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31 July, 2008

British courts stymie crackdown on sham marriages

On "human rights" grounds

Law Lords have ruled the home secretary cannot use controversial powers to stop sham marriages as they discriminate against foreigners in the UK. They said the Home Office had interfered in an "arbitrary and unjust" way in the rights of 15,000 people.

Ministers said the rules were vital to tackle illegal immigration scams - but conceded they will need to be reformed. The measures were brought in after registrars complained they they had no way of stopping bogus marriage rackets. But many foreign nationals said they were being treated unfairly, and that the scheme was unnecessary, slow and bureaucratic. They also said it was expensive - the regulations meant they had to pay up to $1200 in fees to get permission to marry.

The controversial Home Office powers on marriages were introduced in February 2005. The rules meant people who were not legally permanently settled in the UK were obliged to seek special permission to marry, irrespective of the status of their partner. But the powers were challenged in April 2006 when three couples alleged their human rights had been breached.

In the first case the home secretary refused permission to marry to Mahmoud Baiai, 37, an Algerian illegal immigrant, and Izabella Trzcinska, 28, from Poland, who was in the UK legally. The two other cases related to asylum seekers - including one individual who had been told to leave the country, but wanted to marry someone already given protection as a refugee. All three were later given permission to marry.

In his ruling against the Home Office, Lord Bingham said immigration rules, as well as the right to respect for family life under the European Convention, gave protection to some migrants who marry in the UK - even if they had limited or no leave to enter or stay.

He added that the Immigration Directorate had issued instructions, without clear parliamentary approval, to deny permission to marry under certain circumstances. "The vice of the scheme is that none of these conditions, although of course relevant to immigration status, has any relevance to the genuineness of a proposed marriage," he said.

The ruling was welcomed by some campaigners - the chief executive of the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, Habib Rahman, said the government's policy was now in "tatters". He added: "It's a great day for human rights, for justice and for migrant communities... The government will have to go back to the drawing board." Solicitor Amit Sachdev, who represented three of the claimants in the case, described the marriage legislation as "draconian... misconceived and ill thought-out".

The scale of sham marriages is unknown, although senior registrars suggested that before the new legislation there could have been at least 10,000 a year. Registrars at Brent Council in north London suggested in 2005 that a fifth of all marriages there were bogus, with officials able to spot couples who barely knew each other.

According to Home Office figures, since the new checks were introduced the number of suspicious marriage reports received from registrars fell from 3,740 in 2004 to fewer than 300 by the end of May 2005. Between January and August 2006, there were only 149 such reports, it said.

Source



Britain shuffling the student visa deckchairs

Foreign students who miss more than 10 lectures in a row will be reported to the Government under new plans to crack down on illegal immigration. However, foreigners will be able to avoid the new requirements if they opt to enter the UK as a "student visitor", rather than under a student visa.

The Conservatives said that this was a potential loophole which could be exploited by unscrupulous immigrants who had no intention of studying here. The moves were announced by the immigration minister Liam Byrne as part of a shake-up of the student visa system to crack down on bogus colleges. Universities and colleges will also have to apply for a $800 licence to recruit international students and could be blacklisted if they fail to comply with new regulations.

The proposals form Tier 4 of the Government's new points-based immigration system. It will force colleges offering courses longer than six months to accept responsibility for a student while he or she is in the UK. They will have to keep up-to-date contact details for all students and report to the Home Office if a student misses 10 lectures in a row, fails to enrol on time or quits college. If this happened to a number of students, the Home Office would consider the college's "overall suitability" as a licensed college to teach international students.

Once accepted on a course by a licensed college, each student will have to prove to the UK Border Agency that he or she has enough money to pay their fees and support themselves and any dependants. They will also have to prove they have a track record in achieving qualifications before coming to the UK. If successful they will be allowed to stay in the UK for up to four years, longer than under present rules. They will also be allowed to work in the country for up to two years after completing their studies - 12 months more than at present, as discloseed by The Daily Telegraph yesterday.

Immigration minister Liam Byrne said: "All those who come to Britain must play by the rules. It is right that foreign students wanting to take advantage of our world-class universities and colleges must meet strict criteria. "By locking people to one identity with ID cards, alongside a tough new sponsorship system, we will know exactly who is coming here to study and crack down on bogus colleges."

In 2006, 309,000 people from outside Europe came to Britain on student visas - but this figure does not include those coming as short-term student visitors. The Home Office said that student visitors had to pass an "intentions test" showing they support themselves and will leave after completing their course.

But shadow immigration minister Damian Green said: "This new system is so full of loopholes it will be useless at best and might even encourage the growth of bogus colleges or applications."

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30 July, 2008

The pot calls the electric kettle black

These are the guys who constantly condemn Israel but who have yet to utter a single condemnation of human rights abuses in Muslim countries

The UN Human Rights Committee has slammed France's immigration policies and expressed concern about overcrowding and poor conditions in its prisons, according to documents seen by AFP. It also asked France to re-examine a new law under which people deemed a threat to society can be kept in prison - possibly for the rest of their lives - even after they have served out their full sentence.

The criticisms came in a text dated July 22, addressed to the French state by the Geneva-based international committee of jurists. It "noted with concern" that many asylum-seekers and would-be immigrants were held in "inappropriate premises" in airports and elsewhere. It regretted that France had not opened any enquiries into allegations of ill-treatment of foreigners in prisons and so-called "retention centres" where asylum-seekers and illegal immigrants are held. Nor did French authorities "punish as is fitting the authors" of such ill-treatment, the document by the committee said.

French authorities also failed to properly inform people held in these centres of their rights, such as their right to request asylum, and they also sent people back to their home countries even when "their integrity was in danger" there, it said.

The UN Human Rights Committee also said it was worried by the "overcrowding and poor conditions that reign" in prisons in France. This month, the number of people in prisons here hit a historic high of 64,250, according to official figures. The latest figures for the number of places in the country's 200 jails have not been released, but last month there were just over 50,000 available spots.

The UN body said France should limit the amount of time people can spend in jail while waiting for trial, noting that in terrorism and organised crime cases this can be as much as four years and eight months.

Source



Australian Labor Party reverses John Howard's tough immigration policies

These were the policies that stemmed the flow of "boat people" (illegals arriving on small boats). Now that they have nothing much to fear, the illegals will start coming again

Mandatory detention for asylum-seekers has been eased under changes to immigration policy announced by the Government today. "A person who poses no danger to the community will be able to remain in the community while their visa status is resolved," Immigration Minster Chris Evans said. Mandatory detention would apply only to those arriving by boat for health, identity and security checks, or those considered a risk to national security or health.

Legal assistance would be offered to those arriving by boat and they could have an independent review of unfavourable decisions. Children would also not be detained in immigration detention centres.

"The department will have to justify why a person should be detained," Senator Evans said. "Once in detention a detainee's case will be reviewed every three months to ensure that the further detention of the individual is justified.

Senator Evans said the Government would still retain its right to deport refugees. "People who have no right to be here and those who are found not to be owed protection under Australia's international obligations will be removed."

Source





29 July, 2008

Immigration an issue in Missouri gubernatorial race



Remember immigration? The issue seems so six-months ago now that foreclosure rates and gas prices have teamed-up to weigh down the economy. Republican hopeful for governor Sarah Steelman, though, believes the debate still has enough political punch to make it the focus of her latest ad, which comes with Election Day just over a week away.

The ad praises Steelman’s record on immigration, and, predictably, disparages her primary rival, U.S. Rep. Kenny Hulshof. Steelman credits herself with forcing a company using illegal immigrants to replace the workers with local employees. This is fairly accurate: As state treasurer, Steelman threatened to withhold $1.4 million in tax credits from a St. Charles County construction site where illegal immigrants were discovered.

On the other side, Steelman takes a bit more liberties with her attack on Hulshof. True, Hulshof did vote against a measure that prohibited authorizing funds on inspections that would allow Mexican trucks into the U.S. (Sorry for all of the double-negatives — that’s Beltway speak for you.) But the Democratic-sponsored amendment was more a union-backed attempt to bolster American jobs than, as Steelman suggests, a crackdown on smuggling.

Source



Obama wants more Haitians in America

Voodoo immigration?

Last year, when Sen. Barack Obama was making the circuit of conventions for journalists of color, the question was whether the prospective candidate was black enough. This year, when he appeared before the UNITY: Journalists of Color convention in Chicago, the presumptive Democratic nominee joked, “I’m too black.”

Obama appeared Sunday at the close of the convention in a session aired live on CNN to talk about his observations from his trip to the Middle East and Europe, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. economy and questions from the journalists about faith, affirmative action, immigration and apologies for slavery and to Native Americans.

Asked whether he thought too many immigrants had been allowed into the U.S. and “who should be allowed” into the country, Obama said the issue wasn’t whether to let immigrants in but to develop an official policy that makes it easier to become legal and discourages illegal immigration and penalizes employers who use illegal immigrants to avoid paying fair wages. He also said there should be greater equity across the board for immigrants as well, pointing out that “it’s much harder for Haitians to immigrate, despite similar circumstances in need” as other groups that have been admitted legally.

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28 July, 2008

Sometimes you can't press 2 for Spanish

Manuel Castillo was driving a truck through Alabama hauling onions and left with a $500 ticket for something he didn't think he was doing: speaking English poorly. Castillo, 50, who was stopped on his way back to California, said he knows federal law requires him to be able to converse in English with an officer but he thought his language skills were good enough to avoid a ticket. Still, Castillo said he plans to pay the maximum fine of $500 rather than return to Alabama to fight the ticket. "It just doesn't seem fair to be ticketed if I wasn't doing anything dangerous on the road," he said.

Federal law requires that anyone with a commercial driver license speak English well enough to talk with police. Authorities last year issued 25,230 tickets nationwide for violations. Now the federal government is trying to tighten the English requirement, saying the change is needed for safety reasons. Most states let truckers and bus drivers take at least part of their license tests in languages other than English. But the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has proposed rules requiring anyone applying for a commercial driver license to speak English during their road test and vehicle inspection. The agency wants to change its rules to eliminate the use of interpreters, and congressional approval isn't required.

Drivers could still take written tests in other languages in states where that is allowed, and they wouldn't have to be completely fluent during the road test, said Bill Quade, an associate administrator with the agency. "Our requirement is that drivers understand English well enough to respond to a roadside officer and to be able to converse," said Quade, who heads enforcement. Drivers need to be able to communicate with authorities about their loads and their vehicles, he said. A handful of states and organizations supports the change, and no one opposed the new rule in comments submitted to the agency.

The rule change, which Quade said would likely take effect next year, could particularly affect the nation's fast-growing Spanish-speaking population. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated last year that more than 17 percent of the nation's 3.4 million truck drivers were Hispanic, as were more than 11 percent of its 578,000 bus drivers. It's unknown how many speak both Spanish and English.

The issue of English-speaking drivers also could become larger if the Bush administration succeeds with efforts to make it easier for trucks to enter the United States from Mexico. Trucks already are allowed to enter border areas under a pilot program.

An Alabama state trooper thought Castillo couldn't speak English well enough to drive an 18-wheeler when he was headed back to California from picking up onions in Glennville, Ga. A driver for 20 years, Castillo was stopped in west Alabama for a routine inspection. Castillo, who says he speaks English at roughly a third-grade level, said he understood when the trooper asked him where he was heading and to see his commercial driver license and registration. He said he responded in English, though he has an accent. Castillo wasn't speeding, and the inspection and computer check turned up no offenses, so he was surprised to get a ticket for being a "non-English speaking driver." "I had heard that Congress had passed that law, so I knew people were getting tickets," he said in an interview in Spanish. "But it didn't seem fair to me because I was communicating fine with him. I don't know a lot of things, but when it comes to my work I understand everything people say to me." Castillo, a permanent U.S. resident who lives near Fresno, said he took his California license test in Spanish because it's the language he's most comfortable speaking.

Jan Mendoza of the California Department of Motor Vehicles said the state gives the written test in both English and Spanish, but the roadside portion of the exam is in English only because of the federal rule. Limiting the road portion of the CDL test to English-only conversation would help eliminate drivers who don't speak English well enough to talk to an officer on the roadside, Quade said. He sees no conflict in continuing to let applicants take the written test in languages other than English. "The level of English proficiency we are looking for at the roadside is basic. The (written) CDL is a whole different level. There's multiple choice, fairly in-depth quarters that require more of an understanding of the English language."

English-only testing for commercial licenses is limited to just seven states, according to the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, which tracks the issue. Those include Maine, New Hampshire, Oregon, South Dakota, West Virginia, Wyoming and Missouri, which recently passed the rule, according to the group. The OOIDA supports the English-language rules for commercial drivers, as does the American Trucking Association, said spokesman Clayton Boyce.

Source



"La Migra" getting tougher

And the pips are squeaking

For years, the chief punishment for immigrants caught working illegally in the United States has been deportation. But prosecutors are now bringing criminal charges that include aggravated identity theft, which can bring a hefty prison sentence. Immigrant rights groups and some members of Congress are challenging the practice. A congressional panel is meeting Thursday to look at the controversial fallout from an immigration raid on an Iowa meat-packing plant in May. Not long ago, illegal immigrants swept up in such raids faced administrative charges and swift deportation. But in recent years, the Bush administration has started bringing criminal charges against immigrants who use fake documents, including stolen Social Security numbers.

After the raid at the Agriprocessors plant in Postville, Iowa, more than 250 workers were sentenced to five months in prison. Rights groups, defense lawyers and even some judges are questioning the Bush administration's strategy. Iowa immigration attorney Dan Vondra says he was stunned to see immigrant workers from the plant charged with aggravated identity theft. Congress created that law in 2004 to toughen penalties for the growing problem of identity theft. Still, Vondra said, "When you think of identity theft, what you really want to target is somebody getting credit cards in your name, ruining your credit, using your name to commit crimes, things of that nature."

The immigrants had bought stolen Social Security numbers to help them find work, Vondra said. In fact, one of the translators at the court proceedings has said the mainly Guatemalan immigrants he encountered had no idea what a Social Security card was - let alone that the numbers on it belonged to real people. Last year, another Iowa attorney used that argument in court. Gary Koos' client had been arrested at a concrete company after buying an ID off the street in order to fill out employment forms. Koos didn't think that fit the crime of aggravated identity theft. "If you want to think of it in legal terms, it would be that a person has to be put upon notice of what the crime is," Koos said. "And in this case, it's knowingly to use someone else's identity. My client didn't know he had someone else's Social Security number, he just had a number."

Koos lost the case on appeal, and his immigrant client is now serving five years in federal prison. But Koos' argument has been backed by other appeals courts - and he thinks the Supreme Court may need to resolve the dispute.

The issue is coming up more often because of another part of the Bush administration's immigration crackdown. More and more companies are using a federal computer program that can detect fake Social Security numbers. But it can't tell when real numbers are used by another person - which has fueled a growing market for stolen IDs. "The issue is whether people using false identifications should be held accountable for that," said Bob Teig, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's office in northern Iowa, which prosecuted the Agriprocessors case. Teig said he didn't know whether any of the workers charged with aggravated ID theft had used Social Security numbers for anything but work. But that's not the point, he said. "The point is, by the time it happens it's too late. The statute is not just designed to punish, the statute is designed to prevent," Teig said.

To be clear, the Agriprocessors employees did not plead guilty to aggravated ID theft. But because the charge carries a two-year prison sentence as its mandatory minimum, it put pressure on them to accept a plea deal on lesser charges. Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) has called for a hearing to look at that procedure. She's also an immigration attorney, and she questions whether due process was upheld. "Hundreds of people were convinced to plead guilty to a crime without really an adequate opportunity to see if they had any remedy under immigration law," Lofgren said. "And of course, now that they've pled guilty to a crime, they have no remedies that they might otherwise have had."

Not all arrested immigrant workers are being sentenced to jail time. But federal immigration officials say incarceration can be an important deterrent. And Julie Myers, head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, says that some victims of this kind of ID theft suffer financial and legal hardships. "We think it's tragic and unfortunate when people break the law by coming here," Myers said, "and then break the law again by actually stealing the identity of U.S. citizens." So far this year, the immigration agency has made more than 900 criminal arrests.

Source





27 July, 2008

Judge says Texas High schools must teach in Spanish

A federal judge on Friday gave the state of Texas until the end of January to come up with a plan to improve education programs for secondary school students with limited proficiency in English, criticizing the state education agency for "failing to ensure equal education opportunities in all schools." U.S. District Judge William Wayne Justice said the Texas Education Agency is violating the civil rights of Spanish-speaking students under the federal Equal Education Opportunity Act. Furthermore, the state's monitoring of programs for students with limited English-language skills is "fatally flawed" because of unqualified monitors, undercounting of students with limited English proficiency and arbitrary standards, Justice said.

The 1981 Bilingual and Special Education Programs Act, a measure passed by the Texas Legislature 27 years ago that staved off court action addressing discrimination in Texas schools, has not improved the schooling of secondary students with limited English proficiency, Justice ruled.

The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, an organization that helped litigate the case on behalf of other advocacy groups, said primarily Spanish-speaking students in Texas have higher dropout rates, lower graduation rates and lower achievement rates than their English-speaking counterparts. "The clear failure of secondary LEP students unquestionably demonstrates that, despite its efforts, TEA has not met its obligation to remedy the language deficiencies of Texas students," Justice wrote. "After a quarter century of sputtering implementation, defendants have failed to achieve results that demonstrate they are overcoming language barriers for secondary LEP students. Failed implementation cannot prolong the existence of a failed program in perpetuity."

The ruling gave the TEA until Jan. 31, 2009 to come up with plans to improve secondary school programs for students with limited English proficiency and the monitoring of those programs. Those plans must be implemented by the 2009-2010 school year. Texas Education Agency spokeswoman Debbie Ratcliffe declined to comment Friday night, saying she hadn't seen the ruling.

