USCIS Raid Blame Shifted
By Sig Christenson
Two Houston firms that provided 40 Indian contract computer programmers arrested by U.S. immigration agents at Randolph AFB have broken no laws, one of their San Antonio attorneys said Friday. Saying the Immigration and Naturalization Service "went about this thing the wrong way," attorney Joe De Mott also argued that the workers, who were released from detention Friday, didn't need to be arrested. But his assertion that the USCIS instead should have sent a letter
to Frontier Consulting Inc. and Softech Consulting Inc. advising it planned to revoke the workers' visas drew a quick rebuke by an agency official. "If someone commits a crime in San Antonio, someone isn't going to call them up and say, 'We're going to arrest you,'" said Thomas Homan,
USCIS assistant district director of criminal investigations. "The immigration service is sending a message. We're not going to tolerate companies or individuals who knowingly violate
immigration law."
http://www.mysa.com/pantheon/homebase/hbn&w/2201aart2nz.shtml
H-1 Visa Program Open to Abuses
By Alan T. Saracevic
An alleged tale of prostitution, illegal immigration and molestation in Berkeley has reopened one of Silicon Valley's most contentious issues: the use and abuse of temporary work visas. The unlikely and unwanted attention stems from the highly publicized case of Lakireddy Bali Reddy, the 62-year-old Berkeley landlord who stands accused of smuggling young Indian girls into the United States for the purpose of prostitution, among other charges. The fact that an H-1B visa was allegedly used to get a man claiming to be the girls' father into the country with them as his dependents has many industry watchers taking a second look at the controversial program. Created by the Immigration Act of 1990, H-1B visas have become a politically charged issue in recent years. Silicon Valley companies, claiming they can't find enough skilled workers in the United States, have lobbied to increase the number of visas issued every year, enabling them
to recruit overseas. Opponents charge the technology industry with ignoring qualified workers here at home.
http://eXaminer.com/000123/0123visa.html
L.A. Raid Finds Fake Documents
LOS ANGELES (AP) - More than a million fake documents, including Social Security cards and drivers' licenses, were seized during a raid of a self-storage business, officials said Monday.
The Immigration and Naturalization Service said the raid late Friday led
to the arrest of five people who are being held without bail. The seizure was related to 1998's "Operation Fine Print," in which 11 people were arrested and pleaded guilty in federal court.
Juan San German, a 34-year-old Mexican citizen, was sentenced to a 6 1/2-year prison sentence earlier this month for running a counterfeiting ring that supplied illegal immigrants with fake identity documents throughout the country.
http://news.excite.com/news/ap/000124/22/fake-green-cards
Smuggling Patrols Face Violence at Sea
Freighters Bearing Human Cargo Pose a Risky Test for Coast Guard
By Roberto Suro
The Washington Post
After the U.S. Coast Guard intercepted the freighter Wing Fung Lung on the high seas last month, the smugglers who were bringing 249 illegal Chinese immigrants to America attempted to sink the ship. When that failed, they tried to blend in with the immigrants, start a riot, set fires, and overpower U.S. sailors. On his first night aboard this floating nightmare, the commander of the Coast Guard boarding party, Lt. j.g. Robert Borowczak, lay awake worrying that his crew might not have captured all of the smugglers, known as "snakeheads," and wondering what mayhem might come next. The rust bucket and its desperate human cargo were intercepted Dec. 9
about 300 miles off the coast of Guatemala, the most recent in a series of incidents that have caused the Coast Guard to declare that intercepting illegal migrants has become a more dangerous business than running down drug smugglers. "As smuggling in human cargo becomes more lucrative, the propensity for violence has risen, and in addition to the smugglers using force, the migrants have become more willing to jeopardize life and limb," said Cmdr.
Jim McPherson, a Coast Guard spokesman.
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/2000-01/27/217l-012700-idx.html
Smuggling Ring Probe Implicates China's Ruling Elite $10B Criminal Operation: Senior military and police officers, head of immigration among 150 arrested
Peter Goodspeed
National Post
Chinese police have uncovered a massive smuggling ring that threatens to ruin the careers of some of China's leading politicians. In what is already being billed as the biggest corruption scandal in 50 years of Communist rule, police are slowly untangling a $10-billion (Cdn)
criminal operation, centred on the southeastern city of Xiamen. Its tentacles reach into the heart of China's government, implicating senior party officials, senior police and military officers, the head of the immigration bureau, the former wife of a leading politburo member, almost the entire customs department of a major seaport and relatives of some of China's most powerful men.
