Free Republic

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said Thursday that a temporary worker program for migrants who want jobs in the United States and stronger sanctions against employers who knowingly hire undocumented workers are critical to improved border security. Chertoff said the government has "no other choice" but to develop a legal channel that will match willing migrants with U.S. employers in order to relieve the strain on the Border Patrol and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau. House Republicans in particular are bitterly divided on whether border security reforms should include a temporary worker program. "If we don't have a temporary...

Arizona and New Mexico are under a state of emergency Friday night. The governors of both states made the declaration to free up money to increase Mexican border patrols. It is an effort to fight illegal immigration. Illegal immigrants in Nevada say it's only a matter of time before a similar state of emergency is issued here. They fear being thrown out of the country, unable to make money from jobs they find here in the states. Illegal immigrants in southern Nevada believe it's only a matter of time until authorities here crack down on them. Here in the valley,...

JAFFREY — A judge has dismissed trespassing charges against a group of illegal immigrants, disagreeing with two small-town police chiefs who applied the state law because they said they were frustrated by lax federal enforcement. The closely-watched district court decision was released Friday afternoon. The police chiefs in New Ipswich and Hudson were praised by many law enforcement officers nationwide for their novel approach to homeland security. But lawyers for the immigrants argued that only the federal government has the power to regulate immigration, and that the state law was designed to apply to people intruding on private property. Jaffrey...

Documents emerging from once-closed Soviet archives are forcing historians to rewrite the history of the last days of World War II and reassess the impact of the Hiroshima bomb on Japan's surrender. Tsuyoshi Hasegawa, a professor of history at the University of California-Santa Barbara, said the evidence shows that it wasn't so much the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that forced the Japanese to capitulate in August 1945, but the Soviet invasion of Manchuria and impending threat of Soviet occupation of the Japanese mainland. "I think the Soviet presence was crucial," said Hasegawa, author of "Racing the Enemy: Stalin, Truman...

The president, in a wide-ranging talk, gives a hint at how he'll pitch reform measures GRAPEVINE - President Bush told a crowd of state legislators Wednesday that he will push immigration reform as beneficial for U.S. employers as well as foreigners looking for work. He also made an impassioned pitch for Americans to stay behind the war in Iraq. "Immigration reform is going to be an interesting subject when we get back to Washington" in September, said Bush, who plans to spend this month at his Crawford ranch. He argued that his proposal for a "guest worker" program is good...

No one knows exactly how many people enter the United States illegally each year, but studies based on data from the Census bureau and other federal agencies indicate that there are now more than 10 million undocumented immigrants residing in the country. As many as three million of them may have entered the country just within the past year or so. Most of the illegal entry occurs on the US-Mexico border, with the main point being the border with Arizona. The number of illegal immigrants crossing over from Mexico has grown steadily in recent years in spite of U.S. Border...

MEXICO CITY Mexican authorities are investigating reports that 13 migrants may have been apprehended by U-S civilians guarding the Arizona-Mexico border against illegal crossers. Mexican Deputy Foreign Secretary for North America Geronimo Gutierrez says he's received reports that 13 Mexicans were "detained and referred to the Border Patrol" by the volunteers. Volunteers participating in the "Minuteman Project," began patrolling April 1st for migrants crossing the Arizona-Mexico boundary. The area is the most active for illegal immigrants cross into the U-S. Gutierrez says they're doing an investigation in each one of the cases. A spokesman for the Minuteman Project says he...

Microsoft has issued a list of nearly 50 software applications and games that may encounter problems with its Windows XP Service Pack 2 update. In a document published in the "Knowledge Base" section of the company's Web site, Microsoft details the various issues that people may face when they install the SP2 package, which was released to PC manufacturers earlier this month. A range of applications are listed in the Microsoft report, including several of the software maker's own products, along with antivirus tools, Web server software and a handful of games. Among the primary issues Microsoft highlights in the...

CHICAGO -- This week, a series of public forums on a program requiring all pregnant women and children through age 18 years to be tested for mental health needs is being held this week in five different locations statewide. One group of parents learned about the state's plans to proceed with this program and on Monday issued an alarm asking for parents and citizens concerned about the new program to voice their opinions at the forums. "We're moving toward social training over academic training with this program," Larry Trainor, a Mt. Prospect parent of four children and a contact for...

Proposal to eliminate services to illegals assailed as 'racist' Julissa Molina Soto knows all too well the health-care needs of illegal immigrants, struggling to eke out a living in the land of opportunity. More than 725,000 illegal immigrants do not have health insurance. When they're battling ailments such as hepatitis C, they turn to her organization and handful of others supported in part by federal and state funding. But she worries that a proposed constitutional amendment by U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., eliminating social services for illegal immigrants would virtually gut programs that aid tens of thousands of documented and...

