Backlog in Naturalization Applications Will Take Nearly Three Years to Clear
By Muzaffar Chishti and Claire Bergeron
Migration Policy Institute
February 15, 2008
It will take almost three years for United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to clear the naturalization backlog due to a surge in applications last summer, agency officials say.
According to previously unpublished figures that USCIS has given the Migration Policy Institite, during May, June, and July 2007, the agency received 737,223 applications — three-and-a-half times the number of applications (207,536) received during the same period a year earlier. As of October 2007, USCIS had almost 1 million naturalization applications pending approval.
The surge caused the processing time to more than double — now standing at 16 to 18 months for applications filed during the summer of 2007, compared to the six-to-seven-month timeframe for applications filed in 2006.
The increase coincided with the agency's January 2007 announcement of a rise in the fee for adult naturalization (N-400) applications from $330 to $595 beginning July 30, 2007.
Officials attribute the application increase to several other factors as well, including citizenship campaigns launched across the country, the charged political climate of the immigration debate, and the 2008 presidential elections.
In response to the "summer surge" in naturalization applications, USCIS expanded work hours for its employees, detailed 84 staff members to its application processing centers, and hired additional contract staff. The agency also plans to hire 1,800 additional employees, including retired USCIS workers, to help cope with the increased workload.
USCIS Director Emilio Gonzalez has stated that he hopes these efforts will reduce processing times to presurge levels by April 2010.
Applicants, several members of Congress, and immigrant advocacy groups have raised concerns over these delays. Among the concerns are that the backlog will prevent recent applicants from naturalizing in time to vote in the November 2008 presidential elections. Immigrant advocates have stated that USCIS should have anticipated the surge, given that the factors could have been predicted.
Members of Congress have also pointed out that when USCIS first proposed the fee increase, the agency promised this action would result in decreased processing times.
In testimony before Congress, and in the USCIS press release announcing the fee schedule, USCIS officials stated that the fee increase would cut average processing times for naturalization applications by 20 percent by the end of FY 2009.
Texas Service Center To Pilot New Adjustment Processing System
TSC is starting the "PLUS Pilot" program for adjudicating concurrently-filed adjustment of status application packets. Until recently, each form in a typical AOS packet was separated and sent to a different officer for a preliminary name check and adjudication. The pilot will allow one officer to review the packet as a whole, which includes the I-140, I-485, I-765 and I-131 and supporting documentation. The pilot is aimed at eliminating repetitive steps in the adjudication process. Members may begin to see one RFE that requests information for more than one application form within a single AOS packet or one envelope containing multiple, related RFEs. While less than two weeks have passed since the pilot was implemented, it does seem to be faster than the previous process. Members may see some more recently-filed AOS packets being completed before others that have been pending longer. TSC reports that this is likely due to the recent pilot implementation and that members should not send inquiries about cases unless they fall outside of posted processing times.
McCalifornia
The Wall Street Journal
February 11, 2008
Now that John McCain is close to wrapping up the GOP Presidential nod, the same people who endorsed his opponents are saying he needs to become more restrictionist on immigration for the general election. We'd direct readers to last week's California primary exit poll, which offers better advice.
California is supposed to be ground zero in the illegal alien debate, especially among conservatives who listen to talk radio. Mitt Romney played to that perception, spending millions contrasting his hardline stance with Senator McCain's more moderate position. Some 29% of Republicans did indeed say immigration was the most important issue facing the country. Yet according to the exit poll, some 25% of those who cared most about immigration favored Mr. McCain, compared to 45% for Mr. Romney. Either those voters thought other issues counted for more in electing a President, or they preferred Mr. McCain's position.
The exit poll also asked Republicans to choose among three immigration policy options. About six in 10 voters said illegal aliens should either be allowed to apply for U.S. citizenship or to stay as temporary workers. Those voters went for Mr. McCain comfortably. A minority of 38% favored deportation, which is closer to Mr. Romney's position, but the Senator won even 29% of those voters.
Exit surveys conducted across 14 other states -- Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Utah -- also show that a clear majority of Republican voters (55%) favor a guest-worker program or path to citizenship for the estimated 12 million illegals in the U.S.
The GOP primaries have been about as clear a market test as one could imagine for the restrictionist position. Mr. Romney adopted it in full-throated fashion, as Fred Thompson did earlier, and as Mike Huckabee does now. If hostility to illegal immigration were as decisive a voting issue as the TV and radio talkers claim, Senator McCain would not be the presumptive Republican nominee. And this is all without taking account of Democrats and Independents, who tend to be even less restrictionist.
The primaries suggest that even GOP voters appreciate that immigration is more complicated than conservative media elites pretend. Mr. McCain has adapted his immigration position over the last year and now talks about securing the border before other reforms go ahead. But he also talks about a guest-worker program to deal with economic realities, as well as the folly of deportation.
The Arizona Senator will never please the talk-radio and Internet voices who now refer to him as "Juan McCain." He shouldn't try. Most Americans agree with him.
USCIS Revised Name Check Policy Should Alleviate FBI Backlog Delays
USCIS previously required that the FBI name check clearance be
obtained before any immigration benefits applications were
approved, regardless of the length of time required for the FBI
name check approval. USCIS issued a revised FBI name check policy,
"Where the application is otherwise approvable and the FBI name
check request has been pending for more than 180 days, the
adjudicator shall approve the 1-485,1-601,1-687, or 1-698 and
proceed with card issuance. The FBI has committed to providing
FBI name check results within this timeframe."
