{"id":2297,"date":"2009-06-18T21:51:59","date_gmt":"2009-06-19T01:51:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thedustininmansociety.com\/blog\/?p=2297"},"modified":"2009-06-18T21:51:59","modified_gmt":"2009-06-19T01:51:59","slug":"special-report-on-sotomayors-ties-to-the-troublesome-prdlef","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/2009\/06\/18\/special-report-on-sotomayors-ties-to-the-troublesome-prdlef\/","title":{"rendered":"Special report on Sotomayor&#8217;s ties to the troublesome PRDLEF"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Judicial Watch  <\/em>    <\/p>\n<p><strong>Special report on Sotomayor&#8217;s ties to the troublesome PRDLEF   <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>According to the Special Report: &#8220;The PRLDEF bills itself as an organization that provides legal services to the Latino community. However, the organization&#8217;s activities reflect a commitment to the worst aspects of liberal judicial activism: identity politics, race baiting, and ethnic favoritism.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The following is a partial list of the PRLDEF&#8217;s activities during Judge Sotomayor&#8217;s tenure as described in Judicial Watch&#8217;s Special Report:<\/p>\n<p>In 1990, the PRLDEF attacked then-New York Mayor David Dinkins after the mayor labeled three Puerto Rican &#8220;nationalists&#8221; who shot five members of Congress in 1954 &#8220;assassins.&#8221; The radicals were members of a violent Puerto Rican terrorist group Fuerzas Armadas de Liberaci\u00f3n Nacional (FALN). The PRLDEF said the mayor&#8217;s comments &#8220;lacked sensitivity.&#8221; Reuben Franco, President of the PRLDEF said: &#8220;[Mayor Dinkins] doesn&#8217;t recognize that to many people in Puerto Rico, these are fighters for freedom and justice&#8230;&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>In 1988, the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund engaged in a battle with the New York City Police Department over its &#8220;racist&#8221; promotion exam, ultimately presiding over a radical redesign to allow more minorities to achieve a passing grade. According to The New York Times: &#8220;The new test, a four-part exam prepared with the help of an expert designated by the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund&#8230;involved changes in format, including the addition of open-book questions and a video portion.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>In 1981, the PRLDEF filed a complaint against Elizabeth, New Jersey Mayor Thomas Dunn following a City Hall directive requiring staff to speak English while on the job. In 1990, the organization also opposed a law to require merchants to post an English sign in the storefront explaining the nature of business. <\/p>\n<p>In a March 1981 memo to the directors of the PRLDEF, Sotomayor and two colleagues argued against the death penalty because it is, &#8220;associated with evident racism in our society&#8221; and because it &#8220;creates inhuman psychological burdens for the offender.&#8221; The memo, which Sotomayor initially failed to turn over to the Senate Judiciary Committee, argued that the PRLDEF should oppose the restoration of the death penalty in New York State. <\/p>\n<p>In 1981, the PRLDEF applauded a decision by a federal judge that forced teachers at an Ann Arbor Michigan elementary school to undergo &#8220;consciousness raising&#8221; about a dialect spoken by young black children called &#8220;Black English.&#8221; The training program cost taxpayers $44,000. <\/p>\n<p>During her 12-year tenure, according to one former staff lawyer, &#8220;Sonia [Sotomayor] displayed an increasing amount of leadership on the board.&#8221; The New York Times, meanwhile, characterized Sotomayor as the &#8220;top policy maker&#8221; on the PRLDEF Board of Directors, who &#8220;was an involved and ardent supporter of [the PRLDEF&#8217;s] various legal efforts during her time with the group.&#8221;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, today released a new special report on Supreme Court Nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor and her connection to the leftist Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund (PRLDEF)&#8230;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.judicialwatch.org\/news\/2009\/jun\/judicial-watch-releases-special-report-judge-sotomayors-connection-puerto-rican-legal-\">HERE<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Judicial Watch Special report on Sotomayor&#8217;s ties to the troublesome PRDLEF According to the Special Report: &#8220;The PRLDEF bills itself as an organization that provides legal services to the Latino community. However, the organization&#8217;s activities reflect a commitment to the worst aspects of liberal judicial activism: identity politics, race baiting, and ethnic favoritism.&#8221; The following [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2297"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2297\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thedustininmansociety.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}