NDN Blog

Julie Preston of the New York Times has written a piece on the drop in the number of illegal immigrants in the U.S.

The report entitled Number of Illegal Immigrants in the U.S. Drops, Study Says, cites a recent Pew Hispanic Report  U.S. Unauthorized Immigration Flows Are Down Sharply Since Mid-Decade:

The number of illegal immigrants in the United States, after peaking at 12 million in 2007, fell to about 11.1 million in 2009, the first clear decline in two decades....

The reduction came primarily from decreases among illegal immigrants from Latin American countries other than Mexico, the report found. The number of Mexicans living in the United States without legal immigration status did not change significantly from 2007 to 2009. Some seven million Mexicans make up about 60 percent of all illegal immigrants, still by far the largest national group, the Pew Center said.

However Preston notes that there is an even more important number cited in the report, the 11.1 million immigrants still in the country.

But the figure that may be most sobering to all sides in the increasingly contentious immigration debate is the estimate that more than 11 million illegal immigrants remain here. The Pew report shows that despite myriad pressures, there was no mass exodus of those immigrants to their home countries, especially not to Mexico.

This statistic indicates that despite all of the border security legislation, and all of the press coverage surrounding immigration, immigrants are not leaving.

As important as politicians think drafting legislation solely designed to secure borders, it is also equally important to figure out a way to bring those 11.1 million currently living out of the shadows.

Joel Kotkin, a presidential fellow at the urban futures at Chapman University, recently wrote an editorial for Forbes Magazine on a new 21st Century Business Model for the United States. This article focuses on the positive economic impact of immigrants in the United States.

The article notes:

In our globalized economy, the most enthusiastically touted approaches are those adopted by centralized, state-dominated economies such as China, Brazil and Russia as well as--somewhat less oppressively--those of the major E.U. states.

Yet the U.S. may well be constructing the best sustainable business model for the 21st Century. It is an approach built on the country's greatest enduring strength--an innovative business culture driven increasingly by a diverse pool of immigrants.

The article puts forth a narrative that highlights America's unique ability to take all manner of people and integrate them into a cohesive business model, while also showing that the complexion of the American Business model is changing:

If the U.S. wants to retain pre-eminence, it needs to go with what makes it a great country: its protean national and increasingly post-racial business culture.

This evolution is increasingly evident at the very top of our economy

1. Between 1990 and 2005 immigrants started one quarter of all venture-backed public companies.

2. Large American firms are also increasingly led by people with roots in foreign countries Including 14 of the CEOs of the 2007 Fortune 100. 

3. Even the top tier of corporate America--once the almost-exclusive reserve of native-born Anglo-Saxon--increasingly reflects the diversification of the larger society.

The financial benefit to the country is significant:

Already, for example, eight Indian American CEOs run U.S. corporations with over $2 billion in sales, including companies like Citicorp, Adobe Systems and Pepsico. Pepsi's historic rival, Coca Cola, is now run by Muhtar Kent, a native of Turkey. Foreign CEOs also include Kellogg's Australian-born David Mackay and Ethan Allen's M. Farooq Kathwari, yet another native of India.

It is important to note that this is not just a high skilled immigrant phenomena:

Immigrant commerce also thrives at the grassroots level. It manifests most visibly in the proliferation of small stores, restaurants, food-processing businesses, garment factories and trucking lines.

Overall, immigrants are 60% more likely to start a new business than native-born Americans. The number of self-employed immigrants has grown even in New York City, where the number of self-employed among the native-born has dropped.

Immigrant businesses have thrived by providing basic services, such as banks, insurance agents, funeral homes and grocery stores. Some of these businesses arose because the mainstream community had failed to identify opportunities in these markets or had consciously decided to exclude them.

This trend will only continue in the future:

One critical harbinger can be seen in the current crop of students at top U.S. business schools. Between one-third and one-half all students at Stanford, MIT, University of Pennsylvania, University of Chicago and UC Berkeley come from abroad. These schools are training camps for immigrants transitioning into careers as American entrepreneurs.

The article also does a great job of placing the current influx of immigrants in a more historical context by looking at the effect of earlier ethnic groups positive impact on the American economy.

This is a great read and one that focuses on the broader immigration economic picture, which is that in an increasingly globalized economy having a diverse population is a net positive.