The case is so sweeping and sensational it could reach as high as Jiang Zemin, China's president, who for years has pledged to clean up rampant corruption. Although he has made the battle for clean government a hallmark of his rule, in the past decade, highly publicized anti-corruption sweeps have seldom implicated China's senior leaders.
http://www.nationalpost.com/news.asp?f=000128/188646.html
Delays Soaring for Green Cards
By Ken Mclaughlin
San Jose Mercury News
U.S. immigration officials recently boasted that in a year they had cut the average time it takes to become a citizen from 28 to 12 months. What they failed to say is that the wait for green cards grew interminably long as the citizenship lines got shorter. Nowhere is the wait felt more deeply than in Silicon Valley, where thousands of engineers and other highly skilled immigrants are
seeking green cards, which allow them to live here permanently without becoming citizens.
Because workers without green cards are still considered ``temporary'' residents, they often can't get promotions or even home mortgages. They must get written permission from the Immigration and Naturalization Service to travel abroad. Some -- particularly tech workers from India and
China -- may even be forced to leave the country. ``Real lives are being destroyed,'' said Peter Larrabee, a San Diego attorney who specializes in employment-based immigration. USCIS officials reluctantly concede that the agency's frenetic effort to cut citizenship lines has slowed processing of applications for permanent residency to a turtle's pace. The average wait nationwide for ``adjustment of status''-- the final stage of green card processing -- is about 33 months, up from 21 months in August 1998, said Eyleen Schmitt, an USCIS spokeswoman in Washington, D.C.
http://www.sjmercury.com/premium/front/docs/inswait30.htm
Senate Said Supporting Elian Return
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle suggested Wednesday that sentiment is growing in both parties in the Senate for allowing 6-year-old Cuban shipwreck survivor Elian Gonzalez to return to his father in Cuba. "How that is done and when it is done, are still open questions. But I think that there is a great deal of support for it. And I think
ultimately that probably represents the sentiment of the majority of the Senate today," Daschle, D-S.D., said. Although Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., once pledged to bring
a bill conferring U.S. citizenship on the boy to a quick Senate vote, he backed away from the plans in the face of mounting opposition. Meanwhile, in the House, Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry Hyde, R-Ill., has put off consideration of the bill at least until a federal court in
Miami rules on the boy's fate. Supporters of the citizenship bill say it would block the Immigration and Naturalization Service from carrying out its ruling that the boy be sent back to his father in Cuba.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/aponline/20000202/aponline174826_000.htm
Supervisors Plan to Aid Illegal Gays
By Rachel Gordon
San Francisco Examiner
"City of Refuge' would shield relationships of citizens and aliens San Francisco's elected leaders plan to create a "City of Refuge" for undocumented residents who are in same-sex relationships with U.S. citizens. The proposed law, which is headed for approval at the Board of Supervisors next week, would bar city workers from actively aiding federal immigration authorities in deportation efforts involving a citizen's homosexual partner who is in the country illegally. On a symbolic level, the idea is to confer the same status to gay couples that married couples have. Foreign-born married partners of U.S. citizens have a much easier time attaining the legal right to live in the United States because their marriages are legally recognized. It is unlawful for gays and lesbians to marry in this country. "Our immigration laws confer rights and privileges on heterosexual couples that same-gender couples are denied," said Supervisor Leslie Katz, chief sponsor of the legislation that has the backing of all 10 of her colleagues.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/examiner/hotnews/stories/02/refuge.dtl
Counting Illegal Immigrants a Controversial Issue for 2000 Census
By Martha Irvine
CHICAGO (AP) -- A census worker at the front door often means one thing to illegal immigrants. ''A lot of people think, `Hey, who's this guy coming to my door? Probably Immigration,''' says Alejandro Lopez, a Chicagoan who is one of many people being asked to spread the word about the census in the nation's often undercounted minority communities. The word is this: Whether you are here legally or not, you should fill out the questionnaire when it arrives in April. Officials at the Census Bureau say they don't care if you're here illegally. In fact, they won't even ask. ''The Census doesn't exist to do law enforcement,'' says Dianne Schmidley, a census demographer. ''Our job is to get a body count.'' The Census Bureau asks whether those in the household are U.S. citizens. But it has never distinguished between non-citizens who are in this country legally or illegally because the U.S. Constitution simply calls for a head count. The counting of illegal immigrants was not even an issue until their numbers began swelling in the mid-1970s.
