Dallas-Fort Worth Immigration Lawyer
Immigrant Students Spared As Deportations Rise
Category: Deportation and Detention
A recent article in the Dallas Morning News discussed the relatively "hands-off" deportation policy regarding students who are in the country illegally, but only because their parents brought them here as young children. In other words, these students did not choose to break the law and enter the U.S. illegally of their own will. Here are excerpts from the article:
The Obama administration, while deporting a record number of immigrants convicted of crimes, is sparing one group of illegal immigrants from expulsion: students who came to the U.S. without papers when they were children.
The students who have been allowed to remain are among more than 700,000 illegal immigrants who would be eligible for legal status under the Dream Act, a bill before Congress specifically for high school graduates who came to the U.S. before they were 16.
Department of Homeland Security officials said they had made no formal change of policy to permit those students to stay. But they said they had other, more pressing deportation priorities.
"In a world of limited resources, our time is better spent on someone who is here unlawfully and is committing crimes in the neighborhood," John Morton, the head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said in an interview. "As opposed to someone who came to this country as a juvenile and spent the vast majority of their life here."
Still, Republicans say the authorities should pursue all immigrants who are here illegally.
The administration is debating how to handle immigration now that the chances for a broad overhaul that President Barack Obama supports have faded for this year.
An internal Homeland Security memorandum, released last month by Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, set off a furor among his fellow Republicans because it showed immigration officials weighing steps they could take without congressional approval to give legal status to some illegal immigrants – including suspending deportations of students.
But a White House official said that the administration had decided against the moratorium, preferring to push for the student bill.
"Legislation does far more for Dream Act students than deferring deportations would, in that it puts them on a path to citizenship," said the official, who requested anonymity to discuss an internal policy debate.
Instead of a general moratorium, immigration authorities appear to be acting case by case to hold up deportations of young immigrants.
The vast majority of students who are illegal immigrants have no criminal records, and they would have to keep it that way to qualify to become legal under the Dream Act. To meet its terms, immigrants must also have graduated from high school and lived in the U.S. for at least five years, and they must complete two years of college or military service.
Lawmakers from both parties say the student bill draws wider support than the broader overhaul – but still not enough to make it likely to pass before the election.
Many young immigrants were brought to the U.S. illegally as small children by their parents. Often they only learn of their illegal status years later, when they are old enough to apply for a driver's license or to attend college.
Ruben Navarrette Jr: GOP Finds New Way to Enrage Latinos
Category: Proposed Immigration Laws
I don't always agree with newspaper columnist Ruben Navarrette, Jr. but his most recent column, regarding talk of altering the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, seems so completely correct that I'm going to take the liberty of reprinting almost all of it here.
Supposedly, elephants don't forget. But these days, when it comes to the explosive issue of immigration, I wonder if they even bother to think.
Not from the looks of it. Not when top Republicans in Congress are toying with the wacky and wicked idea of rewriting the 14th Amendment to eliminate so-called birthright citizenship.
A half-dozen prominent Senate Republicans have called for a review of Section 1, which dictates that "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States," to see if they can find a way to exclude the U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has joined Sens. John Cornyn of Texas, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, John Kyl of Arizona, Charles Grassley of Iowa, and John McCain of Arizona in demanding a national debate on the issue.
Given the devastating effect such a debate would have -- chiefly on the GOP -- one wonders whether these six Republicans and others supporting such a brainless idea are secretly working for the Democrats. They're certainly not working for the long-term best interests of their own party.
Not in light of the fact that Latinos, the fastest-growing demographic in the country, increasingly consider the GOP brand toxic. This fight will close the deal because Latinos operate by a simple code: "Say what you will about the adults, but leave the children alone."
Still, in a way, it must be nice to be a Republican.
You don't have to worry about being morally consistent. You're not tied down by any core principles. You don't have to worry about being honest, logical or sincere. You can sell out and simply say whatever your constituents want to hear, even if it means uttering something totally different from what you used to believe just a few years ago.
For instance, how strange that a party whose members, whenever there are hearings for a Supreme Court nominee, put on a great show about adhering to a strict interpretation of the Constitution and not giving into judicial activism would now be flirting with a kind of legislative activism that defiles the very Constitution they supposedly revered.
How curious that a party whose members insist time and again that they have no problem with legal immigrants, and that they are only trying to run off the illegal variety, would destroy its credibility by going after a group of legal immigrants simply because critics don't approve of the process by which these people obtained legal status.
Finally, how unfortunate that a party whose leaders in Congress used to have the good sense to thwart legislation written by fellow Republicans seeking to deny citizenship to the U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants would now cave in to pressure from voters and pursue a course of action that they formerly claimed was unwise and unnecessary.
The GOP was right the first time. This debate is unwise and unnecessary. It's also unseemly.
Republicans in Congress are acting like schoolyard bullies and picking on a group that, at least for the moment, can't defend itself -- children. Sadly, that's probably part of the appeal. Think about it. Republicans like to pick on illegal immigrants and U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants because those people can't vote.
But when Republicans have the chance to do something substantive about illegal immigration by punishing those who hire illegal immigrants, they never have the guts to follow through. Instead, to stay in the good graces of business groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, they pore over immigration bills and carefully take out language calling for sanctions on employers.
It's easier to try to punish children for the sins of their parents. After all, employers vote; children don't.
At least not yet. Republicans are obviously worried about what's going to happen to their candidates in the future when these so-called anchor babies grow up. The concern is that, when the sons and daughters of illegal immigrants earn the right to vote, they'll start settling scores for the despicable way in which their parents were treated -- hunted, demonized, exploited, scapegoated etc. -- often with the blessing of the GOP.
That's a lot to answer for. So naturally, Republicans are trying to put off this reckoning as long as possible. But by foolishly going down this road, they're further enraging the current crop of Latino voters -- and other Americans of good will -- and thus ensuring that the bill comes due that much sooner.