This means that "green cards" can now be issued 180 days after
and FBI name check has been requested even though it is still
pending. This new procedure does not apply to pending naturalization
applications which will still have to wait for FBI clearances before
they can be approved.
Oklahoma bill designed to prevent frivolous immigration lawsuits advances
By Janice Francis Smith
The Journal Record
February 6, 2008
Oklahoma City -- Disgruntled ex-employees may take advantage of Oklahoma’s immigration law to impose a financial hardship on their former employers, said state Rep. Charles Key, R-Bethany.
Key’s House Bill 3228 is designed to discourage frivolous lawsuits, Key told members of the House Economic Subcommittee on Industry and Labor on Tuesday.
The bill was approved by the committee. But state Rep. Randy Terrill, R-Moore, who authored the state’s newest immigration law, said the bill may cause more problems than it would solve.
Terrill’s HB 1804, signed into law last year, contained several provisions designed to discourage employers from hiring illegal aliens.
Among other provisions, the new law declares it a discriminatory practice for an employer to discharge a U.S. citizen while retaining an unauthorized alien to do a similar job.
Key said employers have contacted him with concerns over the new law. A discharged employee could accuse their former employer of hiring unauthorized workers simply out of spite, and the lawyers involved in filing and defending against the lawsuit will get paid regardless of whether the charge is valid.
“An employer told me the cost to him was around $10,000 just to deal with a suit of this nature, whether it’s legitimate or not,” said Key.
HB 3228 would require a former employee who files a civil action on a wrongful discharge claim to file an affidavit attesting to the validity of their charge.
The affidavit would show that the discharged employee made reasonable efforts to determine if their charge is valid and based on evidence.
The affidavit would also attest to the discharged employee’s knowledge regarding if the employer uses the Status Verification System to check the immigration status of new hires.
Employers enrolled in and using the Status Verification System are granted safe harbor from such lawsuits.
When asked how the employee would know if their employer used the Status Verification System, Key said such questions will be addressed as the bill progresses through the legislative process.
Key’s bill would allow the discharged employee 60 days from the time they filed their lawsuit to file the affidavit. Without the affidavit, HB 3228 would require the court to dismiss the action, though the court could grant a 90-day extension if necessary.
“This would give them (the discharged employee) some time to reassess, to say ‘I’ve thought about the allegations I’m making and understand what really happened and I’m not just filing a suit the employer is going to have to deal with,’” said Key.
Key voted in support of HB 1804, and said his new bill would strengthen enforcement of state immigration laws by protecting employers who comply with the law from frivolous lawsuits.
But Terrill said HB 3228 appears to be a solution in search of a problem. The provisions of HB 1804 that pertain to private employers don’t go into effect until July 1, so problems with the law are purely speculative at this point, said Terrill. And even if well-intentioned, HB 3228 would clearly weaken enforcement of the state’s immigration law, he said.
“This could open a can of worms,” said Terrill. The bill provides a vehicle opponents of the immigration law could use to try to repeal the provisions of HB 1804. Key’s bill appears to be a reasonable effort to discourage frivolous lawsuits at first glance, but the bill would serve to deter all lawsuits filed in keeping with the provisions of HB 1804, said Terrill.
Disgruntled ex-employees may file frivolous lawsuits against their former employers based on a number of claims – age discrimination, racial discrimination, sexual harassment, etc. – but no other discrimination claim carries an affidavit requirement.
The discharged worker would be required to attest to their knowledge of information they would never have access to, namely, if their employer checks the immigration status of new hires, and to make a legal determination regarding the lawsuit’s validity, which is the job of the courts.
Labor license applications decrease with new immigration legislation
January 30, 2008
By D. E. Smoot
Staff Writer
Muskogee Daily Phoenix - Muskogee, OK
Oklahoma Department of Labor officials blame the fallout of the state’s strict immigration bill for a dramatic reduction in the number of license applications processed since the law took effect.
Robert Everman, the agency’s chief financial officer said the number of applications issued for asbestos abatement has fallen 70 percent since Nov. 1. The number of all licenses issued by the department is off 55 percent.
At the Oklahoma Labor Department, Everman said, licensing and other fees account for a third of its annual budget, which totaled about $8 million this year. Because of the anticipated shortfall, the agency is seeking increased appropriations from the Legislature for the next fiscal year.
“Right now we are making sure that every single penny being spent is absolutely necessary,” Everman said of the department’s expenditures. “But right now, for every penny we are able to save we’re having to spend two or three more because we are getting overrun by health care costs and increasing fuel prices.”
In addition to its request for increased appropriations, Everman said the department is asking lawmakers to approve increased fees. The move would shift the burden of offsetting the anticipated shortfall to tradesmen and others required to secure licenses to conduct business.
With regard to the cause of the drop in license applications, Everman said there is nothing that indicates the reduction was caused by anything other the passage of House Bill 1804. Everman said the Department of Labor was the first state agency to fully implement all requirements mandated by the law.
Supporters of the new law, the provisions of which are some of the strictest in the nation, said the law is intended to curb the number of undocumented immigrants and crack down on perceived problems caused by that population. Critics say the law prompted a mass exodus of undocumented workers and has led to declining profits of businesses supported by the Hispanic community.
Rep. Jerry McPeak, D-Warner, said he is concerned about the loss of licensing revenues to the state. But an even bigger concern, he said, may be the broader question of whether there are jobs in the state that aren’t being filled.
“With that many licenses not being renewed, you’ve got to wonder,” McPeak said. “Is there work out there that’s not getting done because there is nobody to do it?”
