Badmus

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) recently announced that it has redesigned the Permanent Resident Card—commonly known as the “Green Card”—to incorporate severalmajor new security features. The Green Card redesign is the latest advance in USCIS’s ongoing efforts to deter immigration fraud. State-of-the-art technology incorporated into the new card prevents counterfeiting, obstructs tampering, and facilitates quick and accurate authentication. Beginning today,USCIS will issue all Green Cards in the new, more secure format.

“Redesigning the Green Card is a major achievement for USCIS,” said Director Alejandro Mayorkas. The new security technology makes a critical contribution to the integrity of the immigration system.”

The enhanced features will better serve law enforcement, employers, and immigrants, all of whom look to the Green Card as definitive proof of authorization to live and work in the United States. Among the benefits of the redesign: Secure optical media will store biometrics for rapid and reliable identification of the card holder. Holographic images, laser engraved fingerprints, and high resolution micro-images will make the card nearly impossible to reproduce. Tighter integration of the card design with personalized elements will make it difficult to alter the card if stolen. Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) capability will allow Customs and Border Protection officers at ports of entry to read the card from a distance and compare it immediately to file data. Finally, a preprinted return address will enable the easy return of a lost card to USCIS.

In keeping with the Permanent Resident Card’s nickname, it will now be colored green for easy recognition. USCIS will replace Green Cards already in circulation as individuals apply for renewal or replacement.

Categories: Employment Immigration, Family Immigration, Medical Professionals, Blogroll, General |

From the Immigration Policy Center -

March 18, 2010

Washington D.C. - Today, in the Washington Post, Senators Charles Schumer (D-NY) and Lindsay Graham (R-SC) laid out their blueprint for immigration reform legislation, noting that the American people want Congress to reform the badly broken immigration system. Their framework, welcomed by the President in a statement also released today, rests on four pillars: ending illegal employment through biometric Social Security cards, enhancing border and interior enforcement, managing the flow of future immigration to correspond to economic realities, and creating a tough but fair path toward legalization for the 11 million people currently in the U.S. without authorization. While there will undoubtedly be intense debate over the specifics of each component, the framework marks an important bipartisan step forward on an issue that has been mired in political controversy and held up by both parties for too long.

 ”Today’s statements mark renewed commitment to providing immigration reform that will bolster the economy and provide for America’s future,” said Mary Giovagnoli, Director of the Immigration Policy Center. ”We encourage the President and Senators Schumer and Graham to go beyond words and produce legislation that will finally fix our broken immigration system once and for all.” 
Of critical importance is the recognition that immigration reform can’t be accomplished if we focus on just one aspect of the problem. While many think that immigration reform is only about the millions of unauthorized immigrants currently living in the United States, the scope and necessity of reform is much greater, and will have a significant positive impact on U.S. citizens and businesses. For example, there are insufficient numbers of visas for either high-skilled or less-skilled workers to meet the changing needs of the U.S. economy and labor market, which hurts U.S. business and fuels unauthorized immigration when economic times are good. Outdated and arbitrary visa caps have created long backlogs of family members who wait up to 20 years to be reunited with family living in the United States. Wage and workplace violations by unscrupulous employers who exploit immigrant workers are undercutting honest businesses and harming all U.S. workers. Inadequate government infrastructure is delaying the integration of immigrants who want to become U.S. citizens and fully participate in our civic life.  

The Immigration Policy Center has developed a series of papers which clearly lay out the problems with our broken immigration system, and the solutions which must be included in comprehensive immigration reform legislation. 
To read the papers in the series see:  

• Breaking Down the Problems: What’s Wrong With our Current Immigration System
• Family Immigration: Repairing our Broken Immigration System
• Enforcing Immigration Laws: Repairing our Broken Immigration System
• Naturalization and Integration: Repairing our Broken Immigration System
• Earned Legalization: Repairing our Broken Immigration System
• Employment Verification: Repairing our Broken Immigration System

Categories: Legislation and Policy, Employment Immigration, Employer Compliance, Family Immigration, General |

 The claim that illegal immigrants are “cutting in line” is blathered on talk radio all of the time. But, the truth is, there is no line for most undocumented immigrants. Before throwing your hands up in frustration and defeat when you hear this myth, consider responding with these quick mythbusting facts!

