expected -- GLAD, ACLU, HRC and others -- have not stepped up to the plate.

First Massachusetts, then California; now United Nations
Forcibly separated same-sex Mass. couple accuse U.S. of treaty violation at United Nations

Coco and Oliveira accuse the United States of violating the "Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment" by failing to grant asylum to Oliveira despite "substantial grounds" to do so and failing to appoint "competent" arbiter to hear the asylum case -- both are required under the convention, ratified by the US in 1994. In the 65-page complaint filed this week with the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights at United Nations office at Geneva, Switzerland, the couple argues their case is admissible because the US further "recognized the competence of the committee established under the relevant treaty to consider complaints from individuals."

More information at:
www.reunitethisfamily.com

This full movie can be found there too.

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Q-Tip's Story... "A Lonely Dog"

2009-01-09T02:30:29Z

Featuring "Half," a poem by Oswaldo Montenegro. Edited by Genesio Oliveira.

"Great strides toward equality for gays have been made in this country, but the woeful fate of Tim Coco and Genesio Oliveira,a same-sex married couple facing the deportation of one spouse because the federal government does not recognize their marriage shows that thousands of same-sex couples, even in Massachusetts, still aren't really full citizens."

More information:
"Reunite this Family," an Editorial by the Boston Globe, published August 27, 2007 (http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2007/08/27/reunite_this_family/)

________"Half"______________

May the force of fear I have
don't hold me to see what I wish.
May the death of all that I believe
don't close my ears and mouth.
Because half of me is what I cry,
but the other half is silence.

May to be beautiful the music I can hear far away, even though sadness.
May the one I love be forever loved,
even apart.
Because half of me is departure,
but the other half is missing.

May the words I speak are not heard as a prayer nor repeated with zeal,
only respected as the only thing remaining
to a man flooded with feelings.
Because half of me is what I hear,
but the other half is what I keep silent.

May that my desire to leave
becomes into the calm and peace that I deserve,
and may that stress that erodes me from inside
be one day rewarded.
Because half of me is what I think
and the other half is a volcano.

May the fear of loneliness go away,
may the sociability with myself become at least bearable.
May the mirror reflects in my face a sweet smile
that I remember to have given in childhood.
Because half of me is the memory of what I was,
and the other half I don't know ...

May don't need anything else more than a simple joy
for make me pacify my own spirit.
And may your silence
talk to me each time more.
Because half of me is refuge,
but the other half is tiredness.

May the art to aim us an answer,
even though she doesn't know,
and may nobody try to complicate it
because is needed simplicity to make it flourish.
Because half of me is the audience
and the other half is a song.

And may my madness be forgiven.
Because half of me is love
and the other half...
...too.

(Translated from the original poem, "Metade," by Oswaldo Montenegro)

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Q-Tip's Story... "A Lonely Dog" Second version

2009-01-09T02:30:29Z

Featuring "Half," a poem by Oswaldo Montenegro. Edited by Genesio Oliveira.

More information:
"Reunite this Family," an editorial by the Boston Globe, published August 27, 2007 (http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2007/08/27/reunite_this_family/)

________"Half"______________

May the force of fear I have
don't hold me to see what I wish.
May the death of all that I believe
don't close my ears and mouth.
Because half of me is what I scream
but the other half is silence.

May to be beautiful the music I can hear far away, even though sadness.
May the one I love be forever loved,
even apart.
Because half of me is departure,
but the other half is yearning.

May the words I speak be not heard as a prayer nor repeated with fervor,
only respected as the only thing remaining
to a man flooded with feelings.
Because half of me is what I hear,
but the other half is what I keep silent.

May that my desire to leave
becomes into the calm and peace that I deserve, and may that stress that erodes me from inside be one day rewarded.
Because half of me is what I think
and the other half is a volcano.

May the fear of loneliness go away,
may the sociability with myself become at least bearable.
May the mirror reflects in my face a sweet smile that I remember to have given in childhood.
Because half of me is the memory of what I was, and the other half I don't know ...

May don't need anything else more than a simple joy for make me pacify my own spirit.
And may your silence talk to me each time more.
Because half of me is refuge,
but the other half is tiredness.

And may my madness be forgiven.
Because half of me is love
and the other half...
...too.

(Translated from the original poem, "Metade," by Oswaldo Montenegro)

Watch the video

"Apart"

2009-01-09T02:30:29Z

A Dilemma Faced by Genesio Oliveira, Tim Coco and Q-Tip. Featuring an Editorial by the Boston Globe,"Reunite this Family," and Carmina Burana-O Fortuna, performed by the Boston Symphony Orchestra under the direction Seiji Ozawa.

Edited by Genesio Oliveira.

More information:
"Reunite this Family," An Editorial by the Boston Globe, published August 27, 2007
(http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2007/08/27/reunite_this_family/)

Watch the video