 Anti-Immigrant Think Tank Releases Study Claiming that Increased Enforcement has Led to Decrease in Undocumented Immigration.
The Center for Immigration Studies, a research organization that's part of the Tanton Network of anti-immigrant organizations that includes the hate group, The Federation for American Immigration Reform, and Numbers USA, released a report Wednesday claiming that increased enforcement along the border and stepped up interior enforcement efforts like the recent raid in Postville Iowa have led to a dramatic decrease in undocumented immigrants entering the US.
The report, entitled, Homeward Bound: Recent Immigration Enforcement and the Decline in the Illegal Alien Population echoes the findings of other researchers that the number of undocumented immigrants in the United States has recently declined. However, the report reaches the highly dubious conclusion that a decrease in the size of the undocumented population which probably occurred between August 2007 and May 2008 is largely the result of new immigration-enforcement efforts, rather than the downturn of the U.S. economy. The persuasiveness of this argument is undermined not only by an absence of hard data, but by the faulty logic and contradictory statements of the report itself.
IPC analysis of CIS reprt
More on CIS report from NYT
ALIPAC:All Smoke but Not Too Much Fire
A group called Americans for Legal Immigration Political Action Committee is checking its list and checking it twice.
If you haven't heard of the group, you're not alone. Earlier this summer, it held a rally outside the Legislative Building. About two dozen people showed up. The speechifying seemed to draw more gawking reporters than people cheering.
Of course, Americans for Legal Immigration isn't exactly for immigration. It was created by a fellow named Bill Gheen to oppose illegal immigration. A more apt name for the group would be "Round Up the Illegals and Ship 'Em All Back to Mexico."
Americans for Legal Immigration now says it is ready to put candidates' feet to the fire on illegal immigration.
The group recently sent out a missive saying that it will begin endorsing candidates in U.S. Senate and congressional races based on their support of "border security, fines for employers, removal of taxpayer benefits for illegals, and the empowerment of local police to enforce immigration laws."
Among other things, it will penalize candidates whose campaigns advertise in Spanish. No doubt, all those state legislators who voted a few years ago to print election ballots in Spanish will get a zero.
Still, politicians everywhere are probably shaking in their boots.
FEC reports show that the group has raised $179,547 in the current election cycle. That's a pretty good chunk of change, right? At the end of June, it had given to one candidate, $500 to California Republican Ted Hayes in a Don Quixotesque campaign against Democrat Maxine Waters.
Remaining in its coffers: $1,270.
Instead of giving to candidates, Gheen has mainly used PAC donations to pay for the group's Website, mount public relations campaigns, conduct more fundraising and travel to Iowa and Washington.
Rockey Mountian Telegram
alternet link
ICE's New Plan:Self Deportation
Rather than risk getting caught, turn yourselves in.
That's the latest government strategy in its ongoing effort to dramatically reduce the nation's ballooning population of illegal immigrants.
Scheduled to be unveiled next week, it was announced Sunday by Julie Myers, director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, in an interview with a Spanish-language television network.
Myers told the network that "Operation Scheduled Departure" will allow illegal immigrants without criminal records a chance to literally "self-deport" by turning themselves in to her agents.
She said the idea derived from a common complaint voiced by immigrant detainees: If given the opportunity, they'd rather just go home than be holed up in immigration prisons.
Under the new program, those still walking free will have the chance to walk into ICE offices, be processed and get a few weeks to arrange their affairs, pack their belongings and ship out of the country without being detained.
"The program basically gives an opportunity to those seeking an organized way to self-deport," Myers told Univisión anchor Jorge Ramos.
Houston Chronicle
In response to Myers harebrained scheme Ali Noorani of the National Immigration Forum had this to say:
Just when you thought the Bush Administration would ride quietly into the sunset, along comes another harebrained scheme that can’t have been carefully thought out. We are not going to deport our way out of our current immigration mess, nor is it likely that most or even many of the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants here will choose to leave on their own.
Even with an economy headed south, the chances that people will also head south of the border is unlikely, at best. The worst-hit communities in America probably provide more opportunity than rural Guatemala or other destinations from which immigrants are coming. While the flow of undocumented immigrants has slowed since the economy first started to sputter in 2000, it is still the case that the demand for legal immigration from our economy and families far outstrips the supply of legal immigration from the government.
This new policy is a tacit recognition on the part of ICE and Ms. Myers that raids in homes and businesses are terrorizing immigrant communities and families. Add to that the numerous reports of deaths in detention, limited or non-existent access to basic health care and prescribed medications, and the hodge-podge of for-profit and government run state and local prisons to which ICE detainees are assigned, and the fear of ICE is palpable in neighborhoods across the country. But even as we escalate police-state tactics, the majority of immigrants are not going to give up on their American Dream, nor the dreams they gave for their children. The majority of the undocumented have been here for years, have careers, friends, mortgages, and children â€" often U.S. citizens â€" that bind them to their American communities.
read full statement from NIF
More on ICE's newest plan |
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