Immigration Reform
A Long Journey to the Voting Booth
For some people, this year’s journey to the voting booth started years ago, in El Salvador or China or Cameroon, when it became clear that they had to leave their country and start over in America. For those people, (whom U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services calls “Americans by choice,”) the journey to the polls has involved hardship, struggle, hundreds of hours learning English and civics, and studying for the naturalization test. They bring not only their vote to the polls, but a reminder to all of us that our precious democracy can only succeed when we believe in this country enough to take the time to vote. Read More
Nativist Group Releases Hopelessly Flawed Report on Immigrants and Job Creation
By Patrick Oakford, Research Assistant for the Economic Policy Team at the Center for American Progress. Last week the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) released a shocking report claiming that most new jobs created under President Obama have gone to immigrants. Aside from the sheer incorrectness of the claim, being founded on flawed methodologies, CIS perpetuates a hateful “us versus them” discourse at a time when we should be focused on creating more and longer-lasting jobs. Read More
Immigrant Workers Likely to Play Big Role in Post-Sandy Reconstruction
Hurricane Sandy may be gone, but the monumental task of reconstruction remains. In New Jersey and New York in particular, thousands of workers will be needed to rebuild or restore roads, homes, and office buildings damaged or destroyed by the storm. If history is any guide, many of those workers will be immigrants, and many of those immigrants will be unauthorized. Ironically, as they play an outsized role in reconstruction after a natural disaster, immigrant workers will be especially vulnerable to abuse and exploitation by unscrupulous employers. As a result, federal and state officials must be vigilant in ensuring that labor laws are vigorously enforced to protect all workers involved in post-Sandy reconstruction efforts. Read More
Immigrant from Nepal Named U.S. Army’s Soldier of the Year
Immigrants have served with honor in the U.S. armed forces since the Revolutionary War. But in what is believed to be a first, the Army has crowned as its top soldier and an enlistee who was not a U.S. citizen at birth. Read More
Could DACA Have Happened Without Public Engagement at USCIS?
Approximately two months after the program opened, nearly 200,000 individuals have submitted requests for grants under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) imitative. It’s still too early to assess the overall success of the program or evaluate the grant rates, but it isn’t too early to take note of the important role that preparation played in making DACA a reality. Read More
Immigrants Play Key Role in Virginia’s Economy
Recent state-level immigration battles are often characterized by a great deal of negative attention and not enough positive information about immigrants living in those states. Unfounded claims about the costs of immigration overlook the benefits and contributions immigrants make to American communities. Fortunately, some organizations are dedicated to pushing back on the negativity and publishing accurate data about the role immigrants play in state economies. Read More
A Growing Consensus on Supporting Immigration Reform
Immigration reform is not a “liberal” cause; it is a common-sense cause that appeals to people from a variety of political persuasions. More than a few conservative intellectuals, commentators, politicians, religious leaders, and law-enforcement officials favor revamping the U.S. immigration system to make it more responsive to the economic demands, social realities, and security concerns of the 21st century. This stance represents not only compassion, but enlightened self-interest. A growing body of evidence has quantified the enormous contributions that immigrants make to the U.S. economy through their labor, entrepreneurship, buying power, and innovation. Moreover, demographic trends point clearly to the growing electoral power of naturalized immigrants and to the native-born children of immigrants. In other words, being anti-immigrant in this day and age is self-destructive from both an economic and a political standpoint. Read More
Immigration (Finally) Takes the Stage at a Presidential Debate
George W. Bush made several appearances in last night’s presidential debate, but perhaps nowhere with greater effect than when President Obama contrasted Governor Mitt Romney’s position on immigration reform. Where President Bush supported comprehensive immigration reform, declared President Obama, Governor Romney supports “self-deportation” and Arizona style anti-immigrant laws. Moderator Candy Crowley then segued into a direct immigration question from an undecided voter about Romney’s plans for dealing with the 11 million undocumented immigrants living in our nation. The next few minutes revealed a great deal about both candidates’ positions on the immigration question, but perhaps more importantly, the points where the candidates challenged each other suggest that both parties recognize they must begin talking about immigration in new ways. Read More
Pace of DACA Approvals Quickens, but Will it be Fast Enough?
For the first time since immigration authorities officially launched Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals in mid-August, the federal government released statistics last Friday indicating that thousands of requests have been officially granted. But while the figures themselves are an encouraging sign, other evidence suggests that most applicants will not have their requests considered until after the next presidential inauguration in January, if at all. Read More
California Passes Groundbreaking Legislation to Prevent “Shattered Families”
By Yali Lincroft, Policy Consultant, First Focus Campaign for Children. Late last month, California Governor Jerry Brown signed into law two bills – AB2015 and SB1064 - which address the nightmare scenarios that can befall parents and their children caught up in the immigration system. The recent report Shattered Families: The Perilous Intersection of Immigrant Enforcement and the Child Welfare System describes the issue in detail including the “extent to which children in foster care are prevented from uniting with their detained or deported parents and the failures of the child welfare system to adequately work to reunify these families.” Read More
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