Free Republic

Federal authorities announced the arrests yesterday of four construction supervisors and 76 illegal immigrants at a Kentucky home-building company, continuing a promised government crackdown on employers that rely on illegal labor. The arrests at Fischer Homes, a leading builder in Kentucky, Indiana and Ohio, followed the April 19 arrests of seven current and former managers and more than 1,100 workers for Ifco Systems North America Inc., a subsidiary of a Dutch manufacturer of plastic crates and wooden pallets. The effort comes as Congress debates plans to overhaul the nation's immigration laws. "We will continue to bring criminal actions against employers...

Hundreds rally in Toronto for illegal workers Updated Sat. Apr. 22 2006 7:19 PM ET CTV.ca News Staff Organizers expected up to 3,500 people for a march and rally through the streets of Toronto, but only a few hundred supporters of undocumented Portuguese workers braved rainy weather on Saturday. Chanting "support, don't deport," the crowd made its way from Queen's Park to Toronto city hall to cheer speakers who said Canada's "immigration system is broken." "We are trying to put a human face on the issue," Peter Ferreira of the Portuguese Congress said. "Sometimes we tend to see these people...

When federal authorities catch illegal immigrants on the job, some U.S. employers have a ready explanation for how they came to be hired: It wasn't us. It was a contractor. Although these middlemen, including recruiters and temporary agencies, do not figure prominently in the current debate over illegal immigration, they are playing an increasingly significant role in hiring and managing the nation's workforce. Especially in California, an untold number of contractors employ immigrants — legal and illegal — in such industries as construction, janitorial service, hospitality and agriculture. For now, work site raids and prosecution are infrequent, except where immigration...

Any guest-worker program approved by Congress for the nation's 11 million illegal aliens would spawn a new wave of cheap-labor illegals that already-overwhelmed federal authorities are unprepared to handle, law-enforcement authorities and immigration officials say. A former high-ranking U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) official said the federal government does not have an adequate post-legalization enforcement program to prevent an expected flood of fraudulent identity documents or sanction employers who hire the new illegals. "The new illegal aliens will be cheaper than the guest workers, and there will be nobody in the government to check up on them," said the...

The Protests -- Whose Backlash?By Victor Davis Hanson Hundreds of thousands of Mexican citizens, along with Mexican-Americans and Hispanics in general, hit the streets throughout the United States this past week in one of the largest displays of public outrage since the Vietnam-War era. The conventional wisdom was that the supposedly spontaneous outbursts of immigrant pride and anger took lawmakers by surprise. In response, politicians may backtrack on some of the tougher proposals concerning border enforcement, from constructing a wall to deportations. The media tended to emphasize the heartfelt anguish of the demonstrators, who often on selected televised clips carried...

Immigration is yet another issue which we seem unable to discuss rationally -- in part because words have been twisted beyond recognition in political rhetoric. We can't even call illegal immigrants "illegal immigrants." The politically correct evasion is "undocumented workers." Do American citizens go around carrying documents with them when they work or apply for work? Most Americans are undocumented workers but they are not illegal immigrants. There is a difference. The Bush administration is pushing a program to legalize "guest workers." But what is a guest? Someone you have invited. People who force their way into your home without...

A coalition of pro-immigration advocates will march on Washington next month to pressure the Senate into defeating pending House-approved legislation making illegal entry a criminal offense and calling for the construction of 700 miles of high-security fences on the U.S.-Mexico border. Led by the National Alliance for Human Rights (NAHR), the march was approved last week during a meeting in Riverside, Calif., of more than 500 immigration advocates who mapped out a strategy of "social justice and political empowerment" involving Hispanic groups from throughout the United States and Mexico. NAHR Coordinator Armando Navarro, chairman and professor of ethnic studies at...

Planeload of deportees flown to Portugal Updated Sun. Mar. 26 2006 11:38 PM ET CTV.ca News Staff There were tears at Pearson International Airport in Toronto as people said good-bye to friends and loved-ones being deported from Canada on Sunday. After more than seven years in Canada, Maria Alves and her son have been told they must return to Portugal. It is a trip they don't want to make because they say their roots are in Canada. "She has no words to explain," Alves son Rafael Belchior translated. Through tears ,his aunt Laurinda Carrasqueira expressed her feelings of desperation. "She...

Demonstrators march in Los Angeles, California, to protest proposed illegal immigration legislation. Half a million protesters paralyzed downtown Los Angeles, demanding amnesty for undocumented immigrants and rejection of a proposed law that would drastically tighten US immigration rules. Members of the Brotherhood of Undocumented Idiots chanted "GIVE US FREE MEDICAL AND DENTAL!" while playing bongos on Adams Blvd. Holding tightly to her anchor babies, an unidentified undocumented immigrant explains that she appreciates the free breakfast and lunch program in the Los Angeles Unified School System and is trading in her foodstamps for lotto tickets. Jesus "Chewy" Sanchez leads the...

Tories begin deporting illegal workers Portuguese families caught in immigration crackdown Mar. 21, 2006. 02:19 PM PETER GORRIE STAFF REPORTER Illegal workers in Toronto's underground economy are being deported as the new Conservative government abandons a Liberal amnesty plan, immigration lawyers and consultants say. Some families who have been in Canada five years or more are being given less than two weeks to pack up and leave. Toronto's Portuguese community — with up to 15,000 undocumented members, working mainly in the booming construction industry — is especially concerned. Early last year, then-Immigration Minister Joe Volpe said he would try to...

