immigration

And the immigration battle continues. After U.S. Senator John McCain's last ad on immigration, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama responds in kind.  Chris Cillizza reports that overall, Obama is outspending McCain 3 to 1 on television.

NDN has long advocated on the importance of immigration as a motivating issue for Hispanics, regardless of whether they are native or foreign born - as demonstrated by this back and forth. With a significant percentage of Latino voters in key battleground states, the candidates are working to win over this important voting demographic by speaking on the issue of immigration. In this ad, Obama taps into the damaged Republican brand among Hispanics, linking John McCain to his party and to the GOP's hateful anti-immigrant attacks and the pressure that party exerted to halt immigration reform. The ad is called, "Otra Vez lo Mismo", or "Here We Go Again".

The translation of the script of the ad:

[Announcer:]
Here We Go Again...
McCain is still manipulating and lying on the issue of immigration.
He wants to hide the fact he's the one who turned his back on us...
[CNN video]
McCain caved to the anti-immigrant crowd
And, along with the Republicans, betrayed our community.
If John McCain is not willing to stand up to his own Republican Party, how will he defend us in the White House?

NDN has followed U.S. Sen. John McCain's track record on Immigration. The latest is John McCain's second ad on immigration in Spanish. Andres commented on the ad during an interview with NPR:

"It's disturbing to me, as a Hispanic, to have someone who feels he can blatantly deceive and think people won't pay attention," says Andres Ramirez, vice president for Hispanic programs at NDN..."

Marisa wrote about the ad, and NDN has long advocated on: 1) the importance of the Hispanic vote (this demographic could very well swing several southern and western states in this election), and 2) the issue of immigration as a motivating factor in the way many Hispanics vote regardless of whether they are native or foreign born - this is thanks to the GOP strategy of turning the debate on immigration into a debate on whether Hispanics should be in this country.

Actually, McCain's message on immigration is not mixed at all - since 2006 he's been consistently against immigration reform. The first and second ads focus on misrepresenting Obama's position on immigration, but at no time do they state McCain's position - much less go as far as saying that McCain supports immigration reform. Instead, since the GOP now recognizes that Hispanics respond negatively to these anti-Hispanic attacks, they created the same kind of degrading ad except this time they (inaccurately)attribute the comments about Mexico and immigrants to Barack Obama.

So will McCain's attempt at making Obama seem anti-Hispanic work? Andres is right - it's not working. NDN and analysts across the board believe the large numbers of Hispanic voters in Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada and Florida could be decisive in those swing states. Our latest polling in these states showed that Barack Obama is ahead of John McCain by at least 30 points among Hispanics in the Southwest, and specifically on the issue of immigration, Hispanics believe Barack Obama would do a better job than John McCain. Even in Florida, where the candidates were even among Hispanics (42%-42%), when asked about immigration, 42% of voters trusted Barack Obama to better handle the issue over 37% preferring John McCain. The largest difference was in Nevada, where 60% of Hispanics trusted Barack Obama more on the issue of immigration, while only 18% preferred John McCain.

And the latest ad makes no sense when put in context - on the one hand, the McCain campaign launches this ad to attempt to portray Obama as anti-immigrant, while on the other hand, they create another ad in English and Spanish that attacks Obama for allegedly voting against allowing people to own guns in order to defend themselves from these "criminal aliens" who are "crossing illegally into our country." So which is it?

In a year when the Hispanic electorate has nearly doubled from what it was in 2000 (from 7.5 million to approximately 14 million this year), given that Hispanics make up a large part of the electorate in key Southern and Western states, and given that Hispanics are mobilizing to get out the vote, to vote early and vote absentee in those states, it does not bode well for John McCain.

Every year the United States takes a time out from September 15-October 15 to recognize the contributions of Hispanics in the United States as part of Hispanic Heritage Month. Hispanics are now recognized as the largest minority in the U.S. - the Census estimates that by 2042 one in four persons will be of Hispanic origin. As this year's Hispanic Heritage Month kicked off this week, it becomes clear that an unprecedented number of Latino voters could decide this year's election, Latinos are increasingly represented in government and industry, Latinos are a growing force in the media - as evidenced by the launch of shows like "Agenda" and "Al Punto" on Spanish language networks, and Hispanics are also becoming web and technology users in rapidly growing numbers.

