Category: immigration

ICE officials say they were just doing their jobs

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By Alan Bean

Two Latino parents were arrested in Detroit on Tuesday morning as they dropped their children off at school.  Immigrant rights groups are outraged.  Officials with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) say they were simply following procedures.

Although Latino voters gave Barack Obama his margin of victory in 2012, more undocumented residents have been deported under his watch than under any previous administration.  Obama won because Latino voters perceived, correctly, that the situation would have deteriorated even further had Mitt Romney become president.

Were the ICE officials who arrested two men in front of their children following standard procedures?  Probably.  The Obama administration is ostensibly focusing on deporting criminals while going easy on undocumented residents with close family ties in America.  Unfortunately, as the article below makes clear, entering the country without documentation is now a federal crime even, as is often the case, the primary reason for entering the United States was to be re-united with young children.

If you were deported as an “illegal alien” while your citizen child remained in the United States, what would you do?

Nothing?  Perhaps, but if you didn’t do everything in your power to get back with your child you would lose my respect (and Jesus wouldn’t be impressed either). (more…)

Senator Durbin highlights the story of Friends of Justice intern, Pierre Berastain

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By Alan Bean

Senator Dick Durbin wanted to dramatize the need for getting serious about the DREAM act,  so he used the story of Friends of Justice intern, Pierre Berastain to add some sizzle to his argument.  Pierre, a student at Harvard Divinity School, is a wonderful example of what immigrants, documented and otherwise, can give our nation.  Please check this out!

Crossing the border without papers

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Posted by Pierre Berastain

What if the person crossing the border had been a Latin American? What if the person had not been white? It seems to me that no amount of “God-talk” would let that person cross. Our perspectives and attitudes are colored, and they are often colored with shades of injustice or inequalities in the way we treat others. This is an invitation to examine our prejudices.

Don’t buy the hype; immigration reform will be a hard sell in Washington

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By Alan Bean

A week ago, I asked “Can the Republicans Romance Latinos?”  My conclusion was negative.  Immigration reform will require strong bipartisan support and the initial leadership must come from the Republican side of the aisle.  Barack Obama’s embrace of mass deportation (we deported more people in 2011 than were deported between 1907 and 1980) shows how desperate Democrats have been to flex their tough-on-immigrants muscle.  Obama is unlikely to stick his head out for the Latino community so long as the Republicans are competing to see who can offend Hispanic voters the most.  Only if the Republican party moves to the left of the Democrats on this single issue will the dynamics of the immigration debate shift significantly.

And that is unlikely to happen.  I argued that a political party that has prospered for two generations by tapping into white racial resentment is unlikely to discard it’s trump card.  How can you play to angry white men and advocate meaningful immigration reform at the same time?  You can’t.

Of course there is more than one kind of racial resentment.  If the Democrats have been undermined by white racial resentment, the Republicans just stumbled over Latino racial resentment.  Latinos have good reason to resent both parties, but the Republicans tried to shore up white votes by intentionally demeaning Hispanic voters.  It came down to choosing which brand of racial resentment would hurt you the most.  Republicans decided, correctly, that they had more to lose by alienating their Tea Party base than they would gain from courting Latino votes.  Obama, realizing he couldn’t out-tough the Republicans, wisely decided to toss the Latino electorate a bone.

Republicans should understand that conservative white voters won’t be voting Democrat anytime soon.  Unfortunately, it isn’t that simple.  Conservative whites will vote Republican even if the party moves to the left on immigration; but a large chunk of the party faithful, perhaps a majority, will voice their displeasure.  An internecine civil war will be avoided at all cost.

Barack Obama would likely do his part if the Republicans took the lead on immigration, but he is unlikely to go to the wall on this issue  if he isn’t sure his party has his back.

So it comes as no surprise that Chuck Schumer of the Blue Team and Lindsay Graham of the Red Team are now associating “reform” with an even more militarized border and no real path to citizenship for undocumented residents.  That kind of talk will get us nowhere.

Seth Wessler, the author of the article pasted below, is the guy I call when I have a question about immigration.  He has a thorough grasp of the key issues and the courage to speak painful truth.

Until we get it through our heads that undocumented immigrants are normal men and women with a compelling interest in bettering their lives, we won’t create just policy.  Even those who seem willing to grant “amnesty” insist on “sealing the borders” first.  That is the approach Ronald Reagan took: “The people that are already here can become citizens, but that’s it.”

