Migrants with no medical insurance 'won't get NHS care': British Minister's tough stance on new influx from the East
Migrants from Romania and Bulgaria who travel to Britain without a job are to be told they must have private medical insurance to prevent the NHS becoming an ‘international health service’.
Immigration minister Mark Harper told the Daily Mail that limiting access to free healthcare is seen as key to preventing a fresh influx of migrants when controls are lifted at the end of this year.
He suggested the requirement for medical insurance would apply to all student incomers and those who claim they are ‘self-sufficient’, meaning they are not coming looking immediately for work.
Ministers are also examining incomers’ rights to benefits and other public services. Other measures under discussion include requiring migrants to leave Britain if they fail to secure a job after three months – or cannot prove they have sufficient funds to support themselves for at least six months.
Transitional arrangements in place since 2005, which restrict the rights of 29million Bulgarian and Romanian citizens to live and work in other EU states, will expire on January 1. No official figure has been put on the anticipated number of arrivals, but Tory MPs warn there must be no repeat of the situation when Poland joined the EU and Labour catastrophically underestimated the numbers that would come.
A significant influx of immigrants from the two former Communist regimes could derail the Conservatives’ testing target of reducing net immigration to under 100,000 by 2015.
Campaign group MigrationWatch has claimed as many as 250,000 people could arrive in the UK from Romania and Bulgaria over the next five years, though ministers do not believe there will necessarily be an influx of that size since other EU countries are lifting restrictions at the same time.
Mr Harper, who is chairing a new cross-Government committee examining measures to deter incomers who would be a burden, said: ‘We are all clear we need an immigration system that works in the national interest. That is why we are bringing together colleagues from other departments to address the pull factors that drive immigration to the UK.
‘European nationals do not have unrestricted access to the UK – they must be exercising their treaty rights. This means they must be working, studying or self-sufficient. We already have tough rules on access to benefits; we need to see if there is more we can do to tighten them up.
‘In addition, EU students and those that are self-sufficient should not be a burden on the host member state, which means they should have things like health insurance. We have a National Health Service, not an international health service.’
It is unclear how the proposals would work in practice but it is likely NHS staff would be asked to check healthcare entitlements when migrants first came into contact with the NHS.
But restrictions on access to free healthcare are likely to run into opposition from some doctors, who resent the idea they should act as another branch of the immigration service.
Ministers insist Britain must have the right to address ‘pull factors’ that are blamed for attracting jobless migrants from the EU. Areas being looked at include healthcare, education, housing and benefits.
The NHS has written off debts of at least £35million incurred by foreign national patients since 2002.
As well as restrictions on students and non-working migrants from the EU, ministers are understood to be considering making non-EU migrants have health insurance before being granted a visa.
Downing Street said the Government was determined to prevent potential damage to the labour market from a fresh influx of migrants, but acknowledged Britain will have to operate within EU rules on the right to free movement. The Government is also examining the idea of an ad campaign telling potential migrants in Romania and Bulgaria that British streets are not necessarily ‘paved with gold’.
SOURCE
Key senators agree on immigration reform
A bipartisan group of leading senators has reached agreement on the principles of sweeping legislation to rewrite the nation's immigration laws.
The deal, which was to be announced at a news conference Monday afternoon, covers border security, guest workers and employer verification, as well as a path to citizenship for the 11 million illegal immigrants already in the United States.
Although thorny details remain to be negotiated and success is far from certain, the development heralds the start of what could be the most significant effort in years toward overhauling the nation's inefficient patchwork of immigration laws.
President Obama also is committed to enacting comprehensive immigration legislation and will travel to Nevada on Tuesday to lay out his vision, which is expected to overlap in important ways with the Senate effort.
The eight senators expected to endorse the new principles Monday are Democrats Charles Schumer of New York, Dick Durbin of Illinois, Robert Menendez of New Jersey and Michael Bennet of Colorado; and Republicans John McCain of Arizona, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Marco Rubio of Florida and Jeff Flake of Arizona.
In a statement, White House Deputy Press Secretary Josh Earnest said, "As the President has made clear for some time, immigration reform is an important priority and he is pleased that progress is being made with bipartisan support. At the same time, he will not be satisfied until there is meaningful reform and he will continue to urge Congress to act until that is achieved. The President looks forward to redoubling the administration's efforts to work with Congress on this important issue this week."
Several of these lawmakers have worked for years on the issue. McCain collaborated with the late Democratic Sen. Edward M. Kennedy on comprehensive immigration legislation pushed by then-President George W. Bush in 2007, only to see it collapse in the Senate when it couldn't get enough GOP support.
Now, with some Republicans chastened by the November elections which demonstrated the importance of Latino voters and their increasing commitment to Democrats, some in the GOP say this time will be different.
"What's changed, honestly, is that there is a new, I think, appreciation on both sides of the aisle -- including maybe more importantly on the Republican side of the aisle -- that we have to enact a comprehensive immigration reform bill," McCain said Sunday on ABC's "This Week."
"I think the time is right," McCain said.
The group claims a notable newcomer in Rubio, a potential 2016 presidential candidate whose conservative bona fides may help smooth the way for support among conservatives wary of anything that smacks of amnesty.
In an opinion piece published Sunday in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Rubio wrote that the existing system amounts to "de facto amnesty," and he called for "commonsense reform."
The group says in a statement, "We recognize that our immigration system is broken. And while border security has improved significantly over the last two Administrations, we still don't have a functioning immigration system. This has created a situation where up to 11 million undocumented immigrants are living in the shadows. Our legislation acknowledges these realities by finally committing the resources needed to secure the border, modernize and streamline our current legal immigration system, while creating a tough but fair legalization program for individuals who are currently here. We will ensure that this is a successful permanent reform to our immigration system that will not need to be revisited."
According to documents obtained by CBS News and The Associated Press, the senators will call for accomplishing four goals:
-Creating a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants already here, contingent upon securing the border and better tracking of people here on visas.
-Reforming the legal immigration system, including awarding green cards to immigrants who obtain advanced degrees in science, math, technology or engineering from an American university.
-Creating an effective employment verification system to ensure that employers do not hire illegal immigrants.
-Allowing more low-skill workers into the country and allowing employers to hire immigrants if they can demonstrate they couldn't recruit a U.S. citizen; and establishing an agricultural worker program.
The principles being released Monday are outlined on just over four pages, leaving plenty of details left to fill in.
What the senators do call for is similar to Mr. Obama's goals and some past efforts by Democrats and Republicans, since there's wide agreement in identifying problems with the current immigration system.
The most difficult disagreement is likely to arise over how to accomplish the path to citizenship.
In order to satisfy the concerns of Rubio and other Republicans, the senators are calling for the completion of steps on border security and oversight of those here on visas before taking major steps forward on the path to citizenship.
Even then, those here illegally would have to qualify for a "probationary legal status" that would allow them to live and work here -- but not qualify for federal benefits -- before being able to apply for permanent residency. Once they are allowed to apply, they would do so behind everyone else already in line for a green card within the current immigration system.
That could be a highly cumbersome process, but how to make it more workable is being left to future negotiations. The senators envision a more streamlined process toward citizenship for immigrants brought here as children by their parents, and for agricultural workers.
The debate will play out at the start of Mr. Obama's second term, as he aims to spend the political capital afforded him by his re-election victory on an issue that has eluded past presidents and stymied him during his first term despite his promises to the Latino community to act.
"As the president has made clear for some time, immigration reform is an important priority and he is pleased that progress is being made with bipartisan support," a White House spokesman, Clark Stevens, said in a statement. "At the same time, he will not be satisfied until there is meaningful reform and he will continue to urge Congress to act until that is achieved."
For Republicans, the November elections were a stark schooling on the importance of Latino voters, who voted for Mr. Obama over Republican Mitt Romney 71 percent to 27 percent, helping ensure Obama's victory. That led some Republican leaders to conclude that supporting immigration reform with a path to citizenship has become a political imperative.
SOURCE
Tuesday, January 29, 2013
Why not keep the talented?
As we head into the New Year, there are signs that Congress may finally allow an increase in legal immigration. Specifically, it now appears that Congress is becoming increasingly aware that it is folly to kick out foreign students who achieve science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) degrees.
In fact, both Republicans and Democrats have now sponsored bills to reform immigration laws to encourage STEM workers to immigrate here. And a very recent report by the Information Technology Industry Council, the Partnership for a New American Economy, and the US Chamber of Commerce provides ample evidence that the time is ripe for reform.
The report, “Help Wanted: The Role of Foreign Workers in the Innovation Economy,” looked at three questions: Is there a STEM worker shortage? If so, how bad is it and in what fields is it the worst? Does hiring foreign STEM workers take jobs away from native-born workers?
Take the issue of whether there is a general STEM worker shortage. A number of the report’s findings indicate there is indeed such a shortage, and that it is pervasive across the various STEM fields. Remember that economists typically hold that an overall unemployment rate of about 4% represents essentially full employment (with people who are out of work being mainly in transition between jobs in a fluid market). Our current national unemployment rate has hovered around 8% for four years, which is high by recent standards (those of the 1990s and 2000s).
Well, the report notes that the unemployment rate for American citizens with STEM PhDs is only 3.15%. For those with STEM MS degrees it is only 3.4%.
As to whether foreign-born STEM workers are taking jobs from American-born workers, the data the report surveyed show no such effect. While only 6.4% of non-STEM workers with PhDs are foreign-born, 26.1% of STEM workers with PhDs are foreign-born. (For workers with Master’s degrees, the figures are 5.2% of non-STEM versus 17.7% of STEM.) But even though a higher percentage of STEM than non-STEM workers are foreign-born, STEM workers still have a lower overall unemployment rate.
The job market is not a zero-sum game. There is no set-in-stone number of jobs, so that if an immigrant takes one, there is one less for you or me.
In some STEM fields, the figures are especially dramatic. While 25% of medical scientists are foreign-born, medical scientists generally have a 3.4% unemploymnent rate. In fact, the unemployment rate is lower than the general STEM average of 4.3% in 10 out of the 11 STEM fields with the highest percentage of foreign-born workers.
Moreover, the data indicate that immigrant STEM workers on average earn $3,000 per year more than equivalent native-born workers, putting paid to the myth that they “drive down wages.”
The reason none of this should be surprising is that the job market is not a zero-sum game. There is no set-in-stone number of jobs, so that if an immigrant takes one, there is one less for you or me. No, talented immigrants create jobs, by starting new companies, creating new products, or making our industries more competitive than foreign ones.
In this regard, the study argues that every foreign-born student who graduates from an American college and stays here creates an average 2.62 jobs for native-born workers. At the top 10 patent-producing American universities, more than three-fourths of all patents awarded last year were invented or co-invented by an immigrant.
Why can’t the Republicans and Democrats at least agree on removing the obviously counterproductive caps on foreign students who graduate from American colleges with STEM degrees and who want to remain here to work?
In short — why send the most talented and innovative students home — to start businesses that will only compete with ours?
SOURCE
British human Rights laws stop Algerian terror suspect with links to gas plant massacre group being deported because he is suicidal
An Algerian terror suspect has been allowed to stay in Britain because a judge believes he may commit suicide if he is forced to go back home.
The 43-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, does not dispute he is a risk to Britain's national security and is believed to support one of the terrorist groups which carried out the deadly attack on an Algerian gas plant earlier this month which claimed the lives of 39 hostages including six Britons.
He is also suspected of providing fake passports and travel arrangements to terrorists.
But in another blow for the Home Office, the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (Siac) has allowed the married man to remain on British soil today because deporting him would breach his human rights.
Making his ruling, Mr Justice Mitting - who recently allowed hate preacher Abu Qatada to stay in the UK - said: 'We must look at the totality of the psychiatric evidence in the round.
'We are persuaded by it that the risk that G would commit suicide, especially after arrival in Algiers, is very high.
'It may be containable in the UK but no special arrangements have been negotiated with Algeria to cope with it.'
In the same judgment, Mr Justice Mitting told six other Algerian terror suspects they must leave.
But the senior immigration judge warned there was still 'no end in sight' in attempting to put the men on a flight home because they are likely to appeal the decision.
Among the six men were two fundamentalists with links to an alleged 2003 plot to commit mass murder using the poison ricin and cohorts of hook-handed preacher Abu Hamza.
The decision comes after a dramatic terror attack last week on a gas plant in Algeria, which claimed the lives of at least 39 foreign hostages, including six Britons.
Hostages at the In Amenas gas facility during the siege earlier this months which claimed the lives of 39 foreigners including six Britons
Hostages at the In Amenas gas facility during the siege earlier this months which claimed the lives of 39 foreigners including six Britons
Siac said the judgment was drafted before the In Amenas attack and it was too early to say if it would have an impact on its assessment of Algeria.
In the wake of the crisis, Prime Minister David Cameron pledged to put terrorism 'right at the top of the agenda' for Britain's presidency of the G8 nations in 2013.
The successful appellant - who was referred to as "G" - claimed asylum in 1995 when he was caught entering the UK on a fake passport.
A previously published open judgment revealed he did not dispute the Home Secretary's case that he poses a risk to national security.
He is a suspected supporter of Groupe Islamique Arme (GIA), an Islamist organisation that wants to overthrow the Algerian government, and the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, which is now known as Al Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb.
And he is understood to have supplied passports to terrorists and been involved in fundraising and providing travel to extremists undertaking jihad and terrorist training.
But the extremist was diagnosed with a major depressive disorder and is known to have made a suicide attempt in 2005 when he was found hanging in a cell in Belmarsh prison.
Experts concluded that medication would not stop him from committing suicide and he instead required round the clock supervision.
Mr Justice Mitting concluded that the UK would be in breach of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights - that no one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment - if he were deported in his present condition.
The six suspects ordered to leave the country claimed they would be at risk of torture or degrading treatment if returned to Algeria.
Among them is a regular visitor to the Finsbury Park mosque, who sided with hate preacher Abu Hamza, and a senior member of an Afghanistan training camp.
But Mr Justice Mitting said the court was 'satisfied that the Algerian state's assurances can be relied upon' in the case of these men.
He added that the relations between Algeria and the UK are strong and the North African country has a good record with other men who have previously been deported.
However, in a sign that the six men are expected to drag out their fight against deportation, Mr Justice Mitting warned that after seven years of litigation there was 'as yet, no end in sight'.
The Prime Minister pledged support to international efforts to track down and tear up the terror network behind last week's attack on the In Amenas gas plant.
Mr Cameron said that the world was involved in a 'generational struggle' against al Qaida-inspired Islamist terrorism in North Africa.
Siac upheld Qatada's appeal against deportation to Jordan, where he was convicted of terror charges in his absence in 1999.
The Government will appeal against the decision next month but Qatada remains in the UK on bail conditions including a 16-hour curfew, wearing an electronic tag, not using the internet and not contacting certain people.
A Home Office spokesman said: 'We are pleased Siac has dismissed the appeals of six of the individuals in the 'W and Others' case against their deportation, recognising the strength of our assurances with Algeria. We intend to remove them as quickly as possible.'
SOURCE
Why not keep the talented?
As we head into the New Year, there are signs that Congress may finally allow an increase in legal immigration. Specifically, it now appears that Congress is becoming increasingly aware that it is folly to kick out foreign students who achieve science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) degrees.
In fact, both Republicans and Democrats have now sponsored bills to reform immigration laws to encourage STEM workers to immigrate here. And a very recent report by the Information Technology Industry Council, the Partnership for a New American Economy, and the US Chamber of Commerce provides ample evidence that the time is ripe for reform.
The report, “Help Wanted: The Role of Foreign Workers in the Innovation Economy,” looked at three questions: Is there a STEM worker shortage? If so, how bad is it and in what fields is it the worst? Does hiring foreign STEM workers take jobs away from native-born workers?
Take the issue of whether there is a general STEM worker shortage. A number of the report’s findings indicate there is indeed such a shortage, and that it is pervasive across the various STEM fields. Remember that economists typically hold that an overall unemployment rate of about 4% represents essentially full employment (with people who are out of work being mainly in transition between jobs in a fluid market). Our current national unemployment rate has hovered around 8% for four years, which is high by recent standards (those of the 1990s and 2000s).
Well, the report notes that the unemployment rate for American citizens with STEM PhDs is only 3.15%. For those with STEM MS degrees it is only 3.4%.
As to whether foreign-born STEM workers are taking jobs from American-born workers, the data the report surveyed show no such effect. While only 6.4% of non-STEM workers with PhDs are foreign-born, 26.1% of STEM workers with PhDs are foreign-born. (For workers with Master’s degrees, the figures are 5.2% of non-STEM versus 17.7% of STEM.) But even though a higher percentage of STEM than non-STEM workers are foreign-born, STEM workers still have a lower overall unemployment rate.
The job market is not a zero-sum game. There is no set-in-stone number of jobs, so that if an immigrant takes one, there is one less for you or me.
In some STEM fields, the figures are especially dramatic. While 25% of medical scientists are foreign-born, medical scientists generally have a 3.4% unemploymnent rate. In fact, the unemployment rate is lower than the general STEM average of 4.3% in 10 out of the 11 STEM fields with the highest percentage of foreign-born workers.
Moreover, the data indicate that immigrant STEM workers on average earn $3,000 per year more than equivalent native-born workers, putting paid to the myth that they “drive down wages.”
The reason none of this should be surprising is that the job market is not a zero-sum game. There is no set-in-stone number of jobs, so that if an immigrant takes one, there is one less for you or me. No, talented immigrants create jobs, by starting new companies, creating new products, or making our industries more competitive than foreign ones.
In this regard, the study argues that every foreign-born student who graduates from an American college and stays here creates an average 2.62 jobs for native-born workers. At the top 10 patent-producing American universities, more than three-fourths of all patents awarded last year were invented or co-invented by an immigrant.
Why can’t the Republicans and Democrats at least agree on removing the obviously counterproductive caps on foreign students who graduate from American colleges with STEM degrees and who want to remain here to work?
In short — why send the most talented and innovative students home — to start businesses that will only compete with ours?
SOURCE
British human Rights laws stop Algerian terror suspect with links to gas plant massacre group being deported because he is suicidal
An Algerian terror suspect has been allowed to stay in Britain because a judge believes he may commit suicide if he is forced to go back home.
The 43-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, does not dispute he is a risk to Britain's national security and is believed to support one of the terrorist groups which carried out the deadly attack on an Algerian gas plant earlier this month which claimed the lives of 39 hostages including six Britons.
He is also suspected of providing fake passports and travel arrangements to terrorists.
But in another blow for the Home Office, the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (Siac) has allowed the married man to remain on British soil today because deporting him would breach his human rights.
Making his ruling, Mr Justice Mitting - who recently allowed hate preacher Abu Qatada to stay in the UK - said: 'We must look at the totality of the psychiatric evidence in the round.
'We are persuaded by it that the risk that G would commit suicide, especially after arrival in Algiers, is very high.
'It may be containable in the UK but no special arrangements have been negotiated with Algeria to cope with it.'
In the same judgment, Mr Justice Mitting told six other Algerian terror suspects they must leave.
But the senior immigration judge warned there was still 'no end in sight' in attempting to put the men on a flight home because they are likely to appeal the decision.
Among the six men were two fundamentalists with links to an alleged 2003 plot to commit mass murder using the poison ricin and cohorts of hook-handed preacher Abu Hamza.
The decision comes after a dramatic terror attack last week on a gas plant in Algeria, which claimed the lives of at least 39 foreign hostages, including six Britons.
Hostages at the In Amenas gas facility during the siege earlier this months which claimed the lives of 39 foreigners including six Britons
Hostages at the In Amenas gas facility during the siege earlier this months which claimed the lives of 39 foreigners including six Britons
Siac said the judgment was drafted before the In Amenas attack and it was too early to say if it would have an impact on its assessment of Algeria.
In the wake of the crisis, Prime Minister David Cameron pledged to put terrorism 'right at the top of the agenda' for Britain's presidency of the G8 nations in 2013.
The successful appellant - who was referred to as "G" - claimed asylum in 1995 when he was caught entering the UK on a fake passport.
A previously published open judgment revealed he did not dispute the Home Secretary's case that he poses a risk to national security.
He is a suspected supporter of Groupe Islamique Arme (GIA), an Islamist organisation that wants to overthrow the Algerian government, and the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, which is now known as Al Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb.
And he is understood to have supplied passports to terrorists and been involved in fundraising and providing travel to extremists undertaking jihad and terrorist training.
But the extremist was diagnosed with a major depressive disorder and is known to have made a suicide attempt in 2005 when he was found hanging in a cell in Belmarsh prison.
Experts concluded that medication would not stop him from committing suicide and he instead required round the clock supervision.
Mr Justice Mitting concluded that the UK would be in breach of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights - that no one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment - if he were deported in his present condition.
The six suspects ordered to leave the country claimed they would be at risk of torture or degrading treatment if returned to Algeria.
Among them is a regular visitor to the Finsbury Park mosque, who sided with hate preacher Abu Hamza, and a senior member of an Afghanistan training camp.
But Mr Justice Mitting said the court was 'satisfied that the Algerian state's assurances can be relied upon' in the case of these men.
He added that the relations between Algeria and the UK are strong and the North African country has a good record with other men who have previously been deported.
However, in a sign that the six men are expected to drag out their fight against deportation, Mr Justice Mitting warned that after seven years of litigation there was 'as yet, no end in sight'.
The Prime Minister pledged support to international efforts to track down and tear up the terror network behind last week's attack on the In Amenas gas plant.
Mr Cameron said that the world was involved in a 'generational struggle' against al Qaida-inspired Islamist terrorism in North Africa.
Siac upheld Qatada's appeal against deportation to Jordan, where he was convicted of terror charges in his absence in 1999.
The Government will appeal against the decision next month but Qatada remains in the UK on bail conditions including a 16-hour curfew, wearing an electronic tag, not using the internet and not contacting certain people.
A Home Office spokesman said: 'We are pleased Siac has dismissed the appeals of six of the individuals in the 'W and Others' case against their deportation, recognising the strength of our assurances with Algeria. We intend to remove them as quickly as possible.'
SOURCE
Monday, January 28, 2013
Thousands of Bulgarians and Romanians plan to flood UK in 2014 as employment restrictions relax
Hordes of Romanians and Bulgarians are already preparing to head for Britain in search of work, according to a Mail on Sunday investigation.
Employment restrictions will be relaxed on December 31, and the UK will throw open its Jobcentres and benefit offices to what pressure group Migration Watch predicts could be as many as 70,000 people a year for the next five years.
The Government refuses to reveal its own estimates and the authorities in Romania and Bulgaria are sceptical of Migration Watch figures, but have not compiled their own.
However, our research in the EU’s two poorest countries found plenty of migrants among their combined populations of 29 million waiting for the chance to travel to Britain.
As soon as they find a job, they will also become eligible for a raft of income-related benefits far more generous than anything on offer in their home countries.
Access to welfare payments in Britain is easier than in either Germany or France, which will be relaxing work restrictions at the same time.
One job agency in Bucharest told our undercover reporter it already has hundreds registering for work in the UK from 2014 and the waiting list is so long they are no longer accepting applications.
Posing as a jobseeker, the Romanian reporter was told there was no point in even putting her name on a waiting list to travel to the UK in 2014 because of the huge numbers of her compatriots who had already applied.
Bosses at two other Romanian work-placement companies said they expected to send record numbers to Britain when open access is granted to the jobs market in the New Year.
The reporter approached three Romanian employment agencies stating she was an unemployed graduate who was struggling to find work in Romania and was keen to take advantage of the change in the law and move to Britain.
At the Albatross Travel agency’s offices in north-west Bucharest, a staff member told her the firm routinely arranged coach-loads of migrants to be driven to Britain to take up jobs on farms.
But the agent added: ‘We have so many people who want to travel to Britain in 2014 because of the lifting of the work permit restriction, there is no point in even putting you on the waiting list.’
An agent for Blue Mountain Recruitment in Bacau, north-eastern Romania, said there were likely to be large numbers of British job opportunities if she returned later in the year.
‘Currently it’s very hard to find a job without a contract,’ he said. ‘But in 2014 that will change and we’re hoping to send many more people than we have before.’
Tatiana Geogea, director of Best Opportunity in northern Bucharest, expects her company to help at least 1,000 Romanians travel to Britain next year – the company’s previous record was 700 people in a year.
‘There is little doubt the numbers will increase,’ she said. ‘I just don’t think the English are willing to pick strawberries on a farm. Romanians have a terrific work ethic.’
Across the Danube in the Zhenski Pazar market in Sofia, Bulgaria, virtually everyone we spoke to said they would come to Britain.
‘I would love to go there and next year I will take my family,’ said Roma cigarette vendor Plamen Aljoshev, a 53-year-old father of two.
Slavka Mitova, 29, a mother of two who runs a butcher’s shop in Sofia, said: ‘There is no future here. The young people should go to England and make money.’
Why England? ‘Partly because of the language – young people are speaking some English,’ she said, ‘but your country has a reputation for fairness and treating people well.’
The only state benefit available in either country is child benefit, which is £3.50 per child per week in Bulgaria and £3.69 in Romania. In Britain, a single person can claim up to £71 a week in jobseekers’ allowance and a couple can claim £111. Housing benefit varies depending on local authorities. Child benefit adds another £20.30 a week for the first child and £13.40 for each one after that.
The Department of Work and Pensions confirmed to The Mail on Sunday that visitors from the European Economic Area who demonstrate that they ‘have or retain worker status may be able to claim income-based jobseekers’ allowance, income support, housing benefit, council tax benefit, income-related employment and support allowance, and state pension credit’.
‘We are obliged under EU law to pay some income-related benefits to EEA workers, self-employed people and jobseekers,’ said a spokesman.
From January 1, 2014 that will also include the Bulgarians and Romanians
SOURCE
Stupidity: Romanians and Bulgarians to be told: UK's too cold for you in advertising campaign to try and deter them from coming to Britain
Britain actually has an unusually mild climate for its latitude
Plans have been drawn up for an advertising campaign denouncing Britain as cold and wet to deter Romanians and Bulgarians from coming to the UK.
Ministers are working on ideas to prevent an influx of immigrants from Eastern Europe when restrictions are lifted on citizens from the two countries moving to the EU next New Year's Day.
A public information campaign would warn those considering a move that they won't be able to cash in on state largesse – and that the weather is bad.
Under proposals being examined in Downing Street, the Home Office and the Department for Work and Pensions, the new migrants – who are expected to number at least 70,000 over the next five years – would face tough restrictions on the benefits they could claim.
One option would see new arrivals deported after three months if they don't have a job. Another plan would require those arriving from Romania and Bulgaria to show they have the means to support themselves for six months.
The 'nuclear option' would be to declare an 'economic emergency' to defer arrivals – though government lawyers are nervous about the legality of such a move.
Once the plans to limit the amount of money new arrivals can claim are in place they are likely to form the heart of an advertising campaign later this year.
A senior Government source told the Mail: 'By the time people are able to come here we would want to have something in place and we would want people considering coming here to know what they could expect.'
A minister said an advertising campaign was needed to 'correct the impression that the streets here are paved with gold'.
David Cameron and Home Secretary Theresa May are concerned new arrivals will wreck efforts to slash immigration – a key election pledge.
One of those involved in discussions said: 'Every single thing we've done on immigration risks being blown out of the water by this. Bettering Labour on immigration is one of the best cards we have.'
But despite the warnings of restrictions, agencies have sprung up in Romania and Bulgaria offering to arrange work in the UK.
Britain has a buoyant job market, in contrast to some EU nations, and access to welfare payments is easier than in Germany or France, which will be relaxing work restrictions at the same time.
even though
One job agency in the Romanian capital Bucharest told undercover reporters it has hundreds registering for work in the UK and the waiting list is so long they are no longer accepting applications. While the minimum wage in the UK is £6.19 per hour, in Bulgaria it is just 73p and, in Romania, 79p.
The average weekly wage is £63.50 in Bulgaria and £86 in Romania. The only state benefit available in either country is child benefit, which is £3.50 per child per week in Bulgaria and £3.69 in Romania. In Britain, a single person can claim up to £71 a week in jobseekers' allowance.
Housing benefit varies depending on local authorities. Child benefit adds another £20.30 a week for the first child and £13.40 for each one after that.
Visitors from the European Economic Area who demonstrate they 'have or retain worker status may be able to claim income-based jobseekers' allowance, income support, housing benefit, council tax benefit, income-related employment and support allowance, and state pension credit.
SOURCE
Thousands of Bulgarians and Romanians plan to flood UK in 2014 as employment restrictions relax
Hordes of Romanians and Bulgarians are already preparing to head for Britain in search of work, according to a Mail on Sunday investigation.
Employment restrictions will be relaxed on December 31, and the UK will throw open its Jobcentres and benefit offices to what pressure group Migration Watch predicts could be as many as 70,000 people a year for the next five years.
The Government refuses to reveal its own estimates and the authorities in Romania and Bulgaria are sceptical of Migration Watch figures, but have not compiled their own.
However, our research in the EU’s two poorest countries found plenty of migrants among their combined populations of 29 million waiting for the chance to travel to Britain.
As soon as they find a job, they will also become eligible for a raft of income-related benefits far more generous than anything on offer in their home countries.
Access to welfare payments in Britain is easier than in either Germany or France, which will be relaxing work restrictions at the same time.
One job agency in Bucharest told our undercover reporter it already has hundreds registering for work in the UK from 2014 and the waiting list is so long they are no longer accepting applications.
Posing as a jobseeker, the Romanian reporter was told there was no point in even putting her name on a waiting list to travel to the UK in 2014 because of the huge numbers of her compatriots who had already applied.
Bosses at two other Romanian work-placement companies said they expected to send record numbers to Britain when open access is granted to the jobs market in the New Year.
The reporter approached three Romanian employment agencies stating she was an unemployed graduate who was struggling to find work in Romania and was keen to take advantage of the change in the law and move to Britain.
At the Albatross Travel agency’s offices in north-west Bucharest, a staff member told her the firm routinely arranged coach-loads of migrants to be driven to Britain to take up jobs on farms.
But the agent added: ‘We have so many people who want to travel to Britain in 2014 because of the lifting of the work permit restriction, there is no point in even putting you on the waiting list.’
An agent for Blue Mountain Recruitment in Bacau, north-eastern Romania, said there were likely to be large numbers of British job opportunities if she returned later in the year.
‘Currently it’s very hard to find a job without a contract,’ he said. ‘But in 2014 that will change and we’re hoping to send many more people than we have before.’
Tatiana Geogea, director of Best Opportunity in northern Bucharest, expects her company to help at least 1,000 Romanians travel to Britain next year – the company’s previous record was 700 people in a year.
‘There is little doubt the numbers will increase,’ she said. ‘I just don’t think the English are willing to pick strawberries on a farm. Romanians have a terrific work ethic.’
Across the Danube in the Zhenski Pazar market in Sofia, Bulgaria, virtually everyone we spoke to said they would come to Britain.
‘I would love to go there and next year I will take my family,’ said Roma cigarette vendor Plamen Aljoshev, a 53-year-old father of two.
Slavka Mitova, 29, a mother of two who runs a butcher’s shop in Sofia, said: ‘There is no future here. The young people should go to England and make money.’
Why England? ‘Partly because of the language – young people are speaking some English,’ she said, ‘but your country has a reputation for fairness and treating people well.’
The only state benefit available in either country is child benefit, which is £3.50 per child per week in Bulgaria and £3.69 in Romania. In Britain, a single person can claim up to £71 a week in jobseekers’ allowance and a couple can claim £111. Housing benefit varies depending on local authorities. Child benefit adds another £20.30 a week for the first child and £13.40 for each one after that.
The Department of Work and Pensions confirmed to The Mail on Sunday that visitors from the European Economic Area who demonstrate that they ‘have or retain worker status may be able to claim income-based jobseekers’ allowance, income support, housing benefit, council tax benefit, income-related employment and support allowance, and state pension credit’.
‘We are obliged under EU law to pay some income-related benefits to EEA workers, self-employed people and jobseekers,’ said a spokesman.
From January 1, 2014 that will also include the Bulgarians and Romanians
SOURCE
Stupidity: Romanians and Bulgarians to be told: UK's too cold for you in advertising campaign to try and deter them from coming to Britain
Britain actually has an unusually mild climate for its latitude
Plans have been drawn up for an advertising campaign denouncing Britain as cold and wet to deter Romanians and Bulgarians from coming to the UK.
Ministers are working on ideas to prevent an influx of immigrants from Eastern Europe when restrictions are lifted on citizens from the two countries moving to the EU next New Year's Day.
A public information campaign would warn those considering a move that they won't be able to cash in on state largesse – and that the weather is bad.
Under proposals being examined in Downing Street, the Home Office and the Department for Work and Pensions, the new migrants – who are expected to number at least 70,000 over the next five years – would face tough restrictions on the benefits they could claim.
One option would see new arrivals deported after three months if they don't have a job. Another plan would require those arriving from Romania and Bulgaria to show they have the means to support themselves for six months.
The 'nuclear option' would be to declare an 'economic emergency' to defer arrivals – though government lawyers are nervous about the legality of such a move.
Once the plans to limit the amount of money new arrivals can claim are in place they are likely to form the heart of an advertising campaign later this year.
A senior Government source told the Mail: 'By the time people are able to come here we would want to have something in place and we would want people considering coming here to know what they could expect.'
A minister said an advertising campaign was needed to 'correct the impression that the streets here are paved with gold'.
David Cameron and Home Secretary Theresa May are concerned new arrivals will wreck efforts to slash immigration – a key election pledge.
One of those involved in discussions said: 'Every single thing we've done on immigration risks being blown out of the water by this. Bettering Labour on immigration is one of the best cards we have.'
But despite the warnings of restrictions, agencies have sprung up in Romania and Bulgaria offering to arrange work in the UK.
Britain has a buoyant job market, in contrast to some EU nations, and access to welfare payments is easier than in Germany or France, which will be relaxing work restrictions at the same time.
even though
One job agency in the Romanian capital Bucharest told undercover reporters it has hundreds registering for work in the UK and the waiting list is so long they are no longer accepting applications. While the minimum wage in the UK is £6.19 per hour, in Bulgaria it is just 73p and, in Romania, 79p.
The average weekly wage is £63.50 in Bulgaria and £86 in Romania. The only state benefit available in either country is child benefit, which is £3.50 per child per week in Bulgaria and £3.69 in Romania. In Britain, a single person can claim up to £71 a week in jobseekers' allowance.
Housing benefit varies depending on local authorities. Child benefit adds another £20.30 a week for the first child and £13.40 for each one after that.
Visitors from the European Economic Area who demonstrate they 'have or retain worker status may be able to claim income-based jobseekers' allowance, income support, housing benefit, council tax benefit, income-related employment and support allowance, and state pension credit.
SOURCE
Sunday, January 27, 2013
British minister blocks moves to ease immigration rules
The Home Secretary has blocked a proposal by the Treasury to help the economy by relaxing immigration rules, it has emerged.
Sources said Theresa May has been fighting against moves by her Cabinet colleagues to give more visas to highly-skilled people.
A number of senior ministers, including George Osborne, the Chancellor, and Vince Cable, the Business Secretary, believe letting in more well-qualified foreign workers could help boost the economy.
However, Mrs May has been standing up to her colleagues amid fears that watering down the rules would stop the Coalition meeting its targets on cutting immigration.
She warned in a speech before Christmas mass immigration can push up house prices, forces people onto benefits, and suppresses wages for the low-paid.
The Home Secretary is in charge of enforcing a promise made by David Cameron at the last election to reduce net migration to the tens, not hundreds of thousands.
Over the last year, the Prime Minister has come under pressure from within the Coalition and business groups to scrap that target.
One senior ministerial source said the target should be abandoned because it is harming the economy and would be “virtually impossible to achieve” anyway. The sources described the targets as "a bit absurd" and counter-productive at a time when Britain needs all the help it can get to return to growth.
In November, John Cridland, the director-general of the CBI, was one of the first public figures to call for the policy to be changed.
He said the immigration of students and business people were not so much a concern of the public.
“I don’t think this will ever be resolved until the government changes the target.”
Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, has also warned that limiting access to Britain for students and business people is harming the City of London.
On a visit to India, he said last year, he said the public does not want to highly-skilled people.