Immigration Policy Aims to Help Military Families
Category: Immigration News
The Obama administration has tried to make it easier for illegal immigrant spouses and family members of military personnel to get legal immigration status. The policy changes were reported in the New York Times. Here are excerpts:
The new policy was described in an internal memorandum from Citizenship and Immigration Services that was released last week by Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, and caused a furor in Washington on Friday.
The memo outlined measures that the agency could take under existing laws to “reduce the threat of removal for certain individuals present in the United States without authorization,” instead of waiting for Congress to pass an immigration overhaul to give legal status to millions of illegal immigrants.
With the title “Administrative Alternatives to Comprehensive Immigration Reform,” the memo prompted protests from Mr. Grassley and other Republicans that the Obama administration was trying an end run around Congress, rather than confronting a divisive debate on immigration legislation during an election season. The memo was first reported on the Web site of The National Review, a conservative magazine.
Officials of the immigration agency denied on Friday that they were pursuing any plan to legalize millions of illegal immigrants by fiat.
According to the memo, one of those changes has been quietly put into practice since May. The new policy allows illegal immigrants who are spouses, parents and children of American citizens serving in the military to complete the process of becoming legal residents without having to leave the United States — a procedure that is known in immigration law terms as granting parole. The memo says agency officials approved the new parole approach “to preserve family unity and address Department of Defense concerns regarding soldier safety and readiness for duty.”
Department of Homeland Security officials estimate that many thousands of military service members have close relatives who are illegal immigrants. Under a legal Catch-22 in immigration law, those families could face as much as 10 years of separation if the immigrant relative leaves the United States to pursue a legal visa.
Administration officials sought to play down the memo. They said the proposals were largely “notional” and most had not been approved as policy by Alejandro Mayorkas, the director of Citizenship and Immigration Services. However, the memo is signed by some of the highest officials in the agency, including Roxana Bacon, the general counsel, and Denise Vanison, the chief of the office of policy and strategy.
The memo finds that it is “theoretically possible to grant deferred action to an unrestricted number of unlawfully present individuals,” but rejects that option as politically “controversial” and too expensive. The memo suggests the agency could instead “tailor the use of this discretionary option for particular groups.”
Christopher Bentley, the spokesman for the immigration agency, said, “To be clear, D.H.S. will not grant deferred action or humanitarian parole to the nation’s entire illegal immigrant population.”
Humane Tweak to Immigration Enforcement
Category: Immigration News
The Dallas Morning News has an excellent editorial today about a new approach to immigration "raids" at employers:
Any new approach to immigration enforcement almost certainly will raise someone's hackles, and the Obama administration's latest innovation, known as "silent raids," is no exception. As a temporary step while the nation debates comprehensive immigration reform, there is much to praise, but also much to criticize, in this new strategy.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are de-emphasizing the disruptive, headline-grabbing workplace raids such as those in 2006 at Swift meat-packing plants in Cactus, Texas, and other American towns. The raids, in which 1,297 illegal workers were captured, helped satisfy advocates seeking harsh action against millions of undocumented workers.
The problem was that the raids imposed unduly cruel punishments on those captured. They lost all household belongings. Children came home from school to find empty houses and were left to their own devices as their parents were whisked into deportation proceedings.
In the silent raids, ICE auditors comb through businesses' employee rosters and computer records to identify illegal workers. The employer is notified and fined, as well as warned of additional sanctions if the illegal workers aren't fired.
"Instead of hundreds of agents going after one company, now one agent can go after hundreds of companies. And there is no drama, no trauma, no families being torn apart, no handcuffs," immigration-law consultant Mark K. Reed said in a recent news report.
But serious deficiencies exist in this new approach. Without deportation, the tagged immigrant is often free to stay in the U.S. and hunt for new work. And companies caught employing large numbers of illegal immigrants escape the embarrassing "name and shame" coverage that occurred during the raids experienced by companies like Swift. The anonymity of silent raids allows violators to escape public accountability, and that's not right.
This newspaper favors this more humanitarian approach, albeit with additional tweaks. There should be no ambiguity for illegal workers who are tagged. ICE must follow up with a written or verbal warning: Your days are numbered; clear up your affairs, pack up and leave immediately to avoid forced deportation. A 48-hour warning seems humane but adequately tough.
As for employers, there must be no escaping full public accountability. Embarrassment and bad publicity provide a much-needed deterrent, which is why the occasional raid serves a constructive purpose.
Jobs are generally the reason migrants come here illegally. Those who employ illegal immigrants deserve to be named and shamed so that the magnet of work ceases to exist. That said, comprehensive immigration reform is essential, including provisions for a greatly expanded guest-worker program that gives businesses greater access to low-cost – and legal – immigrant labor.
The goal shouldn't be to destroy lives and traumatize families. But enforcement must include an unmistakable message that the American workplace is open only to those who enter legally, obtain the proper documents and stay only as long as permitted.
At Least $800 Million Spent for 53-Mile Border Fence
Category: Immigration News
The Associated Press reports that taxpayers have spent at least $15.1 million per mile for 53 miles of "virtual fence" built to secure the U.S. and Mexico border, more than 12 times the original estimate. Here are excerpts from the article:
The federal government set aside $833 million for the fence of cameras, sensors and other barriers in 2007, and the vast majority of that money, at least $800 million, has been spent on a sliver, in Arizona, of the nearly 2,000-mile southern border. About $20.9 million has been used on the northern border.
Rep. Chris Carney, D-Pa., chairman of a House Homeland Security subcommittee, said the money was supposed to buy virtual fence for 655 miles of border in Arizona, New Mexico and a slice of Texas, at a cost of about $1.2 million per mile.
The fence, developed as part of a border security plan under President George W. Bush, was supposed to monitor most of the southern border with Mexico by 2011. Now, the 53 miles in Arizona is expected to be done by the end of the year.
Additionally, the expected capabilities of the virtual fence have shrunk, said Randolph Hite, a Government Accountability Office official.
The Homeland Security Department has suspended the project while it decides what to do next. Several officials acknowledged some good has come from the project, but they questioned the cost for those capabilities.