FACT: There is no “line” for the vast majority of undocumented immigrants. Accusations that immigrants in the U.S. illegally — numbering an estimated 12 million, and representing five to six percent of the U.S. workforce — should simply get in line miss the point: There is no line and the “regular channels” do not include them.

FACT: Approximately 500,000 undocumented immigrants enter the U.S. each year — most coming to work and typically to do so in the service sector — yet there are only 5,000 green cards for unskilled workers. Until there are more legal avenues for employers to hire immigrant workers, illegal immigration will fill the gap and we will not gain the control over immigration that the American people demand.

More mythbusting facts on this issue can be found in Why Don’t They Just Get In Line? The Real Story of Getting a “Green Card” and Coming to the U.S. Legally, a report from the Immigration Policy Center

-American Immigration Lawyers Association

Categories: Legislation and Policy, Employment Immigration, Family Immigration, Blogroll, General |

Shortly after a devastating earthquake destroyed the homes and lives of innumerable Haitians, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano announced the designation of Temporary Protective Status (TPS) for the roughly 100,000-200,000 eligible Haiti nationals currently in the United States as of January 12, 2010. As the world continues to respond with an outpouring of relief efforts, it is important to understand the facts on what TPS is, what it isn’t, how it works and who is eligible.

The Immigration Policy Center (IPC) released a fact sheet which provides background information vital to understanding TPS, including:

• Temporary Protected Status (TPS) is a temporary, humanitarian form of relief from deportation that does not include granting permanent residence or “amnesty” to unauthorized immigrants in the United States.
• The 100,000-200,000 Haitian immigrants whom the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) estimates are now in the United States on a temporary basis or without authorization will not be subject to removal as long as there is no functioning country to which they can return, and provided that they do not have criminal records.
• The Secretary of Homeland Security, “in consultation with the Secretary of State, can issue TPS for periods of 6 to 18 months and can extend these periods if conditions do not change in the designated country.”
• Major requirements for TPS include compliance with nationality and physical presence criteria (such as evidence of a passport issued by the designated country), continuous physical presence in the United States since the date TPS went into effect, timely registration, and being otherwise admissible as an immigrant.

To view the fact sheet in its entirety, see:

• Granting Refuge: Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitians in the United States

Categories: Legislation and Policy, Immigration Litigation and Removal, Family Immigration, Blogroll, General |

On June 26, 2009, the ACLU of Texas made the following, highly-anticipated announcement regarding the settlement of a pending case in Brownsville, Texas, involving Mexican Americans who were categorically denied U.S. passports simply due to the fact that they were born by midwife:

State Department Agrees To Fair Issuance Of Passports To Mexican Americans (6/26/2009)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: (212) 549-2666; media@aclu.org

McALLEN, TX –The U.S. Department of State (DOS) has agreed to implement new procedures designed to ensure the fair and prompt review of U.S. passport applications by Mexican Americans whose births in Texas were attended by midwives. Under the agreement, no eligible applicant should be denied a passport.

The procedural changes are the result of a settlement agreement following a class action lawsuit filed by a coalition of civil rights and legal organizations including the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Texas, the international law firm Hogan & Hartson LLP, and Refugio del Rio Grande, Inc.

“The new procedures agreed to by the government are aimed at restoring the core American values of fairness and equality to the ways in which it issues U.S. passports,” said Vanita Gupta, staff attorney with the ACLU Racial Justice Program who worked on the case along with the ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project. “Citizens will no longer be denied a passport solely because of their race, ancestry or because they happened to be born at home with a midwife.”