President Bush's immigration initiative has sparked a great deal of discussion across the country. Perhaps the most interesting debate centers on whether the president, in announcing the initiative, has embraced conservative principles or abandoned them. I believe a temporary worker program is consistent with conservative principles, and here's why. First, conservatives value national security, and the status quo encourages anything but national security. The presence of 8 million to 12 million illegal aliens within the confines of our borders should prompt the type of reform the president has suggested. President Bush's proposal will ensure smarter border enforcement by redirecting resources...

WASHINGTON - The nation's top immigration official says registering 8 million illegal residents for temporary permits, as proposed by President Bush last week, would be a "tall challenge" but doable. Eduardo Aguirre, director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, conceded in an interview that his agency is still struggling with a huge backlog that has recently grown to nearly 6.2 million pending applications. Requests for a change of status, for example, are now backed up more than 2 1/2 years. "We are certainly not satisfied on where it is today," he said of the agency he inherited, which was recently...

<p>President Vicente Fox said Thursday he has agreed with U.S. President George W. Bush to hold a private meeting during January's Summit of the Americas, to restart talks on immigration reform.</p> <p>The two leaders agreed in a telephone conversation Thursday to meet in the northern city of Monterrey, where the Jan. 12-13 summit is to be held.</p>

<p>Democratic presidential candidate Wesley Clark has more in common with Republican Sen. John McCain than serving in Vietnam and seeking the White House.</p> <p>The retired Army general said Monday in Phoenix that he shares views similar to those of McCain and two other Arizonans, Republican congressmen Jim Kolbe and Jeff Flake, who together are sponsoring a bill aimed at curbing undocumented immigration from Mexico by creating a guest-worker program.</p>

Johnnie Cochran took on Paul Esposito's case yesterday, describing the badly injured Staten Island ferry crash survivor as a New Yorker whose tenacity and gusto for life will help the city emerge from the tragedy. "I think Paul Esposito represents all of us," said the famed lawyer. "This could have been any one of us, and we need to do something so that it never happens again." Cochran met with Esposito at his bedside at Staten Island University Hospital yesterday as the young man wrestled with excruciating pain from the loss of his legs in the Oct. 15 crash. The...

WASHINGTON — Rep. Charles Rangel, a caustic critic of the military effort in Iraq, labeled Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld “an embarrassment” on Wednesday and called for his resignation. “It’s time that he does the American people a service by resigning,” Rangel said, arguing that Rumsfeld has shown he has no strategy for securing postwar Iraq. “He has no plan,” said Rangel, D-N.Y., a Korean War veteran. “When you have a problem as we do in Iraq,” Rangel said, “you want somebody that does better than acknowledging there’s a problem. Heck, anybody can do that. I can get a kid...

Mexico's President Vicente Fox is on his way to Austin. Fox is visiting three U.S. states - all of which share interests and a border with Mexico. Fox will meet with Gov. Rick Perry Wednesday and Thursday. Perry has a few complaints -- one of which is about water rights with Mexico. "If Mexico continues to refuse to live up to the obligations of the 1944 treaty, then the United States should consider turning off the tap on the Colorado River of water into Mexico," Perry said two months ago. While water is on the agenda for discussion, the Mexican...

WESTLAKE VILLAGE -- American automakers are building more-dependable cars, toppling some of Europe's most-vaunted names and making inroads on long-standing leaders from Japan, according to a study released Tuesday by J.D. Power and Associates. Toyota Motor Sales USA Inc. continued its dominance of the annual Vehicle Dependability Study, powered by its premium Lexus nameplate, but General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. made strong strides in improving their quality as measured by the three-year performance of 2000 models. GM, in particular, performed above the industry average with five of its domestic brands. "The Japanese have really raised the bar in...

<p>HONOLULU (AP) A student is suing Hawaii's private Kamehameha Schools, saying he was denied admission because he isn't Hawaiian.</p> <p>The student, unidentified in the lawsuit filed this week in U.S. District Court, says the rejection was based on race and violated federal civil rights laws.</p>

Company Ordered to Turn Over Information to Union WASHINGTON, June 18 /U.S. Newswire/ -- When meat cutters at a Jacksonville, Tex., Wal-Mart voted for United Food and Commercial Workers Local 540 representation, the company refused to recognize the union -- and suddenly changed the job functions of the meat cutters with a change to case-ready meat. Wal-Mart believed it had successfully circumvented the UFCW's first victory at one of its stores -- until a National Labor Relations Board Administrative Law Judge ordered the company to recognize and bargain with Local 540 over the effects of the change to prepackaged meat....