In a statement, MALDEF hailed the ruling as the "most comprehensive legal decision concerning the civil rights of English language learners in the last 25 years." Justice's ruling affects "every single high school in Texas," Luis Figueroa, a MALDEF attorney, told The Associated Press. "Every school district is going to have to realize the TEA is going to be looking at their accountability of English language learners." Justice did say in the ruling that the problems in secondary schools are not seen in the state's elementary school programs.

Source



Italy calls state of emergency over influx of immigrants

Italians are pretty feisty in the USA too. Think Tancredo, Barletta and Arpaio -- and, of course Joe Vento

Italy declared a "national state of emergency" over illegal immigration yesterday - and was promptly accused of causing unnecessary alarm with xenophobic rhetoric.

A Cabinet statement said that the Government had to confront a "persistent and exceptional influx" of non-EU citizens and it had approved a proposal from Roberto Maroni, the Interior Minister, to declare a state of emergency "throughout the national territory".

Mario Morcone, a senior official at the Interior Ministry, said that the decision had been prompted by the continuing arrival of illegal immigrants in ramshackle boats run by people-smugglers at the tiny Italian island of Lampedusa, just off the North African coast. Many such boats capsize and their passengers drown.

Mr Morcone said that 9,342 immigrants had arrived between the start of the year and the end of June - double the figure for the previous year - and there were at present more than 1,000 at the overcrowded refugee camp in Lampedusa. Some are repatriated but many are sent to immigrant camps on the Italian mainland. The centre-left Opposition demanded an explanation for the state of emergency being declared, saying that it would cause "confusion and alarm".

Silvio Berlusconi, the Prime Minister, won final parliamentary approval this week for a security package under which illegal immigrants convicted of crimes will face jail sentences a third longer than those for Italians.

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26 July, 2008

Illegal-Immigrant Population Dropping in U.S.

New Report Finds Significant Decline Since Last Summer

A new analysis by the Center for Immigration Studies of monthly data collected by the Census Bureau shows that the illegal immigrant population has declined significantly between last summer and May of this year. The study is the first to find quantitative evidence that illegal immigrants are leaving the country. It also examines the extent to which stepped-up enforcement and the downturn in the economy account for this trend.

The report, entitled 'Homeward Bound: Recent Immigration Enforcement and the Decline in the Illegal Alien Population,' is embargoed until Wednesday, July 30th at 2:30 pm. The study will be available online at www.cis.org. Advance copies are available to the media.

The Center will formally release the report at a press conference on Wednesday, July 30th at 2:30 pm in room 1309 of the Longworth House Office Building. The report's lead author, Dr. Steven Camarota will be joined by Representatives John Barrow (D-GA), Lamar Smith (R-TX), Tom Feeney (R-FL) and Heath Shuler (D-NC) to discuss the implications of the study.

For more information, contact Steven Camarota at (202) 466-8185 or sac@cis.org

Source



Immigration must be cut to fight climate change - Australian study

This is going to perplex Prime Minister Rudd. He likes both immigration AND environmentalism

IMMIGRATION must be slashed if Australia has any chance of seriously tackling climate change, says a Monash University study. The report said Australia's high population growth would be a major driver of greenhouse emissions, and would counter tough government measures to reduce carbon output, The Herald Sun reports. But the Rudd Government and its climate adviser Ross Garnaut were ignoring the population issue at their peril, said the study, entitled Labor's Greenhouse Aspirations, by Monash's Centre for Population and Urban Research.

The nation's migrant intake is at record levels, with the Government recently announcing an increase of 37,500 places for 2008-09. Given current migration and fertility rates, the population will increase by at least 10 million to 31.6 million by 2050.

Monash researchers Bob Birrell and Ernest Healy used computer modelling to predict the effect of population and economic growth on greenhouse emissions. If no carbon trading scheme is introduced, Australian emissions will reach 797 million tonnes - or four times Labor's target - by 2050, the researchers found. Emissions would only fall to 502 million tonnes if the nation managed to cut carbon intensity levels by one per cent a year under a tough cap and trade scheme.

"The problem with radical decarbonisation proposals is the limited political feasibility of these measures," the authors said. "It is hard to understand why the population driver has been ignored in the recent debate, including the work of the Garnaut climate change review." The authors said that net migration would contribute to most of the 50 per cent increase in Australia's population over the next 40 years. "Like all Australians they'll be living at twice the standard of living of current residents if the Government's predictions for per capita economic growth are correct," they said. "Clearly, it's not possible to achieve the Government's target of 60 per cent reduction in emissions at the same time we add an extra 10 million people living at twice the current income level."

The authors called for immigration to be slashed, and the population stabilised at about 22 million by 2050. Prof Garnaut has predicted the population will reach 47 million by 2100. The Monash report, which appeares in the latest issue of university journal People and Place, will be released today.

Source





25 July, 2008

Triple murder turns focus on S.F. sanctuary policy

The scene repeats itself every day on city streets: A driver gets stuck bumper-to-bumper, blocking the intersection and another car's ability to complete a left turn. San Francisco authorities say that was enough to prompt Edwin Ramos to unload an AK47 assault weapon on a man and his two sons, killing all three.

The murders immediately sparked public outrage, which only intensified when authorities revealed that Ramos, 21, is an illegal immigrant who had managed to avoid deportation despite previous brushes with the law. The case has put San Francisco's liberal politics to the test, igniting a nationwide debate over its sanctuary law that shields undocumented immigrants from deportation and putting pressure on the district attorney to break her anti-death penalty pledge.

On Wednesday, Ramos pleaded not guilty to three counts of murder in the deaths of Anthony Bologna, 49, and his sons, Michael, 20, and Matthew, 16.

Bologna, a supervisor at a San Mateo grocery store and a youth sports coach, and his older son died in the intersection in the city's Excelsior district on June 22. His younger son succumbed to his injuries a couple days later. Shortly after that, police arrested Ramos, an El Salvador native and a reputed member of the notorious Mara Salvatrucha gang, known as MS-13. Investigators believe he was the gunman, although two other men were seen in the gray Chrysler 300M with him.

The heinousness of the crime has put considerable pressure on San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris to seek the death penalty against Ramos. Harris, who campaigned on an anti-death penalty platform and has never pursued capital punishment during her more than four years in office, has declined to directly address how she intends to proceed. "This case has been charged as a special circumstance case," making it eligible for the death penalty, said Erica Derryck, a spokeswoman for Harris. "No additional announcement has been made about this aspect of the charging."

Outside court Wednesday, Ramos' attorney, Robert Amparan said his client was not the shooter. "They have the wrong person," he said. Amparan declined to discuss details of the case but also denied that his client was involved in "gang activities" and said that Ramos "entered the country legally," even though federal officials contend Ramos is undocumented.

The victims' family learned that Ramos had been arrested at least three times prior to the shooting and evaded deportation, largely as a result of San Francisco's self-imposed sanctuary status. The policy, adopted in 1989 by the city's elected Board of Supervisors, barred local officials from cooperating with federal authorities in their efforts to deport illegal immigrants. Officials in the juvenile offenders agency interpreted the law to also shield underaged felons from deportation by refusing to report their undocumented status. Mayor Gavin Newsom said he rescinded the nearly two-decade policy regarding juvenile offenders after learning about it in May.

Bologna family members say Ramos apparently benefited from this policy for juveniles when he reportedly was convicted twice of felonies in 2003 and 2004 but never was turned over for deportation. "All San Francisco's sanctuary ordinance has done is bring violence and death to this once-great city," said Bologna's brother-in-law Frank Kennedy, who attended Ramos' court hearing Wednesday. "We want other sanctuary cities in the country to observe this closely and end their policies of non-cooperation." Kennedy is married to Anthony Bologna's sister and it was his Fairfield home where the three victims spent their last hours at a family barbecue before embarking on the fatal road trip home. He called for an investigation of the city's sanctuary policy and demanded "prosecutions for violating the law."

Meanwhile, local authorities and federal officials were pointing fingers of blame at each other over Ramos' most recent arrest prior to the shooting. Ramos was arrested in the city's Tenderloin neighborhood in late March with another man after police discovered a gun used in a double homicide in the car Ramos was driving. The district attorney's office decided not to file charges against Ramos, and he was released on April 2 even though he was in the process of being deported after his application for legal residence was turned down, according to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, known as ICE. San Francisco Sheriff's Department spokesman Eileen Hirst said jail officials had faxed ICE on March 30 asking if Ramos should remain jailed. Ramos was freed after Hirst said immigration officials didn't respond. ICE spokesman Timothy Counts said his agency did not receive word of Ramos arrest in March. He contends that the only communication received about Ramos was an "electronic message" from the sheriff's department three hours after his release.

The case has since garnered national attention, prompting Republican Rep. Tom Tancredo of Colorado and an anti-immigration group called Californians for Population Stabilization to ask the U.S. Department of Justice to take over because of San Francisco's alleged mishandling of the case. "Because San Francisco's political leaders have already demonstrated their willingness to act in flagrant violation of federal law, I do not believe that local judicial institutions can be trusted to fairly try the case or mete out an appropriate punishment," Trancredo said in a letter sent Tuesday to U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey.

Diana Hull, president of the anti-immigration group, also called on about a dozen cities nationwide who have similar sanctuary policies to end those programs. "We need to remember always that a death-dealing policy like 'sanctuary' hides behind the false mantle of compassion," Hull said.

Charles Miller, a Justice Department spokesman, said he was unaware of the San Francisco case or the congressman's request. Miller said it's routine for the attorney general to respond privately to requests such as Tancredo's.

Nathan Ballard, a spokesman for San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, said city officials were wrong to shield undocumented, juvenile felons from federal immigration authorities. "The sanctuary program was never intended to shield felons," Ballard said. "The policy was inappropriate." However, Newsom "still supports the worthwhile aims of denying the federal government" assistance in deporting otherwise law-abiding undocumented residents, Ballard said.

Source



Passport checks between UK and Ireland restored

Travellers between Britain and the Republic of Ireland face passport checks for the first time since the 1920s, amid fears that the free travel arrangements between the countries could be exploited by terrorists and smugglers. The Common Travel Area (CTA) was set up in 1925 after Ireland gained independence and had survived intact during the three decades of the Troubles. But London and Dublin announced yesterday that border controls would be introduced on air and sea routes to prevent Islamist terrorists, illegal immigrants and smugglers using them as easy routes between Britain and Ireland.

Full immigration controls will be brought in for foreign travellers, while British and Irish nationals will have to prove their identities, either by showing a passport or a driving licence. And while there are no plans for full immigration controls on the meandering frontier between Northern Ireland and the Republic, immigration officials will step up spot-checks on vehicles moving crossing the border.

The new controls will be phased in over the next six years. They are being brought in as Britain overhauls its system of immigration checks, including the introduction of its e-Borders programme screening all new arrivals to the UK. The plans do not cover travel between Northern Ireland and the mainland UK, which is still being examined by the Home Office with a view to announcing proposals by the end of the year

Details of the plans were set out in a Home Office consultation paper yesterday. It suggested that British and Irish residents travelling between the two countries will be separated into separate queues from foreign passengers. Airlines and ferry operators could face fines if they allow passengers on board without the relevant documents.

Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, and Dermot Ahern, the Irish Justice Minister, said in a joint statement: "It is crucial our two countries work closely together to ensure our borders are stronger than ever." But they added that both governments fully recognised the "particular circumstances of Northern Ireland" and insisted there are "no plans to introduce fixed controls on either side of the Irish land border for immigration or other purposes".

They added: "We will tackle the challenges we face head-on through the use of state-of-the-art border technology, joint sea and port operations and the continued exchange of intelligence. We are both introducing electronic border management systems so we can count people in and out of the country and identify those people who may be of interest to our law enforcement authorities."

The CTA also includes the Crown Dependencies, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, which will also face the new checks.

The Home Office said the CTA was an "important component of the special relationship" between the two countries, but that the arrangements were "out of date". It said the moves had been prompted by worries over security, illegal immigration and smuggling, but added there were no specific events that had led to toughening the checks.

Its consultation paper said London and Dublin would work more closely on a range of initiatives to "reduce the risk of abuse of the CTA arrangement". It added: "These include a number of intelligence-led operations and further co-operation on data sharing to protect the integrity of our border controls." Nearly 16 million passengers travelled between Ireland and the UK, and the Crown Dependencies, in 2006.

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24 July, 2008

New Zealand a 'giant transit lounge'

New Zealand has been described as a "giant transit lounge" after an analysis showed many of its immigrants ended up moving to Australia. Nearly 20 per cent of the 37,000 New Zealanders who crossed the Tasman last year intending to stay in Australia permanently or for at least a year were born outside New Zealand, the Dominion Post has reported. In 2003 the number of New Zealand citizens born overseas moving to live in Australia was 4,187, but this rose to 7,159 last year, the newspaper reported.

New Zealand has long been suspected of providing "back-door entry" to Australia because it has less strict immigration criteria and most Kiwis can visit, live and work in Australia without needing to apply ahead for a visa. Most of the people who last year moved to Australia after emigrating to New Zealand were born in South Africa (871) followed by India (696) and England (678).

New Zealand's Revenue Minister Peter Dunne, who leads the United Future political party, has described his country as a "giant transit lounge". "Our immigration and resettlement policy is not effectively encouraging people to make long-term commitments," he told the newspaper.

A spokesman for Australia's Department of Immigration and Citizenship did not wish to comment. "Foreign policy is not a matter for this department,'' he said.

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Robot recruited in war on illegal immigrants to Britain

A robot the size of a briefcase is flushing out illegal immigrants trying to smuggle themselves into Britain.

Fitted with powerful searchlights and high-resolution video cameras, the robot - codenamed Hero - carries out detailed searches of the undersides of lorries and coaches. It is also used inside the vehicles as its four-wheel-drive enables it to scramble it over obstacles while looking for concealed people. The robot can also be fitted with heartbeat detectors as well as sensors to identify chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear materials being smuggled into Britain.

News of the device comes only days after a group of stowaways was found after entering the country hidden on Army vehicles. The battery-powered robot, which costs about $12,000, was on display at the Farnborough Air Show last week. It has been adapted by the armaments company BAE Systems from devices used by troops in Afghanistan to search buildings or examine suspected bombs and mines. British border guards at Calais have tested it and senior officials may now introduce the robot at other ports.

A spokesman for the UK Border Agency said: "Last year over one million lorries were searched and we stopped a record 18,000 people. New technology is crucial in the fight against illegal immigrants."

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23 July, 2008

Georgia: Immigration law aims at employers

Businesses with more than 100 employees that bid for job contracts with public entities in Georgia must now verify that their employees are legally in the United States. "If they do any type of work with the county, those people have to show verification that their employees are legal," said Whitfield County Human Resources Director Jackie Palacios. "That will be for anybody to bid or to be considered." She said the federal employment verification system, or E-Verify, maintains accountability for contractors and the public employers working with contractors on public projects of any type.

The rule is part of the Georgia Security and Immigration Compliance Act of 2006, and it began by requiring contractors with more than 500 employees to register themselves with E-Verify last year. On July 1, the law changed to apply to contractors with more than 100 workers, and next July 1 it will apply to any company - no matter how many employees - that wants to bid on public contracts.

Ms. Palacios said Whitfield County wasn't really affected until this month when the law changed to the mid-size contractors. But the biggest impact will be in 2009 because most of the companies the county works with will fall within the less- than-100-employee category, she said. Until then, businesses that have less than 100 employees still must file an affidavit that their employees are legal to work in order to bid on public jobs, which holds the businesses liable if any information they provide is false.

Stan Griffin, a project manager with Smith & Green Construction Co. of Dalton, said he has yet to use E-Verify, but he welcomed the system of accountability. "I'm all for anybody in this business having to verify," Mr. Griffin said. "I would advocate that rule because we adhere to it anyway." Mr. Griffin said he works with men employed by Smith & Green who spent many years working to gain their U.S.. citizenship, and he feels it's unfair to have to compete with businesses that hire illegal immigrants and underpay them.

Smith & Green, with about 25 employees, will come under the verification requirement next year when it bids on public works projects, but he said the firm has had to comply with previous worker certification requirements. Mr. Griffin said that many years ago public entities began requiring contractors to show proof employees were legal for such jobs as electrical work, so the new legal status certification won't be much different.

The E-Verify employment verification system is a free service provided by the federal government. E-verify checks the information and documentation of citizenship or residency provided by the workers against Social Security Administration and Department of Homeland Security databases. According to the agencies' Web sites, E-Verify evolved from the Basic Pilot/Employment Verification Program originally developed in 1997. The program gave employers Internet access in 2004, making it much more handy for them to use when hiring new workers.

The vast majority of prospective workers are confirmed in seconds, but about 5 percent are not confirmed. That can be because they are not authorized to work in the United States or because the applicant was not aware that he or she could appeal the initial response, according to the E-Verify Web site.

More than 64,000 employers participate in the program with 1,000 new employers each week. E-Verify has received more than 4 million queries since Oct. 1, 2007, according to the Web site.

Source



Italians despise parasite immigrants

Gypsies rarely have regular jobs -- living mainly by begging and crime. And a big majority of Italians are not hung up by fears of "racism" in responding to that fact.

Italian society has been rocked by photos showing sunbathers relaxing on a beach next to the bodies of two drowned girls. CNN reports the two girls, Violetta, 12, and Cristina, 13, had been swimming with two friends at Torregaveta beach, west of Naples, on Saturday when they got into trouble. Photographs published around the world show their bodies laid out on the beach under towels while sunbathers sit close by. The photographer told CNN the mood among sunbathers was one of indifference towards the girls, who were Roma gypsies - a disliked minority in Italy.