“A tough immigration policy would have said that you can’t come here unless you have a visible means of support and are not going to be a burden on the National Health Service or housing system,” he said.
“People understand that... what they don’t understand is excluding talented people.”
On the same trip, Mr Johnson also called for ministers to “shift the debate on student visas away from numerical targets and squarely onto policy based on promoting jobs and growth in the UK”.
The Government has since tweaked the rules to allow foreign PhD students to stay in the UK for a year after their studies.
However, Mrs May has been standing firm on the key targets amid wider worries that loosening the rules could threaten national security.
A letter leaked to The Daily Telegraph earlier this year showed the Home Secretary’s office issued Downing Street with a warning against relaxing the rules for Chinese tourists.
Her private secretary wrote in a letter to Number 10 that this could lead to a rise in organised crime and bring more asylum seekers to Britain.
SOURCE
Immigrant who lured underage schoolgirls to house for sex can't be deported from Britain because he is a member of 'persecuted African tribe'
An immigrant who was locked up for four years after he had unprotected sex with a 13-year-old girl cannot be deported because he is member of a 'persecuted' African tribe, it was disclosed today.
Jumaa Kater Saleh, 24, who arrived in the UK in November 2004 hidden in a lorry, was convicted of two charges of sexual activity with a female under 16 in May 2008.
After serving his sentence, Saleh was recommended for deportation and detained under the 2007 Borders Act pending moves to send him back to Sudan because of the seriousness of his criminal offences.
But deputy High Court judge Philip Mott QC, speaking at the High Court, said Saleh had not been deported because it had been established that he was a member of the Zaghawa tribe, which was subject to widespread persecution and it was 'not possible' to return him to Sudan.
The details of Saleh's case were disclosed during a court hearing in which he attempted to claim damages for unlawful detention during the Government's failed bid to send him back to Sudan.
Judge Mott rejected his application and ruled there was no evidence of him being held unlawfully or unreasonably and said his case failed 'on all grounds'.
The judge ruled that the refusal to release him earlier on bail pending a final decision on whether or not he could be deported was reasonable, given the nature of his offences.
He said: 'It was deliberate, targeted abuse of a young and vulnerable girl. 'The risk that the claimant, in his early 20s, would commit a further sexual offence if released on a precarious basis at risk of return to Sudan had to be considered as substantial.'
The judge rejected submissions that Saleh, now of Leicester, could have been released because bail conditions and the requirements of him being on the Sex Offenders' Register would have provided safeguards.
The judge ruled: 'The experience of the criminal courts is that these have a very limited ability to prevent or deter re-offending.'
Saleh was one of a group of five immigrants convicted of luring schoolgirls to a house for sex, two of whom were aged 13 and one 14, and unprotected intercourse took place.
Saleh was convicted of two charges of sexual activity with a 13-year-old girl, and he was sentenced on the basis that they were planned offences and he knew the girl's age.
The trial judge had remarked that all three girls were "clearly disturbed and vulnerable, far from mature for their years and had been targeted by the group".
After smuggling his way into the country, Saleh's application for asylum was initially refused in January 2005 because he was a minor, he was granted discretionary leave to remain in the country until his 18th birthday in October 2006.
Later he applied for permission to stay in the country longer. But in May 2007 he was arrested and charged with the sex offences.
SOURCE
British minister blocks moves to ease immigration rules
The Home Secretary has blocked a proposal by the Treasury to help the economy by relaxing immigration rules, it has emerged.
Sources said Theresa May has been fighting against moves by her Cabinet colleagues to give more visas to highly-skilled people.
A number of senior ministers, including George Osborne, the Chancellor, and Vince Cable, the Business Secretary, believe letting in more well-qualified foreign workers could help boost the economy.
However, Mrs May has been standing up to her colleagues amid fears that watering down the rules would stop the Coalition meeting its targets on cutting immigration.
She warned in a speech before Christmas mass immigration can push up house prices, forces people onto benefits, and suppresses wages for the low-paid.
The Home Secretary is in charge of enforcing a promise made by David Cameron at the last election to reduce net migration to the tens, not hundreds of thousands.
Over the last year, the Prime Minister has come under pressure from within the Coalition and business groups to scrap that target.
One senior ministerial source said the target should be abandoned because it is harming the economy and would be “virtually impossible to achieve” anyway. The sources described the targets as "a bit absurd" and counter-productive at a time when Britain needs all the help it can get to return to growth.
In November, John Cridland, the director-general of the CBI, was one of the first public figures to call for the policy to be changed.
He said the immigration of students and business people were not so much a concern of the public.
“I don’t think this will ever be resolved until the government changes the target.”
Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, has also warned that limiting access to Britain for students and business people is harming the City of London.
On a visit to India, he said last year, he said the public does not want to highly-skilled people.
“A tough immigration policy would have said that you can’t come here unless you have a visible means of support and are not going to be a burden on the National Health Service or housing system,” he said.
“People understand that... what they don’t understand is excluding talented people.”
On the same trip, Mr Johnson also called for ministers to “shift the debate on student visas away from numerical targets and squarely onto policy based on promoting jobs and growth in the UK”.
The Government has since tweaked the rules to allow foreign PhD students to stay in the UK for a year after their studies.
However, Mrs May has been standing firm on the key targets amid wider worries that loosening the rules could threaten national security.
A letter leaked to The Daily Telegraph earlier this year showed the Home Secretary’s office issued Downing Street with a warning against relaxing the rules for Chinese tourists.
Her private secretary wrote in a letter to Number 10 that this could lead to a rise in organised crime and bring more asylum seekers to Britain.
SOURCE
Immigrant who lured underage schoolgirls to house for sex can't be deported from Britain because he is a member of 'persecuted African tribe'
An immigrant who was locked up for four years after he had unprotected sex with a 13-year-old girl cannot be deported because he is member of a 'persecuted' African tribe, it was disclosed today.
Jumaa Kater Saleh, 24, who arrived in the UK in November 2004 hidden in a lorry, was convicted of two charges of sexual activity with a female under 16 in May 2008.
After serving his sentence, Saleh was recommended for deportation and detained under the 2007 Borders Act pending moves to send him back to Sudan because of the seriousness of his criminal offences.
But deputy High Court judge Philip Mott QC, speaking at the High Court, said Saleh had not been deported because it had been established that he was a member of the Zaghawa tribe, which was subject to widespread persecution and it was 'not possible' to return him to Sudan.
The details of Saleh's case were disclosed during a court hearing in which he attempted to claim damages for unlawful detention during the Government's failed bid to send him back to Sudan.
Judge Mott rejected his application and ruled there was no evidence of him being held unlawfully or unreasonably and said his case failed 'on all grounds'.
The judge ruled that the refusal to release him earlier on bail pending a final decision on whether or not he could be deported was reasonable, given the nature of his offences.
He said: 'It was deliberate, targeted abuse of a young and vulnerable girl. 'The risk that the claimant, in his early 20s, would commit a further sexual offence if released on a precarious basis at risk of return to Sudan had to be considered as substantial.'
The judge rejected submissions that Saleh, now of Leicester, could have been released because bail conditions and the requirements of him being on the Sex Offenders' Register would have provided safeguards.
The judge ruled: 'The experience of the criminal courts is that these have a very limited ability to prevent or deter re-offending.'
Saleh was one of a group of five immigrants convicted of luring schoolgirls to a house for sex, two of whom were aged 13 and one 14, and unprotected intercourse took place.
Saleh was convicted of two charges of sexual activity with a 13-year-old girl, and he was sentenced on the basis that they were planned offences and he knew the girl's age.
The trial judge had remarked that all three girls were "clearly disturbed and vulnerable, far from mature for their years and had been targeted by the group".
After smuggling his way into the country, Saleh's application for asylum was initially refused in January 2005 because he was a minor, he was granted discretionary leave to remain in the country until his 18th birthday in October 2006.
Later he applied for permission to stay in the country longer. But in May 2007 he was arrested and charged with the sex offences.
SOURCE
Friday, January 25, 2013
Migrants with no job or money are being allowed to settle in Britain because of failure of background checks
Immigrants are being granted permission to settle in Britain despite having ‘zero income and no employment’, a government inspector warned last night.
The failure to carry out full background checks on the migrants undermines a key Home Office policy that applicants should be able to support themselves and their families without relying on the State.
Foreign nationals who want to remain in the UK permanently are supposed to undergo strict checks by officials into their financial background.
As a minimum, they require enough money to pay for housing, plus a disposable income of more than £100 a week.
But the chief inspector of immigration, John Vine, found potentially tens of thousands were having their applications rubber-stamped without either a face-to-face interview or HMRC investigation.
An estimated one million migrants apply for permission to stay in the UK each year.
But, incredibly, HMRC is willing to do only 3,000 checks a year for the UK Border Agency – just 250 every month. Such checks would establish if a migrant who claimed to be able to support themselves was telling the truth about their income or even having a job.
As a result of the HMRC policy, officials are letting migrants stay without having had access to wages slips, P60 forms and other crucial data.
Mr Vine, who carried out spot checks on a small sample of cases, said officials had granted permission to settle here despite the applicant having ‘zero income and no employment’.
He said the number of HMRC checks was ‘insufficient’ and must be urgently increased.
Of 49 cases he looked at where migrants were asking to stay on the grounds of marriage, not a single person was interviewed. This is despite huge concern over sham marriages.
In other cases, the application was decided while the husband or wife was still overseas. Mr Vine said in one in every ten of such cases the decision reached by immigration officials was ‘unreasonable’, mainly due to insufficient evidence the migrant could afford to support themselves.
The inspector raised his concerns in a report which focused on how UKBA handles cases involving marriage and civil partnerships.
In it, he also said there are currently more than 16,000 migrants waiting to hear from border officials whether they can stay in Britain in yet another ‘unacceptable’ UKBA backlog.
Some 14,000 applicants, growing at a rate of 700 a month, have already been refused the right to stay but are pleading with officials to reconsider.
An additional 2,100 cases – shipped in a box from a UKBA office in Croydon to Sheffield – are still waiting for an initial decision, some dating back a decade. Mr Vine said: ‘This is completely unacceptable and I expect the Agency to deal with both types of case as a matter of urgency.
‘Delays also mean enforcement action is likely to be more difficult in the event the case is ultimately refused. This is because the individual will have been in the UK for a number of years and may have developed a family or private life.’
He also said the percentage of successful appeals in marriage cases was too high, at 53 per cent from April 2011 to February last year. Sir Andrew Green, of Migration Watch, said: ‘This is yet further evidence of the chaos in the immigration system.’
UKBA said last night: ‘We are working with HMRC to increase the number of searches we can do against their systems. Since this report we have brought in strict new rules on proving income levels to make sure that those bringing in family members are able to support them.’
SOURCE
Endanger America, Keep Your Citizenship?
National Security Threats Should Be Denaturalized
In light of the discussions of a "path to citizenship" for illegal immigrants, it's important to note that in extraordinary cases, the path to citizenship can be run in reverse. Naturalized citizens who acquire their citizenship through fraud, especially those involved in terrorism or espionage, can and should be subject to denaturalization.
The Center for Immigration Studies today released a new report, "Upholding the Value of our Citizenship: National Security Threats Should Be Denaturalized", that discusses the danger of allowing naturalized U.S. citizens who have been charged with serious national security-related offenses to retain their citizenship. Even immigrants who fraudulently conceal material facts in order to be granted citizenship remain citizens and receive all the benefits, including sponsorship of family members for immigration and traveling abroad using a U.S. passport. The report also reveals that the Department of Homeland Security has no method in place for reviewing such cases, which ensures there will not be any future improvement of the vetting process.
The report is here
Prior to 2000, the Immigration and Naturalization Service administratively denaturalized individuals when facts came to light revealing that an applicant had been ineligible at the time of naturalization. Presently, however, denaturalization can only occur through criminal prosecution or civil suits in the already overburdened federal district courts. The report recommends re-instituting the capability to administratively denaturalize individuals granted citizenship in error or as a result of misrepresentations, concealment of material facts, or other forms of fraud.
“It is the government’s responsibility to protect the American people”, said Mark Krikorian, Executive Director of the Center. “If we are unwilling to provide better screening at the front end, then we certainly should be willing to reverse mistakes and strip citizenship from those involved in terrorism, espionage, and theft of sensitive information and technology.”
The report includes an appendix listing dozens of recent examples of naturalized citizens who have been charged with serious national security offenses.
The above is a press release from from Center for Immigration Studies. 1522 K St. NW, Suite 820, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 466-8185 fax: (202) 466-8076. Email: center@cis.org. The Center for Immigration Studies is an independent research institution which examines the impact of immigration on the United States. The Center for Immigration Studies is not affiliated with any other organization
Migrants with no job or money are being allowed to settle in Britain because of failure of background checks
Immigrants are being granted permission to settle in Britain despite having ‘zero income and no employment’, a government inspector warned last night.
The failure to carry out full background checks on the migrants undermines a key Home Office policy that applicants should be able to support themselves and their families without relying on the State.
Foreign nationals who want to remain in the UK permanently are supposed to undergo strict checks by officials into their financial background.
As a minimum, they require enough money to pay for housing, plus a disposable income of more than £100 a week.
But the chief inspector of immigration, John Vine, found potentially tens of thousands were having their applications rubber-stamped without either a face-to-face interview or HMRC investigation.
An estimated one million migrants apply for permission to stay in the UK each year.
But, incredibly, HMRC is willing to do only 3,000 checks a year for the UK Border Agency – just 250 every month. Such checks would establish if a migrant who claimed to be able to support themselves was telling the truth about their income or even having a job.
As a result of the HMRC policy, officials are letting migrants stay without having had access to wages slips, P60 forms and other crucial data.
Mr Vine, who carried out spot checks on a small sample of cases, said officials had granted permission to settle here despite the applicant having ‘zero income and no employment’.
He said the number of HMRC checks was ‘insufficient’ and must be urgently increased.
Of 49 cases he looked at where migrants were asking to stay on the grounds of marriage, not a single person was interviewed. This is despite huge concern over sham marriages.
In other cases, the application was decided while the husband or wife was still overseas. Mr Vine said in one in every ten of such cases the decision reached by immigration officials was ‘unreasonable’, mainly due to insufficient evidence the migrant could afford to support themselves.
The inspector raised his concerns in a report which focused on how UKBA handles cases involving marriage and civil partnerships.
In it, he also said there are currently more than 16,000 migrants waiting to hear from border officials whether they can stay in Britain in yet another ‘unacceptable’ UKBA backlog.
Some 14,000 applicants, growing at a rate of 700 a month, have already been refused the right to stay but are pleading with officials to reconsider.
An additional 2,100 cases – shipped in a box from a UKBA office in Croydon to Sheffield – are still waiting for an initial decision, some dating back a decade. Mr Vine said: ‘This is completely unacceptable and I expect the Agency to deal with both types of case as a matter of urgency.
‘Delays also mean enforcement action is likely to be more difficult in the event the case is ultimately refused. This is because the individual will have been in the UK for a number of years and may have developed a family or private life.’
He also said the percentage of successful appeals in marriage cases was too high, at 53 per cent from April 2011 to February last year. Sir Andrew Green, of Migration Watch, said: ‘This is yet further evidence of the chaos in the immigration system.’
UKBA said last night: ‘We are working with HMRC to increase the number of searches we can do against their systems. Since this report we have brought in strict new rules on proving income levels to make sure that those bringing in family members are able to support them.’
SOURCE
Endanger America, Keep Your Citizenship?
National Security Threats Should Be Denaturalized
In light of the discussions of a "path to citizenship" for illegal immigrants, it's important to note that in extraordinary cases, the path to citizenship can be run in reverse. Naturalized citizens who acquire their citizenship through fraud, especially those involved in terrorism or espionage, can and should be subject to denaturalization.
The Center for Immigration Studies today released a new report, "Upholding the Value of our Citizenship: National Security Threats Should Be Denaturalized", that discusses the danger of allowing naturalized U.S. citizens who have been charged with serious national security-related offenses to retain their citizenship. Even immigrants who fraudulently conceal material facts in order to be granted citizenship remain citizens and receive all the benefits, including sponsorship of family members for immigration and traveling abroad using a U.S. passport. The report also reveals that the Department of Homeland Security has no method in place for reviewing such cases, which ensures there will not be any future improvement of the vetting process.
The report is here
Prior to 2000, the Immigration and Naturalization Service administratively denaturalized individuals when facts came to light revealing that an applicant had been ineligible at the time of naturalization. Presently, however, denaturalization can only occur through criminal prosecution or civil suits in the already overburdened federal district courts. The report recommends re-instituting the capability to administratively denaturalize individuals granted citizenship in error or as a result of misrepresentations, concealment of material facts, or other forms of fraud.
“It is the government’s responsibility to protect the American people”, said Mark Krikorian, Executive Director of the Center. “If we are unwilling to provide better screening at the front end, then we certainly should be willing to reverse mistakes and strip citizenship from those involved in terrorism, espionage, and theft of sensitive information and technology.”
The report includes an appendix listing dozens of recent examples of naturalized citizens who have been charged with serious national security offenses.
The above is a press release from from Center for Immigration Studies. 1522 K St. NW, Suite 820, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 466-8185 fax: (202) 466-8076. Email: center@cis.org. The Center for Immigration Studies is an independent research institution which examines the impact of immigration on the United States. The Center for Immigration Studies is not affiliated with any other organization
Thursday, January 24, 2013
Immigration into Britain from Eastern Europe
An upbeat view -- but time will tell
On January 16th Stewart Jackson, a conservative member of parliament, presented a bill calling to limit the immigration process for Romanian and Bulgarians coming to Britain: “We don’t want to make the same mistake that we made in 2004, which was to import a very large number of low-wage, low-skill workers and embed welfare dependency in our indigenous workforce.” In a speech last month, Theresa May, the home secretary, said that migration puts a downward pressure on wages and has a bad influence on the social cohesion of the country.
Mr Stewart and Ms May omit to mention the positive effects of the last big influx of workers from new EU member countries. It was vastly higher than predicted, but it was also more successful than forecast. According to a study conducted by The Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford migrants from so-called A8 countries (the eight countries that joined the EU in 2004) have made a positive contribution to the country’s public finances in each fiscal year since their EU accession. While they mostly work in the lower wage sector, their labour-force participation and employment rates tend to be higher, which offsets the impact of their lower wages.
A number of studies show that immigrants are slowing the ageing of Britain’s population. And despite the popular belief that a new wave of immigrants will increase unemployment the National Institute of Economics and Social Research states that there is no aggregate impact of migration on unemployment.
Maybe most importantly, Britain today is less attractive to would-be immigrants than ten years ago, In 2004, only Britain and two other countries did away with almost all restrictions for workers from A8 countries. Since it was the largest economy of the three and its economy was booming, Britain became a magnet for them. This time, all EU countries are opening their labour markets Romanians and Bulgarians. And Britain’s economy is in dire straits.
Titus Corl??ean, Romania’s minister of foreign affairs, believes figures of Romanians immigrating to Britain next year circulated in the British press are wildly exaggerated. According to Mr Corl??ean the issue has become a British domestic political “game”, kindled by the United Kingdom Independence Party, an insurgent outfit devoted to Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union. He is relying on the British government that it “will respect what is written in the European Treaty for the accession of Romania, that from January 1st 2014 there will be a free access for Romanians to the labour market in Britain,” he said.
Surveys show that immigration is one of Britons’ biggest concerns. A report by British Future, a think tank, has revealed that people worry more about immigration as a national than as a local issue. Its State of the Nation poll found that 19% chose immigration as a top local worry while 30% placed immigration first when thinking about tensions facing British society as a whole. This suggests that immigration is more a problem of perception than of reality.
SOURCE
Obama wants it all -- so may get nothing
President Obama’s second inaugural address was heavy on the theme of unity. He used the word “together” seven times in the 15-minute speech. But tucked inside was a prelude to a contentious fight he’ll soon have with Republicans—the battle over reforming the nation’s immigration laws.
Obama couched his comments about the issue in uplifting language: “Our journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity,” he said. “Until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce, rather than expelled from our country.”
On the surface, there’s nothing controversial about that. Increasing the number of visas for highly-skilled immigrants is one of the few policy goals Obama and the GOP agree on. That reflects a big change in Republican thinking in recent months, as party leaders saw support among Hispanics drop in the face of tough anti-immigrant rhetoric. When Mitt Romney talked about immigrants during the Republican primaries, he focused on undocumented workers, suggesting they should “self-deport.” By the summer, he had softened his tone, saying he wanted to “staple a green card to the diplomas” of all foreign math and science grads who study at U.S. universities.
If visas for highly -skilled workers were the only issue on the table, Democrats and Republicans could solve it fairly quickly. The GOP would need a little time to convince the staunchest conservatives to sign on. Democrats would have to win over unions, but that might not be too difficult because most science and engineering grads work in fields with few union jobs, anyway.
But that’s not the way it’s going to happen. What Obama didn’t say in his speech, and the thing Republicans will latch onto in the days ahead, is that he wants to tie the popular idea of raising visas for skilled workers to making broader changes in immigration laws—to which that Republicans strongly object.
Last week, administration officials—speaking anonymously, of course—”leaked” to reporters some of the details of Obama’s immigration plan. For the first time, the White House made clear that the president won’t agree to raise the visa caps for highly skilled immigrants unless it’s part of an overall reform plan that includes a path to citizenship for many of the estimated 11 million immigrants living illegally in the U.S.
These immigrants aren’t the “bright young” future job-creators Obama lauded in his speech. Most work dirty jobs for low wages, and many lack high-school diplomas. They’re the undocumented workers that Republican governors in Arizona, Georgia, Alabama, and other states have driven away with tough anti-immigration laws.
Obama’s insistence on an everything-at-once approach puts Republicans in a difficult position as the party struggles to settle on a policy that its different factions can rally around. For many House Republicans from Southern and border states, such words as “legalization” and “citizenship” are non-starters. But increasingly, party leaders and other prominent conservatives—House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Charlie Spies, counsel for the pro-Romney Restore Our Future super PAC, even Bill O’Reilly–are advocating for a compromise—yet to be defined—between “throw them out” and “let them stay.”
This means that skilled would-be immigrants hoping for the door to open could be in for a long wait. They’ve become the essential bargaining chip in what will likely be a tense, protracted negotiation—not just between Democrats and Republicans, but among Republicans themselves.
SOURCE
Immigration into Britain from Eastern Europe
An upbeat view -- but time will tell
On January 16th Stewart Jackson, a conservative member of parliament, presented a bill calling to limit the immigration process for Romanian and Bulgarians coming to Britain: “We don’t want to make the same mistake that we made in 2004, which was to import a very large number of low-wage, low-skill workers and embed welfare dependency in our indigenous workforce.” In a speech last month, Theresa May, the home secretary, said that migration puts a downward pressure on wages and has a bad influence on the social cohesion of the country.
Mr Stewart and Ms May omit to mention the positive effects of the last big influx of workers from new EU member countries. It was vastly higher than predicted, but it was also more successful than forecast. According to a study conducted by The Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford migrants from so-called A8 countries (the eight countries that joined the EU in 2004) have made a positive contribution to the country’s public finances in each fiscal year since their EU accession. While they mostly work in the lower wage sector, their labour-force participation and employment rates tend to be higher, which offsets the impact of their lower wages.
A number of studies show that immigrants are slowing the ageing of Britain’s population. And despite the popular belief that a new wave of immigrants will increase unemployment the National Institute of Economics and Social Research states that there is no aggregate impact of migration on unemployment.
Maybe most importantly, Britain today is less attractive to would-be immigrants than ten years ago, In 2004, only Britain and two other countries did away with almost all restrictions for workers from A8 countries. Since it was the largest economy of the three and its economy was booming, Britain became a magnet for them. This time, all EU countries are opening their labour markets Romanians and Bulgarians. And Britain’s economy is in dire straits.
Titus Corl??ean, Romania’s minister of foreign affairs, believes figures of Romanians immigrating to Britain next year circulated in the British press are wildly exaggerated. According to Mr Corl??ean the issue has become a British domestic political “game”, kindled by the United Kingdom Independence Party, an insurgent outfit devoted to Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union. He is relying on the British government that it “will respect what is written in the European Treaty for the accession of Romania, that from January 1st 2014 there will be a free access for Romanians to the labour market in Britain,” he said.
Surveys show that immigration is one of Britons’ biggest concerns. A report by British Future, a think tank, has revealed that people worry more about immigration as a national than as a local issue. Its State of the Nation poll found that 19% chose immigration as a top local worry while 30% placed immigration first when thinking about tensions facing British society as a whole. This suggests that immigration is more a problem of perception than of reality.
SOURCE
Obama wants it all -- so may get nothing
President Obama’s second inaugural address was heavy on the theme of unity. He used the word “together” seven times in the 15-minute speech. But tucked inside was a prelude to a contentious fight he’ll soon have with Republicans—the battle over reforming the nation’s immigration laws.
Obama couched his comments about the issue in uplifting language: “Our journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity,” he said. “Until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce, rather than expelled from our country.”
On the surface, there’s nothing controversial about that. Increasing the number of visas for highly-skilled immigrants is one of the few policy goals Obama and the GOP agree on. That reflects a big change in Republican thinking in recent months, as party leaders saw support among Hispanics drop in the face of tough anti-immigrant rhetoric. When Mitt Romney talked about immigrants during the Republican primaries, he focused on undocumented workers, suggesting they should “self-deport.” By the summer, he had softened his tone, saying he wanted to “staple a green card to the diplomas” of all foreign math and science grads who study at U.S. universities.
If visas for highly -skilled workers were the only issue on the table, Democrats and Republicans could solve it fairly quickly. The GOP would need a little time to convince the staunchest conservatives to sign on. Democrats would have to win over unions, but that might not be too difficult because most science and engineering grads work in fields with few union jobs, anyway.
But that’s not the way it’s going to happen. What Obama didn’t say in his speech, and the thing Republicans will latch onto in the days ahead, is that he wants to tie the popular idea of raising visas for skilled workers to making broader changes in immigration laws—to which that Republicans strongly object.
Last week, administration officials—speaking anonymously, of course—”leaked” to reporters some of the details of Obama’s immigration plan. For the first time, the White House made clear that the president won’t agree to raise the visa caps for highly skilled immigrants unless it’s part of an overall reform plan that includes a path to citizenship for many of the estimated 11 million immigrants living illegally in the U.S.
These immigrants aren’t the “bright young” future job-creators Obama lauded in his speech. Most work dirty jobs for low wages, and many lack high-school diplomas. They’re the undocumented workers that Republican governors in Arizona, Georgia, Alabama, and other states have driven away with tough anti-immigration laws.
Obama’s insistence on an everything-at-once approach puts Republicans in a difficult position as the party struggles to settle on a policy that its different factions can rally around. For many House Republicans from Southern and border states, such words as “legalization” and “citizenship” are non-starters. But increasingly, party leaders and other prominent conservatives—House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Charlie Spies, counsel for the pro-Romney Restore Our Future super PAC, even Bill O’Reilly–are advocating for a compromise—yet to be defined—between “throw them out” and “let them stay.”
This means that skilled would-be immigrants hoping for the door to open could be in for a long wait. They’ve become the essential bargaining chip in what will likely be a tense, protracted negotiation—not just between Democrats and Republicans, but among Republicans themselves.
SOURCE
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
Skilled immigration reform and STEM education advocates get spotlight in inaugural address
Washington woke early Monday to begin its quadrennial ritual of watching, waiting and bearing witness to the presidential swearing-in.
Advocates for greater investment in math and science education and for changes to the nation’s visa laws for skilled immigrants got a surge of nitrogen to their engines. [Is that unintentional bathos? Nitrogen does not burn. We live at the bottom of a nitrogen sea]
In his inaugural address Monday, President Obama placed both issues front and center, emphasizing their priority with their placement in one of the most high-profile speeches of his presidency.
“No single person can train all the math and science teachers we’ll need to equip our children for the future. Or build the roads and networks and research labs that will bring new jobs and businesses to our shores,” said the president before a crowd estimated to be anywhere between 800,000 and a million people, with millions more watching across the country and around the world.
Then there was his reference to immigration reform, particularly that of skilled immigrants — those who acquire degrees in science and technology but are unable to stay in the United States.
“Our journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity,” said Obama, “until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce rather than expelled from our country.”
Obama’s remarks in his second and final inaugural address, were, as others have mentioned, a clearly broadcast signal of his position on a range of issues, including climate change, renewable energy, and entitlement programs. But for advocates who have long called for greater emphasis on science, technology, engineering and math education and a growing community that wants change to the nation’s immigration laws, particularly for skilled immigrants, the president sent an even clearer signal.
But this isn’t the first time Obama has incorporated these issues into a key, national address. During his 2012 State of the Union, nearly a year ago today, the president made a similar appeal for reform to the immigration laws as they pertain to those trained in science and technology:
...let’s also remember that hundreds of thousands of talented, hard-working students in this country face another challenge: the fact that they aren’t yet American citizens. Many were brought here as small children, are American through and through, yet they live every day with the threat of deportation. Others came more recently, to study business and science and engineering, but as soon as they get their degree, we send them home to invent new products and create new jobs somewhere else. That doesn’t make sense.
Let’s see if, this time, the hope of advocates for reform of the nation’s skilled immigration laws is met, to use the president’s old campaign slogan, with actual change.
SOURCE
Obama’s Empty Promises on Immigration
Immigration reform made a brief appearance in President Obama’s inauguration address, disappearing faster than the shadow of Punxsutawney Phil on Groundhog Day. “Our journey is not complete,” Obama declared, “until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity; until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce rather than expelled from our country.”
Much like the elusive predictor of the length of winter, the President’s promises to fix our broken borders and deeply flawed immigration system have become an annual event. The clarion call in this speech seems particularly vacuous—leaving no suggestion of what the President actually plans to do.
Many on Capitol Hill believe that the President plans to back a “comprehensive” bill—a confusing, complicated, and contentious measure that Congress has rejected before. That’s a disappointing approach that shows Obama is more interested in playing politics than solving problems.
“Comprehensive” legislation–likely to be written behind closed doors producing a massive, unwieldy bill loaded with measures for special interests–will worsen the problems it seeks to solve. A real problem-solving approach would look to unite the left and right behind the proposals we can all agree on and look for solutions that actually make the system work better.
Instead of a comprehensive bill, a problem-solving approach that treats each of the many issues in our immigration system in its own lane can offer a better solution. In this manner, reforms can move forward in multiple areas at the same time and advance toward meaningful and effective solutions. That is an approach that would turn the meaningless words in the President’s speech into real answers.
SOURCE
Skilled immigration reform and STEM education advocates get spotlight in inaugural address
Washington woke early Monday to begin its quadrennial ritual of watching, waiting and bearing witness to the presidential swearing-in.
Advocates for greater investment in math and science education and for changes to the nation’s visa laws for skilled immigrants got a surge of nitrogen to their engines. [Is that unintentional bathos? Nitrogen does not burn. We live at the bottom of a nitrogen sea]
In his inaugural address Monday, President Obama placed both issues front and center, emphasizing their priority with their placement in one of the most high-profile speeches of his presidency.
“No single person can train all the math and science teachers we’ll need to equip our children for the future. Or build the roads and networks and research labs that will bring new jobs and businesses to our shores,” said the president before a crowd estimated to be anywhere between 800,000 and a million people, with millions more watching across the country and around the world.
Then there was his reference to immigration reform, particularly that of skilled immigrants — those who acquire degrees in science and technology but are unable to stay in the United States.
“Our journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity,” said Obama, “until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce rather than expelled from our country.”
Obama’s remarks in his second and final inaugural address, were, as others have mentioned, a clearly broadcast signal of his position on a range of issues, including climate change, renewable energy, and entitlement programs. But for advocates who have long called for greater emphasis on science, technology, engineering and math education and a growing community that wants change to the nation’s immigration laws, particularly for skilled immigrants, the president sent an even clearer signal.
But this isn’t the first time Obama has incorporated these issues into a key, national address. During his 2012 State of the Union, nearly a year ago today, the president made a similar appeal for reform to the immigration laws as they pertain to those trained in science and technology:
...let’s also remember that hundreds of thousands of talented, hard-working students in this country face another challenge: the fact that they aren’t yet American citizens. Many were brought here as small children, are American through and through, yet they live every day with the threat of deportation. Others came more recently, to study business and science and engineering, but as soon as they get their degree, we send them home to invent new products and create new jobs somewhere else. That doesn’t make sense.
Let’s see if, this time, the hope of advocates for reform of the nation’s skilled immigration laws is met, to use the president’s old campaign slogan, with actual change.
SOURCE
Obama’s Empty Promises on Immigration
Immigration reform made a brief appearance in President Obama’s inauguration address, disappearing faster than the shadow of Punxsutawney Phil on Groundhog Day. “Our journey is not complete,” Obama declared, “until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity; until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce rather than expelled from our country.”
Much like the elusive predictor of the length of winter, the President’s promises to fix our broken borders and deeply flawed immigration system have become an annual event. The clarion call in this speech seems particularly vacuous—leaving no suggestion of what the President actually plans to do.
Many on Capitol Hill believe that the President plans to back a “comprehensive” bill—a confusing, complicated, and contentious measure that Congress has rejected before. That’s a disappointing approach that shows Obama is more interested in playing politics than solving problems.
“Comprehensive” legislation–likely to be written behind closed doors producing a massive, unwieldy bill loaded with measures for special interests–will worsen the problems it seeks to solve. A real problem-solving approach would look to unite the left and right behind the proposals we can all agree on and look for solutions that actually make the system work better.
Instead of a comprehensive bill, a problem-solving approach that treats each of the many issues in our immigration system in its own lane can offer a better solution. In this manner, reforms can move forward in multiple areas at the same time and advance toward meaningful and effective solutions. That is an approach that would turn the meaningless words in the President’s speech into real answers.
SOURCE
Tuesday, January 22, 2013
Migrant baby boom triggers midwife crisis in Britain: Half of wards being forced to turn expectant mothers away
Women in labour are being turned away from maternity units as midwives are overwhelmed by record numbers of births.
With immigrants helping push birth rates in England to their highest level for 40 years, more than half of maternity wards admit shutting their doors an average of seven times a year when the strain on midwives becomes too great.
Expectant women who then turn up are sent away to other hospitals.
Research by The Royal College of Midwives says that thousands of new midwives are needed if the ‘massive gap’ in staffing is to be plugged, the ‘relentless rise in births’ handled and for mothers and babies to be given the quality of care they need.
Yesterday Cathy Warwick, chief executive of the RCM, warned of ‘threadbare’ services with midwives ‘running themselves ragged’. She said: ‘Maternity units are under intense strain, with many midwives really at the end of their tether. We are reaching a crucial tipping point for maternity services.’
The RCM’s State Of Maternity Services report, which will be launched at an event in Parliament tomorrow, says that although there have been attempts to boost midwife numbers, England alone still needs another 5,000 – an increase of about a quarter on today’s level.
Office for National Statistics figures show there were 688,120 babies born in England in 2011, the most since 1971.
The trend seems set to continue, with provisional data for 2012 pointing to it being another record-breaker and ONS projections suggesting the birth rate in England could hit 743,000 by 2014.
Corby in Northamptonshire saw the biggest baby boom, with a 63 per cent jump between 2002 and 2011 – three times the rise across England as a whole. Other hotspots include Bournemouth, with a 54 per cent increase, Boston, Lincolnshire (53.5 per cent), the London borough of Barking and Dagenham (52.5 per cent) and Slough in Berkshire, which saw a 50.5 per cent rise.
birthrate hotspots
Immigration is one factor, with foreign-born mothers now having nearly a quarter of all babies in Britain, but the RCM report says midwives are also struggling to look after record numbers of older mothers, who are more prone to complications.
The report follows a survey of new mothers which found that despite a Government pledge for mothers-to-be to have their care overseen by one midwife, 40 per cent always saw a different one.
Health Minister Dr Dan Poulter said that more than 800 new midwives have started work since 2010, and 5,000 more are due to qualify in the next three years.
He added: ‘The number of midwives is increasing faster than the birth rate. Most women already have one-to-one maternity care, and we are working closely with The Royal College of Midwives to ensure that is available for every woman.’