A common refrain from anti-immigration organizations is that immigrants weaken the wages of American workers and do damage to the economy. 

According to the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, on a state level the opposite is true:

Immigration actually boost wages and increase productivity overall for states that have large populations of immigrant workers.

The report written by Giovanni Peri, entitled The Effects of Immigrants on U.S. Employment and Productivity examined the following:

The effects of immigration on the total output and income of the U.S. economy can be studied by comparing output per worker and employment in states that have had large immigrant inflows with data from states that have few new foreign-born workers.

Statistical analysis of state-level data shows that immigrants expand the economy's productive capacity by stimulating investment and promoting specialization.

The paper also examined the short and long term effect of immigration on the economy:

Immigration effects on employment, income, and productivity vary by occupation, job, and industry. Nonetheless, it is possible to total these effects to get an aggregate economic impact.

Here we attempt to quantify the aggregate gains and losses for the U.S. economy from immigration.

If the average impact on employment and income per worker is positive, this implies an aggregate “surplus” from immigration.

In other words, the total gains accruing to some U.S.-born workers are larger than the total losses suffered by others.

A lot of great information here, highly reccomend reading from start to finish. The economic data presented here helps to contextualize the current debate over immigrants and wages.

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano announced yesterday substantial implementations of border security measures.

Below are some of the security measures DHS has implemented to date:

1 – Expanded Unmanned Aircraft Systems operations to cover the entire Southwest Border.

Results: On Sept. 1st, CBP will expand Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) flight operations, covering all Southwest border states and providing critical aerial surveillance assistance to personnel on the ground.

2 – Dedicated historic levels of personnel to the Southwest border.

Results: The Border Patrol is better staffed than at any time in its 86-year history, having nearly doubled the number of agents from approximately 10,000 in 2004 to more than 20,000 today – including more “boots on the ground” in Arizona than ever before.  Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has also deployed a record number of agents to the Southwest border with more than a quarter of its personnel deployed in this region, doubling the number of agents assigned to Border Enforcement Security Task Forces and tripling the number of ICE intelligence analysts working along the U.S.-Mexico border. Further, President Obama has ordered the deployment of 1,200 National Guard troops to the Southwest border to contribute additional capabilities and capacity to assist law enforcement agencies.

3 – Deployed additional technology and complete fencing construction along the Southwest border.

Results: Over the past 17 months, CBP has deployed additional Z-Backscatter Van Units, Mobile Surveillance Systems, Remote Video Surveillance Systems, thermal imaging systems, radiation portal monitors, and license plate readers to the Southwest border. DHS has also completed 646.5 miles of fencing out of nearly 652 miles mandated by Congress, including 298.5 miles of vehicle barriers and 348 miles of pedestrian fence, with the remaining construction scheduled to be complete by the end of 2010.

4 – Increased outbound inspections to interdict illegal weapons, drugs, and cash leaving the United States.

Results: In addition to placing an increased emphasis on screening southbound vehicle traffic, CBP began screening 100 percent of southbound rail shipments for illegal weapons, drugs, and cash – for the first time ever. These enhanced outbound inspections have yielded more than $39.2 million in southbound illegal currency – an increase of more than $29.4 million compared to 2008.

5 – Increased seizures of drugs, weapons, and currency to disrupt the operations of transnational criminal organizations.

Results: In 2009, DHS seized more than $103 million in illegal currency, more than 1.7 million kilograms of drugs and more than 1,400 firearms – increases of more than $47 million, more than 450,000 kilograms of drugs and more than 300 firearms compared to 2008.

6 – Detered illegal immigration through unprecedented investments in border security

Results: Illegal border crossings have been significantly reduced, as apprehensions of illegal aliens decreased from 723,825 in FY2008 to 556,041 in FY2009, a 23 percent reduction, in part as the result of increased security along the southwest border.

7 – Increased employer audits to deter violations of employment verification laws and protect American workers.   

Results: Since Jan. 2009, DHS has audited more than 2,785 employers suspected of hiring illegal labor, debarred more than 100 companies and 80 individuals, and issued more than $6.4 million in fines—more than the total amount of audits and fines issued in the entire previous administration.

8 – Deployed Secure Communities technology to all southwest border communities.

