05/17/13 If you think the Senate Judiciary Committee’s markup of the Gang of 8 bill has been intense so far, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. As the SJC moves into Titles II and III of the bill—which cover everything from E-Verify to detention policy to family immigration to agricultural workers, not to mention the path to [...]
Read More »

05/15/13 When the Gang of 8 talks about how immigration enforcement will look under their bill, they tend to mention 1) border security and 2) mandatory E-Verify. But make no mistake, ICE isn’t going away—much as those of us who’ve been paying attention to the 1100 deportations a day under this Administration might wish that it would. While offering an inclusive path to citizenship to the 11 million undocumented immigrants currently in the country should go a long way toward humanizing detention and deportation practices, several amendments being offered by Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee would curb some of the most abusive practices ICE has developed over the last several years.
Read More »

03/18/13 The Republican National Committee took a serious step toward reclaiming its big-tent-party status today, when it announced that it will spend millions this year on minority outreach and endorsed comprehensive immigration reform.  It was a move toward reason and rationality, and a tiny hint that Republicans might be willing to make things work in Washington, [...]
Read More »

03/18/13 It’s a shame that Sens. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) showed up to bully the witnesses of today’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the needs of women and families in immigration reform, because, as our own mothers always used to say, the worst thing you can do for a bully is give him [...]
Read More »

03/14/13 The manufactured kerfuffle of ICE’s release of a number of immigrants from detention facilities last month has officially reached the phase where House Republicans hold hearings to show off how outraged they are by the Obama Administration. Typically, such hearings are full of fact-free fearmongering about criminals running amok on the streets. But while this [...]
Read More »

03/05/13 This morning, the Immigration Subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee held a hearing on America’s need for high-skilled immigration, the third in a series of narrowly-focused single-issue hearings they’re holding as an effort to “educate” their party on immigration issues. So far, the hearings have indeed been instructive — but maybe not in the way [...]
Read More »

02/28/13 The House Judiciary Committee held two hearings today, on two different topics (agriculture and E-Verify), yet the takeaway was the same: immigration reform must happen as soon as possible, and must include a path to citizenship. During Tuesday’s agriculture hearing, businesses and farmworkers found potential for an agreement on legalization, with several participants agreeing on the need [...]
Read More »

02/28/13 Tuesday’s House Judiciary Committee hearing on agricultural labor and a guest-worker program saw anti-immigrant Rep. Steve King (R-IA) getting a little bit of a smackdown when he tried to insist that immigration enforcement has been lax under President Obama–despite reams of evidence that, to the contrary, it’s been ever more draconian.  Here’s the quote: KING: We’ve seen the [...]
Read More »

02/13/13 As a general rule: there is no reason, ever, for a member of Congress to ask a question at a hearing of the witness from the Center for Immigration Studies. (And there’s always a witness from the Center for Immigration Studies.) But this exchange, led by Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal, is definitely the exception to [...]
Read More »

02/07/13 Turns out Brian Bilbray’s nativist collection of crackpots, the House Immigration Reform Caucus, is not so dormant after all. Like that flu you’d really hoped you kicked, the IRC (we also call them the Bully Brigade) is flaring up again, nominating Rep. Ted Poe (R-TX) to be its new chairman and holding a kickoff meeting. [...]
Read More »

02/04/13 Remember Brian Bilbray? The hardline anti-immigrant Congressman-turned-FAIR-lobbyist-turned-Congressman-turned-forced-retiree? Well, Bilbray—before his most recent electoral defeat—was the head of a group of anti-immigrant members of the House of Representatives called the “Immigration Reform Caucus.” To avoid confusion about what real reform looks like, we prefer to call it the Bully Brigade. Bilbray had inherited the Caucus from [...]
Read More »

12/14/12 If our latest video doesn’t have you amped up enough about next year, check out this short (but fabulous) interview that United We Dream’s Cristina Jimenez did on Al Punto last Sunday, in which she explains to Jorge Ramos how and why UWD has resolved to push for citizenship for all 11 million undocumented immigrants [...]
Read More »

08/01/12 Tomorrow’s House Constitution Subcommittee hearing on Rep. Steve King (R-IA)’s English Language Unity Act—a bill that would mandate “English-only” government documents and services—is hardly the first indication that the House GOP is taking its cues on immigration from the anti-immigrant movement’s playbook, but it might be the most brazen. Since returning to power in 2011, [...]
Read More »

04/18/12 You might remember E-Verify. It’s House Judiciary Committee Lamar Smith’s pet project to singlehandedly boost the American economy by expanding regulation and costing hundreds of thousands of legal American workers their jobs.  The bill stalled after it passed the House Judiciary Committee last fall, and it’s no more politically viable or better an idea now [...]
Read More »