Thousands of patients are at risk from appalling care reminiscent of scandal-hit Stafford Hospital, the health secretary has claimed.
Jeremy Hunt’s warning comes just weeks before the report of a public inquiry into the deaths of up to 1,200 people from poor care in the hospital’s A&E department between 2005 and 2009.
He said that while there are no hospitals as bad as Stafford, ‘there are little bits of Stafford dotted around the system’.
He added: ‘The biggest change the NHS needs to make is to embed compassion at the heart of what it does.’
SOURCE
Illegal immigrants pay £1,500 to be smuggled OUT of Britain: Fears gangs are helping foreign criminals flee the country
Illegal immigrants are paying criminal gangs £1,500 a time to smuggle them out of Britain, it emerged last night. The foreign nationals – many of whom sneaked into the UK undetected in the first place – are put in the back of lorries and transported to France.
By avoiding contact with the authorities they can travel on to a European destination of their choice, rather than risk being sent back to their homeland thousands of miles away.
It is feared that foreign criminals on the run from the police are fleeing in this way.
The bizarre trade, exposed by a BBC Panorama investigation to be shown this evening, is an embarrassment for ministers.
Critics will say it shows how the Government cannot stop illegal migrants from leaving Britain, let alone entering.
Over a year, Panorama made contact with three criminal gangs offering to smuggle illegal immigrants out of the country with no questions asked.
Reporter Paul Kenyon secretly recorded the meeting with the fixer of one gang, held in a fast-food restaurant in London.
He posed as an immigrant from Moldova who had been working illegally in the UK without a passport or paperwork and who wanted to return home to his sick wife.
The fixer, a former Indian police officer called ‘Munga’, said for £1,500 per person the gang would smuggle groups of three or four illegal immigrants across the Channel in the back of a lorry, taking them to Calais train station.
Mr Kenyon told the Daily Mail: ‘This is a trade in human cargo of a very different kind to the one the UK Border Agency is used to.
‘Many people will be astonished – as well as relieved – to learn that illegal immigrants are abandoning the UK in search of work abroad.
‘It suggests that attempts to crack down on failed asylum seekers and overstayers – as well as the downturn in our own economy and subsequent lack of work here – could at last be having an effect.
‘But who is to say that when these people fail to find work abroad, they won’t simply buy their way back to Britain via the very people traffickers they used to leave the country.
‘Once back here, they might then try again to claim asylum, or simply vanish into the “ghost” community.’
Illegal immigrants who are caught by the authorities are offered financial ‘bribes’ if they agree to go home.
Officials estimate a forced deportation costs more than £11,000.
Mark Harper, the immigration minister, yesterday admitted: ‘It is possible we don’t catch every single person who tries to enter the country clandestinely.’
But he added: ‘When we do catch people, we’re increasing the work we do with our European colleagues. We make sure people are fingerprinted so we can check to see if they have entered the European Union in another country.
‘If they have, we can return them back to the country where they first entered.’
SOURCE
Migrant baby boom triggers midwife crisis in Britain: Half of wards being forced to turn expectant mothers away
Women in labour are being turned away from maternity units as midwives are overwhelmed by record numbers of births.
With immigrants helping push birth rates in England to their highest level for 40 years, more than half of maternity wards admit shutting their doors an average of seven times a year when the strain on midwives becomes too great.
Expectant women who then turn up are sent away to other hospitals.
Research by The Royal College of Midwives says that thousands of new midwives are needed if the ‘massive gap’ in staffing is to be plugged, the ‘relentless rise in births’ handled and for mothers and babies to be given the quality of care they need.
Yesterday Cathy Warwick, chief executive of the RCM, warned of ‘threadbare’ services with midwives ‘running themselves ragged’. She said: ‘Maternity units are under intense strain, with many midwives really at the end of their tether. We are reaching a crucial tipping point for maternity services.’
The RCM’s State Of Maternity Services report, which will be launched at an event in Parliament tomorrow, says that although there have been attempts to boost midwife numbers, England alone still needs another 5,000 – an increase of about a quarter on today’s level.
Office for National Statistics figures show there were 688,120 babies born in England in 2011, the most since 1971.
The trend seems set to continue, with provisional data for 2012 pointing to it being another record-breaker and ONS projections suggesting the birth rate in England could hit 743,000 by 2014.
Corby in Northamptonshire saw the biggest baby boom, with a 63 per cent jump between 2002 and 2011 – three times the rise across England as a whole. Other hotspots include Bournemouth, with a 54 per cent increase, Boston, Lincolnshire (53.5 per cent), the London borough of Barking and Dagenham (52.5 per cent) and Slough in Berkshire, which saw a 50.5 per cent rise.
birthrate hotspots
Immigration is one factor, with foreign-born mothers now having nearly a quarter of all babies in Britain, but the RCM report says midwives are also struggling to look after record numbers of older mothers, who are more prone to complications.
The report follows a survey of new mothers which found that despite a Government pledge for mothers-to-be to have their care overseen by one midwife, 40 per cent always saw a different one.
Health Minister Dr Dan Poulter said that more than 800 new midwives have started work since 2010, and 5,000 more are due to qualify in the next three years.
He added: ‘The number of midwives is increasing faster than the birth rate. Most women already have one-to-one maternity care, and we are working closely with The Royal College of Midwives to ensure that is available for every woman.’
Thousands of patients are at risk from appalling care reminiscent of scandal-hit Stafford Hospital, the health secretary has claimed.
Jeremy Hunt’s warning comes just weeks before the report of a public inquiry into the deaths of up to 1,200 people from poor care in the hospital’s A&E department between 2005 and 2009.
He said that while there are no hospitals as bad as Stafford, ‘there are little bits of Stafford dotted around the system’.
He added: ‘The biggest change the NHS needs to make is to embed compassion at the heart of what it does.’
SOURCE
Illegal immigrants pay £1,500 to be smuggled OUT of Britain: Fears gangs are helping foreign criminals flee the country
Illegal immigrants are paying criminal gangs £1,500 a time to smuggle them out of Britain, it emerged last night. The foreign nationals – many of whom sneaked into the UK undetected in the first place – are put in the back of lorries and transported to France.
By avoiding contact with the authorities they can travel on to a European destination of their choice, rather than risk being sent back to their homeland thousands of miles away.
It is feared that foreign criminals on the run from the police are fleeing in this way.
The bizarre trade, exposed by a BBC Panorama investigation to be shown this evening, is an embarrassment for ministers.
Critics will say it shows how the Government cannot stop illegal migrants from leaving Britain, let alone entering.
Over a year, Panorama made contact with three criminal gangs offering to smuggle illegal immigrants out of the country with no questions asked.
Reporter Paul Kenyon secretly recorded the meeting with the fixer of one gang, held in a fast-food restaurant in London.
He posed as an immigrant from Moldova who had been working illegally in the UK without a passport or paperwork and who wanted to return home to his sick wife.
The fixer, a former Indian police officer called ‘Munga’, said for £1,500 per person the gang would smuggle groups of three or four illegal immigrants across the Channel in the back of a lorry, taking them to Calais train station.
Mr Kenyon told the Daily Mail: ‘This is a trade in human cargo of a very different kind to the one the UK Border Agency is used to.
‘Many people will be astonished – as well as relieved – to learn that illegal immigrants are abandoning the UK in search of work abroad.
‘It suggests that attempts to crack down on failed asylum seekers and overstayers – as well as the downturn in our own economy and subsequent lack of work here – could at last be having an effect.
‘But who is to say that when these people fail to find work abroad, they won’t simply buy their way back to Britain via the very people traffickers they used to leave the country.
‘Once back here, they might then try again to claim asylum, or simply vanish into the “ghost” community.’
Illegal immigrants who are caught by the authorities are offered financial ‘bribes’ if they agree to go home.
Officials estimate a forced deportation costs more than £11,000.
Mark Harper, the immigration minister, yesterday admitted: ‘It is possible we don’t catch every single person who tries to enter the country clandestinely.’
But he added: ‘When we do catch people, we’re increasing the work we do with our European colleagues. We make sure people are fingerprinted so we can check to see if they have entered the European Union in another country.
‘If they have, we can return them back to the country where they first entered.’
SOURCE
Monday, January 21, 2013
Santorum's view
Rick Santorum suggested on Sunday that Republicans are ready to tackle immigration reform. "I think the Republicans are ready to do something on immigration," he said on ABC's This Week.
He stressed that President Obama and the Democrats would need to be willing to compromise with Republicans, though.
"They're not willing to give the president everything he wants, because I think they believe the rule of law still matters in this country and that -- and that we have to respect those who did it the right way, who waited in line, and did -- and made sacrifices, and that they shouldn't be treated the same as people who broke the law and came here," he said.
The former presidential candidate said he thought Obama was unwilling to compromise on immigration.
"There's not a single Republican up on Capitol Hill who believes he wants to get it done. They all believe ... he will put a measure that the Republicans can't accept and then blame Republicans and then continue to drive a wedge between Republicans and Hispanics."
He also criticized the president over the recent debt ceiling negotiations. He said that the administration's reaction to Republicans' announcement that they would seek a 3-month extension of the debt limit was harsh.
"That's the problem with this administration," he said. "They're not very gracious winners. And I always said, you know, there's one thing worse than a sore loser, and that's a sore winner. And the president's a sore winner.
Santorum also sounded off on gun control.
"Fifty years ago, you could go on a catalog and buy a gun," he said. "There were no restrictions on gun ownership. There were no restrictions on magazines. There were no restrictions on anything. And we had a lot less violence in society than we do today."
The former Pennsylvania senator, who now chairs conservative group Patriot Voices, has in the past made strong statements against immigration reform. During his 2012 presidential run, he said that families with undocumented immigrations should be broken up. However, he has taken a softer tone on the issue since ending his campaign. In December, he said that the U.S. needs immigration.
“I think the fact that we send some of those people back and don’t give them the opportunity to participate here is wrong," Santorum told Politico. “I think we need to look at a simple fact: We are not having enough children to replace ourselves. Our country is not growing in population simply by the people that are here.”
SOURCE
Asian Immigration To California Has Surpassed Latin-American Immigration
California is facing the end of an era as Asian immigrants have begun to come to California faster than Latino immigrants.
"This is a pretty astounding change over a short period of time," Hans Johnson, co-director of the Public Policy Institute of California, told the Sacremento Bee, citing census data.
In 2001, 42 percent of immigrants coming to California were from Latin America, primarily Mexico, while 37 percent were from Asia, the Bee reports. In 2011, 57 percent of new immigrants were from Asia, and just 22 percent were from Latin America.
The demographic breakdown of California's swearing-in of new citizens Wednesday was as follows:
450 from Asia (100 from India, 94 from the Philippines, 63 from Vietnam, 33 from China, 29 from Laos), 160 from Latin America (119 people from Mexico), 35 from Ukraine,
Johneric Concordia, a restaurant owner in LA's Filipinotown, told NBC that he is optimistic that the state's new immigration trend will mean more Asian political candidates, loans and scholarships.
One hurdle that Asians face in advocating for such access, however, is the diversity of Asian languages -- whereas most Latinos speak Spanish.
Doreena Wong of the Los Angeles Asian Pacific American Legal Center, told ABC that a lot of Asian immigrants are highly-educated and employable. "There are a lot of students from overseas countries in Asia and then they come here and get jobs," Wong said.
But this immigration change doesn't mean that the number of Asians in California is about to surpass the number of Latinos.
In fact, Latinos are expected to become California's largest ethnic group sometime this year, which is a couple of years earlier than demographers predicted. That's partially because California's birthrate is declining, as is migration from other states and nations.
SOURCE
Santorum's view
Rick Santorum suggested on Sunday that Republicans are ready to tackle immigration reform. "I think the Republicans are ready to do something on immigration," he said on ABC's This Week.
He stressed that President Obama and the Democrats would need to be willing to compromise with Republicans, though.
"They're not willing to give the president everything he wants, because I think they believe the rule of law still matters in this country and that -- and that we have to respect those who did it the right way, who waited in line, and did -- and made sacrifices, and that they shouldn't be treated the same as people who broke the law and came here," he said.
The former presidential candidate said he thought Obama was unwilling to compromise on immigration.
"There's not a single Republican up on Capitol Hill who believes he wants to get it done. They all believe ... he will put a measure that the Republicans can't accept and then blame Republicans and then continue to drive a wedge between Republicans and Hispanics."
He also criticized the president over the recent debt ceiling negotiations. He said that the administration's reaction to Republicans' announcement that they would seek a 3-month extension of the debt limit was harsh.
"That's the problem with this administration," he said. "They're not very gracious winners. And I always said, you know, there's one thing worse than a sore loser, and that's a sore winner. And the president's a sore winner.
Santorum also sounded off on gun control.
"Fifty years ago, you could go on a catalog and buy a gun," he said. "There were no restrictions on gun ownership. There were no restrictions on magazines. There were no restrictions on anything. And we had a lot less violence in society than we do today."
The former Pennsylvania senator, who now chairs conservative group Patriot Voices, has in the past made strong statements against immigration reform. During his 2012 presidential run, he said that families with undocumented immigrations should be broken up. However, he has taken a softer tone on the issue since ending his campaign. In December, he said that the U.S. needs immigration.
“I think the fact that we send some of those people back and don’t give them the opportunity to participate here is wrong," Santorum told Politico. “I think we need to look at a simple fact: We are not having enough children to replace ourselves. Our country is not growing in population simply by the people that are here.”
SOURCE
Asian Immigration To California Has Surpassed Latin-American Immigration
California is facing the end of an era as Asian immigrants have begun to come to California faster than Latino immigrants.
"This is a pretty astounding change over a short period of time," Hans Johnson, co-director of the Public Policy Institute of California, told the Sacremento Bee, citing census data.
In 2001, 42 percent of immigrants coming to California were from Latin America, primarily Mexico, while 37 percent were from Asia, the Bee reports. In 2011, 57 percent of new immigrants were from Asia, and just 22 percent were from Latin America.
The demographic breakdown of California's swearing-in of new citizens Wednesday was as follows:
450 from Asia (100 from India, 94 from the Philippines, 63 from Vietnam, 33 from China, 29 from Laos), 160 from Latin America (119 people from Mexico), 35 from Ukraine,
Johneric Concordia, a restaurant owner in LA's Filipinotown, told NBC that he is optimistic that the state's new immigration trend will mean more Asian political candidates, loans and scholarships.
One hurdle that Asians face in advocating for such access, however, is the diversity of Asian languages -- whereas most Latinos speak Spanish.
Doreena Wong of the Los Angeles Asian Pacific American Legal Center, told ABC that a lot of Asian immigrants are highly-educated and employable. "There are a lot of students from overseas countries in Asia and then they come here and get jobs," Wong said.
But this immigration change doesn't mean that the number of Asians in California is about to surpass the number of Latinos.
In fact, Latinos are expected to become California's largest ethnic group sometime this year, which is a couple of years earlier than demographers predicted. That's partially because California's birthrate is declining, as is migration from other states and nations.
SOURCE
Sunday, January 20, 2013
What Gets in the Way of U.S. Immigration Reform
A useful summary below but it ignores the elephant in the room: Republicans would be out of their minds to add millions more of Democrat voters to the voter lists. Hispanics are their own worst enemy. The big majority are and will remain poor so will always vote Democrat even if Republicans do an octopus job of "reaching out"
There's been lots of talk about legislation, but reform could face significant roadblocks in Congress.
The Gang of Eight is drafting principles. The White House says immigration reform could be in the State of the Union. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., is planning Judiciary hearings. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and AFL-CIO have joined hands to push for action. There's no shortage of political will to get immigration reform done in this Congress, but attempts at an overhaul of the system have failed before, and lawmakers still have several major hurdles to overcome this time. Here are a few:
A path to citizenship versus legal status: This is the single most divisive issue that lawmakers will have to overcome. Democrats, in general, will demand that any legislation include a path to citizenship (this is also a priority for the AFL-CIO). Many Republicans, on the other hand, remain staunchly opposed to anything resembling amnesty. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told a Nevada news outlet that a bipartisan group of senators “have agreed tentatively on a path to citizenship, which is the big stumbling block.” But it remains to be seen whether that agreement would be acceptable to the entire Congress.
Comprehensive versus piecemeal reform: Proponents say a comprehensive package is the only way to fix the system. It’s also a top priority of the president and the aim of the Gang of Eight—Sens. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., Robert Menendez, D-N.J., John McCain, R-Ariz., Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., Mike Lee, R-Utah, and newly elected Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz. But a comprehensive bill also gives everyone something to hate. Some lawmakers, such as Rep. Raul Labrador, R-Idaho, say it will be easier to tackle different reforms in smaller bills because different coalitions will support each piece.
Inclusion of a guest-worker program: Disagreement over granting foreign workers temporary visas to work in the United States has historically separated business and labor groups, but the two are trying to find common ground this time. Jeff Hauser, spokesman for the AFL-CIO—which has opposed such programs in the past—said his group is talking to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce about ways to create a depoliticized body to manage the future flow of workers.
The Hastert Rule: While a number of high-profile Republicans such as McCain have worked on immigration reform for years, it’s still likely that legislation will have more Democratic than Republican support. But House Speaker John Boehner has generally run the House in the style of former House Speaker Dennis Hastert, always ensuring that a majority of the majority party supports legislation before bringing it to the floor. The rule was violated to get the fiscal-cliff legislation passed. Redistricting after the 2010 election put more and more lawmakers into safe districts, meaning they have less incentive to compromise. So it may not be possible for Boehner to get a majority of the majority to back immigration reform.
A crowded agenda: The temporary nature of the deal produced to avert the fiscal cliff means that within the first few months of the year, Congress will have to negotiate a deal to raise the debt ceiling, deal with the sequester, and fund the government. President Obama is also pushing gun control as a top priority. With limited time before legislators start focusing on their 2014 midterm races, there might not be enough oxygen for immigration reform to happen this year as well.
Plain old politics: There’s a reason that immigration reform has failed so many times: It’s a tough political nut to crack, and can bring out ugliness and name-calling on both sides of the aisle. At a Politico Pro event Tuesday, Labrador suggested that Obama wanted a political victory instead of a policy victory—which may be easier if nothing gets done and Republicans get the blame.
That’s not the way Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., a longtime immigration-reform advocate, sees it. “I have had Republicans say they don't want Obama to do a bill because they want flexibility, but if he doesn't do a bill, he's criticized,” she said at the event. She says she’s just waiting for Boehner to get the ball rolling. “It's not that tough, it's just the decision to do it,” she said.
SOURCE
Our town's like a foreign country: Locals can't cope with all the immigrants, says British mother after TV clash with academic
A mother who tackled a leading historian on live television about immigration insisted last night that her family’s home town has become like a ‘foreign country’.
On BBC1’s Question Time, Professor Mary Beard dismissed stories about the number of migrant workers overwhelming Boston as ‘myths’ and said ‘public services can cope’.
But Rachel Bull, an office manager in Boston, who was in the audience, immediately challenged the Cambridge University classics professor, claiming hospitals and schools are struggling to cope in the Lincolnshire agricultural town.
Mrs Bull – whose grandparents moved to Britain from Poland after the Second World War – said that she is not against immigration, but believes ministers should reconsider allowing Romanians and Bulgarians unrestricted rights to live and work in the UK from December 2013.
After Professor Beard – known to millions for the BBC2 series Meet the Romans – told Question Time on Thursday night she believed local services in Boston are able to cope, Mrs Bull raised her hand and said: ‘I’m sorry, I really disagree.’
She told the panel, which was sitting in Lincoln: ‘I have a business in Boston, I have family that live in Boston and we’ve got land at Boston and we’ve had major issues with workers who’ve got nowhere to go, camping on our land and we can’t move them off because the police aren’t interested. Boston is at breaking point. All the locals can’t cope any more – the services, doctors’ surgeries, hospitals.
‘I have a family member that’s a midwife at Boston Pilgrim Hospital. The facilities are at breaking point because of these people coming into the country and nothing is being done. You go down to Boston High Street and it’s just like you’re in a foreign country. And it’s got to stop.’
Yesterday Mrs Bull said that Boston, which has a population of around 61,000, is too small to cope with such a large number of migrants, now thought to number 9,000.
She added: ‘The problem is we’re not like these politicians or other people on television, we’re on the frontline. I’ve not been to university, I’m just a 35-year-old who spoke from the heart.’
Mrs Bull, whose family has a retirement home business, said she is worried that more migrants from Romania and Bulgaria will make the problems worse. She said many workers head to the area on the promise of work, but end up without employment or money.
Mrs Bull, who has a 10-year-old son, said: ‘They are going to come to Boston because of the landworkers, the farms and agriculture, that’s where they would get work.
‘But we’ve got so many homeless on the streets, this town has so many problems that are just being swept under the carpet and the locals are crying out. Someone needs to help us.
‘I don’t want it to be about them and us. We all want to work together as one, but when resources are stretched that’s when the animosity starts, and we don’t want that.’ Mrs Bull, who now lives elsewhere in Lincolnshire, said her family has had repeated problems with migrants camping on their land and that it has been impossible to get help from the authorities and police to move them.
'I don't want it to be about them and us... but when resources are stretched that's when the animosity starts, and we don't want that'
She said: ‘My dad and brother used to go there every day as my dad speaks Polish, to explain to them that they have to move on because we were getting complaints from environmental health, and local residents were complaining about the mess they were leaving. There were empty bottles, human faeces, needles.
‘We felt sorry for them as there was a young couple who had been promised work, they’d been dropped off in Boston, had their passports taken off them, they had no money, and they were just left stranded. ‘We gave them a bit of money for them to get some food and drink to help them out, but the numbers just grew.’
Mrs Bull’s grandfather was a flight sergeant who fought for Britain, flying Lancaster Bombers and Mosquitoes.
She said her family is proud of its background and enjoy pierogi – traditional dumplings – from the local Polish shops.
She said: ‘We just want help from the Government, and we want them to reconsider when the Romanians and the Bulgarians come in.’
SOURCE
What Gets in the Way of U.S. Immigration Reform
A useful summary below but it ignores the elephant in the room: Republicans would be out of their minds to add millions more of Democrat voters to the voter lists. Hispanics are their own worst enemy. The big majority are and will remain poor so will always vote Democrat even if Republicans do an octopus job of "reaching out"
There's been lots of talk about legislation, but reform could face significant roadblocks in Congress.
The Gang of Eight is drafting principles. The White House says immigration reform could be in the State of the Union. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., is planning Judiciary hearings. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and AFL-CIO have joined hands to push for action. There's no shortage of political will to get immigration reform done in this Congress, but attempts at an overhaul of the system have failed before, and lawmakers still have several major hurdles to overcome this time. Here are a few:
A path to citizenship versus legal status: This is the single most divisive issue that lawmakers will have to overcome. Democrats, in general, will demand that any legislation include a path to citizenship (this is also a priority for the AFL-CIO). Many Republicans, on the other hand, remain staunchly opposed to anything resembling amnesty. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told a Nevada news outlet that a bipartisan group of senators “have agreed tentatively on a path to citizenship, which is the big stumbling block.” But it remains to be seen whether that agreement would be acceptable to the entire Congress.
Comprehensive versus piecemeal reform: Proponents say a comprehensive package is the only way to fix the system. It’s also a top priority of the president and the aim of the Gang of Eight—Sens. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., Robert Menendez, D-N.J., John McCain, R-Ariz., Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., Mike Lee, R-Utah, and newly elected Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz. But a comprehensive bill also gives everyone something to hate. Some lawmakers, such as Rep. Raul Labrador, R-Idaho, say it will be easier to tackle different reforms in smaller bills because different coalitions will support each piece.
Inclusion of a guest-worker program: Disagreement over granting foreign workers temporary visas to work in the United States has historically separated business and labor groups, but the two are trying to find common ground this time. Jeff Hauser, spokesman for the AFL-CIO—which has opposed such programs in the past—said his group is talking to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce about ways to create a depoliticized body to manage the future flow of workers.
The Hastert Rule: While a number of high-profile Republicans such as McCain have worked on immigration reform for years, it’s still likely that legislation will have more Democratic than Republican support. But House Speaker John Boehner has generally run the House in the style of former House Speaker Dennis Hastert, always ensuring that a majority of the majority party supports legislation before bringing it to the floor. The rule was violated to get the fiscal-cliff legislation passed. Redistricting after the 2010 election put more and more lawmakers into safe districts, meaning they have less incentive to compromise. So it may not be possible for Boehner to get a majority of the majority to back immigration reform.
A crowded agenda: The temporary nature of the deal produced to avert the fiscal cliff means that within the first few months of the year, Congress will have to negotiate a deal to raise the debt ceiling, deal with the sequester, and fund the government. President Obama is also pushing gun control as a top priority. With limited time before legislators start focusing on their 2014 midterm races, there might not be enough oxygen for immigration reform to happen this year as well.
Plain old politics: There’s a reason that immigration reform has failed so many times: It’s a tough political nut to crack, and can bring out ugliness and name-calling on both sides of the aisle. At a Politico Pro event Tuesday, Labrador suggested that Obama wanted a political victory instead of a policy victory—which may be easier if nothing gets done and Republicans get the blame.
That’s not the way Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., a longtime immigration-reform advocate, sees it. “I have had Republicans say they don't want Obama to do a bill because they want flexibility, but if he doesn't do a bill, he's criticized,” she said at the event. She says she’s just waiting for Boehner to get the ball rolling. “It's not that tough, it's just the decision to do it,” she said.
SOURCE
Our town's like a foreign country: Locals can't cope with all the immigrants, says British mother after TV clash with academic
A mother who tackled a leading historian on live television about immigration insisted last night that her family’s home town has become like a ‘foreign country’.
On BBC1’s Question Time, Professor Mary Beard dismissed stories about the number of migrant workers overwhelming Boston as ‘myths’ and said ‘public services can cope’.
But Rachel Bull, an office manager in Boston, who was in the audience, immediately challenged the Cambridge University classics professor, claiming hospitals and schools are struggling to cope in the Lincolnshire agricultural town.
Mrs Bull – whose grandparents moved to Britain from Poland after the Second World War – said that she is not against immigration, but believes ministers should reconsider allowing Romanians and Bulgarians unrestricted rights to live and work in the UK from December 2013.
After Professor Beard – known to millions for the BBC2 series Meet the Romans – told Question Time on Thursday night she believed local services in Boston are able to cope, Mrs Bull raised her hand and said: ‘I’m sorry, I really disagree.’
She told the panel, which was sitting in Lincoln: ‘I have a business in Boston, I have family that live in Boston and we’ve got land at Boston and we’ve had major issues with workers who’ve got nowhere to go, camping on our land and we can’t move them off because the police aren’t interested. Boston is at breaking point. All the locals can’t cope any more – the services, doctors’ surgeries, hospitals.
‘I have a family member that’s a midwife at Boston Pilgrim Hospital. The facilities are at breaking point because of these people coming into the country and nothing is being done. You go down to Boston High Street and it’s just like you’re in a foreign country. And it’s got to stop.’
Yesterday Mrs Bull said that Boston, which has a population of around 61,000, is too small to cope with such a large number of migrants, now thought to number 9,000.
She added: ‘The problem is we’re not like these politicians or other people on television, we’re on the frontline. I’ve not been to university, I’m just a 35-year-old who spoke from the heart.’
Mrs Bull, whose family has a retirement home business, said she is worried that more migrants from Romania and Bulgaria will make the problems worse. She said many workers head to the area on the promise of work, but end up without employment or money.
Mrs Bull, who has a 10-year-old son, said: ‘They are going to come to Boston because of the landworkers, the farms and agriculture, that’s where they would get work.
‘But we’ve got so many homeless on the streets, this town has so many problems that are just being swept under the carpet and the locals are crying out. Someone needs to help us.
‘I don’t want it to be about them and us. We all want to work together as one, but when resources are stretched that’s when the animosity starts, and we don’t want that.’ Mrs Bull, who now lives elsewhere in Lincolnshire, said her family has had repeated problems with migrants camping on their land and that it has been impossible to get help from the authorities and police to move them.
'I don't want it to be about them and us... but when resources are stretched that's when the animosity starts, and we don't want that'
She said: ‘My dad and brother used to go there every day as my dad speaks Polish, to explain to them that they have to move on because we were getting complaints from environmental health, and local residents were complaining about the mess they were leaving. There were empty bottles, human faeces, needles.
‘We felt sorry for them as there was a young couple who had been promised work, they’d been dropped off in Boston, had their passports taken off them, they had no money, and they were just left stranded. ‘We gave them a bit of money for them to get some food and drink to help them out, but the numbers just grew.’
Mrs Bull’s grandfather was a flight sergeant who fought for Britain, flying Lancaster Bombers and Mosquitoes.
She said her family is proud of its background and enjoy pierogi – traditional dumplings – from the local Polish shops.
She said: ‘We just want help from the Government, and we want them to reconsider when the Romanians and the Bulgarians come in.’
SOURCE
Friday, January 18, 2013
Labour got it wrong on immigration, admits Miliband
Ed Miliband has suggested he could limit foreigners’ rights to benefits in the UK as he apologised for Labour’s failures on immigration.
In an interview with BBC Radio 4’s Today programme Mr Miliband admitted that the last Labour government was not “sufficiently alive to people's concerns” over immigration.
The Labour leader said his party got “the numbers wrong” when estimating the number of migrants who would flock to the UK when restrictions on movements from Poland and other Eastern European countries were lifted in 2004.
He suggested that he would in future consider limiting immigrants' rights to benefits in the UK.
“We didn’t get this right in government because I think we underestimated the impact,” Mr Miliband said. “We did get the numbers wrong… I don’t think we were sufficiently alive to people’s concerns once people had come into this country.”
He made the comments as MigrationWatch suggested that 250,000 migrants from Bulgaria and Romania could head to the UK for work when working restrictions are lifted at the end of the year.
MigrationWatch said 50,000 migrants a year for the next five years could try to come to settle in the UK, based on analysis of the numbers who came from Poland and other eastern European countries into the UK after 2004.
Ministers have repeatedly refused to give estimates on how many Romanians and Bulgarians will come to the UK when restrictions are lifted on December 31 this year.
Mr Miliband said immigrants' rights to benefits in the UK “should be looked at” in the future.
“Yes, that is an issue that should be looked at,” Mr Miliband said. “Of course that’s an issue that should be looked at, the length of entitlement to benefits and how quickly people can get them.
“All of these issues would be on the table as we seek to manage our relationship with the European Union, and as we seek to manage migration. I actually think that diversity helps our country. But it can’t just work for some and not for all.”
In an interview with The Daily Telegraph Ion Jinga, the Romanian Ambassador to London, suggested that the number migrants from his country will be in the low tens of thousands, possibly as low as 10,000 a year, and nothing like the hundreds of thousands of Poles who came to live in the UK after 2004.
Mr Jinga said: “It is totally ungrounded to circulate in the media that hundreds of thousands of Romanians will come, it will be an invasion.
"‘They will take our jobs, they will take our houses’. Come on! If it was not related to real human beings I would consider it to be a joke.”
SOURCE
Up to 70,000 Romanian and Bulgarian migrants a year ‘will come to Britain’ when controls on EU migrants expire
Up to 70,000 Bulgarians and Romanians will travel to Britain each year when they finally gain open access to the jobs market, a report claims today.
Almost 29million people from the two countries will be free to work in Britain from the end of this year when temporary controls on new EU migrants expire.
But although ministers have their own estimate of the scale of the influx, they refuse to reveal it.
The figure is likely to be the crucial factor in deciding whether the Government will hit the Prime Minister’s goal of cutting net migration – the difference between those arriving and leaving each year – to ‘tens of thousands’
The report by the pressure group MigrationWatch says Romanians and Bulgarians will add between 30,000 and 70,000 to our population in each of the next five years. This is partly based on the events of 2004 when immigration soared after Poland and seven other nations joined the EU.
The report estimates an average of 50,000 Romanians and Bulgarians will arrive here each year, a total of 250,000.
But it warns the figure could soar if Roma gipsies or the nearly 1million Romanians already in other EU countries also come.
Romania and Bulgaria joined the EU in 2007, but the number who could take jobs here was capped at 25,000 for low-skilled workers. That limit expires this year.
The study explains why Britain is likely to be attractive to Romanians and Bulgarians. Both are relatively poor with a minimum wage of around £1 an hour, compared to £6.19 here, and income per head of about a fifth of Britain’s. In addition, destinations such as Spain, Italy and France have high youth unemployment.
The UK also offers full benefits when immigrants find work, including housing and child benefit and child tax credit.
MigrationWatch chairman Sir Andrew Green said: ‘It is not good enough to duck making an estimate of immigration. It is likely to have significant consequences for housing and services. It will also add to the competition young workers face.’
David Cameron indicated he did not have confidence in Government figures, saying the estimated influx of around 14,000 Poles in 2004 turned out to be ‘ridiculously low’.
The Home Office said it was looking at ‘factors that may encourage EU nationals to come to the UK’.
SOURCE
Labour got it wrong on immigration, admits Miliband
Ed Miliband has suggested he could limit foreigners’ rights to benefits in the UK as he apologised for Labour’s failures on immigration.
In an interview with BBC Radio 4’s Today programme Mr Miliband admitted that the last Labour government was not “sufficiently alive to people's concerns” over immigration.
The Labour leader said his party got “the numbers wrong” when estimating the number of migrants who would flock to the UK when restrictions on movements from Poland and other Eastern European countries were lifted in 2004.
He suggested that he would in future consider limiting immigrants' rights to benefits in the UK.
“We didn’t get this right in government because I think we underestimated the impact,” Mr Miliband said. “We did get the numbers wrong… I don’t think we were sufficiently alive to people’s concerns once people had come into this country.”
He made the comments as MigrationWatch suggested that 250,000 migrants from Bulgaria and Romania could head to the UK for work when working restrictions are lifted at the end of the year.
MigrationWatch said 50,000 migrants a year for the next five years could try to come to settle in the UK, based on analysis of the numbers who came from Poland and other eastern European countries into the UK after 2004.
Ministers have repeatedly refused to give estimates on how many Romanians and Bulgarians will come to the UK when restrictions are lifted on December 31 this year.
Mr Miliband said immigrants' rights to benefits in the UK “should be looked at” in the future.
“Yes, that is an issue that should be looked at,” Mr Miliband said. “Of course that’s an issue that should be looked at, the length of entitlement to benefits and how quickly people can get them.
“All of these issues would be on the table as we seek to manage our relationship with the European Union, and as we seek to manage migration. I actually think that diversity helps our country. But it can’t just work for some and not for all.”
In an interview with The Daily Telegraph Ion Jinga, the Romanian Ambassador to London, suggested that the number migrants from his country will be in the low tens of thousands, possibly as low as 10,000 a year, and nothing like the hundreds of thousands of Poles who came to live in the UK after 2004.
Mr Jinga said: “It is totally ungrounded to circulate in the media that hundreds of thousands of Romanians will come, it will be an invasion.
"‘They will take our jobs, they will take our houses’. Come on! If it was not related to real human beings I would consider it to be a joke.”
SOURCE
Up to 70,000 Romanian and Bulgarian migrants a year ‘will come to Britain’ when controls on EU migrants expire
Up to 70,000 Bulgarians and Romanians will travel to Britain each year when they finally gain open access to the jobs market, a report claims today.
Almost 29million people from the two countries will be free to work in Britain from the end of this year when temporary controls on new EU migrants expire.
But although ministers have their own estimate of the scale of the influx, they refuse to reveal it.
The figure is likely to be the crucial factor in deciding whether the Government will hit the Prime Minister’s goal of cutting net migration – the difference between those arriving and leaving each year – to ‘tens of thousands’
The report by the pressure group MigrationWatch says Romanians and Bulgarians will add between 30,000 and 70,000 to our population in each of the next five years. This is partly based on the events of 2004 when immigration soared after Poland and seven other nations joined the EU.
The report estimates an average of 50,000 Romanians and Bulgarians will arrive here each year, a total of 250,000.
But it warns the figure could soar if Roma gipsies or the nearly 1million Romanians already in other EU countries also come.
Romania and Bulgaria joined the EU in 2007, but the number who could take jobs here was capped at 25,000 for low-skilled workers. That limit expires this year.
