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WASHINGTON, July 8, 2009 – The commander of a U.S. Marine brigade in southern Afghanistan is cautiously optimistic at progress made in the first week of an offensive there, but says more Afghan forces are needed.“We're still very early into this operation. … [I’m] very cautiously optimistic that things have gone well,” Marine Corps Brig. Gen. Lawrence Nicholson, commander of the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade, said in a conference call from Marine Camp Leatherneck in Helmand province with reporters at the Pentagon. Some 4,000 Marines and 650 Afghan security forces launched the ongoing Operation Khanjar, which translates to Strike of...

WASHINGTON, July 3, 2009 – U.S. Marines and Afghan security forces are continuing Operation Khanjar in Afghanistan’s Helmand province, NATO officials said today. Almost 4,000 personnel from the Marine Expeditionary Brigade Afghanistan have moved into cities and towns along the Helmand River and are digging in for the long haul. The addition of nearly 22,000 American personnel in Afghanistan will allow the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force to institute a “clear, hold, build” counterinsurgency strategy. Before, small numbers of coalition forces would enter an area and clear it of Taliban, but the shortage of forces meant that when they pulled...

Madison - The Legislature's Joint Finance Committee approved measures Friday that would let some illegal immigrants pay in-state college tuition, and provide limited legal protections to same-sex couples. Democrats who control the committee pushed through the measures over Republican objections, on party line votes of 12-4. The provisions were folded into the state budget the panel plans to send to the full Legislature. The committee also approved establishing new schools of freshwater science and public health at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. It did not provide funding. Wisconsin high schools graduate 400 to 650 illegal immigrants annually, and they must pay...

HAMDEN — Less than a week after a town woman was brutally attacked, allegedly by a co-worker, friends and strangers are coming forward to help her. Two bank accounts for her needs have been set up, and a nurse who works at Yale-New Haven Hospital said she wants employees from 65 area bars and restaurants to donate a portion of their tips May 1 to help the woman with what the nurse believes will be enormous medical bills. Eli’s on Whitney, 2392 Whitney Ave., has agreed to be the dropoff point for the one-day event. The victim, 25, was released...

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) - Illegal immigrants in Oklahoma prisons for nonviolent crimes would be subject to deportation under legislation overwhelmingly approved by the Oklahoma House. In a rare late-night session tonight, House members voted 90-0 for the bill by Rep. Randy Terrill. The Moore Republican says the bill will save the state millions of dollars in incarceration costs. The measure allows the Department of Corrections to send illegal immigrant inmates to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. The bill applies only to inmates who are incarcerated for nonviolent crimes who have served at least half their sentence in state...

TACOMA, Wash. – A judge has sentenced a mother to three months in jail for hitting a convicted sex offender with an aluminum baseball bat. Before her sentencing Friday, Tammy Lee Gibson told Pierce County Superior Court Judge Susan Serko that laws were needed to keep convicted sexual predators away from children. Gibson, 40, who has two daughters, pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of third-degree assault in January. She initially was charged with second-degree assault and felony harassment, which could have meant an eight-month jail sentence if she'd been convicted. Court papers said Gibson hit William Allen Baldwin, a...

A 20-year-old man died in a late Thursday night one-car collision near the Broken Arrow Expressway, said Tulsa Police Cpl. T.J. Campbell. According to police, 18-year-old Joel Jaimes was driving westbound at about 10 p.m. Thursday near 5000 E. 31st. St. with two passengers when he lost control of the vehicle. The vehicle rolled several times before hitting a light pole and coming to a stop upside down, Campbell said. One passenger riding in the front seat, a 20-year-old man, died at the scene, Campbell said. The victim was still wearing his seatbelt in the vehicle when police arrived. However,...

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio says scrutiny of racial and ethnic profiling by incoming President Barack Obama and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder will not deter his get-tough approach to illegal immigration. “I’m not stopping,” said Arpaio. The Republican sheriff said he plans to continue crime sweeps and raids aimed at illegal immigrants and businesses that employ them. The Obama administration and Holder are expected to increase the focus on racial and ethnic profiling by police. Critics of Arpaio’s immigration enforcement argue the sheriff’s office targets Hispanics and such actions take away from more serious investigations. Arpaio said his immigration...

Fayetteville, N.C. — Cumberland County investigators arrested an illegal immigrant from Honduras in connection with the death of a 64-year-old woman Tuesday. Julio Cesar Ramos, 45, who claims to be homeless and unemployed, is charged with beating Paulette Locklear outside her house Tuesday afternoon. He was being held without bond Wednesday in the Cumberland County Detention Center. Investigators said Ramos had been deported at least a dozen times over the last 20 years but kept getting back into the U.S. Barbara Gonzalez, a spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Charlotte, could confirm only one deportation – from Houston...

For two decades, Anaheim businessman Erkan Aydin has taken on a task unimaginable for most immigrants like himself: trying to convince the U.S. government that he was here illegally. Aydin, 50, arrived in the United States from his native Turkey with a valid student visa in 1981, but fell out of legal status when he failed to enroll in school, he said.The customer service representative has a powerful reason why he wants to be considered an illegal immigrant. It would make him eligible for the amnesty offered to 2.7 million illegal immigrants under the 1986 immigration reform law. Thanks to...

