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Immigrants' Rights Update
Volume 21, Issue 1 |
February 20, 2007 |
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IN THIS ISSUE
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Driver's
Licenses & REAL ID
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US-VISIT,
Detention, Expedited Removal
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Temporary
Protected Status (TPS)
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DREAM
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Other
Immigration Issues
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Civil
Rights Litigation
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Immigrants
& Public Benefits
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Workers'
Rights Litigation
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Employment
Eligibility Verification
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Driver's Licenses and REAL ID |
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Maine Rejects REAL ID Act; Other States Considering Similar Legislation |
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By
Tyler Moran, Employment Policy Director
Maine has become the first state to refuse to comply with the REAL ID Act, a
federal law enacted in May 2005 that prevents the federal government from
accepting state-issued driver’s licenses or ID cards as identification
unless they meet the act’s strict and complex requirements by May 2008.
Under these requirements, applicants for driver’s licenses must present
extensive documentary proof of their identity, citizenship or lawful
immigration status, and residence; and the documents they present must then
be verified as being authentic.
[Read more.]
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Bill Would Repeal Driver’s License Provisions of REAL ID Act |
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By
Joan
Friedland, Immigration Policy Director
This past December, shortly before the close of the 109th Congress, Senators
Daniel K. Akaka (D-HI) and John Sununu (R-NH) introduced the Identification
Security Enhancement Act of 2006 (S 4117), which among other things would
repeal the driver’s license provisions (title II) of the REAL ID Act of
2005.
[Read more.]
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Two Driver’s License Advocacy Tools Updated |
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NILC recently updated two resources that
advocates working on driver’s license–related issues might find useful: “Overview
of States’ Driver’s License Requirements” and “2007
State REAL ID Legislation.”
[Read more.]
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US-VISIT, Detention, Expedited Removal |
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US-VISIT: Technological Fix Ordered by Congress Stymied for Lack of
Know-How, Funds |
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By
Richard Irwin, Editor,
Immigrants' Rights Update
The Dept. of Homeland Security has given up on trying to develop and
implement the land-exit component of its U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status
Indicator Technology (US-VISIT) system by its Dec. 2007 deadline, and DHS
officials have said that it might take an additional 5 to 10 years to
develop the technology required to make that part of US-VISIT
cost-effective, according to an article in the Dec. 15, 2006, New York
Times. The article quoted the assistant secretary for homeland
security, Stewart A. Baker, as saying that developing and implementing a
system for electronically tracking who leaves the country by land would cost
“tens of billions of dollars.” Because the vast majority of visitors to the
U.S. enter and exit via land ports of entry on the borders with Mexico and
Canada, this development represents a huge setback to US-VISIT.
[Read more.]
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Deplorable Immigrant Detention Conditions Detailed |
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¶
The U.S. Dept. of Homeland
Security (DHS) inspector general recently issued a
report on
the treatment of immigration detainees at five facilities used by U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to “house” them.
¶
On Feb. 2, the
Washington Post published an article
that describes the deplorable conditions in which about 2,000 undocumented
people are being held at a “tent city” detention facility in Raymondville,
TX.
¶
On Jan. 25, 84 immigration
detainees, the
National Immigration Project
of the National Lawyers Guild, and six other immigrant rights organizations
formally petitioned DHS to issue legally enforceable regulations to
govern detention standards for immigration detainees.
[Read more.]
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U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom Criticizes U.S. Handling
of Asylum-Seekers |
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From a press release posted on the
commission’s website: “Two years after the U.S.
Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) published the
congressionally authorized
Report on Asylum Seekers in Expedited Removal, the problems it
identified remain and the majority of its recommendations have not been
implemented.”
[Read more.]
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Temporary Protected Status (TPS) |
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Liberian TPS Ends Oct. 1, but Liberia Remains a Tinderbox |
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By
Richard Irwin, Editor,
Immigrants' Rights Update
On Oct. 1, 2007,
approximately 3,600 nationals and former residents of Liberia will lose
their temporary protected status (TPS) when, on that date, the designation
of Liberia as a country whose nationals and former residents may be eligible
for TPS is terminated, as we
reported previously
in Immigrants’ Rights Update.
