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2019 End of Year Report
Dear Friends and Supporters, 2019 was a groundbreaking year for New American Economy. We officially launched a new Arts & Culture program, added 16 communities to our State and Local work, bringing our total number of active communities to over 75 — 75 percent of which are in red and purple areas — released State […]
Read More3 Ways Our Immigration System Can Eliminate Barriers to Becoming a US Citizen
When people who immigrate to the United States are enabled to become U.S. citizens, everyone benefits. Citizenship allows people to have more stable lives by granting access to better work, housing, health care, and education. This leads to a stronger, safer, and more prosperous country for foreign- and native-born Americans alike. Yet the Trump administration […]
Read MoreFederal Court Orders Government to Recognize American Samoans as US Citizens
In a landmark decision last week, a federal court in Utah ordered the U.S. government to extend birthright citizenship to people born in the U.S. territory of American Samoa. In a lengthy decision, Judge Clark Waddoups declared that his decision was “required by the mandate of the Fourteenth Amendment as construed and applied by Supreme […]
Read MoreThousands in ICE Detention Sue Private Prison Company for Forced Labor
A recent federal court ruling in California could allow hundreds of thousands of immigrants currently and previously detained by private prison companies to demand compensation and damages for work completed behind bars under threat of retaliation. The decision follows a series of lawsuits filed against GEO Group, the largest private prison corporation in the United […]
Read MoreLaunch of Looking for America: Northwest Arkansas, part of a new dialogue and art initiative that is touring six dynamic U.S. cities
Looking for America: Northwest Arkansas is part of a new dialogue and art initiative that began in Detroit and toured four other cities across the United States before coming to Northwest Arkansas. The Looking for America tour is an effort to hear different perspectives on immigration in America through the lens of very different communities. […]
Read MoreUSCIS Announces Major Change to H-1B ‘Cap’ Filing With Electronic Registration
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) recently announced that U.S. employers will have to pay a $10 fee and register to have a chance at filing an H-1B petition subject to the statutory “cap” of 65,000 workers per fiscal year (FY). The annual “cap” filing also includes 20,000 additional visa numbers for foreign workers with […]
Read MoreDetention of Pregnant Women Increases 52% Under the Trump Administration
The rate at which U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detained pregnant women increased 52% during the first two years of the Trump administration, according to a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report released last week. 2,098 pregnant women were detained by ICE in 2018, compared to 1,380 in 2016. The increase aligns with a December […]
Read MoreUSCIS Plans Massive Fee Hike for Access to Genealogical Records
If you have ever wanted to trace your family’s immigration history, you should do it now—accessing genealogical records from the 1800s and 1900s may soon become far more expensive than ever before. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is planning to increase its fees to access millions of historical records held under the agency’s Genealogy […]
Read More‘Zero Tolerance’ Overwhelmed Courts and Diverted Resources From Criminal Investigations
Attorney General Sessions’ orders to prioritize prosecuting people for immigration-related offenses in 2017 and 2018 put a significant strain on law enforcement across the border, diverting resources away from drug and organized crime prosecutions. The increase in immigration prosecutions, which played a primary role in the family separation crisis, also led to overcrowded jails, backed […]
Read MoreThe Government Knew It Didn’t Have the Technology to Track Separated Families. It Did So Anyway.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)—the agency responsible for systematically separating thousands of migrant families in the summer of 2018—lacked the technology or mechanisms to record and track the separations, a government watchdog group recently found. Family separations—done under the Trump administration’s “Zero Tolerance policy”—started before the policy was even announced. The policy was first […]
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