Online:
House Homeland Security Committee
Secure Border Initiative report
Calling Immigration System 'Broken,' Obama Pushes Bill
Category: Immigration News
President Obama gave a speech today calling the current immigration system "broken" and urging passage of comprehensive immigration reform. For an excellent summary of the speech, and of the issues surrounding the immigration debate, please read the article in the New York Times.
Common Sense Needed in Immigration Cases
Category: Deportation and Detention
The Dallas Morning News has an excellent editorial today pointing out the inequities in our current immigration system, particularly deportation. Few people would object to the deportation of criminals or of those who knowingly came here illegally as adults and made no effort to work within the system. But the editorial mentions the plights of other immigrants who, through no real fault of their own, have been placed in terrible situations by seemingly arbitrary decisions by the federal government.
The editorial is important enough to be reprinted in full:
Justice isn't always blind when it comes to immigration enforcement. U.S. authorities exercise apparently wide latitude to impose the letter of the law or inject compassion, especially in cases of political expediency. Too often, simple common sense doesn't seem to factor into the equation. Three recent cases illustrate the point.
Olivera Snyder and her sister, Jelena Boldt, were born in the former Yugoslavia and brought here as children by their parents in 1985. They know little of their Serbian homeland. Both married Americans, and Olivera has three American children. Through one of the stranger twists in U.S. immigration enforcement, the Dallas-area sisters are bracing for deportation, despite having filed all the required paperwork and completed every step of the process.
Their immigrant mother won permission to stay. They have no criminal history. Someone in the bowels of Immigration and Customs Enforcement decided it was time to close their cases and move on. Their lawyer says he can't get an explanation and describes the case as "one of the most disturbing departures from rational thinking I have ever witnessed."
Eric Balderas is a Harvard student who grew up in the United States and has virtually no memory of his early childhood before his parents brought him to Texas from Mexico. He lost his passport and wound up in the sights of an ICE official as he boarded a flight from San Antonio to Boston. Now he faces deportation. Harvard dignitaries are trying to help, but the 19-year-old's future hangs in limbo until a July 6 deportation hearing.
Hervé Fonkou Takoulo is a Cameroonian facing deportation after losing an asylum bid. He and his American wife, Caroline Jamieson, are professionals in Manhattan. Jamieson wrote to President Barack Obama in a desperate attempt to stave off the deportation, and in apparent retaliation, two immigration agents went to the couple's house, mentioned the Obama letter and then took Takoulo away in handcuffs. An inquiry by The New York Times led to Takoulo's quick release.
Thousands of such cases never make it into the media spotlight, so there's no telling how many horror stories are out there. It shouldn't take a reporter's inquiry or an embarrassing news article to make immigration authorities recognize that theses are human beings whose lives face irrevocable destruction.
Yes, we want a predictable and consistent system of immigration laws that apply equally to all. But common sense also must come into play. These three cases underscore the real human hardship created by America's broken immigration system and overburdened immigration courts. Comprehensive immigration reform, with tough but fair measures to help people attain legal status in this country, is the best way to break this chain of tragedy.
ICE Detains Fewer Suspected Illegal Immigrants from Irving Jail
Category: Immigration News
As reported by the Dallas Morning News, federal immigration agents since October have cut back by about 50% the number of suspected illegal immigrants removed from the Irving city jail. The city of Irving began running citizenship checks in 2006 on all people arrested by Irving police.
There seems to be some confusion about the reason for the decrease in immigration holds. Here are excerpts from the newspaper article:
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials and Irving police disagree on the cause of the drop. Irving police say that federal officials are no longer detaining scores of suspected illegal immigrants who only have class C misdemeanor charges.
"Nothing changed in terms of our practice," Irving Police Chief Larry Boyd said. "We still share information with everyone who is arrested in Irving."
Immigration officials say they continue to place immigration holds on suspected illegal immigrants accused of low-level crime. They suggest Irving jailers are the ones who have made an alteration.
"We haven't stopped taking any sort of referrals at all," said Carl Rusnok, an ICE spokesman.
Irving has turned more than 5,600 people over for deportation since the city began using the Criminal Alien Program in 2006. The program allows federal authorities to check the immigration status of inmates in the city's jail.
Irving officials brag that with the program, they have turned over more suspected illegal immigrants than any other city in the country. Demonstrations supporting and opposing CAP helped the city become the backdrop for America's discussion on illegal immigration nearly three years ago.
Rusnok said the agency will take only people charged with more serious crimes if resources such as beds, time or manpower are scarce. But, he said, there have not been the kind of long-term resource shortages to explain the sudden and sustained drop in detainers in Irving.
Boyd maintains that his jailers have said that ICE no longer seems able or interested in taking suspected illegal immigrants charged with the lowest level of crimes. Boyd said ICE has taken about 82 percent fewer Irving people charged only with class C misdemeanors this year compared with last year.
The Chief Justice Earl Warren Institute on Race, Ethnicity and Diversity last year released a report that found "strong evidence" that Irving officers racially profiled Hispanics in order to process them through CAP. Boyd disputed the study. The report from the institute, which is part of the law school at the University of California-Berkeley, was released the month before last year's drop in detainers.
Boyd, who has disputed the study's finding, said it had nothing to do with the decline in immigration holds. He said the study also has not changed the average number of inmates or the crimes for which arrestees are held.
Edward Schumacher-Matos: Why We Need the Dream Act
Category: Proposed Immigration Laws
This opinion piece in the Dallas Morning News is by Edward Schumacher-Matos, the Robert F. Kennedy Visiting Professor for Latin American Studies at Harvard University.
Of all the political fights over immigration, the one that makes the least sense concerns children who came here illegally with their parents and then graduated from American high schools.
Based on statements to the media, most of the heartless Scrooges who want to kick these innocent youths out of the country – even though most are culturally and patriotically American – are Republicans.
But the dirty little secret is that Democrats have been as responsible for short-circuiting these young lives – and for denying the nation their talent after having already paid for their schooling.