Results: The Obama Administration has expanded the Secure Communities initiative—which uses biometric information to identify criminal aliens in state prisons and local jails to expedite removal proceedings—from 14 to 567 locations, including all jurisdictions along the Southwest border. DHS expects to expand this program nationwide by 2013. As of July 31, 2010, this program had identified more than 287,500 aliens in jails and prisons who have been charged with or convicted of criminal offenses, including more than 43,000 charged with or convicted of major violent or drug offenses (level 1 offenses). Through Secure Communities, over 37,900 convicted criminal aliens have been removed from the United States, including more than 10,800 convicted of major violent or drug offenses (level 1 offenses).

9 – Targeted criminal aliens who pose a threat to public safety.

Results: The Obama Administration has fundamentally reformed immigration enforcement, focusing on identifying and removing criminal aliens who pose a threat to public safety. Overall, criminal removals/returns increased by almost 22,000 between FY 2008 and FY 2009, a 19 percent increase. So far this fiscal year, ICE has removed a record 170,000 criminals from the U.S. DHS will continue to increase focus on removing those convicted of crimes who pose a threat to the safety of communities. 

10 – Boosted funding for Southwest border infrastructure, technology, and law enforcement

Results: The recent passage and signing of Southwest border security supplemental legislation will provide critical additional capabilities to secure the Southwest border at and between our ports of entry and reduce the illicit trafficking of people, drugs, currency and weapons. This law provides $14 million for improved tactical communications systems along the Southwest border and $32 million for two additional CBP unmanned aircraft systems – in addition to $176 million for an additional 1,000 Border Patrol agents to be deployed between ports of entry; $68 million to hire 250 new Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers at ports of entry and to maintain 270 officers currently deployed to ports of entry; and $6 million to construct two forward operating bases along the Southwest Border to improve coordination of border security activities.

DHS and the General Services Administration (GSA) are also directing more than $400 million in Recovery Act funding to the Southwest border, including funds for:

•    Port and other infrastructure projects in Otay Mesa, California; Antelope Wells, New Mexico; Los Ebanos, Amistad Dam, Falcon Dam and Corpus Christi, Texas; and Nogales, Arizona.

•    Non-Intrusive Inspection Equipment at Southwest border ports of entry, including both low energy and large-scale systems;

•    Modernized tactical communications equipment for the El Paso and Rio Grande Valley Sectors; and

•    Tested, commercially available security technology including thermal imaging devices, ultra-light detection, backscatter units, mobile radios, cameras and laptops for pursuit vehicles, and Remote Video Surveillance System enhancements.

Further, DHS has increased the funds state and local law enforcement can use to combat border-related crime through Operation Stonegarden—a DHS grant program designed to support state, local, and tribal law enforcement efforts along our nation’s borders. Based on risk, cross-border traffic and border-related threat intelligence, nearly 83 percent of 2009 and 2010 Operation Stonegarden funds – more than 124 million dollars – went to Southwest border states, up from 59 percent in 2008.

Much has been written on this blog about increased security on the Southern Border. The Northern Border is another matter.

With the White House and Congress increasing funding for border security the Border Patrol has ramped up enforcement on both the Southern and the Northern Border.

Interior enforcement is nothing new. The Border Patrol has long had jurisdiction in the United States to enforce federal immigration laws.

Those living along the Northern Border are finding that the increase in Border Security is not everything they thought it would be.

New York Times reporter Nina Bernstein in her story Border Sweeps in North Reach Miles Into U.S.  gives a fuller account of  new tensions developing along the Northern Border.

The increase in Border Patrol activity has mostly manifested itself in the train system:

The little-publicized transportation checks are the result of the Border Patrol’s growth since 9/11, fueled by Congressional antiterrorism spending and an expanding definition of border jurisdiction. In the Rochester area, where the border is miles away in the middle of Lake Ontario, the patrol arrested 2,788 passengers from October 2005 through last September.

The checks are “a vital component to our overall border security efforts” to prevent terrorism and illegal entry, said Rafael Lemaitre, a spokesman for United States Customs and Border Protection. He said that the patrol had jurisdiction to enforce immigration laws within 100 miles of the border, and that one mission was preventing smugglers and human traffickers from exploiting inland transit hubs.

This has led to some uncomfortable encounters between Naturalized Citizens traveling domestically:

Ruth Fernandez, 60, a naturalized citizen born in Ecuador, was asked for identification. And though she was only traveling home to New York City from her sister’s in Ohio, she had made sure to carry her American passport. On earlier trips, she said, agents had photographed her, and taken away a nervous Hispanic man.

