Free Republic

A California bill that would allow undocumented immigrants to get drivers licenses is one step closer to becoming a state law. State senate bill 60 passed through the assembly Friday. If the bill becomes law, legislators say the estimated 2.2 million undocumented immigrants in California will apply for one, an idea that's creating a lot of controversy. "I think they should be able to get licenses just like everybody else," said Nicole Holland, a Fresnan who supports the bill. "They are already committing a crime coming over here," said Albert Ratliff, a Fresnan who opposes the bill. "I don't think...

PICKENS — Illegal immigrants arrested in Pickens County are walking back into the shadows after serving their time or paying their fines, according to officials. More than half of arrested illegal immigrants are released on the orders of U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE), said Capt. Phil Sargent, jail administrator for Pickens County. The mission of ICE is “to more effectively enforce our immigration and customs laws,” but most of the agency’s Web site is devoted to anti-terrorist activities. Numerous phone calls by the Independent-Mail to various ICE offices, including one in Puerto Rico, led to dead ends in trying...

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama used his own name and heritage to make a point about change at a fundraiser that raised a record $7.8 million for his campaign in San Francisco Sunday.Others wrote checks for as much as $14,000 for the special Asian-Pacific Islander VIP reception filled with CEOs, executives and spouses - a few in elegant saris - that included a meeting and individual picture with Obama.Obama told the group - which included many Indian and Pakistani immigrants - that he is not only familiar with their cultures - but also proud of his lifelong association with them....

The state community college system will discuss at its monthly meetings this week whether to allow illegal immigrants into degree programs. The decision to revisit the contentious issue comes after federal Homeland Security officials told the state Attorney General’s Office in July that no federal law bars illegal immigrants from pursuing degrees. The discussions will be held during the Thursday and Friday sessions of the community colleges’ board in Raleigh, spokeswoman Audrey Bailey said. Tony Asion, director of the Raleigh-based Hispanic advocacy group El Pueblo, expressed excitement over the decision to reopen discussion on the issue. “This is good for...

MELROSE PARK, Ill. - In a yellow-brick building by the railroad tracks, the Illinois Welcoming Center is the crown jewel of a broad state initiative to help immigrants blend into mainstream America. Yet the center is also an example of the initiative's disappointments. Illinois's ambitious effort to lend immigrants a hand as they navigate their new homeland is being held up as a model for Massachusetts, but it has fallen far short of its expectations because of lack of state money. Now Illinois's program also stands as a warning as Massachusetts embarks on its own effort this year - with...

A Los Angeles City Council committee unanimously recommended an ordinance that would require home improvement stores that are 100,000 square feet or larger, or any building with 250,000 square feet or more of warehouse floor area, to set aside space for day laborers. The space required must include shelter from the elements, be easily accessible and equipped with drinking water, bathrooms, tables with seating, free condoms, and trash receptacles. Bethany Leal of the Multi-Ethnic Immigrant Worker Organizing Network, urged adoption of the ordinance. “These immigrants have journeyed far from their native countries,” Leal observed. “Most have entered the United States...

----snip Villanueva was reportedly shooting dice with friends in Henri Bourassa Park in the ethnically-diverse borough when police attempted to make a routine arrest. Montreal police say about 20 youths then surrounded them -- several of them reportedly rushing at police. ----snip Villanueva's death triggered an angry and violent response Sunday night. Vehicles were set on fire and there was widespread looting and violence targeting police and emergency service workers. One police officer was shot in the leg, while another officer and an ambulance technician received minor injuries. The technician was struck in the head with a bottle, said CTV...

COSTA MESA – Three teens, including the son of a former City Council candidate and community activist, have been arrested in connection with a shotgun attack on a teenage girl, police said today. The arrests stem from a July 28 shooting on Shalimar Drive – a notorious area barricaded with concrete stumps at all but one access point because of rampant gang activity – that resulted in a 15-year-old girl being hospitalized with a shotgun wound to the torso. The three suspects - one young man and two juveniles - were booked on suspicion of attempted murder, conspiracy and street...