They have done so in Congress by holding hostage the so-called Dream Act, which would give these young people a pathway to citizenship by joining the military or going to college. For the past decade, this bill has been seen as a motherhood-and-apple-pie measure that would help sell comprehensive immigration reform.
That logic once made tactical sense, but no more. The immigration debate has become so toxic that, spurred by Arizona, it now threatens to turn into a downward spiral of national paranoia about immigrants, particularly Hispanics. Periodic bouts of such hysteria pockmark our history – Japanese living in America during World War II, Germans before World Wars I and II, Italians and Slavs in the 1920s, and Irish and Chinese before that.
The Dream Act is urgently needed to help break this dangerous dynamic by reminding Americans of the positive side of immigration. The terms of the immigration debate have to be changed from what now is one of enforcement – and unfounded fears, largely of crime and terrorism – to an honest assessment of costs and benefits, and of the moral responsibility of immigrants and employers.
Only Obama can do this, in alliance with Democratic congressional leaders and some sympathetic Republicans. Most of our leaders have become cowed instead by the loud, often virulent anti-immigrant backlash. Obama himself says the right things but is reluctant to act.
Opposition to the act comes in part from the hard right and the normal cabal of talk show hosts who call the bills "amnesty light." They add, as Republican Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas wrote three weeks ago, that the Dream Act "will result in illegal immigrants taking more of the limited number of spaces available for students at public universities, crowding out deserving American students."
Opponents on the hard left, meanwhile, charge that, given the low numbers of Latinos in college, the offer of citizenship through military service will become a popular default choice that condemns them to fighting in Iraq.
Nearly 115,000 immigrants are in the military today, and the Pentagon says it indeed would welcome more. Being an immigrant and a Vietnam War veteran myself, I agree with paying your dues or proving your loyalty. The immigrants don't have to stay.
But going to a university and using your learned skills is a contribution, too, and we are amazingly foolish to kick out youths in whom we already have invested so much.
Arguments such as Smith's are misplaced. States subsidize tuition because college graduates stimulate economic growth. There may be a point where those costs outweigh the benefits, but the relatively small number of students involved and the fact that they are already in each state's education system suggest that we are nowhere near this point. What the opponents are doing is shrinking their state talent pools, a recipe for decline.
The youths themselves best make their case. As a 22-year-old wanting to join the military told The Boston Globe, "We don't want a handout, just the opportunity to prove ourselves."
Obama to Send 1,200 Guard Troops to Mexico Border
Category: Immigration News
President Obama will send up to 1,200 National Guard troops to the Southwest border and increase spending on law enforcement, yielding to demands from both Republican and Democratic lawmakers there that border security be tightened, administration officials said.
That was the opening of an article in the New York Times. Here are additional excerpts:
Homeland Security officials said that the troops would provide support to law enforcement officers already working along the border by helping observe and monitor traffic between official crossing points, and would help analyze trafficking patterns in hopes of intercepting illegal drug shipments. They performed similar tasks in an earlier deployment along the border from 2006 to 2008, when they also assisted with road and fence construction. The troops have not been involved directly in intercepting border crossers.
In addition to the soldiers, the White House said it would request $500 million in supplemental funds to pay for more federal agents, prosecutors, investigators and technology at the border.
Homeland Security officials have said that they have significantly increased border security efforts since Mr. Obama took office. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, a former governor of Arizona, said last month that the border was “as secure now as it has ever been,” though she conceded there was room for improvement. Critics on the right derided her remarks as out of touch.
Visas for Illegal Immigrant Crime Victims Debated
Category: Temporary Visas
Two little-known types of immigrant visas are the T and the U visas. The T visa is for people innocently involved in human trafficking, and the U visa is for victims of crime. The U visa's basic purpose is to make it easier for police to prosecute those who commit violence.
Both types of visas were discussed in a recent Dallas Morning News article. Here are excerpts from the article, beginning with a discussion of the U visa:
The visas began flowing only 18 months ago and the majority have gone to domestic violence victims, say officials from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
Under the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act, up to 10,000 such visas are authorized annually. Illegal immigrants may receive such visas if they've suffered "substantial" physical or mental abuse from criminal activity and, among other things, a law enforcement agency certifies they have information on criminal activity. The visa can lead to permanent legal residency status.
The issuing of U visas comes at a tense time in the national immigration debate, amid a polarizing crackdown and potentially broader policing powers against immigrants in Arizona. And it illuminates a prickly point of justice: Should the federal government give illegal immigrants special treatment for a societal good such as fighting violent crime?
The Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act created both the U visa and the T visa. They're near the end of a complex network of visas, A through V.
T visas, for those involved in human trafficking, began flowing in 2002, but the flow of U visas was delayed as regulations on issuance were hammered out. In the last three full fiscal years, only about 250 to 300 T visas have been approved of the maximum annual allotment of 5,000.
In the last fiscal year, ending in September 2009, the federal government authorized 5,825 U visas. In the first five months of this fiscal year, nearly 5,000 such visas were given. There are about 6,600 visa applications pending, and the 10,000 allotment is expected to be reached as early as next month, said Maria Elena Garcia Upson, a spokeswoman for the immigration agency.
So You Want to Be an American: Five Circles of Immigration Hell
Category: Family-Based Immigration
There is a wonderful, humorous article about an Australian's frustrating passage through the immigration process at Cracked.com. Caution: the article contains some strong language.
Five Deal-Breakers in Arizona's New Immigration Law
Category: Immigration News
Miami Herald columnist Andres Oppenheimer has an interesting take on the new anti-immigrant bill passed in Arizona. Here are excerpts from his column:
Now that Arizona has enacted the most xenophobic anti-immigration law in this country, get ready for the big Hispanic exodus.
But it won't be an exodus back to Mexico or to Central America. It will be a stampede toward Miami, Los Angeles, Chicago and other cities with huge Hispanic populations, where Latinos will be able to live without fear of being stopped by police because of the color of their skin or for speaking Spanish.