... and the jailing of students visiting the United States:

But some of the same kinds of students are being jailed by the patrol, like a Taiwan-born Ph.D. candidate who had excelled in New York City public schools since age 11. Two days after he gave a paper on Chaucer at a conference in Chicago last year, he was taken from his train seat and strip-searched at a detention center in Batavia, N.Y., facing deportation for an expired visa.

....and also raised the specter of racial profiling and Arizona's controversial law SB1070:

Another challenge is pending in the 2009 train arrest of the Taiwan-born doctoral student, who had to answer the agent after being singled out for intense questioning because of his “Asian appearance,” he said. His account was corroborated in an affidavit filed this month by another passenger.

Similar complaints have been made by others, including a Chicago couple who encountered the patrol on a train to Poughkeepsie, N.Y., for the woman’s graduation from Vassar College.

“At least in Arizona, you have to be doing something wrong to be stopped,” said the woman, a citizen of Chinese-American descent who said her Mexican boyfriend was sleeping when an agent started questioning him. “Here, you’re sitting on the train asleep and if you don’t look like a U.S. citizen, it’s ‘Wake up!’ ”

With the border increasingly becoming more militarized some see these train stops as a harbinger of worse things to come:

  ...it evokes travel through the old Communist bloc. “I was actually woken up with a flashlight in my face,” recalled Mike Santomauro, 27, a law student who encountered the patrol in April, at 2 a.m. on a train in Rochester.

Across the aisle, he said, six agents grilled a student with a computer who had only an electronic version of his immigration documents. Through the window, Mr. Santomauro said, he could see three black passengers, standing with arms raised beside a Border Patrol van.

 

There has been much written about violence on the border between the United States and Mexico.

What has not been reported with nearly the same frequency is the increase in violence to immigrants who cross into the United States along the southern border.

With increased resources and more focus on enforcement the border is more safe on the American side. Examples of this can be seen here, here, here and here.

The only people who are really suffering death in great numbers on the border is immigrants who are increasingly the target of violence from drug cartels.

As enforcement has increased and the border has become more militarized, the channels with which drug smugglers and human traffickers has been joined. The joining of the drug smugglers and human trafficking has led to an increase in deaths. Mostly the increase in deaths has been to immigrants who are trying to come into the United States.

Sacha Feinman of the LA Times wrote about this growing problem in his report entitled Drug Cartels Imperil Immigrants in the Desert:

.....migrants and drugs once occupied separate worlds. But tougher border enforcement has pushed the groups into the same obscure parts of the desert. The close company adds a new element of danger to migrants' already perilous journey, and may be responsible for a drop in immigration and economic decline in towns that depend on the migrants.

The combination of drug smuggling and human trafficking has now become common place:

Mexico's drug cartels have become a more formidable presence here, taxing the coyotes and threatening their human cargo as they make their way to the border.

As drug smuggling groups find their profits pinched by tighter border enforcement, they have moved into human smuggling, according to U.S. law enforcement officials. And with good reason: The average migrant pays about $1,300 to $1,800 to be smuggled past the bolstered Border Patrol as well as fences, surveillance towers and other new security measures. What once was a wildcat operation with marginal profits has become big business.

This has created a deadly situation for immigrants crossing the desert. Max Fisher of The Atlantic Magazine has a story up showing just how deadly it has become. In his article Mexico Discovers Mass Grave, Yielding 4 Hard Lessons does a great job of contextualizing what has happened on the border.

1. Journey to America Increasingly Dangerous  The Christian Science Monitor's Sara Miller Llana writes, "With attention focused on the US tightening its borders and stepping up deportations, mostly of undocumented Mexicans, the plight of migrants crossing through Mexico is often overlooked. ... The journey through Mexico has become more and more treacherous as suspected drug traffickers branch out into other businesses, including human trafficking.

2. Why Cartels Are Getting More Violent  The Washington Independent's Elise Foley explains, "It's not the first mass killing by drug cartels, but it may be the largest. Mexican authorities discovered 51 bodies in mass graves in July, and uncovered 55 bodies in a mine in May.