Stepped-up enforcement measures have contributed to a 11 percent decline in the number of illegal immigrants in the country over the past year, according to a new report by a nonpartisan think tank. The illegal immigrant population fell from a peak of 12.5 million in August 2007 to 11.2 million today, according to the Washington D.C.-based Center for Immigration Studies. If current trends continue, the illegal immigrant population would be cut in half within five years, the report states. The decline is at least seven times larger than the number of illegal immigrants removed by the government in the last...

Workers at a second county-owned golf course have abandoned their jobs after managers announced the county was auditing their immigration status. The flight from Eisenhower Golf Course in Crownsville last week followed a similar scenario that unfolded at the other county-owned facility, Compass Pointe Golf Course in Pasadena. "Some voluntarily saw fit not to return to their jobs the next day, and we haven't heard from them since," confirmed Rich Katz, senior vice president of Billy Casper Golf, the Northern Virginia company that manages both courses for the county. Workers fleeing the courses have drawn the suspicion of a county...

More than 350 illegal immigrants landed in Italy on Saturday, a day after the Government extended a state of emergency in an effort to combat the problem, Italy's Ansa news agency said. Four boats carrying a total of 227 people were either picked up off the island of Lampedusa or reached land by themselves. Two Nigerian children on one of the boats died during the crossing, Ansa said. The bodies of the two children were thrown into the sea, their father told the crew of an Italian coast guard launch that rescued the group. He said his two-year-old son began...

The Mexican government announced that it will honor U.S. Senator Ted Kennedy by granting him citizenship in what President Felipe Calderón called “the emerging ‘Greater Mexico.’” “Señor Kennedy’s staunch defense of the rights of so-called illegal immigrants has been a cornerstone of the effort to unite the Norte Americano continent into one political entity,” Calderón proclaimed. “As a ‘founding father’ of ‘Greater Mexico,’ he deserves to be awarded citizenship.” Calderón contrasted what he contended was Mexico’s “spirit of generosity” in awarding Kennedy citizenship with U.S. plans to build a barrier on the border. “Thanks to the work of Señor Kennedy,...

The high-priced corporate lobbyists walking Capitol Hill corridors have a new mantra: innovation. They demand that Congress bring in more guest workers, especially from Asia, in order to maintain American innovation supremacy. The lobbyists' backup buzzword is "the best and the brightest." They argue that U.S. workers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics are in short supply and we must now import foreign engineers and scientists, i.e., allow the multinationals to bring in an increased or even unlimited number of H-1B visas. Their argument lacks evidence: Economics 101 teaches that shortages in labor or goods produce higher wages or higher...

FORT WORTH — The bus that ferries workers twice daily to the Day Labor Center in south Fort Worth is partially empty, but the center’s parking lot is nearly full.Soon there won’t be enough room to accommodate the vehicles of the workers, who have to drive to the center because contractors are more likely to hire them if they have their own transportation.But high gas prices are forcing contractors and day laborers to change how they do business, which is causing a ripple effect in other areas.Construction projects and landscaping jobs are being delayed because contractors can’t afford to...

Frustrated by a steady flow of illegal Mexican immigrants into Arizona, Sheriff Joe Arpaio has decided to take matters into his own hands. He has drawn support and opposition in equal measure for his treatment of prisoners, which includes re-introducing chain gangs and making prisoners wear pink underwear. Now he's under fire for dispatching teams of sheriff's deputies into Hispanic communities where they stop people and arrest anyone who cannot prove he or she is a legal U.S. resident. It has brought an onslaught of criticism from Hispanic activists, local lawmakers and the Phoenix mayor, who call his crackdown on...

An immigrant couple, here legally, and their U.S.-born son have joined a statewide lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security after their Paterson home was raided last month by federal agents looking for illegal immigrants. Walter Chavez and his wife, Ana Galindo, said Thursday that on April 2, agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, forced their way into their home, pointing guns at Galindo and their child. "It was a nightmare for our family, and continues to be even today," said Galindo, 42. "The very worst part of it all was when an agent, who screamed at me...

