04/23/13 Today, the Senate Judiciary Committee holds its third hearing on “The Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act, S.744.” The only witness today is Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano. We’ll be livetweeting from @americasvoice, as will many of our colleagues and allies, using the hashtag #SJC.  You can watch the hearing [...]
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02/15/13 A disturbing new article in USA Today, based on a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request by the ACLU of North Carolina, highlights how the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has been focused on meeting deportation quotas by targeting, arresting and deporting low-priority immigrants.   Despite a stated policy [...]
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01/11/13  Earlier this week, the Migration Policy Institute published a report, Immigration Enforcement in the United States: The Rise of a Formidable Machinery. The headline of MPI’s press release summed up its findings, “U.S. Spends More on Immigration Enforcement than on FBI, DEA, Secret Service & All Other Federal Criminal Law Enforcement Agencies Combined.” Of course, [...]
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10/01/12 Sometimes you just need something in writing. From the New York Times today: The Department of Homeland Security has stated in writing that foreigners who are same-sex partners of American citizens can be included under an Obama administration policy suspending deportations of some immigrants who pose no security risk. In letters sent late Wednesday to several Democratic [...]
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08/23/12 Kris Kobach, immigration advisor to the Romney campaign, architect of the infamous Arizona and Alabama immigration laws, and driving force behind the Republican Party’s hard line platform on immigration, today joined with Roy Beck of NumbersUSA, the head of a leading anti-immigrant organization, and Chris Crane, the head of the ICE Union, to file a [...]
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08/03/12 The following is a statement from Lynn Tramonte, Deputy Director at America’s Voice Education Fund, responding to today’s release of additional Deferred Action guidelines by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS): There’s a lot of excitement around this announcement from DHS because the pieces are falling into place.  In less than two weeks, thousands of young immigrants [...]
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07/19/12 Cross-Posted at Jack and Jill Politics: Today, at an oversight hearing of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Steve King (R-Peanut Gallery) ominously threatened to sue DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano unless she reversed the Obama Administration’s popular new policy to grant temporary relief to DREAMers. In case you don’t know him, Rep. King is one of [...]
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07/05/12 Major progress in the California State Senate this afternoon. We got the good news via twitter from National Day Labor Organizing Network’s (NDLON) Chris Newman: TRUSTACTpassed out of the California Senate — Chris Newman (@newman_chris) July 5, 2012 This bill is basically the antithesis of Arizona’s SB 1070. It’s designed to ensure that the federal “Secure Communities” [...]
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06/22/12 At America’s Voice Education Fund, we have been strong critics of Secure Communities, the Obama Administration’s signature immigration enforcement program. We’ve noted that it’s difficult to distinguish the difference between Arizona’s draconian SB 1070 and the Obama administration’s tactics under Secure Communities. That’s how bad it is. The Secure Communities program is now active in 97 % [...]
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06/12/12 As we reported yesterday, immigration lawyers, community leaders, and advocates representing a broad spectrum of Latino and immigrant communities declared the Department of Homeland Security’s implementation of prosecutorial discretion a failure and asked the Obama Administration to take immediate action to protect families, DREAM Act eligible youth, and those standing up for their civil and [...]
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06/11/12 UPDATE: Heydi Mejia learned late yesterday that her deportation was deferred: Mejia’s reprieve came unannounced in a fax that arrived at her attorney’s office in the late afternoon. It represented the first step in what could be a long legal process, Malik said. “The Deferred Action will expire June 11, 2013,” the memo read. Here’s [...]
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06/11/12 After a growing outcry by immigrants, allies, and Members of Congress, outraged at the record number of deportations carried out by the Obama Administration, the Department of Homeland Security announced a new policy in June 2011 that was supposed to focus immigration enforcement on the “worst of the worst” and spare individuals who have been in the [...]