Everman said it is too early to tell whether McPeak’s concerns will become a reality.
“If you have those kinds of numbers not coming up for renewal, it does pose the question of who is doing the work or whether it’s even getting done,” Everman said. “The most immediate impact of this (HB 1804) is strictly financial, but I would think that concern would warrant an investigation.”
Immigration issue looms over Oklahoma Legislature
By Sean Murphy
The Associated Press, January 28, 2008
Oklahoma City (AP) -- The author of the new Oklahoma law cracking down on illegal immigrants says he has no intention of bowing to pressure from Hispanic leaders, church officials and the business community.
Rep. Randy Terrill, author of the law, House Bill 1804, says he plans to push forward with even tougher restrictions during the upcoming session that begins Feb. 4.
Terrill says he expects several bills to be the 'offspring of HB 1804.' Those include a measure seeking a vote of the people to make English the official state language and bills that make it harder for illegal immigrants to go to college and allow law enforcement to seize property of those who harbor or transport illegal aliens.
Meanwhile, Terrill, R-Moore, said House leaders plan to fight any effort to repeal or weaken the law.
'I think it's pretty clear that there won't be any weakening or appeal of House Bill 1804,' Terrill said. 'There are a number of people who are making sounds like they're moving in that direction, but I think the Speaker has made it clear he doesn't support weakening or repealing it.'
State Sen. Harry Coates, R-Seminole, has introduced a bill that would repeal provisions of the bill that target employers that are scheduled to go into effect on July 1. They would require employers to verify the immigration status of their employees and face legal action for hiring unauthorized illegal aliens in place of U.S. citizens.
Coates, one of the only Republicans in the Legislature who opposed the bill last year, said the law has fostered a negative climate toward both legal and illegal Hispanic workers and created an unfriendly environment for businesses.
'The labor pool in Oklahoma started diminishing the day the governor signed the bill,' Coates said. 'We haven't corrected anything. We haven't changed anything. All we've said is we're going to make Oklahoma a state that's unfriendly to businesses and immigrants.'
Coates said the idea behind tough immigration laws was to create a wedge issue between Republicans and Democrats, but the plan backfired when Democrats refused to stand up and stop the bill.
'This was designed to get people re-elected and cost people their seats in the Oklahoma Legislature,' Coates said. 'But what happened is that Republicans trotted this thing out, most of them lawyers with no need for workers except for mowing their lawns, and the Democrats became so frightened that they were led around by the nose.
'There are a few brave souls that are standing up and saying, 'we made a mistake,' but unfortunately I'm not seeing many Republicans at that party.'
One thing that both sides of the immigration debate can agree upon is that immigration needs to be addressed at the federal level.
A spokesman for Gov. Brad Henry, who signed House Bill 1804, said the governor is withholding comment on the new law while it is being challenged in court, but that clearly federal authorities need to take action.
'As Gov. Henry has said many times, immigration reform is a critical issue, but it is also an issue best handled by the federal government,' said Henry spokesman Paul Sund. 'Because of Washington, D.C.'s inaction on immigration reform, the states have been forced to act as Oklahoma did with HB 1804.'
Leaders in the Hispanic community, who say they were caught off guard by legislation last year, said they plan to rally opposition to any further measures targeting illegal immigrants.
'Last year we were not quite organized, but we have seen these families devastated. We have felt their sorrow and pain. And we're going to stand up for them,' said Rev. Victor Ortega, state coordinator of the National Coalition of Latino Clergy and Christian Leaders. 'We will not what happened last year happen again this year.'
Ortega said debate over the issue has created a climate of hatred toward even legal residents from Mexico and other Latin American countries. He said children of illegal immigrants are particularly vulnerable because they live in fear that their parents could be deported and they could be forced to return to a country with which they are unfamiliar.
'They're hearing that they should all be out of here, have no right to be here and that their parents are criminals,' Ortega said. 'It has taken a toll on the families. Many of the children have been traumatized. They fear that when their dad goes to work in the morning, he might not come back in the evening.'
Bishop Edward J. Slattery, the head of the Catholic diocese in Tulsa has called the law 'immoral and unjust.'
Undocumented immigrant Maria Saldivar, 44, said she searches for what little factory work she can to support her three children. Her landlord recently asked her to provide papers, so she must also look for a new home.
'Many of the places asking for applications are asking for documents,' she said in Spanish through a translator. 'Before (1804), they didn't.'
Vicente Ruiz, a 47-year-old legal immigrant who runs his own electrical contracting business, says the new law is too harsh on immigrants who come to America seeking a better life.
'They can't lock up everybody,' he said. 'They have to give people a chance.'
ICE Assistant Secretary Myers signs MOU with Vietnam
January 22, 2008
MOU will allow for the repatriation of Vietnam Citizens who entered the United States on or after July 12, 1995
WASHINGTON, D.C. – A path to diplomatic cooperation and partnership between the U.S. and Vietnam was sealed today after Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Immigration and Customs Enforcement Julie L. Myers and Deputy Foreign Minister for the Government of Vietnam Mr. Dao Viet Trung signed a memorandum of agreement (MOU). The MOU, signed during a special ceremony at the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs Office in Hanoi lays out a framework for the prompt and efficient repatriation of Vietnamese nationals who have been ordered removed by the U.S. Government.
The repatriation MOU is the culmination of almost a decade of negotiations between the United States Department of State and the government of Vietnam. Under this agreement, vietnamese nationals who arrived in the United States on or after July 12, 1995 are subject to return to Vietnam.