3. Mexican Cartels Pushing South Into New Countries   Reuters' Sarah Grainger reports a "southward push" by the notorious cartels. "Central America is struggling to contain rising violence as powerful Mexican drug cartels, facing an escalating government crackdown at home, expand southward and intensify operations in neighboring nations.

4. War Against Cartels Is Not Going Well  The U.K. Independent's Guy Adams writes, "The discovery on Tuesday afternoon marked a new low in a brutal conflict that has taken the lives of an estimated 28,000 Mexicans since the President, Felipe Calderon, declared 'war' on the nation's wealthy and extraordinarily well-armed drug cartels in 2007. ...

The Human Rights Watch (HRW) has released a report today on immigrant detainees and sexual abuse.

The 24 page report entitled Detained and at Risk: Sexual Abuse and Harassment can be read HERE.

The report provides:

1. Documented incidents of Sexual Abuse

2. Recorded allegations of abuse.

3. Recent proposals by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to address the issue.

4. Recommendations from the Human Rights Watch which emphasize that the agency should make improvements swiftly to improve oversight of the entire detention system and ensure accountability.

Meghan Rhode, women's rights researcher at the HRW, released the following statement with the report:

"ICE has finally recognized the need for stronger protection of people in detention against sexual abuse, but it needs to play catch up quickly. ICE needs to get new rules in place and make sure the rules have the teeth to ensure compliance from the hundreds of facilities across the detention system."

According to the release the report was commissioned after:

It was reported in May that a guard employed by a contractor, Corrections Corporation of America, at the T. Don Hutto immigration facility in Texas had sexually assaulted several detainees.

The guard, who was arrested on August 19, 2010, on suspicion of official oppression and unlawful restraint, allegedly groped women while transporting them to an airport and a bus station where they were being released.

The Congressionally Mandated National Prison Rape Elimination Commission issued a report in 2009 that said:

...immigrants in detention face particular challenges in reporting abuse, including a lack of information about rules governing staff conduct and fear of speaking out against the same authority that is seeking their deportation.

Ezra Klein of the Washington Post featured Suzie Kim of Mother Jones  in an article up HERE, which shows:

As President Obama has increased the number of deportations of immigrants, his administration has not increased the number of federal judges that can actually process the legal removal of immigrants from the country.

On President Obama's increase in enforcement Kim notes:

Obama has devoted nearly all his efforts on immigration to ramped up enforcement, and his administration is on track to deport a record number of illegal immigrants. The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency expects the number of deportations to increase by 10 percent above Bush's 2008 total -- and 25 percent above the 2007 total.

A chart provided within the article shows that there has been a clear increase in number deportations:

So while the President has ramped up deportations  as of yet there has been no complimentary increase in the number of judges that can process these increased numbers of deportation.

Obama's Justice Department has also failed to fill an eyebrow-raising number of judicial vacancies in immigration courts. As of March, one out of every six positions remained unfilled, the Center for Investigative Reporting notes. At the time, the agency had promised to hire 47 judges by Sept. 30, but only five new immigration judges have been sworn in thus far. (The empty slots are also a reminder of the glaring number of judicial vacancies that have yet to be filled in the federal courts as well.)

The slowness of the administration to fill judicial vacancies is creating major problems:

The Center for Investigative Reporting explains: There were nearly 248,000 cases pending by the middle of June this year, a whopping 33 percent higher than where the figure stood at the end of fiscal year 2008. … TRAC also found that the average length of time it’s taken to conclude immigration cases during 2010 reached 459 days, a number higher than any year since at least 1998. By state, California remains the leader in average wait times with more than 640 days. One hearing location in San Diego posted an extraordinary average wait time of nearly 1,300 days, or to put it another way, more than three years.

Enforcement only measures are useless unless the infrastructure to process immigration both in and out of the country is changed.

If politicians are serious about solving the current immigration problems facing this country, they will have to look beyond merely throwing money at border enforcement and get serious about creating a process not just for deporting immigrants, but also allows  those that want to come to work, do so legally.

With the Arizona primary happening today, a clear narrative has been established in the news coverage: the politics of immigration has had a significant impact on how candidates have run their campaigns.

Below are some of the stories on the Arizona primary:

AZKPHO News Channel 5 - Low Turnout Expected For Ariz. Primary Election Heated Issues Not Enough To Attract More Voters, Experts Say

Voters will head to the polls Tuesday for Arizona's primary election, but there may not be as big a turnout as some might expect, according to state officials.

