Enforcement
UNC Report Confirms Police Immigration Enforcement Misses Target
A new report from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the North Carolina ACLU examines the 287(g) partnership between DHS and local police in North Carolina. The 287(g) program--in which DHS and local police enter into Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs) allowing local police to act as immigration officers in the course of their daily activities -- has grown by leaps and bounds over the last several years, and North Carolina is home to eight of the 60 current MOUs with the federal government. At least 20 additional NC law enforcement agencies have requested MOUs. Read More
Pew Report Shows: “Deportation Only” Immigration Approach Undermines Courts
A new report from the Pew Hispanic Center illustrates the degree to which the U.S. government is wasting money and manpower on the pursuit and punishment of undocumented immigrants who are non-violent and pose no threat to public safety or national security. According to the data in the Pew report, the federal government's ever-intensifying (and unsuccessful) effort since the early 1990s to stop undocumented immigration through deportation-only policies has flooded the federal courts with immigrants from south of the border who are charged only with unlawfully entering or remaining in the United States. Even though "unlawful presence" and "entry without inspection" are usually civil and not criminal offenses, all violations of immigration law automatically fall under federal jurisdiction and are therefore channeled into the federal courts. Read More
Napolitano Outlines DHS Immigration Policies on NPR
In an interview yesterday with NPR's Day to Day host, Madeleine Brand, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano thoughtfully outlined the department's immigration priorities. DHS was recently scrutinized in a report by the Migration Policy Institute (MPI) assessing DHS's past performance under the Bush administration and offering "recommendations for policy and operational changes." Read More
Communities Across the Nation Rethink Hard-Line Immigration Laws
Amidst a deep economic recession and a growing climate of fear and alienation within immigrant communities, many states, cities and counties that "plunged into the immigration debate are having second thoughts," reports USA Today. In states like Texas, Alabama and elsewhere, hard-line immigration legislation has been repealed or modified by lawmakers that have come to terms with the fact that the time and expense associated with implementing such policies has made their anti-immigrant position less popular among their constituents. In Iowa and Utah, legislators are proposing similar reversals. Accusations of racism and a surge in anti-immigrant hate crimes are also cited by USA Today as reasons for the about face. Read More
Steele Rewords, not Redefines GOP’s Immigration Stance
New RNC Chairman, Michael Steele declared in his acceptance speech that it's "time for something completely different." Yet when it comes to immigration, Steele is side-stepping pragmatic politics and choosing to stick with the same hard-line position that soured Latino and immigrant voters and contributed to the GOP's devastating losses this past election year. When pressed by Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace, who asked Steele if the GOP needs to change its position on immigration reform and reach out to Hispanics and let them know that they have a home in the Republican Party, Steele replied: Read More
ICE’s Costly Net Catches Non-Fugitives, Misses Violent Criminals
The Bush Administration's increased interior enforcement measures were originally billed as necessary for national security and public safety. But it appears that very few terrorists or violent criminals have been caught. A new report by the Migration Policy Institute entitled "Collateral Damage: An Examination of ICE's Fugitive Operations Program" finds that as their budget multiplies and the number of immigrants apprehended increases, ICE is netting fewer and fewer violent criminals and arresting more and more undocumented immigrants with no criminal history. Read More
Unemployed Americans Are Just Collateral Damage in War on Immigrants
It would seem that the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) and the Heritage Foundation regard unemployed Americans as little more than collateral damage in their endless war against immigrants. Both groups have concocted a new and predictably anti-immigrant argument against passage of the economic stimulus bill now under consideration in the U.S. Senate, which is intended to save or create jobs for millions of unemployed and soon-to-be-unemployed Americans. According to CIS and the Heritage Foundation, the fatal flaw of this bill is that some of the jobs it creates, especially in the construction industry, might end up in the hands of undocumented immigrants. Apparently, this is reason enough to delay passage of the bill until it is modified to require unemployed Americans to jump through hoops in order to prove that they are entitled to work in the United States. Read More
Sheriff Joe Arpaio Stages Immigrant-Degradation March for the Cameras
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Phoenix, Arizona, seems to have an appetite for publicity so insatiable that it overrides both rationality and morality. His latest stunt—announced yesterday in an official press release, no less—comes today, when he will order "approximately 200 illegal aliens to be chained and marched" from the Durango Jail to a segregated area of his "Tent City" incarceration complex. Lest one be fooled into believing that this is a legitimate law-enforcement operation, Arpaio's press release includes details on the parade route and where "interested media" should park to cover this spectacle of degradation. According to Arpaio, marching chained immigrants from prison cells to tents surrounded by electric fencing will save money because it's cheaper to house inmates in tents than in a traditional jail. However, Maricopa County Supervisor Mary Rose Wilcox notes that Arpaio "doesn't outline how he'll save costs." Acting County Manager Sandi Wilson says that if Arpaio is "coming up with budget savings, he ought to offer it up. At this point, he hasn't. And this doesn't make any sense to me." Read More
Candidate for RNC Chair Chip Saltsman Stirs Controversy with “Star Spanglish Banner”
At a time when the GOP should be warming up to key Latino and immigrant voting blocs, Chip Saltsman-candidate for the next chair of the Republican National Committee (RNC)-chose to ring in the New Year with a song called "The Star Spanglish Banner." Saltsman, who is also known as the former head of the Tennessee Republican Party who managed the Mike Huckabee campaign, included the song on his controversial holiday CD that he sent to RNC members as a Christmas gift. The story-which NDN's Melissa Merz officially broke-exposes yet another example of the xenophobic and bigoted rhetoric put forth by reckless public figures that has fueled rising hate crimes and violence against Latinos. Today's Huffington Post's head-lining article, "Star Spanglish Banner: RNC Candidate Chip Saltsman Causes Immigration Stir," described the song as: Read More
Gov. Paterson Stuns Immigrant Community With Gillibrand Senate Pick
The State of New York has, throughout its history, been both a haven and a hotbed for immigrants and diversity. That's why New York State Governor David Paterson's decision to pick Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) to replace Hillary Rodham Clinton as U.S. Senator raises deep concern among immigrants and advocates in the state and across the country. Read More
All gifts are matched dollar for dollar
No one should face the immigration system alone