For these reasons and more, the Pew Hispanic Center reported this week on a survey it conducted on the overall state of Latinos. The report reflects how Hispanics are bearing much of the current economic crisis, combined with suffering increased instances of discrimination.

Half (50%) of all Latinos overall (native and foreign born) say that the situation of Latinos in this country is worse now than it was a year ago, according to this nationwide survey of 2,015 Hispanic adults (higher than the average for non-latinos). Fully 63% of Latino immigrants say that the situation of Latinos has worsened over the past year. In 2007, just 42% of all adult Hispanic immigrants - and just 33% of all Hispanic adults - said the same thing. These increasingly downbeat assessments come at a time when the Hispanic community in this country--numbering approximately 46 million, or 15.4% of the total U.S. population--has been hit the hardest by rising unemployment.

Due mainly to the crisis in the housing and construction industry, the unemployment rate for Hispanics in the U.S. rose to 7.3% in the first quarter of 2008, well above the 4.7% rate for all non-Hispanics, and well above the 6.1% rate for Hispanics during the same period last year. As recently as the end of 2006, the gap between those two rates had shrunk to an historic low of 0.5 percentage points--4.9% for Latinos compared with 4.4% for non-Latinos, on a seasonally adjusted basis. The spike in Hispanic unemployment has hit immigrants especially hard. For the first time since 2003, the unemployment rate for Latinos not born in the United States was higher, at 7.5 percent, than the rate for native-born Latinos, at 6.9 percent, the report found. Latinos make up 14.2% of the U.S. labor force, or roughly 22 million people.

In addition to the economy, issues like immigration, access to health care, and discrimination continue to be of concern to Hispanics and to Hispanic voters. In the Pew survey, one-in-ten Hispanic adults - native-born U.S. citizens (8%) and immigrants (10%) alike - report that in the past year the police or other authorities have stopped them and asked them about their immigration status. Some Latinos are xperiencing other difficulties because of their ethnicity. One-in-seven(15%)say that they have had trouble in the past year finding or keeping a job because they are Latino. One-in-ten (10%) report the same about finding or keeping housing.

On the question of immigration enforcement, the Pew Center's research demonstrates the same data NDN found through our polling on immigration, released last week. Latinos disapprove of current enforcement-only measures - more than four-in-five Hispanics (81%) say that immigration enforcement should be left mainly to the federal authorities rather than the local police and 76% disapprove of workplace raids. Two-thirds (68%) of Latinos who worry a lot that they or someone close to them may be deported say that Latinos' situation in the country today is worse than it was a year ago, as do 63% of Latinos who have experienced job difficulties because of their ethnicity and 71% of Latinos who report housing difficulties because of their ethnicity.

Most Hispanics in the U.S. are native born, i.e., U.S. citizens legally not susceptible to deportation, therefore the fact that most Hispanics worry about raids, immigration, and even facing possible deportation reflects how the existing reckless "enforcement-only" policies are impacting not only foreign Hispanics, but U.S. citizens.

NDN has a history writing and speaking about the Hispanic community as one of the great American demographic stories of the 21st century, recognizing that it will be hard for any political party to build a 21st century political majority without this fast-growing electorate. Hispanics have become one of the most volatile and contested swing voting blocs in American politics, and they are responding to this attention. As reported in Hispanics Rising II, an analysis of the Hispanic electorate and their motivation, Hispanic immigrants are becoming increasingly involved, as reflected by the data released this week by the Immigration Policy Center, demonstrating a spike in citizenship applications. Immigrants want to be U.S. citizens, they want to apply for citizenship, often having to overcome virtually impossible obstacles to be able to pay the obscenely high application filing fees.

Therefore, political candidates will do well to pay attention to the many challenges facing Hispanics today. At the onset of Hispanic Heritage Month this week, both Presidential candidates released statements praising Hispanics' contributions to American society and their military service. The difference between the two statements is that Barack Obama also called for comprehensive immigration reform. On the other hand, John McCain didn't mention it. This is curious because polling for the last 3 or 4 years, including the latest polls conducted by NDN, consistently shows that immigration is of top concern for Hispanic voters.

