This week, right-wing think tank Center for Equal Opportunity held a press conference in Madison, Wisconsin to tout their recent findings blasting the University of Wisconsin for supposed anti-white policies. The group — dedicated to anti-”Afrocentric”, anti-multicultural, English-only, “colorblind” public policies — insisted the university was supporting “severe discrimination based on race and ethnicity” through its affirmative action policy, giving preferential treatment to African-Americans and Latinos.

Forty-five minutes into the conference, over 100 university students stormed the room chanting “power to the people” and “we’re more than our scores,” effectively shutting down the conference:

[CEO president Roger] Clegg introduced the study at an 11 a.m. news conference Tuesday at the DoubleTree hotel, 525 W. Johnson St. He was immediately peppered with questions from students and faculty members questioning the analysis.

After about 45 minutes, more than 100 students and others stormed into the room, chanting “power to the people!” and “more than our scores!” to a steady drumbeat. Clegg packed up his briefcase and left. Students took over the microphone and began to share personal stories about the value of diversity.

Police arrived on the scene to monitor the crowd. Three DoubleTree employees reported getting pushed or knocked down in the melee, but no one was seriously injured and there were no arrests.

Many white students at the protest “voiced support for an admissions policy that doesn’t rely on test scores, to help achieve more diversity.” After all, as the Journal Sentinel’s Eugene Kane notes, this is the same university that “photo-shopped a black student into a recruitment brochure because a real one apparently wasn’t available.” Right-wing columnist and founder of CEO Linda Chavez slammed the protesters as “undeniably dishonest and thuggish.” University officials responded by noting that “admissions were predicated on more criteria” than CEO used and said the policy complies with Supreme Court ruling on affirmative action.

Citing the report as an “attack” on the university’s diversity efforts, Interim Chancellor David Ward said, “Any student who is accepted at UW-Madison is here because he or she has the potential and the capacity to succeed.”

As the Obama administration nears its 1 millionth deportation, a task force advising the president is sharply criticizing immigration officials and a U.S. deportation program they say has an “unintended negative impact” on public safety in local communities. The New York Times reports today on the task force’s findings, which were completed yesterday:

In a report on the program, known as Secure Communities, the task force said that the program had eroded public trust by leading to the detention of many immigrants who had not committed serious crimes, after officials said its aim was to remove “the worst of the worst” immigrant criminals from the United States. [...]

The report also said that immigration officials had created tensions with local authorities by making inconsistent statements on whether states and cities were required to participate.

In the most significant of its recommendations, the task force said that fingerprint identifications through the program should no longer lead federal agents to deport immigrants arrested by local police officers for minor traffic violations.

The task force was made up of a diverse group of immigrant advocates, homeland security officials, and law enforcement chiefs from major cities. The group’s findings will certainly fan the controversy already surrounding the Secure Communities program, which is “a centerpiece of the Obama administration’s efforts to curb illegal immigration by deporting as many as 400,000 foreigners a year.”

The program has extended across half the country and some complain it has turned local law enforcement into federal immigration officers. Local police officials have testified that it has eroded the trust between them and immigrant communities, and made people less likely to report crimes. During public hearings the task force learned of many cases of undocumented immigrants that stopped by the police for minor traffic offenses, or for no offense at all, who were swept into deportation after being flagged by a Secure Communities check.

The task force found itself sharply divided over their recommendations for the future of the program, with several members saying it was so deeply flawed that it should be shut down entirely. Dissension grew so strong in the final hours of work on the report that five of the 19 members resigned rather than endorse the final product, which it felt did not rebuke the program strongly enough. Nevertheless, task force chairman Chuck Wexler said there was “strong consensus” in the group that Secure Communities should focus on deporting serious and violent felons.

Between January 2009 and July 2011, the Obama administration deported 982,548 undocumented immigrants. However, last month the Department of Homeland Security announced that it would suspend deportation proceedings against many undocumented immigrants who pose no threat to national security or public safety.