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06/07/12 As you know, we’ve been publishing a series of posts from the DREAMers of the Campaign for an American DREAM.  In March, they set off from San Francisco to begin a 3,000-mile, 8-month+ walk to Washington, DC to call attention to the DREAM Act and the need for immigration reform. This week, the DREAMers arrived in Denver to [...]
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06/07/12 The New York Times’ immigration-beat reporter, Julia Preston, wrote an important article today which confirms what we’ve known to be true: the Obama administration’s prosecutorial discretion program is not working: After seven months of an ambitious review by the Obama administration of all deportations before the nation’s immigration courts, very few of them have been halted, disappointing [...]
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05/16/12 In 2008, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in Florida raided the home of Adolfo Garcia and Julio Diaz, reportedly in search of human traffickers.  Although no one in the home was involved in trafficking, the agents stormed the house and violently arrested Garcia, Diaz and several others for civil immigration violations.  ICE agents punched [...]
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05/11/12 The Obama administration’s Secure Communities program is making headlines again — and that’s never good. Secure Communities has played a key role in the Obama administration’s record-breaking number of deportations. Last year, PBS produced a documentary, Lost in Detention, that examined the controversial program. It’s must see for anyone concerned with immigrant rights. The website for  last year’s [...]
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05/09/12 Norma Galindo Gonzalez is a Colorado mom of two U.S. citizen children – and she desperately needs help to stay in this country with her family. Norma came to the United States in 1991 to escape extreme poverty in her hometown in Mexico. Since then, she has learned English, paid taxes, and raised two sons [...]
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05/09/12 Yesterday, four members of the “Southern 32” appeared in New Orleans immigration court, where a judge granted them temporary relief from deportation while ICE considers their requests for prosecutorial discretion.  The judge refused to move forward with their deportation cases even though the ICE lawyer arrived in court determined to press the cases forward, despite [...]
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05/08/12 Casa De Maryland took to the streets yesterday to protest the Obama Administration’s failure to implement immigration policy that would keep undocumented immigrants who fit certain criteria safe from deportation. And, those activists took to the streets right outside of  the DC headquarters of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (a.k.a. ICE.) Famously known in our advocacy world [...]
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04/17/12 Last June, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Director John Morton outlined criteria for prosecutorial discretion in a memo, which called on ICE officials to consider a range of factors in determining whether an individual should be deported or not. Here’s how the Immigration Policy Center described the memo after it was issued: On June 17, [...]
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04/04/12 Negotiations between the U.S. Department of Justice and Maricopa Sheriff Joe Arpaio have broken down. DOJ, which accused Arpaio of racial discrimination, says the Sheriff is "wasting time and not negotiating in good faith."
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03/19/12 It's not often that you get to hear in English what Spanish language journalists are writing about, but since immigration is a core issue for many Latino voters, you might have guessed – correctly – that it's also an issue highlighted every day in Spanish language media.
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03/12/12 Late last month, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) released new health and safety standards for immigration detainment facilities, which now include things like visitation rights and permission to adhere to dietary restrictions.
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11/14/11 Over the weekend, The New York Times' Julia Preston reported on the Obama administration's new deportation policy. And, her article echoed concerns we've been hearing: A new Obama administration policy to avoid deportations of illegal immigrants who are not criminals has been applied very unevenly across the country.
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11/03/11 Very powerful op-ed in The Hill, written by Professor Randall McGuire about the Border Patrol titled, Border Patrol abuses of human rights must be stopped. McGuire cuts right to the problem with Border Patrol. It's a "rogue agency."
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11/02/11 We know that deportations can have a destructive impact on immigrant families. A new report from the Applied Research Center, Shattered Families: The Perilous Intersection of Immigration Enforcement and the Child Welfare System, found that over 5,000 children of deported parents are now stuck in the foster care system.
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11/02/11 Yesterday, Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Tom Perez wrote to Alabama school districts reminding them, "that denying innocent children the benefit of schooling provided to other students within the district was unconstitutional."
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