Los Angeles Pols Would Protect Illegal-Alien Criminals

R. Cort Kirkwood

In the latest act from the illegal-alien lobby, Los Angeles city council members have announced they want the city to stop full participation in the federal Secure Communities program, which matches the fingerprints of local arrestees against the database maintained by the FBI and Department of Homeland Security. The purpose of Secure Communities is to identify illegal aliens so they can be deported after they serve sentences.

According to the Los Angeles Times, council members Bernard C. Parks and Jan Perry are behind the effort to undermine federal enforcement of immigration laws. Los Angeles has been a sanctuary city for 30 years, and now its political leaders are trying to hamper efforts to deport illegal alien criminals. The pair, along with the immigration lobby, is backing a bill that passed the assembly which limits the fingerprints state and local authorities can share to those of convicted felons.

No Deportations

Thirty years ago, the city adopted Special Order 40, which prohibits aw enforcement officials from contacting someone solely because those officials suspect him of being an illegal alien. The council members argue the federal program trespasses Special Order 40, the Times reports.

As well because illegal alien criminals who are not felons, but perhaps only "minor" offenders, get caught in the dragnet of the Secure Communities fingerprint program, the leftist leaders in Los Angeles want to short circuit it. According to the Times:

Secure Communities . has come under fire for leading to the deportation of those who were either arrested but not subsequently convicted of a crime or convicted of misdemeanors or infractions, such as a traffic violation. Of 38,828 people in California deported through Secure Communities between May 2009 and March of this year, about 12,000 were charged with or convicted of major violent offenses, while nearly 11,000 were classified as non-criminal deportees, according to ICE statistics.

The Times reports that the resolution backs a recently passed assembly bill, sponsored by a crackpot leftist in San Francisco, "which requires that only fingerprints of convicted felons be run through the immigration database." The bill would cancel and renegotiate participation in the Secure Communities program. . The bill would also make counties' participation in the program voluntary.

Will Obama Sue? The move, as with most sanctuary policies, would appear to trespass the federal prerogative to enforce immigration laws, as the Obama Administration argued in its lawsuit against Arizona. Wtih the carefully crafted SB 1070, Arizona sought to intensify the enforcement of federal immigration law by permitting police to question the immigration status of anyone with whom they have otherwise lawful contact. The Obama Justice Department successfully argued in federal court that SB 1070 usurped federal authority over immigration. Arizona is appealing a decision from the radically leftist U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, based in San Francisco, that validated the Obama Administration's view that immigration is solely a federal prerogative.

The question is why the Administration has not sued any of the dozens of sanctuary cities, such as Los Angeles and San Francisco, which openly defy federal programs meant to bring illegal immigration under control. The upshot of the proposal from the Los Angeles council members is that no illegal alien who is not an violent or potentially violent criminal is worthy of deportation.

Crime Wave

Sanctuary cities such as Los Angeles typically suffer cosmically high violent crime rates because they refuse to help deport illegal aliens. As Heather Mac Donald reported in the Manhattan Institute's City Journal in 2004, sanctuary laws help perpetuate crime, particularly because they inhibit the deportation of illegals who commit "minor" crimes.

L.A.'s sanctuary law and all others like it contradict a key 1990s policing discovery: the Great Chain of Being in criminal behavior. Pick up a law-violator for a "minor" crime, and you might well prevent a major crime: enforcing graffiti and turnstile-jumping laws nabs you murderers and robbers. Enforcing known immigration violations, such as reentry following deportation, against known felons, would be even more productive.

LAPD officers recognize illegal deported gang members all the time-flashing gang signs at court hearings for rival gangbangers, hanging out on the corner, or casing a target. These illegal returnees are, simply by being in the country after deportation, committing a felony (in contrast to garden-variety illegals on their first trip to the U.S., say, who are only committing a misdemeanor).

"But if I see a deportee from the Mara Salvatrucha [Salvadoran prison] gang crossing the street, I know I can't touch him," laments a Los Angeles gang officer. Only if the deported felon has given the officer some other reason to stop him, such as an observed narcotics sale, can the cop accost him-but not for the immigration felony.

Though such a policy puts the community at risk, the department's top brass brush off such concerns. No big deal if you see deported gangbangers back on the streets, they say. Just put them under surveillance for "real" crimes and arrest them for those. But surveillance is very manpower-intensive. Where there is an immediate ground for getting a violent felon off the street and for questioning him further, it is absurd to demand that the woefully understaffed LAPD ignore it.

Secure Communities is particularly important, then, in fighting illegal alien crime, which is out of control. Reported Mac Donald, "In Los Angeles, 95 percent of all outstanding warrants for homicide (which total 1,200 to 1,500) target illegal aliens. Up to two-thirds of all fugitive felony warrants (17,000) are for illegal aliens."

Mac Donald's figures are a few years old, but they explain the concerns of cops who worry more about crime than the rights of illegal aliens.

Sheriff Supports Secure Communities

The Los Angeles County Sheriff, Lee Baca, supports Secure Communities, as he wrote in an op-ed piece for the Times. Wrote Baca:

Consider the following case: In January, a local police agency arrested a man for driving with a suspended license. A subsequent fingerprint screening revealed that he was also a convicted felon illegally in the United States from Mexico. His record included three prior drug trafficking convictions and six deportations in 11 years.

Or consider this one: Recently, a 32-year-old man was booked into the Los Angeles County Jail on DUI charges. His fingerprints revealed not only that he was in the United States illegally but that he had previously been deported after his conviction for killing a child in 1997.
Both men were identified through the Secure Communities program.

Baca argues that concerns about non-criminal illegals being deported, as if that ought to be a concern, given that they shouldn't be here anyway, are misplaced. Secure Communities, he argues, is a success. 

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Light to be shone on Australia's illegal immigration mess

LABOR'S immigration regime will be scrutinised as part of a formal inquiry into the detention network, with the Greens and crossbenchers indicating they support a Coalition-led review.

As another boatload of asylum-seekers was intercepted off Ashmore Reef yesterday, the opposition motion for a "warts and all" examination into detention received its strongest support yet.

The Greens backflipped on previous statements the review would simply be a political "witch-hunt" after securing concessions from the Coalition.

After a week of negotiations with the Greens and crossbenchers, opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison yesterday amended the terms of reference of his inquiry to address concerns by both groups -- including closer scrutiny of the system of mandatory detention.

"Over the last several years, we have seen a litany of chaos and abuse and cost blowouts in this sector which defy imagination . . . and a failure by this party to address policy failures," Mr Morrison said. "No member should be muzzled in seeking to ask the questions and get the answers they deserve in this sector."

Greens MP Adam Bandt and independent Andrew Wilkie voiced support for the inquiry yesterday. Independent Bob Katter and West Australian National Tony Crook are expected to vote for the motion when debate resumes next parliamentary sitting.

Mr Bandt said he welcomed the inquiry but wanted to see the upper and lower houses involved. "It is clear, for reasons other members have pointed out, that mandatory detention has failed and anything we can do to shed light on the issue is something I would welcome," Mr Bandt said. "I hope it is treated as a serious issue and for that reason I would like to see it take the form of a joint select committee."

Mr Wilkie labelled mandatory detention "cruel and inhumane" and said the government could not "keep kidding itself that its policy is working". "I trust the inquiry will not be a political circus but instead the first step to Australia adopting a more humane and effective approach," Mr Wilkie said.

Mr Bandt yesterday secured support from the opposition for a Greens motion condemning the proposed five-for-one asylum-seeker swap with Malaysia.

The motion passed through the Senate last sitting and if successful in the House of Representatives, it will be the first time in the new parliament both houses have condemned a government policy. "The deal is a rushed political fix designed to paper over the government's mandatory detention policy," Mr Bandt said. "My decision to put forward this motion and use the word 'condemn' has not been taken lightly," he said.

Minister for Home Affairs Brendan O'Connor yesterday confirmed the interception of the 25th asylum-seeker vessel to arrive this year.

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Obama is deceiving Hispanics on immigration

There is nothing astonishing about the fact that President Barack Obama’s Republican critics claim that he is taking U.S. Hispanics for a ride on immigration issues. What’s surprising is that some of Obama’s closest Democratic allies are beginning to say the same thing.

Virtually all Hispanic Democrats in the U.S. Congress — they include the only Hispanic Democratic Senator, Bob Menendez, D-New Jersey — are stepping up their criticism of Obama for not doing more on the immigration front.

Last week, I was amazed by what I heard from Rep. Luis V. Gutierrez, a Democratic congressman from Chicago — the president’s hometown — and longtime Obama backer. Gutierrez was visiting Miami as part of a national tour to denounce Obama’s immigration stand, saying that he is playing games with Hispanics by claiming to be fighting for a comprehensive immigration reform, while not doing anything to stop massive deportations of people who shouldn’t be deported.

Obama has in recent weeks stepped up calls for congressional approval of an immigration overhaul that would both secure the border, and offer a path to earned legalization to millions of undocumented residents who are willing to pay penalties and learn English.

He had pledged during the 2008 campaign that he would pass such a law during his first year in office.

But Gutierrez and growing numbers of Democrats in Congress say that Obama’s immigration reform campaign is political posturing, because the president knows that he won’t get the votes for congressional passage of a comprehensive immigration reform in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives.

Obama’s rhetoric may help win Hispanic votes for the 2012 elections by showing Republicans as the stumbling block for immigration reform, but is creating false expectations among Hispanics, they say.

So what should Obama do, I asked Gutierrez. There are many things Obama can do with discretionary powers he already has, without going to Congress, Gutierrez said.

First, Obama could use existing presidential powers to stop deportations of the estimated 65,000 undocumented students who were brought to the United States as children, and who graduate from high school every year, and want to enter college or the armed forces, Gutierrez said. Obama has called repeatedly for congressional passage of the Dream Act, which would allow these youths to stay, but is not using his discretionary powers to delay their deportations until Congress decides on their fate, he added.

Second, Obama should use his executive powers to delay deportation of the parents of the estimated four million U.S.-born children who have at least one parent who does not have legal status, he said.

