10/02/12 What would happen if the United States were to grant a pathway to legal status to an estimated 2.1 million eligible youth in our country by pass­ing the DREAM Act? That’s the  focus of a new report released by the Center for American Progress and Partnership for a New American Economy. The report reveals that [...]
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04/04/12 Today, a delegation representing civil rights and labor leaders -- which includes our very own Patty Kupfer -- will be in attendence at the Mercedes-Benz annual shareholders' meeting in Berlin, Germany, to protest Daimler AG's silence on HB 56, Alabama's worst-in-the-nation anti-immigrant law.
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04/04/12 Today, a delegation representing civil rights and labor leaders -- which includes our very own Patty Kupfer -- will be in attendence at the Mercedes-Benz annual shareholders' meeting in Berlin, Germany, to protest Daimler AG's silence on HB 56, Alabama's worst-in-the-nation anti-immigrant law.
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02/01/12 Despite his claim that HB 56 "is a jobs bill" that would free up hundreds of thousands of jobs for Americans once immigrants self-deported, there's been no evidence that the immigration law has contributed to the state's lowered unemployment rate, and no job growth in immigrant-heavy sectors like agriculture and construction.
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11/30/11 The AP reports that the agriculture industry is worried about enforcement measures like E-Verify, a flawed tool which would evaluate whether or not an employee is legal to work in the United States.
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11/22/11 According to some supporters of Alabama's worst-in-the-nation immigration law – figures such as State Senator Scott Beason, Congressman Mo Brooks (R-AL), U.S. Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL), anti-immigrant leader Mark Krikorian, and immigration law architect and current Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach (R) – the state's "papers, please" anti-immigration law is working exactly as they intended.
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08/29/11 In rural Alabama lies Cullman County, recognized as the "state's top agricultural community." David Palmer of The Cullman Times interviewed two farmers who express concern over Alabama's new anti-immigration law, which is scheduled to take effect in three days on September 1st. Both farmers come to the same consensus. To put it succinctly: this new law stinks.
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08/02/11 Here's a question: how many border agents does it take to the protect the border? The real-life answer is that we'll never find out because apparently, a significant number of them have been known to fall asleep on the job.
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07/21/11 Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) has really thin skin. He just can't help himself and has to respond to any article that mentions him and/or immigration policy. These are not baseless allegations. Even well-known news columnist, Ruben Navarrette, called him out on it, writing that Lamar Smith "creates his own reality on immigration." Navarrette didn't have to wait long before Rep. Smith had drafted and published a response in the Ventura County Star.
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07/15/11 As it turns out, undocumented workers aren't really big fans of being targeted while they're doing their job, and farmers aren't so keen on having their workers picked on either. As a result of anti-immigrant legislators passing legislation that scares off undocumented workers, farmers are suffering, and a multi-billion dollar industry is at a significant loss.
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06/24/11 Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) is promoting his E-Verify program as a "jobs" bill that will ease unemployed Americans' woes. It's telling that the first GOP "jobs plan" introduced this year would send unemployed manufacturing workers in Ohio or Michigan to the fields to pick fruit and vegetables. It's best described as a 21st Century Grapes of Wrath.
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05/24/11 Even though the DREAM Act, a bill to legalize undocumented youth, was reintroduced in both chambers of Congress earlier this month, the legislative fight up next is not over that measure but instead, a bill to mandate nationwide use of the E-verify system to determine if employees have their papers in order.
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04/26/11 There's more news for those naysayers who claim that undocumented immigrants don't pay taxes, despite plenty of evidence to the contrary. Last week, the Institute for Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) estimated that in 2010, the state and local taxes paid by households that are headed by undocumented immigrants came to approximately $11.2 billion in state and local taxes.
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04/13/11 Ending the day on a positive note, our neighboring state of Maryland passed an in-state tuition bill for undocumented youth, Tuesday evening. The bill now goes to the desk of Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley, who is expected to sign the legislation into law, thereby bringing Maryland communities together.
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04/12/11 Elton Gallegly's zeal to get touch on immigrants would have profound consequences for California and the rest of the United States.
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04/11/11 Rep. Elton Gallegly is the most important California Member of Congress dealing with immigration that you've never heard of. But if his hard-line views become law, he could ruin the state's economy – and his party's prospects with Latino voters.
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04/05/11 A recent hearing on the H-1B work-visa program also made it clear that while Reps. Smith, Gallegly, and King have never met an undocumented dishwasher or field hand they liked, they recognize the vital role of high-skilled immigration to the United States.
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03/28/11 Ahead of the one-year anniversary of SB 1070, the Center for American Progress released a new report entitled "A Rising Tide or a Shrinking Pie: The Economic Impact of Legalization Versus Deportation," analyzing what would happen if SB 1070 were carried out to its full intended effect and every single undocumented immigrant was purged from Arizona, and would happen if the state instead decided to legalize all of its undocumented.
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02/18/11 The American people want leadership and solutions on the immigration issue, but what they've been getting from Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) is flip-flopping and hypocrisy. Instead of taking the lead towards solutions, Cornyn talks about supporting immigration reform in public, while undermining legislative efforts in Congress.
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02/09/11 For those of you who don't know, E-Verify is part of a Republicans' strategy of expelling 11 million undocumented immigrants and their families from the country. However, if the program worked as Reps. Smith, Gallegly, and King hope, the GOP would essentially be deporting the entire U.S. agriculture industry and send more of our nation's food supply—and jobs--overseas.
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01/27/11 Yesterday, the Immigration Subcommittee (of the House Judiciary Committee), which is led by notoriously anti-immigrant members of Congress -- Lamar Smith (R-TX), Elton Gallegly (R-CA), and Steve King (R-IA) -- held their first immigration hearing since Republicans took control of the House.
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01/12/11 The Immigration Policy Center has released a comprehensive new guide to responding to the controversial Arizona-style immigration laws already popping up in states like Florida and Texas.
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12/02/10 This just in -- a new Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimate of the DREAM Act shows that the legislation would increase revenues by $2.3 billion in the 2011-2020 period. After accounting for spending: CBO and JCT estimate that enacting the bill would reduce deficits by about $1.4 billion over the 2011-2010 period. More analysis soon, but here is the full CBO report:
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11/01/10 In an interview yesterday with Univision's Jorge Ramos, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) said that he would bring the DREAM Act to a vote in the "lame duck" session after the midterm elections, regardless of the election results. Meanwhile, Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee sent a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano asking how much it would cost to implement their mass deportation strategy.
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09/03/10 A new study about the effects of immigration on U.S. employment supports the long-standing arguments of immigration advocates: Rather than displacing American workers, immigrant labor actually makes our economy stronger. Kevin Drum has the details at Mother Jones.
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09/01/10 A new study by the San Francisco Fed, highlighted by the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg,  and Reuters, provides state-level proof that immigrants, well, make us richer. According to the author of the report: [T]otal immigration to the United States from 1990 to 2007 was associated with a 6.6% to 9.9% increase in real income per [...]
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06/21/10 Mint.com, a popular personal finance blog, quickly saved face after one their bloggers posted an unreservedly biased, immigrant-bashing analysis of the economic implications of immigration. The one-sided reporting and questionable data drew hasty scrutiny, leading the site to replace the post with an apology.
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