In the real world, however, people keep crossing the border no matter how many walls we build or how dangerous the passage.  Moreover, in their shoes, we would do the same–if we could summon the courage, that is. (more…)

Normal Republicans have always favored immigration reform

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Although you would never know it from watching television during the past five years, Republican report for comprehensive immigration was strong before the Tea Party made the issue toxic.  Or so says Molly Ball.

Why Republicans Are Suddenly Pro-Immigration Reform

Molly Ball

The Atlantic

November 14, 2012

The GOP establishment has long wanted to pass comprehensive immigration reform but been cowed by its activist base. Tuesday’s election gave them an opening.

Republicans lost the election in part because Mitt Romney drew record-low support from Hispanic voters, who made up a record-high proportion of the electorate. Within days, top Republicans have figured out what to do about this: Support immigration reform!

The chorus of prominent voices has been stunning: From Sen. Marco Rubio to former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, from television and radio host Sean Hannity to columnist Charles Krauthammer. To some on the left, this looks like the most craven sort of opportunism — the GOP scrambling for a quick PR fix to its deep-seated demographic problems. (more…)

Now, this is encouraging . . .

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By Alan  Bean

An exit poll conducted for the Associated Press contains this surprising result:

Only 3 in 10 voters said that most illegal immigrants working in the U.S. should be deported, while nearly two-thirds said such people should be offered a chance to apply for legal status.

Voter opinion depends a great deal on the way the question is phrased, so a different question might have received a less generous response.  But if 65% of the nation thinks undocumented residents deserve a shot at citizenship, Congress has a mandate for comprehensive reform.  Let’s hope they make the most of it.

Do DREAM Kids Have a Right to an Education?

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There has been a lot of press recently about the plight of illegal immigrants, though most of the coverage on Friends of Justice has centered on basic human rights and adult deportation rules. In the article below. Rachel Higgins looks at a dilemma all too common among younger generations of immigrants: access to education and college funding. Rachel writes about issues impacting college students for a site that examines 1,691 accredited online colleges and provides comparison information for those considering an online education.

Colleges and Legislators Continue to Debate the Right to Education

Rachel Higgins

As Democrats and Republicans continue to debate the conditions of a federal DREAM Act, many provincial programs have enabled children of undocumented citizens to receive financial aid, earn a college degree and enter the workforce as trained professionals, something the country so desperately needs.  In recent years, financial aid for illegal immigrants has been a hot-button topic among American lawmakers. Some have stated that a higher number of well-educated, first-generation Americans would be beneficial to the country, while others argue that individuals who have not become legal citizens have no right to education in the United States.

In June 2012, President Obama announced he was enacting a law that deferred deportation of immigrants who met certain requirements of American citizenship, even if their status in the country was currently illegal. In order to pass this step of the so-called “We Can’t Wait” initiative, the president circumvented Congress in order to spearhead the law. This ostensible “abuse of power” drew criticism from House Republicans, wrote NPR contributor Frank James.  “Americans should be outraged that President Obama is planning to usurp the Constitutional authority of the United States Congress and grant amnesty by edict to 1 million illegal aliens,” said Rep. Steve King [R-Iowa]. (more…)

Work Visas and the New Indentured Servitude

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Opportunity in America is often conditioned on a number of outside factors — race, educational achievements, or, as today’s article discusses, citizenship status. Higher ed writer Valerie Harris, who blogs over at MastersDegreeOnline.org, takes a look at the H1B visa debate currently pending in Congress. Valerie’s thoughts add a new dimension to prior discussions on what it takes to get ahead — and, importantly, how we define equality.

Reforming Work Visas to Benefit from Every Masters Degree Earned in the US

Valerie Harris

Higher education is today considered a universal standard of career preparedness – and as a result, the enrollment of international students has sharply increased at most American colleges and universities in recent years. While pursuing a degree in the United States often affords foreign students a wide range of opportunities, students are often limited by their temporary citizen status when it comes to looking for career opportunities in the U.S. market.

As fewer American-born students are attending graduate school, more international students are filling their spots in the classroom every year. In Fall 2011, the International Institute of Education surveyed roughly 750 American colleges and universities. More than half of the respondents reported an increase in foreign student enrollments, while 20 percent reported declines and 27 percent reported no increase at all. Furthermore, 60.4 percent of institutions that enrolled more than 1,000 international students reported increases. Slightly more than two-thirds of doctoral/research-based institutions recorded an increase of international students, while roughly half of both baccalaureate and master’s institutions saw their foreign enrollments rise. At 31.5 percent, two-year institutions recorded the lowest number of international enrollment increases – but this figure still exceeded the number of two-year schools where declines were reported.