According to a bill passed by the Arizona legislature and signed into law Friday, police officers would have to arrest anyone when they have "reasonable suspicion" that the person does not have valid immigration papers. And it would allow anyone to sue local or state officials who they believe aren't carrying out the law.
There are five major reasons why this Nazi-era-reminiscent legislation should be stopped in Arizona and kept from being copied by other states.
First, it won't stop undocumented immigrants from coming to the United States. As long as the U.S. per capita income is more than three times higher than Mexico's -- $46,400 vs. $13,500, to be precise -- Mexicans and other Latin Americans will continue crossing the border one way or another.
Second, it will not make Arizona safer. On the contrary, it will divert police resources away from fighting crime and will compel undocumented immigrants -- as well as U.S.-born Hispanics who won't want to be hassled by police -- not to report crimes.
But the Arizona Police Chiefs Association and others opposed the measure, saying it will drain law enforcement resources and prevent witnesses from stepping forward. By the same token, U.S. authorities in 2007 publicly honored 26-year-old undocumented immigrant Manuel Jesus Cordova for rescuing a 9-year-old whose mother had died in an accident. Would Cordova do so under the new law?
Third, it will hurt Arizona's economy. The new law is likely to be struck down by the courts as unconstitutional, but only after long and costly legal battles.
In addition, a flight of many of the estimated 470,000 undocumented Latinos from Arizona and the closing of some of the more than 35,000 Hispanic-owned businesses in the state will drain the state's already ailing finances.
Fourth, if more U.S. states follow Arizona's lead, there may be a Latin American tourism backlash. Many of the more than 13 million Mexicans, 2.5 million South Americans and 860,000 Central Americans who travel to the United States every year may think twice before visiting a country where they may be stopped by police just because of the color of their skin or the language they speak.
Fifth, and perhaps most important, the law is morally wrong and profoundly un-American. The United States, despite the decline of its international image immediately after the Iraq War, is once again being seen positively by a majority of countries, according to a BBC poll released last week. Racial profiling laws would no doubt hurt the U.S. image abroad.
My opinion: Arizona's new law is not only legally dubious, economically counterproductive and morally repugnant, but it will do nothing to solve the U.S. immigration crisis. The solution is for the Obama administration to push for its much-promised immigration reform this year. That would help both secure the borders and give a path to legalization to more than 10 million undocumented immigrants. Otherwise, headline-seeking local politicians in other states will seek to fill the vacuum with similarly xenophobic laws, with not much more effect than producing a big Hispanic exodus -- within the United States.
Does Farmers Branch Have Spending Priorities Straight?
Category: Immigration News
The Dallas suburb of Farmers Branch has been in the news for a couple of years now because of its efforts to run undocumented immigrants out of the city. The city leaders have attempted to do this by passing ordinances making it illegal to rent apartments or houses to such immigrants.
Unfortunately for the city, these ordinances keep getting shot down in court as unconstitutional, and the city has been forced to pay the legal fees of the plaintiffs who sue the city over the ordinances. After the latest adverse ruling, the Farmers Branch City Council voted this month to appeal the federal court judgment.
The rationale for the appeal is that this time the decision will be made by the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which is notoriously conservative. The city believes this court will be more likely to ignore or overturn other court opinions and decide that the ordinance is indeed constitutional.
The city's outside counsel has estimated the legal fees for an appeal could range from $100,000 to $150,000. Thus far, Farmers Branch has spent about $3.2 million trying to get illegal immigrants out of town, and has set aside another $620,000 for the remainder of 2010. By some estimates, the total legal costs could be more than $5 million by the end of this year. That's a lot of money for a city with a population of about 30,000.
For several years I lived in Carrollton, the suburb immediately north of Farmers Branch. I worked in Dallas, immediately south of Farmers Branch. So I passed through Farmers Branch at least twice each day, and actually was in the city far more than that. It's a nice town, with nice people. I hate to see all the negative publicity they are getting, although I do strongly disagree with their attempts to drive immigrants from Farmers Branch.
I know Farmers Branch has much more pressing needs for the money they are spending on these federal court appeals. Road maintenance, libraries, activities for senior citizens, and many other city projects are left wanting. That's a sad situation, and unfair to the residents of Farmers Branch.
Supreme Court Decision Protects Right to Immigration Advice
Category: Immigration News
This press release was issued today by theAmerican Immigration Council:
The American Immigration Council applauds today's Supreme Court decision on the right to counsel for noncitizens charged with committing a crime. The Court held that criminal defense lawyers must advise their noncitizen clients about the risk of deportation if they accept a guilty plea. The Court recognized that current immigration laws impose harsh and mandatory deportation consequences onto criminal convictions, and that Congress eliminated from these laws the Attorney General's discretionary authority to cancel removal in meritorious cases. The Court said, "These changes to our immigration law have dramatically raised the stakes of a noncitizen's criminal conviction. The importance of accurate legal advice for noncitizens accused of crimes has never been more important."
The case, Padilla v. Kentucky, involved a Vietnam War veteran who has resided lawfully in the U.S. for over 40 years. His criminal defense lawyer told him not to worry about the immigration consequences of pleading guilty to a crime, but that advice was wrong. In fact, the guilty plea made Mr. Padilla subject to mandatory deportation from the United States. The state of Kentucky said that Mr. Padilla had no right to withdraw his plea when he learned of the deportation consequence. Today's decision reverses the Kentucky court. It also rejected the federal government's position (which had been adopted by several courts) that a noncitizen is protected only from "affirmative misadvice" and not from a lawyer's failure to provide any advice about the immigration consequences of a plea.
"The right to counsel is at the very core of our criminal justice system. The Court affirms that immigrants should not be held accountable when they rely on incorrect advice from their lawyers or where counsel fails to provide any immigration advice at all," said Beth Werlin, an attorney at the American Immigration Council's Legal Action Center. "Today's decision also reminds us that ultimately, the increased criminalization of immigration law and lack of flexibility has resulted in harsh results. Congress should do its part to restore immigration judges' discretion to consider the particular circumstances in a person's case, thus affording each person facing deportation an individualized and fair opportunity to be heard."