If the Obama administration recently used discretionary powers to give temporary residency status to Haitian immigrants to avoid their deportation to earthquake-devastated Haiti, why not give a similar relief to Mexicans who face deportation to violence-ridden Ciudad Juárez, he asked.

So why is Obama not doing any of this? I asked Gutierrez. “The president doesn’t feel the pressure to do it, because he feels that Latinos will vote for him anyway,” he said. “But this is a matter of life and death, that has to be taken seriously, and not be used to deceive the Latino community as we come near the next elections.”

Responding to such criticism, Obama said in a recent speech in El Paso, Texas, “I wish I could simply bypass Congress and change the law myself, but that’s not how a democracy works.” A White House official told me that, while the administration continues to push for immigration reform in Congress, it is changing the way it enforces deportation procedures, focusing on removing undocumented immigrants with criminal records.

My opinion: Obama’s calls for congressional passage of a comprehensive immigration reform are a good electoral strategy to gain sympathies among Hispanics ahead of the 2012 elections, but is raising false expectations within the Latino community.

Obama should stop playing this game. Instead of fearing being criticized by Hispanic-phobic anti-immigration zealots for allegedly pursuing a blanket “amnesty” for 11 million undocumented residents, he should use his discretionary powers to give temporary status to some categories of immigrants.

For instance, as he said in his State of the Union address, “it makes no sense” to deport thousands of undocumented students who grew up as Americans, or others — including many from China, India and other parts of the world — who came to study in some of the best U.S. universities, and upon obtaining advanced degrees are “sent back home to compete against us.” Obama can stop their deportations, but — as far as we know — isn’t doing so.

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Australian government's "refugee" hypocrisy

THE past week has brought home that the Labor government can't claim a shred of principle on asylum policy any more. It has shamed itself repeatedly and in a most hypocritical way. Those who condemned the Pacific solution have embraced a Malaysian one. The people who said Nauru was unacceptable for offshore processing in part because it wasn't signed up to the UN convention on refugees aren't worried that Malaysia is also outside it.

If the government wasn't desperate, it would be embarrassed. If its backbench wasn't frightened of the electoral backlash over boat arrivals, it would be up in arms.

Last week the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, lashed out at the deal and Malaysian human rights activists attacked it. Pillay, visiting Australia, toned down her initial criticism after government briefings but still declared the bilateral agreement would need to be scrutinised carefully for its human rights guarantees.

Meanwhile, Malaysian activist Eric Paulsen from that country's Lawyers for Liberty wondered how Australia could achieve what others could not. "All of a sudden, without any changes to Malaysian immigration laws and policies, will asylum seekers suddenly become immune to their day-to-day reality of arbitrary arrest, detention, harassment, extortion, jailing and whipping? We doubt that very much."

Former federal human rights commissioner Sev Ozdowski reinforced a point the opposition has pushed, when he said at least in Nauru "we were able to control the conditions in the detention centre" - Malaysia would be a "much worse solution".

It does seem a leap of faith to believe Australia can be sure the asylum seekers we send there under the "swap" deal won't be badly treated, given the country's record. It will take some formidable monitoring.

The only way the government can get out of its imbroglio is if the deterrent - the fear of being sent to Malaysia and the back of that long "queue" - discourages the boats quickly. Then perhaps, the government hopes, it won't have to send too many people to Malaysia. Or, at least, if the boats slow dramatically, criticism of the nastier aspects of the deterrent will fade. The end will be regarded as justifying the means.

No wonder Immigration Minister Chris Bowen and Foreign Affairs Minister Kevin Rudd are out spruiking the "don't come" message, as the government has been working frantically to bed down the formalities of the Malaysian deal, so implementation can start. On another front, negotiations with Papua New Guinea for a processing facility there crawl along.

If the boats keep coming, and the Malaysian 800 quota is filled, the government's border protection political disaster will continue. If the people smugglers are discouraged, on the other hand, Tony Abbott will find a potent issue rapidly subsiding

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S.C. Gov. Nikki Haley: Feds 'get in the way' of enforcement

Gov. Nikki Haley accused federal officials Friday of preventing South Carolina from enforcing a 2008 anti-illegal immigration law, saying they are denying the state access to electronic records used to verify a worker's eligibility.

Catherine Templeton, the director of the Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation, said the state has not been able to enforce the law since April 29. As a result, Haley said, the state may lay off its two dozen immigration auditors.

Immigration experts said Friday it was the first they had heard of problems between state immigration auditors and the federal Department of Homeland Security.

The dispute is over access to federal E-Verify documents, which Haley said are crucial to allowing the state to enforce its 2008 law. Haley said the Department of Homeland Security has denied the state access to those documents and is not answering questions why. Haley sent a letter Friday to Homeland Security director Janet Napolitano about the dispute, which she said began in February.

"They continue to get in the way of me governing this state," Haley said of the federal government. "They can't be serious about illegal immigration if they won't allow us to enforce the law."

An official from the Department of Homeland Security said the agency had reached out to the governor's office to discuss the issue on multiple occasions but did not receive a response. He did not provide documentation to show how often the department reached out or what communication channels were used.

Adam Fetcher, a Homeland Security spokesman, said Haley's request was pending while the U.S. Supreme Court considered a case regarding an Arizona E-Verify law. Now that the Supreme Court has upheld that state's right to enforce immigration laws that regulate businesses' hiring practices, the department that manages E-Verify is reviewing the S.C. request, Fetcher said.

The news conference with Haley and Templeton, an appointee of the new Republican governor, caused immigration attorneys to scratch their heads.

South Carolina passed its first immigration laws in 2008 and began phasing in requirements for all businesses to verify the eligibility and legal status of all newly hired workers. Under the law, businesses are allowed to use the federal E-Verify program or accept a driver's license from South Carolina or from one of 26 other states, approved by the S.C. Department of Motor Vehicles.

The Legislature put the S.C. Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation in charge of auditing businesses. The agency has more than 20 auditors who inspect businesses; those inspections often are based on complaints from the public.

Frederick Manning, an immigration employment attorney with Fisher and Phillips in Columbia, said he has not heard of any instances in which a business did not show E-Verify documents to state inspectors when asked.

Manning said the state inspectors are effective and had a solid track record in finding illegal immigrants working in South Carolina. "This doesn't make sense to me."

Tammy Besherse, an S.C. Appleseed Legal Justice Center attorney who follows immigration legislation, said no one from the state Labor, Licensing and Regulation Department has told legislators this year that its agents have not been able to enforce the law because of the federal government. Besherse has attended every hearing this session that has involved immigration. "If she had said we can't enforce the law, they would have tried to amend the bill to make sure she could," Besherse said.

Manning said the majority of employers ask for a driver's license to meet the state's employment eligibility requirements, meaning the federal Homeland Security Department would not be in a position to interfere with the state's enforcement.

When a company uses E-Verify, it signs a memorandum of understanding with Customs and Immigration Services, which falls under the Department of Homeland Security. Those agreements include privacy provisions, intended to protect companies and their workers from fraud, Besherse said.

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Immigrants key to Tory victory in Ontario, Canadian immigration minister says

An interesting perspective. I wonder how well-founded it is? The Tories have certainly got the runs on the board Federally. But will that transfer to the Provincial elections? In Australia, Federal and State elections often go in different directions

Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney says immigrants allowed the Conservatives to take Ontario away from the Liberals in the federal election.

He says the Ontario Tories can do the same this fall if they stick to their conservative values and keep courting new Canadians.
Speaking at the provincial party's convention today, Kenney boasted that "Tory Toronto is back."

The Conservatives made a major breakthrough in Toronto on May 2, claiming eight Liberal seats in a city that's repeatedly rebuffed Tory advances.

Kenney says media and commentators will try to explain away the Harper government's majority mandate and its historic breakthrough in Ontario.

But he says his party picked up 23 more seats in the province because Conservative beliefs — such as job creation through lower taxes — resonate with Ontario voters.

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Immigration is 'out of control', admits British minister: Rising numbers dash Tory hopes of cuts

Immigration rose to near-record levels last year, official figures have revealed. Net migration increased at the fastest rate since Labour opened Britain’s doors to workers from the Eastern European states that joined the EU seven years ago.

In the year up to September 2010, the figure for net migration – the difference between immigration and emigration – was 242,000, the third highest on record.

Some 586,000 people arrived to live in Britain and 344,000 emigrated. The net migration of 242,000 was nearly 100,000 higher than the previous year. It means that David Cameron must more than halve immigration if he is to get anywhere close to the Coalition ‘aspiration’ of bringing net migration down to tens of thousands a year.

A raft of figures published yesterday delivered a series of blows to the Government’s hopes of curbing the levels of immigration that critics say have distorted the economy and deepened poverty and benefit dependency over the past 14 years.

Migration from Eastern Europe is back up again after falling in 2009. The numbers of Poles and other Eastern Europeans in the UK rose by 43,000. Immigration from Eastern Europe rose by some 50 per cent to 72,000 while the numbers of Eastern Europeans leaving to go home dropped by nearly half to 29,000.

Labour put no restrictions on the rights of Eastern Europeans to work in the UK when their countries joined the EU in 2004. As a result, the Coalition cannot close the doors or tighten the rules.

Ministers did succeed in cutting the numbers of student visas issued to those from outside Europe in the 12 months to March this year. Student visas issued fell by 2 per cent to 346,245 in the year to March. But this was offset by a rise in the numbers of work visas issued.

Despite the efforts of Home Secretary Theresa May to reduce visas issued to workers from outside Europe, the number rose 6 per cent to 161,815 in the year to March.

Two fifths of workers in London come from overseas, the ONS has said. More than 1.4million of the capital's working population were foreign born. By comparison, just over 2.3m were born in the UK. A third of high-skilled workers in the city - including accountants, doctors, teachers and scientists - are also foreign-born with 403,000 posts filled by overseas workers.

Overseas workers fill nearly two thirds of low-skilled jobs in London with just over 200,000 working in jobs such as cleaners, hotel porters, postmen and catering assistants - 80,000 more than British workers.

