Splits Over Immigration Reform On Display From Coast to Coast
Via The Washington Post
PHILADELPHIA, July 5 — House and Senate Republicans sparred over
immigration in hearings on opposite coasts Wednesday, holding firm to
their starkly different viewpoints on what has become one of the most
intractable and divisive issues to confront the GOP in years.
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Bush toughens immigration stance
Via Yahoo News
WASHINGTON (AFP) – President George W. Bush is adopting a tougher line in the contentious debate on overhauling US immigration laws, putting an emphasis on border control and strict enforcement measures favored by his conservative base.
The new approach was evident as the US leader made an appearance Wednesday at a coffee shop in Alexandria, Virginia, touting enforcement measures meant to catch illegal immigrants when they try to apply for work.
“Part of a comprehensive immigration plan is to give employers the tools necessary to determine whether or not the workers they’re looking for are here legally in America,” the US president said, flanked by immigrant workers from Iran, Guatemala and El Salvador.
“Part of a comprehensive immigration plan is to make sure … that we uphold our laws and say to employers, ‘It’s against the law for you to hire somebody here illegally. We intend to find you when we catch you doing it,'” the president said.
But Bush also stressed the importance of making it easier for employers to legally hire foreign-born workers “for jobs Americans aren’t doing.”
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US immigration hearings to begin
Via BBC News
Republicans are set to open a series of public hearings around the US on the controversial issue of immigration.
Republicans in the House of Representatives are seeking approval for the House’s tough immigration bill in a hearing in San Diego.
But Republican senators have set up their own session in Philadelphia to back a more liberal Senate proposal.
The issue has divided the party, with President George Bush’s vision initially closer to that of the Senate.
However, reports suggest the president is now moving closer to the conservative line.
The decision by Republican House leaders to call public hearings on the issue was seen by many as a serious setback for the president, who has been trying to see a bill passed ahead of mid-term elections in November.
The House and Senate have passed their own contrasting immigration bills, but work to reconcile the two bills is now delayed until the hearings are over.
Both bills seek to tighten border security, but while the Senate bill includes a guest-worker programme and offers illegal immigrants a “path to citizenship”, the House’s “enforcement-only” bill seeks to deport illegal immigrants and make it a felony to remain in the US illegally.
Democrats have dismissed the hearings as political theatre.
Terrorism
Wednesday’s first hearing will take place at a San Diego Border Patrol station.
Reports suggest Republicans will use the hearing to highlight the dangers of terrorists getting across the border and to assess improvements in border security since 11 September 2001.
“My mission is to investigate our border security shortcomings post-9/11,” said Ed Royce, a California Republican and chairman of the House’s International Relations subcommittee on International Terrorism and Non-proliferation which is behind the hearings.
“The problem is that border security has become national security.”
Another hearing will take place in Laredo, Texas on Friday, and reports suggest Arizona will also host one of the hearings.
Meanwhile, senators have organised their own hearing in Philadelphia on Wednesday to defend the broad scope of the Senate immigration bill.
The hearing will “develop a broader, factual, evidentiary record on the need for the comprehensive bill, which is challenged by quite a number of House members”, said the host of the meeting, Sen Arlen Specter – himself a Pennsylvania Republican.
But the New York Times newspaper reports that President Bush, whose stance on immigration initially appeared to correspond more closely with the Senate bill, is moving closer to a compromise with conservatives on immigration.
It quotes Candi Wolff, White House director of legislative affairs, as saying Mr Bush is considering “triggers” on the immigration bill.
This refers to the idea that the guest-worker and “path to citizenship” schemes which Mr Bush has publicly backed could be introduced only once border-security targets have been met.
This “enforcement-first” approach would bring Mr Bush much closer to the “enforcement-only” measures demanded by his Republican colleagues in the House.
Bloomberg: Economy relies on illegal immigrants
Via CNN.com
PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania (AP) — The economy of the country’s largest city and the entire nation would collapse if illegal immigrants were deported en masse, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg told a Senate committee hearing Wednesday.
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Border agents under investigation vanish
Via Yahoo News
SAN DIEGO – Two U.S. Border Patrol agents under investigation for smuggling migrants and drugs into the United States have disappeared, a federal law enforcement official said Friday.
