Articles Posted in Comprehensive Immigration Reform

Today, the House Judiciary Committee held a markup and H.R. 3012 was reported favorably out of committee by a voice vote. An amendment from Rep. Lofgren (D-CA) that would make adjustments to the three year phase-in period was accepted. H.R. 3012 must next be scheduled for House floor debate which may occur in the next few weeks. We will update as soon as more information becomes available.

H.R. 3012, the Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act, introduced on September 22, 2011 by Rep. Chaffetz (R-UT), eliminates the employment-based per-country cap entirely by fiscal year 2013 and raises the family-sponsored per-country cap from 7% to 15%. We will keep you posted!!!

The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta ruled that Alabama cannot prosecute illegal immigrants for not carrying registration documents with them at all times or require schools to check the immigration status of all students.

But the court said Alabama, among other things, can require police officers to verify the immigration status of anyone they lawfully stop if they suspect they are in the country illegally. Illegal immigrants will also be prohibited from obtaining a license to drive, get a vehicle or open a business.

Alabama’s law, passed by the legislature this summer, would allow state and local officials to check the immigration status of public school students and to detain suspected undocumented immigrants without bond. It would make it a crime for immigrants who lack proper documents to conduct business with the state for things such as driver’s licenses.

On Sunday, October 9th, 2011 Governor Jerry Brown signed into law AB 1236, the Employment Acceleration Act authored by Assemblymember Paul Fong (D-Cupertino). The bill ensures that it prohibits the state, cities or counties from requiring employers to use E-Verify, an electronic employment verification system that uses employees’ social security numbers to determine work eligibility. Exceptions are made, however, for city or county workers, or if E-verify is a requirement for particular employers under federal or as a condition for employers receiving federal funds.

While supporters of mandatory E-Verify claim the system will magically open up millions of jobs to American workers, reports find that the program would actually cost California’s small businesses (which make up 99% of employers in the state) more than $312 million per year and potentially put 90,000 U.S. citizen and legal state workers out of a job. Nationally, mandatory E-Verify would cost small businesses $2.6 billion a year, according to Bloomberg News Service, and cost federal contractors $10 billion to implement. According to Assemblyman Paul Fong, AB 1236’s sponsor:

“This bill protects our California workers and businesses. The mandated use of E-Verify would impose a major financial burden on businesses, especially small businesses. In addition, businesses will suffer from delayed hiring and the cost of mistaken identities. In this tough economy, we need to help businesses and grow and provide jobs, not set up barriers that cost jobs.”

Illegal immigrants can now apply for state-financed scholarships and aid at state universities after Gov. Jerry Brown announced last Saturday that he had signed the second half of a legislative package focused on such students.

The bill is the second half of the California Dream Act. Mr. Brown signed the first half of the package back in July, which approved private scholarships and loans for students who are illegal immigrants.

Under current law, illegal immigrant students who have graduated from a California high school and can prove they are on the path to legalize their immigration status can pay resident tuition rates. The bill would allow these students to also apply for state aid.

Alabama has prevailed where four other states which enacted anti-immigrant state laws, including Arizona, did not. Today Alabama law enforcement officers will have the right to question and detain anyone they suspect may be an undocumented immigrant, Gov. Robert Bentley said, after a federal judge upheld key provisions of the state’s immigration law on Wednesday.

Yesterday U.S. District Judge Sharon Lovelace Blackburn returned her ruling for the Department of Justice’s challenge to Alabama’s recently passed HB 56, widely recognized as the harshest state immigration law on the books. Blackburn blocked several parts of the law, but let stand provisions that no other judge considering these laws so far has, including provisions that give law enforcement officers unprecedented power to act as immigration agents.

Mary Bauer of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s legal director, said Wednesday in a statement. “Today is a dark day for Alabama. This decision not only places Alabama on the wrong side of history but also demonstrates that the rights and freedoms so fundamental to our nation and its history can be manipulated by hate and political agendas – at least for a time.”
Blackburn blocked a provision that would have made it illegal for undocumented immigrants and other non-citizens from enrolling in Alabama public colleges and universities from going into effect. She also enjoined the enforcement of provision targeting day laborers’ rights to look for work and be picked up for a job, as well as a provision that would have criminalized undocumented immigrants’ attempts to look for and get a job. Blackburn also blocked a portion of the law that would have made it illegal to give a ride to or harbor a person who’s undocumented.

However, she was unconvinced by arguments from the Department of Justice, faith groups and a civil rights coalition that other severe parts of the law ought to be blocked as well. Blackburn refused to enjoin provisions that equip law enforcement agents with the power to question and detain anyone who they have “reasonable suspicion” to believe may be undocumented. Immigrant and civil rights groups have argued that this provision all but legalizes racial profiling, because it’s impossible to determine a person’s immigration status on sight alone, and any inference would rely on profiling.