It is clear that John McCain would rather lose his integrity than lose this election. After a series of lies and mischaracterizations that have been chronicled by numerous news sources, U.S. Sen. John McCain released an attack ad today about Barack Obama's record on immigration.  Having participated in the immigration debate during 2007 as a Hill staffer as it was happening, and having delved into the dozens of amendments thrown at the bill per minute by those who would try to block immigration reform, and having had to sort through all the "poison pill" amendments, I feel a responsibility to distinguish between truth and fiction in regards to an issue as important as immigration reform.  The truth is that Senator Obama proposed an amendment to the section on a temporary worker program in order to ensure that those workers are a paid a prevailaing wage - i.e., to help push wages up.  It is disturbing to see this attempt to misinform Hispanic voters, as members of the Democratic leadership are accused in this ad for having halted immigration reform, when they were the ones who presented the legislation to the floor and fought to have the issue voted on and passed - not once, but twice.  The reason immigration even came to a vote twice is that many Republicans - including President George W. Bush - also recognize the dire need to fix the broken immigration system, and there was thought to be enough support at the time for reform.  What really happened: there were insufficient votes to close debate and move to vote on immigration reform because the Republicans who had pledged to support the legislation caved to the anti-immigrant rhetoric and voted against cloture.  The truth is John McCain changed his position and did not participate in the 2007 debate to provide the necessary political leadership to pass reform.  And that could have made a difference - one could argue that it was John McCain's absence and lack of leadership on this issue that led to its demise.  I'll refer you to our Hispanics Rising report, where we track the immigration debate and John McCain's abandonment of his own reform legislation.  The truth is, John McCain abandoned the reform he had once promoted because he feared the political ramifications.  As reported by the Washington Post (see Hispanics Rising), John McCain told his party "I got the message", immigration reform was not popular.  Sadly, it remains very necessary.  

Here is the translation of the ad, called "Which Side Are They On":

ANNCR:Obama and his Congressional allies say they are on the side of immigrants. But are they?
The press reports that their efforts were 'poison pills' that made immigration reform fail. The result:
No guest worker program.
No path to citizenship.
No secure borders.
No reform.
Is that being on our side?
Obama and his Congressional allies ready to block immigration reform, but not ready to lead.
JOHN MCCAIN: I'm John McCain and I approve this message.
ANNCR: Paid for by McCain-Palin 2008 and the Republican National Committee. Approved by McCain-Palin 2008.

I must say, this ad insults my intelligence, and it is a shame because John McCain was the first to come out promising to keep this campaign "clean", and to not reach for baseless attacks like this one.  You will see below, McCain said, "Do we have to go to the lowest common denominator? I don't think so". Well Mr. McCain, you already have - this is just another example of how low you can go. Is lying to voters putting "country first"? I don't think so.

Staying true, never wavering. Rising above politics as usual. Taking on his own Party. He is his own man. Willing to do the hard stuff, like tackling climate change and immigration reform. A courageous maverick. The drumbeat from St. Paul is relentless.

But is it true?

While it may have been at one time, it can no longer be considered true. McCain fought the Bush economic strategy. He now embraces it. McCain opposed the Bush approach to use of torture. Today he supports it. He was a leader on the effort to fix our broken immigration system. Today he no longer supports his own bill. While he has been a leader on tackling elements of the climate change fight, as Jake writes below, it is no longer clear that he supports the positions he had a few months ago. He runs ads with wind turbines and solar panels but has helped kill the main government program supporting their growth. He fought the lobbyists and now his campaign is run by, and littered with, them. He says he is the experienced one, but is now on his 3rd campaign manager and his team wildly bungled the vetting of his VP, the most important decision he has made to date. He argues each day he will balance the budget but independent analysis all show that he will do the very opposite.

In order to win the nomination this year, John McCain embraced the very politics he fought so hard against for so many years. His story is not one of courage, of fortitude, of virtue but one of an old politician, seeing his last chance for the Presidency slip away, give in to a Party's and a President he had fought so long, sacrificing his integrity and his beliefs along the way. The McCain story is much more craven than courageous, more aging pol than heroic leader, more a man who has bragged repeatedly that he supported President Bush more than 90% of the time than an independent maverick.

It is not an inspiring story no matter how much they attempt to dress it up this week in Minnesota. Like so many, I admired the old McCain, but that man is not the man running for President of the United States this year. He disappeared forever sometime in 2007.

