Badmus

Washington D.C. - As Congress works on bills to extend unemployment benefits and create jobs, they are likely to face considerable pressure to include E-Verify amendments. E-Verify is a federal, web-based, employment verification program. As the latest IPC fact check explains, those who claim that E-Verify will prevent unauthorized workers from gaining employment ignore the fact that the program harms U.S. citizen and legal immigrant workers who will be ensnared by database errors and forces U.S. businesses to bear additional costs associated with the program. Small businesses - which employ approximately 50% of the U.S. workforce - would be disproportionately affected. At a time when the U.S. economy is still struggling to recover from recession and the national unemployment rate hovers around 10%, expanding E-Verify before improving it would be a costly and chaotic mistake.

To read the fact sheet in its entirety see:  

• How Expanding E-Verify Would Hurt American Workers and Business (IPC Fact Check, March 2, 2010) 
  

Also see, from our Repairing our Broken Immigration System series:

• Employment Verification: Repairing our Broken Immigration System   (IPC Fact Check, November 12, 2009)

Categories: Legislation and Policy, Employer Compliance, General |

Washington D.C. - Every 10 years, as required by the U.S. Constitution, the federal government undertakes a massive nationwide effort to count the residents of the United States, who now number more than 300 million.  The results form the basis for the apportionment of congressional districts and the distribution of hundreds of billions of dollars in federal funds, as well as serving to guide a wide range of community-planning decisions across the country. The Census is, however, no stranger to controversy, such as the suggestion by some activists that immigrants sit out the Census this year to protest the federal government’s failure to enact comprehensive immigration reform. Yet, among immigrants, ethnic minorities and other demographic groups who are typically under-counted in the Census, a boycott would be self-defeating. The Immigration Policy Center has prepared a fact check that explains what’s at stake and how anyone living in an area afflicted by a large under-count stands to lose out on political representation and access to economic and educational opportunities. To read the fact check in its entirety see: 

Categories: Legislation and Policy, General |

February 1, 2010

Washington D.C. - Today, the Immigration Policy Center (IPC) releases the final in its series of “Solutions Papers,” Future Flow: Repairing our Broken Immigration System. The perennial question of how to regulate future employment-based immigration flows has been, by far, one of the greatest sticking points in the immigration reform debate. In 1986, lawmakers passed the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) in an attempt to reign in undocumented immigration through heightened worksite and border enforcement, combined with legalization of most undocumented immigrants already in the country. Unfortunately, IRCA failed to address the fact that immigrant workers would be needed in the future, and the lack of future flow mechanisms resulted in a large unauthorized immigrant population.

Policymakers now have the opportunity to realistically assess our future employment-based immigration needs. This includes permanent and temporary visas, high-skilled and low-skilled workers. Many people agree that our current legal immigration flow is drastically out of sync with America’s labor needs. If the U.S. is to thrive in the globalized 21^st century economy, employment-based immigration must be seen as a strategic resource that can both meet labor market needs and foster economic growth and competition while still protecting U.S. workers and improving wages and working conditions. This paper lays out the key principles for future employment-based immigration flows within the context of comprehensive immigration reform.

To read the paper in its entirety, see: 
Future Flow: Repairing our Broken Immigration System
(IPC Focusing on the Solution series, February 2, 2010)
 

To read other papers in the series, see:

Family Immigration: Repairing our Broken Immigration System 
(IPC Focusing on the Solutions series, January 15, 2010)

Enforcing Immigration Laws: Repairing our Broken Immigration System
(IPC Focusing on the Solutions series, December 8, 2009)

Naturalization and Integration: Repairing our Broken Immigration System
(IPC Focusing on the Solutions series, December 4, 2009)

Employment Verification: Repairing our Broken Immigration System
(IPC Focusing on the Solutions series, November 12, 2009)
 
Earned Legalization: Repairing our Broken Immigration System
(IPC Focusing on the Solutions series, November 5, 2009)

Breaking Down the Problems: What’s Wrong With our Current Immigration System
(IPC Special Report, October 21, 2009)
 

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

The American Immigration Council applauds today’s U.S. Supreme Court decision ensuring that immigrants facing deportation have fair process in the review of their cases. The Court ruled that individuals who seek to reopen their deportation orders have the right to appeal to the federal courts if the immigration court refuses to hear the appeal. The Court’s decision protects immigrants’ access to federal court review and affirms the role of the courts in our system of checks and balances on government power.

The case, Kucana v. Holder, was brought by an asylum seeker who filed a motion to reopen his removal proceedings because of changed circumstances in his request for asylum. A motion to reopen is a procedural mechanism that allows individuals to present new evidence to an immigration judge.    “The Supreme Court’s decision reaffirms that immigrants are entitled to fair process” said Beth Werlin, Attorney at the American Immigration Council’s Legal Action Center. “Given the stakes involved in immigration cases, federal court review is an important check on the executive branch and is a necessary layer of protection for individuals who are facing removal from the United States.”    

Read more about the Supreme Court’s decision at the Legal Action Center’s Supreme Court Update webpage.

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

Last week the Immigration Policy Center, together with the Center for American Progress, released a report conducted by Dr. Raúl Hinojosa-Ojeda of UCLA titled, Raising the Floor for American Workers: The Economic Benefits of Comprehensive Immigration Reform. The report finds that comprehensive immigration reform that includes a legalization program for the roughly 12 million unauthorized immigrants in the U.S. and enables a future flow of legal workers would benefit U.S. workers and generate much needed economic growth.