To date, this will affect approximately 1,500 Vietnamese nationals currently living in the U.S. “This agreement between our countries reflects the commitment of our respective nations to come together and craft viable partnerships that work for both of us,” said Julie L. Myers. “Agreements such as this are the building blocks of diplomacy. This agreement allows us to carry out a judge's order to remove individuals from our country in a safe and humane manner.”
As part of the agreement the U.S. government will pay for the cost of repatriating individuals under the agreement. Once the Vietnamese government has issued a travel document, the U.S. Government will provide at least fifteen (15) days notice of the flight and travel arrangements by which the person will be returned to Vietnam.
On par with hundreds of other ICE repatriation missions across the globe, ICE will also manage the repatriation of Vietnamese nationals with equal care and commitment. The missions will be carried out in an orderly and safe way, and with respect for the individual human dignity of the person being repatriated.
The Vietnamese Government will provide a prompt response to the U.S. Government on cases referred for their review. If it is determined that a person whose name and file has been provided to the Vietnamese Government is a national of Vietnam and has been ordered to be removed from the U.S., the Vietnamese Government will issue a travel document authorizing that person’s return to Vietnam.
The MOU will enter into force sixty (60) days from the date of signature, January 22, 2008 and will be valid for five years. The MOU will be extended automatically for terms of three years thereafter unless written notice not to extend is given by one government to the other at least six months prior to the expiration date of the Agreement. The MOU may be amended or supplemented by written agreement of the Vietnamese government and the U.S. government through appropriate diplomatic channels.
Efficient and expedient removal procedures are an important part of ICE’s strategy to support the Secure Border Initiative (SBI), a comprehensive multi-year plan by the Department of Homeland Security to secure America’s borders and reduce illegal migration. Under SBI, Homeland Security seeks to gain operational control of both the northern and southern borders, while re-engineering the detention and removal system to ensure that illegal aliens are removed from the country quickly and efficiently. SBI also involves strong interior enforcement efforts, including enhanced worksite enforcement investigations and intensified efforts to track down and remove illegal aliens inside this country.
Okla. Immigration Law Blamed for Death
The Associated Press
By JUSTIN JUOZAPAVICIUS
Jan. 25, 2008
TULSA, Okla. (AP) — Edgar Castorena had diarrhea for 10 days and counting, and the illegal immigrant parents of the 2-month-old didn't know what to do about it.
They were afraid they would be deported under a new Oklahoma law if they took him to a major hospital. By the time they took him to a clinic, it was too late.
A ruptured intestine that might have been treatable instead killed the U.S.-born infant, making him a poster child for opponents of House Bill 1804 months before it was enacted as the Oklahoma Taxpayer and Citizen Protection Act of 2007.
"The sad part of it was the child didn't have to die if House Bill 1804 didn't ever come around," said Laurie Paul, who runs the clinic where Edgar was finally taken. "It was a total tragedy because the bill was there to create the myths and untruths and the fear."
The law, billed by its backers as the nation's toughest legislation against illegal immigration, took effect Nov. 1. It bars illegal immigrants from obtaining jobs or state assistance and makes it a felony to harbor or transport illegal immigrants.
A final portion of the law goes into effect July 1, requiring private companies to verify the employment eligibility of all new hires.
While it's difficult to characterize which state has the toughest immigration-related law, Oklahoma's goes beyond most because it includes the clause about harboring and transporting illegal immigrants, said Ann Morse, program director for the National Conference of State Legislatures' Immigrant Policy Project.
"What I think these laws may have are unintended consequences on the general public," Morse said recently. "How does the law get implemented? Who is the target?"
The crackdown has caused thousands of Hispanics to flee for neighboring states, with as many as 25,000 leaving northeastern Oklahoma alone, according to the Greater Tulsa Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.
The law's fallout also can be seen in the struggling businesses, worker shortages and widespread fear among immigrants who say they are afraid to drive to church or the market because police might pick them up.
"I feel like I'm in some kind of Nazi country where if they see your color, you'll be stopped," said Maria Sanchez, a 22-year-old student who is looking to leave Oklahoma rather than risk waiting the seven years it will take to get her papers. "I can't work, I can't study, I can't go out, there's no point of me staying here."
Civil rights leaders call the law xenophobic and redundant, and say other states will wrongly look to Oklahoma to push their own anti-illegal immigrant legislation. Business and church leaders also have been vocal opponents.
"Oklahoma was settled by immigrants ... which means that diverse is normal in Oklahoma," said the Rev. Miguel Rivera, president of the National Coalition of Latino Clergy and Christian Leaders. "It's difficult for us to understand a state which is so Christian, that to have all this animosity toward immigrants is completely outrageous."
Supporters — described by Dan Howard, the founder of an anti-illegal immigration Web site, as "good, American, God-fearing people of the heartland that bleed red, white and blue" — say the law is necessary because of Washington's bungled immigration policy. They also believe the law has helped deter crime and punishes the companies that make money on the backs of illegal labor.
The bill's Republican author, state Rep. Randy Terrill, said similar versions have been introduced or are under consideration in more than a dozen states. Last year, more than 1,500 pieces of immigration-related legislation were introduced across the country, with 244 becoming law in 46 states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
"More than half the nation will soon be modeling Oklahoma's bill," said Terrill, who plans to introduce a companion piece this year that would make English the state's official language, order schools to report how many illegal children are enrolled and require people or businesses who transport, hire or rent to illegal immigrants to forfeit property.