I am disheartened to read the Republican platform, presented yesterday at their Convention. In the area of immigration, once again, the party has shown their temperment, short-sightedness, and intolerance. I am even sorrier to see that the man who was once a champion of Immigration Reform, John McCain, is either not strong enough to stand up to the radical party base, or doesn't want to. It is telling that the section on immigration in the RNC platform is under "Defending Our Nation, Supporting Our Heroes, Securing the Peace" - again implying that 1) all immigrants are undocumented, and 2) all immigrants inherently pose some sort of danger, grasping at the irrational fear that's intended to move everday Americans to hate immigrants of all colors and creeds and to support the conservative base. But I shouldn't be surprised by the offensive nature of the RNC platform, after all, just today, in trying to "appeal" to Hispanic voters, Sen. McCain's campaign manager Rick Davis said that Republicans had to offer this demographic something "other than a deportation center" - but if he's appealing to Hispanic voters, his comment is pretty offensive - equating all the undocumented with Hispanics, and all Hispanic voters with the undocumented.

By contrast, the DNC platform includes immigration under the section entitled "Renewing the American Community," and is more concerned with modernizing and correcting the underlying flawed immigration system than with demonizing immigrants; more concerned with working with the countries of origin of immigrants and dealing with the causes of immigration than with building porous walls. The RNC platform tries to argue that Americans favor a mass deportation - that is not at all the case. Polling data consistently shows that American's favor a solution to the immigration issue at a federal level in the form of smarter laws, legalization for the undocumented, and smarter enforcement, not in the form of intolerance.

THE REPUBLICAN PLATFORM ON IMMIGRATION

"Defending Our Nation,

Supporting Our Heroes, Securing the Peace

Immigration, National Security, and the Rule of Law

Immigration policy is a national security issue, for which we have one test: Does it serve the national interest? By that standard, Republicans know America can have a strong immigration system without sacrificing the rule of law. Border security is essential to national security. In an age of terrorism, drug cartels, and criminal gangs, allowing millions of unidentified persons to enter and remain in this country poses grave risks to the sovereignty of the United States and the security of its people. We simply must be able to track who is entering and leaving our country. Our determination to uphold the rule of law begins with more effective enforcement, giving our agents the tools and resources they need to protect our sovereignty, completing the border fence quickly and securing the borders, and employing complementary strategies to secure our ports of entry. Experience shows that enforcement of existing laws is effective in reducing and reversing illegal immigration. Our commitment to the rule of law means smarter enforcement at the workplace, against illegal workers and lawbreaking employers alike, along with those who practice identity theft and traffic in fraudulent documents. As long as jobs are available in the United States, economic incentives to enter illegally will persist. But we must empower employers so they can know with confidence that those they hire are permitted to work. That means that the EVerify system-which is an internet-based system that verifies the employment authorization and identity of employees-must be reauthorized. A phased-in requirement that employers use the E-Verify system must be enacted.

The rule of law means guaranteeing to law enforcement the tools and coordination to deport criminal aliens without delay - and correcting court decisions that have made deportation so difficult. It means enforcing the law against those who overstay their visas, rather than letting millions flout the generosity that gave them temporary entry. It means imposing maximum penalties on those who smuggle illegal aliens into the U.S., both for their lawbreaking and for their cruel exploitation. It means requiring cooperation among federal, state and local law enforcement and real consequences, including the denial of federal funds, for self-described sanctuary cities, which stand in open defiance of the federal and state statutes that expressly prohibit such sanctuary policies, and which endanger the lives of U.S. citizens. It does not mean driver's licenses for illegal aliens, nor does it mean that states should be allowed to flout the federal law barring them from giving in-state tuition rates to illegal aliens, nor does it mean that illegal aliens should receive social security benefits, or other public benefits, except as povided by federal aw. We oppose amnesty. The rule of law suffers if government policies encourage or reward illegal activity. The American people's rejection of enmasse legalizations is especially appropriate given the federal government's past failures to enforce the law.