For more background on this Supreme Court's decision, read the Legal Action Center's blog post.
Another Judge Rules Farmers Branch Rental Ban Is Unconstitutional
Category: Immigration News
For the second time, a federal judge has declared a Farmers Branch ordinance banning illegal immigrants from renting in the city to be unconstitutional. Here are excerpts from a Dallas Morning News article reporting this decision:
U.S. District Judge Jane Boyle of Dallas ruled Wednesday that the ordinance was an attempt to enforce U.S. immigration laws – something the judge said only the federal government can do.
The judge also issued a permanent injunction to stop Farmers Branch from enforcing Ordinance 2952.
Mayor Tim O'Hare, the driving force behind the ordinances, said he wants to appeal.
"The American people are tired of judges legislating from the bench," he said. "This decision is not unexpected but welcomed, because it allows us to get closer to this ordinance becoming reality."
But O'Hare said the City Council would have to vote on whether to continue a fight that has cost the city nearly $3.2 million since September 2006. And the city may need to spend an additional $623,000 in legal fees in the year ahead, city finance director Charles Cox said Wednesday.
About one-quarter of the estimated 30,000 people who live in Farmers Branch were born outside the United States. About 47 percent of the city's population is Hispanic.
In the past four years, the city has proposed a series of ordinances that would make it illegal for landlords to rent to illegal immigrants. A version approved by the council in 2006 was repealed in early 2007 to make way for another ordinance.
That ordinance, No. 2903, was approved by two-thirds of voters in 2007 but later declared unconstitutional by U.S. District Judge Sam Lindsay. The city abandoned an appeal of that ordinance in favor of Ordinance 2952. No. 2952 added all rental units, including houses, to the ban on renting to illegal immigrants.
Wait-And-See Is Not An Immigration Strategy
Category: Proposed Immigration Laws
"...the time for comprehensive immigration reform is overdue, that our nation's system just isn't working." That was the gist of an excellent editorial this week in the Dallas Morning News. Here are excerpts:
We don't know how many times we'll have to write that the time for comprehensive immigration reform is overdue, that our nation's system just isn't working. And however many times it takes, we will. Instead of getting better, our immigration problems keep getting worse, if that's possible.
Latest is the news that Homeland Security Director Janet Napolitano has suspended payments on the "virtual fence" that many reformers, including this newspaper, had hoped would increase security along the U.S.-Mexico border. The fence, so far, has been a big dud – and an expensive one.
The U.S. has paid Boeing about $1 billion so far to develop a "virtual fence" that would rely on sophisticated electronics to track people illegally crossing our border with Mexico. Among other problems, The New York Times reports, Boeing failed to design tests that would work out the kinks.
Rather than keep pouring money down that hole, it's time to pursue an alternative. Options include the thermal-imaging devices, heat-seeking cameras and laptops that border agents want.
Of course, a real, physical fence is being built across parts of the U.S.-Mexico border. But there is no way enough fence can be built in a manner that seals the border from Brownsville to San Diego. We need some kind of electronic system to help border agents snare illegal crossers.
Some will want to use the apparent failure of the virtual fence to again do nothing on immigration reform this year, despite President Barack Obama's promise to pursue it and the efforts last week by Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer and GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham to offer a serious overhaul.
Waiting around isn't going to solve the problem. If Congress falls prey to more wait-and-see, the nation won't have to wait long to see more scattershot local efforts, like the ill-advised one being pursued in the Arizona Legislature.
Some lawmakers there want to give local law enforcement the authority to charge an immigrant with trespassing if found in the state illegally. The immigrants wouldn't have to be accused of any other offense. Cops could just stop a suspected illegal immigrant while he is walking down the street and arrest him for not having valid papers. If this sounds good to you, please explain how this would not degenerate into profiling specific ethnicities based almost solely on their skin color.
The only good thing to say about the Arizona proposal is that it provides one more compelling reason for Washington to start creating a saner immigration system so that states and local governments aren't so tempted to take the law into their hands.
Tamar Jacoby: New Heartland Voices on Immigration
Category: Immigration News
Tamar Jacoby is president of ImmigrationWorks USA, a national federation of employers working to advance immigration reform. She recently wrote an opinion piece for the Dallas Morning News that raises interesting points. Here are excerpts:
In the years since Congress last considered an overhaul – since the bitter failures of 2006 and 2007 – a new type of immigration advocate has emerged: small-business owners.
Of course, some large U.S. businesses also rely on immigrant workers. And some employers are all too happy to take advantage of the broken immigration system – happy to hire unlawful workers, to pay them below-market wages, to exploit the fact that they can't bargain and aren't protected by the law.
But the lion's share of employers who depend on immigrants are small-business owners, known and trusted in their communities, who want nothing more than to be on the right side of the law.
After all, in most cases, they've invested their savings in their businesses, and they have brand names to protect, often their own family names. The last thing they want, or can afford, is to have all this snatched out from under them because they've run afoul of the law. They need a stable, reliable, legal workforce, and they're more than willing to pay for it.
Their message? They talk less about rights than about America's interests, less about compassion or ideals than about the U.S. economy and national security.
Sure, they speak in part from self-interest; they all have businesses to protect. But when it comes to immigration, their interests coincide with the interests of many American workers and of the U.S. economy.
Think about how a local economy works. If an employer has to shrink or close his business because he can't find immigrant workers, most often for the operation's lowest- or highest-skilled slots, he'll have to fire the Americans who fill the jobs in the middle of the skill ladder – the foreman at the dairy or packing plant, the maitre d' in the restaurant, the marketer at the IT startup. And when the restaurant chain shrinks or the biotech firm moves across the border to Canada, that means less work for American businesses up – and downstream in the economy – less work for other local businesses and fewer jobs for Americans.