Terrill said there's no correlation between his bill and Edgar's death, noting that the child died in July, months before the law took effect, and that the law provides an exception for emergency medical care.
"To the extent that these illegal alien parents deprived their own child needed and necessary medical care because of their ignorance of the law, then they should be in prison, frankly," Terrill said.
Edgar's parents are believed to have gone underground following the boy's death, returning either to Mexico or going to stay with family in Arkansas, according to interviews with people in Tulsa's Latino community.
Far from the halls of the state Capitol, fear leads illegal immigrants to develop elaborate emergency plans for their children in case the youngsters should find their parents missing.
Irene Maldonado, 24, has been designated as the one to call in case her sister-in-law gets deported. Meanwhile, she worries if her husband, Jose, will come home on weekends from the construction jobs he works throughout the state.
She has legal residency, he doesn't.
"I don't know if he has less fear, or he's trying to be the macho guy," she said.
Illegal immigrant Maria Saldivar, 44, searches for what little factory work she can to support her three children. Past employers now ask for papers.
"Every time I look for a job, it's always the same thing," Saldivar said in Spanish through a translator. "There was more work for me to do before."
Even workers with proper paperwork are leaving for jobs in neighboring states rather than split up their families.
"My guy who runs my framing crew, he had 70 workers, and as of Nov. 1, he lost 35 of them," said Caleb McCaleb, who runs a homebuilding company in Edmond. "My painter has lost 30 percent of his work force, my landscaper has lost 25 percent of his work force."
Some in Terrill's own party doubt the wisdom of his legislation.
"We've removed not only those here illegally and working, but those who are here legally," said state Sen. Harry Coates, a Republican who voted against 1804 and wants to repeal portions of the bill. "I'm not the smartest person in the world, but I understand economics."
Gov't pact permits deportation of Vietnamese criminals
By My-Thuan Tran and Christopher Goffard
Los Angeles Times
January 24, 2008
To U.S. officials, a new pact announced this week with Vietnam, allowing the government to deport illegal immigrants, was almost routine -- a straightforward matter of treating Vietnam like other nations.
But for many among the tens of thousands of immigrants in Orange County, the nation's largest Vietnamese population center, nothing about their homeland is routine. Tuesday's announcement of the long-negotiated pact has stirred some-times-bitter debate within a community where loathing of Vietnam's communist government remains white hot.
'The Vietnamese have already been persecuted. I am afraid that sending those people back would give them another life sentence,' said Loc Nam Nguyen, director of the Immigration and Refugee Department of Catholic Charities in Los Angeles.
Until now, most Vietnamese in the United States could not be deported back to Vietnam because many had left as refugees and Vietnam was unwilling to take them back. The repatriation pact, announced Tuesday after 10 years of negotiations, affects about 1,500 Vietnamese nationals -- many of them described by the U.S. government as people who were convicted of crimes in this country -- who arrived in the United States after July 12, 1995, when the two countries resumed diplomatic relations. The repatriations are scheduled to begin in two months.
In addition to these 1,500 people, another 6,200 Vietnamese nationals have received final deportation notices. However, because they arrived in the U.S. before 1995, they cannot be returned to Vietnam under the new pact. Instead, they face possible deportation to a third country, according to the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
In all, roughly 1.5 million Vietnamese Americans live in the United States, many clustered in enclaves in Orange County, San Jose and Houston.
The repatriation agreement underscores the growing economic and diplomatic ties between the United States and Vietnam, even as many Vietnamese immigrants here abjure personal and business ties with their home country.
The struggle of many Vietnamese to flee their homeland -- on rickety boats, in military plane convoys to Camp Pendleton -- remains the founding story of large immigrant enclaves. As a result, many reacted with anger or hesitation to the idea of returning any Vietnamese to communist control.
Lan Quoc Nguyen, an attorney who serves on the Garden Grove school board, said that after the agreement was announced he received frantic calls from members of the community who worried it might affect them.
'For those who go back to Mexico, they go back to their families and nothing happens to them,' Nguyen said. 'But for people who go back to Vietnam, it's a totally different ballgame. They will be discriminated against. They will be de-nied household registration and even identification papers because they cannot provide their background in the bureaucracy process. They will have a hard time finding jobs.'
But the reaction was neither unanimous nor one-dimensional. Many Vietnamese immigrants are also strongly conservative. The conflict between anger at the communists and distaste for lawbreakers led to mixed feelings.
Lac Tan Nguyen, president of the Vietnamese American Community of Southern California, spent two years in a communist reeducation camp before fleeing on a raft in 1982 and detests the government in Hanoi, which he has denounced in dozens of protests. Yet he doesn't think lawbreakers deserve to stay in the U.S.
'I would like to give people a second chance to make corrections and redo their lives in the United States,' he said. But 'the people who don't respect the law have abused their freedom here.'
A group of men drinking coffee Wednesday at the Asian Garden Mall in Westminster also said deporting criminals who violated U.S. laws was the right thing to do.
'It follows the law. There are thousands of good people who want to come here from Vietnam who can't,' said Du Nguyen, 62, who came here in 1975.
'Returning criminals to Vietnam is better for society here,' he said. 'They make the society here dirty.'
Minh Dang, 56, of Westminster, who arrived in 1989, believes political refugees should be allowed to stay but had little sympathy for criminals. 'We pay taxes to take care of criminals in prisons here,' he said. 'If they are criminals they deserve to be sent back.'
Reaction in Washington was swift. Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-San Jose) and 12 other lawmakers condemned the arrangement with Vietnam in a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, demanding that the measure not be implemented until Congress approves it.