EASTSOUND, Wash. - Pedro Perez has not left Orcas Island in more than four months. Not for weekend trips with his family, not for cheaper groceries on the mainland, not for medical care — not for anything. He is afraid border agents will stop him and send him back to Mexico, wrecking the quiet life he has built on one of Washington's remote San Juan Islands. "I had my eyes on this place for my kids to grow up in," Perez, who is married with two young children, said in Spanish. "There's no gangs here, no crime. It's the kids...

Federal and local law enforcement have arrested seven alleged members and associates of the Hermanos Pistoleros Latinos prison gang over the last week.Prosecutors say the seven people from Laredo and 17 from the Houston area were involved in a conspiracy to transport large amounts of cocaine from Laredo to Houston and launder the proceeds in Laredo. Pedro Gil III, 37, also known as "Master P," "PG" and "Carwash," was arrested over the weekend and charged with five counts of conspiracy with intent to distribute more than 5 kilograms of cocaine and one count of money laundering. Police later arrested his...

When her neighbor's roosters and chickens persisted in running through her yard, G. Stone took matters into her own hands. She marched next door and issued a warning: Do something about the uninvited guests or the birds "were going in my pot." The incursions stopped. But Stone, a retired Los Angeles County librarian who lives northwest of Watts, shook her head in exasperation as she recalled the incident. "I've lived here for 50 years," she said. "All of a sudden, there's an influx of chickens. You're not supposed to have chickens in the city." For many, the image of South...

WOODBRIDGE, Va. – Business at Pedro Vargas' store, Club Video Mexico, has slid so steeply that only eight people walked through the door one day last month. One thing he has been selling, however, are one-way bus tickets from northern Virginia to Texas and Mexico. Soon he'll be getting his own ticket out of town – seeking a friendlier and more lucrative place to do business. “The last few months have been very, very bad for us,” said Vargas, who plans to move this summer from Prince William County, about 25 miles southwest of Washington, to Utah, where he recently...

ORLANDO, Fla. - For three years and three months, Ali Hussain has waited to become a U.S. Citizen. On Thursday, his wait was over - but not before he sued the federal government. In February, Hussain and 24 other Muslims joined a statewide lawsuit against Citizenship and Immigration Services and the FBI for what they called unusually lengthy delays in processing their citizenship applications. Some waited as long as five years. ''The lawsuit helped my application. I have been waiting so long,'' said Hussain, an Orlando machinist from Iraq. In a post Sept. 11 era of fingerprinting and thorough background...

BRUSSELS - Nearly 200 youngsters were detained during riots in the Brussels borough of Anderlecht on Friday evening where immigrant youngsters clashed with supporters of Anderlecht Football Club. Fourteen police officers were injured. Two are still receiving medical treatment. Twelve rioters were also hurt. Most of the youngsters were minors and were released in the course of the night. Earlier in the week, immigrant youngsters used the Internet to unveil their plans to fight with Anderlecht supporters. There was a massive police presence in the Brussels borough of Anderlecht. The police were deployed between the two groups in an attempt...

Denmark, long the liberal, open society that welcomed immigrants, has done an about face. After being the symbolic envy of Universalists, of Socialists, of cultural liberalism, Denmark today has the strictest immigration policy in Europe. The Muslim population in Denmark, constituting a mere 4% of the total, refuses to integrate, consumes 40% of the welfare, and constitutes a majority of the country’s convicted rapists. The Danes now acknowledge that their core values of personal liberty, free speech, equality for women and tolerance of other ethnic groups are incompatible with Islam as they know it. Muslim leaders openly advocate introducing Islamic...

Students Must Pay To Make Up Difference In Out-Of-State Tuition. Was it a promise kept, or a promise broken? Four years ago in an auditorium at Cole Middle School, Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper promised the 300-plus students in attendance that he would find a way to send each of them to college for free. Now, the first group of those students is set to graduate, and some are finding that the mayor's promise isn't adding up. The promise only pays in-state tuition, and state law requires illegal immigrants to pay out-of-state tuition. So undocumented students must make up the difference....