Archbishop of Naples Cardinal Crecenzio Seppe wrote in his parish blog: "Indifference is not an emotion for human beings. To turn the other way or to mind your own business can sometimes be more devastating than the events that occur," CNN reported. One witness told The Daily Mail: "Their bodies were left on the beach for an hour before being collected, just covered by a beach towel while people just got back to sunbathing and playing football. It was very surreal. There was this picture of a typical Italian beach with families enjoying the sun and then just metres away were the bodies of these two children. People were completely indifferent about what had happened".

The Guardian reports Italy is gripped by anti-Gypsy feeling. “Since coming to office in May, Silvio Berlusconi's right-wing Government has appointed three special commissioners to deal with the Roma in each of Italy's three biggest cities - Naples, Milan and Rome. It has also ordered the fingerprinting of the country's Gypsy population, including minors, who make up more than half of the estimated 150,000 Roma in Italy,” it said.

The newspaper quoted a survey showing 68 per cent of Italians want the Roma expelled, regardless of whether they hold Italian passports. Many Italians are openly hostile towards the Roma, accusing them of choosing crime over legitimate employment, and living in illegal camps instead of joining mainstream Italian society.

The British broadsheet quotes Italian newspaper La Repubblica, which also expressed astonishment at the behaviour of those on the beach: "While the lifeless bodies of the girls were still on the sand, there were those who carried on sunbathing or having lunch just a few metres away.”

Earlier this month, the European Parliament demanded Italy end its plans to fingerprint thousands of Roma children, calling the move a direct act of discrimination

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22 July, 2008

Even the Spanish Left is learning

As immigrant boat tragedy returns to Spain's coasts, Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero is busy steering the policies of his Socialist government in a new direction on the influx of illegal migrants into the country. The second week of July saw some 45 Africans from three crews perish at sea off the coast of Andalusia and the Canary Islands, including nine small children, the bodies of whom the survivors of one expedition threw overboard during an ill-starred crossing from northern Morocco. But in recent days, Zapatero, who during his first term as Spain's leader had stood out on the European scene for his dogged insistence on maintaining a humane approach to the phenomenon of illegal immigration, has hardened his stance in line with European Union colleagues who fear losing support with their electorates by looking soft as the effects of global economic stagnation kick in.

Immediately after securing a second term in Spain's March elections, Zapatero made an eloquent statement by naming Celestino Corbacho as labor and immigration minister. Corbacho had previously been mayor of a Barcelona suburb with a high immigrant population, and was an outspoken critic of the idea that laws should be tailored to meet the needs of the "last one in." With this year's sudden decline of Spain's decade-long economic boom - fueled in large measure by massive construction using cheap foreign labor, causing average salaries to drop as GDP soared - the Socialist government took steps to avert a social spending deficit as immigrants swelled the unemployment figures. Those eligible for unemployment benefit, including some of the 700,000 foreign workers who had been made legal contributors to the social security system during the three-month amnesty for illegal immigrants and their employers in 2005, were offered lump sum benefit payments - half before leaving, and the rest on arrival in their home countries - as an incentive to flee a deteriorating economic situation.

This could be considered a logical, and fair, reaction. After all, the government was not forcing anyone to go home, but merely clearing the way for the immigrants wishing to return home in better financial shape than when they set out for Spain's once-buoyant job market. But on the European stage, Zapatero's support for the European Commission's Returns Directive was to cause controversy and dissent within his own ranks. Several high-profile Spanish members of the European Parliament from the Socialist bloc voted against legislation which allows EU member states to lock up undocumented migrants for up to 18 months in exceptional cases (otherwise the limit is set at six months), without the need for a judicial order.

While Zapatero desperately tried to claim that the directive was a "progressive move", arguing that several states previously had no time limit on internment for migrants, an editorial in Madrid's left-leaning daily El Pais talked about a "rightward shift" in government policy and even accused the Socialists of "opportunism."

Meanwhile, French President Nicolas Sarkozy had been negotiating with Spain over the terms of a proposed "European immigration pact" in preparation for France's six-month spell as EU president. On the one hand it is noteworthy that Sarkozy wished to accord the terms of the pact with a political animal of very different stripes than his own in Zapatero, in order to give the initiative greater credibility than it would otherwise have had. On the other, Spain's Socialists had to fight tooth and nail to the eleventh hour before the pact was presented to European interior and justice ministers in Cannes on July 7 to avoid an ugly disavowal of their own immigration policies to date

More here



Hazleton mayor named Pa.'s Mayor of the Year

Hazleton Mayor Lou Barletta, who is best known for a local crackdown on illegal immigration, has been named Mayor of the Year by the Pennsylvania State Mayors Association.

Barletta is a hands-on mayor who has been on location at crime scenes, said Lititz Mayor Russell Pettyjohn, the chairman of the association's six-member Mayor of the Year award committee. The immigration crackdown was another reason for Barletta's unanimous selection, Pettyjohn said. "He's gone one step further to take on immigration," Pettyjohn said.

The Hazleton City Council approved the Illegal Immigration Relief Act in July 2006. The law sought to deny business permits to companies that employ illegal immigrants, fine landlords who rent to them and require tenants to register and pay for a rental permit. A federal judge struck down Hazleton's ordinance as unconstitutional.

Barletta, a three-term Republican mayor, is trying to unseat Democratic U.S. Rep. Paul Kanjorski. He is continuing to use the immigration issue in his congressional campaign.

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21 July, 2008

Sanctuary City Once Protected Alleged Killer

An alleged gang member charged with killing a father and his two sons on a street in San Francisco last month was apparently shielded from immigration authorities from previous encounters with the law. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Edwin Ramos, 21, was found guilty of two felonies when he was a juvenile: an assault on a Muni passenger and the attempted robbery of a pregnant woman.

San Francisco's Juvenile Probation Department never alerted federal immigration authorities because it was the agency's policy not to consider immigration status when deciding how to deal with an offender.

Nathan Ballard, a spokesperson for Mayor Gavin Newsom, said that as soon as the Mayor discovered the city's policy, he immediately reversed it. "As soon as the mayor found out that the juvenile probation department was not turning over undocumented immigrants, he changed that policy. That was in mid-May."

The native of El Salvador is now being held on three counts of murder for last month's fatal shooting of Tony Bologna, 48, and his two sons Michael, 20, and Matthew, 16, after a traffic dispute. Police said they were shot when the father was driving home from a family picnic and appears to have briefly blocked Ramos from completing a left turn down a narrow street.

Source



Imprisoned illegals in Australia are floating high

Many of these have been imprisoned for years -- since before the Howard government's crackdown on "boat people". Others are visa overstayers and failed "refugee" claimants

Immigration officials are adamant there is no drug problem in immigration detention centres; there is, however, an abundance of "unidentified white powder", "green vegetable matter", "liquid with alcohol scents" and numerous "unidentified tablets".

Amid reports last week that immigration detention centres were hotbeds of drug and alcohol abuse, the Immigration Department has issued figures on the number of prohibited substances seized in centres in 2006-07.

The 31 prohibited substances confiscated in seven centres across the country included 10 quantities of liquid - believed to be alcohol - 14 unidentified tablets, four quantities of ``green vegetable matter'' and three unidentified powders.

The powders included two quantities of an unidentified white powder, both found in Melbourne's Maribyrnong detention centre, and one quantity of brown powder, which Immigration officals believe was kava.

Sydney's Villawood detention centre topped the list, with 19 seizures. Maribyrnong had four seizures; Brisbane had three; Perth's two facilities had two seizures; Darwin had one; and there was one seizure at one of Sydney's residential facilities.

An immigration spokesman said seized items were not tested or positively identified by detention centre staff. Instead, suspicious items were handed over to local police. A spokeswoman for NSW Police refused to comment on the drug claims, citing "operational'' reasons.

Refugee advocates have said drug use in immigration detention centres is common. Ngareta Rossell told The Australian the drug problem in Villawood was concentrated in the so-called "stage one'', or maximum security area, of the centre. "It's nothing new,'' she said. "It's been going on for years.''

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20 July, 2008

Corruption in Australia's immigration representatives overseas

Employing Muslim Arabs to represent Australia in the Middle East was certainly a "courageous" decision (Courageous in a "Yes Minister" sense)

Former immigration minister Kevin Andrews instructed his department to lift the intake of Christian refugees from the Middle East. Mr Andrew's instruction was in response to what he saw as a pro-Muslim bias created by corrupt local case officers.

The Weekend Australian says Mr Andrews was so concerned about the extent of corruption in Middle Eastern posts - despite the allegations being investigated and dismissed by his own department - that he wrote to then Prime Minister John Howard advocating a $200 million plan to replace local employees with Australian staff in 10 "sensitive" countries, including Jordan, Iran and Egypt. Opposition immigration spokesman Chris Ellison said yesterday this remains Coalition policy. "We do not want discrimination or bias occurring ... and that's why I believe it is appropriate that our sensitive overseas posts, such as those in the Middle East, are staffed by Australians," Senator Ellison said.

A Department of Immigration spokesman said there were no substantiated cases of anti-Christian discrimination in Australian embassies and no plans to replace "Islamic locally engaged staff" with Australian officials.

An investigation by The Weekend Australian has discovered Mr Andrews was petitioned by the Australian Christian Lobby to address alleged religious discrimination against Iraqis. Before losing office in the November 2007 election, he ordered the number of Christian Iraqi refugees to be increased by 1,400 for 2007-08, almost doubling the previous year's Iraqi total of 1,639. "Put it this way, it was made very clear to the immigration department that more Christian refugees were wanted," a Howard government source said.

In his letter to Mr Howard in August last year, Mr Andrews, a devout Catholic, proposed significant changes to the refugee selection process. In the letter, seen by The Weekend Australian, Mr Andrews accused the case workers in Australian embassies of fraud and bribery when processing migration applications. Such posts are predominantly staffed by local workers. He said this raised "considerable security risks".

Mr Andrews named 10 countries - Pakistan, India, United Arab Emirates, China, Iran, Lebanon, Jordan, Kenya, Russia and Egypt - in which the posts should be staffed exclusively with Australian departmental officers. The non-Muslim countries named by Mr Andrews are understood to be less riddled by religious discrimination and more so by corruption, a source told The Weekend Australian.

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UK retains ancestral visas for Australians

Australians with a UK-born grandparent will retain the right to live and work in Britain but visa conditions may be changed. The British High Commission says the UK government has decided not to scrap ancestry visas as proposed earlier in the year. Under the existing rules, Commonwealth citizens aged 17 and over can be granted residency if they can prove that one of their grandparents was born in Britain. Those awarded visas are allowed to work and then apply for citizenship after five years of residence.

The British government in February called for a debate over whether the UK ancestry route should be abolished. British high commissioner to Australia Helen Liddell today said the visas would be retained as a route to UK citizenship. "Ancestry visas are a tangible sign of our close, shared history. They give Australians a glimpse of their heritage and a gateway to one of the world's most innovative economies," Ms Liddell said in a statement. "Full details on how ancestry visas will work in the future are yet to be announced. For the time being, the current rules apply."

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19 July, 2008

People power has a role

Lost amid news about rising fuel costs, falling stock prices, mortgage foreclosures, and one African-American’s nutty surgical wish are stories of push backs by communities fed up with illegal immigration.

Out in Thousand Oaks, Calif., earlier this month, some residents scored a small victory by effectively closing down for a day a city-sponsored day-labor center. Last year Judicial Watch wrote the mayor about the organization’s concerns that the city was violating federal immigration laws by spending more than $133,000 of public funds between 2001 and 2007 to subsidize what amounts to city-sanctioned criminal activity, since mostly illegal aliens hang out at the center.

A small group of residents gathered on the sidewalk to wave placards and US flags at passing motorists. They also used video cameras to tape folks trying to hire illegals, which considerably cut down on business for the day.

Out in Aurora, Colo., city council members this month will take up a proposal to change the definition of a temporary employment agency after citizens and business owners complained about people gathered at an intersection looking for temporary work. Some of the job seekers reportedly jump in front of vehicles or urinate behind the buildings. The proposal would force day laborers to stand 1,500 feet from the newly defined employment agencies.

Lou Barletta, the three-term mayor of Hazelton, Pa., wants businesses there to work with a company that uses a federal data base to check on employees’ immigration status. Illegal immigration is the cornerstone of his campaign to oust a 12-term member of Congress. He also convinced the city council in 2006 to approve an ordinance denying business permits to companies that employ illegals. The ordinance also allowed for fines against landlords who rent to illegals, and it required tenants to register and pay for a rental permit. A federal judge said “No, no, no.”

Federal courts around the nation struck down other attempts by cities to staunch the flow of illegals into their communities. Up in Farmers Branch, Texas, a federal judge this month quashed the city’s ban on renting apartments to illegals. Now, the city is thinking about following Hazelton’s plan.

The Fremont, Neb., city council is considering a proposal to ban the harboring or hiring of illegals or renting to them. And, officials in Escondido, Calif., want to enact ordinances that outlaw picking up day laborers from along some streets. They also want to discourage multiple families from sharing houses by requiring a permit for overnight parking.

Opponents of the Fremont and Escondido plans say the cities’ attempts are unconstitutional. And, they’re probably right. Cities and states can’t enact laws governing immigration. That’s the job of the federal government. Plenty of laws exist to control immigration; they just need to be enforced.

We’re starting to see some that enforcement. A few days ago, feds in Rhode Island raided six courthouses and arrested 31 illegals from Mexico, Guatamala, Honduras, and Brazil hired by contractors for the state court system. Then there’s Mack Associates, Inc., owner of eleven McDonald’s restaurants in Nevada, fined $1 million this past week after admitting to hiring 58 illegal immigrants. In Morgan City, La., Lenny Dartez, a former member of the state’s Democratic Party central committee and husband of former state representative Carla Dartez, faces up to five years in the pokey and up to $250,000 in fines for employing illegals from Trinidad at one of his companies. Citizen tips led to the arrests in all three of these cases.

And, there is the answer. The illegal immigration issue may be a national concern, but it’s really an issue that can be addressed only on the individual level. Here’s what I mean. A couple of years ago, my mother-in-law nearly died after an illegal immigrant made an unlawful u-turn and rammed into her vehicle. My mother-in-law wanted to talk with her city council member and write letters to her state representatives about passing stricter immigration legislation until I pointed out that neither the city nor the state has jurisdiction.

It’s up to you and your friends to do something about it, and that something is simply shunning those who purposely hire illegal workers, I said. Folks concerned about crime in their neighborhood establish neighborhood watches to keep out miscreants. Residents fed up with prostitution chase away the customers from the street corners. Citizens tired of drugs run off the dealers. They don’t wait for the government to enforce laws already on the books.

Her preacher frequented the Mexican restaurant that hired the woman who hit her, so I suggested she tell the preacher to either stop going there or else they’d find a new minister. She didn’t like the idea. Shunning is not easy. She lives in a small Arkansas town. Shunning business owners and neighbors she’s known for decades would make it uncomfortable for her whenever she went to the country club or attended a Kiwanis meeting, she admitted.

Some places encourage illegals to settle in their communities. But folks living in other cities, like the one’s mentioned earlier, want the illegals to go away. They can’t pass city ordinances, but they can take individual action.

One person becomes two, who become four, which then becomes a movement. When the government won’t enforce its laws, the individual must turn his or her back on those who hire and harbor illegals. Non-violent community pressure in the form of economic and social shunning, also known as boycotts, may be the only solution.

Source



Another shonky "study"

"Shonky" is a very useful term in Australian English but I gather that it is little used outside Australia. A con-man or a fraud of some kind is a "shonk". Something shonky is anything fraudulent, dodgy, untrustworthy, not genuine or underhand. The shonkiness of the study described below resides in it not being a real piece of research designed to find the truth but something filled with assumptions designed to produce the required conclusion. Note that it is sourced from the "Oregon Restaurant Association"! One indication of how shonky it is is the assertion that the loss of illegals would substantially lower tax receipts. How many illegals pay taxes? Some do but lots don't. And a real study would focus on net taxes -- the balance between tax money received from illegals and the cost of providing government services to the illegals

The Coalition for a Working Oregon released a study on July 9th predicting a considerable loss of economic output if the federal "No-Match" rule is implemented.

Conducted by William Jaeger, Ph. D., Professor in the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics at Oregon State University, the study details the consequences of the "No-Match" rule, a federal regulation designed to identify undocumented workers in the U.S. Under the "No-Match" rule, if a worker's social security number is questioned by the Department of Homeland Security, he or she must provide proper work authorization by a predetermined date. If the employee cannot provide proper authorization, the employer must release the employee or face penalties.

"In the long-term, the study suggests that we could be looking at a loss of 147,000 jobs, an annual reduction in state output of up to $14.7 billion, a tax loss of $656 million and an overall economic loss of $7.2 billion," says Dr. Jaeger.

The study, entitled Potential Economic Impacts in Oregon of Implementing Proposed Department of Homeland Security "No Match" Immigration Rules, concludes that eliminating undocumented workers will not reduce the number of unemployed in Oregon.

Bill Perry, Oregon Restaurant Association's vice president of government affairs, co-chairs the CWO, a coalition consisting of 20 Oregon business associations whose industries employ more than 300,000. Perry says the data found in the study should be helpful to build support for comprehensive reform. "These workers are an important part of our community and economy," says Perry. "We as a state need a legal workforce and we can only get a solution through federal comprehensive reform. Piece by piece or state by state only makes a solution more difficult and confusing."

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18 July, 2008

McDonald's Franchise to Pay $1 Million for Immigration Offenses

A company that owns 11 McDonald's restaurants in the United States will pay a $1 million fine for giving illegal immigrants false Social Security numbers. The U.S. Justice Department says one current and one former executive for the company, Mack Associates, and the company itself pleaded guilty to felony immigration offenses in a federal court Wednesday in the western state of Nevada. Attorneys for the franchise pleaded guilty on behalf of the firm to one count of conspiring to encourage an illegal immigrant to live in the U.S., and one count of helping an illegal immigrant remain in the country.