The study explains why Britain is likely to be attractive to Romanians and Bulgarians. Both are relatively poor with a minimum wage of around £1 an hour, compared to £6.19 here, and income per head of about a fifth of Britain’s. In addition, destinations such as Spain, Italy and France have high youth unemployment.
The UK also offers full benefits when immigrants find work, including housing and child benefit and child tax credit.
MigrationWatch chairman Sir Andrew Green said: ‘It is not good enough to duck making an estimate of immigration. It is likely to have significant consequences for housing and services. It will also add to the competition young workers face.’
David Cameron indicated he did not have confidence in Government figures, saying the estimated influx of around 14,000 Poles in 2004 turned out to be ‘ridiculously low’.
The Home Office said it was looking at ‘factors that may encourage EU nationals to come to the UK’.
SOURCE
Thursday, January 17, 2013
1,500 foreign criminals 'held beyond sentence' in Britain
Britain is being forced to pay tens of millions of pounds to keep nearly 1,500 foreign criminals behind bars beyond the term of their sentence as they fight deportation.
The cost could reach the equivalent of £55 million a year as more than 500 foreign prisoners are held in jails after their sentences should have ended while almost 1,000 are being kept in immigration removal centres, figures showed.
Prime Minister David Cameron pledged nearly two years ago to put an end to agreements that mean foreign offenders cannot be returned home without their consent.
Tory MP Priti Patel, who obtained the figures through a parliamentary question, said the number of foreign criminals who can not be deported showed the Government needed to scrap the Human Rights Act.
“Ministers must remove dangerous foreign criminals quickly from Britain,” she said.
“Taxpayers should not be paying for foreign offenders to remain in the UK after their prison sentence has ended. “It’s a disgrace they’re allowed to remain here for such a long time, which is only made worse by the Human Rights Act which must be scrapped so we can send foreign criminals back home as quickly as possible.”
Ms Patel went on: “There’s no doubt that the Government wants to do more to remove foreign criminals from Britain.
“But we have to look at issues like the Human Rights Act which clearly hinders them from doing that. “We can no longer sit back because clearly it’s having a serious impact on the number of foreign criminals in the country.”
Mark Harper, the Immigration Minister, said: “In September 2012, 547 foreign national offenders were detained by the UK Border Agency in prisons following completion of their custodial sentence. “A further 919 foreign national offenders were detained beyond the end of their sentence in immigration removal centres.’
He could not say for how long each prisoner had been detained.
However, the latest figures from the Prison Reform Trust showed the average number of days taken to remove a foreign prisoner at the end of their sentence has fallen from 131 days in 2008 to 77 in 2011.
Each prison place costs an average of almost £38,000 a year, while immigration detention costs £102 per night, the trust’s figures also showed.
The number of foreign criminals awaiting deportation was released on Tuesday as ministers signed a new deal to ensure a wave of Albanian prisoners held in England and Wales will be sent back to their home country to finish their sentences.
The move, which is expected to save taxpayers around £25 million over the next 10 years, should see the first batch of prisoners deported in around two months time.
It is the first agreement providing for transfer from the UK to outside the European Union and Albanian nationals make up the 16th highest foreign national population in English and Welsh prisons.
A total of 77 out of nearly 200 Albanian prisoners who are currently eligible for transfer under the agreement between the two nations have been referred to the UK Border Agency for deportation, the Ministry of Justice said.
Jeremy Wright, the Prisons Minister, said: “The British Government wants more foreign national prisoners to serve their sentences in their home country.”
In April 2010, there were 701 foreign offenders detailed in jail after their sentence, which fell to 516 in April 2011 but rose again to 552 in the same month in 2012, the figures revealed.
The number of people held in immigration detention centres after completing a prison sentence has fallen from 1,213 in April 2010 to 812 in April 2012.
SOURCE
Immigration Enforcement Law Proposed in Montana
It’s not a magnet for undocumented immigrants. And that's just the way at least one Montana lawmaker likes it. State Rep. David Howard, a Republican known well in Montana for his take-no-prisoners stance on illegal immigration, is determined to keep the state nicknamed “Big Sky Country” as the last place any undocumented immigrant would want to call home.
Howard is pushing a bill that calls on government agencies across the state to enforce federal immigration laws.
Howard told the Montana House Judiciary Committee on Monday that his bill, HB 50, ensures local governments will enforce immigration laws and not turn a blind eye to undocumented immigrants.
Howard said that some cities in other parts of the United States barred their police officers and other public agency workers from inquiring about immigration status. Montana, he told the committee, had to make sure it protected itself against that ever happening within its borders.
His measure, he said, would send a message a message to undocumented immigrants that they are not welcome in Montana. “It creates a defense in wonderful Montana where they won’t come here … all this does is to protect Montanans,” he told the committee. His office did not return various attempts for comment from Fox News Latino.
Montana’s small foreign-born population is mainly Latinos, though many Canadians have settled there too. The Latino population is about 28,565, or 3 percent of the total state population, according to the Pew Hispanic Center.
Howard’s move runs counter to trends across the nation that have seen a softening by Republicans on illegal immigration, as well as less clamor at the state level to pass immigration laws.
In 2011, 30 state legislatures introduced more than 50 bills similar to that of Arizona, which, among other things, calls on police to check the immigration status of a person they have stopped for another reason and whom they suspect of being in the country unlawfully.
But in 2012, after court challenges blocked parts of many such laws, and as public support for these measures waned, only five states – Kansas, Mississippi, Missouri, Rhode Island and West Virginia – considered immigration bills. None were enacted, according to the National Council of State Legislatures.
On the political front in recent years, many GOP leaders adopted a hard-line position on illegal immigration that was similar to the one embraced by Howard’s in Montana. But after that approach – which dominated much of the Republican primary and debates – was blamed as a key reason for many Latinos walking away from the GOP, the party has softened its tone.
Many Republicans, including House Speaker John Boehner, Ohio Republican, have pledged to soften their positions since the Nov. 6 election, in which the vast majority (71 percent) of Latino voters chose President Obama over the GOP challenger, Mitt Romney.
Echoing many other Republicans, Boehner said he would consider proposals for comprehensive immigration reform, which would include tightened enforcement as well as a pathway to legalization for certain undocumented immigrants.
Some Republican leaders expressed dismay over Howard’s proposal.
“It’s amazing that after everything we went through, after our terrible performance with Latino voters in the election, that you would still have some Republicans who would be willing to present this type of legislation,” said Alfonso Aguilar, executive director of the Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles, a Washington, D.C.-based group.
“If it passes, it will not help the Republican Party.”
“Republicans who are pro-immigrant have to come forward and condemn those laws,” said Aguilar, a former Homeland Security Department official in the George W. Bush administration. “What killed us before was that Republicans who were pro-immigrant remained silent.”
Proponents of strict immigration measures praised Howard’s proposal. “Rep. Howard’s bill ensures common sense state-federal enforcement practices for those of us who believe in the rule of law and the restoration of an immigration law that works,” said Dan Stein, director of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, based in Washington D.C. “Americans are tired of paying for the same old political games designed to reward, promote and encourage illegal immigration. We applaud his efforts.”
Montana has taken on illegal immigration before; in November, voters approved a measure requiring proof of legal U.S. residency in order to receive public services. A measure similar to HB 50 cleared the state legislature two years ago, but former Gov. Brian Schweitzer vetoed it, calling it unnecessary in Montana.
Immigration advocacy groups in Montana say they are worried about Howard’s latest proposal, given the approval that voters gave to the referendum measure in November. “Montana does not have an immigration problem,” said Shahid Haque-Hausrath, executive director of the Montana Immigrant Justice Alliance. “Montana is one of the states with the least number of immigrants – documented or undocumented.”
SOURCE
January 16, 2013
Rubio outlines immigration proposal
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., outlined his proposals for immigration reform in an interview with the Wall Street Journal in a plan that is sure to upset some within his own party. But Rubio argues that immigration is an important issue to Hispanic voters, a voting bloc that the Republicans lost ground with in 2012.
"[T]he immigration issue is a gateway issue for Hispanics, no doubt about it. No matter what your stance is on a number of other issues, if people somehow come to believe that you don't like them or want them here, it's difficult to get them to listen to anything else," Rubio said.
The Republican Party's struggle with Hispanics in the 2012 elections was most glaring at the top of the ticket as Mitt Romney only received 27 percent of the Hispanic vote. Party leaders now admit that they have to do more to reach out to the growing demographic.
Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, said he would like to propose a "comprehensive package of bills", which would include increased access for high-skilled workers, such as engieneers and doctors, a guest worker program for low-skilled workers, including farm workers. He supports workplace enforcement and stronger border security.
But the real challenge revolves around what to do with the up to 12 million undocumented immigrants currently living in the U.S.
He says his plan for that group "is not blanket amnesty or a special pathway to citizenship." Instead, they would have to get in line to apply for legal status and adhere to challenging requirements, but no immigrant would have to leave return to their home country to start the process.
The waiting time for a green card "would have to be long enough to ensure that it's not easier to do it this way than it would be the legal way," he told the Wall Street Journal. "But it can't be indefinite either. I mean it can't be unrealistic, because then you're not really accomplishing anything. It's not good for our country to have people trapped in this status forever. It's been a disaster for Europe."
Potentially signaling a shift within the party, Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., who was Romney's running mate last year and, like Rubio, is considered a possible 2016 presidential candidate, came out in support of Rubio's general proposal. On his Facebook page, Ryan wrote, "Senator Rubio is exactly right on the need to fix our broken immigration system. I support the principles he's outlined: modernization of our immigration laws; stronger security to curb illegal immigration; and respect for the rule of law in addressing the complex challenge of the undocumented population. Our future depends on an immigration system that works."
SOURCE
Labour party leader needs bolder answers over the European Union and immigration
While, in normal circumstances, the EU may be as inflammatory as mashed potato, immigration is anything but. Soundings this week by the think tank British Future ranked it as the greatest cause of social division in Britain, in a verdict consistent with what voters have told pollsters and politicians for years. With the imminent arrival of Bulgarian and Romanian incomers entitled to work here, the debates over Europe and immigration are about to collide, and the fallout will be toxic.
Fears of mass immigration, when travel restrictions on the two newest EU member states are lifted next January, have been heightened by warnings of housing problems from Eric Pickles, the Communities Secretary. The PM’s reluctance to speculate on the numbers expected has been exploited by Ukip, which supplied its own estimate of 350,000 to 400,000.
Wild exaggeration as that may be, Ukip has seized on a potential vote-winner. Private polling suggests that any party successfully linking EU withdrawal and immigration could potentially appeal to 80 per cent of the electorate, leaving Mr Cameron in double trouble. Take Europe first. The Netherlands speech, which may boast the longest gestation period in oratorical history, signifies his reluctance to be the PM who takes Britain out of Europe. The paradox is that by playing a long game, Mr Cameron will make exit more likely.
Sources close to Angela Merkel’s administration are adamant that the four EU pillars of freedom – goods, capital, services and movement – are “sacrosanct”. Should we prove obdurate on any one, then Germany will, with regret but no demur, let Britain go.
One senior figure says that the Merkel government is increasingly alarmed by Mr Cameron’s tactics. “We are worried that things will get out of hand,” this source tells me. “We agree with Miliband; we’re fearful Cameron could sleepwalk out.” Leading Labour strategists calculate that, even if the Tories win in 2015, he is “a seven-year PM” likely to bequeath the referendum to a more Eurosceptic successor (the choice is ample), who would lead Britain out of the EU.
Nor are Mr Cameron’s delaying tactics likely to repel the Ukip advance, pacify his hardliners or satisfy Fresh Start, a Tory faction which sounds like a January detox and which, in the way of crash diets, will be doomed in its bid to rid Britain of the excess weight of EU treaties. As Douglas Alexander wrote recently, the Europe speech “reveals more about the PM’s weakness at home than his agenda abroad”.
On migration, the Tories are also ensnared. The aim of bringing net migration to below 100,000 is misconceived and – irrespective of how few Bulgarians turn up – scare stories are already rife. Yet in the face of Tory disarray, Labour seems oddly silent, even allowing for some powerful interventions from Mr Alexander and Labour’s big beasts, such as Lords Kinnock and Mandelson. Mr Miliband, for example, contrived to get through his speech to the Fabians on Saturday without a single mention of the EU.
Asked by a delegate from Brussels to explain this omission, he offered a stout defence of Britain in Europe, echoing his speech last year to the CBI. None the less, One Nationism, Mr Miliband’s Fabian topic and defining creed, is susceptible to tipping into an insular doctrine in which Britons appear to have some privileged monopoly on universal values such as decency and kindness.
While Mr Miliband, the son of refugees, would never intend his new brand to be so construed, Labour’s sudden reverence for tradition demands the constant caveat that what was good for Disraeli’s Britain has little relevance in a globalised world and a Europe where, as one senior Labour figure says, reform is “perfectly possible without using the politics of blackmail”. That is the settled view within a party that, contrary to rumour, is not full of Eurosceptics. Though many Labour figures want a referendum, the issue is consent, not exit.
Mr Miliband should profit from that relative consensus to drum home, from now to the election, that any exit from Europe would be outweighed by a catastrophic slump in influence and a fall in trade with a market that accounts for half our exports. Those cities dependent on the motor industry would become as desolate as Detroit, as carmakers disappeared, and the City would be recast as a mausoleum to a lost financial services industry.
Stridency is vital to Labour, not least because the EU debate risks being further poisoned by the migration question. The Opposition still bears the scars of its decision to open our borders to Polish workers because Tony Blair insisted that a seven-year transition period was unfair – a move that helped ordain Labour’s defeat in 2010. Mr Miliband has conceded that his party got it wrong and promised measures ranging from curbs on agencies recruiting cheap foreign labour to an emphasis on English teaching.
He knows that tackling the housing shortage, low pay and integration is a better answer to resentment over immigration than a numbers game – not least because Labour’s polling reflects public dissatisfaction with Tory immigration policies. A much-needed report to be published tomorrow by the Institute for Public Policy Research on the principles that should underpin a fair and democratic immigration policy is likely to be welcomed by many across the political spectrum.
It will not, however, stop those Labour figures who counsel increased toughness. Mr Miliband, who has not yet ruled out a migration cap, may believe he can sit back while the Tories indulge in internecine war. An electorate spooked by Europe and enraged by immigration is unlikely to accord him the luxury of time.
SOURCE
1,500 foreign criminals 'held beyond sentence' in Britain
Britain is being forced to pay tens of millions of pounds to keep nearly 1,500 foreign criminals behind bars beyond the term of their sentence as they fight deportation.
The cost could reach the equivalent of £55 million a year as more than 500 foreign prisoners are held in jails after their sentences should have ended while almost 1,000 are being kept in immigration removal centres, figures showed.
Prime Minister David Cameron pledged nearly two years ago to put an end to agreements that mean foreign offenders cannot be returned home without their consent.
Tory MP Priti Patel, who obtained the figures through a parliamentary question, said the number of foreign criminals who can not be deported showed the Government needed to scrap the Human Rights Act.
“Ministers must remove dangerous foreign criminals quickly from Britain,” she said.
“Taxpayers should not be paying for foreign offenders to remain in the UK after their prison sentence has ended. “It’s a disgrace they’re allowed to remain here for such a long time, which is only made worse by the Human Rights Act which must be scrapped so we can send foreign criminals back home as quickly as possible.”
Ms Patel went on: “There’s no doubt that the Government wants to do more to remove foreign criminals from Britain.
“But we have to look at issues like the Human Rights Act which clearly hinders them from doing that. “We can no longer sit back because clearly it’s having a serious impact on the number of foreign criminals in the country.”
Mark Harper, the Immigration Minister, said: “In September 2012, 547 foreign national offenders were detained by the UK Border Agency in prisons following completion of their custodial sentence. “A further 919 foreign national offenders were detained beyond the end of their sentence in immigration removal centres.’
He could not say for how long each prisoner had been detained.
However, the latest figures from the Prison Reform Trust showed the average number of days taken to remove a foreign prisoner at the end of their sentence has fallen from 131 days in 2008 to 77 in 2011.
Each prison place costs an average of almost £38,000 a year, while immigration detention costs £102 per night, the trust’s figures also showed.
The number of foreign criminals awaiting deportation was released on Tuesday as ministers signed a new deal to ensure a wave of Albanian prisoners held in England and Wales will be sent back to their home country to finish their sentences.
The move, which is expected to save taxpayers around £25 million over the next 10 years, should see the first batch of prisoners deported in around two months time.
It is the first agreement providing for transfer from the UK to outside the European Union and Albanian nationals make up the 16th highest foreign national population in English and Welsh prisons.
A total of 77 out of nearly 200 Albanian prisoners who are currently eligible for transfer under the agreement between the two nations have been referred to the UK Border Agency for deportation, the Ministry of Justice said.
Jeremy Wright, the Prisons Minister, said: “The British Government wants more foreign national prisoners to serve their sentences in their home country.”
In April 2010, there were 701 foreign offenders detailed in jail after their sentence, which fell to 516 in April 2011 but rose again to 552 in the same month in 2012, the figures revealed.
The number of people held in immigration detention centres after completing a prison sentence has fallen from 1,213 in April 2010 to 812 in April 2012.
SOURCE
Immigration Enforcement Law Proposed in Montana
It’s not a magnet for undocumented immigrants. And that's just the way at least one Montana lawmaker likes it. State Rep. David Howard, a Republican known well in Montana for his take-no-prisoners stance on illegal immigration, is determined to keep the state nicknamed “Big Sky Country” as the last place any undocumented immigrant would want to call home.
Howard is pushing a bill that calls on government agencies across the state to enforce federal immigration laws.
Howard told the Montana House Judiciary Committee on Monday that his bill, HB 50, ensures local governments will enforce immigration laws and not turn a blind eye to undocumented immigrants.
Howard said that some cities in other parts of the United States barred their police officers and other public agency workers from inquiring about immigration status. Montana, he told the committee, had to make sure it protected itself against that ever happening within its borders.
His measure, he said, would send a message a message to undocumented immigrants that they are not welcome in Montana. “It creates a defense in wonderful Montana where they won’t come here … all this does is to protect Montanans,” he told the committee. His office did not return various attempts for comment from Fox News Latino.
Montana’s small foreign-born population is mainly Latinos, though many Canadians have settled there too. The Latino population is about 28,565, or 3 percent of the total state population, according to the Pew Hispanic Center.
Howard’s move runs counter to trends across the nation that have seen a softening by Republicans on illegal immigration, as well as less clamor at the state level to pass immigration laws.
In 2011, 30 state legislatures introduced more than 50 bills similar to that of Arizona, which, among other things, calls on police to check the immigration status of a person they have stopped for another reason and whom they suspect of being in the country unlawfully.
But in 2012, after court challenges blocked parts of many such laws, and as public support for these measures waned, only five states – Kansas, Mississippi, Missouri, Rhode Island and West Virginia – considered immigration bills. None were enacted, according to the National Council of State Legislatures.
On the political front in recent years, many GOP leaders adopted a hard-line position on illegal immigration that was similar to the one embraced by Howard’s in Montana. But after that approach – which dominated much of the Republican primary and debates – was blamed as a key reason for many Latinos walking away from the GOP, the party has softened its tone.
Many Republicans, including House Speaker John Boehner, Ohio Republican, have pledged to soften their positions since the Nov. 6 election, in which the vast majority (71 percent) of Latino voters chose President Obama over the GOP challenger, Mitt Romney.
Echoing many other Republicans, Boehner said he would consider proposals for comprehensive immigration reform, which would include tightened enforcement as well as a pathway to legalization for certain undocumented immigrants.
Some Republican leaders expressed dismay over Howard’s proposal.
“It’s amazing that after everything we went through, after our terrible performance with Latino voters in the election, that you would still have some Republicans who would be willing to present this type of legislation,” said Alfonso Aguilar, executive director of the Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles, a Washington, D.C.-based group.
“If it passes, it will not help the Republican Party.”
“Republicans who are pro-immigrant have to come forward and condemn those laws,” said Aguilar, a former Homeland Security Department official in the George W. Bush administration. “What killed us before was that Republicans who were pro-immigrant remained silent.”
Proponents of strict immigration measures praised Howard’s proposal. “Rep. Howard’s bill ensures common sense state-federal enforcement practices for those of us who believe in the rule of law and the restoration of an immigration law that works,” said Dan Stein, director of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, based in Washington D.C. “Americans are tired of paying for the same old political games designed to reward, promote and encourage illegal immigration. We applaud his efforts.”
Montana has taken on illegal immigration before; in November, voters approved a measure requiring proof of legal U.S. residency in order to receive public services. A measure similar to HB 50 cleared the state legislature two years ago, but former Gov. Brian Schweitzer vetoed it, calling it unnecessary in Montana.
Immigration advocacy groups in Montana say they are worried about Howard’s latest proposal, given the approval that voters gave to the referendum measure in November. “Montana does not have an immigration problem,” said Shahid Haque-Hausrath, executive director of the Montana Immigrant Justice Alliance. “Montana is one of the states with the least number of immigrants – documented or undocumented.”
SOURCE
January 16, 2013
Rubio outlines immigration proposal
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., outlined his proposals for immigration reform in an interview with the Wall Street Journal in a plan that is sure to upset some within his own party. But Rubio argues that immigration is an important issue to Hispanic voters, a voting bloc that the Republicans lost ground with in 2012.
"[T]he immigration issue is a gateway issue for Hispanics, no doubt about it. No matter what your stance is on a number of other issues, if people somehow come to believe that you don't like them or want them here, it's difficult to get them to listen to anything else," Rubio said.
The Republican Party's struggle with Hispanics in the 2012 elections was most glaring at the top of the ticket as Mitt Romney only received 27 percent of the Hispanic vote. Party leaders now admit that they have to do more to reach out to the growing demographic.
Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, said he would like to propose a "comprehensive package of bills", which would include increased access for high-skilled workers, such as engieneers and doctors, a guest worker program for low-skilled workers, including farm workers. He supports workplace enforcement and stronger border security.
But the real challenge revolves around what to do with the up to 12 million undocumented immigrants currently living in the U.S.
He says his plan for that group "is not blanket amnesty or a special pathway to citizenship." Instead, they would have to get in line to apply for legal status and adhere to challenging requirements, but no immigrant would have to leave return to their home country to start the process.
The waiting time for a green card "would have to be long enough to ensure that it's not easier to do it this way than it would be the legal way," he told the Wall Street Journal. "But it can't be indefinite either. I mean it can't be unrealistic, because then you're not really accomplishing anything. It's not good for our country to have people trapped in this status forever. It's been a disaster for Europe."
Potentially signaling a shift within the party, Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., who was Romney's running mate last year and, like Rubio, is considered a possible 2016 presidential candidate, came out in support of Rubio's general proposal. On his Facebook page, Ryan wrote, "Senator Rubio is exactly right on the need to fix our broken immigration system. I support the principles he's outlined: modernization of our immigration laws; stronger security to curb illegal immigration; and respect for the rule of law in addressing the complex challenge of the undocumented population. Our future depends on an immigration system that works."
SOURCE
Labour party leader needs bolder answers over the European Union and immigration
While, in normal circumstances, the EU may be as inflammatory as mashed potato, immigration is anything but. Soundings this week by the think tank British Future ranked it as the greatest cause of social division in Britain, in a verdict consistent with what voters have told pollsters and politicians for years. With the imminent arrival of Bulgarian and Romanian incomers entitled to work here, the debates over Europe and immigration are about to collide, and the fallout will be toxic.
Fears of mass immigration, when travel restrictions on the two newest EU member states are lifted next January, have been heightened by warnings of housing problems from Eric Pickles, the Communities Secretary. The PM’s reluctance to speculate on the numbers expected has been exploited by Ukip, which supplied its own estimate of 350,000 to 400,000.
Wild exaggeration as that may be, Ukip has seized on a potential vote-winner. Private polling suggests that any party successfully linking EU withdrawal and immigration could potentially appeal to 80 per cent of the electorate, leaving Mr Cameron in double trouble. Take Europe first. The Netherlands speech, which may boast the longest gestation period in oratorical history, signifies his reluctance to be the PM who takes Britain out of Europe. The paradox is that by playing a long game, Mr Cameron will make exit more likely.
Sources close to Angela Merkel’s administration are adamant that the four EU pillars of freedom – goods, capital, services and movement – are “sacrosanct”. Should we prove obdurate on any one, then Germany will, with regret but no demur, let Britain go.
One senior figure says that the Merkel government is increasingly alarmed by Mr Cameron’s tactics. “We are worried that things will get out of hand,” this source tells me. “We agree with Miliband; we’re fearful Cameron could sleepwalk out.” Leading Labour strategists calculate that, even if the Tories win in 2015, he is “a seven-year PM” likely to bequeath the referendum to a more Eurosceptic successor (the choice is ample), who would lead Britain out of the EU.
Nor are Mr Cameron’s delaying tactics likely to repel the Ukip advance, pacify his hardliners or satisfy Fresh Start, a Tory faction which sounds like a January detox and which, in the way of crash diets, will be doomed in its bid to rid Britain of the excess weight of EU treaties. As Douglas Alexander wrote recently, the Europe speech “reveals more about the PM’s weakness at home than his agenda abroad”.
On migration, the Tories are also ensnared. The aim of bringing net migration to below 100,000 is misconceived and – irrespective of how few Bulgarians turn up – scare stories are already rife. Yet in the face of Tory disarray, Labour seems oddly silent, even allowing for some powerful interventions from Mr Alexander and Labour’s big beasts, such as Lords Kinnock and Mandelson. Mr Miliband, for example, contrived to get through his speech to the Fabians on Saturday without a single mention of the EU.
Asked by a delegate from Brussels to explain this omission, he offered a stout defence of Britain in Europe, echoing his speech last year to the CBI. None the less, One Nationism, Mr Miliband’s Fabian topic and defining creed, is susceptible to tipping into an insular doctrine in which Britons appear to have some privileged monopoly on universal values such as decency and kindness.
While Mr Miliband, the son of refugees, would never intend his new brand to be so construed, Labour’s sudden reverence for tradition demands the constant caveat that what was good for Disraeli’s Britain has little relevance in a globalised world and a Europe where, as one senior Labour figure says, reform is “perfectly possible without using the politics of blackmail”. That is the settled view within a party that, contrary to rumour, is not full of Eurosceptics. Though many Labour figures want a referendum, the issue is consent, not exit.
Mr Miliband should profit from that relative consensus to drum home, from now to the election, that any exit from Europe would be outweighed by a catastrophic slump in influence and a fall in trade with a market that accounts for half our exports. Those cities dependent on the motor industry would become as desolate as Detroit, as carmakers disappeared, and the City would be recast as a mausoleum to a lost financial services industry.
Stridency is vital to Labour, not least because the EU debate risks being further poisoned by the migration question. The Opposition still bears the scars of its decision to open our borders to Polish workers because Tony Blair insisted that a seven-year transition period was unfair – a move that helped ordain Labour’s defeat in 2010. Mr Miliband has conceded that his party got it wrong and promised measures ranging from curbs on agencies recruiting cheap foreign labour to an emphasis on English teaching.
He knows that tackling the housing shortage, low pay and integration is a better answer to resentment over immigration than a numbers game – not least because Labour’s polling reflects public dissatisfaction with Tory immigration policies. A much-needed report to be published tomorrow by the Institute for Public Policy Research on the principles that should underpin a fair and democratic immigration policy is likely to be welcomed by many across the political spectrum.
It will not, however, stop those Labour figures who counsel increased toughness. Mr Miliband, who has not yet ruled out a migration cap, may believe he can sit back while the Tories indulge in internecine war. An electorate spooked by Europe and enraged by immigration is unlikely to accord him the luxury of time.
SOURCE
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Recent posts at CIS below
See here for the blog. The CIS main page is here.
Publication
1. Backgrounder: Before Considering Another Amnesty, Look at IRCA’s Lessons
Media
2. Op-ed: Should there be a path to citizenship?
3. Op-ed: A Bogus Immigration-Enforcement Factoid: A respected think tank makes a phony claim.
Blogs
4. Pravda and the Rise of a Toothless Tiger
5. Doubling Down on an Immigration Factoid
6. Immigration Vox Populi on C-SPAN, Part Two
7. Brilliant at Everything but Managing the Immigration Rules
8. Welshing on the Deal Before It's Even Reached
9. Immigration Vox Populi on C-SPAN, Part One
10. ICE Press Operation Concentrates on Everything but Immigration
11. Happy National Migration Week!
Napolitano Stays at DHS, Immigration Reform Advocates Cheer
Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano will remain at her post during President Obama's second term, a development that could have implications for the debate over immigration reform.
Officials from the White House and the Department of Homeland Security confirmed to ABC/Univision on Monday that Napolitano will stay in her current job.
As Homeland Security chief, Napolitano oversees the bulk of the nation's immigration enforcement agencies, including U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Border Patrol, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).
The federal government has beefed up resources dedicated to immigration enforcement during Napolitano's tenure. The government spent $18 billion in fiscal year 2012 to fund agencies like ICE and Border Patrol, more than what was spent all other federal law enforcement agencies combined, according to a report released last week by the Migration Policy Institute.
Under Napolitano, the former Democratic governor of Arizona, the Obama administration has overseen a record pace of deportations of undocumented immigrants. Through Obama's first four years in office, 1.59 million people have been deported, including nearly 410,000 in fiscal year 2012, according to ICE statistics. By comparison, the George W. Bush administration deported roughly 2 million during his eight years in office. On average, Obama has deported roughly 12,000 more people per month than Bush.
Immigration reform advocates believe that Napolitano's record on enforcement could help prove to skeptics that enacting comprehensive reform won't pose a danger to national security.
"I think with Secretary Napolitano as the head of the Department of Homeland Security, it certainly is very hard to argue that the Obama administration isn't serious about enforcement. She has been very aggressive in enforcing the law," said Benjamin Johnson, the executive director of the American Immigration Council in Washington, D.C. "She's bringing a lot of credibility and a lot of experience in making the case that we've done enforcement, and it's time to start thinking about other areas of immigration policy that have to be changed."
Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, said that Napolitano's relationships on Capitol Hill forged during her interactions with lawmakers over the past four years could pay off when the White House presses Congress to pass a bill.
"This will move quickly," he said. "So, the less of a learning curve someone has, the better."
But Napolitano has also faced myriad complaints from those on both sides of the debate. The administration's enforcement policies have drawn the ire of Latino and immigrant-rights groups, who staged protests against Obama several times during last year's presidential campaign.
In part to assuage those concerns, Napolitano announced in August 2011 that immigration enforcement agencies would conduct a case-by-case review of deportation cases in an effort to reduce the deportation of undocumented immigrants who otherwise have no criminal record. DHS claims removals of people not considered "priority" cases (i.e. no criminal record, no past immigration violations, and not caught at the border) fell to 4 percent of all deportations in 2012, down from 25 percent in 2008.
More HERE
Recent posts at CIS below
See here for the blog. The CIS main page is here.
Publication
1. Backgrounder: Before Considering Another Amnesty, Look at IRCA’s Lessons
Media
2. Op-ed: Should there be a path to citizenship?
3. Op-ed: A Bogus Immigration-Enforcement Factoid: A respected think tank makes a phony claim.
Blogs
4. Pravda and the Rise of a Toothless Tiger
5. Doubling Down on an Immigration Factoid
6. Immigration Vox Populi on C-SPAN, Part Two
7. Brilliant at Everything but Managing the Immigration Rules
8. Welshing on the Deal Before It's Even Reached
9. Immigration Vox Populi on C-SPAN, Part One
10. ICE Press Operation Concentrates on Everything but Immigration
11. Happy National Migration Week!
Napolitano Stays at DHS, Immigration Reform Advocates Cheer
Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano will remain at her post during President Obama's second term, a development that could have implications for the debate over immigration reform.
Officials from the White House and the Department of Homeland Security confirmed to ABC/Univision on Monday that Napolitano will stay in her current job.
As Homeland Security chief, Napolitano oversees the bulk of the nation's immigration enforcement agencies, including U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Border Patrol, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).
The federal government has beefed up resources dedicated to immigration enforcement during Napolitano's tenure. The government spent $18 billion in fiscal year 2012 to fund agencies like ICE and Border Patrol, more than what was spent all other federal law enforcement agencies combined, according to a report released last week by the Migration Policy Institute.
Under Napolitano, the former Democratic governor of Arizona, the Obama administration has overseen a record pace of deportations of undocumented immigrants. Through Obama's first four years in office, 1.59 million people have been deported, including nearly 410,000 in fiscal year 2012, according to ICE statistics. By comparison, the George W. Bush administration deported roughly 2 million during his eight years in office. On average, Obama has deported roughly 12,000 more people per month than Bush.
Immigration reform advocates believe that Napolitano's record on enforcement could help prove to skeptics that enacting comprehensive reform won't pose a danger to national security.
"I think with Secretary Napolitano as the head of the Department of Homeland Security, it certainly is very hard to argue that the Obama administration isn't serious about enforcement. She has been very aggressive in enforcing the law," said Benjamin Johnson, the executive director of the American Immigration Council in Washington, D.C. "She's bringing a lot of credibility and a lot of experience in making the case that we've done enforcement, and it's time to start thinking about other areas of immigration policy that have to be changed."
Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, said that Napolitano's relationships on Capitol Hill forged during her interactions with lawmakers over the past four years could pay off when the White House presses Congress to pass a bill.
"This will move quickly," he said. "So, the less of a learning curve someone has, the better."
But Napolitano has also faced myriad complaints from those on both sides of the debate. The administration's enforcement policies have drawn the ire of Latino and immigrant-rights groups, who staged protests against Obama several times during last year's presidential campaign.
In part to assuage those concerns, Napolitano announced in August 2011 that immigration enforcement agencies would conduct a case-by-case review of deportation cases in an effort to reduce the deportation of undocumented immigrants who otherwise have no criminal record. DHS claims removals of people not considered "priority" cases (i.e. no criminal record, no past immigration violations, and not caught at the border) fell to 4 percent of all deportations in 2012, down from 25 percent in 2008.
More HERE
Monday, January 14, 2013
Welcome Illegal Aliens - You're Safe Here
by ALAN CARUBA
The Obama administration loves to pass unpopular legislation-Obamacare-and release news of unpopular policies on Christmas Eve. The assumption is that people are too distracted to pay attention and, anyway, there's nothing they can do about it.
Illegal aliens received a Christmas gift when the chief of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency, part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), John Morton, released new guidelines for local police who might think it was their job to cooperate with ICE by detaining illegal aliens stopped for probably cause. Previously ICE had a "287 (g) program" that facilitated the process, but no more.
As ICE explained this change, the administration's goal is to limit the role of local cops with regard to the detention of illegal aliens arrested for misdemeanors (offices punishable by jail sentences of between 30-days and one year) or violations (offenses punishable by jail sentences of 30-days or less). Apparently there are just so many of these arrests that ICE doesn't want to bother with them anymore. And, after all, it only involves someone here ILLEGALLY.
According to ICE, the policy change will "further enhance our ability to focus enforcement efforts on serious offenders" by "changing who ICE will issue detainers against."
Need it be said that the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) pushed hard to get this policy change, along with a variety of immigrant and refugee advocacy groups, including the Arab-American Institute.
I was reading a new book by Brett Braaten, "Homeland Insecurity: Failed Politics, Policies, and a Nation at Risk", when the new ICE policy was announced. The author is a former special agent whose career spans 29 years with both the U.S. Customs Service and, after the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). He saw how these agencies operated from the inside.
In his book, he warns that "The tangled web of guidelines, each one more convoluted than the last, stifles every innovative though that might otherwise see the light of day. The political correctness and cultural sensitivities that abound in the federal system, shackle law enforcement officers who are simply trying to do right by the American taxpayer and get everyone home safe at the end of the day."
What he learned along the way is the pecking order of the FBI, the IRS, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and ATF (the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.) "There had never been, nor would there ever be, a selfless spirit of cooperation among these agencies." After 9/11 the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in 2002 was supposed to create greater cooperation among its components, but old rivalries die hard. At the bottom of the pecking order was and remains now the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
"Customs personnel quickly found that dealing with illegal alien processing and deportation was unwieldy and mind numbing. Layers of bureaucratic fine print, immigration laws saturated with loopholes, and exceptions to exceptions, slow the process to a near halt." During its first term, it became obvious to anyone paying attention that deporting illegal aliens had a very low priority.
