Showing posts with label immigration. Show all posts
Showing posts with label immigration. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Illegal immigration: our best foreign aid
Chinese swimmers reached the finals for Group B in L.A., while 3 silver and 1 bronze medals were snatched at the 24th Games, 7 Asian bests were created, and 10 national records were bettered. The heartening achievements, a break through zero, helped open a new era in China's swimming history. Chinese women rowers sprang a surprise by taking a silver and a bronze in the coxed fours and coxed eights respectively. Before that, no Asian athletes had ever entered the finals. In addition, the number of Chinese athletes in track and field witnessed a big increase, and notably, woman shot-putter Li Meisu gained a bronze—the only track and field medal for Asia at the Games.
Saturday, July 07, 2007
Undocumented students deserve aid too
THE UTTER collapse of immigration reform in Congress was particularly devastating to one group: undocumented students. It leaves those who have excelled academically in our high schools, but who are not legal residents, ineligible for financial aid. Such a barrier means our students, through no fault of their own, have no path to success or citizenship.
I say "our students" because that is just who they are. We have invested in these children, providing them access to public education in our K-12 schools. Our teachers have encouraged them to learn, to compete and to succeed. It is only after these eager and ambitious young people gain college admission and apply for state or federal financial aid that we turn them away. We must not penalize these young people because their parents brought them here illegally.
The futures of high school graduates are being shaped now. These young people cannot wait out yet another attempt at broad immigration reform. Every year that passes, we deny another class of talented, keen young people hopeful futures for themselves and their families and relegate another generation to an existence on the margins of society.
It's a terrible waste of young talent — talent that this country desperately needs. Each year across the nation, 50,000 to 65,000 undocumented students graduate from high school after having spent at least five years in this country. Because California is home to an estimated 40% of the nation's undocumented students, that means 20,000 or so are in this state.
Statistics on how many go on to the state's public colleges and universities are more difficult to come by. Applications don't require proof of citizenship if a student graduated from a California high school. At UC Berkeley, we may have dozens of such students, but we hear about their struggles only anecdotally or when they apply for financial aid, only to learn that they do not qualify.
Undergraduates who are California residents will pay as much as $25,000 for fees, room and board and books and supplies for the coming school year at Berkeley. It is no surprise that 70% of them rely on state and federal financial aid. But federal law prohibits making these same grants and loans available to undocumented students. They cannot even be hired for campus jobs.
How do they manage? Many are forced out of school for a semester or longer. They work multiple low-paying jobs hoping to save enough to re-enroll. It can take them many more years to graduate, yet they are determined. But other high-achieving California students never even consider attending the University of California or other universities. Even if they could pay for it, a college degree doesn't get them any closer to legal residency status, which they need to put their degrees to work.
To address the plight of undocumented students, Congress must ensure that the well-conceived and broadly supported federal DREAM (Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors) Act goes forward. The act, which provides access to financial aid and a thoughtfully mapped-out path to citizenship for qualified students, became entangled in the latest failed immigration bill. It is time to pass the act on its own merits.
Legislation that would create a California DREAM Act, offered by state Sen. Gil Cedillo (D-Los Angeles), is moving forward in the Legislature. It allows all qualified students to apply for institutional aid at the University of California, California State University and the California Community Colleges.
Financial aid and a path to citizenship is a sound and humane investment. If we provide up-front loans and grants to talented students seeking to escape generations of poverty, society will be paid back many times over. With higher education, they will be able to raise their standard of living as they become taxpaying citizens. We must seize the opportunity to adopt these well-designed state and national policies that will be good for everyone — our students, their families, our state and nation.
I say "our students" because that is just who they are. We have invested in these children, providing them access to public education in our K-12 schools. Our teachers have encouraged them to learn, to compete and to succeed. It is only after these eager and ambitious young people gain college admission and apply for state or federal financial aid that we turn them away. We must not penalize these young people because their parents brought them here illegally.
The futures of high school graduates are being shaped now. These young people cannot wait out yet another attempt at broad immigration reform. Every year that passes, we deny another class of talented, keen young people hopeful futures for themselves and their families and relegate another generation to an existence on the margins of society.
It's a terrible waste of young talent — talent that this country desperately needs. Each year across the nation, 50,000 to 65,000 undocumented students graduate from high school after having spent at least five years in this country. Because California is home to an estimated 40% of the nation's undocumented students, that means 20,000 or so are in this state.
Statistics on how many go on to the state's public colleges and universities are more difficult to come by. Applications don't require proof of citizenship if a student graduated from a California high school. At UC Berkeley, we may have dozens of such students, but we hear about their struggles only anecdotally or when they apply for financial aid, only to learn that they do not qualify.
Undergraduates who are California residents will pay as much as $25,000 for fees, room and board and books and supplies for the coming school year at Berkeley. It is no surprise that 70% of them rely on state and federal financial aid. But federal law prohibits making these same grants and loans available to undocumented students. They cannot even be hired for campus jobs.