New details are emerging about a potential corruption investigation into Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) and his staff after FBI agents this week raided the home of Cindy Archer, who until last month was Walker’s deputy administration secretary.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that authorities last year launched a secret “John Doe investigation” into Walker’s time as Milwaukee County executive, looking into allegations that county staffers did political work while at work, and thus on the taxpayers’ dime. Archer, who held the county’s top staff job for the last three years of Walker’s county executive tenure before following him to the governor’s mansion, said she has done nothing wrong nor has Walker ever asked her to do anything improper.

Milwaukee County prosecutors launched the investigation around the time Walker’s then-constituent services coordinator, Darlene Wink, quit, “after admitting that she was frequently posting online comments on Journal Sentinel stories and blogs while on the county clock,” the Journal Sentinel reported:

Nearly all of her posts praised Walker or criticized his opponents.

Authorities later took her work computer and that of Tim Russell, a former Walker campaign staffer who was then working as county housing director, and executed a search warrant of Wink’s home.

Walker, who is out of the state, has yet to comment on the FBI raid and his spokesperson “said his office would have no comment on the raid or investigation.” Authorities have already requested emails and other information from Walker’s campaign, and he hired former U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic after receiving the subpoena, the AP reported.

Archer has a new job in the state government, which she has yet to begin thanks to an extended sick leave. She is a political appointee, but she held a job that used to be a civil service position. Responding to the FBI raid, Democratic Assembly Leader Peter Barca introduced a bill yesterday to repeal a Walker-backed change that allowed the governor to fill civil service positions with political appointees, the AP reported.

There has already been one conviction relating to Walker’s campaign. A businessman supporter of Walker was sentenced to two years’ probation in July stemming from two felony convictions that of exceeding state campaign donation limits and laundering campaign donations to Walker and other state politicians.

The GOP campaign against voter rights now boasts 30 states with restrictive voter ID laws. While 16 states allow non-photo forms of ID, 14 must include a photo of the voter. Texas, however, joins four other states this year that decided to enact “one of the most restrictive pieces of voter ID legislation in the entire country.”

Passed in May, Texas’ law forces those who do not have a state or federal photo ID to vote by provisional ballot which will only be counted if they return with a valid ID. University Student ID cards and even official state or federal government employee ID cards do not qualify under this law. The law also prohibits veterans from using their ID card from the Department of Veterans Affairs to vote, even though it is a government-issued photo ID. Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) urged the state legislature to pass the law as an “emergency item” and submitted the law to the U.S. Justice Department for “pre-clearance” last month.

Now, numerous civil rights organizations are urging the DOJ to stop the law in its tracks. Under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, changes to Texas’ election laws must be “precleared” to ensure that law does not have discriminatory effects. Noting that such laws can disenfranchise veterans, students, women, low-income voters, seniors, and minorities, the ACLU, the Asian American Justice Center, the Advancement Project, the Southwest Workers Union, the Brennan Center for Justice, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and the Texas NAACP sent a letter to the DOJ insisting the law will indeed discriminate against — and disenfranchise — Texas voters.

Joining the opposition, the League of Young Voters Education Fund also collected statements from dozens of students to confirm that the Texas law will disenfranchise them:

“Texas’s proposed photo ID measure, which does not permit the use of a government-issued student identification card as an acceptable form of identification at the polls, would disfranchise students who only possess student identification,” said Christina Sanders, State Director for the Texas League of Young Voters Education Fund.

Critics said this applies especially for many African-American students at Prairie View A&M University, a historically black university located in Waller County, who have been the target of multiple efforts to deny their votes over the years. The League of Young Voters Education Fund collected statements from dozens of students at Prairie View confirming that the proposed photo ID law will disfranchise them.

Republican lawmakers, however, state that the law is necessary to prevent fraud. And yet, “there is absolutely no record of voter fraud with respect to in-person voting in Texas.” Former Texas Republican Party political director Royal Masset denounced his party’s rationale more bluntly: “It’s a lie. It’s not true. It does not exist.”