If you are here illegally, unless you engage in serious crimes, you are not likely to be returned to your homeland. Indeed, the U.S. has become your homeland and one that where you can get a job and have access to multiple social programs which should be reserved for U.S. citizens.
Under the aegis of the Homeland Security Department, immigration enforcement has become a bad joke. The Center for Immigration Studies recently criticized DHS saying that "the agency responsible for overseeing educational institutions hosting foreign students rarely exercises its enforcement authority." There are nearly 1.2 million foreign students and their dependents in the U.S., attending close to 7,000 educational institutions. We are likely to learn that some of them are here for purposes of terrorism, but by then it will be too late.
Braaten warns that "There is no way that law enforcement can be efficient in the execution of its mission when it is little more than an expression of the political policies designed to serve the best interests of the current administration, regardless of affiliation." The nation's problem with illegal aliens has a long history. Occasional amnesties have only served as an inducement to enter illegally.
To those Americans who think border control is not a priority or that the presence of illegal aliens pose no real problem, Braaten says, Whether (they) like it or not, illegal aliens bring the ills of their respective societies with them. Lacking any reasonable societal pressure from (native born and naturalized Americans), there is no impetus to assimilate into American culture. There's no pressure to learn English in a society that falls all over itself to accommodate a vast population that lacks the interest or ability to learn it."
Large portions of California and the Southwest have literally been reclaimed by their illegal populations. "The southwest border," says Braaten, "has devolved to a state of near chaos. Communities, overrun with a crippling demand for social services from a foreign populace, find themselves falling deeper and deeper into deficient spending with no relief in sight."
The Obama administration has managed to cover up the "Fast and Furious" scandal in which the ATF allowed nearly 2,000 guns to get into the hands of the Mexican drug cartels. It cost the life of a border patrol officer and is currently protected against further Congressional investigation by an executive order. In the course of the investigations, however, Eric Holder became the first Attorney General to be held in contempt of Congress.
While Braaten focused on revelations about customs and immigration enforcement, he also took note of Department of Homeland Security failures that we know about, the uselessness of the Transportation Safety Administration that makes air travel a nightmare, and, in effect, the widespread belief that the U.S. is adequately and actually being protected by the alphabet soup of DHS agencies, and others charged with protecting the nation.
SOURCE
Obama Will Seek Citizenship Path in One Fast Push
President Obama plans to push Congress to move quickly in the coming months on an ambitious overhaul of the immigration system that would include a path to citizenship for most of the 11 million illegal immigrants in the country, senior administration officials and lawmakers said last week.
Mr. Obama and Senate Democrats will propose the changes in one comprehensive bill, the officials said, resisting efforts by some Republicans to break the overhaul into smaller pieces — separately addressing young illegal immigrants, migrant farmworkers or highly skilled foreigners — which might be easier for reluctant members of their party to accept.
The president and Democrats will also oppose measures that do not allow immigrants who gain legal status to become American citizens one day, the officials said.
Even while Mr. Obama has been focused on fiscal negotiations and gun control, overhauling immigration remains a priority for him this year, White House officials said. Top officials there have been quietly working on a broad proposal. Mr. Obama and lawmakers from both parties believe that the early months of his second term offer the best prospects for passing substantial legislation on the issue.
Mr. Obama is expected to lay out his plan in the coming weeks, perhaps in his State of the Union address early next month, administration officials said. The White House will argue that its solution for illegal immigrants is not an amnesty, as many critics insist, because it would include fines, the payment of back taxes and other hurdles for illegal immigrants who would obtain legal status, the officials said.
The president’s plan would also impose nationwide verification of legal status for all newly hired workers; add visas to relieve backlogs and allow highly skilled immigrants to stay; and create some form of guest-worker program to bring in low-wage immigrants in the future.
A bipartisan group of senators has also been meeting to write a comprehensive bill, with the goal of introducing legislation as early as March and holding a vote in the Senate before August. As a sign of the keen interest in starting action on immigration, White House officials and Democratic leaders in the Senate have been negotiating over which of them will first introduce a bill, Senate aides said.
“This is so important now to both parties that neither the fiscal cliff nor guns will get in the way,” said Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, a Democrat who is a leader of the bipartisan discussions.
A similar attempt at bipartisan legislation early in Mr. Obama’s first term collapsed amid political divisions fueled by surging public wrath over illegal immigration in many states. But both supporters and opponents say conditions are significantly different now.
Memories of the results of the November election are still fresh here. Latinos, the nation’s fastest-growing electorate, turned out in record numbers and cast 71 percent of their ballots for Mr. Obama. Many Latinos said they were put off by Republicans’ harsh language and policies against illegal immigrants.
After the election, a host of Republicans, starting with Speaker John A. Boehner, said it was time for the party to find a more positive, practical approach to immigration. Many party leaders say electoral demographics are compelling them to move beyond policies based only on tough enforcement.
Supporters of comprehensive changes say that the elections were nothing less than a mandate in their favor, and that they are still optimistic that Mr. Obama is prepared to lead the fight.
“Republicans must demonstrate a reasoned approach to start to rebuild their relationship with Latino voters,” said Clarissa Martinez de Castro, the director of immigration policy at the National Council of La Raza, a Latino organization. “Democrats must demonstrate they can deliver on a promise.”
Since the election, Mr. Obama has repeatedly pledged to act on immigration this year. In his weekly radio address on Saturday, he again referred to the urgency of fixing the immigration system, saying it was one of the “difficult missions” the country must take on.
More HERE
Welcome Illegal Aliens - You're Safe Here
by ALAN CARUBA
The Obama administration loves to pass unpopular legislation-Obamacare-and release news of unpopular policies on Christmas Eve. The assumption is that people are too distracted to pay attention and, anyway, there's nothing they can do about it.
Illegal aliens received a Christmas gift when the chief of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency, part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), John Morton, released new guidelines for local police who might think it was their job to cooperate with ICE by detaining illegal aliens stopped for probably cause. Previously ICE had a "287 (g) program" that facilitated the process, but no more.
As ICE explained this change, the administration's goal is to limit the role of local cops with regard to the detention of illegal aliens arrested for misdemeanors (offices punishable by jail sentences of between 30-days and one year) or violations (offenses punishable by jail sentences of 30-days or less). Apparently there are just so many of these arrests that ICE doesn't want to bother with them anymore. And, after all, it only involves someone here ILLEGALLY.
According to ICE, the policy change will "further enhance our ability to focus enforcement efforts on serious offenders" by "changing who ICE will issue detainers against."
Need it be said that the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) pushed hard to get this policy change, along with a variety of immigrant and refugee advocacy groups, including the Arab-American Institute.
I was reading a new book by Brett Braaten, "Homeland Insecurity: Failed Politics, Policies, and a Nation at Risk", when the new ICE policy was announced. The author is a former special agent whose career spans 29 years with both the U.S. Customs Service and, after the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). He saw how these agencies operated from the inside.
In his book, he warns that "The tangled web of guidelines, each one more convoluted than the last, stifles every innovative though that might otherwise see the light of day. The political correctness and cultural sensitivities that abound in the federal system, shackle law enforcement officers who are simply trying to do right by the American taxpayer and get everyone home safe at the end of the day."
What he learned along the way is the pecking order of the FBI, the IRS, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and ATF (the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.) "There had never been, nor would there ever be, a selfless spirit of cooperation among these agencies." After 9/11 the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in 2002 was supposed to create greater cooperation among its components, but old rivalries die hard. At the bottom of the pecking order was and remains now the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
"Customs personnel quickly found that dealing with illegal alien processing and deportation was unwieldy and mind numbing. Layers of bureaucratic fine print, immigration laws saturated with loopholes, and exceptions to exceptions, slow the process to a near halt." During its first term, it became obvious to anyone paying attention that deporting illegal aliens had a very low priority.
If you are here illegally, unless you engage in serious crimes, you are not likely to be returned to your homeland. Indeed, the U.S. has become your homeland and one that where you can get a job and have access to multiple social programs which should be reserved for U.S. citizens.
Under the aegis of the Homeland Security Department, immigration enforcement has become a bad joke. The Center for Immigration Studies recently criticized DHS saying that "the agency responsible for overseeing educational institutions hosting foreign students rarely exercises its enforcement authority." There are nearly 1.2 million foreign students and their dependents in the U.S., attending close to 7,000 educational institutions. We are likely to learn that some of them are here for purposes of terrorism, but by then it will be too late.
Braaten warns that "There is no way that law enforcement can be efficient in the execution of its mission when it is little more than an expression of the political policies designed to serve the best interests of the current administration, regardless of affiliation." The nation's problem with illegal aliens has a long history. Occasional amnesties have only served as an inducement to enter illegally.
To those Americans who think border control is not a priority or that the presence of illegal aliens pose no real problem, Braaten says, Whether (they) like it or not, illegal aliens bring the ills of their respective societies with them. Lacking any reasonable societal pressure from (native born and naturalized Americans), there is no impetus to assimilate into American culture. There's no pressure to learn English in a society that falls all over itself to accommodate a vast population that lacks the interest or ability to learn it."
Large portions of California and the Southwest have literally been reclaimed by their illegal populations. "The southwest border," says Braaten, "has devolved to a state of near chaos. Communities, overrun with a crippling demand for social services from a foreign populace, find themselves falling deeper and deeper into deficient spending with no relief in sight."
The Obama administration has managed to cover up the "Fast and Furious" scandal in which the ATF allowed nearly 2,000 guns to get into the hands of the Mexican drug cartels. It cost the life of a border patrol officer and is currently protected against further Congressional investigation by an executive order. In the course of the investigations, however, Eric Holder became the first Attorney General to be held in contempt of Congress.
While Braaten focused on revelations about customs and immigration enforcement, he also took note of Department of Homeland Security failures that we know about, the uselessness of the Transportation Safety Administration that makes air travel a nightmare, and, in effect, the widespread belief that the U.S. is adequately and actually being protected by the alphabet soup of DHS agencies, and others charged with protecting the nation.
SOURCE
Obama Will Seek Citizenship Path in One Fast Push
President Obama plans to push Congress to move quickly in the coming months on an ambitious overhaul of the immigration system that would include a path to citizenship for most of the 11 million illegal immigrants in the country, senior administration officials and lawmakers said last week.
Mr. Obama and Senate Democrats will propose the changes in one comprehensive bill, the officials said, resisting efforts by some Republicans to break the overhaul into smaller pieces — separately addressing young illegal immigrants, migrant farmworkers or highly skilled foreigners — which might be easier for reluctant members of their party to accept.
The president and Democrats will also oppose measures that do not allow immigrants who gain legal status to become American citizens one day, the officials said.
Even while Mr. Obama has been focused on fiscal negotiations and gun control, overhauling immigration remains a priority for him this year, White House officials said. Top officials there have been quietly working on a broad proposal. Mr. Obama and lawmakers from both parties believe that the early months of his second term offer the best prospects for passing substantial legislation on the issue.
Mr. Obama is expected to lay out his plan in the coming weeks, perhaps in his State of the Union address early next month, administration officials said. The White House will argue that its solution for illegal immigrants is not an amnesty, as many critics insist, because it would include fines, the payment of back taxes and other hurdles for illegal immigrants who would obtain legal status, the officials said.
The president’s plan would also impose nationwide verification of legal status for all newly hired workers; add visas to relieve backlogs and allow highly skilled immigrants to stay; and create some form of guest-worker program to bring in low-wage immigrants in the future.
A bipartisan group of senators has also been meeting to write a comprehensive bill, with the goal of introducing legislation as early as March and holding a vote in the Senate before August. As a sign of the keen interest in starting action on immigration, White House officials and Democratic leaders in the Senate have been negotiating over which of them will first introduce a bill, Senate aides said.
“This is so important now to both parties that neither the fiscal cliff nor guns will get in the way,” said Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, a Democrat who is a leader of the bipartisan discussions.
A similar attempt at bipartisan legislation early in Mr. Obama’s first term collapsed amid political divisions fueled by surging public wrath over illegal immigration in many states. But both supporters and opponents say conditions are significantly different now.
Memories of the results of the November election are still fresh here. Latinos, the nation’s fastest-growing electorate, turned out in record numbers and cast 71 percent of their ballots for Mr. Obama. Many Latinos said they were put off by Republicans’ harsh language and policies against illegal immigrants.
After the election, a host of Republicans, starting with Speaker John A. Boehner, said it was time for the party to find a more positive, practical approach to immigration. Many party leaders say electoral demographics are compelling them to move beyond policies based only on tough enforcement.
Supporters of comprehensive changes say that the elections were nothing less than a mandate in their favor, and that they are still optimistic that Mr. Obama is prepared to lead the fight.
“Republicans must demonstrate a reasoned approach to start to rebuild their relationship with Latino voters,” said Clarissa Martinez de Castro, the director of immigration policy at the National Council of La Raza, a Latino organization. “Democrats must demonstrate they can deliver on a promise.”
Since the election, Mr. Obama has repeatedly pledged to act on immigration this year. In his weekly radio address on Saturday, he again referred to the urgency of fixing the immigration system, saying it was one of the “difficult missions” the country must take on.
More HERE
Sunday, January 13, 2013
Interceptions of immigrants stubbornly low
U.S. Border security efforts have a long way to go
Despite massive increases in manpower, the U.S. Border Patrol is still intercepting only about 61 percent of would-be illegal immigrants along the U.S.-Mexico border, according to an audit that the investigative arm of Congress released Wednesday.
The findings, which for the first time show a broad estimate of how many illegal immigrants the Border Patrol fails to catch each year, emerge as pressure builds on Congress to move past border security and begin to grant legal status to the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in the U.S.
The Government Accountability Office report found that an estimated 208,813 illegal immigrants escaped capture along the nearly 2,000-mile border. Slightly more than half of them turned back to Mexico, and the others proceeded deeper into the U.S., the report said.
The report also said that the Obama administration has gone more than two years without having an effective yardstick for measuring border security, meaning there is no good way to evaluate the job the Border Patrol is doing.
“The bottom line is we are far from having operational control of our borders, particularly the southwest border, and as the GAO reports, there still are no metrics to quantify progress,” said House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, Texas Republican. “Meanwhile, the threat from groups ranging from Islamist extremists to drug cartels continues to grow.”
Border security has been a chief focus of immigration efforts since 2007, when the last major immigration reform bill failed in Congress. After that failure, Republicans said voters wanted the border secured before any legalization took place, and President Bush poured resources into the Border Patrol.
According to the GAO, the number of illegal border crossings has dropped, as has the number of illegal immigrants the Border Patrol apprehends. It’s unclear how much of that is a result of stricter enforcement and how much is because of the slumping U.S. economy and changes in Mexico.
But the GAO report painted a picture of an agency struggling to come up with ways to measure its effectiveness.
Two years ago, the Obama administration ditched the “operational control” yardstick that the Bush administration developed. The yardstick showed that just a fraction of the border was effectively sealed.
The Homeland Security Department, which oversees the Border Patrol, said in its official response to the GAO that it is trying to come up with a new yardstick by the end of November — which would mean it will have gone three years without a measure of border enforcement effectiveness.
“[The Department of Homeland Security] fully appreciates the importance and need of having measurable goals to assess progress in the area of border security,” Jim H. Crumpacker, Homeland Security’s liaison to GAO, said in the department’s response.
He said the Border Patrol has added some tools to try to track repeat illegal crossers, and uses internal measures to track progress.
The Border Patrol always has been able to say how many illegal immigrants it captured, but until recently it had little idea of how many crossed without being apprehended.
Now, with the boost in radar, sensors and other tools, the Border Patrol can estimate that number — and that gets it closer to coming up with a good yardstick of effectiveness, said Doris Meissner, a former commissioner of the defunct Immigration and Naturalization Service who just completed a review of immigration enforcement for the Migration Policy Institute.
She said that its particularly true in the Tucson, Ariz., sector, where the infrastructure has been built and where the Border Patrol is trying to figure out a measure of “baseline flows.”
“What Tucson is trying to determine, and what some other parts of the border think that they’re at, is what’s their baseline flow — in other words, what do they have to recognize, all other things being equal, is the normal course of illegal crossing activity,” Ms. Meissner said.
She said It’s a difficult balance, since not all crossings are the same.
Some likely represent the same person trying to cross multiple times, while others are high-risk crossers from countries that pose a risk of terrorism. The Border Patrol is trying to grapple with all of those factors in coming up with a new measure of security.
In 2011, the GAO said, the Border Patrol apprehended 327,118 illegal border crossers, while it estimates another 208,813 got away. Of those, 85,827 escaped into the U.S. and the rest turned back.
Auditors cautioned that the numbers are not exact because they often depend on judgment calls about whether someone was deemed to have turned back based on tracks or other signs.
The Border Patrol is still working on numbers for 2012.
But the numbers do show progress from 2006, when the Border Patrol apprehended 1.1 million, while more than 900,000 got away.
President Obama has said he will write immigration legislation this year and submit it to Congress. The legislation is expected to contain a legalization program for the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in the U.S.
But Steven A. Camarota, research director at the Center for Immigration Studies, said the numbers should be a warning to lawmakers who say the border is secure enough to tackle legalization.
“This doesn’t count the northern border, the coastline, perhaps an equal number of people who overstay temporary visas in the United States,” he said. “The question is, ‘Is that control?’ Most people would say if several hundred thousand people successfully sneak across one of your borders, you’ve still got a serious problem.”
Among other findings, GAO investigators said the rate of repeat offenders has dropped from about 42 percent in 2008 to 36 percent in 2011.
Auditors also said that drug seizures were up 83 percent in 2011 compared with 2006. More than a quarter of that drug activity happened in the Tucson sector.
SOURCE
White Britons are now a minority in Leicester, Luton and Slough and Birmingham is set to follow by end of decade
Three towns and cities have joined London in having a minority white British population.
Researchers say more than 50 per cent of people living in Leicester, Luton and Slough are either foreign or from an ethnic minority.
Birmingham is expected to have a similar make-up by 2020.
Changing face of Britain: Three places outside London have a minority of white Britons. This graph shows the growth of other nationalities in Britain
Changing face of Britain: Three places outside London have a minority of white Britons. This graph shows the growth of other non-white groups in the UK since 1991 in thousands
The findings are based on the 2011 national census, in which residents were asked which ethnic group they were in.
The census also broke the white population down into those who see themselves as white British and those who consider they are ‘white other’ – a group that will include immigrants from Europe as well as Australasia and America.
London has already been shown to have a white British population of only 45 per cent.
Yesterday’s breakdown showed that those who call themselves white British amount to 45 per cent of the population of Leicester, 45 per cent of the population of Luton and only just over a third, 35 per cent, of the people of Slough.
The white populations in all three are swollen by the presence of white migrants, including high numbers of Eastern Europeans who have arrived since their countries joined the EU and they were given the right to live in Britain in 2004.
The analysis, by academics at the University of Manchester, said the comparative decline of white British numbers does not mean that ethnically mixed towns and cities have become less British.
The children of immigrants who were born in this country tend to regard themselves as British, it said. ‘Eighty-one per cent of Luton’s residents have a British national identity while 45 per cent are of the white British ethnic group,’ added the report.
‘We already know from other sources that British identity is felt at least as strongly by those of minority ethnicity as those of white British ethnicity.’
‘This is the case for people of similar age and background born in the UK: younger, more highly educated people, and those born overseas all express less strong British identity.’
It also said segregation is decreasing and residential mixing of different groups became more common between 2001 and 2011.
According to the research, two thirds of Leicester’s 330,000 population were born in the UK. The city, it found, has 17 ethnic groups more than 1,000 strong.
In Luton, only 91,000 of the 203,000 population say they are white British, but 165,000 people regard themselves as British.
In Slough, of 140,000 people, 48,000 say they are white British but 108,000 say their identity is British.
Results for Newham in East London, where fewer than one in six are white British, show two thirds of people say they are British.
Ludi Simpson, professor of population studies at Manchester University, said: ‘We need to understand changing ethnic composition to understand our citizens’ changing needs.
‘Housing, school meals, care of older people, cultural and entertainment facilities, funeral services and many other aspects of local services are intrinsically affected.’
SOURCE
Interceptions of immigrants stubbornly low
U.S. Border security efforts have a long way to go
Despite massive increases in manpower, the U.S. Border Patrol is still intercepting only about 61 percent of would-be illegal immigrants along the U.S.-Mexico border, according to an audit that the investigative arm of Congress released Wednesday.
The findings, which for the first time show a broad estimate of how many illegal immigrants the Border Patrol fails to catch each year, emerge as pressure builds on Congress to move past border security and begin to grant legal status to the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in the U.S.
The Government Accountability Office report found that an estimated 208,813 illegal immigrants escaped capture along the nearly 2,000-mile border. Slightly more than half of them turned back to Mexico, and the others proceeded deeper into the U.S., the report said.
The report also said that the Obama administration has gone more than two years without having an effective yardstick for measuring border security, meaning there is no good way to evaluate the job the Border Patrol is doing.
“The bottom line is we are far from having operational control of our borders, particularly the southwest border, and as the GAO reports, there still are no metrics to quantify progress,” said House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, Texas Republican. “Meanwhile, the threat from groups ranging from Islamist extremists to drug cartels continues to grow.”
Border security has been a chief focus of immigration efforts since 2007, when the last major immigration reform bill failed in Congress. After that failure, Republicans said voters wanted the border secured before any legalization took place, and President Bush poured resources into the Border Patrol.
According to the GAO, the number of illegal border crossings has dropped, as has the number of illegal immigrants the Border Patrol apprehends. It’s unclear how much of that is a result of stricter enforcement and how much is because of the slumping U.S. economy and changes in Mexico.
But the GAO report painted a picture of an agency struggling to come up with ways to measure its effectiveness.
Two years ago, the Obama administration ditched the “operational control” yardstick that the Bush administration developed. The yardstick showed that just a fraction of the border was effectively sealed.
The Homeland Security Department, which oversees the Border Patrol, said in its official response to the GAO that it is trying to come up with a new yardstick by the end of November — which would mean it will have gone three years without a measure of border enforcement effectiveness.
“[The Department of Homeland Security] fully appreciates the importance and need of having measurable goals to assess progress in the area of border security,” Jim H. Crumpacker, Homeland Security’s liaison to GAO, said in the department’s response.
He said the Border Patrol has added some tools to try to track repeat illegal crossers, and uses internal measures to track progress.
The Border Patrol always has been able to say how many illegal immigrants it captured, but until recently it had little idea of how many crossed without being apprehended.
Now, with the boost in radar, sensors and other tools, the Border Patrol can estimate that number — and that gets it closer to coming up with a good yardstick of effectiveness, said Doris Meissner, a former commissioner of the defunct Immigration and Naturalization Service who just completed a review of immigration enforcement for the Migration Policy Institute.
She said that its particularly true in the Tucson, Ariz., sector, where the infrastructure has been built and where the Border Patrol is trying to figure out a measure of “baseline flows.”
“What Tucson is trying to determine, and what some other parts of the border think that they’re at, is what’s their baseline flow — in other words, what do they have to recognize, all other things being equal, is the normal course of illegal crossing activity,” Ms. Meissner said.
She said It’s a difficult balance, since not all crossings are the same.
Some likely represent the same person trying to cross multiple times, while others are high-risk crossers from countries that pose a risk of terrorism. The Border Patrol is trying to grapple with all of those factors in coming up with a new measure of security.
In 2011, the GAO said, the Border Patrol apprehended 327,118 illegal border crossers, while it estimates another 208,813 got away. Of those, 85,827 escaped into the U.S. and the rest turned back.
Auditors cautioned that the numbers are not exact because they often depend on judgment calls about whether someone was deemed to have turned back based on tracks or other signs.
The Border Patrol is still working on numbers for 2012.
But the numbers do show progress from 2006, when the Border Patrol apprehended 1.1 million, while more than 900,000 got away.
President Obama has said he will write immigration legislation this year and submit it to Congress. The legislation is expected to contain a legalization program for the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in the U.S.
But Steven A. Camarota, research director at the Center for Immigration Studies, said the numbers should be a warning to lawmakers who say the border is secure enough to tackle legalization.
“This doesn’t count the northern border, the coastline, perhaps an equal number of people who overstay temporary visas in the United States,” he said. “The question is, ‘Is that control?’ Most people would say if several hundred thousand people successfully sneak across one of your borders, you’ve still got a serious problem.”
Among other findings, GAO investigators said the rate of repeat offenders has dropped from about 42 percent in 2008 to 36 percent in 2011.
Auditors also said that drug seizures were up 83 percent in 2011 compared with 2006. More than a quarter of that drug activity happened in the Tucson sector.
SOURCE
White Britons are now a minority in Leicester, Luton and Slough and Birmingham is set to follow by end of decade
Three towns and cities have joined London in having a minority white British population.
Researchers say more than 50 per cent of people living in Leicester, Luton and Slough are either foreign or from an ethnic minority.
Birmingham is expected to have a similar make-up by 2020.
Changing face of Britain: Three places outside London have a minority of white Britons. This graph shows the growth of other nationalities in Britain
Changing face of Britain: Three places outside London have a minority of white Britons. This graph shows the growth of other non-white groups in the UK since 1991 in thousands
The findings are based on the 2011 national census, in which residents were asked which ethnic group they were in.
The census also broke the white population down into those who see themselves as white British and those who consider they are ‘white other’ – a group that will include immigrants from Europe as well as Australasia and America.
London has already been shown to have a white British population of only 45 per cent.
Yesterday’s breakdown showed that those who call themselves white British amount to 45 per cent of the population of Leicester, 45 per cent of the population of Luton and only just over a third, 35 per cent, of the people of Slough.
The white populations in all three are swollen by the presence of white migrants, including high numbers of Eastern Europeans who have arrived since their countries joined the EU and they were given the right to live in Britain in 2004.
The analysis, by academics at the University of Manchester, said the comparative decline of white British numbers does not mean that ethnically mixed towns and cities have become less British.
The children of immigrants who were born in this country tend to regard themselves as British, it said. ‘Eighty-one per cent of Luton’s residents have a British national identity while 45 per cent are of the white British ethnic group,’ added the report.
‘We already know from other sources that British identity is felt at least as strongly by those of minority ethnicity as those of white British ethnicity.’
‘This is the case for people of similar age and background born in the UK: younger, more highly educated people, and those born overseas all express less strong British identity.’
It also said segregation is decreasing and residential mixing of different groups became more common between 2001 and 2011.
According to the research, two thirds of Leicester’s 330,000 population were born in the UK. The city, it found, has 17 ethnic groups more than 1,000 strong.
In Luton, only 91,000 of the 203,000 population say they are white British, but 165,000 people regard themselves as British.
In Slough, of 140,000 people, 48,000 say they are white British but 108,000 say their identity is British.
Results for Newham in East London, where fewer than one in six are white British, show two thirds of people say they are British.
Ludi Simpson, professor of population studies at Manchester University, said: ‘We need to understand changing ethnic composition to understand our citizens’ changing needs.
‘Housing, school meals, care of older people, cultural and entertainment facilities, funeral services and many other aspects of local services are intrinsically affected.’
SOURCE
Friday, January 11, 2013
New Report Offers Deceptive Assessment of Immigration Enforcement
A new report being promoted by the Migration Policy Institute (MPI), a research institute dedicated to promoting migration, paints a deliberately misleading picture of the state of immigration law enforcement. The report, titled Immigration Enforcement in the United States: The Rise of a Formidable Machinery, is presented as an objective assessment of immigration programs, and has been widely covered in the news media -- but is riddled with false statements, cherry-picked statistics and inappropriate comparisons. This compilation of bogus findings aims to convince opinion leaders and the public that the government has succeeded in creating an effective "bulwark" of immigration enforcement that cannot be improved upon much, and suggests that spending cuts might be in order. MPI seems to have issued this report in an attempt to help sell the President's immigration agenda, which includes amnesty for illegal immigrants, further restrictions on immigration enforcement, and expanded legal immigration.
Researchers at the Center for Immigration Studies have found numerous problems in the MPI report. Below are some of the false and/or deceptive statements found in the report’s executive summary, followed by our critique:
"U.S. Spends More on Immigration Enforcement than on FBI, DEA, Secret Service & All Other Federal Criminal Law Enforcement Agencies Combined; Nearly $187 Billion Spent on Federal Immigration Enforcement over Past 26 Years." This is the headline on the MPI press release, and the most egregious falsehood in the report. First, MPI grossly inflates the immigration enforcement spending totals by tallying all spending by three Department of Homeland Security agencies -- Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and US-VISIT. But a large share of these agencies’ activities are not immigration enforcement, including customs screening and enforcement, drug and weapons interdiction, cargo inspection, returning stolen antiquities, and intellectual property violations. Some of these agencies’ activities, such as inspecting incoming travelers at ports of entry and maintaining databases, are not enforcement at all, but routine administrative work. It is impossible to determine how much the federal government has spent on immigration enforcement in any year, much less the last 26 years, because the Department of Homeland Security and its predecessor, INS, have never tracked these activities; but one thing is obvious – that amount is certainly far less than $187 billion. It is probably at least 25-30% less, judging by historical budgets for Customs enforcement.
Second, MPI’s comparison of immigration enforcement spending to other federal law enforcement spending is similarly deceptive. MPI fails to include several big-ticket agencies in its tally of other principal federal law enforcement expenditures, such as the federal prison system and the U.S. Attorneys. This is important, because MPI counted similar program expenses in ICE and CBP’s budget (immigration detention, Border Patrol, and ICE trial attorneys).1
Further, MPI excludes expenses of more than a dozen other federal law enforcement agencies that are part of "other federal law enforcement." Some of these law enforcement agencies, such as the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), have budgets larger than ICE, DEA, or ATF.2
A few simple adjustments turn MPI's dubious calculations upside-down. Subtract a conservative estimate for customs enforcement ($4.4 billion) from the immigration agencies, and add the Bureau of Prisons, U.S. Attorneys, and TSA to the "All Others" total spending, then immigration enforcement costs closer to half of "All Others," not more, as MPI claims (See Table 1). Add in the other missing federal law enforcement agencies and the whole point about a huge immigration enforcement complex disappears.
Some of what MPI calls immigration enforcement overlaps and possibly even surpasses the efforts of other federal criminal law enforcement agencies. It would be interesting to compare, for example, the number of CBP drug and weapons seizures with DEA and ATF statistics, and the number of ICE gang arrests and prosecutions with FBI activities. That is beyond the scope of this fact sheet, but such an analysis would give some context to MPI’s facile spending comparisons.
"Border Patrol staffing, technology and infrastructure have reached historic highs, while levels of apprehensions have fallen to historic lows." Border Patrol funding is higher than ever, but illegal immigration has been higher in the last decade than 20 or 40 years ago. Apprehensions are down overall, but that is an incomplete measure of progress, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), which has concluded that DHS had achieved operational control of only a small share of the southwest border. According to the latest GAO report, the border patrol is intercepting only an estimated 61% of illegal crossers.3
"CBP and ICE together refer more cases for prosecution than all Department of Justice (DOJ) law enforcement agencies combined." This MPI factoid is based on data they retrieved with a do-it-yourself on-line analytical tool, and is therefore difficult to replicate.4 In any case, immigration prosecutions are the fast food of the federal criminal justice system; there are lots of offenders, the cases are relatively simple, and the sentences (if any) are relatively short because removal is usually the outcome. Another more accessible and perhaps more reliable source, the U.S. Sentencing Commission, reports that immigration cases represent a much smaller share of the federal criminal justice docket than MPI suggests. Their 2011 annual report says that immigration offenders were 35% of all those sentenced in federal court that year, meaning there were twice as many sentenced offenders from non-immigration agency prosecutions than from CBP and ICE.5 However, this same report notes that 10% of murderers, 31% of drug traffickers, 34% of money launderers, 64% of kidnappers, and 28% of food and drug offenders sentenced that year were non-citizens, so it’s easy to see why immigration enforcement should be such a high priority in federal law enforcement. Obviously these two sets of data are measuring different things – referrals for prosecution and sentenced offenders -- but they are equally valid measures of the immigration agencies’ footprint in the federal criminal justice system. MPI obviously preferred the more melodramatic of the two.
"Since 1990, more than 4 million non-citizens, primarily unauthorized immigrants, have been deported from the United States. Removals have increased dramatically in recent years . . ." As the President has said, these numbers are "actually a little deceptive."6 The "dramatic" increases in deportations, removals and returns occurred between 2005 and 2009; since then, the numbers have flattened out.7 By discussing the increases over the time span 1990 to 2011, MPI is able to avoid drawing attention to the recent stagnation in enforcement. It has been established that recent deportation statistics are heavily padded with cases that were not previously counted as such.8 In addition, ICE arrests have been trending downward since 2008, after a sharp rise that year; it’s hard to see how deportations can be rising when apprehensions are falling.9
"Fewer than half of the noncitizens who are removed from the United States are removed following hearings and pursuant to formal removal orders from immigration judges." MPI tries to give the impression that noncitizens are being denied due process. As discussed in a recent CIS publication,10 there are many reasons why DHS is able to remove noncitizens without a hearing. The main reason is because most of the aliens selected for removal by ICE are not entitled to a hearing, either because they are convicted criminals or because they have been ordered removed before. Considering how backlogged the immigration court system is, which MPI notes with great concern, the fact that DHS is using more expedited processing in many cases should be viewed with approval, not alarm.
"The average daily population of noncitizens detained by ICE increased nearly five-fold between FY 1995-11 . . . . a significantly larger number of individuals are detained each year in the immigration detention system than are serving sentences in federal Bureau of Prisons facilities for all other federal crimes." This is another silly apples-to-anchovies comparison. MPI compares the static number of federal prisoners (about 218,000) with a year’s worth of immigration detainees (429,000). It would have been more appropriate (but still pointless) to compare the average daily immigration detention population (33,000) with the BOP number. MPI probably also noticed on the Bureau of Prisons web site that immigration offenders represent only 12% of the federal inmate population, a statistic that does not fit in with their portrayal of a massive immigration enforcement dragnet that dominates the federal corrections system. But as MPI notes, the immigration detention system is not at all like the federal prison system in purpose or nature. Immigration detention is more comparable to the local jail system, which has an average daily population of about 750,000 inmates.11
The above is a press release from from Center for Immigration Studies. 1522 K St. NW, Suite 820, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 466-8185 fax: (202) 466-8076. Email: center@cis.org. The Center for Immigration Studies is an independent research institution which examines the impact of immigration on the United States. The Center for Immigration Studies is not affiliated with any other organization
Chamber Of Commerce: Immigration Overhaul A Top Priority
The president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce said Thursday that the "door to the American dream must always remain open" as he announced a broad coalition of business, labor, faith organizations, law enforcement and ethnic groups intent on overhauling the nation's immigration system.
Tom Donohue outlined his priorities for immigration legislation and expressed optimism that after years of ill-fated efforts, there is momentum in the White House and Congress to tackle the politically charged issue. The backing of the Chamber, which represents the interests of more than 3 million businesses, is certain to provide a critical boost to the push for reform against stiff opposition.
Donohue said any legislation should include increased border security, provisional visas for lesser-skilled workers and expansion of green cards for foreign nationals who receive advanced degrees from U.S. colleges and universities. He also favors a national employee verification system, which has been a contentious issue in the debate.
Donohue stressed that there should be a way to citizenship for illegal immigrants.
"We need to provide a path out of the shadows for the 11 million undocumented immigrants who live in the United States today – provided that they meet strict conditions," he said in a speech on the state of American business.
Donohue questioned the wisdom of training individuals "to have PhDs in organic chemistry" and then sending them back to their native country. He noted that there are a number of seasonal jobs in entertainment and agriculture.
The Chamber president is working with AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, whom he praised as the "best guy in town" at building coalitions. Donohue also said he has met with Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who had been involved in previous efforts on immigration legislation.
"It's a work in progress as no legislation had yet been introduced, but we have been informally cooperating because all of us have a shared interest in America actually having a working immigration system that includes a roadmap to citizenship for the undocumented, together with other reforms to make our immigration laws meet the needs of the country," said Ana Avendano, assistant to the president for Immigration and Community Action at the AFL-CIO.