The Secretary of State's Office is expecting a turnout of about 20 to 25 percent of registered voters. According to political consultant Jaime Molera, the state's hot political issues, such as immigration, education, and health care, will not be enough to drive more people to the polls.

Time - Adam Klawonn - Arizona's Accidental Governor: The Reinvention of Jan Brewer

People in Arizona remember a different Jan Brewer from the tough-talking Republican governor at the center of the bitter immigration debate swirling out of her state. If politicians have multiple lives, her previous ones showed a much more personable presence — one pundit called her "delightful." Not eloquent but engaging, not book-smart but pragmatic, Brewer would often crack jokes in boring committee meetings when she was a state legislator, trading punch lines with another lawmaker who acted as the comedic foil. The exchanges reminded some of scenes with Lucy and Ethel in I Love Lucy more than legislative debate.

The Atlantic - Nicole Allan - Immigration Politics A boon For Jan Brewer and John McCain

For Brewer, signing Arizona's tough new immigration law in April set her star on the rise. Instantly, she was all over the TV networks and conservative blogs. Her heroism within conservative circles was cemented once the Obama administration took on the law. Whining over her proposed tax hike was soon subsumed by publicity about her immigration policies. Her two most serious Republican challengers dropped out of the race and she is expected to glide to victory tomorrow.

NPR - Ted Robbins - Immigration Plays Major Role in Arizona Primary

But since April 23 — and Senate Bill 1070 — none of that has mattered.

Brewer's decision to sign Arizona's tough anti-immigration law has proved popular among Arizona voters, especially Republicans, though much of the law is on hold awaiting a court hearing.

She has since become one of the party's highest-profile members in the country, and one by one, her opponents have dropped out.

"I can assure you that if she had not signed 1070, she would have had no chance to get the Republican nomination," says pollster Bruce Merrill, a former Arizona State University professor.

New York Times - Marc Lacey - On Primary Day, McCain Seeks Political Comeback

One key to Mr. McCain’s rebound was how he neutralized Mr. Hayworth’s, and Arizona’s, big issue — immigration. The senator endorsed Arizona’s immigration crackdown, known as SB1070. He changed his mind on the necessity of the border fence, insisting that it was effective and declaring gruffly in one ad: “Complete the danged fence.” He also backpedaled fiercely on whether there ought to be a path to citizenship for those who entered the country against the rules, which in the past he has endorsed.

Bloomberg - Hans Nichols - Keep Immigrants Out Is McCain's Refrain That May Mean Re-Election

McCain’s campaign for re-election in Arizona “concluded that if they didn’t take an extreme position on immigration, he was at risk of losing,” said Espinoza, president of Raza Development Fund in Phoenix. “Well, he’s not going to lose, but it’s been heart-wrenching for me. It’s such a radical departure from where he was just a couple of years ago.”

NDN President Simon Rosenberg was featured recently in a piece in The Economist wrote on the GOP's assault on the 14th Amendment. The full story can be seen HERE:

The article does a great job of summarizing and providing hard facts on all of the recent developments in this ongoing story.

In July Lindsey Graham, a moderate Republican senator, suggested amending the amendment to fight the “drop and leave” tactic of visiting America to give birth. Louie Gohmert, a Texas congressman, had earlier warned of enemies sending mothers-to-be to America to have their babies who could then be “raised and coddled as future terrorists” before being sent back.

Only about a sixth of the world’s nations practice birthright citizenship. The United States originally adopted it to end slavery, by making a citizen anyone born in the country and “subject to the jurisdiction thereof”—a clause then meant to exclude sovereign Native-American tribes, and still used to exempt children of foreign diplomats. In 1982 the Supreme Court ruled that people who had entered America illegally also met the “subject to the jurisdiction” standard. A recent study by the Pew Hispanic Centre found that 8% of births in America are to illegal immigrants.

Simon, provides some much needed historical context on exactly what the Republican party is attempting to do.

Yet their rivals counter that even tweaking the policy could create an underclass of stateless youths.

“They’re saying this is about narrow, small things, but this is revisiting the civil war,” says Simon Rosenberg, the director of NDN, an advocacy group. “This is settled law that righted the most egregious wrong in our constitution.”

We will continue to follow this story closely as it continues to develop.