How do they manage? Many are forced out of school for a semester or longer. They work multiple low-paying jobs hoping to save enough to re-enroll. It can take them many more years to graduate, yet they are determined. But other high-achieving California students never even consider attending the University of California or other universities. Even if they could pay for it, a college degree doesn't get them any closer to legal residency status, which they need to put their degrees to work.
To address the plight of undocumented students, Congress must ensure that the well-conceived and broadly supported federal DREAM (Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors) Act goes forward. The act, which provides access to financial aid and a thoughtfully mapped-out path to citizenship for qualified students, became entangled in the latest failed immigration bill. It is time to pass the act on its own merits.
Legislation that would create a California DREAM Act, offered by state Sen. Gil Cedillo (D-Los Angeles), is moving forward in the Legislature. It allows all qualified students to apply for institutional aid at the University of California, California State University and the California Community Colleges.
Financial aid and a path to citizenship is a sound and humane investment. If we provide up-front loans and grants to talented students seeking to escape generations of poverty, society will be paid back many times over. With higher education, they will be able to raise their standard of living as they become taxpaying citizens. We must seize the opportunity to adopt these well-designed state and national policies that will be good for everyone — our students, their families, our state and nation.
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Nobody Neets this lazy lot any more
The Neets, the idle young, are a huge drain on welfare and with immigrants keen to do the jobs they won’t, they will remain so, says David Smith
This week Channel 4 will begin a new series of Shameless, the series set around the Gallaghers, described by the producers as “the UK’s most dysfunctional family”, on the fictional Chatsworth Estate.
The father figure, Frank Gallagher, is an ageing “Neet” — the government’s own acronym for those of working age who are not in employment, education or training. The surprise, and this is perhaps why the series is fictional, is that his children are hard working although they are mostly still at school. In real life they would almost certainly end up as Neets.
If so they would join more than a million others. The number of young people aged 16 to 24 in Britain who are classified as Neets stands at 1.24m. The number of young male Neets has risen by 27% to 575,000 since the spring of 1997, while the number of young female Neets is also up but by only 6% to 669,000.
Other countries have Neets although only in Britain, and curiously Japan, is the problem considered significant enough for the term to be widely used.
The Neets are the yobs hanging around off-licences late into the night. They are the graffiti artists who cannot spell and the drug-dealing pit-bull owners. They are also the Vicky Pollard types who become single mothers. Not all Neets fit the caricature. A young mother in a stable relationship bringing up children at home would be classified as a Neet. So could somebody temporarily out of work, such as a university graduate looking for their first job.
In many cases, however, Neets do fit the caricature and are responsible for much more than their fair share of crime and antisocial behaviour.
A study by the Department for Education and Skills in 2005 found that the proportion of Neets among 16 to 18-year-olds “has remained stubbornly persistent” over the past decade at about 10%.
Research assembled by Reform, the think tank, shows that on the government’s own figures, each new entrant to the Neet class will cost the public £97,000 over their lifetime, with the worst examples weighing in at more than £300,000.
The same study also analysed their social impact. Drug use among 16 to 18-year-olds is higher, with 71% admitting to having used illegal drugs, compared with 45% of non-Neets. This and other factors had an impact on their health: 15% of male and 25% of female Neets were in poor health by age 21 (compared with 10% and 15% respectively of non-Neets).
Neets are also more likely to have children earlier — potentially disrupting their education. Some 60% of Neet women have had children by the age of 21, compared with only 10% of the non-Neet population. They are also more likely to drift into crime.
The same study found that 29% of male and 8% of female young Neets were involved in crime, three times the rate among all young people. It estimated that the cost to society of the Neet class in terms of crime, public health and antisocial behaviour was so high that a single 157,000-strong cohort of 16 to 18-year-old Neets would cost the country £15 billion by the time they died (prematurely) in about 2060.
David Willetts, the Tory shadow education secretary, says the problem is down to educational failings. Neets tend to do badly at primary school, leaving without being able to read or write properly, and then getting stuck in the slow lane at secondary school. Children who have neither parent working, like the Gallaghers, or a single parent who does not work, are much more likely to end up as Neets.
The rising number of Neets also reflects another governent failing. When he introduced the “New Deal” for young people in 1998, Gordon Brown insisted that there would be “no fifth option” beyond work, training, education or starting a business. But the New Deal, for many, has proved to be a revolving door back to unemployment. And the Neets have discovered that there is indeed a fifth option. Most continue to claim benefit while happily ignoring the strictures of our future prime minister.
“The New Deal is very effective, by international standards, at what it does — getting young long-term unemployed benefit claimants into jobs — but its focus on unemployed benefit claimants has meant less was provided to the majority of 18-24 Neets,” says Paul Bivand, head of analysis at Inclusion, a non-profit organisation which promotes social justice.
