Legalization

Published on Tue, Mar 01, 2011

The United States ranks ninth out of 31 countries in an international study evaluating immigrant integration policies released this week.

The Migrant Integration Policy Index (aka MIPEX), produced by the British Council and the Migration Policy Group, evaluates seven areas: labor market mobility, family reunion, education, political participation, long-term residence, access to nationality and anti-discrimination measures in all European Union member states plus Norway, Switzerland, Canada and for the first time the U.S.

The Immigration Policy Center, the research and policy arm of the American Immigration Council, served as a U.S partner for the study, and helped answer questions and gather information from various American expert.

The study indicates that strong U.S. anti-discrimination laws protect immigrants and guarantee them equal rights and opportunities, a model for immigration rules elsewhere.

Mary Giovagnoli, director of the Immigration Policy Center, told The Florida Independent that the U.S invests very little in immigrant integration and that budget cuts at the state and federal level put the country’s positive ranking at risk. She added that policymakers need to know that helping people to integrate and learn English provides a large return on investment.

Giovagnoli explained that the MIPEX study can help guide best practices, so the U.S. can learn from other countries like Canada that have a thoughtful integration policy, and help other countries learn from areas where the U.S. shows positive advances.

According to the study, U.S legal status gives most migrant workers and their families some of the same chances in the labor market as native-born Americans, but immigrants often take jobs far below their skill level.Read more...

Published in the American Independent

Published on Thu, Jun 09, 2011

This week Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick joined a growing chorus of governors standing up against the federal government’s immigration enforcement agenda when he announced that he would not enter his state into Secure Communities. The program, which is supposed to target immigrants who commit serious crimes for deportation, has been controversial in that it has deported streams of people, both documented and undocumented, who were convicted of minor offenses or, in some cases, none at all.

The Department of Homeland Security responded to Gov. Patrick by immediately slamming the door on the state’s efforts to keep out of the program. An anonymous DHS official told the Boston Globe that the state’s participation is not optional. Immigrant rights advocates say DHS is setting itself up for a legal fight over what’s quickly becoming its most controversial immigration enforcement program.

“The tide is turning on S‐Comm,” said Pablo Alvarado, the executive director of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, which is coordinating a national effort to dismantle Secure Communities. “A chorus of opposition to the program is growing louder as the migrant rights movement demands a reversal of politics that criminalize immigrants.”

Under Secure Communities, local authorities mush share the fingerprints of anyone booked in a local or county jail with federal immigration authorities. People without immigration documents and documented immigrants with prior criminal convictions get marked for deportation proceedings, even if they’re never charged with or convicted of a crime. The controversial and rapidly expanding program has become the marquee immigration enforcement program of the Obama administration’s deportation agenda. It’s currently operating in 42 states, and the administration hopes to expand it to the entire country by 2013.Read more...

Published in the Colorlines Magazine