Regardless of fact, Perry still stands firmly behind the law. “Voter ID can ensure an accurate reflection of the will of the voters,” his spokeswoman said Wednesday. “Without confidence in our elections process, the rights of all voters are cast in doubt.”

The DOJ has until Sept. 23 to object to the law on the grounds of discrimination.

A bill by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) that would require businesses to screen for undocumented immigrants using the E-Verify system is facing growing opposition from Smith’s own party. E-Verify has been plagued by false identifications and concerns that it casts an overly-wide net that ensnares American citizens along with the undocumented.

At a markup of the bill yesterday, one Republican, Rep. Dan Lungren (CA) said, “It would devastate agriculture. … If we do not recognize the demonstrated need for foreign workers.” An estimated 80 percent of workers in the agricultural industry are undocumented, and agricultural groups testified in June that a mandatory E-Verify bill could drive out vital employees that cannot easily be replaced.

Additionally, a coalition of almost 30 conservative and Tea Party groups representing millions has launched a national media campaign against the bill. Their letter to the House Judiciary Committee focuses on the negative impact to employers and threat to civil liberties: “This job-killer creates a universal, mandatory electronic employment verification system by EVERY employer in the U.S. for EVERY person seeking employment in the U.S.”

Next Wednesday, Georgia death row inmate Troy Davis is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection. Davis’ case has drawn wide protests because seven out of the nine witnesses that testified against him have recanted their stories, and there is “no physical or scientific evidence” tying him to the death of the Savannah police officer he was convicted of killing.

Now, civil rights hero Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) has joined with 50 members of Congress to write an open letter to the Georgia State Board of Pardon & Paroles asking it to grant clemency to Troy Davis because of the “cloud of doubt” that exists over his case:

It is clear now that the doubts plaguing Davis’s case can never be adequately addressed; the lack of scientific or relevant physical evidence has made it impossible to resolve with any degree of certainty. Over the last four years, the inability of our courts to resolve these uncertainties has shaken public confidence in our judicial system, and an execution under such a cloud of doubt would do nothing but further undermine that confidence. Public faith in the integrity of justice in Georgia is at stake and it is for this reason that we urge you to grant clemency to Troy Davis.

The 51 members of Congress join a growing chorus of voices calling for Davis to not be executed under such circumstances. Individuals and organizations ranging from former president Jimmy Carter to the Vatican to former Republican Rep. Bob Barr (GA) have made similar pleas.

The NAACP and Amnesty International are both running campaigns to stop the execution, and Troy Davis’s sister started a petition on Change.org calling for the execution to be halted that has gained more than 200,000 signatures in five days. Amnesty International is organizing a global day of solidarity with Troy Davis today with scores of rallies planned across the United States and internationally. Find a rally here.

Before President Obama entered the White House, there was a widespread consensus — even among leading conservatives — that the Constitution leaves most decisions to We the People and the leaders we elect. The election of a center-left president eager to move the nation in a progressive direction, however, killed many conservatives’ belief that democracy is a good thing. As an alternative, Tea Partiers embraced tentherism, the belief that everything from Social Security to Medicare to child labor laws to the Affordable Care Act violates the Constitution. Watch a brief compilation of leading lawmakers declaring that virtually everything is unconstitutional:

A new Center for American Progress white paper — written by an author who should be very familiar to the readers of this blog — outlines exactly what would happen if the right succeeds in imposing its constitutional agenda upon the nation. The core of the paper is an explanation of everything that will cease to exist if the Tea Party gets it’s way:

• Social Security and Medicare
• Medicaid, SCHIP, and other health care programs
• All federal education programs
• All federal antipoverty programs
• Federal disaster relief
• Federal food safety inspections and other food safety programs
• Child labor laws, the minimum wage, overtime, and other labor protections
• Federal civil rights laws

Indeed, as the paper explains, the Tea Party’s embrace of the unconstitutional doctrine of nullification threatens the very union itself. You can read the paper at this link.