Immigration in the News
The New Bedford Raids
In the Boston Globe (here), EILEEN MCNAMARA writes about the impacts of the New Bedford raids, which we repirted on earlier this week:
It is no small irony that the Spanish-speaking grandmothers and nursing mothers rounded up as national security threats in an immigration raid on a New Bedford leather factory were stitching safety vests and backpacks for the US military. The government’s multimillion-dollar contract with the owners of the factory where hundreds of low-wage earners were led away in shackles after an immigration sweep last week underscores the absurd contradictions inherent in our immigration policy. One federal bureaucracy is trying to deport the same undocumented workers whose cheap labor another federal bureaucracy is content to exploit.
Immigration Reform: The Lowdown
DENA BUNIS, Washington Bureau Chief of the Orange County Register (here), has an interesting analysis of the prospects for immigration reform in this Congress. An experienced journalist who knows immigration, Bunis analyzes the dicey politics as well as anyone.
Her bottom line: “The best way to get through the immigration debate over the next few months is be patient.”
Border Apprehensions Decrease: What Does It Mean?
NPR (here) reports that, along the United States-Mexico border, Border Patrol officials are reporting a significant decrease in the number of apprehensions of illegal immigrants sneaking into the country. They are giving credit to the increased border security provided by National Guard troops, and to a new policy to lock up and detain immigrants in U.S. prisons. The story makes it clear, however, that it is uncertain whether the decrease in apprehensions really means anything significant. The decrease might be temporary. It might mean that migrants are traveling through more isolate locales and not being apprehended. It might mean that more undocumented migrants are simply staying in the United States and do not try, as in the past, to move back and forth across the border. It is not even clear that the decrease in apprehensions means that there are fewer undocumented immigrants in the United States.
It is clear that, as a matter of politics, reports of increased apprehensions makes immigration reform more likely in Congress.
Iraqi Refugees Journey to the United States
In the N.Y. Times, RACHEL L. SWARNS (here) writes that “As the violence rages in Iraq and tens of thousands of its people flee to neighboring countries, a small stream of Iraqis is trickling into the United States despite improbable odds. . . . .[S]ome have traveled to the southern border because there were few good opportunities for resettlement overseas and tight limits on visas to come here.”
KJ