Most Democrats have favored legislation to give millions of illegal immigrants a chance at citizenship, but some Republicans have rejected that step. The issue has exposed divisions within the Republican ranks, and the split was particularly pronounced during the GOP presidential primaries.
Republican nominee Mitt Romney adopted a hard line on the issue, suggesting that illegal immigrants "self-deport." The results of the general election forced many in the GOP to reconsider their position, especially after Obama captured an estimated 71 percent of the Hispanic vote in winning re-election.
Looking ahead to the next election, Republicans recognize the political drawbacks of a tough line on immigration, especially with growing Hispanic populations in Florida, California and Texas. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., the son of Cuban immigrants, worked on a bill last year that would have permitted young illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. with their parents to apply for non-immigrant visas.
It was a policy that Obama adopted.
Donohue acknowledged the difficulty in getting all parties to agree to legislation. "You can demagogue this issue very easily," he said at a news conference following his speech.
Donohue's comments came as he detailed the chamber's priorities this year on federal spending, regulation and energy.
SOURCE
A new report being promoted by the Migration Policy Institute (MPI), a research institute dedicated to promoting migration, paints a deliberately misleading picture of the state of immigration law enforcement. The report, titled Immigration Enforcement in the United States: The Rise of a Formidable Machinery, is presented as an objective assessment of immigration programs, and has been widely covered in the news media -- but is riddled with false statements, cherry-picked statistics and inappropriate comparisons. This compilation of bogus findings aims to convince opinion leaders and the public that the government has succeeded in creating an effective "bulwark" of immigration enforcement that cannot be improved upon much, and suggests that spending cuts might be in order. MPI seems to have issued this report in an attempt to help sell the President's immigration agenda, which includes amnesty for illegal immigrants, further restrictions on immigration enforcement, and expanded legal immigration.
Researchers at the Center for Immigration Studies have found numerous problems in the MPI report. Below are some of the false and/or deceptive statements found in the report’s executive summary, followed by our critique:
"U.S. Spends More on Immigration Enforcement than on FBI, DEA, Secret Service & All Other Federal Criminal Law Enforcement Agencies Combined; Nearly $187 Billion Spent on Federal Immigration Enforcement over Past 26 Years." This is the headline on the MPI press release, and the most egregious falsehood in the report. First, MPI grossly inflates the immigration enforcement spending totals by tallying all spending by three Department of Homeland Security agencies -- Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and US-VISIT. But a large share of these agencies’ activities are not immigration enforcement, including customs screening and enforcement, drug and weapons interdiction, cargo inspection, returning stolen antiquities, and intellectual property violations. Some of these agencies’ activities, such as inspecting incoming travelers at ports of entry and maintaining databases, are not enforcement at all, but routine administrative work. It is impossible to determine how much the federal government has spent on immigration enforcement in any year, much less the last 26 years, because the Department of Homeland Security and its predecessor, INS, have never tracked these activities; but one thing is obvious – that amount is certainly far less than $187 billion. It is probably at least 25-30% less, judging by historical budgets for Customs enforcement.
Second, MPI’s comparison of immigration enforcement spending to other federal law enforcement spending is similarly deceptive. MPI fails to include several big-ticket agencies in its tally of other principal federal law enforcement expenditures, such as the federal prison system and the U.S. Attorneys. This is important, because MPI counted similar program expenses in ICE and CBP’s budget (immigration detention, Border Patrol, and ICE trial attorneys).1
Further, MPI excludes expenses of more than a dozen other federal law enforcement agencies that are part of "other federal law enforcement." Some of these law enforcement agencies, such as the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), have budgets larger than ICE, DEA, or ATF.2
A few simple adjustments turn MPI's dubious calculations upside-down. Subtract a conservative estimate for customs enforcement ($4.4 billion) from the immigration agencies, and add the Bureau of Prisons, U.S. Attorneys, and TSA to the "All Others" total spending, then immigration enforcement costs closer to half of "All Others," not more, as MPI claims (See Table 1). Add in the other missing federal law enforcement agencies and the whole point about a huge immigration enforcement complex disappears.
Some of what MPI calls immigration enforcement overlaps and possibly even surpasses the efforts of other federal criminal law enforcement agencies. It would be interesting to compare, for example, the number of CBP drug and weapons seizures with DEA and ATF statistics, and the number of ICE gang arrests and prosecutions with FBI activities. That is beyond the scope of this fact sheet, but such an analysis would give some context to MPI’s facile spending comparisons.
"Border Patrol staffing, technology and infrastructure have reached historic highs, while levels of apprehensions have fallen to historic lows." Border Patrol funding is higher than ever, but illegal immigration has been higher in the last decade than 20 or 40 years ago. Apprehensions are down overall, but that is an incomplete measure of progress, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), which has concluded that DHS had achieved operational control of only a small share of the southwest border. According to the latest GAO report, the border patrol is intercepting only an estimated 61% of illegal crossers.3
"CBP and ICE together refer more cases for prosecution than all Department of Justice (DOJ) law enforcement agencies combined." This MPI factoid is based on data they retrieved with a do-it-yourself on-line analytical tool, and is therefore difficult to replicate.4 In any case, immigration prosecutions are the fast food of the federal criminal justice system; there are lots of offenders, the cases are relatively simple, and the sentences (if any) are relatively short because removal is usually the outcome. Another more accessible and perhaps more reliable source, the U.S. Sentencing Commission, reports that immigration cases represent a much smaller share of the federal criminal justice docket than MPI suggests. Their 2011 annual report says that immigration offenders were 35% of all those sentenced in federal court that year, meaning there were twice as many sentenced offenders from non-immigration agency prosecutions than from CBP and ICE.5 However, this same report notes that 10% of murderers, 31% of drug traffickers, 34% of money launderers, 64% of kidnappers, and 28% of food and drug offenders sentenced that year were non-citizens, so it’s easy to see why immigration enforcement should be such a high priority in federal law enforcement. Obviously these two sets of data are measuring different things – referrals for prosecution and sentenced offenders -- but they are equally valid measures of the immigration agencies’ footprint in the federal criminal justice system. MPI obviously preferred the more melodramatic of the two.
"Since 1990, more than 4 million non-citizens, primarily unauthorized immigrants, have been deported from the United States. Removals have increased dramatically in recent years . . ." As the President has said, these numbers are "actually a little deceptive."6 The "dramatic" increases in deportations, removals and returns occurred between 2005 and 2009; since then, the numbers have flattened out.7 By discussing the increases over the time span 1990 to 2011, MPI is able to avoid drawing attention to the recent stagnation in enforcement. It has been established that recent deportation statistics are heavily padded with cases that were not previously counted as such.8 In addition, ICE arrests have been trending downward since 2008, after a sharp rise that year; it’s hard to see how deportations can be rising when apprehensions are falling.9
"Fewer than half of the noncitizens who are removed from the United States are removed following hearings and pursuant to formal removal orders from immigration judges." MPI tries to give the impression that noncitizens are being denied due process. As discussed in a recent CIS publication,10 there are many reasons why DHS is able to remove noncitizens without a hearing. The main reason is because most of the aliens selected for removal by ICE are not entitled to a hearing, either because they are convicted criminals or because they have been ordered removed before. Considering how backlogged the immigration court system is, which MPI notes with great concern, the fact that DHS is using more expedited processing in many cases should be viewed with approval, not alarm.
"The average daily population of noncitizens detained by ICE increased nearly five-fold between FY 1995-11 . . . . a significantly larger number of individuals are detained each year in the immigration detention system than are serving sentences in federal Bureau of Prisons facilities for all other federal crimes." This is another silly apples-to-anchovies comparison. MPI compares the static number of federal prisoners (about 218,000) with a year’s worth of immigration detainees (429,000). It would have been more appropriate (but still pointless) to compare the average daily immigration detention population (33,000) with the BOP number. MPI probably also noticed on the Bureau of Prisons web site that immigration offenders represent only 12% of the federal inmate population, a statistic that does not fit in with their portrayal of a massive immigration enforcement dragnet that dominates the federal corrections system. But as MPI notes, the immigration detention system is not at all like the federal prison system in purpose or nature. Immigration detention is more comparable to the local jail system, which has an average daily population of about 750,000 inmates.11
The above is a press release from from Center for Immigration Studies. 1522 K St. NW, Suite 820, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 466-8185 fax: (202) 466-8076. Email: center@cis.org. The Center for Immigration Studies is an independent research institution which examines the impact of immigration on the United States. The Center for Immigration Studies is not affiliated with any other organization
Chamber Of Commerce: Immigration Overhaul A Top Priority
The president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce said Thursday that the "door to the American dream must always remain open" as he announced a broad coalition of business, labor, faith organizations, law enforcement and ethnic groups intent on overhauling the nation's immigration system.
Tom Donohue outlined his priorities for immigration legislation and expressed optimism that after years of ill-fated efforts, there is momentum in the White House and Congress to tackle the politically charged issue. The backing of the Chamber, which represents the interests of more than 3 million businesses, is certain to provide a critical boost to the push for reform against stiff opposition.
Donohue said any legislation should include increased border security, provisional visas for lesser-skilled workers and expansion of green cards for foreign nationals who receive advanced degrees from U.S. colleges and universities. He also favors a national employee verification system, which has been a contentious issue in the debate.
Donohue stressed that there should be a way to citizenship for illegal immigrants.
"We need to provide a path out of the shadows for the 11 million undocumented immigrants who live in the United States today – provided that they meet strict conditions," he said in a speech on the state of American business.
Donohue questioned the wisdom of training individuals "to have PhDs in organic chemistry" and then sending them back to their native country. He noted that there are a number of seasonal jobs in entertainment and agriculture.
The Chamber president is working with AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, whom he praised as the "best guy in town" at building coalitions. Donohue also said he has met with Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who had been involved in previous efforts on immigration legislation.
"It's a work in progress as no legislation had yet been introduced, but we have been informally cooperating because all of us have a shared interest in America actually having a working immigration system that includes a roadmap to citizenship for the undocumented, together with other reforms to make our immigration laws meet the needs of the country," said Ana Avendano, assistant to the president for Immigration and Community Action at the AFL-CIO.
Most Democrats have favored legislation to give millions of illegal immigrants a chance at citizenship, but some Republicans have rejected that step. The issue has exposed divisions within the Republican ranks, and the split was particularly pronounced during the GOP presidential primaries.
Republican nominee Mitt Romney adopted a hard line on the issue, suggesting that illegal immigrants "self-deport." The results of the general election forced many in the GOP to reconsider their position, especially after Obama captured an estimated 71 percent of the Hispanic vote in winning re-election.
Looking ahead to the next election, Republicans recognize the political drawbacks of a tough line on immigration, especially with growing Hispanic populations in Florida, California and Texas. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., the son of Cuban immigrants, worked on a bill last year that would have permitted young illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. with their parents to apply for non-immigrant visas.
It was a policy that Obama adopted.
Donohue acknowledged the difficulty in getting all parties to agree to legislation. "You can demagogue this issue very easily," he said at a news conference following his speech.
Donohue's comments came as he detailed the chamber's priorities this year on federal spending, regulation and energy.
SOURCE
Thursday, January 10, 2013
House Gears Up For Immigration Battle
With immigration expected to be a top issue in the new Congress, lawmakers in both parties continue to call for a bipartisan approach — while also preparing for battle.
The messaging from many House Democrats and Republicans about the chances of passing an immigration overhaul remains optimistic. And some of them, such as Republican Mario Diaz-Balart of Florida and Democrat Zoe Lofgren of California, have begun to meet privately.
But other moves indicate that lawmakers are hedging their bets and girding for a fight.
Meanwhile, both sides are waiting to gauge President Obama's involvement after he campaigned last year on a pledge to deliver immigration reform. His administration recently announced another change to its immigration policy that will allow some illegal immigrants married to U.S. citizens to stay longer before returning to their countries to apply for permanent American visas.
The Republican leadership has installed a pair of immigration hawks to chair the House Judiciary Committee and its subcommittee that would be charged with drafting any immigration bills. In an apparent countermove, a veteran Democrat has given up his seniority on the coveted Financial Services Committee to join the judiciary panel and help push through possible reforms.
Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., the new House Judiciary Committee chairman, is a former immigration attorney who has taken a hard line against Democratic proposals, many of which he has regarded as amnesty. He opposes the Obama administration's policy changes, including its deferred deportation program that provides a two-year reprieve to qualified young people brought to the United States illegally as children.
Any hearings would be presided over by conservative Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., the new chairman of the subcommittee on immigration and border security. Gowdy holds many of the same positions as Goodlatte, including opposition to the Obama policies.
Has the Republicans' post-election embrace of an immigration overhaul worn off?
Maybe not. Gowdy, who just began his second term, recently told a South Carolina newspaper that he wants to come up with a bill that reflects "the humanity that I think defines us as a people, and the respect for the rule of law that defines us as a republic."
Gowdy dismissed the notion embraced by some conservatives that the nation should deport the estimated 11 million or more immigrants illegally living in the U.S. But he didn't indicate whether he would support Democratic principles such as offering a path to citizenship.
He said any legislation would have to reinforce the nation's borders and order the deportation of lawbreakers to gain the needed support of conservative lawmakers. Many Democrats, including leading Latino lawmakers, have said they would agree to such requirements.
Goodlatte and Gowdy will have to contend with Democratic Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., who took leave from the House Financial Services Committee to be a junior member of the Judiciary Committee and help that panel draft immigration legislation. Immigration overhaul has been the signature issue of Gutierrez's two decades in Congress.
"I felt I must be on the Judiciary Committee during this Congress to help the others on the committee get immigration reform to the finish line," Gutierrez said in a statement. "We can't wait and wait and wait for immigration reform, and I am finding an enthusiasm for action that I have not seen on Capitol Hill for years."
SOURCE
U.S. Immigration Policy Is chasing away valuable high-skilled entrepreneurs
When we teach our introductory entrepreneurship class at MIT, we take it for granted that each of our 75 students will be able to start an American company upon graduating. But many of them lack one thing they need to be able to do so—permission from the United States government to continue working in our country.
In this academic year, three in 10 MIT students, including four in 10 graduate students, are not U.S. citizens or permanent residents. So for them our entrepreneurship class is likely to remain just an academic exercise. Their student visas expire when they graduate, leaving them with two options, to leave the country or find an existing company to sponsor them for a chance at an H-1B visa.
Either way, they can’t start a company in the United States. Their only hope is to secure a visa extension for “optional practical training,” after which they must apply for an H-1B visa for their startup once it grows large enough to be recognized as a legitimate enterprise—among other things, one that employs 25 or more employees. But even if they follow this path, they are not allowed to become a majority shareholder in their own startup.
Much discussion about immigration views it as a zero-sum game, where a set number of jobs at existing companies will be awarded either to Americans or to foreigners. Indeed, the logic underlying the H-1B process is that a visa should be granted only when a qualified American cannot be secured for a position. The present view of immigration policy, where the resulting labor supply is applied only toward jobs at existing companies, misses the essential contribution that would-be immigrant entrepreneurs sitting in our classroom can provide, the creation of new American companies, and with them new American jobs.
Innovation-driven entrepreneurs are the engine of a vibrant economy. Their high levels of education and their pursuit of global markets and rapid expansion create jobs and economic prosperity. And many of them, such as these MIT students, were not born in the United States. There is a global competition to recruit this talent, and countries such as Canada, Singapore, and Australia have introduced policies that are far more welcoming than ours. Although strides have been made in retaining immigrant science, technology, engineering, and mathematics students, these measures are largely designed to let immigrants to fill jobs in existing companies. Would-be immigrant entrepreneurs still face major obstacles and uncertainty.
However, a window of opportunity around immigration may be opening. Alejandro Mayorkas, director of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, recently addressed a group of MIT students and acknowledged the benefits of keeping talented foreign-born entrepreneurs in our country. He is working to streamline USCIS procedures to aid entrepreneurs as much as possible under existing laws and has just launched a website, www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/eir, to help entrepreneurs understand their options. Meanwhile President Obama and a number of congressional Democrats and Republicans alike have publicly expressed a desire to help foreign-born entrepreneurs stay in the United States.
Certainly we don’t pretend to have all the answers, and we are mindful of moral (and political) hazard. But we see three areas that the U.S. government should revisit in order to address the needs of foreign-born entrepreneurs’ desire to start American companies and create American jobs.
First, immigration policy needs to focus not just on skilled immigrants filling positions in existing companies, but on immigrants’ potential to create new companies, leading to the creation of new jobs. Perhaps a new EB-1 (priority worker) category could be created for entrepreneurs, similar to the existing category for scientists. The United Kingdom has designed a new entrepreneur’s visa for just such a purpose.
Second, we need to appreciate the talent of these entrepreneurs rather than making them feel like aliens. We have heard more than one outstanding foreign-born student reveal feelings of being treated like a suspect at a crime scene rather than a highly valuable asset. Other countries are increasingly becoming more welcoming to them, so our customer service policy has got to become more sensitive.
Third, one of the great advantages of startups is that they typically move fast and run lean and mean. They eschew bureaucracy in favor of action and experimentation, which is what makes them so great. We are in a competitive market and must actively recruit this talent and be more responsive to its needs.
We hope that our talented, foreign-born students at MIT and other higher learning institutes aren’t shown the door at the conclusion of their American education. Let’s instead use immigration as a tool to promote innovation-driven entrepreneurship and the gains in jobs and economic prosperity that result.
Or to put it another way, what if Steve Wozniak had been born not in San Jose but in Saskatchewan?
SOURCE
House Gears Up For Immigration Battle
With immigration expected to be a top issue in the new Congress, lawmakers in both parties continue to call for a bipartisan approach — while also preparing for battle.
The messaging from many House Democrats and Republicans about the chances of passing an immigration overhaul remains optimistic. And some of them, such as Republican Mario Diaz-Balart of Florida and Democrat Zoe Lofgren of California, have begun to meet privately.
But other moves indicate that lawmakers are hedging their bets and girding for a fight.
Meanwhile, both sides are waiting to gauge President Obama's involvement after he campaigned last year on a pledge to deliver immigration reform. His administration recently announced another change to its immigration policy that will allow some illegal immigrants married to U.S. citizens to stay longer before returning to their countries to apply for permanent American visas.
The Republican leadership has installed a pair of immigration hawks to chair the House Judiciary Committee and its subcommittee that would be charged with drafting any immigration bills. In an apparent countermove, a veteran Democrat has given up his seniority on the coveted Financial Services Committee to join the judiciary panel and help push through possible reforms.
Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., the new House Judiciary Committee chairman, is a former immigration attorney who has taken a hard line against Democratic proposals, many of which he has regarded as amnesty. He opposes the Obama administration's policy changes, including its deferred deportation program that provides a two-year reprieve to qualified young people brought to the United States illegally as children.
Any hearings would be presided over by conservative Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., the new chairman of the subcommittee on immigration and border security. Gowdy holds many of the same positions as Goodlatte, including opposition to the Obama policies.
Has the Republicans' post-election embrace of an immigration overhaul worn off?
Maybe not. Gowdy, who just began his second term, recently told a South Carolina newspaper that he wants to come up with a bill that reflects "the humanity that I think defines us as a people, and the respect for the rule of law that defines us as a republic."
Gowdy dismissed the notion embraced by some conservatives that the nation should deport the estimated 11 million or more immigrants illegally living in the U.S. But he didn't indicate whether he would support Democratic principles such as offering a path to citizenship.
He said any legislation would have to reinforce the nation's borders and order the deportation of lawbreakers to gain the needed support of conservative lawmakers. Many Democrats, including leading Latino lawmakers, have said they would agree to such requirements.
Goodlatte and Gowdy will have to contend with Democratic Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., who took leave from the House Financial Services Committee to be a junior member of the Judiciary Committee and help that panel draft immigration legislation. Immigration overhaul has been the signature issue of Gutierrez's two decades in Congress.
"I felt I must be on the Judiciary Committee during this Congress to help the others on the committee get immigration reform to the finish line," Gutierrez said in a statement. "We can't wait and wait and wait for immigration reform, and I am finding an enthusiasm for action that I have not seen on Capitol Hill for years."
SOURCE
U.S. Immigration Policy Is chasing away valuable high-skilled entrepreneurs
When we teach our introductory entrepreneurship class at MIT, we take it for granted that each of our 75 students will be able to start an American company upon graduating. But many of them lack one thing they need to be able to do so—permission from the United States government to continue working in our country.
In this academic year, three in 10 MIT students, including four in 10 graduate students, are not U.S. citizens or permanent residents. So for them our entrepreneurship class is likely to remain just an academic exercise. Their student visas expire when they graduate, leaving them with two options, to leave the country or find an existing company to sponsor them for a chance at an H-1B visa.
Either way, they can’t start a company in the United States. Their only hope is to secure a visa extension for “optional practical training,” after which they must apply for an H-1B visa for their startup once it grows large enough to be recognized as a legitimate enterprise—among other things, one that employs 25 or more employees. But even if they follow this path, they are not allowed to become a majority shareholder in their own startup.
Much discussion about immigration views it as a zero-sum game, where a set number of jobs at existing companies will be awarded either to Americans or to foreigners. Indeed, the logic underlying the H-1B process is that a visa should be granted only when a qualified American cannot be secured for a position. The present view of immigration policy, where the resulting labor supply is applied only toward jobs at existing companies, misses the essential contribution that would-be immigrant entrepreneurs sitting in our classroom can provide, the creation of new American companies, and with them new American jobs.
Innovation-driven entrepreneurs are the engine of a vibrant economy. Their high levels of education and their pursuit of global markets and rapid expansion create jobs and economic prosperity. And many of them, such as these MIT students, were not born in the United States. There is a global competition to recruit this talent, and countries such as Canada, Singapore, and Australia have introduced policies that are far more welcoming than ours. Although strides have been made in retaining immigrant science, technology, engineering, and mathematics students, these measures are largely designed to let immigrants to fill jobs in existing companies. Would-be immigrant entrepreneurs still face major obstacles and uncertainty.
However, a window of opportunity around immigration may be opening. Alejandro Mayorkas, director of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, recently addressed a group of MIT students and acknowledged the benefits of keeping talented foreign-born entrepreneurs in our country. He is working to streamline USCIS procedures to aid entrepreneurs as much as possible under existing laws and has just launched a website, www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/eir, to help entrepreneurs understand their options. Meanwhile President Obama and a number of congressional Democrats and Republicans alike have publicly expressed a desire to help foreign-born entrepreneurs stay in the United States.
Certainly we don’t pretend to have all the answers, and we are mindful of moral (and political) hazard. But we see three areas that the U.S. government should revisit in order to address the needs of foreign-born entrepreneurs’ desire to start American companies and create American jobs.
First, immigration policy needs to focus not just on skilled immigrants filling positions in existing companies, but on immigrants’ potential to create new companies, leading to the creation of new jobs. Perhaps a new EB-1 (priority worker) category could be created for entrepreneurs, similar to the existing category for scientists. The United Kingdom has designed a new entrepreneur’s visa for just such a purpose.
Second, we need to appreciate the talent of these entrepreneurs rather than making them feel like aliens. We have heard more than one outstanding foreign-born student reveal feelings of being treated like a suspect at a crime scene rather than a highly valuable asset. Other countries are increasingly becoming more welcoming to them, so our customer service policy has got to become more sensitive.
Third, one of the great advantages of startups is that they typically move fast and run lean and mean. They eschew bureaucracy in favor of action and experimentation, which is what makes them so great. We are in a competitive market and must actively recruit this talent and be more responsive to its needs.
We hope that our talented, foreign-born students at MIT and other higher learning institutes aren’t shown the door at the conclusion of their American education. Let’s instead use immigration as a tool to promote innovation-driven entrepreneurship and the gains in jobs and economic prosperity that result.
Or to put it another way, what if Steve Wozniak had been born not in San Jose but in Saskatchewan?
SOURCE
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
U.S. Administration Spends More on Immigration Than all Other Federal Law Enforcement Combined
Most law enforcement is by the States
Last year, the Obama administration spent almost $18 billion on immigration enforcement. That's more than what it spent on the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, Secret Service, U.S. Marshals Service, and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, combined, according to a report by the Migration Policy Institute. Twenty-four percent more to be exact.
Considering the amount of money that is spent, "today, immigration enforcement can be seen as the federalgovernment's highes criminal law enforcement priority," a co-author of the report said in a statement
In addition to huge spending, immigration enforcement accounts for over half of federally prosecuted crimes. The nearly 430,000 people detained each year for immigration-related crimes is a significantly larger number than the entire population currently serving sentences for all federal crimes combined. Meanwhile, deportations have increased from 30,000 in 1990 to nearly 400,000 in 2011. From 1990 to 2011more than 4 million people have been deported from the United States, according to the report.
Here's how the MPI explained their findings in the 182-page report that the New York Times describes as "an opening salvo in a contentious debate over immigration that President Obama has pledged to lead this year":
"[The] findings tell a story of aggressive enforcement of immigration laws at the borders and in the nation’s interior, and of immigration agencies that are utilizing wide-ranging statutory and procedural authorities. Moreover, immigration enforce- ment is increasingly going global through international agreements, unprecedented cross-border cooperation with Mexico and Canada, and special initiatives that combat transnational crime. Dramatic growth, advanced technology, and new programs have cohered to constitute a transformed immigration enforcement system that increasingly implicates foreign relations, national security, counterterrorism, trade, labor standards, system that increasingly implicates foreign relations, national security, counterterrorism, trade, labor standards, states’ rights, criminal justice, and civil-rights policy realms."
SOURCE
Enough illegal migrants to fill three cities the size of Newcastle: Home Office reports that 863,000 are living in the UK
Britain is hosting enough illegal immigrants to fill three cities the size of Newcastle, according to border officials.
A Home Office report says an estimated 70 per cent of the 863,000 illegal migrants are living in London.
The study also reveals that 10,000 foreigners who had no legal right to live in Britain have been granted permission to stay under the so-called 14-year rule.
It means they managed to stay in the country for so long without being booted out that the Government has now given up the fight.
Ministers say the situation is a legacy of Labour's shambolic handling of border controls.
The illegal immigrants are a mixture of those who sneaked into Britain in the back of lorries and those who arrived on visas but never went home.
Officials, overwhelmed by the foreign prisoners scandal and a deluge of asylum claims, did not have the resources to track them down.
The 'robust estimate' of how many illegals are living in the UK comes from the London School of Economics, and is included in a study titled Practical Measures for Reducing Irregular Migration. Ministers accept the figure.
The Home Office says the top five countries from which the illegals have arrived are believed to be India, Nigeria, Pakistan, China, and Bangladesh.
This is based on the nationalities of those people the authorities have detected.
Last night Immigration Minister Mark Harper said: 'It's no surprise that after years of uncontrolled immigration, we have a sizeable illegal immigrant population in Britain.
'We are determined to get immigration under control, and in the past year net migration has fallen by a quarter. We also want to get tough on illegal immigration.'
The illegal population – more than three times the 275,000 who live in Newcastle – will add sharply to the number of foreign-born nationals living here legally.
Earlier this month, the official Census showed that 7.5million people who were born abroad were living here in 2011, of whom more than half have arrived since 2001.
The Home Office study sets out for the first time how many beneficiaries there have been of the 14-year rule.
This states that, once a migrant has lived in the UK for this long, he or she will have established a right to a family life and should not normally be kicked out.
Between 2004 and 2011, 9,266 'irregular migrants' were granted permission to stay, including a record figure of 2,062 in 2010.
The total is now understood to have breached the 10,000 barrier.
SOURCE
January 8, 2013
Deport first, ask questions later: 'Fed up' British PM reveals plans to remove terror suspects before they launch appeals
Terror suspects could face a new system of being deported before they get the chance to hold a full appeal, David Cameron revealed yesterday.
The Prime Minister said he was ‘fed up’ with the likes of hate-preacher Abu Qatada using a string of human rights appeals to remain in the UK. Mr Cameron went on: ‘That’s why I’m keen to move to a policy where we deport first, and suspects can appeal later.’
Under this new arrangement, deportees would only be able to appeal against the decision while still in this country - suspending their removal - if they faced ‘a real risk of serious, irreversible harm’.
Currently, nobody can be put on a plane until all their appeals to British courts - and Strasbourg - have been exhausted. The proposals go further than ministers have ever previously suggested.
But last night government officials were unable to provide further details of how the new regime would operate. It was also unclear whether it would apply only to suspected terrorists.
Currently, there are 4,000 foreign rapists, muggers and other criminals walking the streets who the UK cannot kick out.
New rules limited only to the extradition of terror suspects would fall far short of the demands made by Tory MPs for a wide-ranging overhaul of human rights law.
There are also question marks over whether Mr Cameron’s idea would be acceptable to either the Liberal Democrats or, crucially, the European Court of Human Rights.
Ministers would have to explain how, in the event of a terror suspect winning their appeal from overseas, they would be able to locate the terror suspect and bring them back to Britain. Strasbourg has taken a hard-line on removing anybody to a country where torture or ill-treatment takes place.
Qatada’s deportation to Jordan was blocked by Strasbourg on the grounds not that he would be harmed himself, but that some of the evidence used against him may have been obtained by torture. He is currently living in a £400,000 London house - paid for by the taxpayer - pending an appeal by Home Secretary Theresa May.
Last night Tory MP Dominic Raab, who has campaigned to stop the abuse of human rights law by foreign criminals, said: ‘The Prime Minister is absolutely right to embrace fundamental deportation reform.
‘For it to work, we will need an Act of Parliament that lays down the law in clear terms, so ingenious judges with other agendas - at home and in Strasbourg - can’t subvert the common sense system the British public want put in place.’
In October last year, Home Secretary Theresa May said there was a need to reduce ‘the wholly unacceptable delays’ that have occurred in the extradition process for terror suspects. She said there was ‘scope for reforming rights of appeal, streamlining the stages, expediting cases through the court and looking again at the provision of legal aid for terrorist suspects’.
Yesterday, Mr Cameron also voiced frustration with the pace of change on immigration reform, which he said was ‘just an issue where there is quite a profound disagreement between the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives’. The Prime Minister said it is ‘an issue of the absolute centre ground of British politics”
SOURCE
Recent posts at CIS below
See here for the blog. The CIS main page is here.
Media
1. Mark Krikorian Debates Obama Administration's Rule Change on CNBC
2. Op-ed: Would You Buy an Amnesty from These People? Past performance really is an indicator of future results.
Publication
3. Migration Enforcement Agency Discourages Funds for Its Own Work
Blogs
4. A Little Good Immigration Policy News from . . . Oklahoma
5. New Waiver Shields Sponsored Illegal Aliens From Penalties
6. Grover Norquist and Reporters Without Questions
7. Here’s a Sound, if Obscure, Congressional Precedent about Amnesties
8. 'Immigration Reform' – Coming Soon to a Congress Near You
9. Foreign Students Can Still Attend Flight Schools Not Authorized by FAA
10. DREAMers, Conservative Allies Demand Full Amnesty for All Illegal Aliens
11. Cold Water on Globalization
12. Many EB-5 Investments are Marginal – Like that Hockey Team in Phoenix
13. ICE Cancels Enforcement Agreements with 32 Local Partners
14. An Unfortunate Leap
15. "It's an Ill Wind . . . " Hurricane Sandy and TPS for Haitians
16. Walking a Fine Line Between Pastoral Care and Political Activism
17. Pandering on Illegal Immigration Leads to Defeat
18. Mexico's El Universal Says Latinos in U.S. Have No Civil Rights
19. As We Face a "Fiscal Cliff" Let's Close Immigration-Related Tax Loopholes
20. H-1B Victims Win Symbolic but Hollow Victory in U.S. District Court
21. NPR Fudges the Facts on Border Security
22. DHS Gives Criminal Alien Privacy but Snubs Victim
23. Who Comes First, the Inventor or the Casino Investor?
24. ICE Exercises Prosecutorial Discretion for ID Fraud
25. It's a Sealed Court Document, But if You Cross My Palm with Silver . . .
26. Why Scrap the Per-Country Cap?
27. Amnesty's Impact on Health Resources
28. Obama's Illegal Amnesty Continues
U.S. Administration Spends More on Immigration Than all Other Federal Law Enforcement Combined
Most law enforcement is by the States
Last year, the Obama administration spent almost $18 billion on immigration enforcement. That's more than what it spent on the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, Secret Service, U.S. Marshals Service, and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, combined, according to a report by the Migration Policy Institute. Twenty-four percent more to be exact.
Considering the amount of money that is spent, "today, immigration enforcement can be seen as the federalgovernment's highes criminal law enforcement priority," a co-author of the report said in a statement
In addition to huge spending, immigration enforcement accounts for over half of federally prosecuted crimes. The nearly 430,000 people detained each year for immigration-related crimes is a significantly larger number than the entire population currently serving sentences for all federal crimes combined. Meanwhile, deportations have increased from 30,000 in 1990 to nearly 400,000 in 2011. From 1990 to 2011more than 4 million people have been deported from the United States, according to the report.
Here's how the MPI explained their findings in the 182-page report that the New York Times describes as "an opening salvo in a contentious debate over immigration that President Obama has pledged to lead this year":
"[The] findings tell a story of aggressive enforcement of immigration laws at the borders and in the nation’s interior, and of immigration agencies that are utilizing wide-ranging statutory and procedural authorities. Moreover, immigration enforce- ment is increasingly going global through international agreements, unprecedented cross-border cooperation with Mexico and Canada, and special initiatives that combat transnational crime. Dramatic growth, advanced technology, and new programs have cohered to constitute a transformed immigration enforcement system that increasingly implicates foreign relations, national security, counterterrorism, trade, labor standards, system that increasingly implicates foreign relations, national security, counterterrorism, trade, labor standards, states’ rights, criminal justice, and civil-rights policy realms."
SOURCE
Enough illegal migrants to fill three cities the size of Newcastle: Home Office reports that 863,000 are living in the UK
Britain is hosting enough illegal immigrants to fill three cities the size of Newcastle, according to border officials.
A Home Office report says an estimated 70 per cent of the 863,000 illegal migrants are living in London.
The study also reveals that 10,000 foreigners who had no legal right to live in Britain have been granted permission to stay under the so-called 14-year rule.
It means they managed to stay in the country for so long without being booted out that the Government has now given up the fight.
Ministers say the situation is a legacy of Labour's shambolic handling of border controls.
The illegal immigrants are a mixture of those who sneaked into Britain in the back of lorries and those who arrived on visas but never went home.
Officials, overwhelmed by the foreign prisoners scandal and a deluge of asylum claims, did not have the resources to track them down.
The 'robust estimate' of how many illegals are living in the UK comes from the London School of Economics, and is included in a study titled Practical Measures for Reducing Irregular Migration. Ministers accept the figure.
The Home Office says the top five countries from which the illegals have arrived are believed to be India, Nigeria, Pakistan, China, and Bangladesh.
This is based on the nationalities of those people the authorities have detected.
Last night Immigration Minister Mark Harper said: 'It's no surprise that after years of uncontrolled immigration, we have a sizeable illegal immigrant population in Britain.
'We are determined to get immigration under control, and in the past year net migration has fallen by a quarter. We also want to get tough on illegal immigration.'
The illegal population – more than three times the 275,000 who live in Newcastle – will add sharply to the number of foreign-born nationals living here legally.
Earlier this month, the official Census showed that 7.5million people who were born abroad were living here in 2011, of whom more than half have arrived since 2001.
The Home Office study sets out for the first time how many beneficiaries there have been of the 14-year rule.
This states that, once a migrant has lived in the UK for this long, he or she will have established a right to a family life and should not normally be kicked out.
Between 2004 and 2011, 9,266 'irregular migrants' were granted permission to stay, including a record figure of 2,062 in 2010.
The total is now understood to have breached the 10,000 barrier.
SOURCE
January 8, 2013
Deport first, ask questions later: 'Fed up' British PM reveals plans to remove terror suspects before they launch appeals
Terror suspects could face a new system of being deported before they get the chance to hold a full appeal, David Cameron revealed yesterday.
The Prime Minister said he was ‘fed up’ with the likes of hate-preacher Abu Qatada using a string of human rights appeals to remain in the UK. Mr Cameron went on: ‘That’s why I’m keen to move to a policy where we deport first, and suspects can appeal later.’