Authorities fear the agents, who are brothers, were tipped off to the probe and fled, perhaps to Mexico, according to the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case.
The investigation was led by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Homeland Security Department’s Office of the Inspector General.
The Los Angeles Times reported on its Web site late Friday that Border Patrol spokesman Damon Foreman identified the agents as Raul and Fidel Villarreal. Foreman said they were under investigation for suspected smuggling activity and resigned.
Border Patrol spokesman Richard Kite said he could not discuss criminal probes when he was asked if the Villarreals were under investigation. Michael Unzueta, special agent in charge of ICE investigations in San Diego, confirmed the investigation and said no arrests have been made.
The agents were suspected of working for Mexican-based organizations to smuggle Mexicans and Brazilians into the United States, the source said. They allegedly picked up migrants who crossed the border on their own while they were on patrol and took them to a driver.
The brothers didn’t show up for work Monday and later told supervisors they were quitting because of a family illness, the source said.
The Times said the Villarreals did not respond to a request for comment. A woman who identified herself as their mother at their home in National City said she did not know when they would return.
The investigation comes less than a month after two customs officers at San Diego border crossings were charged with waiving cars loaded with illegal immigrants in exchange for cash.
Skilled immigrants wait on Congress
Via Yahoo.com
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The latest fights over immigration have focused on
who should get a place in line for a legal life in the United States.
But the real agony, says Tien Bui, comes when you finally get in line.
Bui, who came to the U.S. as a Vietnamese refugee and is now an
engineer for Boeing Co., can’t take the career-boosting position he’s
been offered because his citizenship application is lodged somewhere
inside the Department of
Homeland Security.
With green card in hand, Bui has waited patiently since 2003 for his
fingerprints to clear background checks, a process that’s become more
involved since Sept. 11.
But if Congress approves a new guest worker program, the overall
waiting period for Bui and the millions of legal immigrants like him
could grow even longer, says a report by the
Government Accountability Office.
President Bush
mandated that by September of this year, the immigration backlog should
be eliminated and DHS should start processing all cases in six months
or less, a deadline the agency is optimistic it can meet.
But a spider web of agencies — including the
Department of Labor,
the Department of State and the Federal Bureau of Investigation — is
also involved in evaluating and approving legal immigration
applications.
If there are more petitions to process, the overall delays could
increase, experts say. At DHS alone, some skilled foreign workers must
wait five years to apply for a green card, something American
engineering companies say is harming their competitive edge.
“I truly think if Albert Einstein were in my office in 2006, he
would be saying ‘I’m going to Canada rather than wait any longer,'”
said Judy Bourdeau, a Kansas City immigration attorney who is filing
employment petitions for several Fortune 500 companies.
‘H-1B Only’ Job Ad Posters Accused of Discrimination
Via eWeek.com
June 20, 2006
The Programmers Guild, an IT worker interest group, has filed 300
discrimination complaints so far this year against companies alleged to
have posted “H-1B visa holders only” ads on job boards.
“Abuse of the H-1B program has become so widespread that
companies apparently feel free to engage openly in the practice. And we
are only reviewing ads for computer programmers,” Programmers Guild
founder John Miano said in a statement June 19.
The actions have been filed with the U.S. Department of
Justice, Office of Special Council for Immigration-Related
discrimination, contending that specific employers have created
“Americans need not apply” job postings on both Monster.com and
Dice.com.
These job ads are accused of disregarding the Immigration and
Nationality Act, which makes it illegal to discriminate against U.S.
workers on the basis of immigration status.
Miano cites examples from postings on Dice.com and Monster.com
in a release, with lines such as “We require candidates for H1B from
India” and “We sponsor GC [green card] and we do prefer H1B holders.”
Several of the ads included free training and interview preparation,
according to the complaint, while others included more flagrantly
illegal maneuvers.
“We have postings for arrangements where the ’employee’ finds
his own work and the ’employer’ takes a cut of the earnings. Many
‘high-tech companies’ obtaining H-1B visas operate out of apartments
and Mailboxes Etc.,” said Miano.