Embracing Immigrant Communities

Today's immigrants are walking in the steps of most other Americans' ancestors, seeking the American dream and contributing culturally and economically to our nation. We celebrate the industry and love of liberty of hese fellow Americans. Both government and the private sector must do more to foster legally present immigrants' integration into American life to advance respect for the rule of law and a common American identity. It is a national disgrace that the first experience most new Americans have is with a dysfunctional immigration bureaucracy defined by delay and confusion; we will no longer tolerate those failures. In our multiethnic nation, everyone - immigrants and native-born alike - must embrace our core values of liberty, equality, meritocracy, and respect for human dignity and the rights of women. One sign of our unity is our English language. For newcomers, it has always been the fastest route to prosperity in America. English empowers. We support English as the official language in our nation, while welcoming the ethnic diversity in the United States and the territories,including language. Immigrants should be encouraged to learn English. English is the accepted language of business, commerce, and legal proceedings, and it is essential as a unifying cultural force. It is also important, as part of cultural integration, that our schools provide better education in U.S. history and civics for all children, thereby fostering a commitment to our national motto, E Pluribus Unum. We are grateful to the thousands of new immigrants, many of them not yet citizens, who are serving in the Armed Forces. Their patriotism is inspiring; it should remind the institutions of civil society of the need to embrace newcomers, assist their journey to full citizenship, and help their communities void patterns of isolation.

Welcoming Refugees
Our country continues to accept refugees from troubled lands all over the world. In some cases, these are people who stood with America in dangerous times, and they have first call on our hospitality. We oppose, however, the ranting of refugee status on the basis of lifestyle or other non-political factors."

THE DEMOCRATIC PLATFORM ON IMMIGRATION

Renewing the American Community

Immigration

America has always been a nation of immigrants. Over the years, millions of people have come here in the hope that in America, you can make it if you try. Each successive wave of immigrants has contributed to our country's rich culture, economy and spirit. Like the immigrants that came before them, today's immigrants will shape their own destinies and enrich our country.

Nonetheless,our current immigration system has been broken for far too long. We need comprehensive immigration reform, not just piecemeal efforts. We just work together to pass immigration reform in a way that unites this country not in a way that divides us by playing on our worst instincts and fears. We are committed to pursuing tough, practical, and humane immigration reform immigration reform in the first year of the next administration. For the millions living here illegally but otherwise playing by the rules, we must require them to come out of the shadows and get right with the law. We support a system that requires undocumented immigrants who are in good standing to pay a fine, pay taxes, learn English, and go to the back of the line for the opportunity to become citizens. They are our neighbors, and we can help them become full tax paying, law-abiding, productive members of society.

Atthe same time, we cannot continue to allow people to enter the United States undetected, undocumented, and unchecked. The American people are welcoming and generous people, but those who enter our country's borders illegally, and those who employ them, disrespect the rule of the law. We need to secure our borders, and support additional personnel, infrastructure and technology on the border and at our ports of entry. We need additional Customs and Border Protection agents equipped with better technology and real-time intelligence. We need to dismantle human smuggling organizations, combating the crime associated with this trade. We also need to do more to promote economic development in migrant-sending nations, to reduce incentives to come to the United States illegally. And we need to crack down on employers who hire undocumented immigrants, especially those who pay their workers less than the minimum wage. It's a problem when we only enforce our laws against the immigrants themselves, with raids that are ineffective, tear apart families and leave people detained without adequate access to counsel. We realize that employers need a method to verify whether their employees are legally eligible to work in the U.S., and will ensure that our system is accurate, fair to legal workers, safeguards people's privacy, and cannot be used to discriminate against workers.

We must also improve the legal immigration system, and make our nation's naturalization process fair and accessible to the thousands of legal permanent residents who are eager to become full Americans. We should fix the dysfunctional immigration bureaucracy that hampers family reunification, the cornerstone of our immigration policy for years. Given the importance of both keeping families together and supporting American businesses, we will increase the number of immigration visas for family members of people living here and for immigrants who meet the demand for jobs that employers cannot fill, as long as appropriate labor market protections and standards are in place. We will fight discrimination against Americans who have always played by our immigration rules but are sometimes treated as if they had not.

This past Sunday, Assistant Secretary for Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE), Julie Myers, announced a new pilot program called "Operation Scheduled Departure" on Univision's political show, Al Punto. The idea is to "invite" all the undocumented immigrants who have already undergone immigration proceedings and have been issued a removal order (called non-criminal fugitives by ICE) to approach their local ICE office to begin their deportation. Why didn't we think of that before?! ICE reports that there are 400,000 people who currently fit that description. People who are not eligible for the program are all the undocumented immigrants who have not yet undergone removal proceedings (i.e., have not been caught), and any with a criminal conviction. However, when Ms. Myers "invited" all the viewers of the channel with the largest Hispanic audience in the country to participate, she omitted this detail, making it sound like anyone who is currently undocumented can participate. Not to mention, the policy is contradictory - during this same interview, Ms. Myers herself stated, "When I speak to people in the [ICE] detention centers and I ask if they plan on coming back [to the U.S.], they say ‘of course I'm coming back - that person always gives me a job.'"