The Justice Department says Mack Associates knew some employees were illegal immigrants and gave them names and Social Security numbers belonging to other people. The department says the case was discovered after Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents raided 11 McDonald's restaurants in the Reno, Nevada, area in September and arrested 58 illegal immigrants.

The U.S. government assigns Social Security numbers to American citizens, legal permanent residents and non-citizens with permission to work in the country. A Social Security number allows people to work legally in the U.S. and is used for taxation. An estimated 12 million illegal immigrants are living in the United States.

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They're flooding into Norway

The number of people applying for asylum in Norway has more than doubled so far this year, putting extraordinary pressure on the already over-burdened immigration agency UDI (Utlendingsdirektoratet). UDI director Ida Borresen unveiled new figures on Thursday documenting the stream of asylum seekers and other immigrants seeking working and residence permission.

Not only has the number of would-be refugees jumped. Never before has Norway, which has had a severe labour shortage in recent years, granted so many applications for working permission. There currently are 100,900 foreigners legally allowed to work in Norway, up 24,800 or nearly 30 percent from last year at this time. As many as 60 new asylum seekers are arriving in Norway every day, and Borresen predicts the year will show a total of nearly 15,000. More than 1,000 persons arrived in June alone. Asylum was granted to just over 40 percent of the applicants whose cases were reviewed during the first half of this year.

"In order to handle the situation in connection with the increased arrivals of asylum applicants, we need a national effort with local governments helping us out," Borresen said.

UDI is in the process of sending "informational letters" to all of Norway's mayors, orienting them about the influx and asking how they can help accommodate them while asylum applications are being reviewed.

Many other persons are also trying to move to Norway, and the actual portion seeking asylum is small. Fully 66 percent of the applications handled by UDI so far this year were from foreigners seeking work permission. The next largest group, 25 percent, consisted of legal residents trying to bring relatives to Norway. Six percent of the applications were from persons who want to study in Norway, while just 3 percent were from those seeking protection in the country.

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17 July, 2008

Mexico: A failed state?

Tancredo warns asylum will worsen country's drug cartel troubles, burden U.S.

Mexican police are flocking to the U.S.-Mexico border and requesting political asylum as the country's war on drug cartels heats up, but critics say policies granting refuge could be used against the U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., said in a commentary today if Mexican citizens threatened by gangs claim the same right to asylum, it could worsen drug cartel troubles in Mexico and place an undue burden on the states. "If our laws are stretched to accept thousands of refugees from drug cartel violence, it will only exacerbate Mexico's problems," he said.

Current immigration law doesn't routinely offer special accommodations for law enforcement fleeing from organized crime because political asylum is meant to apply to persons facing government persecution.

Tancredo said while Americans may sympathize with cartel-targeted Mexican prosecutors or police chiefs who seek refuge, the U.S. must consider its options before accepting numerous asylum requests. "What will happen if we do not accept these asylum applications as a humanitarian gesture?" he asked. "What will happen if we do?"

The number of such requests has doubled as people seeking refuge simply walk to ports of entry along the southern border and ask authorities to protect them. "We must respect them for following our laws and doing it the right way," Tancredo said. "But we must also ask some hard questions before throwing open our gates. Humanitarian concerns must be balanced against other considerations - because the fate of Mexico hangs in that balance."

With honest officers escaping to the U.S., Tancredo expressed concern that corrupt officials would be left to conspire with criminals, control the courts and worsen conditions for the country. Likewise, he said law-abiding citizens who seek refuge will leave a vacuum of corruption waiting to be filled by truckers, farmers and bankers who are willing to collaborate with drug cartels. "The unpleasant truth is that this new refugee problem is the sign of a deep crisis not in the Mexican economy but in the Mexican political system itself," Tancredo said. "Mexico exhibits mounting signs of a 'failed state,' a political system that cannot satisfy the most basic conditions of civic order such as safety in one's streets, home, school and workplace."

Tancredo emphasized a distinction between illegal immigrants who come to the states and refugees who are chased from their homes. He said they are middle-class citizens with good jobs who wish to remain in Mexico, but who come to the U.S. because they are deeply concerned about the dangerous conditions they leave behind. "If police chiefs and judges cannot be protected from the cartels, then how can ordinary citizens feel safe?" he asked. "If we open the gates to everyone who has a 'credible fear' of the cartels, the Border Patrol will no longer have to worry only about people jumping the fence. Thousands will be waiting in line at one of over 300 ports of entry."

Tancredo said the only way for Mexico to win the battle against drug cartels is for it to rebuild its police and criminal justice systems and protect uncorrupted authorities and citizens from gangs. "To his credit, President Calderon has begun to tackle this problem," he said.

While he said military tactics are needed to break the hold cartels have on the country, such operations are no match for an effective criminal justice system. Citizens must have reason to believe law enforcement can be trusted, and police must be able to expect the same from their government, he said. Offering asylum to law-abiding Mexican authorities is not the answer because the country will be stripped of its most respected civil servants, and Mexico will become a "militarized society," the senator said; however, Tancredo claims all is not lost. "Mexico is not yet a failed state," he said. "But if humanitarian sentiment and special interest pleadings in the U.S. block sound immigration policy - as happens all too often in American law and politics - we will hasten that tragic development."

Source



Greenies moan about the new border fence

There is no such thing as a happy Greenie

The U.S.-Mexico border fence will make life harder on some South Texas farmers, damage valuable wildlife habitat, impair views and generally become an obstacle to border life, the Department of Homeland Security acknowledged in an environmental study of the fence's impact. For the people of the Rio Grande Valley, the federal government said in the recent study that there are serious trade-offs for 70 miles of fence segments that will help Border Patrol control illegal immigration and smuggling from Mexico. But it added that residents will benefit from increased security against "illegal cross-border activity." Construction could begin in the valley next week.

"If you live within a mile or so of the river, which is where the fence will be built, you are eternally sentenced to an unsafe existence," Eagle Pass Mayor Chad Foster, head of the anti-fence Texas Border Coalition, said in a prepared statement.

However, some South Texas denizens will get a break - the fence will include hundreds of holes so the endangered ocelot and jaguarundi can get to the Rio Grande to drink.

The department's Environmental Stewardship Plan for the Rio Grande Valley was controversial before it was ever released. DHS drew up the plan after Secretary Michael Chertoff waived environmental studies required by federal law to speed construction of the fence. As the federal government ramps up efforts to build fencing along the border, Chertoff also has waived environmental laws to build barriers in California and Arizona. "The Secretary made it clear when he invoked the waiver authority that that by no means meant we would act without some responsible plan," Customs and Border Protection spokesman Barry Morrissey said. "The environmental work is still being done."

Environmental advocates said they hadn't fully reviewed the document Tuesday afternoon but said it was a mistake for Chertoff to waive the normal process for vetting projects and minimizing their environmental impact. "There was a formal process in place for how to go through the (environmental impact statement) process and it's something we believe in firmly," said Oliver Bernstein, spokesman for the Sierra Club in Texas. "Any attempt to come up with your own fixes we're going to be very wary of that."

New maps of the 21 fence segments running through the lower Rio Grande Valley showed very little variation from preliminary maps released last fall. The new plan does not clarify the issue of access gates in the fence - one of the most frustrating for landowners along the border who wonder how the gates will be operated, if they will be manned and how access could be restricted. The question is critical for homeowners whose homes and businesses will be left in the no man's land between the fence and the river.

Without offering details, the plan recognized that the fence will be an obstacle to farmers in terms of access to the land for themselves and their machinery and livestock, and will increase their costs and may decrease the land's value.

Despite the access holes for the endangered cats, the plan acknowledges that the fence "will likely impact wildlife movement, access to traditional water sources, and potential for gene flow" because some of the species cross the border into Mexico to mate. Seven segments in Hidalgo County where DHS will build a 15 to 18-foot concrete wall into the river side of levees will not include the wildlife holes. The longest of those segments will be just over four miles, the plan said.

Seventeen of the 21 fence sections in the Valley will affect wildlife management areas or national wildlife refuges, 14 of them directly. Since fence construction will overlap with the migratory bird nesting season, wildlife experts will mark nests in construction's path and attempt to move them. Still, the noise from construction could overwhelm birdsongs, making it difficult for some to find mates, according to the plan.

The government will try to avoid cutting down or to transplant mature trees but concedes that it won't always be possible. "Removal will result in long-term major adverse impacts, because these large mature trees are virtually irreplaceable," the plan said.

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16 July, 2008

Coyotes turning to new tactics to thwart law

Arizona authorities say other states, feds must help squeeze cash pipeline

Mexican human-smuggling rings are sidestepping Arizona's campaign to choke off their pipeline of illegal cash as they collect billions of dollars for sneaking illegal immigrants into the state. Arizona investigators crack down, and the smugglers counter, shifting where and how they collect payments from illegal immigrants. The two sides repeat their sparring, like two grand masters mapping out their paths on a chessboard.

The cartels' shifting tactics show how the smuggling of people increasingly has become an organized business. Typically, a Mexican immigrant pays a smuggler $1,500 to $2,000 in fees, paying a portion up front to reach and then cross the Mexico border. Then a coyote takes the immigrant to a drophouse in Phoenix and holds him or her hostage until the final balance is wired from a friend or relative in the U.S.

Arizona investigators targeted payments wired to Western Union stores in the state and seized millions of dollars. But since then the smugglers have begun having the money transmitted to certain Western Unions in other states and Mexico. They also launder the cash through quickly closed checking accounts at large commercial banks and ferry bags of cash south across the border.

One way or another, at least $1.7 billion a year flows to Arizona's drophouse rings, federal and state investigators estimate. The money sustains illegal immigration, a big business characterized by gunbattles among smugglers and attacks upon immigrants. Every few months coyotes kill an immigrant. The money maneuvers have frustrated Arizona investigators. Focusing on unscrupulous Western Union outlets, they had slashed wire transfers to smugglers from a peak of $500 million in 2002 to less than $50 million in 2006.

Western Union says it does everything it can to help. The company monitors its business thoroughly for money laundering and reports any problems to authorities, said Joseph Cachey III, the company's vice president for global compliance. "We try to run a national anti-money-laundering program, and we feel it is significant and thorough," Cachey said.

The state continues to chisel away at the smugglers' network. Earlier this month, an Arizona Court of Appeals ruling allowed state investigators to open a new front in their campaign: sifting and seizing certain Western Union transactions to Sonora. Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard hailed the ruling as "very important." But he admits it's not enough. Arizona stands alone in combating illegal profits from smugglers. No other state, nor any federal agency, has systematically targeted coyote money. Goddard has asked other border states to copy Arizona's campaign, but none has. He now is urging Mexican authorities to clamp down on smugglers and unscrupulous Western Union operators in Sonora, but it's unknown how far any cooperation will go.

More here



Drug smugglers bribing U.S. agents on Mexico border

U.S. Border Patrol agent Reynaldo Zuniga was arrested last month lugging a bag of cocaine up from the Rio Grande, one of a growing number of law enforcement officers accused of taking bribes from drug gangs. Former colleagues say Zuniga used to wait until agents in the south Texas town of Harlingen were distracted with paperwork, then slip down to the river and help smuggle in drugs from Mexico.

The increasing use of bribes by Mexican drug cartels to corrupt U.S. agents comes as Washington is sending $400 million to help Mexico's army-led war on the trafficking gangs, whose brutal murders have surged to unprecedented levels. "Zuniga was a good agent and a hard worker. I can't understand why he would do this. We're supposed to be protecting our borders," said Border Patrol agent Daniel Doty, a former colleague.

Data on agents convicted of graft are not made public, but the U.S. government is probing hundreds of border corruption cases where a decade ago it saw a few dozen a year. The FBI-led Border Corruption Task Force says it is busier than ever. "We've seen a sharp increase in investigations along the border over the past three years," said Andy Black, who oversees the San Diego task force, near the busy border crossing of San Ysidro. "We are talking about a minority of agents but they are a very significant threat, a weak link in efforts to secure the border."

Some put the rise in bribery down to a recent tightening of border controls and a jump in hiring new agents. Smugglers can offer hundreds of thousands of dollars to get past the heavily policed border with drugs and immigrants -- much more than a border agent or sheriff makes in a year.

Gangs also often use attractive women as bait, setting a "honey trap" to entice officials. "I was offered sex to let a woman across the Rio Grande, but I have a family, I turned her down," one agent told Reuters as his sniffer dog searched a freight train for immigrants and drugs in the Texan borderlands, steamy with tropical rain.

Corruption south of the border is a major hurdle to Mexican President Felipe Calderon's quest to crush drug gangs, with up to half the country's police thought to be crooked. Spiraling drug violence has killed 1,700 people in Mexico this year.

U.S. anti-drug officials have pointed to higher street cocaine prices as proof of tighter border controls. But the campaign is weakened by cases like that of a border agent and his brother in Texas who netted $1.5 million by letting tonnes of marijuana through checkpoint inspection lanes from 2003 to 2005.

Trafficking drugs and people generates billions of dollars a year. Powerful gangs use crooked officials well beyond the border to open smuggling lanes into the United States. In one case showing the breadth of the problem, two California-based employees of Wackenhut, a contractor that transports detained illegal immigrants, were charged last month with freeing them for $2,500 each.

Also in June, police arrested a Los Angeles attorney for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for allegedly accepting huge bribes to issue green cards and other papers. "This was an amazing compromise of our system and its integrity," said Paul Layman, a special agent who oversees ICE's corruption investigations in the western United States. "Smugglers are willing to do anything to get people into the country, they will move anything for a dollar."

U.S. Customs inspector Richard Elizalda, arrested in 2006, was paid $70,000 to let through hundreds of immigrants after a persuasive female smuggler he met at the San Ysidro crossing became his lover.

A sudden influx of Border Patrol agents may have worsened the problem. The number of agents along the border has jumped to more than 14,700 now from less than 9,000 four years ago. Agents receive intense training and ethics courses, but some officials worry about the screening process. "Just given the increases, the odds are you'll get more bad agents," said Paul Charlton, a former U.S. Attorney for Arizona.

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15 July, 2008

Obama's Glaring Contradictions on Immigration

Barack Obama, speaking Powder Springs, Georgia, Tuesday:

"I agree that immigrants should learn English. But instead of worrying about whether immigrants can learn English - they'll learn English - you need to make sure your child can speak Spanish.

Obama, speaking before the National Council of La Raza, Sunday:

We have to finally bring those 12 million people out of the shadows. Yes, they broke the law. And we should not excuse that. We should require them to pay a fine, learn English, and go to the back of the line for citizenship - behind those who came here legally. But we cannot - and should not - deport 12 million people. That would turn American into something we're not; something we don't want to be.

Wait. I thought we shouldn't worry about whether immigrants can learn English, because "they'll learn English." Now Obama wants the government to require it for them to stay in the country? Also in Obama's speech to NCLR:

We walked together in those marches for immigration reform.

Odd. That doesn't seem to jibe with this statement in his book, The Audacity of Hope, on page 266:

And, if I'm honest with myself, I must admit that I'm not entirely immune to such nativist sentiments. When I see Mexican flags waved at proimmigration* demonstrations, I sometimes feel a flush of patriotic resentment. When I'm forced to use a translator to communicate with the guy fixing my car, I feel a certain frustration.

Was Obama experiencing those "nativist sentiments" and "flushes of patriotic resentment" while he was marching with La Raza for immigration reform?

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"La migra" tackling application backlog

Some 48 students fill each of the auditorium-style classrooms, their bulky Immigration Law Handbooks tabbed with dozens of colorful stickies and laptop computers within reach. For the next six weeks, the men and women who make up each class will study topics such as logic, ethics, legal decision-making, discretion, immigration history and trends. Their classes at the USCIS Academy are part of a nationwide effort by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to recruit and train hundreds of new employees who will help tackle the agency's mountainous backlog of cases.

Awaiting each of the students upon graduation will be a pile of petitions, some more than a year old. One by one, these adjudicators, as they are called, will decide the fate of hundreds of thousands of people anxiously waiting to come to the U.S., to remain here and work or to become citizens. Since October, the agency has added 830 adjudication officers to its ranks, bringing the total working at immigration offices nationwide to 3,775. Another 590 are expected to be trained by the end of the year. It's all part of a renewed push to clear pending cases and to approve or deny most applications within six months. It has not been uncommon for some immigrants, who pay hundreds of dollars in filing fees, to spend a year or more awaiting a decision on their status.

About 1.4 million people applied for naturalization in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2007, nearly double the number of petitions filed the previous year. Driving the surge was a rush to file petitions before a planned fee increase took effect last summer and the upcoming presidential elections. Overwhelmed, the agency warned that anyone who had applied after June 1, 2007, would likely wait 15 to 18 months to attain citizenship. That alarmed many applicants, who had hoped to become citizens in time to vote in November. The agency has since said the waits will be shorter, but it won't say by how much.

Several CIS offices around the country have only just finished processing citizenship applications filed last July. Others are even further behind. The Miami field office recently completed naturalization petitions filed in April 2007 and Phoenix was still backlogged to June of last year. The agency is confident the infusion of new adjudicators will help it handle the surge of immigrants. Costs are covered by the fee increase that took effect last year. "Looking at the numbers, the vast majority of offices ... are going to meet their six to nine months" goal, said Stella Jarina, director in residence of the USCIS Academy Training Center in Dallas. The center has graduated 479 adjudicators since opening in January, Jarina said.

Those who have been pushing the agency to speed up the petition process say they've seen improvements, but for many hoping to become citizens it may be too little, too late. "My sense is there is going to be a dent, but not a significant dent in the process of applications in time for a majority of those who applied last year to be able to vote in this presidential election," said Muzaffar Chishti, director of the Migration Policy Institute at NYU School of Law. "There has been some catching up both in terms of resources and recruitment but not enough to meet the response of the challenge that the surge presented."