The Government blamed the previous Labour administration. Immigration Minister Damian Green said: ‘These statistics show that immigration was out of control thanks to the old system. ‘That is why we have already introduced radical changes to drive the numbers down and we will shortly be consulting on a range of new measures.’

Critics warned however that the Coalition is facing an increasingly difficult issue. Sir Andrew Green of Migration Watch said: ‘This sharp rise in immigration comes as a shock. ‘These figures show just what an enormous task the Coalition Government has inherited as a result of Labour’s mass immigration policy. ‘Firm measures are now absolutely essential. The impact on British-born workers is a particular concern that has been brushed under the carpet for too long.’

The net migration figure of 242,000 was 96,000 up in a year and nearly 50 per cent higher than the 163,000 annual figure estimated in the year to December 2008. It is the highest since the record of 260,000 in the year to June 2005.

A fall in emigration contributed to the rise in net migration. The number of emigrants was down from 427,000 a year at the end of 2008 to 344,000 in the year to the end of last September.

But numbers of people coming into the country stayed at roughly the same level that has been maintained since 2004. Over the 12 months to last September, 586,000 people arrived to live in Britain.

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Census: Hispanics half of US population growth

The US Census Bureau reported Thursday that the Hispanic population rose by 15.2 million between 2000 and 2010, accounting for more than half of the nation’s population increase of 27.3 million.

Put another way, the Hispanic population grew by 43 percent – four times America’s overall 9.7 percent growth rate and much more than the non-Hispanic white population, which grew by barely more than 1 percent over the same period.

Details about US population growth come as legal and political issues swirl around illegal immigration, which focuses largely on Hispanics crossing the border into the United States.

The latest Census Bureau information paints a picture of how and where the US Hispanic population is growing – most significantly in the South (57 percent) and the Midwest (49 percent).

“In eight states in the South (Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee) and in South Dakota, the Hispanic population more than doubled in size between 2000 and 2010,” according to the Census Bureau.

While more than half of the Hispanic population in the United States lives in three states (California, Texas, and Florida), the Hispanic population more than doubled in at least one of every four counties across the country.

About three-quarters of Hispanics in the United States indicated on their census forms that they are of Mexican, Puerto Rican, or Cuban origin. But since 2000, three other Hispanic-origin groups surpassed a population of 1 million: Salvadoran, Dominican, and Guatemalan.

While non-Hispanic whites remain a majority in the United States (64 percent, down from 69 percent in 2000), the growth in the Hispanic population has an important political dimension for both major parties.

In the 2010 midterm elections, 60 percent of Hispanics voted for Democrats and 38 percent voted for Republicans, according to exit polls. In 2008, Hispanics voted for Barack Obama by more than 2 to 1 (67 to 31 percent) over John McCain.

Race and ethnicity are likely to be a factor in the congressional redistricting mandated by the 2010 census.

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Strict Arizona immigration law gets Supreme Court blessing

The Supreme Court gave its blessing today to one of the strong immigration control laws passed by Arizona, a law that has served as a model for similar measures in other states.

Arizona requires businesses to use the national eVerify system to check workers immigration status. Licenses are revoked when illegal immigrants are intentionally employed.

The Chamber of Commerce and labor groups formed a powerful coalition to challenge the law. They argued it steps on the federal government's broad immigration powers.

Conservatives carried the day in the 5-3 vote. Chief Justice John Roberts said while federal law bars states from imposing civil and criminal penalties for immigration violations, Arizona's license revocation statute doesn't fall into the category.

Mike Hethmon of the Immigration Reform law Center praised the ruling. "The Supreme Court has essentially given its seal of approval to states making eVerify mandatory for businesses in their jurisdiction," Hethmon said.

Roy Beck of the reform group NumbersUSA sees it as much more than that, calling the ruling "a tremendous victory for unemployed Americans." "There are about 7 million illegal aliens estimated to be working in non-agricultural jobs. There are many Americans unemployed and lined up to get those jobs," Beck claimed.

Also supporting the ruling is the Latino advocacy group known as the League of United Latin American citizens (LULAC). Luis Vera, LULAC's general counsel, says the law should expose businesses that utilize underpaid immigrants in unsafe conditions.

About a dozen states have laws similar to Arizona's. "There are at least a dozen other states that have held back," Rob Beck said, "I think we're going to see those states passing those laws in the next year."

Further, he predicts the business community's concerned for a single uniform system will send it from the Supreme Court across the street to Congress, to push for a standard nationwide eVerify requirement.

One of the Chamber of Commerce's primary complaints to the Supreme Court was that employers would be facing a myriad of state laws that raise business costs.

Making its way to the justices is the challenge over Arizona's better known enforcement measures, which include allowing police to stop anyone suspected of being an illegal alien.

Lower courts have struck down key provisions. CBS News Senior Legal Analyst Andrew Cohen says while scholars will be poring over the language of today's ruling, the issues are different and the justices may not rule in favor of states' rights in that case.

At NumbersUSA, Roy Beck believes that law does not reduce illegal immigration as much as the one that was the subject of today's decision.

He says that's because "the thing that causes illegal aliens to go home eventually and prevents illegal aliens from wanting to come is whether they can get jobs."

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Hispanic Turnout 2010: Despite Predictions, It Neither Spiked nor Slumped

An analysis of new Census Bureau voting data from November 2010 shows that Hispanic turnout conformed to the pattern of recent midterm elections. Before the 2010 election some commentators argued that the failure to address immigration would increase Hispanic turnout, others argued it would cause them to stay home. The new data shows that neither of these predictions were correct.

Among the findings:

* Prior to the 2010 election, the Center for Immigration Studies projected that Hispanics would comprise 6.8 percent of the national electorate in congressional elections. The new Census Bureau data match this projection, with Hispanics comprising 6.9 percent of the vote.

* Our projection was correct because it was based on the assumption that Hispanic turnout would follow past patterns and that they would be neither especially animated nor especially disengaged in 2010.

* The 31.2 percent of Hispanic citizens who voted in 2010 is very similar to the 32.2 percent who voted in the 2006 mid-term election and the 31.2 percent who voted in the 2002 mid-term election. All of these values fall within the margin of error of ± 1.7 percentage points and indicate that 2010 was not unusual.

* In addition to the 6.9 percent of voters who identified as Hispanic in the 2010 election, 77.5 percent of voters identified as non-Hispanic white, 11.5 percent as non-Hispanic black, and 2.4 percent as non- Hispanic Asian.

* Hispanics are a much smaller share of voters than they are of the general population. In November 2010, Hispanics were 16.3 percent of the total U.S. population, 14.1 percent of the adult population, 10.1 percent of the adult citizen population, and 6.9 percent of those who voted.

* The size of the Hispanic vote varied significantly by state. In 2010, Hispanics were less than 5 percent of the vote in 39 states plus the District of Columbia, and more than 10 percent of the vote in only five states (New Mexico, California, Arizona, Texas, and Florida).

* Polling of Hispanics indicates that immigration is not one of their top issues. Like other voters, education, jobs, healthcare, and the federal deficit all rank above immigration in importance.

* This does not mean immigration is unimportant to Hispanics. It does mean it was not an issue that was important enough in 2010 to have a discernable impact on their overall turnout.

* Only 27 percent of Hispanic voters in the 2010 election were immigrants themselves (naturalized U.S. citizens) and just 14.9 percent lived in the same household as a non-citizen. The lack of direct personal experience with immigration may explain why the issue does not rank higher in importance to Hispanic voters.

* CNN’s national exit polls showed that in 2010, 60 percent of Hispanics voted for Democrats and 38 percent voted for Republicans. This compares to 69 percent and 30 percent in the last mid-term election in 2006. If the failure to address immigration played a role in Hispanic voting, it seems to have helped Republicans.

* However, the increase in the Republican share of the Hispanic vote in 2010 is almost certainly related to general voter dissatisfaction with the economy and the Democrats, and it parallels gains that Republicans made among many demographic groups.

Methods and Data

The data for this analysis come from the public use file of the Voting and Registration Supplement of the Current Population Survey (CPS) collected by Census Bureau, which contains about 100,000 adults. The Voting and Registration supplement is conducted in November every other year after Election Day. The public-use file of this data was recently released. Among other questions, the survey asks individuals if they are registered and if they voted. The Hispanic and race questions are separate. Hispanics are individuals in the CPS who self-identify as Hispanic or Latino, which means that they or their ancestors came from a country that derives its language and culture from Spain.

The above is a press release from from Center for Immigration Studies. 1522 K St. NW, Suite 820, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 466-8185 fax: (202) 466-8076. Email: center@cis.org. Contact: Steven Camarota, (202) 466-8185, sac@cis.org. The Center for Immigration Studies is an independent research institution which examines the impact of immigration on the United States. The Center for Immigration Studies is not affiliated with any other organization

ACLU asks court to block Indiana immigration law

The ACLU of Indiana is attempting to block a new law aimed at cracking down on illegal immigrants.

The ACLU filed Wednesday in in U.S. District Court in Indianapolis seeking to block the state's new E-Verify law. It would expand the reasons police can arrest immigrants and make the use of identification cards issued by foreign consulates illegal.

The law also mandates employers check their workers' citizenship.

The ACLU says the arrest provisions violate constitutional protections against arrest without probable cause. It also says that Indiana is overextending its constitutional bounds by regulating international affairs with the ID measure.

Gov. Mitch Daniels signed the measure into law May 10.

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Malaysia treats illegals harshly

Australia's Leftist government intends to send middle-class illegals from Iraq and Afghanistan there. If that happens, most will stop coming

UN Human Rights Commissioner Navi Pillay, who is visiting Australia, claimed yesterday the Gillard government risked breaching international laws with the proposed swap of 800 boat arrivals for 4000 refugees from Malaysia.

While Immigration Minister Chris Bowen insists the deal complies with the UN Refugee Convention, that document does not cover torture, cruel punishment or conditions in detention centres that are dealt with under other international covenants and UN guidelines.