Miano said he considers the offers to teach foreigners particularly offensive in light of the fact that nearly half the money collected from H-1B visa fees is given to training programs to bring U.S. workers’ skills up to speed.
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service announced June 1 that the 65,000 H-1B visa supply has been exhausted for the 2007 fiscal year, four months before new ones would be made available.
This news came on the heels of the U.S. Senate passing the immigration reform bill May 25, which included a provision to raise the H-1B visa cap to 115,000 from 65,000.
H-1B Cap Count as of 6/20/2006
|
Cap |
Beneficiaries Approved |
Beneficiaries Pending |
Beneficiary Target 1 |
Total |
Date of Last Count |
|
|
H-1B |
58,200 2 |
—— |
—— |
—— |
Cap Reached |
5/26/2006 |
|
H-1B Advanced Degree Exemption |
20,000 |
3,311 |
6,950 |
21,000 |
10,261 |
6/20/20063 |
|
H-1B (FY 06) |
58,200 |
—— |
—— |
—— |
Cap Reached |
8/10/2005 |
|
H-1B Advanced Degree Exemption (FY 06) |
20,000 |
—— |
—— |
—— |
Cap Reached |
1/17/2006 |
1
Refers to the estimated numbers of beneficiary applications needed to
reach the cap, with an allowance for denials and revocations. Each
target is subject to revision later in the cap cycle as more petitions
are processed.
2 6,800
visas are set aside during the fiscal year for the H-1B1 program under
the terms of the legislation implementing the U.S.-Chile and
U.S.-Singapore Free Trade Agreements. Unused numbers in this pool can
be made available for H-1B use with start dates beginning on October 1,
2006, the start of FY 2007. USCIS has added the projected number of
unused H-1B1 Chile/Singapore visas to the FY 2007 H-1B cap as announced
in the H-1B Press Release, dated June 1, 2006.
3
The numbers on the chart for H-1B Advanced Degree Exemption include
only receipted petitions. As of 6/20/06, USCIS has identified 500 I-129
H-1B petitions seeking the Advanced Degree exemption and another 1,800
I-129 petitions yet to be sorted.
Jeff City girl wins reprieve
Immigrant student facing deportation
WASHINGTON (AP) – A Missouri college student who waged a highly
publicized campaign to fight her deportation to Costa Rica has received
another extension of her stay in the United States.
Marie Gonzalez can remain in the country for one more year under the
decision reached by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, agency
spokesman Dean Boyd said yesterday.
The 20-year-old student won a similar reprieve last year, but that would have expired on July 1.
“It’s been a crazy day,” Gonzalez said in a telephone interview. “I haven’t really had a chance to let it sink in.”
Gonzalez said she called her parents in Costa Rica immediately after hearing the news yesterday morning.
“Dad and I both cried on the phone together,” she said. “We were both overwhelmed. This is what they wanted to hear.”
Gonzalez was born in Costa Rica but has lived in Jefferson City since
she was 5. Her parents, who entered the country in 1991 on six-month
visitor visas, say they misunderstood legal advice and missed their
chance to apply for permanent status.
Gonzalez’s father, Marvin, was working in Gov. Bob Holden’s office as a
courier and mail opener when he was fired in 2002 after an anonymous
tip about his status. Gonzalez’s parents were both deported to Costa
Rica in 2005.
After a nationwide publicity campaign last year – and personal appeals
for her from Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., and
other high-profile lawmakers – immigration officials granted Marie
Gonzalez a one-year deferment.
U.S. immigration crackdown could drain fire crews
Latinos on lines: Contractors rely on immigrants
AUMSVILLE, Ore. – Rosario Franco
and many in his family have fought wildfires across the West for years.
His brother and cousin are both firefighters. His father is a
contractor for fire crews.
Across the country, a growing number of Hispanics are taking on
the hot, dangerous and dirty work because the demand is high in season
and it usually pays better than farm work.
Many – nobody knows how many – are undocumented, a problem Franco claims does not concern him.
”I think our crews are legal,” he said at his home in this
Willamette Valley town. ”My job is to do my job and that’s what I
do.”
Nevertheless, it is clear Hispanics dominate many wildland fire crews.