During a conference call today with Congressional staffers, ICE officials had a hard time selling the program. Before promoting this program among people in their districts, staffers understandably pressed for answers: "What would be the benefit of participating?" DHS says: Well, they'd avoid risking being caught in a raid (another one, I guess, because they've already been caught, right?) and this way they'd have time to make "all necessary arrangements". Brilliant! It sounds like a concierge service. "Would turning oneself in count towards a legal status?" No. "Would participating in the program grant reprieve from the statutory bars that prohibit re-entry into the U.S.?" No. "Could people just leave of their own accord, without reporting to ICE, and then report their departure to a consulate abroad?" Sure, that's still their choice. Hmmmm...I could almost hear everyone on the phone scratching their head. "What about countries that refuse to issue travel documents, or won't accept their nationals back?" Yeah, then those folks would remain in the U.S. under ICE supervision indefinitely. Sounds like they've really thought this through. ICE could not provide me with the cost of the pilot program, and they couldn't tell us what results they expect to have. So I still don't understand the point of this program - a program that will only be in five cities (Santa Ana, CA, San Diego, CA, Chicago, IL, Pheonix, AZ, and Charlotte, NC), to - ideally - schedule the deportation of 400,000 people during a three-week window (August 5-27). I agree with Doug Rivlin, from National Immigration Forum, "It's pure fantasy." Even Ira Mehlman, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, the largest anti-immigrant lobby group, agreed, "The government would have to offer some kind of incentive to entice immigrants to sign up."

Yet another example of the short-sighted, uninformed, and inadequate policies of this Administration. To us at NDN, this is not a solution to the problem. Instead of laughable policies like this, DHS should channel its resources towards dealing with its own backlog, which is keeping many from obtaining legal status, and it should help Congress pass comprehensive immigration reform to address the flaws in immigration law, provide a pathway to citizenship for those who fulfill certain requirements, and deal with the issue of future flow of immigrants.

On the CIS "report" that I mentioned yesterday - the premise of this paper, does demonstrate that CIS intends to argue that all undocumented immigrants are uneducated Hispanics and that all foreign-born, less-educated Hispanics in the United States are necessarily undocumented immigrants:

CIS ignores that undocumented immigration responds more to economic conditions than to immigration-enforcement measures. Data actually shows the economic downturn in many of the industries where undocumented immigrants tend to be employed (construction, service, and retail sectors) began well before August 2007 (as cited by CIS) - during the 1^st quarter of 2007.

Undocumented immigrants themselves report that immigration-enforcement measures are not a deterrent. The Center for Comparative Immigration Studies at UC-San Diego performed an actual field study and found that 91 percent of individuals who intend to cross the border without documents see attempting to cross the border as "very dangerous," and nearly one-quarter know someone who has died while doing so. Additionally, over 90% of the people who intend to cross the border and believe crossing is "very dangerous" cross anyway. Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Julie Myers, herself admitted during an interview with Univision, that when she asks ICE detainees if they're going to try to cross again, by far most of them say yes.

CIS repeatedly contradicts and undermines its own conclusions. Although no "evidence" is given, CIS posits:"there is good evidence that the illegal population grew last summer while Congress was considering legalizing illegal immigrants. When that legislation failed to pass, the illegal population began to fall almost immediately." Hmm - so these less-educated Spanish-speaking Hispanics (per CIS) were just glued to CPSAN and taking cues from the Senate floor to decide what to do. But CIS then observes (in a footnote), that "illegal immigrant employment is partly seasonal, with more in the country during the summer months [when the immigration debate took place] when employment increases in agriculture, construction, and the hospitality industry."

CIS suggests that the solution to undocumented immigration is more deportation-only measures, a continued economic downturn, and a vow of silence by presidential candidates. CIS also warns that, "Presumably, since even talking about comprehensive immigration reform in the United States could spark a sudden rush of Mexicans across the border, presidential candidates should simply ignore the issue." Great, because ignoring issues always makes them disappear. That is SOUND policy right there.