The agency points out, however, that more adjudication officers are still being hired and trained. About 285 are enrolled in classes now under way in Dallas, Jarina said. Another 290 are registered for future sessions. Most of the future adjudicators have college degrees in such fields as communications, prelaw, sociology, psychology and international studies. Some are naturalized citizens and many speak a language in addition to English. They spend each eight-hour day digesting immigration statutes, understanding naturalization and learning the various classifications for immigrants. As part of their coursework, students also take the same citizenship test that their future customers must pass in order to become citizens.

After graduation, each class travels to the National Benefits Center at Lee's Summit, Mo., where students get at least a week of on-the-job training under the supervision of seasoned adjudicators before taking up cases on their own at USCIS offices throughout the country.

Source





14 July, 2008

Obama overstates his role on immigration

But McCain deserves credit for going out on a limb to forge bipartisan deal

No matter if you are-or are not - voting for presumptive GOP nominee Sen. John McCain (R-Az.), he deserves credit for trying to forge a bipartisan deal on immigration in 2005 and 2006 at great personal political risk, a situation unfamiliar to rival Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.). McCain put his comeback presidential bid in peril because of his leadership role with Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) to find a path for millions of illegal immigrants to stay in the U.S.

The Kennedy-McCain legislation stalled in 2006, because the hardline pro- and anti-immigration forces preferred the status quo to a compromise. Another try in 2007 - in a bill backed by McCain and Obama - also failed.

McCain and Obama, wooing Hispanic voters, each has madeclear in recent appearances before the National Association of Latino Elected Officials and the League of United Latino American Citizens a few days ago that he would make immigration reform - and legalizing the status of millions of illegal immigrants - a priority if elected president. I expect each to send the same message at the upcoming National Council of La Raza conference in San Diego, where Obama speaks Sunday and McCain on Monday.

In the meantime, Obama on the campaign trail inflates his leadership role - casting himself as someone who could figure out how to get something done. Obama "did not absolutely stand out in any way,'' said Margaret Sands Orchowski, the author of "Immigration and the American Dream: Battling the Political Hype and Hysteria," and a close follower of the legislation.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a McCain ally and a key player on immigration, said Obama was around for only a "handful" of meetings and helped destroy a 2007 compromise when he voted for making guest worker visa programs temporary. A permanent guest worker program was to be a trade for a legalization program to cover many illegal immigrants. "When it came time to putting that bill together, he was more of a problem than he was a help. And when it came time to try to get the bill passed, he, in my opinion, broke the agreement we had. He was in the photo op, but he could not execute the hard part of the deal," Graham said," Graham said.

An Obama Senate staffer who did not want his name used disputed whether the sunset provision in the guest worker program killed the bill and said that either Obama or his top immigration staffer were in strategy sessions and that Kennedy, in his speech endorsing Obama vouched for Obama's work on immigration.

In praising Obama for his work on immigration, Kennedy said of Obama, "There is the tireless skill of a senator who was there in the early mornings to help us hammer out a needed compromise on immigration reform, who always saw a way to protect national security and the dignity of people who did not have a vote. For them, he was a voice for justice, a voice for justice. For them, he was a voice for justice."

On Thursday in Fairfax, Va., Obama was asked about his qualifications to understand Latino needs. After noting his work as a community organizer and state senator - he spoke of McCain. "John McCain bucked much of his party and worked with Ted Kennedy, worked with me and others to help shape comprehensive immigration reform legislation in the Senate. And I thought that was courageous of him." Obama, in a sly verbal stroke, made himself an equal on immigration leadership to Kennedy and demoted McCain to a helper.

McCain-after the two failed attempts to pass a comprehensive bill - now wants to satisfy conservatives by first passing a border security and enforcement measure. Obama said that approach means McCain "can't give you confidence that he is going to be serious about that issue. I will be." McCain is not saying enforcement only. He is saying enforcement first.

Source



Big change of heart in SF

Federal officials say San Francisco authorities have started turning over the names of juvenile offenders who may be in the U.S. illegally. Officials say that the city given the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency the names of 10 immigrant offenders in juvenile custody, most of them being held for drug-related offenses. ICE officials say they are investigating whether the youths should be deported.

The move comes after Mayor Gavin Newsom reversed the city's 20-year-old policy of shielding young immigrant offenders from federal deportation under San Francisco's sanctuary city policy. His administration came under intense criticism after three teenage boys escaped from a San Bernardino County group home where they were placed by the city. The city also had been paying for free trips home for youth offenders rather than report them to federal officials.

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13 July, 2008

The usual deceptions from Prof. Tollefson

No doubt Prof. Tollefson considers himself a benevolent person. That would be more convincing if he were an honest person. He is not. In his article below he regurgitates the usual do-gooder nonsense about immigrant crime -- trying to convince us that illegals are LESS prone to crime than are others. Check up on the reference he quotes, however, and you will see that the crime statistics he quotes are NOT about illegals at all. They are about ALL immigrants, legal and illegal. So, what Prof. Tollefson "forgets" to mention:

1). One naturally expects legal immigrants to have a low crime rate and their crime rate drives down the overall crime rate for immigrants.

2). Since most native-born prisoners are black -- who have a very high crime-rate -- being somewhat less criminal than them is not at all reassuring.

3). The CHILDREN of the illegals are a bigger problem than the illegals themselves. As lots of Americans know from their own experience, heavily Hispanic areas of their cities are also high-crime areas due to youth gangs.

So however you look at it, allowing illegals to settle leads to unsafe neighborhoods. Prof. Tollefson's call for "accurate information" is laudable. It is a pity he did not see fit to provide it. I will not waste time on his laughable claim that the drop in crime in recent years is due to the number of illegals coming in

All the heated talk about immigration makes it difficult to sort out fact from fiction. Many popular beliefs about immigration are not based on fact, but on myth and panic spread by individuals and groups with self-interested agendas. Yet effective immigration reform is possible only if it is based on accurate information, not on personal opinion, ideology, or fear.

Two important issues in the immigration debate are immigrants' impact on the communities where they live and their assimilation to American society. In concrete terms: Do immigrants bring crime to America? Do they learn English? The answers to these questions may be surprising.

First, do immigrants bring crime? Polls show that about three out of four Americans believe that immigrants, especially those in the country illegally, increase the crime rate. President Bush has promoted this view, for example in a speech in May 2006, when he claimed ominously that "illegal immigrants live in the shadows of our society...Illegal immigration brings crime to our communities." Fortunately, we don't have to guess about immigrants and crime. Crime rates are available in Department of Justice (DOJ) statistics that show the number of people incarcerated in local, state and federal prisons and jails. The DOJ numbers are clear: Immigrants have a much lower rate of crime than native-born citizens.

This general trend holds for every subgroup in the population (divided by age, sex, level of education, and national origin). For example, among males 18-39 (the most at-risk group), native-born citizens have five times the incarceration rate of foreign-born immigrants. Native-born white males have almost two times the incarceration rate of foreign-born Hispanic males, who make up the bulk of illegal immigrants. Also, for every subgroup, the crime rate increases as they remain longer in the U.S. and become more Americanized, although even immigrants in the U.S. for more than 16 years still have a much lower incarceration rate than native-born citizens.

Of 38 million current residents born outside the United States, about 12 million are in the country illegally. Although recent years have shown an increase in illegal immigration, according to the FBI since 1994 the overall violent crime rate has decreased by about a third. A reasonable conclusion is that immigration has contributed to this drop in crime, and restricting immigration would lead to an increase in the overall crime rate.

The second question is: Do immigrants learn English? Polls show a majority of English-speaking citizens believe that immigrants - especially from Latin America - do not want to learn English. Is this true? We now have the results of a major study of immigration in six counties in Southern California with very high rates of Spanish-speaking immigrants (Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, San Bernardino, Riverside and San Diego counties). This study involved interviews with 5,703 immigrants, many of them interviewed repeatedly over a period of 10 years.

Interviewing 5,703 people is extraordinary for social science research, and it means that the findings of the study are a highly reliable indicator of the overall immigrant population. (By comparison, nationwide presidential preference polls are typically based on fewer than 1,000 people.) The study's main conclusion: Immigrants are shifting to English at the same rate as European immigrants in the early 20th century.

During the third generation, every immigrant mother tongue reaches the point where it cannot survive into the next generation. In fact, by the second generation, most immigrants and their descendants express a preference for English in the home, although completely losing the ability to speak the mother tongue takes a bit longer. The trend is indisputable: Immigrant languages (including Spanish) are endangered.

These statistics about crime and language may surprise many Americans who believe that immigrants commit crimes and refuse to learn English. Yet criminologists and sociolinguists are not surprised. The crime rate among immigrants has been lower than among citizens since the 19th century, and sociolinguists agree that we are currently in a transitional period when immigrants are temporarily bilingual, in the process of losing their mother tongues and shifting to English only.

Because immigrants help to reduce crime and they quickly learn English, we should be skeptical of anyone who stirs up fear and hostility toward immigrants. If we look carefully at the facts of immigration, we find that middle-class Americans and immigrants have something in common: Increased economic insecurity brought about by an unforgiving form of global capitalism in which high-income groups benefit when working people are divided by mutual distrust and fear.

Rather than demonizing immigrants, middle-class Americans should form alliances with them. At a minimum, voters should insist that politicians and pundits who propose changes in immigration policy get their facts straight. You can read about DOJ statistics on immigrants and crime on the Web here

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Immigration reform: Don't count on it

News flash: Barack Obama and John McCain share an identical position on a matter of intense interest to voters--immigration--that is a symbol of Washington's failure to solve the nation's problems. Does that mean something will finally get done about immigration when the new president takes over? Surprisingly, perhaps, the answer appears to be "No." And that might raise questions about exactly how much change the next president will deliver.

At the moment, Obama and McCain are intensifying their efforts to gain support from Latinos, whose votes have the power to decide the presidential election. Both candidates support a comprehensive overhaul of immigration law, an issue that remains stalemated at the national level. Chants of "Si, se puede (yes, we can)" greeted Obama's pledge here the other day, to representatives of the nation's oldest Hispanic organization, that he'd "bring undocumented immigrants out of the shadows" and "avoid creating second-class servants in our midst."

When McCain promoted a plan to give millions of illegal immigrants a path to citizenship, it nearly cost him the Republican nomination. His rhetoric is more muted now. But he remains dedicated to dealing "practically and humanely" with those who are here illegally, he told the same Hispanic audience that Obama addressed. The next round in their duel for Hispanic votes will come in separate speeches to the National Council of La Raza, which calls itself the largest Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization, at its current convention in San Diego.

By itself, having a supporter of immigration reform in the White House means little. A weakened President Bush was no match for grassroots activists, whipped up by conservative talk radio, who blocked the attempt to push immigration reform through Congress in his second term. According to those who track the issue, the key to breaking the stalemate is early action in the next president's tenure, when his influence will be greatest. If Washington "is to take serious steps to resolve the current impasse, it is widely thought that the new president will have to move swiftly and creatively in the honeymoon period," David A. Martin, former general counsel of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, concluded in an analysis for the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia.

Obama says he'd make immigration "a top priority in my first year as president" and finish the job "by the end of my first term." McCain says he'll make another run at reform once he's proved that the borders are secure.

But outside analysts say odds of action in 2009 have dimmed. For many voters, dealing with a faltering economy is far more important than fixing immigration. "The next president will be called upon to focus early and intensely on the problems of the economy and the associated problems of energy and perhaps health care," said Bill Galston, a domestic policy adviser in the Clinton White House, now at the Brookings Institution. "Whether there would be space in the legislative agenda early on for an all-out assault on the immigration problems strikes me as a dicey proposition at best." Like others, Galston believes that, at some point, the next president--whether it is Obama or McCain--will make "a serious run at immigration reform. There are all sorts of forces dissatisfied with the status quo."

Logic might argue that a Democratic Congress and a Democratic president would have a better chance of getting something done. But logic does not always explain how things work inside the Beltway. Mark Krikorian, author of "The New Case Against Immigration, Both Legal and Illegal," points out that some of the Democrats who replaced Republicans in the 2006 election opposed the immigration measure co-sponsored by McCain and Democratic Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts. It is too early to know how the Class of '08 will come down on the issue, but the "anti" forces that successfully blocked action last year will be back to pressure Congress, no matter who's in charge.

Krikorian is no admirer of McCain--he's called him "weasely" and "terrible on immigration"--but thinks the Republican may be more committed to reform than Obama. For McCain, the fight "is now personal," he says. "He wants revenge on the Republican Party for having stopped him last year, so he's much more likely to expend political capital when the going gets rough in Congress." A President Obama, he adds, might not fight as hard for reform but would be less likely than McCain to put hardliners into top border and immigration enforcement positions at the Departments of Homeland Security and Justice.

Immigration, a hot topic in the primaries, especially for Republicans, wasn't expected to be part of the general election debate, since the candidates agree on the issue. But that appears to be changing. Obama, in his speech to the Hispanic audience in Washington, accused McCain of abandoning his "courageous stance" on immigration when it became politically unpopular. The attack on his reputation may have gotten under McCain's skin. "McCain is an honor politician, and he considers that kind of charge an attack on his honor that he has to defend," says Krikorian.

As if on cue, the McCain campaign is airing a new ad this weekend in three swing states where Hispanics could hold the balance of power--Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona. It features footage of McCain defending his immigration stance during a Republican primary debate. In the ad, McCain praises the patriotism of Hispanic members of the armed services and points out that even those who are in this country illegally are "God's children. They must come into our country legally, but they have enriched our culture and our nation as every generation of immigrants before them."

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12 July, 2008

No law enforcement in churches

Everyone knows where Flor Crisostomo lives, even federal Immigration officials who have ordered her deported to Mexico. Her address -- Adalberto United Methodist Church -- is the reason they haven't detained her. Another woman famously took refuge in that church as she championed Immigration reform, and at least 13 other illegal immigrants are doing the same at churches around the country. So far, they've had little to fear.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have arrested illegal immigrants by the hundreds in raids at factories, restaurants, malls, farms and meat packing plants, but are handling cases involving churches delicately. "Our agency takes enforcement actions when we deem it appropriate," said Julie Myers, assistant secretary of homeland security at ICE. "I am personally not aware of an instance when ICE has gone into a church. That being said, if there was a particular, extremely egregious, ax murderer or something else, that's not to say we would not enforce the law at that time."

Avoiding churches is unofficial policy for federal Immigration officials, according to Doris Meissner, a former commissioner at the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the agency that oversaw Immigration until the Department of Homeland Security was formed in 2003. Since the 1970s the unwritten rule has been "no churches, no playgrounds, no schools," said Meissner, now a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington, D.C.

Some say storming a church to arrest a lone person would appear insensitive. Others say making exceptions for churches, where immigrants openly -- and in Crisostomo's case, very publicly -- defy deportation, makes the agency look lax. Crisostomo, who came to the U.S. in 2000 and was arrested in 2006 during a raid at a wooden pallet company in Chicago, has been at the West Side Chicago church for six months, holding news conferences, writing blogs and lecturing school groups about Immigration issues.

"These are people who deliberately violated the law," said Dave Gorak, executive director of the Midwest Coalition to Reduce Immigration. "We can't even enforce the laws without being criticized as Gestapo."

But Meissner said it wouldn't make sense for the agency to devote resources to arrest the relatively small number of people in sanctuary. "An agency like ICE has far more work than it can possibly ever do," Meissner said. "You want to use those resources to thwart as much as possible egregious criminal behavior. A single person in a church doesn't really measure very high on a list."

Over the past year, ICE has focused on raids at workplaces. "They pick work sites because they understand it is work that acts as a lure for unauthorized migrants to come to the U.S.," said Louis DeSipio, a political science professor who teaches Chicano/Latino studies at the University of California, Irvine. "ICE is sensitive to the publicity effect of their actions. They are careful on respecting religion and churches." At the same time, ICE must "take into account that there is a public image issue and that they're being taunted," Meissner said.....

The New Sanctuary Movement, which makes living arrangements for illegal immigrants at churches, is modeled after a similar movement for Central Americans in the 1980s. Those in sanctuary now -- in Illinois, New York, Kansas, California and Washington -- were aided by the movement, said Kristin Kumpf, a national organizer for the movement. The movement's goal is to call attention to Immigration reform, but organizers believe sanctuary is a temporary solution, Kumpf said. "The churches have been treated as sacred space," said Kumpf. But "no one can stay in sanctuary forever."

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Racist rhetoric

Only in America could critics of a group called "The Race" be labeled racists.Such is the triumph of left-wing identity chauvinists, who've succeeded in redefining all opposition as "hate." Both Barack Obama and John McCain will speak this week in San Diego at the annual conference of the National Council of La Raza, the Latino group whose name is Spanish for "The Race." Can you imagine Obama and McCain paying homage to a group of white people who called themselves that? .... Here are 15 things you should know about "The Race":

* It supports driver's licenses for illegal aliens.

* It demands in-state tuition discounts for illegal-alien students that aren't available to US citizens and legal immigrants.

* It vehemently opposes cooperative immigration-enforcement efforts between local, state and federal authorities.

* It opposes a secure fence on the southern border.

* It joined the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee in a failed lawsuit to prevent the feds from entering immigration information into a key national crime database - and to prevent local police from accessing the data.

* It protested common-sense voter-ID provisions as an "absolute disgrace."

* It has opposed post-9/11 national-security measures at every turn.

* It opposed Oklahoma's tough immigration-enforcement-first laws, which cut off welfare to illegal aliens, put teeth in employer sanctions and strengthened local-federal cooperation.

* It joined other anti-assimilationists suing to prevent Proposition 227, California's bilingual-education reform, from becoming law.

* Former "Race" President Raul Yzaguirre said: "US English is to Hispanics as the Ku Klux Klan is to blacks." US English is the nation's oldest, largest citizens' group dedicated to preserving the unifying role of the English language in America. ....

There is more. The positions of this group do a disservice to Hispanics. It is still fighting group identity politics instead of working for assimilation. Its opposition to English is much more harmful to Hispanics than anyone else. The most successful Hispanics I know speak good English. The most likely drop outs are those who do not.

