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Reality at the U.S. Mexico Border
Washington D.C. – On Monday, the Immigration Policy Center (IPC) hosted a teleconference with border and national-security experts who dissected the myths linking immigration and border violence. These experts shared their analyses of the reality of crime and violence along the U.S.-Mexico border, what the real sources of violence are, and how the U.S. should […]
Read MoreMore Detention Abuse Highlights Need for Federal Oversight
Last week, the Associated Press reported that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is investigating allegations of sexual assault by a guard in one of their facilities on female detainees. The detainees, on their way to be deported, were groped while being patted down and at least one was propositioned for sex, according to ICE officials. […]
Read MoreThrowing Good Money After Bad: Immigration Enforcement
Immigration Enforcement without Immigration Reform Doesn’t Work
This week, the Senate will consider amendments to the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Bill that would add thousands of additional personnel along the border (including the National Guard), as well as provide millions of dollars for detention beds, technology, and resources. Yesterday, bowing to pressure, President Obama announced that he would send 1,200 National Guard troops to the border and request $500 million for additional resources. All of this attention on resources for the border ignores the fact that border enforcement alone is not going to resolve the underlying problems with our broken immigration system.
Arizona is Not the First State to Take Immigration Matters into their Own Hands
UPDATED 05/26/10 – Arizona’s controversial new immigration law (SB 1070) is the latest in a long line of efforts to regulate immigration at the state level. While the Grand Canyon State’s foray into immigration law is one of the most extreme and punitive, other states have also attempted to enforce federal law through state-specific measures and sanctions. Oklahoma and Georgia have passed measures, with mixed constitutional results, aimed at cracking down on illegal immigration through state enforcement. Legislators in 45 states introduced 1,180 bills and resolutions[i] in the first quarter of 2010 alone, compared to 570 in all of 2006. Not all state legislation relating to immigration is punitive—much of it falls within traditional state jurisdiction, such as legislation that attempts to improve high school graduation rates among immigrants or funds. The leap into federal enforcement, however, represents a disturbing trend fueled by the lack of comprehensive immigration reform at the federal level.
Read MoreHammering Out Future Immigration Flows: Immigration Commissions in Context
Today the Washington Post reported that Senate Democrats are working on a plan to create an immigration commission to help determine future levels of employment-based immigration as part of a comprehensive immigration reform bill. While some disagree as to how future immigration flows should be regulated, immigration advocates agree that planning for future flows of […]
Read MoreImmigration, Oil Spills and America’s Slippery Slope
It’s hard not to draw parallels between the two biggest stories in today’s headlines—a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and a punitive new immigration law in Arizona. While on some basic level most Americans care about the environment and immigration, it’s not until something really goes wrong that most people begin to […]
Read MoreNot All States Target Immigrants or the Slightly Suntanned
Despite the commotion around Arizona’s SB 1070, a recent report shows that more laws expanding immigrants’ rights are being enacted than those contracting them. The Wilson Center’s study, Context Matters: Latino Immigrant Civic Engagement in Nine U.S. Cities, found that in 2007, 19 percent of 313 bills expanding immigrant rights were enacted and only 11 […]
Read More‘Fox & Friends’ Trumpets Farcical Claim About Murders by Unauthorized Immigrants
The infotainment show Fox & Friends recently trumpeted the absurd and baseless claim that unauthorized immigrants kill 2,158 people in the United States each year. However, as Media Matters describes in detail, this random number is based on a 2005 article in the right-wing journal Human Events that uses a methodology no serious researcher could […]
Read MoreA Race to the Bottom: The Best of the Worst in Recent Anti-Immigrant Proposals
Just when you think you’ve heard it all—someone, somewhere, sets the bar even lower. It’s not an overstatement to say that the immigration debate is ripe with contention. It inspires commentary from a wide range of political spectra—from the libertarian no-border folks to the “don’t retreat, reload” tea partiers. But regardless of political leaning, nearly […]
Read MorePolls Show Americans Want Broken Immigration System Fixed
Two new public opinion polls reveal that the majority of the American public believes the U.S. immigration system is broken, and that fixing it should include the creation of a pathway to legal status for unauthorized immigrants already in the United States. The polls, conducted by the New York Times/CBS News and USA Today/Gallup, indicate […]
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