A preliminary hearing is scheduled Tuesday for an Escondido couple accused of beating to death the woman's 2-year-old son in what a police investigator called the worst case of child abuse he's ever seen. Jose Maurice Castenada, 21, could face the death penalty if convicted of murder and a special circumstance allegation of torture in the death of Cesar Razo last June 25. Castenada and the child's mother, 23-year-old Maria Razo, were arrested shortly after the toddler died of cardiac arrest at Palomar Medical Center. Prosecutor Lucille Weismantel said in court documents that the defendants regularly assaulted the child and...

Wal-Mart Can't Clean Up Michael Maiello, 10.10.05, 2:47 PM ET NEW YORK - Wal-Mart Stores fended off a racketeering charge on Friday, but a U.S. judge decided that a lawsuit brought against the behemoth retailer by the undocumented workers who once buffed its superstore floors can proceed. Wal-Mart will have to answer to charges of not paying these workers fair wages and overtime, and that its store managers locked the doors on overnight cleaning crews, keeping them prisoner until the doors were opened the next morning to let in bargain-hunting shoppers. New York City labor lawyer James Linsey, who represents...

Forty-Nine Undocumented Workers Detained At Seymour Johnson POSTED: 11:49 am EDT July 6, 2005 UPDATED: 2:55 pm EDT July 6, 2005 SEYMOUR JOHNSON AIR FORCE BASE -- Dozens of illegal immigrants who were caught working at one of North Carolina's military bases are behind bars. Authorities say at least 50 illegal immigrants were picked up Wednesday at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base. Forty-nine undocumented workers were arrested at Seymour Johnston Air Force Base Wednesday morning. WRAL has learned they were working on the base when it was discovered that they did not have the proper paperwork.

Man who hit priest to be deported Victim gives forgiveness, asks for leniency By GEORGIA PABSTgpabst@journalsentinel.com Posted: April 19, 2005 Father Eleazar Perez, who lost his left leg in a hit-and-run accident, walked into court on one leg and crutches Tuesday and pleaded for leniency for the man who ran into him. It was an extraordinary court scene that the judge, prosecutor and defense attorney called unprecedented in their careers for the tragic circumstances, the remorse of the defendant and the unconditional forgiveness and petition for mercy from the victim. It was also a case filled with irony, said Circuit...

Oscar Rios Pohirieth dreads the conversation he's had again and again with some of Lincoln's Hispanic high school students. Lucero Satamaria, a UNL senior psychology major from Columbia, South America, shows her support for the DREAM Act at Broyhill Fountain Wednesday evening. They step into his office and ask how they can go to college. If his first question -- "Do you have a green card?" -- is met with a no, the Lincoln Public Schools bilingual liaison must tell them that high school graduation may be the end of the line.Not, mentioned are the ESL classes supported by the...

A longtime critic of the U.S. Border Patrol in Holland is glad to hear that the local office is closing. The Rev. Andres Fierro, who has been at odds with the Border Patrol for years, said he's not sorry to see the office go. "I won't miss them," he said. He said the agency harassed Hispanics in the community. "My problem with the Border Patrol is not the law, but has always been the application of the law, how they enforced it," he said. "It was profiling. "Even though they refused to be accountable to the community, they did have...

In his year-end news conference, President Bush called for an "immigration policy that helps match any willing employer with any willing employee." We already know there are plenty of employers in this country willing to break the law and hire illegal aliens. And there are 8 million to 12 million illegal aliens already living in this country, so we know there are plenty of willing employees. I'm sure the White House staff will clean up the language a bit in the coming months. But for all the world, the president's idea of an immigration policy sounds like a national job...

WASHINGTON — In a last-minute flurry of activity, the Senate passed a bill that would help U.S. border states and cities shoulder the burden of jailing undocumented workers arrested for crimes in the United States. The bill would provide up to $6.4 billion over seven years to reimburse states, with Texas and California receiving the lion's share of funding, a spokesman for Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said Wednesday. "For too long, the federal government has neglected the enormous financial burdens our failed immigration policies have placed on local law enforcement. That must end," Cornyn said in a statement. The Senate...

Feds Let Illegal Aliens Steal Congressional Representation From CitizensSteve Brown, CNSNews.comFriday, Oct. 24, 2003 The heavy influx of immigrants cost the Republican Party nine House seats during the 2000 political redistricting process, according to a report released Thursday. At least one of those seats was lost as a result of illegal aliens being counted as part of the national population by the U.S. Census Bureau, the report's authors said. The report, "Remaking the Political Landscape: The Impact of Illegal and Legal Immigration on Congressional Apportionment," was compiled by the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS). It examined the redistribution of House...

<p>Pressure is increasing on Gov. Gray Davis to sign a measure approved Wednesday by the state Senate that would allow illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses -- with unions joining the list of supporters.</p> <p>If the measure clears the Assembly -- and supporters are confident it will -- Davis for the second consecutive year will have to deal with the politically sensitive issue.</p>