Source





11 July, 2008

Obama on homosexual immigration

Sympathetic noises mainly

I attended the Obama VIP reception which entailed a photo with Barack and maybe the possibility of 10 seconds chat time while the photo was being taken. I consulted Rachel Tiven of Immigration Equality for her suggestion as to what the best 10 second bite would be. She suggested to be as emotional as possible and gave me, "I have to choose between the love of my life and my country because I am gay. Please support immigration rights for gay and lesbian families."

I practiced this line over and over. However, when my moment came, I flubbed my lines. I don't know exactly what I said, but I did manage to get out gay and immigration --- and then I choked up. It was a real emotional choke up, not an act, and not the script. However, I said enough for Obama to know what I was talking about. He put his arm around me and in a very comforting way said, "I know, I know."

It was apparent that he knew this issue well. He took some time to explain that same sex immigration is going to be a very difficult one because it combines two of the most controversial issues Congress faces, gay rights and immigration. (I heard this from Barney Frank two years ago as well.) Obama also said that to tackle it we were going to have to establish a vehicle to recognize gay couples. I think we both said "civil unions" simultaneously -- me as a question, he as a statement.

Civil unions could be a possible vehicle. Then a stand-alone bill limited to same sex immigration rights, similar to the Uniting Americans Family Act could work. He seemed to imply that without that vehicle, it wouldn't work. More broadly, if DOMA is repealed, then granting federal benefits to couples who are civil unioned (or married, although he didn't say married) would realize immigration rights. Immigration is one of those 1200 federal benefits he so often says he wants to grant gay couples in civil unions.

He ended by wanting me to know that the road for a solution to same sex immigration is a difficult one but that he would not forget about our conversation or the issue once he got into office. I don't know exactly how much time I spent talking with Barack Obama, but it was at least a minute or two, far more than the 10 seconds I expected. And if the handlers hadn't escorted me along, I could have asked a dozen follow up questions. I left the event with a good feeling that he understood my problem and would work hard to fix it as soon as it could politically possibly be fixed.

More here



Britain finally figures that all countries are not equal

The government has warned 11 countries that their citizens will need visas to visit the UK unless they "significantly reduce" the risk they pose. Listed are Brazil, Namibia, South Africa, Malaysia, Venezuela, Bolivia, Botswana, Lesotho, Mauritius, Swaziland, and Trinidad and Tobago. A Home Office report identifies bogus passports, criminal acts and terrorism as possible risks posed by visitors. It says the new visa requirements could become law by early 2009.

The new countries on the visa list have a combined population of more than 300 million - nearly 5% of the world's population If visas are imposed on them, 80% of the world's population will be subject to visa entry requirements in order to visit the UK. Because Britain is a member of the EU, citizens of European countries do not need visas to visit the UK.

Border and Immigration Minister Liam Byrne said: "We need to decide how to widen the visa net. "We cannot and will not shy away from going wider and will, whenever we think there is a risk to the UK." He said the government will now "work with" the countries over the next six months in an effort to reduce the risks. "If they are able to show evidence of change then there will be no need to introduce a visa regime," said Mr Byrne.

The criteria for the Home Office's Visa Waiver Test included looking at passport security and integrity; the degree of co-operation over deportation or the removal of a country's nationals from the UK. Levels of illegal working in the UK and other immigration abuses, levels of crime and the risk of a visitor committing a terrorist act were also considered.

Source





10 July, 2008

The Candor Gap

It is one of our fondest political myths that elections allow us collectively to settle the "big issues." The truth is that there's often a bipartisan consensus to avoid the big issues, because they involve unpopular choices and conflicts. Elections become exercises in mass evasion; that certainly applies so far to the 2008 campaign. A case in point is America's population transformation. Few issues matter more for the country's future -- yet it's mostly ignored.

Two changes -- aging and immigration -- dominate, and they intersect. In 2005, 12 percent of the population was over 65; by 2050, that will be almost 20 percent. Meanwhile, immigration is driving population growth. By 2050, the population may exceed 430 million, up from about 300 million now. About four-fifths of the increase will reflect immigrants and their children and grandchildren, estimates the Pew Hispanic Center. The potential for conflict is obvious. Older retirees and younger and poorer immigrants -- heavily Hispanic -- will compete for government social services and benefits. Squeezed in between will be middle-class and middle-age workers, facing higher taxes.

What do the supposedly plain-spoken John McCain and Barack Obama say about these looming problems? Well, not much. Of course, they're against poverty and fiscal irresponsibility. They oppose illegal immigration and favor "reform." But beyond these platitudes, they're mostly mute. It's not that the problems are secret. Dozens of reports have warned of population aging, which affects most wealthy societies. Global aging is "a demographic shift with no parallel in the history of humanity," argue Richard Jackson and Neil Howe in "The Graying of the Great Powers."

By their estimates, U.S. government benefits for retirees (mainly Social Security and Medicare) will rise from 9 percent of national income in 2005 to 21 percent by 2050. The outlook is worse for many other rich nations, some of which face shrinking populations. In Germany, retirement spending is projected at 29 percent of national income in 2050; in Italy, it's 34 percent.

Similarly, immigration is widely studied. Pew projects that immigrants will constitute 19 percent of Americans in 2050, up from 12 percent in 2005. The Hispanic share of the population will double, from 14 percent to 29 percent. If most immigrants assimilated rapidly, this wouldn't be worrisome. But many, especially low-skilled Hispanics, don't.

Consider a new study of Mexican Americans by sociologists Edward Telles and Vilma Ortiz of UCLA. Compared with their parents, the children of immigrants did make progress, they found. Incomes increased; English-language skills spread; intermarriage rose. But after the first generation, additional gains were grudging. Third-generation Mexican Americans were only 30 percent as likely as non-Hispanics to have completed college. In the fourth generation, about 20 percent still had incomes below the government poverty line. "Assimilation, where it occurred, was far slower than it was for European-Americans," write Telles and Ortiz.

Because government policies might mute these problems, they ought to be subjects of campaign debate. We could lighten the burden of aging by curbing government benefits for wealthier retirees and raising Social Security and Medicare eligibility ages to reflect longer life expectancies. These changes would move federal retirement programs back toward their original purpose -- a safety net for the most vulnerable. We could refashion immigration policy to favor skilled over unskilled immigrants, because they contribute more to the economy and assimilate faster.

What we do, or don't do, about these issues will profoundly affect the character of the country in 10, 20 and 50 years. Doing nothing is a policy -- a bad one. That's what Obama and McCain essentially offer. It's easy to explain why. To discuss these issues frankly might be political suicide. It could alienate crucial blocs of voters: retirees, Hispanics. Blunt talk would expose a candidate to charges of being mean-spirited (against retirees) or racist (against Hispanics). What political consultant would advise such a course?

People complain about governmental gridlock. But what often obstructs constructive change is public opinion. The stalemates on immigration and retirement spending are typical. We avoid messy problems; we embrace inconsistent and unrealistic ambitions. We want more health care and lower health costs; cheap energy and less dependence on foreign energy; more government spending and lower taxes. The more unattainable our goals, the more we blame "special interests," "lobbyists" and other easy scapegoats.

In this campaign, we have a candor gap. By and large, Americans want to be told what government will do for them -- as individuals, families, consumers -- and not what it will do for the country's long-term well-being, especially if that imposes some immediate cost or inconvenience. Grasping this, our leading politicians engage in a consensual censorship to skip issues that involve distasteful choices or that require deferred gratification. They prefer to assign blame and promise benefits. So elections come and go, there are winners and losers -- and our problems fester.

Source



Obama tells Latinos: US shouldn't fear newcomers

Democratic nominee Barack Obama told a huge gathering of Latino leaders in Washington their community could well determine the outcome of the US presidential election in November, as both candidates duchessed the powerful audience on Monday. More than 9 million Latinos are expected to vote in the November general election, but aside from their numbers, their real political clout lies in their concentrations in four swing states: Florida, New Mexico, Nevada and Colorado.

Republican nominee, John McCain focussed on jobs and taxes in ghis adress to the League of United Latin American Citizens annual convention. " I believe the role of government is to unleash the creativity, ingenuity and hard work of the American people....Small businesses are the engine of America and I'll make it easier for them to grow and create more jobs," he said, pointing to the two million Latino-owned businesses in America.

Senator Obama chose an emotional plea - and perhaps one that had a personal resonance as well. "America has nothing to fear from our newcomers," he said. "They have come for the same reason that families have always come here, for the same reason that my own father came here from Kenya so many years ago - in the hope that here in Ameria, you can make it if you try. "Ultimately then the danger to the American way of life is not that we will be overrun by those who do not look like us or do not yet speak our language. It will come ... if we stand idly by as our problems grow ... Because America can only prosper if all Americans prosper."

A Gallup survey, conducted in late June, put Obama up 59 per cent to 29 per cent over his rival among registered Hispanic voters across the United States. The poll appears to indicate that many Hispanic voters have shifted their support to Obama from his vanquished Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, who built a Latino powerbase during the fiercely contested nominating contest.

In many primaries, Clinton won the Latino vote by around two-to-one over Obama, according to exit polls, raising fears that black-Latino relations would cripple Obama's vote in this crucial community. This appears not to be the case

More here





9 July, 2008

Germany to seek more high skills and fewer low skills

The German government plans to allow in more immigrants with advanced skills but extend limits on low-wage labour from new European Union countries until 2011, according to a draft of the measures obtained by Reuters. German government spokesman Thomas Steg said there was no final decision yet on plans to reform the immigration rules. He said Chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet would discuss the issue later in July.

The plans obtained by Reuters include measures that would allow university graduates from all EU nations unlimited residency status and university graduates from other countries would be allowed if no Germans were competing for the same jobs. The measures would also lower the minimum wage that high skilled foreigners must receive to 63,600 euros ($99,510) from a previous hurdle of 86,400 euros. But at the same time the government wants to keep the German labour market protected from low-wage unskilled workers from new EU countries from Eastern Europe for two years longer than scheduled -- to 2011 instead of 2009.

Germany's population has been declining for several years and industry has been urging for changes to allow skilled labour in more easily. Most industrialised economies suffer from a lack of highly qualified workers but as the world's biggest exporter of goods, including billions of euros worth of complex machinery and equipment, Germany is particularly vulnerable. An ageing population, an inadequate higher education system and excessively strict rules on immigration have exacerbated the shortfall, analysts and industry officials say. Firms have also become victims of their own success, as robust recent business activity has boosted demand for highly-qualified staff that is far outstripping supply.

Steg said the cabinet would take up the issue on July 16 or July 23. The Labour Ministry said on Saturday the government is discussing plans to survey businesses' labour requirements so as to manage the immigration of skilled workers. Draft government plans seen by Reuters show the ruling coalition is considering setting up a monthly survey of businesses to serve as an indicator of labour requirements. The plans are aimed at securing a skilled workforce.

Source



An impossible asylum claim

If this claim were granted, half of Africa and much of the Muslim world would be entitled to come to the USA

Growing up in the West African nation of Mali, Alima Traore assumed that girls everywhere had to undergo the procedure. "In my country, it is usually an old lady" who performs the crude surgery, the 29-year-old woman said in her attorney's office. "They have a traditional knife for it. They cut your intimate parts. This knife is used for many girls."

It wasn't until Traore came to the United States eight years ago that she learned that female genital mutilation has been condemned the world over as a human rights abuse. Now that she's here - she has been living in Maryland since 2000 - she doesn't want to go back.

Traore's fight against deportation - her student visa expired in 2003 - has put her at the center of a growing dispute between rights groups and the Bush administration over whether victims of the practice also known as female circumcision, or female genital cutting, qualify for asylum here.

In considering her case last fall, the Board of Immigrations Appeals described the "infliction of FGM" as "reprehensible." But the board, a tribunal within the Department of Justice, ruled that Traore does not have a well-founded fear of future persecution if she were to return to Mali, because the damage, though permanent, has already been done.

That interpretation, which now is binding on immigration judges, has drawn criticism from rights advocates, physicians and others, who say it defies federal case law and reverses the board's own reasoning in earlier, similar cases.

Karen Musalo, director of the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at the University of California's Hastings College of the Law, called it "a U-turn." Musalo's center is one of several groups assisting Traore in an appeal now pending in the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va. "Women such as Alima Traore were being granted asylum," she said. The consensus, as Musalo described it, was that "a society where they would be subjected to female genital cutting is probably a society where they would suffer other kinds of gender-related persecution" - such as beatings, rape and sexual slavery....

Traore speaks in halting English, her third language, after the Bambara she used with her three brothers at home and the French she learned at school. A high school graduate, she said she paid for her travel to the United States with money she earned making and selling peanut butter. Traore arrived here as a visitor, but soon obtained a student visa so she could take a course in English. When she transferred to Montgomery College without filling out the proper paperwork, her visa expired. Authorities have ordered her to leave the country.

Ira Mehlman, of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which opposes illegal immigration, said asylum law was never meant to protect foreigners from traditional cultural practices. "It's a road that if you start going down that, you're going to pretty much open yourself up to everybody who is unhappy with any particular custom, however abhorrent we might find it," he said.

Source





8 July, 2008

France unveils pact on EU-wide immigration

Sounds like some progress

France yesterday jolted Europe into establishing common policies on immigration, refugees and asylum, unveiling a European immigration pact as its first big EU presidency move and pushing for 27 countries to back it at an EU summit in October. Meeting in Cannes, EU interior ministers tentatively endorsed President Nicolas Sarkozy's drive to harmonise immigration policy across the EU after he scrapped or watered down the most contentious elements to make them more palatable to Spain and other countries.

The French proposal denies the EU is seeking a Fortress Europe, arguing that harmonisation of policy is needed to "master migrant flows, make integration easier and promote development of [migrants'] countries of origin". "We are not turning Europe into a bunker, but we are steering migrant flows in the world," said the German interior minister, Wolfgang Schauble.

The French scheme aims to make it easier for the EU to attract highly qualified immigrants to fill labour shortages in Europe, to beef up policing of the EU's borders, to establish common European refugee and asylum policies by 2010, and to expel illegal immigrants.

But Sarkozy's own plans for immigration quotas in France were strongly criticized by French government advisers as "unrealistic and irrelevant", according to leaks in the French press yesterday.

Sarkozy has had to strip his European pact of key elements. The French initially called for an "obligatory integration contract", defining how immigrants would have to behave across Europe. But Spain balked at the requirement and last week the French immigration minister, Brice Hortefeux, dropped the demand after touring European capitals on a campaign to have it accepted.

French calls for a ban on the wholesale legalisation of illegal immigrants also ran into opposition. The Spanish and Italian authorities have resorted to blanket amnesties in recent years, enraging other EU members because the hundreds of thousands of people affected were then able to travel elsewhere in the EU.

Last month the EU ended three years of argument over the deportation of illegal immigrants, estimated at 8 million in the EU, by finally agreeing legislation on returning illegal immigrants. Under the law illegals can be detained for 18 months and, once deported, barred from re-entering the EU for five years. The law has been bitterly attacked outside the EU, particularly in Latin America.

The French proposals focus on five areas - regulating legal immigration, returning illegal immigrants, strengthening EU borders, "partnership" with the countries of origin of the migrants, and asylum policy. On the latter, the French are pushing for the EU's first "asylum support office" to be up and running within 18 months.

The French pact builds on new EU laws such as the "return directive", and other drafts from the European commission such as the contested "blue card" scheme, modelled on the US green card and aimed at attracting highly-skilled workers.

So far it has been impossible for member states to agree on blue cards because national labour markets vary and governments are reluctant to sacrifice control over who is admitted to their countries.

Source



U.S. Employers Fight Tough Measures on Immigration

Under pressure from the toughest crackdown on illegal immigration in two decades, employers across the country are fighting back in state legislatures, the federal courts and city halls. Business groups have resisted measures that would revoke the licenses of employers of illegal immigrants. They are proposing alternatives that would revise federal rules for verifying the identity documents of new hires and would expand programs to bring legal immigrant laborers.

Though the pushback is coming from both Democrats and Republicans, in many places it is reopening the rift over immigration that troubled the Republican Party last year. Businesses, generally Republican stalwarts, are standing up to others within the party who accuse them of undercutting border enforcement and jeopardizing American jobs by hiring illegal immigrants as cheap labor.

Employers in Arizona were stung by a law passed last year by the Republican-controlled Legislature that revokes the licenses of businesses caught twice with illegal immigrants. They won approval in this year's session of a narrowing of that law making clear that it did not apply to workers hired before this year. Last week, an Arizona employers' group submitted more than 284,000 signatures - far more than needed - for a November ballot initiative that would make the 2007 law even friendlier to employers.

Also in recent months, immigration bills were defeated in Indiana and Kentucky - states where control of the legislatures is split between Democrats and Republicans - due in part to warnings from business groups that the measures could hurt the economy.

In Oklahoma, chambers of commerce went to federal court and last month won an order suspending sections of a 2007 state law that would require employers to use a federal database to check the immigration status of new hires. In California, businesses have turned to elected officials, including the Democratic mayor of Los Angeles, to lobby federal immigration authorities against raiding long-established companies.

While much of the employer activity has been at the grass-roots level, a national federation has been created to bring together the local and state business groups that have sprung up over the last year. "These employers are now starting to realize that nobody is in a better position than they are to make the case that they do need the workers and they do want to be on the right side of the law," said Tamar Jacoby, president of the new federation, ImmigrationWorks USA.

After years of laissez-faire enforcement, federal immigration agents have been conducting raids at a brisk pace, with 4,940 arrests in workplaces last year. Although immigration has long been a federal issue, more than 175 bills were introduced in states this year concerning the employment of immigrants, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. State lawmakers said they had acted against businesses, often in response to fervent demands from voters, to curb job incentives that were attracting shadow populations of illegal immigrants. "Illegal immigration is a threat to the safety of Missouri families and the security of their jobs," Gov. Matt Blunt, a Republican, said after the Missouri Legislature passed a crackdown law in May. "I am pleased that lawmakers heeded my call to continue the fight where Washington has failed to act."