His office could not guarantee covenants or guidelines would be part of the agreement, which Mr Bowen said would be signed within weeks. Pressed on whether canings and the caging of pregnant women or children would br prevented, Mr Bowen's spokesman said negotiations were ongoing.

Ms Pillay was critical of the government's proposal. "If checks and balances are not made there's a huge risk of violations," Ms Pillay said.

Amnesty International's Dr Graham Thom toured three Malaysian detention centres last year, hearing how detainees had died of leptospirosis contracted via rat urine.

He photographed women and a baby caged in squalid conditions at Lenggeng Immigration Depot, near Kuala Lumpur, and hundreds of men in a tennis court-sized enclosure.

"We went to three different centres and each was equally appalling," he said.

Refugee lawyer David Manne said he had assisted asylum seekers who had been in Malaysian detention camps which were overcrowded and rife with malnutrition. "There are very poor sanitary conditions, serious systematic abuse, beatings, whippings, canings," Mr Manne said.

A spokesman for the UN's refugee agency, the UNHCR, said "safeguards" were needed in the agreement to ensure any detention of asylum seekers was for a limited initial period.

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Europe Has Immigration Problems on Steroids

For all the problems we think we have with immigration, Europe's problems far exceed ours. The U.S. has always had a history of panic about new and alien groups pouring into our country (Irish, Italians, Jews, Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, and now Hispanics). But all of these groups came here to become American; they integrated and contributed. By and large, the same is true of Muslim immigrants to the U.S. today-particularly Iranians and Afghans. In Europe, however, many in the flood of Muslim immigrants are not integrating well-partly out of today's spate of Islamism but partly because ordinary Europeans find these immigrants adhere to an alien culture.

Europeans, after the horrors and genocides of World War II, made a commitment to open their doors to needy immigrants. England is awash with Pakistanis; France with North Africans; Germany with Turks from religious villages; and the Scandinavian countries have been the most generous of all, taking in Somalis, Iraqis, Moroccans, and others. All are creating trouble on two fronts: social integration and horrific welfare costs. The educated elites, who run Europe, have ideological notions that do not jibe with the realities faced by ordinary working Europeans who have not found these immigrants a benefit to their lives.

On the social front (little publicized) are the soaring crime rates: rapes, domestic violence, honor killings, incest, forced child marriages, and public belligerence against European culture. On the economic front, it is even worse. There is enormous welfare fraud, financial support for polygamous families with bloated birthrates, and an overwhelming of these countries' healthcare systems.

In Europe, Canada, and Australia, there is growth of Immigrants scamming social services. One clever rascal in Canada (arrested in 2011) provided false Canadian citizenship documents to hundreds of people in the Middle East so they could collect benefits and tax refunds of up to $500,000. Even worse, none of the recipients actually lived in Canada. The Mounties caught him.

An Iranian immigrant was told by his Swedish social worker that there was no need to get a job because the Swedish government put checks in the mail each month. (Someone should find her and fire her.) Indeed Sweden does this, to the tune of about $7 billion every year, which has contributed to bringing the Swedish welfare state to the brink of bankruptcy. The same is true for Norway. Non-Western immigrants, they say, are ten times as likely to be on social assistance as native Norwegians.

Muslim immigrants in Denmark make up 5% of the population but consume 40% of welfare spending. In France, a polygamous Muslim father of 17 children was charged with welfare fraud when authorities discovered that two of his “wives” lived in Dubai for a year while continuing to get welfare benefits worth 10,000 Euros. One of his wives had been fined for driving while wearing a niqab that restricted her vision.

Australia, which is less tolerant of criminal immigrants than Europe, discovered that an Algerian immigrant and father of seven, Abdul Nacer Benbriks, on trial for terrorism, had been ordered deported three times, never worked a day in 19 years, and has cost the Australians millions in welfare payments, baby bonus checks, and other benefits.

Canada's most notorious terrorist family, the Khadrs, still live on welfare in the Toronto suburbs, and they all share the beliefs of their relative, confessed terrorist Omar Khadr, still in Guantanamo Bay, having pleaded guilty to killing a U.S. soldier in Afghanistan in 2002.

Many well-known Islamic radicals are also on the dole. In London, Anjem Choudary, a notorious hate preacher, has bragged about receiving 25,000 pounds a year in benefits. He also threatened an attack during the recent royal wedding.

Finally, someone is trying to do something about it. British Prime Minister David Cameron has said that large-scale immigration had caused “discomfort and disjointedness” in some parts of the country. He wants the government to reduce net immigration from hundreds of thousands to tens of thousands a year. That is a start, but does not begin to address the social and financial cost of their indulgent generosity and careless follow-up.

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Leftist denial of immigration realities reaches new heights (or depths) in Australia

LABOR is so confident its refugee swap with Malaysia is going to slow the flow of boats that it has budgeted for the arrival of only 750 asylum-seekers next financial year, despite more than 6000 having arrived last year.

Immigration Department secretary Andrew Metcalfe said the figure was in line with arrivals in 2002 -- after the Howard government's introduction of the Pacific Solution.

Speaking in a Senate estimates hearing yesterday, Mr Metcalfe said the prediction of 750 boatpeople for 2011-12 had been made because "the government believes its policy will work". He was referring to the latest announcements by Labor that involves a five-for-one refugee swap with Malaysia and the possible reopening of an offshore processing centre on Papua New Guinea's Manus Island.

"As a result of policy measures put in place, the figure of 750 was decided," Mr Metcalfe said. "The government is confident policy changes made will have a significant impact on boat arrivals. "The figure is purely a figure identified for financial planning purposes . . . that was the same number as the people who came in 2002, which was also after a major policy change."

Mr Metcalfe said the 750 figure would include asylum-seekers sent to any offshore facility, but would not include "up to 800" to be sent to Malaysia as part of the planned deal.

Australia will take 4000 certified refugees from Malaysia even if fewer than 800 asylum-seekers are sent there.

The Immigration Department's chief accountant, Stephen Sheehan, said the budget measures included an average occupancy of about 6500 detainees. "We are budgeting for 750 arrivals as part of our modelling process and an average occupancy of 6556 -- including those IMAs (irregular maritime arrivals) who are sent offshore but spend a few days in Australian detention," Mr Sheehan said.

Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said the 750 figure "proved" the government would indeed send all 800 asylum-seekers to Malaysia. "It just means back to business as usual," he said. "This is further evidence of why we need a parliamentary inquiry into the immigration detention network."

Mr Morrison on Sunday announced the Coalition's plan for a "warts and all" inquiry into immigration.

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£25 milion cost of 'bribing' foreign criminals to go home

Half of foreign prisoners kicked out of the country are now “bribed” to go home costing the taxpayer millions of pounds, The Telegraph can disclose.

Almost 7,000 criminals have been removed from Britain in the past 16 months, but 47 per cent went only after taking advantage of a voluntary return programme which offers up to £1,500 in cash, a leaked document revealed. It also shows the trend is growing – just one in three prisoners deported in 2009 left under the voluntary programme.

The numbers mean that since the scheme began in 2006 the taxpayer has spent between £20 million and £25 million on persuading criminals who have no right to remain in the UK to go home.

The Coalition faced criticism last year after it emerged that it had trebled the value of the cash incentive to clear Britain's jails and detention centres of foreign offenders. Those who agree to go before they have even finished their sentence receive the largest payouts.

The incentives, first offered by the Labour government to avoid drawn-out deportation battles, were criticised by the Tories when in opposition.

Figures for last year have not been officially published but a UK Border Agency document meant for internal distribution shows that between January last year and last month, 6,989 foreign criminals were deported. Of these, 3,338 went under the repatriation scheme at a cost of between £7 million and £12 million.

In October last year, the Coalition reduced the value of the package to between £500 and £1,500 but made it all available in cash for the first time.

Earlier in the year the package was worth between £3,000 and £5,000 but only £500 of that was available in cash.

Between 2006 and 2009 some 3,860 offenders took advantage of the scheme at a cost of around £12 million.

One immigration source said the packages were "essentially bribes", adding: "If we could offer UK criminals such fantastic sums for their retraining, resettlement and housing, reoffending would drop massively." Sir Andrew Green, the chairman of MigrationWatch UK, said: "There is a case for encouraging returns but when it becomes quite so popular one wonders if it has gone a little too far."

In opposition, Dominic Grieve, who is now the Attorney General, called the scheme "simply outrageous".

Damian Green, who is now the Immigration Minister, said in opposition that Labour had abandoned any attempt at removing foreign criminals and was instead "paying them to leave". Now, he says the scheme is "practical" and will save money. The Home Office last night said it refused to comment on leaked documents.

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Recent posts at CIS below

See here for the blog. The CIS main page is here.

1. The Problem with Obama's Immigration Plan (Op-ed)

2. Romney and Huntsman on Illegal Aliens (Blog)

3. New Wrinkle in H-1B Fraud: Stealing from the Taxpayers, Not the Workers (Blog)

4. 9/11's Triumvirate of Terrorist Travel: al Qaeda, Hezbollah, and Iran (Blog)

5. DoJ Zaps Discrimination vs. U.S. Citizens, but Very Rarely (Blog)

6. Golden Parachutes for Illegal Chipotle Workers? (Blog)

7. Amnesty for All Haitians in U.S., Save those Arriving in Last Four Months (Blog)

8. Security Gaps Still Present in Visa Waiver Program (Blog)

9. Senate Holds Hearing on Immigration Courts, II (Blog)

10. Senate Holds Hearing on Immigration Courts, I (Blog)

11. NYT Exposes Fraud in Yet Another Foreign Worker Program (Blog)

12. Border Exchange (Blog)

13. Post-Modern Journalistic Partisanship (Blog)

Canadian Government Plans New Immigration Law, Minister Says

They are undoubtedly feeling their oats now that they have an absolute majority

Canada’s ruling Conservative Party will reintroduce a law aimed at curbing human smuggling when Parliament convenes next month, Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said.

The proposed law was scrapped earlier this year when an election was called for May 2. The Conservatives won the right to form a majority government in the vote, which means they no longer need the support of opposition lawmakers to pass laws.