http://www.boston.com/dailynews/034/region/Counting_illegal_immigrants_a_:.shtml
U.S. Count of Illegal Immigrants
The Associated Press
In 1996, the Immigration and Naturalization Service estimated there were 5 million illegal immigrants living in the United States. That number was expected to grow by about 275,000 a year. A list of the states thought to account for most of those immigrants:
1. California: 2 million
2. Texas: 700,000
3. New York: 540,000
4. Florida: 350,000
5. Illinois: 290,000
6. New Jersey: 135,000
7. Arizona 115,000
8. Massachusetts: 85,000
9. Virginia: 55,000
10. Washington: 52,000
11. Colorado: 45,000
12. Maryland: 44,000
13. Michigan: 37,000
14. Pennsylvania: 37,000
15. New Mexico: 37,000
16. Oregon: 33,000
17. Georgia: 32,000
18. District of Columbia: 30,000
19. Connecticut: 29,000
>20. Nevada: 24,000
[end of text]
Black Activists Protest Immigration
By Mildrade Cherfils
MIAMI (AP) -- Black activists at a rally honoring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on Saturday called for an end to what they see as a double standard in U.S. immigration policy that favors Cubans over Haitians. The group of about 150 people denounced Miami officials for going to Washington on behalf of 6-year-old Cuban Elian Gonzalez while "not saying a word" about more than 400 would-be immigrants shipped back to Haiti after their boat ran aground New Year's Day."It's a simple cry that we're calling: Be fair," said Rev. Willie Simms, a member of the Miami-Dade County Community Relations Board. Under the 1966 Cuban Readjustment Act, Cubans who reach U.S. soil can stay. But there is no such law for Haitians and others who arrive here illegally. They are sent back unless they can prove a "credible fear" of persecution in their homeland. While politicians were fighting to keep Elian in the country, Haitians Marc Dieubon, 9, and his sister Germanie, 8, among the 411 whose boat ran aground, were sent back to Haiti even though their pregnant mother had been taken ashore for medical treatment.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/aponline/20000115/aponline185556_000.htm
Border Patrol's Hiring is Struggle Exam Failure and Red Tape Prompt Most Applicants
to Drop Out of the Process.
By Minerva Canto
The Orange County Register
Adventure. The rugged back country. Catching smugglers. An aspiring Border Patrol agent will find that the first step to this life of action is simply sedentary - building up the vocabulary, brushing up on the study skills and getting cozy with the books. An SAT-like entrance exam is the first hurdle to protecting the nation's borders - a test at the heart of an Immigration and Naturalization Service struggle to find a small army of qualified candidates each year. Nearly three out of four applicants failed last year, highlighting the agency's inability to recruit enough qualified applicants at a time when Congress has mandated 1,000 new agents annually to fortify the Southwest border. Because it has fallen so short of its goal, the agency now needs to hire
2,000 agents in the next fiscal year to stay on track. Union officials suggest that the agency consider reformatting the test because so many fail it. They also contend that the test is not the
best gauge of a candidate's success at the Border Patrol, the law-enforcement arm of the BCIS.
http://www.ocregister.com/politics/hire017w.shtml
Congressional Fight Expected Over Increasing Foreign Technical Workers
By Bart Jansen
WASHINGTON (AP) -- When Hewlett-Packard Co. looks for workers to develop its next printer or software package, the Palo Alto, Calif., firm looks for top graduates from American colleges. But in some of the key disciplines, half of the master's and doctoral
students are foreign nationals. With unemployment less than 2 percent in Santa Clara County and high-tech companies hiring at breathtaking rates, Silicon Valley is exerting its growing lobbying might to expand a special visa program called H-1B that allows foreign college graduates to stay in the country and work. "If we can't get the foreigners, we're not getting enough of the new skills into the company," said Mary Dee Beall, government affairs manager at
Hewlett-Packard, which used the program for 200 of its 7,800 hires last year. A temporary boost from 65,000 visas per year to 115,000 failed to satisfy the industry's appetite, and new legislation is in the works to expand the visa program.