09/20/11 Despite increasing opposition from within his own party, as well as concerns from labor unions, agriculture, and Latino groups, Lamar Smith is pushing onward with his destructive, anti-immigrant "jobs agenda."
Read More »

07/26/11 Representative Lamar Smith and Rep. Elton Gallegly have really outdone themselves this time.
Read More »

06/03/11 The Chair of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), who fancies himself something of an expert on Latino politics, recently sent around a "Dear Colleague" linking to a Rasmussen Reports poll on workplace immigration enforcement. Smith is an ardent advocate of E-Verify and intends to introduce legislation to make it mandatory for all businesses and workers in the U.S.
Read More »

04/28/11 As we wrote last month, Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has been grilling Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano about her Department's deportation practices. Grassley seems particularly agitated about the "threat" of Napolitano using prosecutorial discretion and allowing some individuals with compelling cases to delay their deportations through "deferred action."
Read More »

12/22/10 While the Census numbers for Hispanic voters won't be out until February or March, interested Census geeks can tide themselves over with the predictions America's Voice made earlier this year in our report "The New Constituents: How Latino Population Growth Will Shape Congressional Apportionment after the 2010 Census." The report turned out to be 100% accurate in predicting how many seats each state would win or lose, so it's fair to guess that the conclusion holds true as well: "new Members of Congress in states like Georgia and South Carolina as well as Texas and Florida will owe their positions, in part, to the expanding Latino population," while "states that are losing Congressional representation (like New Jersey and Illinois) would have fared worse had Latinos not moved there in record numbers."
Read More »

11/11/10 Good news, America: you can stop worrying about where to put your town’s immigrant gallows now. Right-wing talk show host Joyce Kaufman, who has called for hanging undocumented immigrants in the public square and making their families pay for it, has decided she’d rather not go to Washington to work as the chief of staff [...]
Read More »

10/18/10 At a town hall meeting in Anchorage yesterday, GOP Senate candidate Joe Miller (R-AK) argued for an interesting approach to border security: harkening back to the good old days of…East Germany. Alaska blog The Mudflats reports: On Sunday, Joe Miller, candidate for US Senate, held a town hall meeting at a middle school in Anchorage. When asked about illegal immigration, Miller offered up: Build a wall! "If the East Germans could do it, so can we!"
Read More »

09/14/10 Big news out of the Capitol today, as Harry Reid announced this afternoon that he plans to introduce the DREAM Act -- which would allow young people brought to the U.S. as children to obtain legal status and contribute to their communities -- as an amendment to the defense re-authorization bill the Senate is due to take up next week. Watch as Senator Harry Reid announces his plan.
Read More »

08/27/10 Surely everyone in America would think it's smarter to spend ICE resources going after dangerous criminals than immigrants who have applied for residency under the current system and are about to be granted a green card, right?
Read More »

08/25/10 After primaries yesterday in Florida and Arizona, the 2010 general election cycle is in full swing -- and one of the most important questions facing political observers is what the nation's fastest-growing voter bloc will do. We won't know the answer to that question until November, of course, but in America's Voice's updated report on "The Power of the Latino Vote" -- and on a telephonic press conference featuring a panel of experts held today in conjunction with the report's release -- it's clear that the immigration debatecontinues to be a driving factor behind Latino political engagement. . In all, the report examines the role of immigration and the potential influence of Latino voters in 41 key races in 12 states across the country – including potential battleground locations such as Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, and Nevada. The report – and the analysis featured on today's call – make clear that Latino voters could make a difference in dozens of 2010 races.
Read More »

08/19/10 Remember candidate Barack Obama? The one who recognized that mass deportation was a failed strategy that tore communities apart, and knew that comprehensive reform was the only lasting solution?
Read More »

08/13/10 This isn't inaction, it's bad action. President Obama has continued many of the worst enforcement policies of President Bush. Both the Obama Administration and congressional Democrats have fallen prey to the border-first mantra of the GOP. In an election year where swing voters are looking for solutions and Latino voters are looking for respect, all parties have some 'splainin to do on immigration.
Read More »

07/28/10 Judge Susan Bolton of the U.S. District Court for Arizona has just issued a injunction preventing key sections of Arizona law SB 1070 from going into effect tomorrow -- including the sections criminalizing all undocumented immigrants under state law and requiring police to ask anyone for papers during traffic stops or housing inspections if they had a "reasonable suspicion" the person was undocumented.
Read More »