The crush of illegal aliens has brought us a variety diseases. For the first time we have seen cases of Chagas disease a parasitic illness that is the leading cause of heart failure in Central and South America where as many as 18 million people are infected with this deadly sickness. Transmitted by insects, Chagas, which was unknown here ten years ago is now in 23 states. The open borders crowd from George Bush down are responsible for bring this and other diseases into our lives, because “they do the jobs Americans won’t do.” What a pile of dung! Tuberculosis...

Labor unions are poised to go after Hispanic workers in states like Arizona and sectors such as services and health care if new union rules are put in place by the Barack Obama administration and Democratic Congress next year. Unions and pro-union Democrats want Congress and Obama to pass card-check legislation. The plan would allow unions to organize in workplaces if they get a majority of workers to sign cards supporting unionization. It would scrap 73-year-old unionization laws that require secret ballots for workers to decide whether they want their work forces represented by a trade union. Card-check legislation is...

WASHINGTON -- On January 20, hundreds of thousands of people will welcome a new president and his administration as Barack Obama takes his official post in the White House. The next day-- his first full day on the job--could also be eventful. Immigration policy groups announced Tuesday that they will organize a mass mobilization of immigrant families and supporters in Washington, on Jan. 21, 2009, in part to welcome the Democratic president, but also to also ensure that humane immigration reform is at the top of his agenda. The National Capital Immigrant Coalition and the Fair Immigration Reform Movement—the two...

KNOXVILLE — Groups representing Hispanic immigrants in East Tennessee joined together Friday in downtown Knoxville to explain their missions and outline their goals to members of other civic-minded groups in the community. It is safe to say everyone present had an accent — the native East Tennesseans as well as the Hispanics. The meeting was sponsored by the East Tennessee Foundation and initiated by Gladys Pineda, chair of the Latino Task Force of CEDnet (Community Economic Development Network of East Tennessee). The Latino Task Force is dedicated to linking Hispanics with businesses and organizations in hopes of unifying to create...

Covington, LA Police report that an illegal alien ran an SUV into a Lee Road church and told officers he was trying to teach himself how to drive. Covington Police Capt. Jack West says that 48-year-old Roman Mateo Zeferino, an illegal alien showing a Covington address, has been cited for careless operation of a motor vehicle, no driver's license, and operating a motor vehicle without lawful presence. It happened shortly after 4:30 p.m. on Wednesday, October 15, in the 1200 block of North Lee Road in Covington. Capt. West says that officers responded to a call where an SUV was...

More than a few pundits and commentators have called the Oct. 7 debate between Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama a snoozer because the two candidates didn't go at each other. Whether you concur or not with their assessment, one thing is certain, the candidates are not being grilled on the issue of illegal immigration and its inextricable link to our economic well-being and our national security. Exhibit A is a violent snapshot from Mr. McCain's home county, Maricopa County, Ariz. It unveils, in brutally honest facts and candid law-enforcement comments, what happens when sanctuary and amnesty policies tied...

WEST ALLIS - An illegal immigrant convicted of running down a West Allis mother and daughter faced sentencing Thursday. The child died in a West Allis intersection four months ago Thursday. The maximum sentence for causing death while driving with a revoked license is only nine months. That's what Jose Rodriguez got…but there's a catch. It was an extremely emotional time for the Maddox family. Thursday was the first time Andrea Maddox saw the man charged with killing her daughter and injuring her as the two crossed the street in West Allis

<p>MCMINNVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- Authorities in Warren County have issued arrest warrants for a man who fled to Atlanta after he was allegedly involved in a double fatality wreck.</p> <p>Sheriff Jackie Matheny said 21-year-old Herlin "Gato" Alvarez of La Vergne is an illegal immigrant and being sought on a charge of leaving the scene of the Sept. 30 accident near Centertown.</p>

NEW HAVEN — Mayor John DeStefano Jr. and supporters lashed back at the Community Watchdog Project, an anti-illegal immigration group, releasing e-mails Thursday sent to city staff members from across the country in opposition to a Mexican flag flying on the Green flagpole. "We do not tolerate hate," DeStefano said, standing in front of the flagpole and backed by representatives of the Irish, Polish and Italian communities, as well as the NAACP and the Anti-Defamation League. "A lot of people have cultural amnesia. They forget they were the sons and daughters of immigrants, and they criticize the next group that...

HOUSTON (Reuters) - The men gather early on street corners here in storm-battered Houston, ready for the jobs they know will come their way, sweeping up broken glass and clearing downed trees and debris from city streets. They speak mostly Spanish, while looking warily at strangers. And these undocumented, also called illegal, immigrants worry that instead of a job and a day's wages, they might instead find themselves arrested and deported. Indeed, in the aftermath of Hurricane Ike, which left a trail of destruction across southeast Texas, America's ongoing debate over U.S. immigration policy is again aflame. On the one...