The settlement comes at a particularly crucial time. The Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI), which went into effect June 1, requires every American who wishes to exit or enter or the United States to have a valid U.S. passport or passport card. Previously, citizens needed only a valid U.S. driver’s license to travel between the U.S. and Mexico or Canada.

“For U.S. citizens who live in the Southwest, a passport is now as necessary as a driver’s license,” said Lisa Graybill, Legal Director for the ACLU of Texas. “We are relieved that US citizens who work, shop, receive medical care, and have family on both sides of the border will no longer be in danger of losing their jobs, risking their health, or being separated from family members simply because of the circumstances of their birth.”  

Although midwifery has been a common practice for more than a century – particularly in rural and other traditionally underserved communities – the lawsuit charged that DOS was violating the due process and equal protection rights of virtually all midwife-delivered U.S. citizens living in the southern border region by forcing them to provide an excessive number of documents normally not required to prove their citizenship. Then, even after the applicants supplied further proof of their citizenship, DOS responded by summarily closing their applications without explanation.

“Because DOS lacked clear standards, countless passport applicants were treated arbitrarily, said Lisa Brodyaga, the attorney for Refugio del Rio Grande. ”With this settlement, applicants born with midwives are guaranteed the same full and fair consideration of their applications as everyone else.  This is especially critical now given that the June 1st deadline of WHTI has passed.”

The lawsuit also charged that the Department’s practices were violating the Administrative Procedure Act, which was enacted as a safeguard against arbitrary and capricious government agency procedures. During the course of the litigation, several of the plaintiffs were granted passports even though they had been denied previously on the very same showing of evidence of citizenship. 

Pending court approval, DOS will train its staff on how to fairly weigh all the evidence provided in passport applications and how to avoid improperly subjecting people whose births were assisted by midwives in Texas and along the U.S.-Mexico border to heightened scrutiny in reviewing their passport applications. All denials will be automatically reviewed by a three-member panel comprised of experienced DOS staff members, and if that panel also denies an application, DOS must communicate the specific reasons for the denial to the applicant. The applicant can then challenge the denial and ask DOS to reconsider its decision.

Additionally, anyone birthed by a midwife who has filed an application for a passport between April 2003 and September 15, 2008 and, with a few exceptions, whose application was not expressly “denied,” can re-apply for free. DOS will be setting up mobile units across the border on specific dates to assist those reapplying.

DOS has also agreed to restrictions on a list it maintains of suspect midwives and other birth attendants, which it purported to use to justify its discriminatory policies. Importantly, DOS will not deny a passport application simply because the applicant’s birth attendant or midwife is on the list. Furthermore, DOS will conduct regular reviews of the list to ensure that no one is included unless DOS has a reasonable, lawful basis to do so. These measures will help ensure that DOS does force passport applicants to take unnecessary measures to prove their citizenship and does not arbitrarily deny passports merely because the individual was born to a suspect midwife. 

“We’re very happy that we were able to come to an agreement with the government that recognizes every U.S. citizen’s constitutional right to be treated with fairness and equality,” said Adam K. Levin of Hogan & Hartson. “You can’t deny basic rights to an entire group of U.S. citizens because their parents did not deliver them in hospitals.”

…. 

To read the announcement and find links to the complaint and settlement, click here.

By Michelle Richart

Categories: Legislation and Policy, Immigration Litigation and Removal, Family Immigration, Blogroll, General |

Reuniting Families Act (S. 1085) was introduced in the Senate on 5/29/2009.

The bill aims to help family members reunite in America in a timely manner by reforming America’s family-based immigration system to end lengthy separations of loved ones, promote family stability and foster the economic growth.

For the full text, click here

Categories: Immigration Litigation and Removal, Family Immigration, Firm News, Blogroll, General |

In an immigration policy update issued on May 7, 2009, the National Immigration Forum writes:

Senate begins consideration of comprehensive immigration reform: On Thursday, April 30, the Senate Immigration Subcommittee held its first hearing to consider how to fix the immigration system. The topic, “Comprehensive Immigration Reform in 2009, Can We Do It and How?”  Witnesses presented compelling testimony from a range of perspectives–faith, business, labor, law enforcement, and civil rights. 