"Francelia Menchaca drove with her family from Phoenix to the Tijuana border to see her mother at the fence on Saturday." You can walk to the U.S. border, Francelia Menchaca's immigration lawyer advised her, but don't put your fingers through its fence. It may hinder her immigration paperwork, the lawyer said.But when, after a year apart, Menchaca's mother arrived in her flowered straw hat to the border in Tijuana on Saturday and put her small, wrinkled hands up to the cast-iron gate, Menchaca reached out and touched them. "Were you anxious to touch my hand?" Menchaca asked in Spanish. Tears...

There was a plaque dedication on Saturday in memory of promising young athlete Jamiel Shaw. The 17-year-old was slain two months ago by a gang member who was also in the country illegally. Now there is a push for a law to get killers like him out of the country before they commit crimes. Leelila Strogov has the details in this video report.

ANAHEIM, California (CNN) -- As he fixes a broken sliding glass door at an apartment in Anaheim, California, Eduardo Gutierrez worries about his parents in Mexico. He can no longer afford to send the $200 to $300 a month he had been sending back home to support his ailing father. "I kind of feel bad that I can't help my parents," said Gutierrez, a legal immigrant who has worked in the United States for 20 years. "I try. But I can't these days, and it's a tough situation." Gutierrez said he earns $18.50 an hour as a glazier, installer and...

Los Angeles is at the leading edge of a U.S. demographic trend, with half of its workforce immigrants, many of them unskilled and speaking little English. As baby boomers retire, the same pattern will emerge across the country, the Los Angeles Times reported Sunday. Demographers estimate that by 2025 most of the growth in the workforce will be from immigrants. Ernesto Cortes Jr., Southwest regional director of the Industrial Areas Foundation, said Los Angeles is at a crossroads. "The question is: Are we going to be a 21st century city with shared prosperity, or a Third World city with an...

Our prisons are boiling over capacity with criminals. Convicted criminal immigrants make up a large number of inmates. IF it costs approximately $42,000 per year to house these illegal immigrants, should they be deported? Even small rural towns like mine are having to cough up tax money to build new jails. No one wants to point to the criminal illegal immigrants that are filling the old jail. They just tell us that we need a bigger jail. Yet the papers are filled with names in the arrest column that points squarely to immigrants.

Silvio Berlusconi says illegal migrants are 'army of evil' By Malcolm Moore in Rome Last Updated: 2:47am BST 16/04/2008 Silvio Berlusconi branded illegal immigrants an "army of evil" yesterday in his first day in office after winning Italy's general election. Malcolm Moore: Silvio Berlusconi must rely on Umberto Bossi Mr Berlusconi, 71, who was elected on Monday to serve a third term as prime minister, said that he would "step up neighbourhood police, who can be an army of good, placing themselves between the Italian people and the army of evil". Mr Berlusconi: My throne will be uncomfortable. But as...

More than a million immigrants live in housing subsidised by the taxpayer, a Government-sponsored report disclosed yesterday. It said the number of foreigners in council or housing association accommodation had soared over the past five years. One in nine subsidised homes is now occupied by a migrant family.

McALLEN, Texas (CBS News) ― It was 5 a.m. and CBS News national correspondent Byron Pitts is with a woman who is nine months pregnant. She's rushed to a south Texas hospital to undergo a C-section - a $4,700 medical procedure that won't cost her a dime. She qualifies for emergency Medicaid. She gave birth to a healthy, 8 1/2 pound baby boy - born in America. His Mexican mother gave him an American name: Eliot. Eliot is one of an estimated 300,000 children of illegal immigrants born in the United States every year, according to the Pew Hispanic Center....

A most astounding program has appeared on national Japanese TV, viewed by millions, in prime time. Just this last Friday night, April 4th. It is a new show called "Wakaru TV", or "TV You Can Understand". They take five or six topical news buzzwords of the day which are often heard, but not truly understood by everyone--and then they give a core explanation of the word, with graphics, statistics and reenactments.The Americans' "SUB PRIME DISASTER" was one of these words this last Friday night. What the Japanese moderator/announcer stated, and the panel agreed (some in true disbelief) showed that...

A 62-year-old policeman was trying to stop the fight between the youths and other passengers where he received heavy blows to his head, stomach and neck. ANTWERP - Following the bus incident in Antwerp on Tuesday where a 62-year-old policeman was badly injured, three young suspects have been taken in. The incident, which took place on Tuesday, saw a group of young migrants got into an argument with the couple sitting next to them on the bus. A fight ensued and the bus driver and one of the other passengers, a plain clothes policeman, came to their rescue. In doing...

