Senators vow to revive immigration bill

NF Reporter · 06-14-2007, 07:56 PM

AP - Senate leaders vowed Thursday night to revive stalled immigration legislation as soon as next week, capping a furious rescue attempt led by President Bush.

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waltky · 09-02-2010, 11:53 AM

Recession indicator...

Report: Illegal Immigration in US Sees Big Drop
(Sept. 2,`10) -- With immigration as a hot-button issue ahead of this year's midterm elections, a new report shows that the number of illegal immigrants to the U.S. fell last year in its first and biggest drop in two decades.

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There were 11.1 million immigrants living in the U.S. illegally in March 2009, down from a peak of 12 million two years earlier, the Pew Hispanic Center said in a report issued Wednesday. From 2007 to 2009, the number of illegals entering the country shrank to about 300,000 per year, down by nearly two-thirds from the estimated 850,000 per year from March 2000 to March 2005. "The decrease represents the first significant reversal in the growth of this population over the past two decades," the report said.

The biggest drop -- 22 percent from 2007 to 2009 -- was in the number of unauthorized immigrants from Latin American countries other than Mexico, it said. And the decline was most apparent along the United States' Southeast coast -- Florida, Virginia, Delaware and Georgia -- as well as in Western mountain states like Nevada, Arizona, Colorado and Utah.

That finding shows that despite Arizona's controversial new immigration law, as well as stepped-up immigration enforcement along America's Southwestern border, there hasn't been a mass exodus of Mexicans fleeing the U.S. for their home country. That's even despite a sour U.S. economy where work opportunities for Mexicans have been fewer than in previous years.

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waltky · 10-03-2010, 01:17 AM

Say what!, don't we have enough gays already???...

Senate Immigration Bill Would Allow U.S. Citizens to Sponsor Same-Sex Partners
Thursday, September 30, 2010 – An immigration bill introduced by Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) on Thursday includes the Uniting American Families Act, which would allow U.S. citizens to sponsor their non-citizen, same-sex partners.

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“Now is the time to reform our nation's cruel and broken immigration system,” Rea Carey, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, said in a press release following the introduction of the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2010. “Today, there are 12 million undocumented immigrants, including at least half a million LGBT people who are forced to live in the shadows of our society.” (LGBT stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender.)

“The Uniting American Families Act is consistent with U.S. immigration law's existing policy of keeping families intact,” Carey said. “These couples and their families have been kept separated or forced to live abroad. It’s unconscionable to ask any American to choose between family and country.” The immigration bill also includes the DREAM Act (Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act), which would allow children of illegal aliens to achieve citizenship through completing two years of college or two years of service in the military.

“The DREAM Act will help ensure brighter and more secure futures for our young people, including countless LGBT youth, by providing them a path to citizenship,” Carey said. “The United States is built on the belief that everyone should get a fair shake to fully participate in civic life, and to be able to build a future in the country they love and call home.”

Senate Immigration Bill Would Allow U.S. Citizens to Sponsor Same-Sex Partners | CNSnews.com

waltky · 03-31-2012, 08:50 PM

Obama makin' detention for illegals another Club Fed...

New Rules Make Detention for Illegal Aliens a 'Holiday on ICE'
March 29, 2012 – The Obama administration’s new manual for detaining illegal aliens “reads more like a hospitality guideline for illegal immigrants,” House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas) said on Wednesday.

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“Under this administration, detention looks more like recess,” Smith told an oversight hearing mockingly entitled “Holiday on ICE.” ICE is the acronym for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency. “While funds for American students’ physical education classes are being cut, the new detention standards expand recreation for illegal immigrants,” Smith said in his opening statement. “For instance, illegal and criminal immigrants in ICE custody will have options such as soccer, volleyball and basketball. It would be nice if all American students got those options.” Smith said federal law enforcement agents should not act be acting as concierges, and he criticized the Obama administration for putting the interests of illegal immigrants ahead of those of American taxpayers.

The new detention standards are intended to improve medical and mental health services; increase access to legal services and religious opportunities; improve communication with detainees who don’t speak English; improve the process for reporting and responding to complaints; and increase recreation and visitation. Earlier this month, ICE opened the $30-million Karnes County Civil Detention Center in Texas, which is the first minimum-security facility built in compliance with the new detention standards. Smith noted that the amenities at Karnes include a library with free Internet access, cable TV, an indoor gym with basketball courts, soccer fields, and sand and nets for beach volleyball. “Instead of guards, unarmed ‘resident advisers’ patrol the grounds,” Smith said – and that’s a problem, a union leader told lawmakers.

‘Unsafe’

“It is the union’s opinion, that if left unchecked, the administration’s actions will defeat many of its own stated goals by creating a more dangerous detention system, resulting in injury to ICE detainees, ICE officers, and contract employees,” said Chris Crane, president of the National ICE Council 118 of the American Federation of Government Employees, in written testimony prepared for Wednesday’s hearing before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration and Policy Enforcement. Crane, who represents thousands of ICE officers, called the new ICE detention standards “unsafe for detainees and unsafe for employees.” He told the hearing that ICE’s new emphasis on arresting the “worst of the worst” has brought “more violent, aggressive and overall dangerous” detainees into ICE facilities. But at the same time, “security protocols within ICE facilities appear to be weakening.”

Under the new rules, a “steep increase” in violence and aggression by detainees against immigration officers as well as escape attempts can be expected, Crane warned. The new detention standards have “been accompanied by no measures to increase safety for ICE officers and contractors,” Crane testified. He added that ICE has not set up a system for ICE employees to report assaults against officers, and as a result, many assaults may go unreported. Crane also said the new standards do not require criminal background screenings of individuals visiting detainees. “In discussion with ICE leadership, ICE stated that it was concerned that aliens attempting to enter ICE facilities would be identified as being in the U.S. illegally during background screenings and would therefore be subject to arrest or otherwise unable to enter the facility,” he explained. “ICE was more concerned with preserving the ability of foreign nationals illegally in the U.S. to enter ICE facilities than (in) the safety of its own officers and the general security of ICE detention facilities and communities nationwide,” he said.

More New Rules Make Detention for Illegal Aliens a 'Holiday on ICE' | CNSNews.com