While many foreign students are able to successfully earn a college degree, many encounter post-graduation problems with their H1B visas. This temporary (non-immigrant) visa enables American companies to employ foreign workers on the condition that the visa-holder has earned a bachelor’s degree in his/her field. Furthermore, the visa is limited to one employer; if the worker is fired or laid off by that company, he/she must apply for a new visa with a different organization or face deportation from the United States. As Brian Grow of BusinessWeek noted, many H1B visa-holders do not benefit from this preferential treatment. He likened them to “indentured servants” whose U.S. citizenship is at the mercy of their employers. This “sponsorship” essentially deprives educated workers of their upward mobility within the American corporate sector – and without an employer to co-sign the H1B visa, entrepreneurial ventures are entirely out of the question. (more…)

The Penalty is Exile

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By Alan Bean

The criminalization of immigration, or “crimmigration” as it is sometimes known, is a recent development.  Michelle Fei lays out the basic problem,

The issue that immigrants face is that, now there is this increasing collaboration between the criminal justice system and the deportation system.  So, for basically, all kinds of immigrants, including green-card holders, undocumented immigrants, people with visas.  This means that once you enter the criminal justice system, often times you are on a fast-track to deportation, usually with no chance of ever coming back to the United States.

There is more crimmigration information packed into this radio program than I have previously discovered in any single source.

The Penalty is Exile: How Immigration and Criminalization Collide

Written by Cory Fischer-Hoffman

Under President Obama more than 1 million people have been deported from the United States. We’re told many of those people are criminals who’ve broken more than just immigration law. On this edition, producer Cory Fischer-Hoffman takes a closer look at how immigration and the criminal justice system work together, to detain and deport hundreds of thousands of people every year.

Transcript:

Cory Fischer-Hoffman: Have you ever traveled on Greyhound Bus Before?  Do you know the feeling of standing in the station, looking around to see if your bus will be full and hoping that after a smooth and uneventful journey, you will safely arrive to your destination?

In January of 2010, Alex Alvarez boarded a greyhound bus in Lawrence, Kansas and then got off his bus in Orlando to transfer to Immokalee, Florida,  but he never arrived to his final destination.

Alex:, I was entering the bus station, and I entered calmly but there was someone who detained me and asked, “where are you going?” I said “to Florida, to work.” and then they asked me for my papers.  I didn’t present any documentation and so, they immediately handcuffed me and they took me to a room, and they said, “sorry you can’t travel because you don’t have papers from here.” In this bus station, it was two of us who were detained, because we were the only ones who were immigrants. But, we didn’t commit any crime, absolutely none

Cory Fischer-Hoffman: Alex Alvarez is from Guatemala, and like so many others he left his country in search of way to provide for his family back home.  Alex worked in a bakery in Florida for four years and then traveled to Kansas.  Since he was unable to find reliable work, he decided to return to Florida and see if he could get his old job back.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement stopped him, solely based on “looking like an immigrant,” Alex said.  They handcuffed and arrested him and then took him to an immigrant detention center.

Alex: I was in an immigrant detention center.  They asked me a lot of questions, “what’s your name, what is this, what is that?” as you were a criminal, even though, I didn’t do anything.  Then they took me to another detention center, where there were more people, and throughout the whole time we were handcuffed.  It enrages me to think about how they treat people, I am not a criminal that they should treat me like that, with chains ties around my wrists, ankles and waist. (more…)

“I will no longer have to hide”: Pierre Berastain in the Dallas Morning News

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This story on Friends of Justice intern, Pierre Berastain, appeared on the front page of Saturday’s Dallas Morning News.  Pierre is a frequent contributor to this blog and also sends out our weekly updates.  AGB

Young illegal immigrant redefines his life in Carrollton and at Harvard

By DIANNE SOLÍS

Staff Writer

dsolis@dallasnews.com

Published: 21 September 2012

CARROLLTON — Pierre Berastain didn’t embrace the role of mediator when thousands of high school students walked out of classes in 2006 in Dallas and other cities to protest U.S. immigration policies.

He wanted a change in federal immigration policies as much as the protesters.

But his high school principal wanted him to calm students to prevent a walkout at R.L. Turner High School. So he got on the public address system and took several students aside in the hallways.

“Do we want to be recognized for negative behavior or for our accomplishments?” he asked his classmates.

In five years of occasional conversations with a reporter at The Dallas Morning News, Berastain anonymously spoke about his journey through college and his social justice crusades. He’s gone public with his story in recent weeks because of a new policy initiative by the Obama administration that halts deportation and grants temporary work permits to young immigrants. (more…)