...ated in 1990, H1-B visas allow companies to sponsor highly educated foreigners -- architects, doctors, engineers, scientists among them -- to work in the United States for at least three years. The H1-B program, which accounts for nearly all skilled immigrants admitted to work here each year, is capped annually at 65,000 for people with a bachelor's degree or higher, plus an additional 20,000 for those with a master's degree or higher. Skilled immigrants have long contributed to rising U.S. standards of living. They bring human capital, brimming with ideas for new technologies and new companies. They bring financial capital...

Ullman as Padma Perkish Video TRACEY ULLMAN did not become an American citizen so she could make fun of the residents of these United States. She had already done that with “The Tracey Ullman Show,” a sketch comedy and variety show on the fledgling Fox network from 1987 to 1990... Ullman, 48, born in England moved here 20 years ago, passing her civics test and taking her Oath of Allegiance in 2006: “has released me psychologically to say that bit more about the people I impersonate.” “Tracey Ullman’s State of the Union,”begins Sunday on Showtime. Characters, such as Doris Basham,...

BISBEE — A local man is organizing an effort to clean up trash left behind by illegal immigrants in the Huachuca Mountains on April 5. The cleanup will focus on Bear Saddle and areas west along the Crest Trail. This section of Crest Trail is part of the Arizona Trail that extends from the Mexico border to the Utah border. The event’s organizer, Steve Roark of Hereford, competes in 100-mile long-distance races and he trains in the Huachucas. “I have been running around here for about 1 1/2 years and right away I noticed there are some areas that are...

PROVIDENCE — A new initiative borne of a recent incident between a Providence storeowner and two Spanish-speaking customers is asking all Rhode Islanders to help stop hate speech and violence directed at “immigrants and communities of color.” The “We Can Stop the Hate” campaign was announced at the University of Rhode Island’s downtown campus, a week after published reports about a March 1 encounter between two Dominican natives who are also U.S. citizens, and David C. Richardson, owner of Rhode Island Refrigeration. The incident provoked accusations against Richardson of racial profiling and committing a hate crime. The “stop the hate”...

Their weapons may not sound like much: two belts, a newspaper and a rose-pattern blanket. But six Chinese immigrants from Chamblee all but gift-wrapped an international fugitive for authorities recently, ending a five-month manhunt for a self-described martial arts expert twice featured on "America's Most Wanted." Nai Yin Xue had sought cover in Atlanta's Mandarin-speaking community. There, he encountered a scrappy band of cooks and deliverymen whose possessions, though few, include a good memory and a keen sense of justice. Now the "Chamblee Six" await final details of a sizable reward from New Zealand police. Today, the five men and...

An effort to force a hearing on a controversial immigration bill led to an outburst of emotion Thursday on the floor of the Minnesota House. At one point Minority Leader Marty Seifert, a Marshall Republican, called the mayors of Minneapolis and Saint Paul "political hacks." The remarks came after Representative Paul Kohls, a Republican from Victoria, asked lawmakers to support a bill outlawing so-called "immigrant sanctuary cities" in Minnesota. Kohls complained he hadn't been able to get a hearing on the bill, and the deadline for first hearings on new measures is approaching. At the time of Seifert's comments, Kohls...

Covering their mouths with tape, student activists marched Thursday to support a colleague who charges immigration agents targeted her Ecuadorean family because of her campaign to legalize undocumented immigrants who go to college. Gaby Pacheco, 23, says authorities seemed to be looking for her when they entered her family's home in July 2006 and detained her parents and two sisters. Pacheco has a student visa and is studying special education at Miami Dade College, but the four family members are undocumented. They were detained for several hours and released, and have since been issued a notice to appear before an...