A cargo ship carrying about 500 Sri Lankan refugees made headlines in August when it reached Canadian waters off the coast of British Columbia. Canada said at the time that human smugglers were behind the operation.

“Criminal networks” are charging people “tens of thousands of dollars” to transport them to Canada illegally, Kenney told CTV television network’s Question Period program in an interview in Ottawa today.

“We committed in our platform to bring forward a bill to crack down on human smuggling,” the minister said. “We know those operations are still going on in East Asia. So this legislation will come forward fairly early to try to deter them.”

The proposed law would also make it easier for Canada to deport fraudulent refugee claimants after a few months instead of several years, Kenney said. About 60 percent of the asylum seekers who come to Canada are found “not to be legitimately in need of our protection,” he said.

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Unlimited free phone calls for illegals detained in Australia -- a big hit on taxpayers

The figures below relate to only one of the many "detention centres" (jails) in operation

PHONE bills at the Scherger defence facility near Weipa have soared by more than a quarter of a million dollars in the first six months of the centre being used to house asylum seekers. The hidden cost is revealed in a bill for $259,455 that Defence sent to the Department of Immigration this month.

The revelations come as the Government faces a series of political attacks on its border protection policies, with the Opposition and Greens calling for inquiries into the way immigration detention centres are run.

Departmental staff will face a grilling from Opposition senators in Budget estimates hearings this week over an estimated $1.7 billion cost blowout in border protection.

Labor's plans to swap 800 asylum seekers with 4000 refugees from Malaysia will cost about $292 million. These costs are likely to increase, with the Government discussing similar deals with other countries, including Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and Thailand.

The phone bill is outlined in a Government contract notice for the Scherger detention centre.

It comes after the temporary use of the Cape York centre as an immigration detention centre was extended for another year. Numbers of asylum seekers housed in the remote far north Queensland facility have almost doubled from the original capacity of 300. There were 591 detainees in the centre this month, according the most recent data.

About 100 Afghan and Sri Lankan detainees were involved in violent clashes at the centre last week, raising fears of overcrowding.

Immigration Minister Chris Bowen declined to comment on the telephone costs. But a Department of Immigration spokeswoman said the costs related to all phone calls from the remote centre between October 2010 and March this year. "The figure is for the cost of all phone calls from Scherger immigration detention centre made by Defence, DIAC, Defence service provider... and local detainee phone calls," the department's spokeswoman said.

Opposition MP Jamie Briggs, who runs the Coalition's "waste watch" committee, demanded the Government provide a detailed breakdown of phone costs at Scherger and other immigration detention centres. "It appears to be an extraordinarily high cost," he said.

Mr Briggs said he did not oppose asylum seekers being able to call their families overseas, but said taxpayers should not be paying for "excessive" numbers of calls. He said he knew of examples of detainees running up large phone bills in other centres through daily calls to destinations including Iran.

Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison yesterday urged a wide-ranging inquiry into the immigration detention system.

The Greens and independent MP Andrew Wilkie have backed the inquiry but have called for it to consider scrapping mandatory detention.

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4 Obama Immigration Claims That Just Aren't True

“Are the borders really secure?” is probably not the best set-up for the next Geico commercial. No, they’re really not secure.

This president would have us believe otherwise. His immigration speech in El Paso, Texas, bordered as much on deception as it did physically with Mexico, just over the Rio Grande. President Obama - now candidate Obama -- did his best to convince Americans that our borders are secure and that interior enforcement is up in order to justify amnesty for illegal aliens to appease his special interests supporters and stoke his voting base.

The problem is that when given close scrutiny, the president’s claims range from minor omissions to major whoppers. Here are

1. “We are deporting those who are here illegally”

The president is suggesting that deportations are up. Not so fast.

The number of deportations in 2009 and 2010 is higher under the Obama administration than at any other time, but it’s not because of increased enforcement. The higher numbers reflect many removal cases that were already in the pipeline, leftovers from Bush-era enforcement. Once those removals are complete, one wonders how the deportation numbers can possibly be sustained since few new removal cases are being initiated because large numbers of non-criminal illegal alien cases are being dismissed by executive fiat. Deportations have, in fact, already declined slightly from 2009 to 2010.

Ultimately, the Commander-in-Chief should be deporting illegal aliens and not expect a gold star for simply enforcing the law, nor using basic immigration enforcement as a bargaining chip for amnesty. Even at a rate of 400,000 removals per year it would still take the federal government 30 years to remove the 12 million illegal aliens currently living in the U.S.

2. “We’ve increased the removal of criminals by 70 percent”

True, but with a major catch. More criminal aliens – illegal aliens who commit violent felonies – are indeed being deported but it is to the exclusion of almost all other illegal aliens!

Think of two similarly sized pie charts, each representing overall deportations. One is 2009, the other is 2010. The 2010 pie is about the same size but is sliced much differently because DHS deported more criminal aliens in 2010. This is the basis of the deception. The president is taking credit for increasing the percentage of criminal aliens removed, hoping we don’t notice that most other illegal aliens are just being ignored. Thus, the Obama Administration is gradually accomplishing an “administrative amnesty” while simultaneously convincing Americans that enforcement has increased.

Criminal-aliens-only immigration enforcement was never the intent of Congress. Laws regarding removal apply to all illegal aliens, irrespective of whether they have committed additional crimes. By selectively choosing classes of people to which the laws apply, the administration is ignoring federal law and conferring upon itself the power to act as it sees fit and as it suits the political whims of the president.

3. “The fence is now basically complete”

The fence has basically hit a wall and has for a long time. There are only 32 miles of the recommended double layer fence built and only 649 miles of single layer fence on a border that’s 2,000 miles long. DHS’s own estimates show that less than half of the southern border is under operational control. And entirely lost in the discussion is the Canadian border and U.S. coastlines, unsecured areas that mounting terrorist threats can, and will exploit.

4. “We’re going after employers who knowingly exploit people and break the law.”

Worksite raids have been abolished and replaced with paper audits that impose modest fines that employers simply roll into the cost of doing business. Employers are given a slap on the wrist and illegal alien employees are simply released.

During a January 2011 hearing of the House Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Immigration, Rep. Lamar Smith (R- Tex.) reported that, “in the area of worksite enforcement, arrests have fallen 77%; criminal arrests are down 60%, indictments are how 64% and convictions have fallen by 68% since 2008.”

The media made much of President George W. Bush’s ill-fated 2003 “Mission Accomplished” speech on the USS Abraham Lincoln in which he prematurely proclaimed “an end to major combat operations in Iraq.”

President Obama’s similar proclamation that our borders are now secure and immigration enforcement has increased deserves no less attention, particularly since the next stage of planned operations is amnesty.

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Texas Senate revives immigration enforcement bill

The so-called “sanctuary cities” bill would prohibit local governments and police agencies from adopting polices to ban their officers from asking detained people about their immigration status. The bill was the subject of angry debate before it passed the House.

The Senate Transportation and Homeland Security Committee had slowed down the bill earlier this week, but revived with Friday. The 5-3 vote broke along party lines with Republicans supporting the bill.

Some Senate Hispanic lawmakers have said they worry the bill would allow police to target Latinos and they consider it racially motivated.

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What 'Comprehensive' Immigration Reform Compromises?

Whatever your views about Immigration Reform, the "Comprehensive" part of recent proposals means imposition of a national identification scheme on American citizens. A little-known core provisions of the “Schumer-Graham” proposal mandates a biometric worker ID system: it requires a national ID card with two-biometric features, and computer tracking system for all U.S. "workers." That means most American citizens would have to carry a national ID.

The U.S. labor force of 160 million men and women dwarfs the estimated 10 million "illegal immigrants." Yet every employable citizen would have to be dually biometricizes-fingerprinted and digitally photographer, perhaps retina scanned. Every “worker” would have to get a "tamper-proof" ID card and have to carry it whenever working on a job. It would have to be produced on demand by employers or government inspectors.

Since the 1930s, multiple schemes for a national ID systems have been rationalized as ways to ferret out fascist or communist infiltration, streamline government services, stop terrorism, or end illegal immigration. New justifications and foolproof schemes pop up every few years like outbreaks of mushrooms. Every one is aimed at the "bad guys," but each one actually undermines the fundamental freedoms of the "good guys." A national ID would compromise what it means to be an American citizen.

Furthermore, this scheme one would even "bait-and-switch" legal immigrants: expecting to shred their green cards on naturalization, they (and other "legal" workers) would instead get shackled to red-and-blue cards. Worker IDs would also become a hugely expensive waste of tax dollars, no doubt tens of billions of dollars more than any large estimate.

Whatever you think is the solution to illegal immigration -- from tall walls to open borders, to guest worker contracts -- a national ID system won't solve the problems. Countries like China and Germany have both strict household registration system and national ID card requirements and bureaucracies. But they still have extensive illegal immigration problems. Both are centralized state provider of order and services, though the Federal Republic is a democracy. Neither represents the American way.

Rationalized and ineffective, a national ID system sadly, too, reverses the proper relationship of consent of the governed to government. Rather than the people delegating democratic power by consent, in a national identification system, the ID imposing government gives, and can take away, consent for the subjects to have identities, rights and benefits. Like the individual health insurance mandate, worker ID systems are the state telling citizens what rights they have, or don't have, to prosper and how to manage their lives in their best interests. Neither is a proper government position.

If you don't like health insurance mandates, you won't like mandatory biometric national worker IDs. Whatever your views of the benefits of immigration reform, any proposal needs to drop the worker ID schemes from consideration. Like arguments for nationalizing the driver's licenses in "Real IDs," the debate around IDs to end illegal immigration, is just another excuse for an unnecessary, outlandishly expensive, compromised and detrimental federal program. Here’s a chance to let your government know now that you oppose any form of a national ID plan.

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Violent "refugees" in Australia

Are these the people we want in Australia? All offenders should be denied permission to stay

THREE critical incidents are being reported each day across detention centres in what insiders claim is a system out of control.