The first panel consisted of former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan; J. Thomas Manger, Police Chief for Montgomery County, Maryland (also speaking on behalf of the Major Cities Chiefs); Dr. Joel Hunter, Senior Pastor of Northland Church in Longwood, Florida, and a member of the President’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships; and Jeff Moseley, President and CEO of Greater Houston Partnership in Houston, Texas.

Greenspan noted that in this economic crisis, immigration has slowed, but that he hoped that Congress will reform the immigration system by the time this crisis fades. He talked about the role undocumented immigrants have played in the U.S. labor force, accounting for 1 in 6 new workers from 2000 to 2007. He also devoted much of his time speaking of the need for high-skilled immigrants to our economy.

Chief Manger told the Senators that one compelling reason for comprehensive immigration reform is that “[i]t is tremendously challenging to deliver police service to a community of people who are afraid to have any contact with the police.” He went on to list a host of problems arising from our broken immigration system that police agencies must deal with.

Dr. Hunter gave one of the most eloquent testimonies I have heard concerning the hardship caused by the broken immigration system. He told the Senators that, “[t]he need for comprehensive immigration reform is to create a path that will help people do the right thing.”

Mr. Mosely talked about the hardship imposed on business due to the broken immigration system. He noted that the legal channels for both low-skilled and high-skilled immigrant workers are insufficient for the needs of our economy, and the fact that there are 12 million undocumented persons here is testament to that fact. Even with unemployment up at the moment, the idea that removing the undocumented would make jobs available for American workers assumes “…that an unemployed worker in New York’s financial sector would be willing to relocate to do agricultural work in California or construction work in Houston….”

A second panel consisted of Eliseo Medina, Executive Vice President of the Service Employees International Union, representing the labor view; Wade Henderson, President and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights presenting the civil rights perspective; and Doris Meissner, formerly Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service and now Senior Fellow with the Migration Policy Institute. The one witness testifying against sensible reform was Kris Kobach of the University of Missouri Law School and formerly with the Department of Justice under Attorney General John Ashcroft.

All of the testimony, and a recording of the Webcast, is available here:

http://judiciary.senate.gov/hearings/hearing.cfm?id=3793

Categories: Employment Immigration, Legislation and Policy, Employer Compliance, Immigration Litigation and Removal, Family Immigration, General |

The U.S. Embassy and consulates in Mexico have announced that they will be closed until May 6 due to the swine flu outbreak.  This means that they will only be operating with regards to emergency affairs.  All visa appointments and processing has been suspended.  To read the announcement and to stay informed on all updates, see the embassy website.

By Michelle Richart

Categories: Employment Immigration, Family Immigration, Blogroll, General |

The Department of State has released the May Visa Bulletin.  Significantly, visa numbers from the EB3 and “Other Workers” categories are unavailable.  The Department of State has stated that permanent resident cards from these categories will remain unavailable until October 1, 2009, the beginning of the federal fiscal year.  Click here to view May Visa Bulletin

 By:  Martha James

Categories: Employment Immigration, Employer Compliance, Family Immigration, General |

FACT: The immigrant community is not a drain on the U.S. economy but, in fact, proves to be a net benefit. Research reported by both the CATO Institute and the President’s Council of Economic Advisors reveals that the average immigrant pays a net 80,000 dollars more in taxes than they collect in government services. For immigrants with college degrees the net fiscal return is $198,000.

FACT: The American Farm Bureau asserts that without guest workers the U.S. economy would lose as much as $9 billion a year in agricultural production and 20 percent of current production would go overseas.

More mythbusting facts on this issue can be found in the National Conference of State Legislatures Summary of State Studies on Fiscal Impact of Immigrants.

AILA InfoNet Doc. No. 09032667 (posted Mar. 26, 2009)

Categories: Legislation and Policy, Family Immigration, Blogroll, General |