Lofgren, who represents the congressional district with the highest number of Vietnamese Americans, cited Vietnam's 'extensive and continuing record of human rights violations,' saying in the letter that 'it is appalling and unbelievable that this administration would even consider returning those who escaped communism back to the clutches of the very communists that they escaped.'
In recent years, the State Department has described the human rights situation in Vietnam as 'unsatisfactory' and detailed a litany of violations, including limits on free speech and the denial of swift trials. Other groups, such as Amnesty International and the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, have also documented human rights violations in Vietnam.
But advocates for greater immigration controls applauded the repatriation memo. 'The mistake was normalizing relations with Vietnam a decade ago without such a memorandum of understanding,' said Mark Krikorian, director of the Washington-based Center for Immigration Studies. He dismissed concerns about Vietnam's human rights record.
'There are a lot of bad countries in the world, but it ain't Auschwitz,' he said, describing it instead as 'authoritarian.'
Charlie Manh, a lawyer from Westminster, expressed concern that the pact would target those who overstayed their visitor or work visas, or those who came here legally and committed crimes but have rebuilt their lives.
'If you look into the real details, some don't deserve to be deported,' Manh said. 'For those with extreme hardship and the fact that they don't have any more family members over there, the law should have exceptions for them not to be deported.'
In 2002, the U.S. and Cambodia signed an agreement for the deportation of Cambodian nationals who were convicted of aggravated felonies.
Assemblyman Van Tran (R-Garden Grove) said he feared deportees could be harassed or intimidated in Vietnam.
'There has to be stringent oversight to ensure that the people are not politically persecuted when they go back to Vietnam,' he said. 'There are very legitimate concerns, given Vietnam is still a one-party totalitarian state.'
Warning: DV Lottery Notification Scam
An email claiming to come from the U.S. Department of State, stating that "you have been selected as one of the lucky winners" of the DV visa lottery and asking for payment of $749 for singles and $949 for families is not a legitimate notification. The sender is trying to steal your money, and you will not get a visa from it.
A legitimate notification of selection under the DV lottery will come ONLY by mail, will include a packet of forms for you to complete, and will NOT ask you for money.
Immigration and the Candidates
New York Times
December 30, 2007
Even by the low standards of presidential campaigns, the issue of immigration has been badly served in the 2008 race. Candidates — and by this we mean the Republicans, mostly — have been striking poses and offering prescriptions that sound tough but will solve nothing. They have distorted or disowned their pasts and attacked one another ferociously, but over appearances, not ideas — over who can claim to be the authentic scourge of illegal immigrants, and who is the Lou-Dobbs-Come-Lately.
Voters deserve much better than what these candidates have given them. The Democrats have done better, though they have not always responded with the courage and specifics this difficult issue demands. Before voters pick a candidate and a president, they should insist on serious answers to questions like these:
What should be the role of immigrant labor in our economy? How does the country maximize its benefits and lessen its ill effects? Once the border is fortified, what happens to the 12 million illegal immigrants already here? Should they be expelled or allowed to assimilate? How? What about the companies that hire them?
And what about the future flow of workers? Should the current system of legal immigration, with its chronic backlogs and morbid inefficiencies, be tweaked or trashed? What is the proper role of state and local governments in enforcing immigration laws? And will a national identity card for immigrants bring on Big Brother for everyone?
The first thing to know about the Republicans’ immigration debate is that it is not much of a debate. The candidates speak essentially with one voice, calling for a bristling border and stiffer penalties against companies that hire the undocumented. Some call for new instruments of law and order, like tamper-proof ID cards.
There is wide support for stricter enforcement. Not many people favor the underground economy. No one is calling for more immigrants to sneak over the border or to overstay their visas, or for less oversight and looser hiring rules in the workplace. Pretty much every candidate in both parties wants the government to bolster the border — even Bill Richardson, the Democratic governor of New Mexico, who calls the fence ridiculous. (He wants more military boots on the ground.)
The problem is that the country cannot build a fence or send troops and expect its problems to go away. Huge numbers of illegal immigrants never go anywhere near the border: about 40 percent enter legally and overstay their visas. Nor can the government purge workplaces of illegal workers without doing vast damage to the economy. At some point it must address the 12 million undocumented, who cannot be deported en masse.
Most of the Republicans have no answer for what to do with those 12 million, except to argue for “attrition through enforcement,” the hard-liners’ strategy of making immigrants’ lives miserable and waiting for them to leave. Some of the Republicans have called on the government to identify and track all who overstay their visas, without specifying how to do that or pay for it.
Instead of answering these questions, the Republican candidates have spent their time blasting one another as coddlers of illegal immigrants and supporters of “amnesty.” This has proved tricky, however, for the candidates who in previous lives had to deal with immigration in the real world, where immigrant energy and low-end labor — both legal and illegal — tend to bolster economies and make life easier for everyone.
Only two years ago, while governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney spoke favorably of a Senate bill that offered illegal immigrants a path to citizenship. Now he says he hates amnesty, condemns Rudolph Giuliani for having been mayor of a “sanctuary city” and has accepted endorsements from hard-liners like Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Ariz., who hounds immigrant day laborers as aggressively as he chases headlines.
Mr. Romney still has had a hard time explaining his own connections to illegal immigration. He was caught — twice — having a landscaping company with undocumented workers tend to his lavish property. When pressed on that he got testy. “Let’s say I go to a restaurant,” he said to reporters. “Should I make sure that all the waiters there are all legal? How would I do that?”