Documents revealed to Federal Parliament show there were more than 3400 incidents reported across the detention network in the nine months to February this year. Of those, 850 were deemed critical.

According to reporting protocols adopted by Serco, the company contracted to run the centres, critical incidents include assaults, bomb threats, chemical and biological threats, death, sexual assaults, riots, escape, hunger strikes, damage to facilities or protests.

"Are things out of control? They have been out of control for five years," one worker said.

SOURCE

Immigration 'boosted the UK population by 1.75m in just eight years'

The number of people from minority backgrounds who live in England and Wales went up by 2.5million in eight years, figures revealed yesterday. Estimates said that 1.75million of the rise came about because of immigration, while 734,000 was the result of rising birthrates. The increases meant the minority population increased by 37 per cent between 2001 and 2009.

According to the Office for National Statistics, one in six of the population is now from an ethnic minority or white non-British background.

In the eight year period studied, the population of white foreigners rose by 550,000 as Eastern Europeans and migrants from Commonwealth countries poured in.

Numbers grew by a further two million with people from black and Asian backgrounds thanks to immigration, rising birthrates, and asylum seeking.

The ONS said its figures, based on immigration counts, census data and birth and death records, had been found to tally with its existing population estimates.

The figures cast new light on the last Labour government’s immigration policies, which added three million to the population between 1997 and last year.

Sir Andrew Green of Migrationwatch said: ‘This is the legacy of Labour’s mass immigration policy now appearing in the official figures. They have, whether deliberately or not, changed the face of Britain. ‘If immigration continues on anything like this scale, we are heading for a population of 70million in 20 years’ time, absolutely contrary to the frequently expressed wishes of the British people.’

The breakdown showed a rise of just under 553,000 in the white non-British population, of which 514,000 were people who came to England and Wales as migrants.

These were ‘particularly people born elsewhere in Europe’ but there was also a large inflow from Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa.

Much of the increase was driven by numbers from Eastern Europe, especially Poland, who arrived after Britain opened its borders when their countries joined the European Union in 2004.

Among black and Asian groups, the Indian population rose by 380,000 to 1.43million and the Pakistani population went up from 728,000 to top one million.

Because of comparatively young age profiles and higher fertility rates than among other groups, Pakistani and Bangladeshi populations were driven up by high numbers of births.

Numbers of black Africans in the population went up by more than 300,000 to reach nearly 800,000. The ONS said one reason for this was high numbers of African asylum seekers. Its report pointed to the effect of ‘international migration, in particular of people from African Commonwealth countries, and from citizens of African countries, notably Zimbabwe, Somalia, Eritrea and the Democratic Republic of Congo, seeking asylum’.

The fastest-growing ethnic group was of Chinese people, whose population nearly doubled to reach 452,000 in 2009.

The greatest concentration of black and Asian numbers was in London, where in several areas ‘minority’ populations make up a majority. However the share of ethnic minority and white non-British in the capital stayed roughly the same, at about 40 per cent, over the eight years. This is because while large numbers of immigrants arrived, many minority families joined the growing flight to suburban towns in the Home Counties.

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Alligators, Moats and Other Such Nonsense

President Obama gave what was billed as an important speech on immigration last week near the border in El Paso, Texas. Unfortunately, it was one of the most demagogic moments in recent presidential history. Nearly everything Obama said was either factually incorrect or deliberately misleading.

Why, 28 months into the Obama presidency, is there now a sudden push to pass "comprehensive" immigration reform? After all, from 2009 to early 2011, Obama had large Democratic majorities in both the House and Senate. Why hasn't Obama already rammed through his own immigration bill, as he did with health care?

The answer, of course, is that about 70 percent of the American people consistently poll against the president's initiatives on illegal immigration. Obama simply did not want to sign an easily passable bill that would earn him further unpopularity.

But now he has lost the House. A close re-election bid looms. The president is enjoying a sudden bounce in popularity after the capture of Osama bin Laden. He needs to firm up his base of Latino supporters. Presto: time to blame Republicans for his own past unwillingness to get a bill through his Democratic Congress.

Obama's demagoguery seemed to work on the crowd in El Paso. It interrupted the president's speech to answer, "Tear it down," when he mentioned the border fence. The audience booed, and jeered on cue, "They're racist," when he went after Republicans. And it joined Obama, the sudden cheerleader in chief, in chanting, "Yes, we can."

In blaming Republicans, Obama charged that their fears about open borders were groundless since, "The fence is now basically complete." And to emphasize that claim, he mocked his opponents by saying, "Maybe they'll need a moat. Maybe they'll need alligators in the moat."

That sounds cute. But it is again quite untrue. The fence is most assuredly not "basically" complete. Currently, fewer than 700 miles of the more than 1,900-mile border have any sort of barrier. And less than 5 percent of the border has a secure double-fenced impediment. Even with increased patrols, a recent Government Accountability Office study found that 40 percent of the border is essentially open and unguarded. There are still well over a half-million illegal border crossings per year.

In a fit of projection, the president also accused his opponents of politicking the issue for partisan advantage: "We've seen a lot of blame and a lot of politics and a lot of ugly rhetoric around immigration."

That too was a distortion for at least two reasons. One, during the 2010 midterm election, the president himself urged Latinos to "punish" their political "enemies." That advice sure seemed like "ugly rhetoric."

And in the El Paso speech, the president rallied his listeners to go lobby for his proposals: "So I'm asking you to add your voices to this debate. You can sign up to help at whitehouse.gov." Whipping up crowds to log onto his website seems just like "the usual Washington games" that Obama deplored in the speech.

The president also deliberately confused legal and illegal immigration in lamenting the inability of highly skilled immigrants to obtain work visas and citizenship opportunities. But polls show wide support for legal immigration based on skill sets, not just on proximity to the border or family ties.

What the president did not dare reveal was that to let in professionals and business people from around the world, based on their skills and earning potential, might also mean to curtail those without education and capital -- in other words, to discourage the millions of illegal immigrants from Mexico who don't speak English or have high school educations, and who often have little means of support but apparent political clout.

Even when the president offered some sensible proposals about illegal aliens paying fines, applying formally for citizenship and learning English, he was still disingenuous. Obama deliberately floated these proposals to his partisan audience without any details of enforcement, since to do so would likely turn off the cheering crowd.

So how exactly would Obama coerce some 11 million illegal aliens into paying a fine, returning to the immigration line to apply legally, or learning English? By threat of deportation or incarceration?

The vast majority of the American public is not racist or "playing politics" in worrying about out-of-control illegal immigration. The enforcement of existing federal immigration law has become a joke. Drug violence in Mexico is destabilizing an entire country and spilling over the border. Jobs are scarce, with unemployment here still at 9 percent. Many billions of dollars in remittances to Mexico leave the American Southwest, often from illegal aliens who rely on American social services to make up the difference.

These are serious issues that deserve more from a president than re-election pandering at the border and bad jokes about alligators and moats.

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Denmark brings in strict border controls to crack down on illegal immigrants from North Africa

Denmark yesterday joined an increasing number of European countries seeking tighter border controls in an attempt to curb crime and illegal immigration. Finance Minister Claus Hjort Frederiksen said police and customs officials will use border stations for random checks on cars and passports, and increase the use of scanners designed to detect illegal immigrants hiding in vans. He said control booths will be erected at crossings to Germany and Sweden and in harbours and airports.

Hjort Frederiksen insisted that since the controls will be random they 'will be within the framework of the Schengen system' - a free-travel agreement that has removed compulsory passport controls between many internal borders in Europe.

The system has been under pressure recently with the EU Commission considering reintroducing national border controls in the face of a flood of North African immigrants.

Uprisings across the Middle East have caused a humanitarian and refugee crisis with hundreds of thousands of people fleeing countries.

Last week, EU Home Affairs Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom suggested reintroducing temporary national border checks 'under very exceptional circumstances' after France and Italy had demanded changes to the Schengen system. France prompted the row by temporarily closing a key railway frontier with Italy and reintroducing tough extra checks on immigrant papers.

Mediterranean border nations like Greece, Italy, Spain and Malta have also complained that the 27-nation EU has dumped its immigration issues and the costs of dealing with illegal immigrants on their backs.

The agreement in Denmark was made to meet demands from the government's nationalistic ally, the Danish People's Party, and is expected to be approved by Parliament. 'We see a rise in cross-border crime: drugs, eastern European gangs, human trafficking, money smuggling, etc. And one of the efficient ways to fight this is border control,' Hjort Frederiksen said. 'It will be put in place as soon as possible.'

Justice Minister Lars Barfoed said Denmark was 'cracking down' on transnational crime. 'Denmark must be a safe country and we will do everything that is possible to combat the rising crime from abroad,' Barfoed said. 'It will otherwise not impede the free crossing of borders by citizens and businesses.'

Some 270 million kroner ($52 million) have been earmarked to build booths, buy electronic equipment and provide more resources to police and customs.

When Denmark joined the Schengen system a decade ago, border barriers were removed and control stations shut down. Instead, random customs and police checks were carried out across the country.

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The invisible price tag of immigration

Comment from Canada

There has been much huffing and puffing by politicians, the media and immigrant lobbyists about the government’s plan to reduce the number of parents and grandparents joining their immigrant offspring in Canada next year.

Yes, the policy change is unfair. Many immigrants have come to Canada having been promised that their parents and grandparents could join them so that they can continue the cultural traditions of their homelands and receive help with family chores and child care.

But, as is the case with all government policies, benefits to one group of citizens impose costs on another. In this case, the benefits to immigrants come at the expense of Canadian taxpayers. Unfortunately, these costs do not show up in government budgets but are hidden behind the provisions of the welfare state and driven by low average incomes of recent immigrants.

New data and studies show the extent of this fiscal burden; recent immigrants remit lower average incomes and tax payments than other Canadians, even 10 years after their arrival. At the same time, these immigrants on average absorb at least the same amount of social benefits as other Canadians.