Under this new arrangement, deportees would only be able to appeal against the decision while still in this country - suspending their removal - if they faced ‘a real risk of serious, irreversible harm’.
Currently, nobody can be put on a plane until all their appeals to British courts - and Strasbourg - have been exhausted. The proposals go further than ministers have ever previously suggested.
But last night government officials were unable to provide further details of how the new regime would operate. It was also unclear whether it would apply only to suspected terrorists.
Currently, there are 4,000 foreign rapists, muggers and other criminals walking the streets who the UK cannot kick out.
New rules limited only to the extradition of terror suspects would fall far short of the demands made by Tory MPs for a wide-ranging overhaul of human rights law.
There are also question marks over whether Mr Cameron’s idea would be acceptable to either the Liberal Democrats or, crucially, the European Court of Human Rights.
Ministers would have to explain how, in the event of a terror suspect winning their appeal from overseas, they would be able to locate the terror suspect and bring them back to Britain. Strasbourg has taken a hard-line on removing anybody to a country where torture or ill-treatment takes place.
Qatada’s deportation to Jordan was blocked by Strasbourg on the grounds not that he would be harmed himself, but that some of the evidence used against him may have been obtained by torture. He is currently living in a £400,000 London house - paid for by the taxpayer - pending an appeal by Home Secretary Theresa May.
Last night Tory MP Dominic Raab, who has campaigned to stop the abuse of human rights law by foreign criminals, said: ‘The Prime Minister is absolutely right to embrace fundamental deportation reform.
‘For it to work, we will need an Act of Parliament that lays down the law in clear terms, so ingenious judges with other agendas - at home and in Strasbourg - can’t subvert the common sense system the British public want put in place.’
In October last year, Home Secretary Theresa May said there was a need to reduce ‘the wholly unacceptable delays’ that have occurred in the extradition process for terror suspects. She said there was ‘scope for reforming rights of appeal, streamlining the stages, expediting cases through the court and looking again at the provision of legal aid for terrorist suspects’.
Yesterday, Mr Cameron also voiced frustration with the pace of change on immigration reform, which he said was ‘just an issue where there is quite a profound disagreement between the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives’. The Prime Minister said it is ‘an issue of the absolute centre ground of British politics”
SOURCE
Recent posts at CIS below
See here for the blog. The CIS main page is here.
Media
1. Mark Krikorian Debates Obama Administration's Rule Change on CNBC
2. Op-ed: Would You Buy an Amnesty from These People? Past performance really is an indicator of future results.
Publication
3. Migration Enforcement Agency Discourages Funds for Its Own Work
Blogs
4. A Little Good Immigration Policy News from . . . Oklahoma
5. New Waiver Shields Sponsored Illegal Aliens From Penalties
6. Grover Norquist and Reporters Without Questions
7. Here’s a Sound, if Obscure, Congressional Precedent about Amnesties
8. 'Immigration Reform' – Coming Soon to a Congress Near You
9. Foreign Students Can Still Attend Flight Schools Not Authorized by FAA
10. DREAMers, Conservative Allies Demand Full Amnesty for All Illegal Aliens
11. Cold Water on Globalization
12. Many EB-5 Investments are Marginal – Like that Hockey Team in Phoenix
13. ICE Cancels Enforcement Agreements with 32 Local Partners
14. An Unfortunate Leap
15. "It's an Ill Wind . . . " Hurricane Sandy and TPS for Haitians
16. Walking a Fine Line Between Pastoral Care and Political Activism
17. Pandering on Illegal Immigration Leads to Defeat
18. Mexico's El Universal Says Latinos in U.S. Have No Civil Rights
19. As We Face a "Fiscal Cliff" Let's Close Immigration-Related Tax Loopholes
20. H-1B Victims Win Symbolic but Hollow Victory in U.S. District Court
21. NPR Fudges the Facts on Border Security
22. DHS Gives Criminal Alien Privacy but Snubs Victim
23. Who Comes First, the Inventor or the Casino Investor?
24. ICE Exercises Prosecutorial Discretion for ID Fraud
25. It's a Sealed Court Document, But if You Cross My Palm with Silver . . .
26. Why Scrap the Per-Country Cap?
27. Amnesty's Impact on Health Resources
28. Obama's Illegal Amnesty Continues
Monday, January 7, 2013
David Cameron: we will keep out EU benefit tourists
Britain will demand new restrictions to keep out benefit tourists under a new relationship with the European Union, David Cameron has said.
The Prime Minister suggested only working immigrants should be allowed into the country, even if it means undermining the EU's key principle of "free movement".
He said there are already some restrictions on immigration across the EU, which could be extended when Britain seeks a new settlement with Brussels over the next few years.
“Should we look at arguments about, should it be harder for people to come and live in Britain and claim benefits? Yes, frankly we should,” he told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show.
There are fears that Britain will see an influx of immigrants from new EU member states within the next year.
Five year old quotas limiting the number of people from Bulgaria and Romania who can move to live in Britain are due to expire.
This will give 29 million Bulgarians and Romanians the right to live and work in Britain, in the same way as immigrants from Poland and other Eastern European countries entered the country from 2004 onwards.
Mr Cameron said stopping European immigrants claiming benefits is just one of a number of areas where Britain will try to re-negotiate its relationship with the EU.
The Prime Minister said he would also like the UK to be exempt from the Working Time Directive, which restricts the number of hours people can work.
“There are lots of things we’d be better off out of," he said. "The working time directive in my view should never have been introduced in the first place because it’s actually affecting things like the way we run our hospitals rather than simply about business and trade and the single market."
He said it is "perfectly acceptable" for Britain to make demands in exchange for other countries negotiating a closer union, despite fears that this will cause resentment within the EU.
Last month, the Prime Minister was chastised by a senior official for trying to pick and choose which EU laws Britain wants to follow.
Cecilia Malmström, EU home affairs commissioner, suggested Mr Cameron should not be trying to claw back 136 powers related to law and order. This is the Prime Minister's first step towards re-negotiating wider powers over areas such as agriculture, justice and employment laws.
This morning, he insisted a looser relationship with Brussels will be possible, as he prepares to give a major speech setting out his vision for Britain's future in the EU.
He is expected to reveal a plan go into the next election promising to give UK voters a referendum on whether to stay in the EU with a new relationship or exit altogether.
If he can persuade Conservatives that Britain already has a better deal from Brussels, it would give him a better chance of persuading many voters to stay in the EU.
However, this will only be possible if other EU countries are willing to co-operate because they want to keep Britain in the union.
Mr Cameron today said Britain is better off staying part of the EU because it must have a "seat at the table" when trading laws are being negotiated.
Asked whether the UK should leave Europe, he said: “I don’t think it would be right for Britain. My policy, my approach is determined absolutely, purely, and simply by the national interest. What is right for Britain? What is right for people in work? What’s right for British business? What’s right for the future of our country?
“Fifty per cent of our trade is with the European Union. At the moment, because we’re in this single market, we have a seat at the table in the single market, we help write those rules. If we were outside the EU altogether, we’d still be trading with these European countries but we’d have no say.”
SOURCE
Funny numbers on immigration
Last Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press," President Obama said that fixing our broken immigration system is one of the top priorities of his second term. He promised to introduce legislation this year to get it done.
No doubt the president felt the need to reiterate this well-worn pledge after two weeks of holiday-related news coverage detailing the impact that his administration's unprecedented deportations have had on immigrant communities across the country. Those news features were kicked off by the Department of Homeland Security's announcement that a record 409,849 individuals were deported in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30.
Those with only a passing interest in the issue might be forgiven for assuming that immigrants who were shown the door were the kind of people who pose a threat to our communities and our nation's security.
Unfortunately, this was not exactly true. And the subtle misrepresentation about the types of people who are being expelled calls into question how these latest statistics will be used to either hammer the president for not doing more to keep illegal immigrants in the country or to again raise the specter that his immigration books are cooked just as compromises on reforms are being negotiated.
Though John Morton, the director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, stated that 55 percent of those deported were convicted of felonies or misdemeanors -- about twice the number of
Advertisement
people in such categories deported in fiscal year 2008 -- the immigrants in question are not overwhelmingly murderers, gang-bangers or drug pushers we'd normally assume them to be.
According to Bryan Johnson, an immigration attorney and blogger in New York, the only reason that ICE is breaking deportation records is because Border Patrol apprehensions are also counted. When these individuals are caught a second time crossing the border, they are then prosecuted for illegal re-entry, a federal felony.
Johnson told me he thinks DHS and the administration "want to make it look like they're prioritizing their efforts, but I think they're intentionally shifting numbers so that they look like they're deporting more and more criminals when in fact they're not -- they're simply destroying more families."
While the distinction may not mean much to those who want to send all illegal immigrants packing, it actually causes two harms. First, it contributes to the incorrect, though popular, belief that simply being present in this country without the proper documentation is a criminal offense -- it's usually only a civil offense, most often for overstaying a visa.
Second, it creates the illusion that limited resources are being spent getting hardened, dangerous criminals out of our communities, when it is not quite the case.
Mary Giovagnoli, director of the Washington, D.C.-based Immigration Policy Center, agrees that whether because of purposeful intent to paint deportation statistics in the best possible light -- or simply because the quirks of government reporting produce un-nuanced, aggregate numbers that don't tell the whole story -- it's important for those interested in our immigration policy to understand what the numbers really mean.
A soon-to-be released report from her organization will detail how these intricacies reflect an increasingly sweeping and punitive U.S. immigration enforcement environment.
"During the course of the Bush and Obama administrations, DHS and ICE have tried to show they're tough on enforcement to try to soften the ground a little bit for eventual immigration reforms," Giovagnoli said in an interview. "But ever since 2005 when Operation Streamline ordered federal criminal charges for every person crossing the border illegally, the system is on auto-pilot to criminalize immigrants, subjecting them to the most vigorous enforcement with few mechanisms for getting out of the system.
"Ironically, these large numbers can be used to say that we're at a tipping point and that the administration should find ways to bring the system back into balance by providing more opportunities for relief."
As immigration returns to the national discourse, President Obama would surely benefit from clearing up rampant misperceptions surrounding his administration's deportation numbers -- and championing policy changes that will ensure that enforcement measures focus on the most serious threats to our nation's safety.
SOURCE
David Cameron: we will keep out EU benefit tourists
Britain will demand new restrictions to keep out benefit tourists under a new relationship with the European Union, David Cameron has said.
The Prime Minister suggested only working immigrants should be allowed into the country, even if it means undermining the EU's key principle of "free movement".
He said there are already some restrictions on immigration across the EU, which could be extended when Britain seeks a new settlement with Brussels over the next few years.
“Should we look at arguments about, should it be harder for people to come and live in Britain and claim benefits? Yes, frankly we should,” he told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show.
There are fears that Britain will see an influx of immigrants from new EU member states within the next year.
Five year old quotas limiting the number of people from Bulgaria and Romania who can move to live in Britain are due to expire.
This will give 29 million Bulgarians and Romanians the right to live and work in Britain, in the same way as immigrants from Poland and other Eastern European countries entered the country from 2004 onwards.
Mr Cameron said stopping European immigrants claiming benefits is just one of a number of areas where Britain will try to re-negotiate its relationship with the EU.
The Prime Minister said he would also like the UK to be exempt from the Working Time Directive, which restricts the number of hours people can work.
“There are lots of things we’d be better off out of," he said. "The working time directive in my view should never have been introduced in the first place because it’s actually affecting things like the way we run our hospitals rather than simply about business and trade and the single market."
He said it is "perfectly acceptable" for Britain to make demands in exchange for other countries negotiating a closer union, despite fears that this will cause resentment within the EU.
Last month, the Prime Minister was chastised by a senior official for trying to pick and choose which EU laws Britain wants to follow.
Cecilia Malmström, EU home affairs commissioner, suggested Mr Cameron should not be trying to claw back 136 powers related to law and order. This is the Prime Minister's first step towards re-negotiating wider powers over areas such as agriculture, justice and employment laws.
This morning, he insisted a looser relationship with Brussels will be possible, as he prepares to give a major speech setting out his vision for Britain's future in the EU.
He is expected to reveal a plan go into the next election promising to give UK voters a referendum on whether to stay in the EU with a new relationship or exit altogether.
If he can persuade Conservatives that Britain already has a better deal from Brussels, it would give him a better chance of persuading many voters to stay in the EU.
However, this will only be possible if other EU countries are willing to co-operate because they want to keep Britain in the union.
Mr Cameron today said Britain is better off staying part of the EU because it must have a "seat at the table" when trading laws are being negotiated.
Asked whether the UK should leave Europe, he said: “I don’t think it would be right for Britain. My policy, my approach is determined absolutely, purely, and simply by the national interest. What is right for Britain? What is right for people in work? What’s right for British business? What’s right for the future of our country?
“Fifty per cent of our trade is with the European Union. At the moment, because we’re in this single market, we have a seat at the table in the single market, we help write those rules. If we were outside the EU altogether, we’d still be trading with these European countries but we’d have no say.”
SOURCE
Funny numbers on immigration
Last Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press," President Obama said that fixing our broken immigration system is one of the top priorities of his second term. He promised to introduce legislation this year to get it done.
No doubt the president felt the need to reiterate this well-worn pledge after two weeks of holiday-related news coverage detailing the impact that his administration's unprecedented deportations have had on immigrant communities across the country. Those news features were kicked off by the Department of Homeland Security's announcement that a record 409,849 individuals were deported in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30.
Those with only a passing interest in the issue might be forgiven for assuming that immigrants who were shown the door were the kind of people who pose a threat to our communities and our nation's security.
Unfortunately, this was not exactly true. And the subtle misrepresentation about the types of people who are being expelled calls into question how these latest statistics will be used to either hammer the president for not doing more to keep illegal immigrants in the country or to again raise the specter that his immigration books are cooked just as compromises on reforms are being negotiated.
Though John Morton, the director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, stated that 55 percent of those deported were convicted of felonies or misdemeanors -- about twice the number of
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people in such categories deported in fiscal year 2008 -- the immigrants in question are not overwhelmingly murderers, gang-bangers or drug pushers we'd normally assume them to be.
According to Bryan Johnson, an immigration attorney and blogger in New York, the only reason that ICE is breaking deportation records is because Border Patrol apprehensions are also counted. When these individuals are caught a second time crossing the border, they are then prosecuted for illegal re-entry, a federal felony.
Johnson told me he thinks DHS and the administration "want to make it look like they're prioritizing their efforts, but I think they're intentionally shifting numbers so that they look like they're deporting more and more criminals when in fact they're not -- they're simply destroying more families."
While the distinction may not mean much to those who want to send all illegal immigrants packing, it actually causes two harms. First, it contributes to the incorrect, though popular, belief that simply being present in this country without the proper documentation is a criminal offense -- it's usually only a civil offense, most often for overstaying a visa.
Second, it creates the illusion that limited resources are being spent getting hardened, dangerous criminals out of our communities, when it is not quite the case.
Mary Giovagnoli, director of the Washington, D.C.-based Immigration Policy Center, agrees that whether because of purposeful intent to paint deportation statistics in the best possible light -- or simply because the quirks of government reporting produce un-nuanced, aggregate numbers that don't tell the whole story -- it's important for those interested in our immigration policy to understand what the numbers really mean.
A soon-to-be released report from her organization will detail how these intricacies reflect an increasingly sweeping and punitive U.S. immigration enforcement environment.
"During the course of the Bush and Obama administrations, DHS and ICE have tried to show they're tough on enforcement to try to soften the ground a little bit for eventual immigration reforms," Giovagnoli said in an interview. "But ever since 2005 when Operation Streamline ordered federal criminal charges for every person crossing the border illegally, the system is on auto-pilot to criminalize immigrants, subjecting them to the most vigorous enforcement with few mechanisms for getting out of the system.
"Ironically, these large numbers can be used to say that we're at a tipping point and that the administration should find ways to bring the system back into balance by providing more opportunities for relief."
As immigration returns to the national discourse, President Obama would surely benefit from clearing up rampant misperceptions surrounding his administration's deportation numbers -- and championing policy changes that will ensure that enforcement measures focus on the most serious threats to our nation's safety.
SOURCE
Sunday, January 6, 2013
Birth tourism
In suburbs of L.A., a cottage industry of birth tourism: Companies operating 'maternity hotels' cater to pregnant women from Chinese-speaking nations who want an American-citizen newborn
USA Baby Care's website makes no attempt to hide why the company's clients travel to Southern California from China and Taiwan. It's to give birth to an American baby.
"Congratulations! Arriving in the U.S. means you've already given your child a surefire ticket for winning the race," the site says in Chinese. "We guarantee that each baby can obtain a U.S. passport and related documents."
That passport is just the beginning of a journey that will lead some of the children back to the United States to take advantage of free public schools and low-interest student loans, as the website notes. The whole family may eventually get in on the act, since parents may be able to piggyback on the child's citizenship and apply for a green card when the child turns 21.
USA Baby Care is one of scores, possibly hundreds, of companies operating so-called maternity hotels tucked away in residential neighborhoods in the San Gabriel Valley, Orange County and other Southern California suburbs. Pregnant women from Chinese-speaking countries pay as much as $20,000 to stay in the facilities during the final months of pregnancy, then spend an additional month recuperating and awaiting the new baby's U.S. passport.
Many of the hotels operate in violation of zoning laws, their locations known mainly to neighbors who observe the expectant mothers' frequent comings and goings.
Such was the case in Chino Hills, where residents recently protested an alleged maternity hotel operating in a hilltop mansion. City officials have sued the property owner, claiming that the seven-bedroom house was illegally subdivided with 17 bedrooms and 17 bathrooms, with at least 10 mothers and babies living there. San Gabriel officials shut down a similar facility in 2011, and Chino Hills officials hope their lawsuit will result in a similar outcome.
Critics also cite safety concerns surrounding the largely unregulated industry. A local attorney says he is representing a maternity hotel in a case where a baby was dropped and died. The California Department of Public Health also is investigating a case that may involve maternity hotels, said a spokesman who said he could not provide further details.
Federal immigration authorities say no law prevents pregnant women from entering the country. The women typically travel on tourist visas and return home with their newborns, who will have the option of coming to the U.S. for schooling, sometimes while the parents remain in Asia. American citizenship is also considered a hedge against corruption and political instability in the children's home countries. For some, giving birth in the U.S. staves off hefty fines under China's one-child policy.
Maternity hotels have proliferated in the last decade as mainland China's new middle class tries to give its offspring every advantage. But birth tourism is not limited to Chinese and Taiwanese nationals. South Korean and Turkish mothers are also reported to pay thousands of dollars for package deals that include hotel rooms and assistance with the visa process.
Since the publicity surrounding the Chino Hills case, Los Angeles County officials have received at least two dozen complaints, mostly regarding sites in Rowland Heights and Hacienda Heights. Curt Hagman, a Republican assemblyman from Chino Hills, said he is looking into whether state government can play a role in addressing the issue.
Because of the increased scrutiny, some maternity tourism businesses are setting up shop in standard hotels, booking long-term stays for clients, according to Scott Wang, manager of China operations for USA Baby Care. Others are opting for apartment complexes, where zoning codes are more flexible and rents are cheap enough to serve a larger number of clients.
Until a few months ago, USA Baby Care was located on a Hacienda Heights cul-de-sac, in a large two-story house with a swimming pool. Now, it operates out of a hotel in Rowland Heights.
"We really want to make this industry legal," Wang said. "There's a demand for these birthing centers, so we should find a way to make them legal. Not a single one of us wants to operate by sneaking around."
The road to giving birth in the U.S. begins with an in-person interview at an American consulate in the woman's home country. Neither pregnancy nor the intent to give birth in the U.S. are disqualifying factors. The primary concern is making sure the applicant will not remain in the country indefinitely, the State Department said.
Likewise, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol officers do not refuse entry because a woman is coming to give birth.
"Obviously, the only reason it happens at all is because we permit it," said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates reduced immigration. "They're not doing anything illegal. The question for policymakers is, 'Is this a good idea?'"
Maternity hotels nonetheless counsel their clients to be discreet.
Women should arrive in the U.S. about six months into their pregnancies, advises the website of a Monterey Park facility, Chico On The Child Care. For petite women who show their pregnancy more easily, four months is recommended. In the winter, when heavier clothing is the norm, the arrival timing can be extended to seven months.
It's considered best for the women to conceal their pregnancies as much as possible, just to be safe.
"When you get on the plane, please wear appropriate clothing to get through customs," the website says in Chinese.
SOURCE
San Francisco: Have no license, will travel
Unlicensed drivers are nearly three times more likely than licensed drivers to cause a fatal crash in California. Indeed, unlicensed drivers are more likely to cause fatal crashes than drivers who have had their licenses suspended or revoked. So found a new study released by the California Department of Motor Vehicles.
The study recommended "the use of countermeasures, including vehicle impoundment" to save lives.
That's a problem for San Francisco. In 2009, then-Mayor Gavin Newsom said police would allow unlicensed drivers to avoid a 30-day impound if they could find someone with a license to drive away their car in 20 minutes.
Then-Police Chief (now District Attorney) George Gascón told The Chronicle the city wanted to be sensitive to those who "can't get a driver's license because of their immigration status." He later told me that the city also wanted to accommodate others who could not afford driver training - that is, people who might or might not know how to drive safely.
That policy seemed reckless and wrong to me. As the Los Angeles Police Protective League blogged in opposition to a similar L.A. policy, "There are two fundamental reasons why vehicle impounding of unlicensed drivers is smart law enforcement. First, an unlicensed driver willing to ignore the law is, at least temporarily, less likely to further violate this law because he or she will not have access to the impounded vehicle. Second, the cost and inconvenience of recovering an impounded vehicle discourages people without licenses from driving. That is precisely why the state Legislature enacted the 30-day hold law."
Don Rosenberg blames San Francisco's lax attitude for his son Drew's death. In November 2010, an unlicensed driver made a left turn and hit Drew and his motorcycle. Drew Rosenberg died after Roberto Galo backed up over his body.
Five months earlier, San Francisco police had stopped Galo for driving the wrong way on a one-way street and driving without a license. The city impounded Galo's car but released it to a licensed driver the next day. Galo was driving that car in the fatal crash.
"In no circumstance does the Police Department allow either a person without a driver's license or a person with a suspended license to maintain control of a vehicle," Chief Greg Suhr told me. Technically true, but City Hall policy invites them get their cars back.
Advocates for illegal immigration have argued that the answer is to allow illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses. Would that make a difference? Galo was a legal immigrant. He could have obtained a license, but he didn't. (The study noted that the "over-involvement rate" of unlicensed drivers didn't change after a 1994 state law required documentation of legal status; the rate should have fallen if safe drivers were denied licenses.)
"Everybody has to obey the rules of the road," Rosenberg said - unless you're an unlicensed driver in San Francisco.
City government goes out of its way to get people out of their cars. Parking is scarce and pricey. Good San Franciscans are urged to take public transit - unless they're unlicensed and nearly three times as likely to kill someone in a car crash. Then City Hall wants them to have a car.
SOURCE
Birth tourism
In suburbs of L.A., a cottage industry of birth tourism: Companies operating 'maternity hotels' cater to pregnant women from Chinese-speaking nations who want an American-citizen newborn
USA Baby Care's website makes no attempt to hide why the company's clients travel to Southern California from China and Taiwan. It's to give birth to an American baby.
"Congratulations! Arriving in the U.S. means you've already given your child a surefire ticket for winning the race," the site says in Chinese. "We guarantee that each baby can obtain a U.S. passport and related documents."
That passport is just the beginning of a journey that will lead some of the children back to the United States to take advantage of free public schools and low-interest student loans, as the website notes. The whole family may eventually get in on the act, since parents may be able to piggyback on the child's citizenship and apply for a green card when the child turns 21.
USA Baby Care is one of scores, possibly hundreds, of companies operating so-called maternity hotels tucked away in residential neighborhoods in the San Gabriel Valley, Orange County and other Southern California suburbs. Pregnant women from Chinese-speaking countries pay as much as $20,000 to stay in the facilities during the final months of pregnancy, then spend an additional month recuperating and awaiting the new baby's U.S. passport.
Many of the hotels operate in violation of zoning laws, their locations known mainly to neighbors who observe the expectant mothers' frequent comings and goings.
Such was the case in Chino Hills, where residents recently protested an alleged maternity hotel operating in a hilltop mansion. City officials have sued the property owner, claiming that the seven-bedroom house was illegally subdivided with 17 bedrooms and 17 bathrooms, with at least 10 mothers and babies living there. San Gabriel officials shut down a similar facility in 2011, and Chino Hills officials hope their lawsuit will result in a similar outcome.
Critics also cite safety concerns surrounding the largely unregulated industry. A local attorney says he is representing a maternity hotel in a case where a baby was dropped and died. The California Department of Public Health also is investigating a case that may involve maternity hotels, said a spokesman who said he could not provide further details.
Federal immigration authorities say no law prevents pregnant women from entering the country. The women typically travel on tourist visas and return home with their newborns, who will have the option of coming to the U.S. for schooling, sometimes while the parents remain in Asia. American citizenship is also considered a hedge against corruption and political instability in the children's home countries. For some, giving birth in the U.S. staves off hefty fines under China's one-child policy.
Maternity hotels have proliferated in the last decade as mainland China's new middle class tries to give its offspring every advantage. But birth tourism is not limited to Chinese and Taiwanese nationals. South Korean and Turkish mothers are also reported to pay thousands of dollars for package deals that include hotel rooms and assistance with the visa process.
Since the publicity surrounding the Chino Hills case, Los Angeles County officials have received at least two dozen complaints, mostly regarding sites in Rowland Heights and Hacienda Heights. Curt Hagman, a Republican assemblyman from Chino Hills, said he is looking into whether state government can play a role in addressing the issue.
Because of the increased scrutiny, some maternity tourism businesses are setting up shop in standard hotels, booking long-term stays for clients, according to Scott Wang, manager of China operations for USA Baby Care. Others are opting for apartment complexes, where zoning codes are more flexible and rents are cheap enough to serve a larger number of clients.
Until a few months ago, USA Baby Care was located on a Hacienda Heights cul-de-sac, in a large two-story house with a swimming pool. Now, it operates out of a hotel in Rowland Heights.
"We really want to make this industry legal," Wang said. "There's a demand for these birthing centers, so we should find a way to make them legal. Not a single one of us wants to operate by sneaking around."
The road to giving birth in the U.S. begins with an in-person interview at an American consulate in the woman's home country. Neither pregnancy nor the intent to give birth in the U.S. are disqualifying factors. The primary concern is making sure the applicant will not remain in the country indefinitely, the State Department said.
Likewise, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol officers do not refuse entry because a woman is coming to give birth.
"Obviously, the only reason it happens at all is because we permit it," said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates reduced immigration. "They're not doing anything illegal. The question for policymakers is, 'Is this a good idea?'"
Maternity hotels nonetheless counsel their clients to be discreet.
Women should arrive in the U.S. about six months into their pregnancies, advises the website of a Monterey Park facility, Chico On The Child Care. For petite women who show their pregnancy more easily, four months is recommended. In the winter, when heavier clothing is the norm, the arrival timing can be extended to seven months.
It's considered best for the women to conceal their pregnancies as much as possible, just to be safe.
"When you get on the plane, please wear appropriate clothing to get through customs," the website says in Chinese.
SOURCE
San Francisco: Have no license, will travel
Unlicensed drivers are nearly three times more likely than licensed drivers to cause a fatal crash in California. Indeed, unlicensed drivers are more likely to cause fatal crashes than drivers who have had their licenses suspended or revoked. So found a new study released by the California Department of Motor Vehicles.
The study recommended "the use of countermeasures, including vehicle impoundment" to save lives.
That's a problem for San Francisco. In 2009, then-Mayor Gavin Newsom said police would allow unlicensed drivers to avoid a 30-day impound if they could find someone with a license to drive away their car in 20 minutes.
Then-Police Chief (now District Attorney) George Gascón told The Chronicle the city wanted to be sensitive to those who "can't get a driver's license because of their immigration status." He later told me that the city also wanted to accommodate others who could not afford driver training - that is, people who might or might not know how to drive safely.
That policy seemed reckless and wrong to me. As the Los Angeles Police Protective League blogged in opposition to a similar L.A. policy, "There are two fundamental reasons why vehicle impounding of unlicensed drivers is smart law enforcement. First, an unlicensed driver willing to ignore the law is, at least temporarily, less likely to further violate this law because he or she will not have access to the impounded vehicle. Second, the cost and inconvenience of recovering an impounded vehicle discourages people without licenses from driving. That is precisely why the state Legislature enacted the 30-day hold law."
Don Rosenberg blames San Francisco's lax attitude for his son Drew's death. In November 2010, an unlicensed driver made a left turn and hit Drew and his motorcycle. Drew Rosenberg died after Roberto Galo backed up over his body.
Five months earlier, San Francisco police had stopped Galo for driving the wrong way on a one-way street and driving without a license. The city impounded Galo's car but released it to a licensed driver the next day. Galo was driving that car in the fatal crash.
"In no circumstance does the Police Department allow either a person without a driver's license or a person with a suspended license to maintain control of a vehicle," Chief Greg Suhr told me. Technically true, but City Hall policy invites them get their cars back.
Advocates for illegal immigration have argued that the answer is to allow illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses. Would that make a difference? Galo was a legal immigrant. He could have obtained a license, but he didn't. (The study noted that the "over-involvement rate" of unlicensed drivers didn't change after a 1994 state law required documentation of legal status; the rate should have fallen if safe drivers were denied licenses.)
"Everybody has to obey the rules of the road," Rosenberg said - unless you're an unlicensed driver in San Francisco.
City government goes out of its way to get people out of their cars. Parking is scarce and pricey. Good San Franciscans are urged to take public transit - unless they're unlicensed and nearly three times as likely to kill someone in a car crash. Then City Hall wants them to have a car.
SOURCE
Friday, January 4, 2013
British councils refuse to reveal number of homes they give to foreigners: Authorities stop giving figures amid worries over impact of immigration
Councils are trying to cover up the number of taxpayer-subsidised homes they are handing to foreigners, it was claimed yesterday.
Local authorities have stopped giving figures for how many houses and flats they have given to foreign citizens amid rising worries over the impacts of immigration, a report said.
Councils in London, where one in five publicly-financed homes are already known to be occupied by foreigners, are among those no longer supplying the figures.
Now MPs have called for an inquiry into the suppression of information on who gets council and housing association homes.
Labour’s Frank Field and Tory Nicholas Soames said in a statement on behalf of the cross-party Balanced Migration group: ‘This is a huge issue for many people.
‘The Government must now launch a full inquiry into what is going on in the allocation of social housing in London.’
The way subsidised homes have been going to foreign citizens and not to families with long-standing local connections has become politically sensitive as immigration hits record levels and the recession has undermined ordinary people’s ability to afford to buy or rent private homes.
Under Tony Blair’s government, senior Labour MPs complained the way in which local families in East London had failed to get public housing while new migrants succeeded had swelled support for the British National Party.
Last year ministers acknowledged that a fifth of the nearly 800,000 publicly-owned homes in London are occupied by families and individuals who are citizens of other countries and not of Britain.
The report from the Migrationwatch think tank said that local authorities in London are now disclosing the nationality of new tenants for fewer than half the homes they let.
Four authorities – Greenwich, Hackney, Lambeth and Newham – have declined to take part in the Government’s count of social housing lettings even though it is a legal requirement for them to do so.
Two more councils, Ealing and Haringey, where there are high numbers of foreign citizens in social housing, have obscured their latest figures by claiming high numbers of tenants refuse to say what their nationality is.
The report said that since waiting lists for social housing are ten times longer than the number of homes made available each year, only a small proportion of families that ask will ever get a house from a council or a housing association.
Migrationwatch added: ‘It is important to be clear that the debate should be about foreign nationals, not people who are foreign born, who should be treated like any other British citizen.’
Its chairman Sir Andrew Green said: ‘It is deeply unsatisfactory that the information on new lets should be so chaotic given the huge importance of this issue to so many families.
The Government must make the nationality question compulsory. This could provide the basis for a renewed debate on the criteria by which social housing should be allocated.’
Coalition ministers have made some changes to social housing allocation rules since 2010, with the aim of giving a greater claim to families with close connections to a local area.
Councils in London let 404,000 houses and flats while state-subsidised housing associations, which do declare the nationality of tenants, have 376,000.
Before the recession Whitehall calculations said that the cost to taxpayers of each socially-owned house or flat was on average £62,000. The figure suggests social housing in London has cost taxpayers almost £50billion.
SOURCE
Australia: Immigration review exposes risk of failure
Chaotic immigration bureaucracies seem to be the norm in most countries
THE crisis-ridden Immigration Department is poorly managed, its workers mistrust each other and its executives' financial illiteracy poses serious risks, an independent review has warned.
The frank report, written by a panel of government and business specialists, also describes a culture of buck-passing, in which few staff take responsibility for problems.
The review of the Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC), overseen by the federal Public Service Commission, found weaknesses in each of the 10 areas it assessed and offered little praise for the leaders of the 10,000-strong workforce.
It warned the department remained at risk of "another high-profile failure" such as the illegal detention of Australian citizens Cornelia Rau and Vivian Solon, which prompted government inquiries in 2005.
Immigration's long-serving secretary, Andrew Metcalfe, left the post late last year to head the Agriculture Department. His replacement, Martin Bowles, said he accepted the findings and agreed there was "significant room for improvement".
"I am confident [the department] will be a better agency for our staff, for our clients and for the government as a result of this capability review."
The review team, led by the former mandarin Ken Matthews, acknowledged Immigration's work was complex and highly contentious compared with other agencies.
However, it found the department failed to plan or innovate effectively because it focused on reacting to crises.
It also said many senior executives believed "risks and issues are 'glossed over' to provide good news stories rather than delivering difficult messages".
The report told of a "heavily risk-averse" culture, in which basic decisions were "routinely escalated because there has been an excessive reliance on the risk-scanning intuition of a small number of senior people".
This "led to a low tolerance for error, with staff believing that their ideas will not be seriously considered by managers", it said.
While the department's mid-level executives were "proficient technical managers", their core management skills were "patchy", the report said.
"Managers, particularly [senior executives], do not always understand their financial management responsibilities, which poses serious risks."
Managers were also often unclear about their responsibilities, saying "they were not always sure who to go to and that 'there are so many fingers in the pie that no one owns the problem'."
The review found some public servants from other agencies had low regard for Immigration's senior executives, saying they were "not always present 'in the forums that matter', are slow to acknowledge risks and impacts on other portfolios, are not always open to ideas when consulting, and do not always represent the department as a whole".
A 2011 survey found 33 per cent of Immigration staff believed recruitment decisions were routinely not based on merit, a higher proportion than the public service average of 25 per cent.
The review said this "perception is discouraging and indicates mistrust among staff members".
Among its recommendations were greater support for managers and involving all staff, rather than a select few, "in the risk-scanning process".
A spokesman for the Immigration Minister, Chris Bowen, said the department had "made it very clear it made a number of changes" in response to the review.
"We're confident it will continue to make those improvements," he said.
SOURCE
British councils refuse to reveal number of homes they give to foreigners: Authorities stop giving figures amid worries over impact of immigration
Councils are trying to cover up the number of taxpayer-subsidised homes they are handing to foreigners, it was claimed yesterday.
Local authorities have stopped giving figures for how many houses and flats they have given to foreign citizens amid rising worries over the impacts of immigration, a report said.
Councils in London, where one in five publicly-financed homes are already known to be occupied by foreigners, are among those no longer supplying the figures.
Now MPs have called for an inquiry into the suppression of information on who gets council and housing association homes.
Labour’s Frank Field and Tory Nicholas Soames said in a statement on behalf of the cross-party Balanced Migration group: ‘This is a huge issue for many people.
‘The Government must now launch a full inquiry into what is going on in the allocation of social housing in London.’
The way subsidised homes have been going to foreign citizens and not to families with long-standing local connections has become politically sensitive as immigration hits record levels and the recession has undermined ordinary people’s ability to afford to buy or rent private homes.
Under Tony Blair’s government, senior Labour MPs complained the way in which local families in East London had failed to get public housing while new migrants succeeded had swelled support for the British National Party.