http://www.star-telegram.com/news/doc/1047/1:COMP12/1:COMP120206100.html
Clinton Plan Could Speed Steps To Get Work Visas
By Joe Cantlupe
San Diego Union Tribune
WASHINGTON -- The Immigration and Naturalization Service wants your tired, your poor and, uh, your money. In the budget plan President Clinton submitted to Congress yesterday, he
proposed that the immigration service "guarantee" speedy processing for businesses that pony up an extra $1,000 for each foreign employee needing a temporary work visa. Immigration advocates said that the proposal could create a two-tier system that favors deep-pocket businesses over colleges, research institutes and smaller firms. "This 'gold card' approach doesn't bode well for everyone in the visa queue," said Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies. "If you give $2,000 -- does that mean you can sleep in the Lincoln bedroom, too?" An immigration advocate, who declined to be identified, observed: "It gives the appearance of a government agency auctioning its services." USCIS officials said the voluntary payment plan would raise some $80 million -- money that would help the beleaguered agency process millions of backlogged applications for green cards, work permits and citizenship. Green cards allow immigrants to live and work legally in the United States and put them on the road to citizenship.
http://www.uniontrib.com/news/business/20000208-0010_1b8ins.html
Senators Introduce Visa Expansion
By Bart Jansen
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The number of visas available for college-educated foreigners would increase substantially under a bill introduced Wednesday (S.2045) to address what the high-tech industry considers an acute worker shortage. The measure, sponsored by two dozen senators, aims to increase the number of six-year visas from 115,000 to 195,000 for each of the next three
years. The National Academy of Sciences is studying how many visas should be issued
permanently. "We want the high-tech industry to thrive in the U.S. and to continue to serve as the engine for the growth of jobs and opportunities for American workers," said Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah and chairman of the Judiciary Committee that will consider the bill. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported the number of high-tech jobs nationwide grew from about 4 million in 1990 to more than 4.8 million in 1998, and estimates jobs in some categories will double in the next six years. While the legislation targets science and engineering graduates, it applies
to all disciplines.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/aponline/20000209/aponline202042_000.htm
FBI: Official in USCIS Spied for Cuba
Miami Herald
A high-ranking Miami official with the Immigration and Naturalization Service was arrested by FBI agents Thursday for allegedly spying for the Cuban government. Mariano Faget, 54, a 34-year veteran, is acting district deputy director for examinations. He holds a ``secret'' security clearance at BCIS, according to a statement by the FBI. The FBI said today that Faget waited only 12 minutes to pass on information about the defection of a Cuban official given to him during a
sting operation. Faget called a New York businessman on his personal cell phone immediately
after meeting with the assistant district director of the FBI in Miami on Feb. 11. Faget told the he businessman details about the defection and called him from home later that day to give him more information, said FBI spokesman Paul Mallett. The businessman, who was not identified, has ties to Cuban government agents, Mallett said. On other occasions, Faget placed calls to the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, which represents Cuba in the United States, and met with
intelligence officers from the Cuban agency, Mallett said. He supervised adjudication and naturalization decisions, including granting of permanent residence status and political asylum.
``Due to his position, Faget had access to classified and sensitive USCIS files relating to confidential law enforcement sources and Cuban defectors,'' FBI's statement said. ``Through sophisticated technical and physical surveillance techniques, the investigation revealed Faget
making unauthorized contacts with Cuban intelligence officers in Miami and other cities in the United States.''
http://www.herald.com/content/today/docs/051580.htm
Bill Targets Fraud in Immigration Services
By Hugo Martin
Los Angeles Times
Immigrant rights lawyers and prosecutors on Monday endorsed proposed legislation to crack down on Southern California's lucrative network of unscrupulous immigration consultants.
Assemblywoman Gloria Romero (D-Los Angeles) announced legislation to increase from $10,000 to $100,000 the civil penalty that victims of such fraud can collect. Romero said crooked consultants routinely charge undocumented immigrants more than $10,000 but do not deliver on promises to obtain permanent legal residency status for them. Her bill would require immigration lawyers to post their state bar numbers on all advertisements, making it easier for immigrants to identify legitimate attorneys. The president of the Mexican American Bar Assn., James Blancarte, called the bill "the strongest protection to date against this pervasive and
exploitative abuse of recent immigrants." But Romero said that unscrupulous consultants are so numerous and earn such huge profits by defrauding immigrants that she can only hope to dent the problem. "This is a lucrative business," she said at a news conference at her district office in Monterey Park. "We think we need to do whatever we can to chip away at the problem."
http://www.latimes.com:80/news/state/20000215/t000014677.html