But because of the mobilization of businesses, the state proposals this year have increasingly reflected their concerns. State lawmakers "are starting to be more responsive to the employer community because of its engagement in the issue," said Ann Morse, who monitors immigration for the national legislature conference.

The offensive by businesses has been spurred by the federal enforcement crackdown, by inaction in Congress on immigration legislation and by a rush of punitive state measures last year that created a checkerboard of conflicting requirements. Many employers found themselves on the political defensive as they grappled, even in an economic downturn, with shortages of low-wage labor.

Mike Gilsdorf, the owner of a 37-year-old landscaping nursery in Littleton, Colo., saw the need for action by businesses last winter when he advertised with the Labor Department, as he does every year, for 40 seasonal workers at market-rate wages to plant, prune and carry his shrubs in the summer heat. Only one local worker responded to the notice, he said, and then did not show up for the job.

More here





7 July, 2008

Mony a mickle maks a muckle

The old Scots saying above translates roughly as "a lot of little things make a big thing". It is a saying that often occurs to me when I read a common Leftist defence of illegal immigration. David Leong has recently put up a comment (scroll down) on this blog that is a characteristic version of that defence. The defence is that some individual immigrant is a good person and that therefore all immigrants should be accepted. Stated as baldly as that, the illogic is obvious but the argument is of course usually stated in a more emotional way, usually with some personal mention included and unreferenced assertions about the benefit of "diversity" etc.

Responding to illogic is always difficult but maybe I should have a brief stab at it. Mr Leong himself appears to come from a fine family of mostly LEGAL immigrants from China and Chinese people are of course famous for prospering wherever they go. And the characteristic virtues of the Chinese -- such as patience, reserve and self-control -- are ones that I personally admire. They are certainly virtues that help Chinese to fit in well with predominantly Anglo-Saxon societies.

The essential point here, however, is an unfashionable one: There ARE intergroup differences. Anybody who argues that (say) the Chinese are as a whole no different from Africans (considered as a whole) is simply not being honest. And from what I gather, the Chinese living in China certainly have a dim view of Africans when they are aware of them at all.

The defence mounted by those who are dishonest about group differences, however, is that realists such as myself are "racist". When conservatives do have that accusation hurled at them by Leftists (a common occurrence) however, conservatives sometimes reflect that if the very mild and centrist George W. Bush is accused by the same or similar people of being a Nazi, we are dealing with hysteria rather than reason. So it seems clear that the "racism" accusation is simply one piece of dishonesty being backed up by another piece of dishonesty. Such accusations do however have some effect in suppressing rational debate -- something that Leftists need to achieve in view of their own slim attachment to reality.

There are however many ways in which group differences can be denominated, quite aside from country of origin and I myself do not at all support immigration being based on race or country of origin. Most opponents of illegal immigration into the USA simply support the rules that the USA already has in place and seek to have those rules enforced. Those rules are a mish-mash of criteria but in all cases rely on people being categorized in various ways -- and none of those ways are racial.

If we ignore all criteria and let anybody in, however, we will soon find that the many "mickles" of individual people coming in will amount to a "muckle" that large numbers of the existing citizens of the country may not want. A big majority of Americans, for instance, are greatly displeased by what they see as the large numbers of unassimilated Hispanics who are now in their country and they want that influx stopped. Whether the political elite will do that, however, remains to be seen.

In the end, however, all that I have said above boils down to that very fundamental disagreement between Left and Right over equality. Conservatives believe that people are equal only in the sight of God and before the law whereas Leftists somehow, somewhere, detect an equality that conservatives cannot see at all. On many occasions, only conservatives seem able to see and admit the real differences between people both as individuals and as groups -- and if that is racist then it gives the term "racism" undeserved dignity.



Judge orders Minutemen road sign to be reposted

Caltrans moved them from I-5 checkpoint

A federal judge has ordered Caltrans to repost the San Diego Minutemen road sign on a two-mile stretch of Interstate 5, a victory for the anti-illegal immigration group.

The Minutemen were granted a northbound stretch of the highway near the Border Patrol's checkpoint south of San Clemente in November as part of the Adopt-a-Highway litter cleanup program. They were reassigned to state Route 52 near Santee in January after complaints to the agency about the group's controversial nature and the location near the checkpoint.

The group, alleging free-speech discrimination, sued Caltrans in February and in May requested a preliminary injunction to restore the sign while lawsuit was pending. District Judge William Q. Hayes on Friday granted the preliminary injunction, saying there was not enough evidence to support the safety risk.

Caltrans argued there was a risk of confrontation on the freeway near the sign, after meeting with local Latino groups and state legislators.

Minutemen attorney, Howard Kaloogian, said yesterday that safety claims were "bogus." "It's a total victory," Kaloogian said. "The government through Caltrans has taken sides. They are supposed to be viewpoint neutral in the way they administer their rules and regulations."

In a prepared statement, Caltrans Director Will Kempton said the agency will consider its options, which include appealing the judge's decision. "It's regrettable the court did not agree with our concerns for the safety implications," Kempton said. "We are reviewing the judge's decision and determining next steps."

In May, the group requested another sign on the southbound side of I-5, according to a statement issued by founder Jeff Schwilk. Caltrans has 30 days to restore the northbound sign, but Kaloogian said he hopes it it replaced tomorrow. "They don't need 30 days; it's a sign, for Pete's sake."

Source





6 July, 2008

"Aiding and abetting" charges for meatpacking managers

There should be more prosecutions like this

Two supervisors at an Iowa meatpacking plant that was raided by immigration agents in May were arrested and charged with encouraging people to live in the United States illegally.

Juan Carlos Guerrero-Espinoza, 35, and Martin De La Rosa-Loera, 43, were also charged Thursday with aiding and abetting the possession and use of fraudulent identification. Guerrero-Espinoza was charged with aiding and abetting aggravated identity theft.

Federal immigration officials raided Agriprocessors, the nation's largest kosher meatpacking plant, on May 12. Nearly 400 workers were detained and dozens of fraudulent permanent-resident alien cards were seized from the plant's human resources department, court records said. Critics have asked federal officials why no top executives at the plant had been arrested, even though more than a third of the plant's employees faced immigration charges.

An Agriprocessors spokesman said the company and its attorneys were reviewing the paperwork from the federal action and couldn't comment.

Source



Canadian changes

After making sweeping immigration changes last month, the Canadian government will on Monday begin nationwide consultations to identify occupations needing manpower from countries like India.

The passage of Bill C-50 gives sweeping powers to the minister for citizenship and immigration to fast-track immigration in certain categories and delay or stop it in others. The minister can now issue instructions to Canadian missions abroad to give priority to certain category of applications, return others with refund or keep them for future consideration. Currently, Canada gets about 250,000 new immigrants from around the world each year, with China and India being its two biggest sources.

But Indian, Chinese and other ethnic groups here feel that under the new law, skilled categories will get preference, not family reunifications. They fear this will force their relatives back home to wait much longer to come here. Under the old rules, it takes just months for a spouse or child or a parent to join his or her family in Canada, but skilled applicants wait for up to five to six years to come to this country.

Diane Finley, minister of citizenship and immigration, intends to change this under the new law, arguing that the old process has led to a backlog of 900,000-plus applications. Under the new law, the fate of the applications will be decided within six to 12 months. "The changes to Canada's immigration law allow us to bring to Canada more quickly those immigrants with the skills that match Canada's labour market needs," the minister said.

"We are now consulting to make sure we accurately define those needs. This will help our economy and help newcomers better support their families. "I believe this inclusive approach will help identify the categories of workers who get priority, and will allow us to prepare instructions that reflect the knowledge and expertise of the provinces, territories and stakeholders." As part of the consultations, her department will hold face-to-face meetings and videoconferences with provincial governments, industry, business bodies, academic institutions, labour organisations and non-governmental organisations.

They will focus on identifying areas facing manpower shortages and how immigration can respond to it and remove barriers to foreign credential accreditation so that immigrants start their work immediately.

The consultations will end with a roundtable with the minister in August. Following it, she will issue instructions on the new immigration plan for 2008. However, applications received before February 27, 2008 will be processed under the old system.

Source





5 July, 2008

Stop LEGAL immigration too?

Mark Krikorian (of Armenian ancestry) says so in the interview below (Introduction omitted)

Krikorian: Once you let 19th century-style workers into a 21st century advanced society, taxpayers are guaranteed to bear the cost. And this is not because the immigrants are coming to rip us off, but because of the mismatch between them and us. If you have a sixth-grade education in an advanced society like ours, it doesn’t matter how hard you work or how many jobs you have — you will not be able to earn enough to support your family without welfare. This is why poverty and lack of health insurance and thus welfare use are so high among immigrants, especially among those from Latin America. That we could admit huge numbers of peasants without creating social costs was one of the animating ideas behind the 1996 welfare-reform bill, and it’s been proved wrong — about a third of immigrant-headed households overall still use at least one major welfare program, half-again higher than among the native-born. And among households headed by immigrants from Mexico, the largest group, fully half are on welfare. This isn’t their fault. It isn’t our fault. Bit it is an inescapable reality of modern life, and we need to adjust our immigration policy to reflect it.

Lopez: You’re even not that into highly educated immigration, are you?

Krikorian: It depends what the meaning of “highly educated” is. Americans have this idea that our skilled immigration categories are for “Einstein immigration,” when most of them really aren’t. It’s not that they’re uneducated, but they’re nothing special, and skilled immigration should be reserved for a small number of the top people on the planet, maybe 10,000 or 15,000 a year.

Trying to do large-scale skilled immigration would have a number of problems: first, there just aren’t that many Einsteins around. Secondly, almost all of today’s skilled immigrants went to college here — in other words, American taxpayers have massively subsidized their education (as with subway fares and the like, tuition doesn’t come close to covering the cost of education). This subsidy, as Borjas says, is “sufficiently large to outweigh any of the productivity benefits that foreign students presumably impart on the nation.”

Maybe most important, skilled immigration creates its own problems — different from the problems created by unskilled immigration, but conflicts nonetheless with a modern society. Chief among these is assimilation; this sounds odd, since skilled immigrants are obviously more likely to successfully undergo the preliminary kinds of assimilation — learning English, getting a job, and driving on the right side of the road. But “patriotic assimilation” — the growth of a deep emotional attachment to America — is less likely to occur among educated immigrants. This is both because they have the resources to live a trans-national life, flitting back and forth across borders, and because they are likely to have already developed a fully formed national identity before they get here, precisely because they went to elementary and secondary school in the old country. As a report on new green card recipients found, “Those with high earnings and U.S. property ownership are actually less likely to intend ever naturalizing; and those with high levels of education are least likely to express satisfaction with the United States, and for this reason both are groups of people less likely to plan becoming U.S. citizens or settling permanently.”

Lopez: How is mass immigration social engineering? Isn’t it about yearning to be free?

Krikorian: The immigrants may well be yearning to breathe free, or at least increase their earnings, but the federal immigration program, established by Congress, is indeed a social engineering project.

Lopez: When you write things like, “the American people have opted, through millions of individual decisions, for a birthrate that would result in slower population growth and eventual stabilization. Who are politicians to second-guess this clear and consistent decision of the American people….?” do you worry Sanger types find a lot of common cause with you?

Krikorian: On the contrary. The eugenicists of the past were merely the flip side of today’s immigration boosters — both are dissatisfied with the childbearing decisions of ordinary Americans. This is what I mean by social engineering — today’s supporters of mass immigration are saying, often quite openly, that their countrymen are deficient because they’re not having enough babies. And that being the case, Congress has to go out and populate the country by recruiting foreigners to move here. I, on the other hand, think today’s American moms and dads should be the ones to decide how many Americans there will be tomorrow.

Lopez: Are green cards a terrorist’s dream come true?

Krikorian: Green cards, political asylum, refugee resettlement, the Visa Lottery, Border-Crossing Cards, student visas, work visas, the Visa-Waiver Program . . .

Lopez: Has the Internet killed assimilation?

Krikorian: Not the Internet alone, but all the modern advances in communications and transportation technology. In prior waves of immigration, when technology was more primitive, it was very hard to keep in touch with the folks back home, and that helped force people to shift their attachments and their focus to the new country. Today, because of the Internet, but also cheap phone calls and airfare, the ties to the homeland just don’t atrophy as quickly or thoroughly. It’s not that your grandpa from Odessa was any more interested in becoming an American — he just didn’t have much choice. I’m not a luddite — I like technological advances. But you can’t successfully assimilate a mass immigration flow under such modern conditions.

Lopez: Is the Wall Street editorial board a threat to national security?

Krikorian: Objectively, as the Marxists say.

Lopez: How is Congress to blame for excessive legal immigration?

Krikorian: Congress creates legal immigration — it’s a federal government program, like farm subsidies or national parks. They could abolish it tomorrow, or double, it, or change it — whatever they want. There’s nothing inevitable about it.

Lopez: Give the Bush administration some credit where credit is due …

Krikorian: You’re killing me here! But seriously, two things: First, I have always argued for a pro-immigrant policy of low immigration — one that admits fewer people than today, but does a better job of welcoming those few whom we do legally admit. And while the president has the “low immigration” part of that all wrong, to his credit he does get the “pro-immigrant” part, welcoming and embracing newcomers. This is an important point that restrictionists sometimes forget.

The second is something the administration would rather have avoided — stepped up enforcement of the immigration laws. With the collapse of the amnesty bill in the Senate last summer, the White House seems to have decided to permit the immigration authorities to start doing their job, and we’ve seen some genuine steps in the right direction. Worksite enforcement and deportations have increased; the E-Verify system has been expanded to the point where it now checks the legal status of more than 10 percent of all new hires, and all federal contractors will soon have to use it as well. While there’s a lot more to do, even these modest steps are already yielding results — new illegal border crossings have declined and some illegals already here appear to be going home.

Lopez: What are we going to do with McCain?

Krikorian: What do you mean “we,” Kemosabe?

Lopez: What is it important to remember about Obama?

Krikorian: It’s hard to compare Obama and McCain on immigration, since their positions are identical. But I think there would be differences in how their respective administrations addressed immigration. On the one hand, my sense is that McCain is much more emotionally committed to amnesty and would expend more political capital to try to push Congress to pass an immigration bill. He wants revenge on the Republican Party for having defied him last year; for McCain, amnesty’s not business any more — it’s personal. Obama, on the other hand, supports all the same policies, but just isn’t as invested in it. He’ll make a show of supporting amnesty, to placate Hispanic elites, but his heart isn’t in it in the same way and he has other, higher-priority goals.

On the other hand, Obama’s immigration-related appointments to the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice would be unbelievably bad, worse than anyone McCain could come up with. So for the purposes of immigration control, the election is already over, and we lost. The only hope will be to repeat last year’s success in stopping Congress from making things worse.

Lopez: Your opening and much in your book is in striking contrast to the cover: “It’s not the immigrants – it’s us.” You’re not blaming, you’re taking responsibility. Does the immigration restrictionist position need a makeover? A softening?

Krikorian: I don’t know that it’s so much a “softening” that’s needed as a systematic approach. Up til now there’s been a grab-bag sense to criticizing immigration — if you’re conservative, you might be worried about security but dismiss immigration’s impact on the working poor; if you’re liberal, you might bemoan the strains on the safety net, but reject any discussion of assimilation. And it can be true that focusing only on one of the impacts, absent a larger context, may sometimes look like you’re picking on foreigners. Which is why my point is that all the problems related to immigration all just different facets of the same problem — the incompatibility of mass immigration with modern society.

But, yes, this approach does take the onus off the immigrants, which is sometimes where conservatives put it (though illegal aliens, obviously, remain morally culpable for their misdeeds). But I also don’t place the onus on us, which is where liberals want to put it. Rather, we’ve just outgrown mass immigration. To use an image that my editor made me take out of the book as too pedestrian: When you’re eight, you eat all the doughnuts your parents will let you eat; heck, they’re probably good for you. But when you’re 47, you can’t eat doughnuts like that any more. There’s nothing wrong with you, and there’s nothing different about the doughnuts, but your metabolism has changed and you need to change your behavior accordingly.

Or, to use a more elevated image, St. Paul writes that “When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.” Mass immigration is a “childish thing,” in the context of our development as a people, and we must put it away.

Lopez: Tell me why your arguments are much more compassionate than, say, Roger Cardinal Mahoney gives them (or you) credit for.

Krikorian: Compassionate toward whom? The goal of a nation’s public policy is to promote the interests of the nation’s citizens, and only secondarily consider the interests and concerns of outsiders. The objects of my compassion are, first, my family, then my wider community or associations, then my countrymen, and only then foreigners. The undifferentiated compassion of too many of the open-borders crowd — in which I regretfully include Cardinal Mahoney — effectively rejects patriotic solidarity among Americans, which is a prerequisite for democracy itself.

Lopez: How does one get to be “the nation’s most frequently quoted immigration expert”?

Krikorian: By writing for National Review Online.

Lopez: Good answer!

What’s newest about your book and how can it advance the debate?

Krikorian: What’s “New” about The New Case Against Immigration is the insight that today’s mass immigration differs from the past not because the immigrants have changed but because we have changed, and that all the problems we see with immigration stem from this fact. As far as advancing the debate, my first hope is that the book doesn’t head straight to the remainder bin. But since I have it on good authority that my book “will head any list of the outstanding public policy books of 2008,” I hope it can help the debate mature beyond a narrow focus on illegal immigration and the unconnected complaints about various consequences, to a more — what’s the word? — comprehensive debate about the impact of immigration on our country.

To quote our greatest president: “As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.”