Most employers who rely on immigrant workers are looking more to the future than the past. Of course, many hope that immigration reform will legalize their current workforce. But most are even more concerned about who will man their businesses in years ahead, as increased spending and pent-up demand power the way to economic recovery.
These small business owners need a way for the workers they count on to grow their businesses to enter the country legally. They want Congress to fix the system so we don't re-create the problem in years ahead. They know that the only way to control illegal immigration is to create a legal immigration system that works – and that this is the best way to secure our borders and restore the rule of law.
No one has more of a stake in fixing the broken immigration system than employers who rely on immigrant workers. And just because you won't see them on TV on Sunday doesn't mean they aren't making their voices heard.
Obama Still Committed to Immigration Reform
Category: Immigration News
The primary question among immigrants, immigrant advocates, and anyone else interested in immigration reform is whether the president and congress will attempt to address comprehensive immigration reform this year. As reported in the Dallas Morning News, President Obama says he is still committed to reform, Here are excerpts from the article:
President Barack Obama on Thursday assured frustrated supporters of a promised overhaul of U.S. immigration laws that he remains committed to fixing a system he says is broken.
What remains unclear is whether Congress will send him a bill this year.
Obama said he told the senators and the advocacy groups that "my commitment to comprehensive immigration reform is unwavering, and that I will continue to be their partner in this important effort."
The immigration issue is an important one for Obama, who has promised to work to solve problems. Hispanics voted heavily for Obama in the 2008 presidential election, making the difference in key states like Florida, and their votes will be critical in the November midterm elections. Latino voters who don't think progress is being made on the issue may not go to the polls.
After meeting for more than an hour with Obama, immigration advocates told reporters they want Schumer and Graham to at least release their blueprint before a planned March 21 demonstration at the Capitol, with a bill introduced in the Senate soon after.
300 Immigrants with Criminal Records Arrested in Texas
Category: Immigration News
Nearly 300 illegal immigrants with criminal convictions were arrested last week in Texas, the Dallas Morning News reports. The largest number of arrests, 119, were in North Texas. According to the article:
Of the total, about half of the immigrants had convictions for violent crimes or drug offenses. Most of the crimes were committed in the United States, authorities said.
The arrests, though, raises questions about why the immigrants hadn’t been deported earlier, immediately after they'd served their time for criminal convictions.
A new program, called Secure Communities, seeks to link jail staff with federal data banks to ensure that those with criminal convictions are removed from the country. There are only 110 jail locations in the country that now use the program.
Secure Communities has come under scrutiny for the relatively low number of persons caught who have been convicted of violent crimes – or what’s known in ICE as a "level one" offense.
Carrollton, Farmers Branch, Irving, Mesquite and Dallas and Denton counties are among the jurisdictions using Secure Communities processes. The program began in November 2008.
K-3 Visa Processing
Category: Family-Based Immigration
Spouses of United States citizens may enter the U.S. with a non-immigrant K-3 visa while the immigrant visa petition is pending. It is important to note that the marriage must be valid in order to qualify and all previous marriages must be legally terminated. Thus, one will include either divorce or death documents (if applicable).
To obtain a K-3 visa, the U.S. citizen will file Form I-130 Petition for Alien Relative along with supporting documentation and the filing fee of $355. Once U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) receive Form I-130, USCIS will issue a receipt notice indicating that they received the petition. The U.S. citizen will thereafter file Form I-129F Petition for Alien Fiancé with USCIS and include the I-130 receipt notice, and other supporting documentation. There are no filing fees when filing Form I-129F in this second step.
If the Immigrant Petition (Form I-130) has not been decided, and Form I-129F has been approved by USCIS, the file will be sent to the National Visa Center (NVC). The NVC will process the K-3 visa petition and send the K-3 petition to the U.S. Embassy or Consulate where the marriage took place or visa applicant's country of nationality. The K-3 visa applicant will be instructed by the U.S. Embassy or Consulate of further administrative processing.
If both Form I-129F (K-3) and Form I-130 (Immigrant Relative petition) have been approved by USCIS and both petitions were received by the NVC, the NVC will process the immigrant visa petition since there is no need to process the K-3 visa.
Please call us at (214)999-9999 for further information on K-3 visas or other immigration related questions.
Judge Finds Grounds to Sanction Arizona Sheriff Arpaio
Category: Immigration News
The Associated Press is reporting that a "federal judge has found grounds for sanctioning an Arizona sheriff's office for its acknowledged destruction of records in a lawsuit that accuses deputies of racially profiling countless Hispanics in immigration patrols." Here is the beginning of the article:
U.S. District Judge Murray Snow held off on imposing the sanctions against the office of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio in the Friday ruling, but indicted he would do so at a later date once related issues were ironed out.
Since early 2008, Arpaio has run 13 immigration and crimes sweeps consisting of deputies and posse volunteers who flood an area of a city — in some cases heavily Latino areas — to seek out traffic violators and arrest other offenders.
The handful of Latinos who filed the lawsuit against Arpaio's office alleged that officers based some traffic stops on the race of Hispanics who were in vehicles, had no probable cause to pull them over and made the stops so they could inquire about their immigration status.
Take Your Passport If You Go To Mexico
Category: Immigration News
Beginning March 1, 2010, Mexico will require U.S. citizens to have valid passports when traveling to Mexico. Legal residents of the U.S. must have their green cards or other documents demonstrating legal status in the U.S.
This new rule by Mexican authorities shouldn't change travel habits, because it has been the law in the U.S. since June 2009 that U.S. travelers returning to this country from Mexico must show their passports.
Running Away From Immigration Reform
Category: Proposed Immigration Laws
Columnist Reuben Navarrette has spoken out about President Obama's near non-mention of immigration reform in the State of the Union speech. Navarrette is concerned that the president will not push for meaningful reform, but will simply work on increased enforcement, which is the one area that gets a consensus opinion. I'm taking the liberty of printing the full column because it's important to read it all.
Thirty-seven words. In this week's State of the Union address -- which was more than 7,000 words long and lasted longer than an hour -- all President Obama devoted to the issue of immigration reform was 37 measly words.