It is a good question — especially since some 12 percent of the workers in the food service industry are believed to be undocumented — and one we would like Mr. Romney and his fellow candidates to answer seriously.
Mr. Romney is not the only one struggling to reconcile his past policies with his present ambitions. Mr. Giuliani once welcomed undocumented immigrants and sued the federal government to preserve an executive order that shielded them from deportation. Now he links immigration and terrorism in the same breath, and talks of cracking the whip through databases and enforcement schemes with names like BorderStat.
For a while it looked as if Mike Huckabee would be a sensibly contrarian Republican. As governor of Arkansas he supported financial aid for illegal-immigrant students, and when Mr. Romney rebuked him for it in a debate, he scolded right back, “Our country is better than that, to punish children for what their parents did.” Then this month he did a stunning backflip, unveiling his “Secure America Plan,” which would require the expulsion of all illegal immigrants within 120 days. And last week, after the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, he used the turmoil in Pakistan as an argument for building a border fence, and said the United States needed to watch whether “there’s any unusual activity of Pakistanis coming into the country.”
The single voice of reason in the Republican camp is Senator John McCain. He was an original sponsor of a comprehensive immigration bill that married enforcement with a guest-worker program and a path to citizenship for those who earn it. For this he saw his presidential hopes nearly blown to bits. He is hanging on, though. He was AWOL for a time when the Senate bill was killed last summer, but has since regained his voice. He speaks of immigrants as “God’s children” and stoutly defends the path to citizenship for the undocumented. Given what he has gone through, his stance is close to heroic.
The Democratic candidates start in a better place, since they and their party are largely on record as firmly supporting the pillars of comprehensive reform. There are no demagogues in their ranks.
But there are timid fumblers, like Senator Hillary Clinton, who first supported then rejected a plan by Gov. Eliot Spitzer of New York to let illegal immigrants earn driver’s licenses. She was right at first to defend Mr. Spitzer’s logic, but wrong to then back away from the firestorm that he ignited. She did not inspire confidence as someone who will have the courage to do what is necessary and right even if it is controversial.
Mrs. Clinton, like Mr. Richardson, Senators John Edwards and Barack Obama, and the rest of the Democratic field, did vigorously support the one piece of legislation that might have led the country out of its immigration morass. That was the ambitious Senate bill that died under a Republican-led assault in June.
The bill was flawed, but it contained the seeds of true reform. It chose assimilation over expulsion for the 12 million. It leveled with Americans by acknowledging that a border fence would never end lawlessness by itself. It grasped a fundamental moral truth that the Republicans — again, with the notable exception of Mr. McCain — have rejected. The truth is this: Americans cannot expect immigrants to serve them — to make their beds and meals, feed their babies and ailing parents, and pick their crops — while living in fear and hopelessness.
One of the strong arguments for passing immigration reform last summer was that it was a last chance. If Congress did not seize it, the presidential race would blot out hopes of reform for two years or more.
Congress did not seize it, and all the problems are still there. The issue has left the country divided, fretful and ambivalent, and voters are yearning for honesty and thoughtfulness. The Republicans are not giving it to them. The Democrats should fill the vacuum. They have said the right things. Amid all the Republican shouting, it would help if they would speak louder.
Immigration officials say raids on illegals are within the law
By Elizabeth Llorente
The Record (Hackensack, NJ), January 2, 2008
The federal government is increasingly deceiving unsuspecting illegal immigrants into granting entry to their homes, a growing chorus of lawyers and civil rights groups say.
They charge that in an overzealous effort to deport illegal immigrants, federal immigration agents forgo required search warrants, instead using ruses and intimidation to gain consent to enter and search private dwellings. In interviews with The Record and in a growing number of lawsuits, immigrants and critics of the raids say that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is violating the U.S. Constitution.
'They're armed agents showing up at 5 a.m., banging on doors, kicking them in, going into people's bedrooms, ripping covers off people in their beds, asking them questions when they're half asleep, and seizing them and taking them away,' said Patrick Gennardo of Englewood, one of several area attorneys who have filed suits recently asking that such ICE practices be found unconstitutional. 'These aren't fine lines between consent and storming in; these are scary, major violations of the Constitution.'
But Scott Weber, field director for ICE's office in Newark, takes exception to those claims.
'We all operate under the same Constitution,' Weber said. 'My officers are not involved in sweeps or random searches. We're looking for specific individuals that we have specific information for and active and valid warrants for their removal [from the U.S.] Our officers have extensive training in which they're taught constitutional law, statutory law and immigration law.'
Confronted by agents
In a scenario commonly described in interviews and court affidavits, immigrants said they have awakened to loud, persistent knocks on their doors, the shout of 'Police,' flashlights shining in their faces and guns dangling from holsters.
In those instances, immigrants opened their doors, expecting local police and fearing news about a tragedy, or a criminal loose in the neighborhood.
Instead, they found themselves confronted by immigration agents, often inquiring about someone whose photo or name they did not recognize. Then, the agents interrogated them, they said, handcuffing, detaining and preparing for deportation those who could not show lawful U.S. residence.
'I don't see it as storming a home,' Weber said. 'We see it as trying to locate someone.'
After 9/11, the federal government focused on finding immigrants with outstanding deportation orders. ICE teams in New Jersey arrested more than 2,000 such illegals in 2007, compared with 1,094 in 2006. Nationally, the arrests also doubled -- 30,408 in 2007, up from 15,462 in 2006. Some 500,000 illegal immigrants are estimated to be living in New Jersey; with at least 12 million in the United States.