As a result, $6,000 is annually transferred to the average immigrant at the expense of Canadian taxpayers. In 2006, the value of these transfers to all 2.7 million immigrants who arrived between 1987 and 2004 and still live in Canada came to $16.3-billion. Taking account of the 1.5 million immigrants who arrived since 2004, the fiscal burden comes to $25-billion in 2010. These costs represent a significant portion of the federal government’s $55-billion deficit projected for the fiscal year 2011.

Important here is the fact that parents and grandparents lower the observed average incomes of all immigrants. The reasons are obvious: parents and grandparents tend to be elderly, often cannot speak English or French and possess few marketable skills. At the same time, the number of parents and grandparents arriving as immigrants are high: 84,917, or 6.7% of the 1.3 million immigrants admitted to Canada from 2006 to 2010.

The fiscal transfers to parents and grandparents are much higher than those of the average immigrant, not only because of their low incomes but also because they tend to be of an age where their demand for costly medical services is at its highest level.

For example, in 2009, family-class immigrants made up 22.1% of all immigrants who entered Canada that year. Those who were selected by the federal government on the basis of their occupational skills and other characteristics contributing to their economic success accounted for only 16.2%.

To alleviate this fiscal strain on taxpayers, Canada’s immigration selection process should be reformed to replace the existing, failed system of using points to select immigrants, with a system that emphasizes a reliance on market forces. This would result in giving preference to immigrants with job offers in Canada and skills needed by Canadian employers.

In our recent paper, Immigration and the Canadian Welfare State 2011, Patrick Grady and I outlined our proposals for reforming the Canadian immigration system to one that places a premium on employable skills. We envisioned a system where would-be immigrants with job offers are provided with temporary work visas, valid for two years and renewable for an additional two years upon the presentation of evidence of continued employment. After four years and continued employment in Canada, the holders of work visas would be eligible for landed immigrant status and for citizenship two years later. Spouses and dependents of the holders of work visas would be allowed to enter Canada under a program of family work visas, which would allow them to accept employment. Finally, immigrants would be able to have their parents and grandparents join them as landed immigrants in Canada after posting a bond that is used to pay for their health care and other social benefits.

Since holders of work visas pay the same personal income, GST and other sales taxes and social insurance premiums as Canadian citizens do, the holders of these visas would rightfully and automatically be entitled to receive the same public benefits that are available to Canadian taxpayers, including employment insurance, provincial welfare, health care and public pensions.

Over time, the immigration issue has attained a kind of religious mystique, so much that any debate over the costs of immigration will immediately be dismissed as racist, or anti-Canadian. But with Canada now facing the prospect of large, cyclical deficits, it’s time for a no-holds-barred examination of current immigration policy.

An examination of the true costs of immigration on Canadian taxpayers would be a good place to start.

SOURCE

Where are they? 181,000 with expired visas are still in Britain

Around 181,000 migrants are thought to be living in Britain unlawfully after their visas expired, a report said last night. The total includes students and workers from outside the EU who should have left the country in the last two-and-a-half years.

UK Border Agency bosses came under fire from MPs after admitting they have no idea how many have returned home because they do not count people out of the country. A new system to monitor electronically everyone who departs will not be fully in place for at least another two years.

The report, by the Commons Public Accounts Committee, warned the agency not to use the lack of exit controls as an ‘excuse’ to ignore thousands who are overstaying illegally.

Committee chairman Margaret Hodge said: ‘The agency has not got a grip on making sure that migrant workers whose visas have expired actually leave the UK.

‘It estimates that 181,000 such workers are staying on without permission – but it can’t even verify the figures, and does not try to enforce the employer’s duty to ensure that the people they bring in leave when they are required to do so.’ The report also raised fears that British workers may be missing out on jobs because some foreign workers are exempt from the Government’s immigration cap.

Tens of thousands of non-EU workers who arrive every year through the ‘intra-company transfer route’ are not counted as adding to the official limit.

Instead they must comply with a salary minimum, set at £40,000 for anyone staying over a year, to ensure they are not simply cheap replacements for British staff.

Many are IT workers transferred in to work in multinational companies. Last year 64,000 workers came in via this route. But the committee said there was a ‘lack of control’ over transferred workers. Employers can pay up to 40 per cent of salary as accommodation and other allowances, but the report said this made it hard to be sure what the workers were actually earning.

Mrs Hodge added: ‘Most workers enter through this route and, for instance, tens of thousands of IT workers have been brought in through intra-company transfers at a time when UK residents with IT skills are struggling to find work.’

She also criticised the agency for a lack of checks on employers. Fewer than one in five businesses are visited before being granted a licence to bring in workers.

The cap on the number of non-EU workers was imposed from the start of last month, and will allow 21,700 workers in over the year, a cut of one fifth.

After wrangling within the Coalition, however, Business Secretary Vince Cable won an exemption for transferred workers. He also won concessions which watered down reforms to the student visa system.

Immigration Minister Damian Green said: ‘This report demonstrates why the immigration system needs radical reform.

‘This Government has already introduced an annual limit on economic migrants. We are making it more difficult for people to live in the UK illegally by taking action against employers that flout our rules.’

SOURCE




Recent posts at CIS below

See here for the blog. The CIS main page is here.

1. Visa Security (Testimony)

2. USCIS Moves (gasp!) to Upgrade Arriving Immigrant Populations (Blog)

3. Ethnic Politicking in El Paso (Blog)

4. Only 30% of Americans Agree with Obama that Border Is Secure (Blog)

5. No Taxpayer Dollars for Sanctuary Cities, States, or Federal Agencies (Blog)

6. DHS Raids Social Security System and Zaps U.S. Workers – Again (Blog)

7. Huffington Post Skips E-Verify (Blog)

8. The Startup Visa Fraud (Blog)

9. Measuring Border Security (Blog)

10. Honduran Woman Tries to Deport Her Own Mother (Blog)

11. Credibility Gap (Blog)

12. Obama's Amnesty Speech (Blog)

13. The Outcomes of 'Comprehensive' Reform (Blog)

14. A Roundup of H-1B News (Blog)

15. Refugee Resettlement: No Easy Solution (Blog)

16. How One Illegal Outwitted Federal, State Authorities for 30 Years (Blog)

British Public report 300 immigration abuses every day

Immigration officials receive 300 reports a day of suspected illegal migrants and other abuses, a watchdog revealed today.

But the way the UK Border Agency handles the intelligence came under intense criticism with official not even able to say whether a call resulted in an arrest.

John Vine, the chief inspector of UKBA, said the picture was “unacceptable” and that intelligence is often focused on hitting targets rather than targeting those organising illegal immigration.

A separate report by the watchdog also revealed that plans to arrest suspected illegal immigrants had to be delayed because of a lack of detention space.

Mr Vine said UKBA received more than 100,000 calls from the public every year – or 2,100 a week – with allegation of immigration abuse. It includes suspected illegal workers, illegal entry and sham marriages. But he said the agency was "unable to identify the proportion of allegations that had resulted in people being prevented from entering the UK, or which had led to enforcement action against people living or working illegally in the UK".

Frontline staff at the UK's ports also used different methods to spot suspicious people or vehicles, but had no way of telling which of these best identified potential offences or offenders.

Mr Vine said: “There is a real need for the agency to focus more rigorously on the actual outcome of intelligence. "There is insufficient understanding across the agency of the role that intelligence should play and whether or not it is the driving force for meeting objectives. "The agency should have a clearer idea of how the use of intelligence contributes to preventing and detecting immigration and customs offences."

A separate report in to the agency's arrest team in Croydon found four of six operations planned by one of the agency's 53 arrest teams had to be rescheduled due to a "lack of detention space". "The remaining four operations were due to be rescheduled when detention space became available," he said. "However, as intelligence reports are only valid for a period of three weeks, according to agency guidance, there is a risk that this period might be exceeded.

Intelligence checks were also carried out two months before one operation and it was unclear whether they had been rechecked since, the report said. "This lack of a clear audit trail presents an obvious risk; for example, if a person had become known to police after the previous checks, the agency may not be aware of this," Mr Vine said. "The risks to staff and members of the public of such an oversight are potentially considerable."

Briefings which contained personal and sensitive information about people suspected of immigration offences were carried out in the street while others failed to note that a potential target was four months pregnant, the inspectors found.

SOURCE





Asylum seekers in Australia pretending to be teenagers for faster processing

IMMIGRATION detainees are pretending to be teens to get their visa applications processed quicker and live in better conditions.

Victoria's biggest youth immigration detention centre in Broadmeadows is filled with many asylum seekers claiming to be under 18 to escape the tougher regulations for adults, an investigation has discovered.

Secret photos obtained by the Herald Sun reveal men with obvious signs of ageing, including crow's-feet, wrinkles around their eyes and receding hairlines. Experts say the men are more likely to be aged in their 20s.

Several Immigration Department sources have confirmed the con. Immigration officials lack time and resources to investigate people's ages so they deliver them to youth detention centres with "a wry smile", a whistleblower said.

"There are some massive guys, we're talking about man mountains, in the centre. Sixteen-year-olds just aren't built like that," the source said. Adult detainees bullied genuine youngsters at the facility, it was revealed.

University of Technology Sydney forensic anatomist Dr Meiya Sutisno said an initial assessment of a selection of the photographs showed men not minors. "They are not juveniles, definitely not," she said. Dr Sutisno said the men in photos she had seen were aged between 18 and their late-20s.

Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said the age scam had become widely known among asylum seekers and the department was unable to prove people's ages.

"They (the department) have no idea how old these people are," he said. "They just guess."

Sources revealed:

MANY detainees deliberately have no documentation of their age so they can lie about how old they are.

SOME asylum seekers have privately confessed to being more than a decade older than they claimed.

INMATES at the Broadmeadows facility have boasted about escaping at night to get McDonald's.

Asylum Seeker Resource Centre coordinator Pamela Curr said many didn't know their ages because it was not in their culture to celebrate birthdays. "They say what they have been told to say by people smugglers."

SOURCE

No Voting Rights For Illegal Aliens - Ever!