Border enforcement alone doesn't remedy, it exacerbates the broken immigration system. Since 1993 there has been a 322% increase in the budget of the border patrol. The result has been that during this period of tighter enforcement, the undocumented population has more than doubled in size. It's like a balloon - when enforcement clamps down in Yuma,AZ, crossings through Yuma might decrease, but they increase in San Diego - people find an alternative route. Border enforcement by itself has only helped get "coyotes" (smugglers) more business - the cost of crossing illegally has gone from $975 in 1995 to $2,124 in 2007.

We need a real solution: The answer is not found in blatant anti-Hispanic propaganda, nor in "ignoring" proposals to reform the immigration system, as CIS suggests. A real solution to the problem is to begin by engaging the countries from which immigrants originate (not just Mexico) and share the responsibility of ensuring that economic conditions in the world are such that people can make a living at home. It's necessary to reform the entire visa and legal immigration system, internal and external enforcement, eliminate the backlog that keeps many in uncertain status, and provide a pathway to earned citizenship. Deportation-only strategies do nothing to actually address the problem.

The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) has received a lot of press for a report it released today called Homewardbound: Recent Immigration Enforcement and the Decline in the Illegal Alien Population, so it's important to set the record straight on the report's "indications." Before pointing out the discrepancies in the report, it is essential to understand the background of who wrote it. CIS has been recognized as the "think tank" of the network of at least 13 anti-immigrant and white supremacist hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center. This group was begun by a man named John Tanton, under the guise of his interest in the environment and "population control." He has helped fund all these groups through one entity, U.S. Inc. U.S. Inc.'s lobbying arm is called "Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR)." The Executive Director of FAIR, Roy Beck, frequently acting as the "moderate" voice on cable news and radio talk shows, is actually editor of the Social Contract Press - a publishing house that promotes works such as "The Camp of the Saints," considered to encourage fear of anyone with colored skin. FAIR in turn created a "think tank" under its tax umbrella - CIS.

They are now separate legal entities, but FAIR still provides funding to CIS. It's evident throughout the history of CIS that its work product is aimed at portraying immigrants as criminals and spreading the notion that the immigrant population is exploding and deteriorating our communities - not once have they published a "research" paper that attempts to inform and remain unbiased, you won't find anything about the positive contributions of immigrants on their website. Take a minute and look through the websites of the groups in this network - the rhetoric against Jews, Blacks, and Hispanics demonstrates how papers like these and groups like these don't just affect immigrants (which are of all colors), or Hispanics, they affect everyone who lives in this country and anyone who cares about the values on which this country was founded. True Patriots would never have such fear of others and never promote such hateful rhetoric and "indications".

The groups in this network care little about facts - I almost felt like I should get the Population Environment Balance a map, or a newpaper, when I saw their website praising the anti-immigrant laws in Prince William County, MARYLAND (this county in VIRGINIA has only been the prime example nationally of immigration enforcement taken to the local level for the past year). But we cannot underestimate the fact that even inaccurate reports like these - words - have consequences: the Southern Poverty Law Center reports that in 2000, 602 hate crimes took place in our country. That number rose to 888 in 2007, and in 2006 819 Hispanics reported being targets of those crimes.  According to the FBI, anti-Latino hate crimes rose 35% between 2003 and 2006. 

The Agriprocessors plant in Postville, Iowa, subject of the largest raid by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), is back in the news.  Following this week's Congressional hearings to review the situation of undocumented immigrants detained during the raid, Congressman Luis Gutierrez and several members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus spent this weekend in Postville to look into the arrests and convictions of 400 plant employees and the impact of the raid on the community as a whole.  What's shocking in this case is that documents show how DHS prompted detainees to plead guilty to a criminal offense that they had not committed - ID theft - in order to "expedite" their processing, without providing legal counsel (Administrative entities, like DHS, don't have to provide counsel).  What's also shocking and demonstrates the broken immigration system is the fact that "enforcement" seems to stop at the worker - Agriprocessors has yet to be sanctioned, punished, or fined for having violated a series of laws.  Congressman Gutierrez noted the "proportional imbalance" of the raid, because Agriprocessors, which was under investigation by the State Department of Labor even before the immigration raid for wage and hour violations, child labor and physical and sexual abuse, so far, has faced no charges, while its undocumented employees have unwittingly pleaded guilty to harsher offenses, with harsher consequences.  This is yet another example of the extent to which "enforcement" is merely a talking point for this administration - until the entire immigration system is reformed, and as long as unscrupulous employers are allowed to continue violating the law without so much as a slap on the wrist, the system will continue to be broken.