Source. Mark's book on the above subject is available here



More on the SF backdown

San Francisco will shift course and start turning over juvenile illegal immigrants convicted of felonies to federal authorities for possible deportation, Mayor Gavin Newsom said Wednesday as he took the blame for what he conceded was a costly and misguided effort to shield the youths. Newsom said he hadn't known until recently that the city was keeping the juvenile offenders from being deported as part of its sanctuary-city policy, but he added that "ignorance is no defense." "All I can say is, I can't explain away the past," Newsom said. "I take responsibility, I take it. We are moving in a different direction."

Newsom had said Tuesday that he had no direct authority to order the change, but that did little to dispel a controversy that overshadowed his announcement this week that he was exploring a 2010 run for governor. National media coverage of the mayor in recent days focused not on his political ambitions but on Chronicle revelations that his city was harboring illegal immigrant youths who had been convicted of dealing crack on the streets. "We're going to fix this," Newsom said Wednesday.

The mayor also revealed some of the costs to San Francisco taxpayers of protecting the offenders from the federal government, something his Juvenile Probation Department had declined to do. The city has spent $2.3 million just to house illegal immigrants in juvenile hall rather than turning them over to federal authorities since 2005, the year Newsom appointed his juvenile probation director, William Siffermann.

San Francisco also has flown more than a dozen juvenile drug dealers back to their homeland of Honduras, allowing them to avoid deportation proceedings that could have resulted in their being barred from ever returning to the United States. The city halted the practice in May after federal authorities pointed out that it was a crime to help illegal immigrants cross the border. From mid-2006 through April 2008, those flights cost the city nearly $19,000, Newsom said.

When those flights were halted, the Juvenile Probation Department recommended that the city place the illegal immigrant youths in group homes, at a cost to taxpayers of $7,000 per month per youth, rather than turn them over to federal authorities. The city stopped making those referrals after eight illegal immigrant crack dealers walked away from youth centers in San Bernardino County.

Newsom had said at a City Hall news conference Tuesday that it was up to juvenile courts, the district attorney, the public defender and his own Juvenile Probation Department to work out whether illegal immigrant criminals under 18 should be turned over to federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. He and Siffermann said San Francisco was trying to balance its responsibilities under U.S. law with its 1989 designation as a sanctuary city, which allowed officials to refuse to cooperate with federal crackdowns on illegal immigrants.

But Wednesday, the mayor issued a statement saying the sanctuary-city policy "is designed to protect our residents. It is not a shield for criminal behavior, and I will not allow it to be used in that fashion. "Adults who commit felonies are already turned over to the federal authorities for deportation," Newsom said. "There has been a lack of clarity, however, on our policy toward juveniles who commit felonies. ... I have directed my administration to work in cooperation with the federal government on all felony cases."

Newsom said in an interview later that the city was working up a protocol to determine how and when youths will be surrendered for possible deportation. Officials with the Juvenile Probation Department will meet with federal authorities today.

"I think they have gotten the message," said Joseph Russoniello, the U.S. attorney for Northern California, who had said he was "flabbergasted" by the city's now-discarded policy of flying the youths home at city-taxpayer expense. "It looks like it's what we wanted."

More here





4 July, 2008

SF mayor backpedalling

Gavin Newsom has his work cut out for him: As he positions himself to run for governor, he must persuade Californians that he is more than just the mayor of a famously liberal city, the man who ushered in same-sex marriage. This week, he has another issue, but it might just make his job a lot harder.

For years, this sanctuary city has been shielding convicted juvenile offenders who were illegal immigrants from federal authorities, either escorting them to their home countries at city expense or transporting them to group homes, often outside the city.

But in recent days, eight young undocumented drug dealers from Honduras who were convicted in San Francisco walked away from unguarded facilities in San Bernardino County. Although Newsom said the city has stopped the practice, news reports of the escapes have created an uproar in the electorally important Inland Empire and shined a national spotlight on this city's singular policies.

On Wednesday, Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands) demanded that San Francisco officials turn over all convicted illegal immigrant drug dealers to federal authorities instead of shipping them "out to San Bernardino County, where they can escape and victimize the neighborhoods in my district."

In a strongly worded statement, Newsom said Wednesday that he has directed his administration "to work in cooperation with the federal government on all felony cases. And I urge the district attorney, the public defender and the courts to do the same."

Reality, however, might not be that simple. Public Defender Jeff Adachi agreed that all parties involved with these youths need to "meet and confer." But their disposition is "ultimately a judicial determination." And the public defenders, he said in an interview, "are going to continue to advocate for the child, for our client. If the client doesn't want to go to the feds, that's what we'll be advocating for."

Even though the city's sanctuary status long predates Newsom, all of the conflict and confusion do little for his nascent bid for statewide office and his efforts to define and introduce himself in the less liberal corners of California. "The criticism and rap on [Newsom] is he's a single-issue" politician, said Barbara O'Connor, director of the Institute for the Study of Politics and Media at Cal State Sacramento. "This is certainly another issue, but it's a core issue for liberal folks. He's already got that corner of the market."

Political analyst Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a senior scholar at the School of Policy, Planning and Development at USC, noted that if Newsom won the Democratic nomination for governor in 2010, "in the general election, Inland California is going to be critical." And that's exactly where the Honduran youths were shipped, ultimately escaped and are doing Newsom no favors among the independent and swing voters that any future governor will have to woo.

O'Connor's and Jeffe's concerns were echoed Wednesday in interviews in this city's bustling Financial District and in scores of scorching comments posted on latimes.com. "Please Newsom, please oh please run for governor!" began one of the more printable missives. "My vote against you shall then be all the more gratifying as, hopefully if Californians aren't that stupid, your campaign crashes in flames." Wrote "disgusted in LB": "Don't even think about running for Governer Newsome! Your a psycho lefty, and the only city in California that would accept your ideals and beliefs is SF."

At lunchtime Wednesday in downtown San Francisco, workers judged the mayor less harshly. But many still scratched their heads at a policy that was designed to protect illegal immigrants who were otherwise law-abiding but apparently shielded convicted drug dealers from justice.

More here



The polls

Sen. John McCain's trip to Latin America this week--his third foreign trip since clinching the Republican nomination--has brought immigration back to the forefront of the presidential campaign.

As McCain hits Mexico City today and both candidates step up their efforts to reach out to Hispanic voters, a number of surveys shed light on Americans' views on the contentious topic. Overall, immigration is broadly considered one of the top issues in the campaign, but neither presidential candidate holds a clear advantage on it, as most surveys place McCain and his Democratic rival, Sen. Barack Obama within striking distance of each other on managing immigration. This tight margin reflects the deep division in opinions on immigration by ideology and along several demographic lines.

In a June 2008 CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll, 8 percent chose illegal immigration as the most important issue in their presidential vote decision. CNN has asked this question five times in 2008: each time about one in 10 respondents rated illegal immigration their top issue, putting it on par with terrorism, and in the most recent poll, just about even with health care.

About three in 10 Americans consider illegal immigration "extremely important" in their vote for president. According to a June 2008 Gallup/USA Today poll, 27 percent of Americans said the candidates' positions on illegal immigration will be "extremely important" to their vote, placing it below the economy (49 percent "extremely important), the situation in Iraq (44 percent) and terrorism (41 percent), but according to a recent CNN poll, the issue remains more salient than abortion, gun policy and foreign trade.

Ideology sharply divides opinions on the importance of the issue. According to the Gallup/USA Today poll, 36 percent of conservatives said illegal immigration will be "extremely important" to their vote, less than half as many liberals agree.

But ideology isn't the only dividing line. About three in 10 Americans over age 35 said illegal immigration is "extremely important" in their vote, but just two in 10 under age 35 said the same. Education matters as well: about a third of Americans with a high school degree or less view illegal immigration as "extremely important," compared with 20 percent of college graduates.

Recent polls suggest neither candidate has a lock on the issue. In a Washington Post-ABC News poll conducted in mid-May, Obama held a five-point edge over McCain as the candidate Americans trust more to handle immigration issues, but the Gallup/USA Today poll found the two about even, 36 percent said McCain would do a better job, 34 percent Obama.

The electorate is split deeply along partisan lines, with 68 percent of Democrats supporting Obama on the issue and 74 percent of Republicans favoring McCain in the Post-ABC News survey. Independents supported Obama by a margin of 12 points.

Personal economic situation plays a large role in determining whom Americans support on this issue. Those with household incomes of $50,000 or more per year supported McCain over Obama by an eight-point margin while those with less income favored Obama by 18 points. Moreover, Americans who reported having difficulty paying their bills supported Obama by 23 points and those worried about their standard of living supported the Illinois Democrat by 11 points.

One pitfall on this issue that could prove troublesome for both candidates, 19 percent in the Gallup survey, including a quarter of independents, said they trust neither candidate to handle immigration. One safe bet on this issue, both will be aiming to fill that void.

Source





3 July, 2008

Let's hear it for foreign models!

Around 1,000 additional tech workers may get visas to work in the United States next year, and they may have fashion models to thank. That's because foreign-born models and programmers will no longer have to duke it out for the same visa slots if a New York congressman gets his way.

Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., has introduced a bill in the House that would create a new, nonimmigrant classification reserved exclusively for the catwalkers. Currently, foreign models who want to work in the United States require H-1B visas, which are normally used by computer programmers and other high-tech workers.

Weiner wants Congress to amend current visa rules to allow 1,000 foreign models into the United States each year under their own immigrant classification.

How long until the AFL-CIO objects to this to help its longstanding push to form a union of U.S.-born fashion models? We must not recklessly imperil high-paying American jobs. Will these foreign models work for cheap? I'm all for competition. But we must have a level catwalk.

Source



EU defends immigration rules after Mercosur criticism

The European Commission defended Wednesday tough new rules to control illegal immigration, after the measures were slammed as "outrageous" by South American leaders. "The directive shouldn't be reduced to a caricature," said EU justice affairs spokesman Michele Cercone. "You have to read it carefully and understand what it says."

The so-called "returns directive", which was given the greenlight last month, allows for illegal immigrants to be detained for up to 18 months, under specific conditions, while they are being processed for expulsion. The measures do not oblige states to hold people for that long, indeed most should be held for no longer than six months. Nine EU nations currently set no limits on how long people may be kept in custody and this will change once the legislation comes into force, probably in 2010. People who resist expulsion could be banned from all of the EU's 27 member nations for five years.

"The directive finally introduces a European legislative framework that allows the commission to verify that humane and dignified conditions are respected" in detention centres, Cercone said.

At a regional trade conference [Mercosur], which wrapped up Tuesday, Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said "the cold wind of xenophobia is blowing again as an erroneous answer to challenges posed by the economy and society." "It is unfair. It is a law that is outrageous, ignominious," added Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who last month threatened to shut off oil exports to European countries if they enforce the new rules.

Many South American nationals live in Europe and send billions of dollars back home to their families.

Source





2 July, 2008

McCain supporters pushing him on immigration

Sen. John McCain has tilted his position on immigration to the right, but he continues to be greeted by supporters who want him to take an even tougher line. At a town-hall meeting at Worth & Company Inc., a woman asked: "Why as an American do I have to push a button to speak English?" The crowd roared with applause. "I think you struck a nerve," Sen. McCain said.

"I'll tell you, I really get ticked," the woman continued. "You go into Lowe's and it says 'Entrada,' " or entrance. Sen. McCain gave his standard reply that comprehensive immigration reform, which he pushed for, can't happen until the borders are secure. After that, he said, the nation needs a temporary-worker program "that's truly temporary," and must address the 12 million people in the U.S. illegally.

But he also said that the U.S. should be a welcoming place. "There's a great thing about America and that is that we welcome all cultures from all over the world," he said. "And we love the Hispanic heritage. We love the Irish heritage." Sen. McCain quickly added: "But English must be learned by everybody." Applause followed.

Source



Sarkozy moves to defend tough immigration stance

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has rejected accusations and criticism alleging that he is insensitive to the plight of undocumented workers in France, saying that he had "a heart on the left like all human beings."

"You, you see it as a human being. I am also human," said the head of state, who was speaking with Audrey Pulvar, a French journalist of Caribbean origin, during a lively debate on France 3television channel. "I have a heart, maybe not necessarily the same as the one you have," said Sarkozy, before adding: "In any case, it is at exactly the same place as yours, on the left, like all human beings."

Sarkozy added: "I understand that this issue affects you, it affects me a lot too, perhaps more than you, because I have been tasked with resolving it."

Nevertheless, the president reaffirmed his conviction that illegal immigrants should be sent back to their countries of origin. "When you find someone who has no papers, he is supposed to be sent back home," said the head of state who argued that laws were to be upheld.

"There is a law dealing with this issue," he said, adding that "if this law is cumbersome, we must change it. But as long as it is there, this law, we must apply it." "If we accept everyone to come into our country, we will end up destroying the social pact and indeed everything will explode," said the president.

"Those who already have a job, and therefore an insertion, can be fully regularized," said Sarkozy. "Those who have no work, no home, no paper, it is a great misfortune," he said, adding: "So we will try to give them the chance to attain development in their country."

Source





1 July, 2008

SF protects illegal immigrant crack dealers

It sounds to me that the SF officials could be prosecuted

An effort by San Francisco to shield eight young Honduran crack dealers from federal immigration officials backfired when the youths escaped from Southern California group homes within days of their arrival, officials said Monday. The walkaways are the latest in a string of embarrassments for city officials, who are protecting illegal alien drug dealers from federal authorities and possible deportation because of San Francisco's 1989 declaration that the city is a sanctuary for undocumented immigrants.

Until recently, San Francisco was flying illegal immigrant juveniles convicted of drug crimes to their home countries rather than cooperate with the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, a practice that drew national attention when The Chronicle reported it Sunday. When federal law enforcement authorities demanded that San Francisco halt the flights and began a criminal investigation, the city decided to house some of the dealers in long-term youth rehabilitation centers. Some of those centers are run by a not-for-profit outfit called Silverlake Youth Services in mountain towns southeast of San Bernardino.

Eight Honduran juveniles who had been convicted of dealing drugs in San Francisco were sent within the past few weeks to the company's group homes, where one month's placement costs $7,000 per youth - an expense borne by San Francisco taxpayers. Within 10 days of being sent to the unlocked group homes, however, all eight youths ran away, said Bill Siffermann, head of juvenile probation in San Francisco. He said his agency has issued arrest warrants for them.

Siffermann said the city has stopped sending juvenile offenders to Silverlake because of the escapes. "We have now eliminated that as a prospect," he said, adding that the city is trying to come up with an approach for how to handle the juveniles that does not involve giving them to federal immigration authorities.

San Bernardino County sheriff's Capt. Bart Gray said Silverlake had reported the eight Honduran youths as runaways - not as juvenile offenders. Three of the youths were listed as missing from Silverlake's Douglas House in the town of Yucaipa, 16 miles southeast of San Bernardino, on June 20 and two more on June 22, Gray said. Juvenile probation officials say three other Honduran youths who had been convicted as juveniles in San Francisco disappeared from another Silverlake-run group home, but it was not immediately known which one....

Turning over the youths to federal authorities for deportation could have resulted in their being legally barred from ever returning to the United States. Federal officials said the city's practice of returning the youths to their homeland to be reunited with their families did nothing to prevent drug-dealing juveniles from coming right back to the United States. They also noted that it is a crime to help an illegal immigrant cross the border, even if it is to leave the country. San Francisco officials countered that many of the youths were victims of drug dealers and that it wasn't fair to bar them from ever becoming citizens.

The eight youths who escaped from the San Bernardino County group homes were scheduled to be flown back to Honduras before city juvenile probation authorities halted the flights in May. They were not convicted of violent crimes, so they were ineligible to be sent to the California Youth Authority. San Francisco did not send them to the county's Log Cabin Ranch on the Peninsula for the same reason.

The eight were among dozens of young Honduran illegal immigrants who have been arrested in San Francisco in recent years for dealing drugs. Police said many of the Hondurans - some of whom they believe are actually adults - live communally in other local cities at the behest of drug lords, who finance their travel here and threaten to kill their families if they cooperate with law enforcement. Officials say there are at least 22 illegal immigrants being held at the city's juvenile hall.

San Francisco sent four illegal immigrant juvenile offenders from El Salvador and elsewhere to the Silverlake home in Yucaipa last year. All four escaped within three weeks, San Bernardino County authorities said....

Lidia Stiglich, president of the San Francisco commission that oversees the Juvenile Probation Department, said she was working with the mayor's office and the probation department to decide what to do with offenders the city refuses to turn over to federal immigration authorities. "Everyone is looking at the current policies," she said. She would not comment on the San Bernardino County escapes.

More here



Italy expels 38 Egyptians in immigration crackdown

Italy said on Saturday it had expelled 38 Egyptians as part of a crackdown ordered by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's government on illegal immigration. In a statement, Interior Minister Roberto Maroni, of the anti-immigrant Northern League party, said he was pleased at the expulsion of the Egyptian immigrants, who were flown to Cairo aboard a chartered plane.

Maroni also defended his plans to fingerprint Roma children. Roma people, known in Italy as "nomads", are blamed for much of the crime in Italian cities. "We don't know who lives in legal (nomadic) camps let alone the illegal ones. We don't know the nationalities of the residents so we have to do a census," Maroni told the newspaper Corriere della Sera.

Berlusconi took office in May pledging tough measures to stem illegal immigration, including legislation to make the act of crossing into Italy illegally itself an offence punishable by imprisonment.

Some immigrants seeking residency in Italy are fingerprinted already, but not usually children or European Union citizens. The Catholic charity Fondazione Migrantes, which is linked to the Italian bishops' conference, questioned why Roma people were being singled out. "It incomprehensible why fingerprints are being taken solely from minors from this tiny ethnic minority," it was quoted as saying by Italian news agencies. "All of this will not reduce fear and give peace to our people, but set the stage for unearthing a type of xenophobia, or worse, of racial discrimination."

Source