Debby Miley, executive director of the National Wildfire
Suppression Association, an umbrella organization for fire crew
contractors, said 75 percent of the contract crews in the United States
come from the Pacific Northwest.
And Oregon Department of Forestry spokesman Rod Nichols said
about 85 percent of the crews in Washington and Oregon are Hispanic.
His office administers firefighting contracts with private companies
for the two states.
It is not the same everywhere. The South Dakota-based
International Association of Wildland Fires says the Hispanic
percentage in Northwest crews is generally considered to be well above
the national average; the Forest Service region covering California and
Hawaii is under a federal consent decree to bring its Hispanic
participation in fire crews up to about 31.5 percent, from about 10
percent now.
US immigration bill rattles Aussies
Via DNAIndia.com
06/19/2006
MELBOURNE:
Australia’s problem of skill workers shortage would take another blow
if the US proposal to increase the migrant intake is implemented,
experts have warned. Australian policy makers and experts have
expressed fears that the US would lure away the best of the skilled
workforce away from the South Pacific country.
The US Senate has recently passed a Bill to increase annual
employment-based migration from 140,000 to a whopping 650,000. If the
proposals are approved by the US lower house, the maximum limit on the
high-skilled H1-B working visas would jump from 65,000 a year to
115,000. This would direct skilled migrants’ movement away from
countries like Australia.
The booming Australian economy is feeling the skills crunch as the
insatiable Chinese demand for its resources is not showing any sign of
petering out in the near future. Indian demand for Australian
resources is also on the rise and would ensure the Australian
economic prosperity for years to come. The Senate Bill to increase the
migrant intake reportedly also includes proposal to allow
international students in the US to be given work and residency rights
after they complete their studies.
These proposals have alarmed Bob Birrell, Director of the Centre for Population and Urban Research at Monash University here.
“There’s already significant competition for skilled migrants,
especially persons who have work experience in skills relevant to an
advanced economy like that of Australia or the United States,” Dr
Birrell told The Age newspaper recently. “There’s already a problem and
if the US upped its level to 600,000, then it would make it
considerably more difficult,” he said. The Age newspaper has also
quoted an American expert in stressing the point that Australian and
the US skill shortage is bound to come worse as the traditional
sources of skilled migrants like India are also keeping their
brightest at home.
“The situation in India has radically changed. It is no longer a
must that to be successful you have to leave India,” the American
expert was quoted as saying.
U.S. said helpless in hiring of aliens
Via The Washington Post
06/19/2006
The federal government is not capable of helping employers determine
whether workers in the U.S. are illegal aliens, a government official
will testify before a Senate subcommittee this afternoon.
Richard M. Stana, director of homeland security and justice
for the Government Accountability Office, said that two decades after
Congress ordered the government to create a program to prevent the
hiring of illegals, such a program still doesn’t exist.
Immigration specialists have “found that the single most
important step that could be taken to reduce unlawful immigration is
the development of a more effective system for verifying work
authorization,” Mr. Stana said in prepared testimony obtained by The
Washington Times.
US cut back on illegal-worker penalties
Via The Boston Globe
Data indicate lax enforcement against employers
WASHINGTON — The Bush administration, which is vowing to crack down
on US companies that hire illegal immigrants, virtually abandoned such
employer sanctions before it began pushing to overhaul US immigration
laws last year, government figures show.
In light of the government’s record, analysts on all sides of the
debate are expressing doubt the administration will be able to remove
the American job magnet that attracts illegal immigrants.
Between 1999 and 2003, worksite enforcement operations were scaled
back 95 percent by the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which
subsequently was merged into the Homeland Security Department. The
number of employers prosecuted for unlawfully employing immigrants
dropped from 182 to four, and fines collected declined from $3.6
million to $212,000, according to federal data. In 1999, the United
States initiated fines against 417 companies. In 2004, it issued fine
notices to three.
The government’s steady retreat from workplace enforcement in the 20
years since it became illegal to hire undocumented workers is the
result of fierce political pressure from business lobbies, immigrant
rights groups, and members of Congress, according to law enforcement
veterans.
The U.S. Immigration Law Blog by Ashwin Sharma 