Unless individuals from Liberia who currently have TPS are granted some
other lawful immigration status or permission to remain in the United States
by Sept. 30, if they remain in the U.S. they will begin to accrue unlawful
presence as of Oct. 1.
[Read more.]
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Haitian Protection Act Would Grant TPS to Haitians in U.S. |
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By
Richard Irwin, Editor,
Immigrants' Rights Update
U.S. Rep. Alcee Hastings
(D-FL) has introduced a bill that would designate Haiti as a country whose
nationals and former residents living in the United States would be eligible
for temporary protected status (TPS). The bill provides that the “initial
period of . . . designation” for TPS would be 18 months.
[Read more.]
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DREAM |
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New Strategies and Network Emerge from Well-Attended DREAM Summit |
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By
Josh Bernstein, Director of
Federal Policy
Earlier this year, immigrant students and advocate supporters of policies
favoring them met in an invitation-only “summit” in Kansas City, Kansas, to
review strategies and to organize themselves into an effective network.
[Read more.]
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Other Immigration Issues |
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USCIS’s Proposed Fee Increase Available for Public Comment |
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The proposed revised fee structure
that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services published on Feb. 1 would
raise the fees for immigration and naturalization benefit applications and
petitions by an average of 66 percent. Under the proposed revision, the fee
to apply for naturalization would rise from $330 to $595, the fee to
petition to immigrate a fiancé would rise from $170 to $455, and the fee to
apply for permanent residence would rise from $325 to $905.
[Read more.]
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Revised USCIS Guide to Naturalization Available |
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U.S. Citizenship and Immigration
Services has revised its publication,
A Guide to Naturalization
(65 pp., Form M-476, Jan. 2007). The guide is intended to help persons
interested in naturalizing to ascertain whether they are eligible, and it
provides a rough guide for how to apply.
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2007 Federal Poverty Income Guidelines Issued |
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The U.S. Dept. of Health and Human
Services has issued updated federal poverty income guidelines that took
effect Jan. 24, 2007. The guidelines, which serve as a basis for
determining eligibility for many means-tested benefits, are updated yearly
to reflect changes in the Consumer Price Index. Under the affidavit of
support requirements created by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant
Responsibility Act of 1996, sponsors seeking to immigrate family members
must establish that they have an income of at least 125 percent of the
federal poverty income.
This table contains the new
guidelines.
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Civil Rights Litigation |
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Rhode Island ACLU Sues over Arrests of Immigrants Resulting from Racial
Profiling |
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The
Rhode Island Affiliate of the ACLU has filed
a federal lawsuit against the Rhode Island State Police, challenging the
legality of the detention and transporting to immigration officials of 14
Guatemalan nationals who were stopped in a van on I-95 on July 11, 2006,
after the driver changed lanes without using a turn signal. The lawsuit,
filed Jan. 8, 2007, on behalf of eleven of those detained, argues that the
actions by the state police violated the state’s Racial Profiling Prevention
Act, as well as the driver’s and passengers’ constitutional rights to be
free from discrimination and from unreasonable searches and seizures.
[Read more.]
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Immigrants & Public Benefits |
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Punitive Colorado Law Has Cost $2 Million and Saved the State $0 |
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From a Jan. 25, 2007,
Denver Post article: “Colorado's new law banning
state spending on illegal immigrants has cost more than $2 million to
enforce — and has saved the state nothing.”
[Read more.]
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“Sin Provecho: Latinos and Food Insecurity” Report
Available from NCLR |
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One in five Latinos faces food
insecurity each year, compromising their health and well-being, according to
a report released in late December by the National Council of La Raza.
Sin Provecho
reports on the impact and associations of hunger, food insecurity, and
obesity on the Latino community, as well as the ability of federal food
assistance programs to address and alleviate these conditions. The paper
assesses the root causes of food insecurity among Latinos, including
economic and geographic barriers and legal immigrant restrictions, which
prevent access to affordable, nutritious foods and assistance.
