Immigration Policy Center

Published on Thu, Apr 08, 2010

Recent reports have raised serious concerns about program failures, secret deportation quotas and the high costs of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS)'s controversial 287(g) program, which trains and authorizes state and local police departments to enforce federal immigration law.

Published in the Progressive States Network

Published on Wed, Apr 14, 2010

Immigrant families in Detroit, Columbus and Cincinnati on Wednesday gathered outside public buildings holding signs with the slogans "We love taxes!" and "Viva Taxes" in an effort to show that immigration reform would bring needed revenue to the government.

Similar demonstrations are planned for Thursday, Tax Day, in San Francisco and Washington, DC.

A recent report from the Immigration Policy Center and the Center for American Progress showed that legalizing undocumented immigrants would generate between $4.5 billion and $5.4 billion in tax revenue over 3 years.

Published in the The Hill

Published on Mon, Apr 12, 2010

Immigration reform needs to happen immediately. For too long, too many have lived under fear of deportation, their families being separated, and employers increasing hours while decreasing wages. There have been studies that suggest that an immigration bill will not only help immigrant families and communities, but the country as a whole.

Published in the Chicago Flame

Published on Sun, Apr 11, 2010

A new report released by the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) this week attempts to assess the economic benefits of a legalization program on immigrants and native born workers. The report, Immigrant Legalization: Assessing the Labor Market Effects, however, falls short on research and methodology. While the report accurately concludes that legalization would not have a negative impact on native workers’ wages and employment, the report takes a myopic approach to legalization’s impact on wages and mobility of the newly legalized. A wide range of economic studies—studies which consider legalization’s impact in both the long term and in context to comprehensive immigration reform—conclude that legalization does in fact benefit both native-born and immigrants alike.

Published in the New American Media

Published on Sat, Apr 10, 2010

Alondra Velasco is part of the underground economy, but she's a legitimate taxpayer in the eyes of Uncle Sam.

The 22-year-old Rialto resident works at a Mexican restaurant. She gets paid in cash because she's in the country illegally and doesn't have a Social Security number.

Like millions of Americans, Velasco will file a tax return this year, reporting her income and earnings to the Internal Revenue Service.

Published in the Contra Costa Times

Published on Wed, Apr 07, 2010

On March 21, over 200,000 people converged on Washington D.C. to demand comprehensive immigration reform in 2010. Asian Pacific Americans participated, including national Asian Pacific American civil rights organizations and Seattle’s Thao Tran, Many Uch and Cathy Pham.

On April 10, Saturday at noon, in Occidental Park in Seattle’s Pioneer Square, the Washington Immigration Reform Coalition of over 50 organizations, including the Asian Pacific Islander Coalition of Washington, will host a comprehensive immigration reform rally in Seattle. This rally will be one of the largest and most multicultural of rallies being held on the National Day of Action. Rally organizers expect at least 5,000 to come from throughout the state, and 1,000 Asian Pacific Americans to attend.

Published in the International Examiner

Published on Sat, Apr 10, 2010

Advocates for information-technology companies have allied with progressive and Hispanic groups to win a broad overhaul of immigration law, but they are also keeping open the option of pursuing a narrow set of tech-friendly legal changes in the next Congress.

"I'm happy to be part of comprehensive reform, and I'm happy to be part of a focused bill," said Brad Feld, a Colorado-based venture capitalist who is pushing to establish a Startup Visa program that would grant green cards to high-tech entrepreneurs. Feld lobbied Rep. Jared Polis, D-Colo., to add the proposal to an immigration bill drafted by Rep. Luis Gutierrez., D-Ill.

Published in the Information Technology Industry Council

Published on Fri, Apr 02, 2010

In the midst of the gossip and grumblings about the U.S. Congress being unable or unwilling to agree on any bill or plan on the table, one is primed to think that President Obama will accomplish a whole lot of nothing in his four years in office.

The latest Gallup poll showing a 52-week low in an approval rating of 46 percent shows that Americans aren’t happy with the way things are going up on Capitol Hill. In his push to see the health care bill through the senate, it seems that the Obama administration is willing to put everything on the back burner in the mean time. But what about those people, living and working in the U.S., for whom health care isn’t an option in the first place?

Published in the Whitworthian

Published on Wed, Apr 07, 2010

A report out of the Department of Homeland Security's Office of the Inspector General (OIG) last week doesn't mince many words when it comes to the failure of 287(g), a 1995 law that allowed local and state law enforcement to assume some of the federal prerogative of immigration enforcement.

Published in the Change.org

Published on Sun, Apr 04, 2010

The American Immigration Council's Immigration Policy Center recently published statistics on every state's immigrant population.

In New Hampshire, the foreign-born share of the population grew from 3.7 percent in 1990 to 5.1 percent in 2007.

In 2007, New Hampshire was home to 67,735 immigrants, of whom around 33,000 were naturalized citizens and eligible to vote.

Published in the Concord Monitor