For Dems, It's All About A Permanent Electoral Majority - Not Human Dignity

No one who broke our laws to enter this country should ever decide who becomes our president, a member of Congress, a governor or mayor, or a member of the local school board. This is the non-negotiable “die line” those who love our country must defend: We cannot permit a huge criminal voting block to determine our future. And every person who entered this country without our government’s formal permission is a criminal. Period.

Democratic Party operatives embed their public arguments for amnesty for eleven-million illegals in terms of human dignity and decency (they never mention votes). The examples they cite in their speeches and sleek commercials always feature hardworking moms with adorable kids who excel at school and, when not doing community service, dream of becoming physicians and curing cancer. Our laws are never mentioned. Nor is the multitude of illegal immigrant criminals who continue to violate those laws after breaking into our national home.

The reality? A few years back—before things worsened--40% of all federal convicts were Latinos, and 72% of those were not U.S. citizens. That tells us two things: First, native-born Hispanics are, on average, better citizens than a number of other ethnic groups. Second, a disproportionate number of illegal immigrants commit felonies. Contrary to Democratic Party bigotry, not all Hispanics are alike.

Those “cute-as-a-puppy” commercials and TV-news featurettes never get around to advertising the murderers, rapists and drug thugs covered in gang tattoos who haunt our cities and ever more small towns, or the fact that at least half of illegal-immigrant households are on at least one welfare-system program at taxpayer expense, or that the cost just to our education system of illegal immigration is between forty and fifty billion dollars per year. (Want to save a few billion a year? Defend our borders.)

Why does the Democratic Party relentlessly inflict this “illegals-are-just-like-you-only-nicer-and-better” propaganda on us? Is it because the party that supported slavery, then relied on the Ku Klux Klan for a full century, then re-enslaved African-Americans on its electoral plantations where their children receive inferior educations (thanks to the overseers in the teachers’ unions) and are discouraged from pursuing careers that might free them finally saw the light and decided to fight for a better future for minorities? Hell, no. Democratic Party support for amnesty for illegals comes down to one word: “Votes.”

So let’s call the Dems out. We’re not going to get an ideal solution to the illegal-immigrant problem. And we’re not going to line up eleven-million criminal invaders (that’s what illegals are, folks) and march them back across the Rio Grande. It just isn’t going to happen. But we can protect our system of government and our social values by insisting that, after ridding ourselves of every illegal with a criminal record beyond the initial border violation, a history of joblessness, or a gang tattoo (checking for them would be no more intrusive than what you and I endure at the airport), we create a new category of provisional residency leading—if the individual’s police record stays clean and he or she stays off dependency programs—to permanent residency without voting rights.

Of course, the Dems will howl that there has been no greater injustice in all of human history and that, in President Obama’s favorite phrase, “That’s not who we are!” (speak for yourself, Mr. President). But let’s apply common sense: How many illegals broke into this country because they hoped one day to participate in our national, state or local elections? Apart from the haters in La Raza, wouldn’t illegals regard residency without voting rights as a damned good deal? If they could choose that option, wouldn’t they jump at it? With all of the benefits of being Americans, except the right to distort our system of government?

They won’t be offered that option, though. Not if this administration has anything to say about it. Democratic Party power brokers wouldn’t accept such a reasonable compromise in a thousand years. Because the Dems don’t give a damn about little Luisa and her dreams of getting a Ph.D. in astrophysics, becoming an astronaut, writing symphonies, and dressing the sores of lepers in her spare time. They only care about the votes they hope to buy with total amnesty.

The fundamental purpose of the Democratic Party’s insistence on full citizenship for the criminals from abroad who live among us is the hope of creating a permanent Democratic majority in key states and nationally. The blunt truth that no Republican official will mouth is that, after creating their squalid electoral plantations—every one a domain of hopelessness and reliable Democratic majorities—the Dems now want to create barrio latifundias with electoral peons who will learn nothing in our schools (certainly not effective English-language skills) except that they owe their allegiance to the Democratic Party—and that race-hatred is America’s primary heritage.

From its long embrace of Communism to its current worship of invasive government, the now-dominant left wing of the Democratic Party has always been uneasy with our republic and the constitutional manner in which we allocate power through elections. The Dems’ attitude really can be summed up as “The masses are asses.” Elites know best, and those of us who didn’t go to top universities are better off as serfs controlled by a directorate of the intelligentsia. And, of course, no native-born American could possibly be as deserving as a criminal alien newly arrived from the underdeveloped world.

We’re reminded, again and again, that we’re a country of immigrants. Absolutely true. And we need continued immigration. But it must be legal. We have every right to decide who does and does not get to enter and remain in our country. And our consular officers—often destructively leftist in their orientation—need new regulations that discourage scamming the system and encourage the allocation of green cards to the young, healthy and educated.

Wouldn’t hurt a bit, if, for a ten-year period, the basic requirement for a green card was a four-year university degree plus the proven ability to speak and write fluent English (the ability would have to be double-checked at ports of entry, since too many of our consular officers have political agendas). Our current system is obsessed with making our society more “balanced,” meaning multicultural and dumbed-down. The left hates the America that was, despises the America that is, and is determined to design the America that will be. And it won’t be a democracy whose leaders are chosen by conscientious, literate citizens.

Really, let’s call the Dems out. If they truly care about giving cuddly illegals the opportunity to unfold their supposedly enormous gifts, live better lives, and rescue our economy, fine: Let’s make a deal (but booting out all criminals is non-negotiable, too). The illegals who measure up—who have a consistent record of employment, no government-aid claims and no police records--get to stay, with every right and opportunity except the vote. And their children who are born on our soil after they receive permanent residency will enjoy full voting rights when they come of age, just like others born legally on our soil. It’s the greatest deal on earth. All the Dems have to do is to prove their humanity and compromise on a single issue.

Think they will?

The first response will be that it’s un-American to have “second-class citizens.” Fine. Don’t call them “citizens.” Call them “residents.” We already have various classes of residency. We can, through legislation, create another. And, frankly, I’m not interested in the party of slavery, then and now, telling me what’s un-American.

As for Hispanics, the Dems are virulently racist, lumping them all together as a group and failing to recognize their individuality and patriotism. Millions of native-born Hispanics are thorough patriots who do not welcome the crime, fecklessness and degradation that illegal immigrants bring to their communities. But to the Democratic Party’s propagandists, all olive-skinned, tan, brown or white folks with a last name such as Gutierrez or Sanchez are oppressed victims who have no stake in our brutal, imperialist society. And the Dems would love to do to Hispanics what they’ve done to African-Americans: Destroy their strong family values, addict them to government programs, discourage them from pursuing good educations and liberating careers—then herd them to polling stations to vote for Democrats anointed by party commissars.

Ultimately, the Dems are going to lose. Our Hispanic fellow citizens just aren’t going to let themselves be dragged backward. And the Dems sense it. So they’re chasing a block of eleven-million uneducated criminals whose poor English-language skills exclude them from full participation in the work-force or our society. That’s the future of the Democratic Party, as the likes of Senator Harry Reid or Representative Nancy Pelosi see it.

To prevent that future from becoming a reality we need to concentrate fiercely on a single battle cry: “No voting right for illegal aliens—ever!”

SOURCE





Thailand interested in unloading its refugees onto Australia too

They'd be mad not to. The mad one is Prime Minister Gillard

THAILAND has expressed interest in striking a similar asylum-seeker deal with Australia to the one proposed by the Gillard government with Malaysia.

The development came as Immigration Minister Chris Bowen said a boatload of 32 asylum-seekers intercepted off Western Australia would be sent to a third country, even though the deal with Malaysia has yet to be finalised. Australia is in talks to swap 800 asylum-seekers for 4,000 genuine refugees currently living in Malaysia.

Australia has been seeking a regional solution to the issue of asylum-seekers, and has also approached Papua New Guinea about reopening its Manus Island detention centre.

Last night Thailand's foreign minister Kasit Piromya said Thailand would be interested in considering a swap arrangement similar to that Australia had reached with Malaysia. “I think the agreement between Australia and Malaysia on this particular model based on, I think, five to one ratio is something that the rest of us will be interested to look at,” Mr Kasit said after bilateral talks with Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd in Bangkok.

He said many countries had been looking for a way to deal with an influx of asylum-seekers. “I think the Australian-Malaysian likely agreement would provide some sort of certainty and also a model for others to study,” he said. “I think the whole issue could be discussed further by all the other countries involved.”

Many of the refugees Australia is set to take from Malaysia are from Burma, and travelled to Malaysia via Thailand.

Mr Rudd said he and Mr Kasit discussed the broader issue of asylum-seekers. “So what we discussed in particular was the ongoing support which our friends in Thailand need to sustain something in the order of 110,000 people spread across nine camps,” Mr Rudd said.

The asylum-seekers intercepted off Western Australia on Friday night are the first to arrive since Labor's announcement of its agreement with Malaysia. Believed to be from Afghanistan and Pakistan, they will be taken to Christmas Island for identity checks.

However Mr Bowen said they would then be taken to a third country, although he would not say what country that was. “It's well known we've been in discussions with Papua New Guinea. It's well known we are in discussions across the region,” he said. “We have an agreement to enter into a bilateral arrangement with Malaysia. “I am not going to flag which country these people will be sent to, but they will be held at Christmas Island, pending removal to a third country.”

Mr Bowen added: “My message to people smugglers and to asylum-seekers is very clear. “We will not be accepting and processing people for asylum claims who arrive in Australia by boat.”

Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said the arrival showed people-smugglers had not been put off by Labor spin on a people-swap deal with Malaysia.

Mr Bowen could not say where the group would be sent because the government had no deal with Malaysia, PNG, East Timor or anywhere else, Mr Morrison said. “Having realised that by announcing their panicked deal before it was agreed and operational they had issued an invitation to people smugglers, Minister Bowen is now trying to shut the gate once, in this case, the boats have bolted.”

Mr Bowen had not confirmed if Malaysia had been specified as a place asylum-seekers could be transferred to under Australian law, Mr Morrison said. “Unlike on Nauru or Manus Island, Australia will have no role in looking after the welfare of those potentially transferred to Malaysia under their five-for-one people-swap deal.

SOURCE