• Immigration reform would increase U.S. GDP by at least 0.84%.  This would translate into at least a cumulative $1.5 trillion in added GDP over 10 years, which includes approximately $1.2 trillion in consumption and $256 billion in investment.
• The benefits of additional GDP growth would be spread broadly throughout the U.S. economy,but immigrant-heavy sectors such as textiles, electronic equipment, and construction would see particularly large increases.
• The higher earning power of newly legalized workers would mean increased tax revenues of $4.5 billion to $5.4 billion in the first three years.
• Higher personal income would also generate increased consumer spending-enough to support 750,000 to 900,000 jobs in the U.S. in the first three years.
• Experience shows that legalized workers open bank accounts, buy homes, and start businesses, further stimulating the U.S. economy.

Conversely, mass deportation would reduce U.S. GDP by 1.46 percent, amounting to a cumulative $2.6 trillion loss in GDP over 10 years, not including the actual costs of deportation.  The Center for American Progress has estimated that mass deportation would cost $206 billion to $230 billion over five years.

Download the Factsheet: The Economic Benefits of Immigration Reform (January 14, 2010)
Download the Report: Raising the Floor for American Workers: The Economic Benefits of Comprehensive Immigration Reform (January 7, 2010)

Categories: Legislation and Policy, General |

From the Immigration Policy Center:

Washington D.C. - As anti-immigrant groups continue to use immigration as a scare tactic to thwart progress on the health care debate, the Immigration Policy Center has provided factual information on why including legal immigrants in health care reform benefits all Americans. By including legal immigrants in health care reform, we can lower the overall costs. Refusing to accept people who want to pay into the system just doesn’t make sense. Immigrants are the not the cause of the health care crisis, but they can certainly be part of the solution.

Who are legal immigrants?

• Each year the U.S. government generously admits immigrants into the country to live, work, reunite with their families, and pursue the American dream. Some have parents, children, or spouses in the United States who sponsored them. Others have been admitted to fill jobs. Still others arrive as refugees or asylees, fleeing persecution in their home country. Many immigrants eventually become U.S. citizens.

• Legal immigrants are citizens-in-waiting. Many legal immigrants are on a path to citizenship. Between 2006 and 2008, over 2 million legal immigrants became U.S. citizens.

Excluding legal immigrants from health care doesn’t make sense.

• Just like U.S. citizens, legal immigrants work and pay taxes. Large numbers of legal immigrants are currently serving in the U.S. military. Legal immigrants are part of our communities, schools, workplaces, and places of worship. It does not make sense to exclude them from paying into the health care system for any amount of time.

• Many legal immigrants live in “mixed-status families” and have U.S.-citizen children. These U.S.-citizen children are often uninsured because their parents work in jobs that do not offer health insurance, or because of fear and confusion about enrolling eligible children in public safety-net programs such as Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP).

• Including legal immigrants in the health care system not only strengthens the system, but is a critical part of their integration into U.S. society. In addition to working, paying taxes, and learning English, legal immigrants should be able to pay their fair share and have affordable health care like everyone else.

• Health care is not a zero-sum game. Including legal immigrants does not mean that U.S. citizens get less care. Making affordable health care available to everyone benefits everyone.

The more people who pay into a system of health insurance, the more everyone benefits.

• It is common sense that the more people who pay into the health care system, the more the costs are spread out over the entire population. Immigrants are eager to pay their fair share and contribute to paying for health reform. In return, immigrants should have affordable health insurance like everyone else in America. It’s common sense to include immigrants’ contributions.

• Access to health care, particularly preventive care services, not only improves public health, but is a cost savings. The Center for Science in the Public Interest concluded that comprehensive prevention programs are the most economical way to maximize health and minimize health care costs.

For more information on immigrants and health care, see:

• IPC Fact Sheet: Including Legal Immigrants in Health Care Reform: Just What the Doctor Ordered
• IPC Fact Sheet: Sharing the Costs, Sharing the Benefits: Inclusion is the Best Medicine
• IPC Blog Post: Including Immigrants in Health Care Reform Makes Economic Sense

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Categories: Legislation and Policy, Blogroll |

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 |

State legislatures continue tackling immigration issues in a variety of policy arenas at an unprecedented rate, according to a new report by the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL). In the first quarter of 2009, state legislators in all 50 states introduced 1,040 bills and resolutions relating to immigrants and refugees. This is comparable to the record numbers of bills and resolutions introduced during the first quarter of 2008. State laws related to immigration have increased dramatically in recent years:

• In 2005, 300 bills were introduced and 38 laws were enacted.
• In 2006, activity doubled: 570 bills were introduced and 84 laws were enacted.
• In 2007, activity tripled: 1,562 bills were introduced and 240 laws were enacted.
• In 2008, activity remained consistent: 1,305 bills were introduced and 206 laws were enacted.

As in past years, the top three areas of interest remain employment, identification/drivers licenses and law enforcement. States also are considering new policy approaches in the education, health and benefits sectors.

To learn more about 2009 legislation at the state level, visit the NCSL website and read the full report.

AILA InfoNet Doc. No. 09061035 (posted Jun. 10, 2009)

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

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 |