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Resource Updated: “Major Benefit Programs
Available to Immigrants in California” |
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On behalf of the California
Immigrant Policy Center, NILC recently updated a
detailed table that lists the major benefit programs available to
immigrants residing in California and tells which categories of immigrants
are eligible for each program. Questions about the information contained in
the table may be directed to
Tanya Broder, NILC public benefits policy
director.
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“Facts About” SSI, ICHIA, and Food Stamps: Resources
Updated |
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NILC’s
Dinah Wiley, public benefits policy
attorney, recently updated the following fact sheets, which are posted on
our website: “Facts
about Supplemental Security Income (SSI) for Refugees, Asylees and Other
Humanitarian Immigrants;” “Facts
about the Immigrant Children’s Health Improvement Act;” and “Fact
Sheet: Immigrants and the Food Stamp Program.”
In addition, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities recently published a
report titled, “Loss of SSI Is Impoverishing Thousands
of Refugees: Congress Could Prevent Further Hardship,” available on
CBPP’s website.
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Workers' Rights Litigation |
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Federal Court in New York Upholds Protective Order
Preventing Inquiry into Plaintiff’s Immigration Status |
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By
Monica Guizar, Employment Policy
Attorney
A federal
district court in New York has upheld the order of a magistrate judge
granting the plaintiff in a case before the court a protective order
prohibiting the defendants from asking questions about her immigration
status during her deposition.
[Read more.]
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Federal Court in Washington State Prevents Inquiry into
Plaintiffs’ Immigration Status, SSNs, and Tax Returns |
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By
Monica Guizar, Employment Policy
Attorney
In a case in which the plaintiffs had filed civil rights actions against the
defendants, a federal court in the state of Washington has granted the
plaintiffs’ motion for a protective order preventing the disclosure of their
(or their spouses’, children’s, relatives’ and assistants’) immigration
status, Social Security numbers and tax returns; and the court denied the
defendants’ motion compelling disclosure of that information.
[Read more.]
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Employment Eligibility Verification |
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The Basic Pilot Program: Not a Magic Bullet |
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The Basic Pilot program
is a voluntary Internet-based program that was established to allow
employers to electronically verify workers’ employment eligibility with the
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Social Security Administration
(SSA). While Basic Pilot often is portrayed as the magic bullet that would
curb unauthorized employment, the program has been plagued by problems since
its inception in 1997. Most notably, Basic Pilot, which is used by only
approximately 12,000 employers, has been hindered by inaccurate and outdated
information in the DHS and SSA databases, misuse of the program by
employers, and lack of adequate privacy protections.
[Read more.]
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Why States and Localities Should Not Require Employer
Participation in the Basic Pilot Program |
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As states and localities consider
making the Basic Pilot mandatory, they should not only consider the
weaknesses of the program, but also understand that an approach that relies
only on enforcement of penalties against employers that violate the law
regarding employment eligibility verification will not solve the problems
associated with unauthorized employment. The lesson learned from the
Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (the federal law that for the
first time required employers to verify the work eligibility of all new
hires) is that some unscrupulous employers knowingly hire undocumented
workers because they assume that such workers will be reluctant to hold them
accountable for labor law violations. It is common practice for these same
employers to use the existence of the employer sanctions scheme to threaten
undocumented workers with deportation if they do indeed complain about
deplorable working conditions.
[Read more.]
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Facts about the IMAGE Program: ICE Mutual Agreement
between Government and Employers |
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The ICE Mutual
Agreement between Government and Employers (IMAGE) program is a joint
government and private sector initiative that was introduced in July 2006 by
the Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS), U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement (ICE) to help employers “self-police” with respect to complying
with the federal immigration law’s prohibition against hiring workers who
are ineligible to be employed in the United States. The IMAGE program was
started in response to an April 1999 Government Accountability Office (GAO)
report entitled “Significant Obstacles to Reducing Unauthorized Alien
Employment Exist,” which noted the high percentages of unauthorized workers
employed in certain industries.
[Read more.]
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