The Neets are part of a wider problem identified by Nicholas Boys Smith, a welfare expert. Welfare, he says, has become the forgotten problem, largely because of government propaganda which implies that the benefits bill is now trivial and that most spending goes on health and education.
In fact, as he points out, spending on social security in 2005-6 was £79 billion, excluding pensions, £6 billion more than was spent on education and not that far below the health budget of £96 billion.
The number of working age people dependent on benefits, 5.4m, or 14% of the age group, has stayed high, as has the tendency for them to be benefit “lifers”. More than 70% of claimants remain on benefits for over a year.
For the Neets, and for others on the margins of the workforce, there is a particular problem now that was barely on the radar screen when Brown was talking so bullishly about his New Deal in 1998 — immigration.
In a speech last week David Blanchflower, one of the members of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee, said it was wrong to blame immigration for the rise in unemployment over the past year or so; it would probably have occurred anyway. The government’s own research has come to similar conclusions.
However, there is no doubt that the arrival of skilled and enthusiastic immigrants from eastern Europe has raised the bar for Neets. Those willing to work face tougher competition than their predecessors.
In many cases they offer no competition. Sir Digby Jones, appointed as the government’s skills “czar” last month, gives the example of a Scottish employer who offered jobs to unemployed young people. On the first day some of them did not turn up; by the end of the week none did. The Polish workers he employed instead, in contrast, have yet to take a day off.
The Neets are going to be with us for a very long time.
This week Channel 4 will begin a new series of Shameless, the series set around the Gallaghers, described by the producers as “the UK’s most dysfunctional family”, on the fictional Chatsworth Estate.
The father figure, Frank Gallagher, is an ageing “Neet” — the government’s own acronym for those of working age who are not in employment, education or training. The surprise, and this is perhaps why the series is fictional, is that his children are hard working although they are mostly still at school. In real life they would almost certainly end up as Neets.
If so they would join more than a million others. The number of young people aged 16 to 24 in Britain who are classified as Neets stands at 1.24m. The number of young male Neets has risen by 27% to 575,000 since the spring of 1997, while the number of young female Neets is also up but by only 6% to 669,000.
Other countries have Neets although only in Britain, and curiously Japan, is the problem considered significant enough for the term to be widely used.
The Neets are the yobs hanging around off-licences late into the night. They are the graffiti artists who cannot spell and the drug-dealing pit-bull owners. They are also the Vicky Pollard types who become single mothers. Not all Neets fit the caricature. A young mother in a stable relationship bringing up children at home would be classified as a Neet. So could somebody temporarily out of work, such as a university graduate looking for their first job.
In many cases, however, Neets do fit the caricature and are responsible for much more than their fair share of crime and antisocial behaviour.
A study by the Department for Education and Skills in 2005 found that the proportion of Neets among 16 to 18-year-olds “has remained stubbornly persistent” over the past decade at about 10%.
Research assembled by Reform, the think tank, shows that on the government’s own figures, each new entrant to the Neet class will cost the public £97,000 over their lifetime, with the worst examples weighing in at more than £300,000.
The same study also analysed their social impact. Drug use among 16 to 18-year-olds is higher, with 71% admitting to having used illegal drugs, compared with 45% of non-Neets. This and other factors had an impact on their health: 15% of male and 25% of female Neets were in poor health by age 21 (compared with 10% and 15% respectively of non-Neets).
Neets are also more likely to have children earlier — potentially disrupting their education. Some 60% of Neet women have had children by the age of 21, compared with only 10% of the non-Neet population. They are also more likely to drift into crime.
The same study found that 29% of male and 8% of female young Neets were involved in crime, three times the rate among all young people. It estimated that the cost to society of the Neet class in terms of crime, public health and antisocial behaviour was so high that a single 157,000-strong cohort of 16 to 18-year-old Neets would cost the country £15 billion by the time they died (prematurely) in about 2060.
David Willetts, the Tory shadow education secretary, says the problem is down to educational failings. Neets tend to do badly at primary school, leaving without being able to read or write properly, and then getting stuck in the slow lane at secondary school. Children who have neither parent working, like the Gallaghers, or a single parent who does not work, are much more likely to end up as Neets.
The rising number of Neets also reflects another governent failing. When he introduced the “New Deal” for young people in 1998, Gordon Brown insisted that there would be “no fifth option” beyond work, training, education or starting a business. But the New Deal, for many, has proved to be a revolving door back to unemployment. And the Neets have discovered that there is indeed a fifth option. Most continue to claim benefit while happily ignoring the strictures of our future prime minister.
“The New Deal is very effective, by international standards, at what it does — getting young long-term unemployed benefit claimants into jobs — but its focus on unemployed benefit claimants has meant less was provided to the majority of 18-24 Neets,” says Paul Bivand, head of analysis at Inclusion, a non-profit organisation which promotes social justice.