ICE officials say they are proud of the arrests -- the result of the so-called Fugitive Operations Program. Many ICE districts, including New Jersey, have topped their annual goal of 1,000 arrests. Weber said ICE is not going after innocent victims, but either 'fugitive absconders' -- people who have ignored deportation orders -- or other illegal immigrants whom ICE agents encounter during a raid.
But a slew of lawsuits in New Jersey and nationwide accuse ICE of pursuing those arrest goals by trampling over the U.S. Constitution – particularly the Fourth Amendment, which grants protection from unlawful search and seizure, and the Fifth Amendment, which provides safeguards against self-incrimination. Two weeks ago, the Center for Social Justice at Seton Hall University requested files from 10 New Jersey towns -- including Englewood and Morristown -- under the state's Open Public Records Act seeking information about ICE raids in those locations. Attorneys with the center say they expect to seek records from more towns where ICE raids were conducted.
Meanwhile, more and more immigrants across New Jersey are finding ICE at their door.
Valjbona Hot, a native of the former Yugoslavia who has been living in Fair Lawn for 17 years, has had an electronic monitoring device on her ankle since her home was raided in September. Her husband, Salih, spent about three months in an immigration detention center in Elizabeth.
'We are not criminals,' said Salih, the father of three U.S.-born sons who was released after his lawyer requested a stay of deportation pending a motion to reopen the case. 'We have not been hiding from them. We have been here, at the same address, the whole time.'
'Luis Borges' ruse?
Salih Hot said immigration officers came to his house, asking about a man he didn't know. But Hot said he noticed that the agents carried a file with his photo and information in it. They asked the Hots for ID and proof that they were legal residents. Then they arrested them when they could not produce it.
Brenda Cumsille of Cliffside Park said more than a dozen ICE agents entered her home in April, asking about 'Luis Borges.' They ended up arresting her husband, who had an outstanding deportation order, and deporting him in May. Cumsille said an unscrupulous 'immigration consultant' they hired never told her husband that he faced deportation.
Cumsille believes ICE agents, who she initially thought were local police, used 'Luis Borges' as a ruse to gain permission to enter. 'It was a lie,' said Cumsille, who stayed behind with two U.S.-born daughters. 'They didn't come looking for Luis Borges. They were looking for my husband.'
In Newark that same month, Susana Vasquez awakened at 4:30 a.m. to find ICE agents in her bedroom. She said they had gained entry into the multifamily home by telling her landlord they were looking for a certain man.
'We didn't know who this was,' she said. 'It was no one we'd ever seen.'
The agents arrested Vasquez and others who couldn't prove legal status. Vasquez said that agents, who she stressed were polite to her, conducted a raid on another site while she and other detainees waited in ICE vehicles.
'The other people they picked up and I talked among ourselves about our arrest, and how ICE had come into our apartments showing photos of people we'd never seen,' Vasquez said. 'I wasn't worried because I thought they were looking for the man in the photo. I answered their questions because they didn't indicate that they were investigating me and could arrest me.'
ICE officials often note that unlike guidelines governing criminal arrests, those for immigration enforcement do not require a judicial warrant to enter a private residence, only a person's consent. They dismiss the assertion that ICE agents use deception in identifying themselves simply as 'police' instead of immigration agents. They say they are police -- federal police.
Weber said agents do not approach homes asking about people they know do not live there. He said they do exhaustive preparatory work to be as sure as possible that a fugitive absconder lives at a particular address.
About the many accounts of inquiries about unknown targets, Weber said: 'People we're looking for in many case provided the wrong addresses or bogus address. [ICE agents] are following up on the information that the person provided.'
But Vasquez's attorney, Rex Chen of Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Newark, says ICE's handling of his client was 'a violation of her constitutional rights.' Chen said agents misled her into thinking she was not a target, and she answered questions and incriminated herself under that assumption.
Gennardo's class-action suit, filed with the Puerto Rican Legal and Defense and Education Fund in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, says: 'When the unsuspecting residents ... open the door to inquire about what is going on, the agents then bully or force their way into homes without first obtaining the occupants' consent to entry.
'The unstated goal of these raids is to gain access to constitutionally protected areas in the hope of seizing as many undocumented persons as possible.'
'We have an invasion'
ICE has plenty of supporters. Many say tougher enforcement is critical, especially because Congress has failed to pass immigration reform bills that have sought to control U.S. borders while also providing some undocumented immigrants a path to legalization. Ron Bass, founder of United Patriots of America, based in Linden, assails the lawsuits as preposterous and hypocritical.
'If they want to talk about the Constitution, fine,' he said. 'They should be reminded that the Constitution also says that the president must protect us against invasions. With the millions of people coming into this country illegally, we have an invasion, there are felons and this is a big problem for homeland security.'
Bass said he would not condone human rights abuses against illegal immigrants, but 'why should people who broke into the United States illegally be protected by my Constitution?'
Critics of ICE raids say everyone should be alarmed when constitutional rights are at issue in the treatment of any group.
'Immigration officials have every right to place people in deportation proceedings,' said Bassina Farbenblum, an attorney with Seton Hall University's Center for Social Justice. 'And if they're not entitled to stay in the United States, they should remove them. But there have to be constitutional limitations on the way in which immigration officials locate and arrest them.'
'It's very dangerous to go down a path where we say the Constitution doesn't matter for a certain group of people,' Farbenblum said. 'This isn't a cowboy state.'