A lawsuit filed Thursday in a New York federal court by Latino immigrants seeks to force immigration authorities to complete hundreds of thousands of stalled naturalization petitions in time for the new citizens to vote in November. (snip) The class action suit was brought by the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund on behalf of legal Hispanic immigrants in the New York City area who are eager to vote... (snip) “It is astonishing the government should be so unresponsive to immigrants who have enthusiastically taken all the steps to become Americans,” said Janet Murguía, president of the National Council...

REFUGIO, Texas - With an abandoned Wild West-vintage town of storefronts slumbering just a block from old US 77, tiny Refugio is a place where myth and reality coexist in a ghostly silence. more stories like this Obama faces heat over aide's NAFTA remarks to Canadians Texas, Ohio could decide Dem nomination Canada says didn't misrepresent Obama over NAFTA McCain tags Dems on trade treaty NAFTA seen differently in Ohio, Texas And now this South Texas outpost is swept up in one of the more intriguing tests of myth vs. reality in today's political life: the battle over the so-called...

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Immigrants are far less likely than the average U.S.-born citizen to commit crime in California, the most populous state in the United States, according to a report issued late on Monday. People born outside the United States make up about 35 percent of California's adult population but account for about 17 percent of the adult prison population, the report by the Public Policy Institute of California showed. According to the report's authors the findings suggest that long-standing fears of immigration as a threat to public safety are unjustified. The report also noted that U.S.-born adult men...

SAN DIEGO – A 24-year-old U.S. citizen suspected of smuggling two illegal immigrants was arrested at the San Ysidro port of entry Saturday, officials said. The woman, a San Diego resident, was registered in the SENTRI frequent traveler program and was using one of the program's exclusive travel lanes at the time of her arrest. Agents said she presented U.S. passports for herself and her son around 10 p.m. An agent reached behind the driver's seat and felt a person hidden in the Dodge Ram truck, officials said. The woman was sent to a secondary inspection area where agents discovered...

WASHINGTON – The government will raise by 25 percent the fines it levies against employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants, officials said Friday. Attorney General Michael Mukasey and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced the increase, which is the first boost in fines in nearly a decade. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the federal agency responsible for investigating illegal hirings, has stepped up its enforcement of the employer sanctions law in the past year, leading to a dozen major busts. Currently, fines range from $275 to $11,000 depending on the offense. The agency says some penalties could include at least six...

East Tennessee's immigrant population is growing and some say Hamblen County may be feeling it the most. That’s why Morristown has become a meeting place for one organization trying to curb illegal immigration.On Saturday, a crowd numbering well over 100 met at the town’s VFW post, proving that just as the population of illegal immigrants has grown, so too has their movement to do something about it."You know it's costing us an arm and a leg for hospitals, health care, schools,” said Bob McFarling, a Morristown resident. “We have to have special teachers." "This is America and this county has...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Hispanics are nearly twice as likely as whites to be left without television service following the nationwide transition to digital broadcasting next year, according to a new survey. Beginning in February 2009, full-power broadcast stations will transmit digital-only signals, meaning people who get their television programming over an antenna and do not have a digital set won't get a picture without a special converter box. The Nielsen Co. survey released Friday estimates that more than 13 million households in the U.S. receive television programming over the air on non-digital sets, meaning they will need converter boxes. Another...

ATLANTA -- Immigrant groups are pouncing on a bill that’s gaining steam at the state Capitol to allow the seizure of cars belonging to illegal immigrants. On any given day in Georgia, thousands of illegal immigrants are driving on the roadways, many of them uninsured. State Rep. James Mills said he wants to make all illegal immigrants think twice before getting behind the wheel. “The front door and the back door of our nation has been kicked in,” Mills said. “It's time that we secure the house in Georgia.” Mills’ bill would allow law enforcement officers to confiscate someone’s vehicle...

ATLANTA -- Immigrant groups are pouncing on a bill that’s gaining steam at the state Capitol to allow the seizure of cars belonging to illegal immigrants. On any given day in Georgia, thousands of illegal immigrants are driving on the roadways, many of them uninsured. State Rep. James Mills said he wants to make all illegal immigrants think twice before getting behind the wheel. “The front door and the back door of our nation has been kicked in,” Mills said. “It's time that we secure the house in Georgia.” Mills’ bill would allow law enforcement officers to confiscate someone’s vehicle...