“This is precisely contrary to the decision that courts that have looked at similar provision in Arizona and Georgia enjoined,” Linton Joaquin, general counsel for the National Immigration Law Center told Colorlines. NILC is one of the plaintiffs in a coalition of civil rights groups’ legal challenge to the law. “It’s a classic example of an area for states not to be legislating in.”
Blackburn also let stand a provision that demands that K-12 schools track the immigration statuses of their students, and let stand a provision that makes any business contract that an undocumented immigrant enters into unenforceable. Even though the Supreme Court has upheld elementary and secondary education as a constitutional right, undocumented immigrant parents who fear being tracked by the government will likely be too fearful to send their kids to school, said Kevin Johnson, a professor of immigration law at the University of California, Davis.

HB 56 and these provisions in particular are an attempt to frighten immigrant communities and undercut their basic constitutional rights, Johnson said.

“Taking away contract rights is just another effort to strip the few, if any, rights that undocumented immigrants have from them.”
The legal strategy to fight Alabama’s HB 56 is very different from the moral arguments against the law, though.

Continue reading

Two bills in Congress would gut the H-2A visa program, replacing it with one more open to abuses.

Few would dispute that the existing system is broken. Its failure can be seen most clearly on farms: An estimated 70% of all agricultural workers in the U.S. are here illegally. However, without undocumented workers, crops would rot in the fields. Skeptics need only consider the plight of growers in Alabama and Georgia, who say that new anti-immigrant state laws have put their harvests at risk. Latino migrant workers have fled those states because they fear being deported, and few documented workers or U.S. citizens have applied for the jobs even though they pay above minimum wage.

It is also not difficult to understand why farmers are reluctant to use the existing guest-worker program that allows them to apply for H-2A visas for temporary foreign workers. Growers say the program is expensive and cumbersome, and requires them to predict harvest schedules and labor needs a year in advance. Such requirements make it difficult for them to determine if they have the need for such laborers or not.

So what is a U visa? The U visa is designed for noncitizen crime victims who (1) have suffered substantial physical or mental abuse from criminal activity; (2) have information regarding the criminal activity; (3) assist government officials in the investigation or prosecution of such criminal activity; and (4) the criminal activity violated US law or occurred in the United States (including Indian country and military installations) or the territories and possessions of the United States.

The U-visa program got off to a sluggish start, with advocates complaining that immigration officials were slow to approve applications. It grew quickly, however, with the help of outreach efforts, including local visits by officials with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

But with increasing awareness has come increasing demand. In the three years that the program has been in place, more than 30,000 applications have been filed and more than 25,600 have been approved. Soon after a visit to Los Angeles this month to promote the program, immigration officials announced that all 10,000 available U-visas had been issued for the fiscal year, which ends Friday.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is implementing the first phase in a series of proposed enhancements to the EB-5 program. As of today, Applicants will be able to communicate directly with USCIS adjudicators via email in an effort to streamline the process and quickly raise and resolve issues and questions that arise during the adjudication process.

The EB-5 Program, also known as the Immigrant Investor Program, is designed to stimulate the U.S. economy through job creation and capital investment by foreign investors. Form I-924 is the Application for Regional Center under the Immigrant Investor Pilot Program. Below are some questions and answers regarding the new proposed enhancements.

Q1. What are the goals of direct email communication between USCIS and Form I-924 Applicants?

Client walked into the office and demanded info about the new Obama amnesty.”I need to apply as soon as possible and hope you can help me.” Where did you hear about amnesty, I asked. A local paralegal told me about it and told me to put a deposit down and the price might go up.

Ever since the 8-18 announcement, similar inquiries come in and I fear this is not the end of it. So what can prospects do, check and double check.

The Obama Administration announcement is NOT an amnesty, it is NOT about granting legal status, and is NOT something that you can sign-up for!

The college dreams of thousands of students who are illegal immigrants moved closer to fulfillment Wednesday after the state Senate approved a bill that for the first time would give them access to public financial aid.

Part of a two-bill package known as the California Dream Act, the measure would allow undocumented students who qualify for reduced in-state tuition to apply for Cal Grants, community college waivers and other public aid programs. To be eligible, they must be California high school graduates who attended schools in the state at least three years, and demonstrate financial need and academic merit.

The Senate vote brought relief to Brian Lee, a UCLA undergraduate who was brought to the U.S. at age 4 from South Korea and fell out of legal status when his mother did not renew their visas. Lee, a biology major who hopes to become a dentist, said the chance to apply for financial aid would help him finish school more quickly and alleviate the stress of working multiple under-the-table jobs. As it is, he has worked for two academic quarters to pay for each term he attends.