Last year ministers acknowledged that a fifth of the nearly 800,000 publicly-owned homes in London are occupied by families and individuals who are citizens of other countries and not of Britain.
The report from the Migrationwatch think tank said that local authorities in London are now disclosing the nationality of new tenants for fewer than half the homes they let.
Four authorities – Greenwich, Hackney, Lambeth and Newham – have declined to take part in the Government’s count of social housing lettings even though it is a legal requirement for them to do so.
Two more councils, Ealing and Haringey, where there are high numbers of foreign citizens in social housing, have obscured their latest figures by claiming high numbers of tenants refuse to say what their nationality is.
The report said that since waiting lists for social housing are ten times longer than the number of homes made available each year, only a small proportion of families that ask will ever get a house from a council or a housing association.
Migrationwatch added: ‘It is important to be clear that the debate should be about foreign nationals, not people who are foreign born, who should be treated like any other British citizen.’
Its chairman Sir Andrew Green said: ‘It is deeply unsatisfactory that the information on new lets should be so chaotic given the huge importance of this issue to so many families.
The Government must make the nationality question compulsory. This could provide the basis for a renewed debate on the criteria by which social housing should be allocated.’
Coalition ministers have made some changes to social housing allocation rules since 2010, with the aim of giving a greater claim to families with close connections to a local area.
Councils in London let 404,000 houses and flats while state-subsidised housing associations, which do declare the nationality of tenants, have 376,000.
Before the recession Whitehall calculations said that the cost to taxpayers of each socially-owned house or flat was on average £62,000. The figure suggests social housing in London has cost taxpayers almost £50billion.
SOURCE
Australia: Immigration review exposes risk of failure
Chaotic immigration bureaucracies seem to be the norm in most countries
THE crisis-ridden Immigration Department is poorly managed, its workers mistrust each other and its executives' financial illiteracy poses serious risks, an independent review has warned.
The frank report, written by a panel of government and business specialists, also describes a culture of buck-passing, in which few staff take responsibility for problems.
The review of the Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC), overseen by the federal Public Service Commission, found weaknesses in each of the 10 areas it assessed and offered little praise for the leaders of the 10,000-strong workforce.
It warned the department remained at risk of "another high-profile failure" such as the illegal detention of Australian citizens Cornelia Rau and Vivian Solon, which prompted government inquiries in 2005.
Immigration's long-serving secretary, Andrew Metcalfe, left the post late last year to head the Agriculture Department. His replacement, Martin Bowles, said he accepted the findings and agreed there was "significant room for improvement".
"I am confident [the department] will be a better agency for our staff, for our clients and for the government as a result of this capability review."
The review team, led by the former mandarin Ken Matthews, acknowledged Immigration's work was complex and highly contentious compared with other agencies.
However, it found the department failed to plan or innovate effectively because it focused on reacting to crises.
It also said many senior executives believed "risks and issues are 'glossed over' to provide good news stories rather than delivering difficult messages".
The report told of a "heavily risk-averse" culture, in which basic decisions were "routinely escalated because there has been an excessive reliance on the risk-scanning intuition of a small number of senior people".
This "led to a low tolerance for error, with staff believing that their ideas will not be seriously considered by managers", it said.
While the department's mid-level executives were "proficient technical managers", their core management skills were "patchy", the report said.
"Managers, particularly [senior executives], do not always understand their financial management responsibilities, which poses serious risks."
Managers were also often unclear about their responsibilities, saying "they were not always sure who to go to and that 'there are so many fingers in the pie that no one owns the problem'."
The review found some public servants from other agencies had low regard for Immigration's senior executives, saying they were "not always present 'in the forums that matter', are slow to acknowledge risks and impacts on other portfolios, are not always open to ideas when consulting, and do not always represent the department as a whole".
A 2011 survey found 33 per cent of Immigration staff believed recruitment decisions were routinely not based on merit, a higher proportion than the public service average of 25 per cent.
The review said this "perception is discouraging and indicates mistrust among staff members".
Among its recommendations were greater support for managers and involving all staff, rather than a select few, "in the risk-scanning process".
A spokesman for the Immigration Minister, Chris Bowen, said the department had "made it very clear it made a number of changes" in response to the review.
"We're confident it will continue to make those improvements," he said.
SOURCE
Thursday, January 3, 2013
Israeli border fence halts migrant flood from Egypt
The number of migrants crossing the border between Egypt and Israel dropped to zero last week for the first time since 2006, as construction of the last small sections of a 240-kilometre fence neared completion.
A total of 36 migrants crossed into Israel from Egypt in December, all of whom were detained, compared with 2295 in January last year. The numbers steadily declined throughout last year as construction of the vast steel fence through the desert from Eilat to the border with Gaza progressed.
"We have succeeded in blocking the phenomenon of illegal infiltrators," the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said.
"It has been several months now that no infiltrator has reached [the Israeli cities of] Eilat, Be'er Sheva, Tel Aviv or any Israeli community."
Israel was repatriating migrants to their countries of origin, he said.
"For several months now hundreds of infiltrators have been leaving here … and thousands will soon do so every month until the tens of thousands of people who are here illegally return to their countries of origin."
More than 9000 migrants were deported in 2012, including almost 4000 from African countries.
Critics of the deportation policy said many migrants faced extreme danger in their home countries.
"There is no doubt the fence is working as a deterrent," said Sigal Rosen, of the Hotline for Migrant Workers.
But she added that Israel's policy of preventing refugees crossing the fence, which was built on Israeli territory, was illegal under international law.
"If a person is asking for asylum, a country has a duty to check their request," Ms Rosen said.
The fence along the southern border was estimated to have cost about 1.4 billion shekels ($360 million).
Israel now has physical barriers along all its land borders apart from one section abutting Jordan, from Eilat to the Dead Sea. Plans to erect a fence along that border are under discussion.
Israel accelerated construction of the southern border fence after an attack by militants in August 2011 in which eight Israelis were killed. The aim was to have it finished by the end of last year.
The gaps, which total 12.8 kilometres, are on mountainous terrain near the Red Sea resort of Eilat.
The purpose of the fence was to deter illegal immigration, cross-border militant activity and the smuggling of drugs and weapons.
More than 65,000 migrants, mainly from Eritrea and Sudan, had entered Israel illegally from Egypt since 2006, according to government figures.
A US State Department report on human rights noted that Israel approved one out of 4603 applications for asylum in 2011.
SOURCE
Immigration Enforcement Agency Lacks Interest in Immigration Enforcement
Report Finds Deficient Regulation of Foreign Student Program
A new Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) Backgrounder finds that the agency responsible for overseeing educational institutions hosting foreign students rarely exercises its enforcement authority.
The Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP), a subset of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) within the Department of Homeland Security, oversees nearly 1.2 million foreign students and their dependents, plus close to 7,000 educational institutions. The new report finds that despite a substantial budget and wide regulatory responsibility, SEVP rarely rejects an institution’s application for the authority to issue the Form I-20, the document allowing a potential foreign student to secure a visa from an American consulate abroad. Even more worrisome, the agency averages a mere 2.2 indictments a year of "visa mills", groups posing as bona fide educational institutions but which exist mainly to collect "tuition" in exchange for visas.
The report is online here.
Report author David North, a CIS fellow and respected immigration policy researcher, comments, “It is incredible that after the would-be Wall Street bomber, the Times Square bomber, and the two 9/11 pilots were all found to have student visas, the Department of Homeland Security makes so little effort to pursue corrupt visa mills, flight schools not authorized by the Federal Aviation Administration, and needless language schools. National security requires the enforcement of our immigration laws.”
The Backgrounder describes the assessment process: “There is no direct governmental screening of the I-20s within the United States; it is up to the consular or the USCIS officers to determine if the alien is eligible for the visa or adjustment. Nor is there any routine face-to-face contact between the SEVP and foreign students after their arrival in the United States.”
The SEVP, staffed by 750 workers and armed with $120 million in fee revenue, has ignored Congress’ mandate to recertify all of its institutions every two years. As of March 2012, the agency had only recertified 19 percent. Since one out of eight institutions approved for the issuance of I-20s has no accreditation, recertification is of particular importance. Mr. North notes, “Limited resources, the agency’s excuse for not seeking or challenging fraud, is not credible with a 2012 end of the year cash balance of 135.2 million.”
The above is a press release from from Center for Immigration Studies. 1522 K St. NW, Suite 820, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 466-8185 fax: (202) 466-8076. Email: center@cis.org. The Center for Immigration Studies is an independent research institution which examines the impact of immigration on the United States. The Center for Immigration Studies is not affiliated with any other organization
Israeli border fence halts migrant flood from Egypt
The number of migrants crossing the border between Egypt and Israel dropped to zero last week for the first time since 2006, as construction of the last small sections of a 240-kilometre fence neared completion.
A total of 36 migrants crossed into Israel from Egypt in December, all of whom were detained, compared with 2295 in January last year. The numbers steadily declined throughout last year as construction of the vast steel fence through the desert from Eilat to the border with Gaza progressed.
"We have succeeded in blocking the phenomenon of illegal infiltrators," the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said.
"It has been several months now that no infiltrator has reached [the Israeli cities of] Eilat, Be'er Sheva, Tel Aviv or any Israeli community."
Israel was repatriating migrants to their countries of origin, he said.
"For several months now hundreds of infiltrators have been leaving here … and thousands will soon do so every month until the tens of thousands of people who are here illegally return to their countries of origin."
More than 9000 migrants were deported in 2012, including almost 4000 from African countries.
Critics of the deportation policy said many migrants faced extreme danger in their home countries.
"There is no doubt the fence is working as a deterrent," said Sigal Rosen, of the Hotline for Migrant Workers.
But she added that Israel's policy of preventing refugees crossing the fence, which was built on Israeli territory, was illegal under international law.
"If a person is asking for asylum, a country has a duty to check their request," Ms Rosen said.
The fence along the southern border was estimated to have cost about 1.4 billion shekels ($360 million).
Israel now has physical barriers along all its land borders apart from one section abutting Jordan, from Eilat to the Dead Sea. Plans to erect a fence along that border are under discussion.
Israel accelerated construction of the southern border fence after an attack by militants in August 2011 in which eight Israelis were killed. The aim was to have it finished by the end of last year.
The gaps, which total 12.8 kilometres, are on mountainous terrain near the Red Sea resort of Eilat.
The purpose of the fence was to deter illegal immigration, cross-border militant activity and the smuggling of drugs and weapons.
More than 65,000 migrants, mainly from Eritrea and Sudan, had entered Israel illegally from Egypt since 2006, according to government figures.
A US State Department report on human rights noted that Israel approved one out of 4603 applications for asylum in 2011.
SOURCE
Immigration Enforcement Agency Lacks Interest in Immigration Enforcement
Report Finds Deficient Regulation of Foreign Student Program
A new Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) Backgrounder finds that the agency responsible for overseeing educational institutions hosting foreign students rarely exercises its enforcement authority.
The Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP), a subset of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) within the Department of Homeland Security, oversees nearly 1.2 million foreign students and their dependents, plus close to 7,000 educational institutions. The new report finds that despite a substantial budget and wide regulatory responsibility, SEVP rarely rejects an institution’s application for the authority to issue the Form I-20, the document allowing a potential foreign student to secure a visa from an American consulate abroad. Even more worrisome, the agency averages a mere 2.2 indictments a year of "visa mills", groups posing as bona fide educational institutions but which exist mainly to collect "tuition" in exchange for visas.
The report is online here.
Report author David North, a CIS fellow and respected immigration policy researcher, comments, “It is incredible that after the would-be Wall Street bomber, the Times Square bomber, and the two 9/11 pilots were all found to have student visas, the Department of Homeland Security makes so little effort to pursue corrupt visa mills, flight schools not authorized by the Federal Aviation Administration, and needless language schools. National security requires the enforcement of our immigration laws.”
The Backgrounder describes the assessment process: “There is no direct governmental screening of the I-20s within the United States; it is up to the consular or the USCIS officers to determine if the alien is eligible for the visa or adjustment. Nor is there any routine face-to-face contact between the SEVP and foreign students after their arrival in the United States.”
The SEVP, staffed by 750 workers and armed with $120 million in fee revenue, has ignored Congress’ mandate to recertify all of its institutions every two years. As of March 2012, the agency had only recertified 19 percent. Since one out of eight institutions approved for the issuance of I-20s has no accreditation, recertification is of particular importance. Mr. North notes, “Limited resources, the agency’s excuse for not seeking or challenging fraud, is not credible with a 2012 end of the year cash balance of 135.2 million.”
The above is a press release from from Center for Immigration Studies. 1522 K St. NW, Suite 820, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 466-8185 fax: (202) 466-8076. Email: center@cis.org. The Center for Immigration Studies is an independent research institution which examines the impact of immigration on the United States. The Center for Immigration Studies is not affiliated with any other organization
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Immigrant removals from Northwest keep dropping
The number of illegal immigrants in the Pacific Northwest removed from the country has fallen dramatically over the past couple of years, according to new numbers from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
They show that 6,733 immigrants were removed in fiscal year 2012 from Washington, Oregon and Alaska, compared with a recent high of more than 10,800 immigrants expelled in 2010.
The 2012 numbers also show that for the first time in five years, the number of illegal immigrants with criminal records declined. The data show that 4,557 of such immigrants were removed in 2012, compared with 5,272 the previous year.
A fiscal year runs from September to October. These removals also include voluntary departures, which is when an illegal immigrant chooses to leave the country on their own.
In recent years, ICE has made removing illegal immigrants with criminal records one of its top priorities. Nationally, the total number of removals stood at nearly 410,000, with nearly 70 percent of those with criminal records.
The decline of removals from the Pacific Northwest can be attributed to fewer people being transferred from out of state to the Tacoma Detention Center, where some immigrants are processed and held before removal, the agency said in a statement.
The agency also said another factor contributing to the drop in numbers is the increase of immigration cases of people who are not detained at Tacoma. In general, those cases tend to take longer, even years, to work through the immigration court system.
For Rich Stolz, executive director of OneAmerica, a Seattle-based immigrant advocacy group, the drop in local numbers is nothing to cheer about.
"I don't view this as a big victory in the total scheme of things, those numbers appear to have just been moved to other jurisdictions," he said, adding that the more 225,000 immigrants removed without a criminal record nationally "reflects hundreds of thousands of families being torn apart."
Stolz said immigrant advocates continue to be troubled by ICE's definition of crimes counted toward its tally of illegal immigrants with criminal records removed. He said people who commit traffic violations can be caught in the dragnet of programs ICE employs with local jurisdictions, such as one called Secure Communities.
Meanwhile, on the day removal numbers were released, ICE director John Morton announced a new policy on when agents should hold in custody immigrants suspected of being in the country illegally. The policy reinforces ICE's priority of going after people with criminal records and brings its detainment policy in line with prosecutorial guidelines released in 2010.
"The new detainer policy further illustrates the Obama Administration's refusal to enforce immigration law as written by Congress, opting only to enforce the law against aliens deemed a 'priority,'" argued the Federal for Immigration Reform, a group that pushes for stricter immigration rules.
Stolz said the new detainment policy is positive step.
"Hopefully, it'll have an impact on the overall numbers of deportations in the future, such as folks pulled over for a broken tail light," he said. "However, the change does not address the fundamental problems created by enlisting local law enforcement in federal immigration enforcement activities, including concerns over racial profiling, undermining trust in law enforcement."
SOURCE
More immigration = fewer American jobs
The Los Angeles Times, California’s most widely read daily newspaper, rarely publishes stories critical of immigration or the resultant population growth that drives the state’s overcrowding.
The Times immigration-avoidance guidelines aren’t written in its manual. But evidence that The Times won’t deal with immigration’s negatives, clear though they are even to casual observers, is overwhelming.
If Times’ readers want to understand what’s really going on with immigration and population, they have to be well-informed and willing to read between the lines.
In his Dec. 21 story titled More People Moving to the United States, reporter Don Lee laid out the facts: as of July 1, the Census Bureau pegged U.S. population at nearly 314 million, up 2.3 million from last year.
California with 38 million people remains the nation’s most-populated state, 12 million more than second-place Texas.
Even though more residents left California last year than moved in, the state added 375,000 people. The Times correctly attributes this phenomenon to immigration (plus 133,000, a 14 percent increase) and net natural increase which is generally defined as new births minus deaths. The Times didn’t elaborate, but a crucial statistic is that most births are from immigrant mothers, legal and illegal and, eventually, the children born to those recent immigrant mothers.
As always, the Times and its sources interpret increased immigration as good.
The Brookings Institute demographer William Frey analyzed the Census data and concluded that more immigrant arrivals indicate that the job market is strengthening.
The potentially challenging prospect of finding employment no longer, according to Frey, dissuades immigrants.
For employers who want to hire cheap labor, a large immigrant pool to choose from is a wonderful thing.
New legal and illegal immigrants benefit, too. They get much-needed jobs.
Once legal immigrants obtain permanent residency, they receive work authorization and can immediately begin to look for gainful employment. Illegal immigrants either falsify work documents or enter the underground economy.
More often than not, a legal or illegal immigrants’ job search is successful.
The Center for Immigration Studies found that since President Obama took office in 2009, immigrants accounted for 67 percent of employment gains. During the third quarter of 2012, there were 1.94 million more immigrants than in January 2009 compared to a 938,000 increase for natives over the same time period.
Congress and the White House, dating back to President Lyndon Johnson’s 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act and continuing through President Obama’s deferred action program, have imposed demographic and economic changes on unsuspecting and often unwilling Americans.
Journalists should treat American job displacement and immigration-fueled population increases as the decade’s biggest stories. Instead, hardly a word has been written.
History proves that during uncertain economic times, presidents Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Dwight David Eisenhower managed their immigration policies in a manner designed to help Americans.
During the Great Depression, Roosevelt, considered by many to be America’s most liberal president, strictly limited immigration and instead created the Works Progress Administration to benefit struggling citizens. Eisenhower signed the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956, the largest public works project at the time.
Americans have taken a back seat to special Chamber of Commerce and the ethnic identity lobby’s interests. Judging from the way President Obama’s second term is poised to begin — with a promise to pass comprehensive immigration reform — more of the same lies ahead
SOURCE
Immigrant removals from Northwest keep dropping
The number of illegal immigrants in the Pacific Northwest removed from the country has fallen dramatically over the past couple of years, according to new numbers from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
They show that 6,733 immigrants were removed in fiscal year 2012 from Washington, Oregon and Alaska, compared with a recent high of more than 10,800 immigrants expelled in 2010.
The 2012 numbers also show that for the first time in five years, the number of illegal immigrants with criminal records declined. The data show that 4,557 of such immigrants were removed in 2012, compared with 5,272 the previous year.
A fiscal year runs from September to October. These removals also include voluntary departures, which is when an illegal immigrant chooses to leave the country on their own.
In recent years, ICE has made removing illegal immigrants with criminal records one of its top priorities. Nationally, the total number of removals stood at nearly 410,000, with nearly 70 percent of those with criminal records.
The decline of removals from the Pacific Northwest can be attributed to fewer people being transferred from out of state to the Tacoma Detention Center, where some immigrants are processed and held before removal, the agency said in a statement.
The agency also said another factor contributing to the drop in numbers is the increase of immigration cases of people who are not detained at Tacoma. In general, those cases tend to take longer, even years, to work through the immigration court system.
For Rich Stolz, executive director of OneAmerica, a Seattle-based immigrant advocacy group, the drop in local numbers is nothing to cheer about.
"I don't view this as a big victory in the total scheme of things, those numbers appear to have just been moved to other jurisdictions," he said, adding that the more 225,000 immigrants removed without a criminal record nationally "reflects hundreds of thousands of families being torn apart."
Stolz said immigrant advocates continue to be troubled by ICE's definition of crimes counted toward its tally of illegal immigrants with criminal records removed. He said people who commit traffic violations can be caught in the dragnet of programs ICE employs with local jurisdictions, such as one called Secure Communities.
Meanwhile, on the day removal numbers were released, ICE director John Morton announced a new policy on when agents should hold in custody immigrants suspected of being in the country illegally. The policy reinforces ICE's priority of going after people with criminal records and brings its detainment policy in line with prosecutorial guidelines released in 2010.
"The new detainer policy further illustrates the Obama Administration's refusal to enforce immigration law as written by Congress, opting only to enforce the law against aliens deemed a 'priority,'" argued the Federal for Immigration Reform, a group that pushes for stricter immigration rules.
Stolz said the new detainment policy is positive step.
"Hopefully, it'll have an impact on the overall numbers of deportations in the future, such as folks pulled over for a broken tail light," he said. "However, the change does not address the fundamental problems created by enlisting local law enforcement in federal immigration enforcement activities, including concerns over racial profiling, undermining trust in law enforcement."
SOURCE
More immigration = fewer American jobs
The Los Angeles Times, California’s most widely read daily newspaper, rarely publishes stories critical of immigration or the resultant population growth that drives the state’s overcrowding.
The Times immigration-avoidance guidelines aren’t written in its manual. But evidence that The Times won’t deal with immigration’s negatives, clear though they are even to casual observers, is overwhelming.
If Times’ readers want to understand what’s really going on with immigration and population, they have to be well-informed and willing to read between the lines.
In his Dec. 21 story titled More People Moving to the United States, reporter Don Lee laid out the facts: as of July 1, the Census Bureau pegged U.S. population at nearly 314 million, up 2.3 million from last year.
California with 38 million people remains the nation’s most-populated state, 12 million more than second-place Texas.
Even though more residents left California last year than moved in, the state added 375,000 people. The Times correctly attributes this phenomenon to immigration (plus 133,000, a 14 percent increase) and net natural increase which is generally defined as new births minus deaths. The Times didn’t elaborate, but a crucial statistic is that most births are from immigrant mothers, legal and illegal and, eventually, the children born to those recent immigrant mothers.
As always, the Times and its sources interpret increased immigration as good.
The Brookings Institute demographer William Frey analyzed the Census data and concluded that more immigrant arrivals indicate that the job market is strengthening.
The potentially challenging prospect of finding employment no longer, according to Frey, dissuades immigrants.
For employers who want to hire cheap labor, a large immigrant pool to choose from is a wonderful thing.
New legal and illegal immigrants benefit, too. They get much-needed jobs.
Once legal immigrants obtain permanent residency, they receive work authorization and can immediately begin to look for gainful employment. Illegal immigrants either falsify work documents or enter the underground economy.
More often than not, a legal or illegal immigrants’ job search is successful.
The Center for Immigration Studies found that since President Obama took office in 2009, immigrants accounted for 67 percent of employment gains. During the third quarter of 2012, there were 1.94 million more immigrants than in January 2009 compared to a 938,000 increase for natives over the same time period.
Congress and the White House, dating back to President Lyndon Johnson’s 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act and continuing through President Obama’s deferred action program, have imposed demographic and economic changes on unsuspecting and often unwilling Americans.
Journalists should treat American job displacement and immigration-fueled population increases as the decade’s biggest stories. Instead, hardly a word has been written.
History proves that during uncertain economic times, presidents Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Dwight David Eisenhower managed their immigration policies in a manner designed to help Americans.
During the Great Depression, Roosevelt, considered by many to be America’s most liberal president, strictly limited immigration and instead created the Works Progress Administration to benefit struggling citizens. Eisenhower signed the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956, the largest public works project at the time.
Americans have taken a back seat to special Chamber of Commerce and the ethnic identity lobby’s interests. Judging from the way President Obama’s second term is poised to begin — with a promise to pass comprehensive immigration reform — more of the same lies ahead
SOURCE
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
VA: Controversial anti-illegal immigration program to continue in Pr. William jail
Federal immigration officials have notified Prince William County and other localities that they will extend a controversial program that seeks to identify undocumented immigrants once they are booked into local jails, officials said.
The program, which allows local police officers to investigate and detain illegal immigrants serving jail time and hand them over to federal authorities, was set to expire in Prince William at the end of Monday. However, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials notified Prince William late last week that its program, called 287 (g), would be extended in Prince William’s regional jail through at least June 30, said Prince William Board Chairman Corey A. Stewart (R-At Large).
However, area task forces on the street who investigate the presence of undocumented immigrants will no longer be able to operate under the agreement, ICE officials said. The jail program will allow the 39 local jails nationwide who have similar agreements to detain all those arrested and booked if they are found to be in the country illegally.
“I don’t give credit to the Obama administration often but you have to give credit where credit is due,” said Stewart, who was pleased with the decision. “They should be complemented for that. … We have received no complaints from the federal government with regard to how we’re implementing it. They see it as a model program and it’s a success story.”
Dani Bennett, an ICE spokeswoman, said in a statement that maintaining the jail agreements is part of “smart and effective immigration enforcement.”
Prince William officials say they have detained more than 5,500 illegal immigrants since the program began in 2007. However, whether federal officials actually deport those detained has remained a sticking point — the county has sued the federal government seeking more information on how many of those detained are actually deported.
Critics have said the 287 (g) program seeks to deport those guilty of less serious crimes — a strain on state and federal resources — as well as encourages racial profiling.
SOURCE
New Immigration Battle: Driver's Licenses
In a sign of growing opposition to President Obama's immigration policy, Iowa has become the latest state to deny driver's licenses to young illegal immigrants who receive deferments from deportation.
Iowa joins Michigan, Nebraska and Arizona in denying licenses or non-operator identification cards because, officials say, Obama's deferred action program doesn't grant legal status in the United States. Officials in each state cite laws restricting the licenses to foreigners who reside here legally.
The program, which began in August, offers a renewable two-year reprieve for qualified young people who were brought to the United States as children. Recipients also gain permission to work here legally. So far, more than 355,000 applicants have been accepted and nearly 103,000 have been approved, according to the latest government figures.
Iowa's Department of Transportation Director Paul Trombino III said in a statement:
"The Iowa DOT understands the exercising of this prosecutorial discretion by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security does not grant lawful status or a lawful immigration path to persons granted Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals status. Rather, it is prosecutorial discretion extended in a blanket fashion to persons who are not lawfully authorized to be present in the United States."
Republicans have criticized the program as backdoor amnesty designed to boost Latino support for Obama. The four states denying licenses are led by Republican governors. One of them, Nebraska's Dave Heineman, has pledged to deny not only licenses, but welfare benefits and other services to illegal immigrants, unless required by state law.
Washington and New Mexico are among states that issue driver's licenses to illegal immigrants, although New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez, who is a Republican, wants her state's enabling law repealed. Illinois could be next to issue licenses after the state Senate recently approved a bill.
At issue is whether the federal program's authorization to stay and work here legally also confers temporary legalized status.
Iowa officials cite the memorandum issued by Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano that outlines the new policy: "This memorandum confers no substantive right, immigration status or pathway to citizenship."
Immigrant advocates say people in deferred action status qualify for licenses under the 2005 Real ID Act, which they have used to file lawsuits to overturn the bans in Arizona and Michigan.
The Real ID law, an anti-terrorism measure aimed at creating a national driver's license system, lists people in deferred action status among the authorized noncitizens who are eligible to obtain a temporary license.
Immigrant advocates also say the states are encroaching on the federal government's authority to set immigration policy, a separation reinforced by the Supreme Court ruling this year that severely weakened Arizona's immigration enforcement law.
"Deferred action has existed for decades and decades. It is a form of lawful presence, just like other forms of administrative relief under our immigration laws," says Thomas Saenz, president and general counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which is one of the groups suing in Arizona.
"There's really no legal or constitutional support for what these states are doing," says Saenz. "Suggesting that they are not here lawfully is a rhetorical political move that a number of these states are engaging in."
SOURCE
Postings from Brisbane, Australia by John Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.) -- former member of the Australia-Soviet Friendship Society, former anarcho-capitalist and former member of the British Conservative party.
The "line" of this blog is that immigration should be SELECTIVE. That means that:
1). A national government should be in control of it. The U.S. and U.K. governments are not but the Australian government has shown that the government of a prosperous Western country can be. Up until its loss of office in 2007, the conservative Howard government had all but eliminated illegal immigration. The present Leftist government has however restarted the flow of illegals by repealing many of the Howard government regulations.
2). Selectivity should be based on "the content of a man's character, not on the color of his skin", as MLK said. To expand that a little: Immigrants should only be accepted if they as individuals seem likely to make a positive net contribution to the country. Many "refugees" would fail that test: Muslims and Africans particularly. Educational level should usually be a pretty fair proxy for the individual's likely value to the receiving country. There will, of course, be exceptions but it is nonetheless unlikely that a person who has not successfully completed High School will make a net positive contribution to a modern Western society.
3). Immigrants should be neither barred NOR ACCEPTED solely because they are of some particular ethnic origin. Blacks are vastly more likely to be criminal than are whites or Chinese, for instance, but some whites and some Chinese are criminal. It is the criminality that should matter, not the race.
4). The above ideas are not particularly blue-sky. They roughly describe the policies of the country where I live -- Australia. I am critical of Australian policy only insofar as the "refugee" category for admission is concerned. All governments have tended to admit as refugees many undesirables. It seems to me that more should be required of them before refugees are admitted -- for instance a higher level of education or a business background.
5). Perhaps the most amusing assertion in the immigration debate is that high-income countries like the USA and Britain NEED illegal immigrants to do low-paid menial work. "Who will pick our crops?" (etc.) is the cry. How odd it is then that Australians get all the normal services of a modern economy WITHOUT illegal immigrants! Yes: You usually CAN buy a lettuce in Australia for a dollar or thereabouts. And Australia IS a major exporter of primary products.
6). I am a libertarian conservative so I reject the "open door" policy favoured by many libertarians and many Leftists. Both those groups tend to have a love of simplistic generalizations that fail to deal with the complexity of the real world. It seems to me that if a person has the right to say whom he/she will have living with him/her in his/her own house, so a nation has the right to admit to living among them only those individuals whom they choose.
I can be reached on jonjayray@hotmail.com -- or leave a comment on any post. Abusive comments will be deleted.
VA: Controversial anti-illegal immigration program to continue in Pr. William jail
Federal immigration officials have notified Prince William County and other localities that they will extend a controversial program that seeks to identify undocumented immigrants once they are booked into local jails, officials said.
The program, which allows local police officers to investigate and detain illegal immigrants serving jail time and hand them over to federal authorities, was set to expire in Prince William at the end of Monday. However, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials notified Prince William late last week that its program, called 287 (g), would be extended in Prince William’s regional jail through at least June 30, said Prince William Board Chairman Corey A. Stewart (R-At Large).
However, area task forces on the street who investigate the presence of undocumented immigrants will no longer be able to operate under the agreement, ICE officials said. The jail program will allow the 39 local jails nationwide who have similar agreements to detain all those arrested and booked if they are found to be in the country illegally.
“I don’t give credit to the Obama administration often but you have to give credit where credit is due,” said Stewart, who was pleased with the decision. “They should be complemented for that. … We have received no complaints from the federal government with regard to how we’re implementing it. They see it as a model program and it’s a success story.”
Dani Bennett, an ICE spokeswoman, said in a statement that maintaining the jail agreements is part of “smart and effective immigration enforcement.”
Prince William officials say they have detained more than 5,500 illegal immigrants since the program began in 2007. However, whether federal officials actually deport those detained has remained a sticking point — the county has sued the federal government seeking more information on how many of those detained are actually deported.
Critics have said the 287 (g) program seeks to deport those guilty of less serious crimes — a strain on state and federal resources — as well as encourages racial profiling.
SOURCE
New Immigration Battle: Driver's Licenses
In a sign of growing opposition to President Obama's immigration policy, Iowa has become the latest state to deny driver's licenses to young illegal immigrants who receive deferments from deportation.
Iowa joins Michigan, Nebraska and Arizona in denying licenses or non-operator identification cards because, officials say, Obama's deferred action program doesn't grant legal status in the United States. Officials in each state cite laws restricting the licenses to foreigners who reside here legally.
The program, which began in August, offers a renewable two-year reprieve for qualified young people who were brought to the United States as children. Recipients also gain permission to work here legally. So far, more than 355,000 applicants have been accepted and nearly 103,000 have been approved, according to the latest government figures.
Iowa's Department of Transportation Director Paul Trombino III said in a statement:
"The Iowa DOT understands the exercising of this prosecutorial discretion by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security does not grant lawful status or a lawful immigration path to persons granted Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals status. Rather, it is prosecutorial discretion extended in a blanket fashion to persons who are not lawfully authorized to be present in the United States."
Republicans have criticized the program as backdoor amnesty designed to boost Latino support for Obama. The four states denying licenses are led by Republican governors. One of them, Nebraska's Dave Heineman, has pledged to deny not only licenses, but welfare benefits and other services to illegal immigrants, unless required by state law.
Washington and New Mexico are among states that issue driver's licenses to illegal immigrants, although New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez, who is a Republican, wants her state's enabling law repealed. Illinois could be next to issue licenses after the state Senate recently approved a bill.
At issue is whether the federal program's authorization to stay and work here legally also confers temporary legalized status.
Iowa officials cite the memorandum issued by Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano that outlines the new policy: "This memorandum confers no substantive right, immigration status or pathway to citizenship."
Immigrant advocates say people in deferred action status qualify for licenses under the 2005 Real ID Act, which they have used to file lawsuits to overturn the bans in Arizona and Michigan.
The Real ID law, an anti-terrorism measure aimed at creating a national driver's license system, lists people in deferred action status among the authorized noncitizens who are eligible to obtain a temporary license.
Immigrant advocates also say the states are encroaching on the federal government's authority to set immigration policy, a separation reinforced by the Supreme Court ruling this year that severely weakened Arizona's immigration enforcement law.
"Deferred action has existed for decades and decades. It is a form of lawful presence, just like other forms of administrative relief under our immigration laws," says Thomas Saenz, president and general counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which is one of the groups suing in Arizona.
"There's really no legal or constitutional support for what these states are doing," says Saenz. "Suggesting that they are not here lawfully is a rhetorical political move that a number of these states are engaging in."
SOURCE
Postings from Brisbane, Australia by John Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.) -- former member of the Australia-Soviet Friendship Society, former anarcho-capitalist and former member of the British Conservative party.
The "line" of this blog is that immigration should be SELECTIVE. That means that:
1). A national government should be in control of it. The U.S. and U.K. governments are not but the Australian government has shown that the government of a prosperous Western country can be. Up until its loss of office in 2007, the conservative Howard government had all but eliminated illegal immigration. The present Leftist government has however restarted the flow of illegals by repealing many of the Howard government regulations.
2). Selectivity should be based on "the content of a man's character, not on the color of his skin", as MLK said. To expand that a little: Immigrants should only be accepted if they as individuals seem likely to make a positive net contribution to the country. Many "refugees" would fail that test: Muslims and Africans particularly. Educational level should usually be a pretty fair proxy for the individual's likely value to the receiving country. There will, of course, be exceptions but it is nonetheless unlikely that a person who has not successfully completed High School will make a net positive contribution to a modern Western society.
3). Immigrants should be neither barred NOR ACCEPTED solely because they are of some particular ethnic origin. Blacks are vastly more likely to be criminal than are whites or Chinese, for instance, but some whites and some Chinese are criminal. It is the criminality that should matter, not the race.
4). The above ideas are not particularly blue-sky. They roughly describe the policies of the country where I live -- Australia. I am critical of Australian policy only insofar as the "refugee" category for admission is concerned. All governments have tended to admit as refugees many undesirables. It seems to me that more should be required of them before refugees are admitted -- for instance a higher level of education or a business background.
5). Perhaps the most amusing assertion in the immigration debate is that high-income countries like the USA and Britain NEED illegal immigrants to do low-paid menial work. "Who will pick our crops?" (etc.) is the cry. How odd it is then that Australians get all the normal services of a modern economy WITHOUT illegal immigrants! Yes: You usually CAN buy a lettuce in Australia for a dollar or thereabouts. And Australia IS a major exporter of primary products.
6). I am a libertarian conservative so I reject the "open door" policy favoured by many libertarians and many Leftists. Both those groups tend to have a love of simplistic generalizations that fail to deal with the complexity of the real world. It seems to me that if a person has the right to say whom he/she will have living with him/her in his/her own house, so a nation has the right to admit to living among them only those individuals whom they choose.
I can be reached on jonjayray@hotmail.com -- or leave a comment on any post. Abusive comments will be deleted.