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Agency Urges USCIS to Streamline “Deferred Action” Process
In a new report issued this week, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services’s (USCIS) Ombudsman’s office called on USCIS to create a standardized procedure for accepting and tracking requests for deferred action made to the agency. The timing of this report, following ICE’s memos on prosecutorial discretion last month, further reinforces the importance of […]
Read MoreThe Cost of Doing Anti-Immigrant Business: Russell Pearce to Face Recall Election
While the authors and proponents of state level anti-immigrant legislation received some measure of notoriety initially, one could also predict that there would be a corresponding price to pay for pursuing such costly and divisive immigration measures. Aside from the immediate lawsuits filed in nearly every state that passed Arizona copycats, there are now additional […]
Read MoreACLU, Civil Rights Groups File Suit Against Alabama’s Immigration Law
More than just stars fell on Alabama last week when civil rights groups filed a class action lawsuit against the state’s restrictive immigration law, HB 56, charging that the law unconstitutionally interferes with federal law and will lead to racial profiling. Filed on Friday, the lawsuit makes Alabama the fifth state (joining Arizona, Utah, Indiana […]
Read MoreWhat Does Record Low Migration From Mexico Mean for Immigration Reform?
In what could be an historic event, the number of unauthorized immigrants coming from Mexico to the United States has fallen drastically in recent years—dropping from 525,000 annually in 2000-2004 to fewer than 100,000 in 2010. In fact, unauthorized immigration from Mexico has dropped to a net rate of zero—meaning that the number of new […]
Read MoreOregon Business Community Latest to Join Fight Against National E-Verify Bill
This week, business and agricultural communities across the U.S. continued the fight against mandatory E-verify, an electronic verification system requiring employers to use a federal database to verify the immigration status of employees. Over the weekend, thousands of protestors marched on Georgia’s state capitol to protest HB 87—a bill which contains mandatory E-Verify—adding their voice […]
Read MoreRestrictive Immigration Law Continues to Threaten Georgia’s Farming Industry
Just days after part of Georgia’s immigration law, HB 87, went into effect, farmers in the Peach State are panicking over how they will find enough workers to harvest their crops—some of which are already starting to spoil. Although a federal judge granted a preliminary injunction enjoining two key provisions of HB 87 last month, […]
Read MoreThe Difference between E-Verify in a Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill and E-Verify Alone
Last month, Rep. Lamar Smith introduced the “Legal Workforce Act of 2011” (H.R. 2164), a bill which would make the E-Verify system mandatory for all employers within three years. While the Smith bill version of mandatory E-Verify has been criticized for snagging U.S. citizens and legal workers, burdening employers with additional costs and not actually […]
Read MoreWhy Morton’s Memo is the Best Road Map on Prosecutorial Discretion Yet
BY DAVID LEOPOLD, ESQ., AILA IMMEDIATE PAST PRESIDENT The memorandum on prosecutorial discretion recently issued by ICE Director John Morton is hardly a substitute for a full fix to our broken immigration system. That’s Congress’s job. But once implemented, the memo will allow ICE agents and trial attorneys to focus limited law enforcement resources on […]
Read MoreNew Data Shows Government Still Prioritizing Immigration Prosecutions over Dangerous Crime
Two recent reports by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), a research center out of Syracuse University, confirm that the federal government is prioritizing immigration enforcement over potentially far more dangerous activities, such as gun smuggling. While prosecutions for illegal re-entry are up in criminal courts, prosecutions for weapons-related offenses are down in the last […]
Read MoreSouth Carolina Governor Signs $1.3 Million Immigration Enforcement Law
This week, on the same day that a federal judge enjoined key provisions of Georgia’s immigration law, South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley signed an Arizona-style immigration bill into law. To date, federal judges in four states (Arizona, Utah, Indiana and Georgia) have blocked key provisions of their Arizona-inspired immigration laws, arguing that these laws unlawfully […]
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