Here they are: "And we should continue the work of fixing our broken immigration system -- to secure our borders, enforce our laws and ensure that everyone who plays by the rules can contribute to our economy and enrich our nation."
It's disappointing that Obama didn't spend more time on this pressing issue -- but not surprising. Even though, elsewhere in the speech, Obama reminded Democrats in Congress that "the people expect us to solve problems, not run for the hills," this White House spent the first year in office running for the hills on immigration reform.
In fact, Obama's chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, once referred to the issue as the real "third rail" of American politics. You touch it, you die.
Every immigration reform advocate in the country -- including many Latinos -- should be disappointed in Obama. Many of them bought the fairy tale that a Democratic president would magically be more committed to immigration reform than a Republican one. And they expected Obama to make good on the promise he made, while addressing the annual meeting of the National Council of La Raza in July 2008 as a candidate, to treat comprehensive immigration reform as "a top priority in my first year as president."
That obviously didn't happen. And, regardless of what Obama's defenders say, it wasn't just because the president found other things to do. The truth is that immigration reform was always going to be an especially tough issue for Democrats since it splits the liberal coalition with Latinos on one side and organized labor on the other.
While many unions support giving illegal immigrants a shot at legal status, they balk at another element in the mix: guest workers, which organized labor claims would undermine U.S. workers who would -- even as we speak -- be happily doing the dirtiest and most dangerous jobs if foreign workers hadn't beaten them to it.
As for what Obama said in his speech, you'll notice that he was careful not to use hot-button phrases: "comprehensive immigration reform," "guest workers," "earned legalization." He was just as careful to emphasize positive phrases: "enforce our laws," "contribute to our economy," "enrich our nation."
Oh brother. Those 37 words must have been focus-grouped 100 times.
Next, Obama also played it safe by basically selling the rhetorical equivalent of mom, puppies and apple pie. By limiting his immigration remarks to feel-good generalities, the president decreased the likelihood of being attacked by opponents.
How does someone oppose "fixing our broken immigration system" or a call to "secure our borders"?
And finally, in going to bat for "everyone who plays by the rules," Obama can't very well be talking about illegal immigrants since they didn't play the rules to get here, stay here or work here. In fact, they are, by their very nature, rule breakers.
So either Obama is telegraphing that he won't be aggressively pursuing a path to earned legalization for illegal immigrants and will instead focus on the low-hanging fruit of enforcement only, or he is redefining what it means to "play by the rules," and what he means is that he aims to help those illegal immigrants who -- having broken the rules to get here -- might now be willing to adhere to a set of conditions to stay here.
There's a big difference between those two approaches, and only time will tell what the president is prepared to do to -- as he said -- fix a broken system.
Obama had it right the first time when he was campaigning for president. The answer is comprehensive immigration reform. "Enforcement only" won't work because it never does. It's just another way for lawmakers to take the easy way out, and -- as Obama said -- run for the hills.
Our elected officials need to grab the immigration issue whole with a comprehensive approach that includes:
• Guest workers to do jobs Americans won't do at any wage;
• A tamper-proof identification card for all U.S. workers to help employers know who is legally eligible to work;
• New employer sanctions that include stiffer fines and jail time for repeat offenders;
• A condition-laden pathway to earned legalization for illegal immigrants who have been in the United States since before 2005;
• More workplace raids and speedier deportations to deal with those who can't or won't meet those conditions;
• A revamping of the immigration system for legal immigrants so that we put more emphasis on the demands of the labor market and less on family reunification;
• A ban on welfare and other social aid programs for those legalized with the exception of emergency health care;
• And efforts to secure the border, not with walls to nowhere but with better and smarter technology that helps Border Patrol agents stay one step ahead in their ongoing battle of wits with immigrant smugglers.
Mr. President, there is no way to say all that in 37 words.
President Declares Ongoing Commitment to Immigration Reform
Category: Immigration News
Press release from the Immigration Policy Center:
January 27, 2010
Washington D.C. - In the State of the Union Address this evening President Obama made clear his ongoing commitment to immigration reform noting "we should continue the work of fixing our broken immigration system - to secure our borders, enforce our laws, and ensure that everyone who plays by the rules can contribute to our economy and enrich our nation." Some may continue to argue that immigration reform is too politically risky to move on this year and that we should focus instead on rebuilding our economy. However, comprehensive immigration reform is compatible with economic reform as it would generate needed economic growth, create jobs and increase tax contributions by ensuring that everyone working in the United States is doing so legally. In fact, immigration reform would allow us to take full advantage of the opportunities for economic growth that immigrants bring. <
- A 2007 report from the White House Council of Economic Advisers concluded that immigration as a whole increases the U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by roughly $37 billion each year because immigrants increase the size of the total labor force, complement the native-born workforce in terms of skills and education, and stimulate capital investment by adding workers to the labor pool.
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Immigrants do not compete with the majority of natives for the same jobs because they tend to have different levels of education and to work in different occupations. In fact, The roughly 90% of native-born workers with at least a high-school diploma experienced wage gains because of immigration between 1990 and 2004, ranging from 0.7% to 3.4% depending on their level of education, according to a 2006 study by Giovanni Peri, Associate Professor of Economics at the University of California-Davis.
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Immigrant entrepreneurs are twice as likely as Americans to start business and immigrant inventors account for more than one quarter of all U.S. patents according theKauffman Index of Entrepreneurial Activity, 2008.
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According to a 2010 study by UCLA professor Raul Hinojosa, comprehensive immigration reform that includes a legalization plan for the unauthorized would contribute a cumulative $1.5 trillion to the Gross Domestic Product over ten years, as more tax revenues are collected, wages increase for U.S.-born and legalized workers, and immigrant workers spend more in our economy. The report also finds that wages for immigrant and native-born workers would rise in part because workers will have more bargaining power in the workplace.
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The libertarian Cato Institute also reported that "legalization of low-skilled immigrant workers would yield significant income gains for American workers and households."