The Neets are part of a wider problem identified by Nicholas Boys Smith, a welfare expert. Welfare, he says, has become the forgotten problem, largely because of government propaganda which implies that the benefits bill is now trivial and that most spending goes on health and education.
In fact, as he points out, spending on social security in 2005-6 was £79 billion, excluding pensions, £6 billion more than was spent on education and not that far below the health budget of £96 billion.
The number of working age people dependent on benefits, 5.4m, or 14% of the age group, has stayed high, as has the tendency for them to be benefit “lifers”. More than 70% of claimants remain on benefits for over a year.
For the Neets, and for others on the margins of the workforce, there is a particular problem now that was barely on the radar screen when Brown was talking so bullishly about his New Deal in 1998 — immigration.
In a speech last week David Blanchflower, one of the members of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee, said it was wrong to blame immigration for the rise in unemployment over the past year or so; it would probably have occurred anyway. The government’s own research has come to similar conclusions.
However, there is no doubt that the arrival of skilled and enthusiastic immigrants from eastern Europe has raised the bar for Neets. Those willing to work face tougher competition than their predecessors.
In many cases they offer no competition. Sir Digby Jones, appointed as the government’s skills “czar” last month, gives the example of a Scottish employer who offered jobs to unemployed young people. On the first day some of them did not turn up; by the end of the week none did. The Polish workers he employed instead, in contrast, have yet to take a day off.
The Neets are going to be with us for a very long time.
plz click the title to see related news on xinhua
Sunday, April 01, 2007
On the Lam by the Thousands, Pursued by the Dozens
THE math isn’t pretty. As of February, there were an estimated 636,000 “fugitive aliens” in the United States — foreigners who have ignored orders to leave the country. They may have entered illegally and been caught (about 60 percent of all fugitives), or they may have visited legally but then overstayed their visas or committed crimes.
Washington (the 27th-largest city) has deputized a force of about 318 officers in the Department of Homeland Security to track and apprehend the fugitives — a backlog of roughly 2,000 fugitives per officer.
Last year, officials ended their practice of “catch and release,” in which only about a third of alleged immigration violators caught were detained, for lack of housing. Most of those released did not show up for court dates and became fugitives. Now, Mr. Torres said, virtually all are detained.
Washington (the 27th-largest city) has deputized a force of about 318 officers in the Department of Homeland Security to track and apprehend the fugitives — a backlog of roughly 2,000 fugitives per officer.
Last year, officials ended their practice of “catch and release,” in which only about a third of alleged immigration violators caught were detained, for lack of housing. Most of those released did not show up for court dates and became fugitives. Now, Mr. Torres said, virtually all are detained.
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Latin America migrant money tops aid
By Duncan Kennedy
BBC News, Mexico City
The amount of money sent home by Latin American migrant workers to their families has reached more than $62bn.
This figure now exceeds the combined total of all direct foreign investment and foreign aid to Latin America.
According to the Inter-American Investment Bank, the figure could reach $100bn in four years' time.
The biggest share of money, $23bn, was sent back to Mexico, mostly from workers living in the United States remitting small sums each month.
Foreign remittances now rank along with oil and tourism as Mexico's biggest foreign currency earner.
The Inter-American Development Bank, which supports the region with aid and other help, says the remittances will increase by about 15% a year during the next four years.
The bank describes the money as a very effective poverty reduction programme because it keeps between 8m and 10m families above the poverty line.
But it says it also means the economies of the region are not generating enough jobs to keep workers from leaving in the first place.
Another problem is that much of the money is sent back in small amounts and so it is difficult to track.
The average is between $100 and $150 a month.
That in turn makes it an unpredictable source of revenue for governments to tap into.
The bank says it wants people to get away from what it calls cash to cash flows and into account to account transfers but the bank says the recent crackdown on illegal immigrants by the US authorities could hinder efforts to get migrants to use banks.
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Immigration Misery
A screaming baby girl has been forcibly weaned from breast milk and taken, dehydrated, to an emergency room, so that the nation’s borders will be secure. Her mother and more than 300 other workers in a leather-goods factory in New Bedford, Mass., have been terrorized — subdued by guns and dogs, their children stranded at school — so that the country will notice that the Bush administration is serious about enforcing immigration laws. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of poor Americans, lacking the right citizenship papers, have been denied a doctor’s care so that not a penny of Medicaid will go to a sick illegal immigrant.
As the country waits for Congress and the president to enact immigration reform, the indecency of existing policies is becoming intolerable. The immigrant underclass is in a growing state of misery and fear. States and localities have rushed to fill the vacuum of Congressional inaction with a jumble of enforcement regimes. Farmers are worrying about crops rotting as their immigrant workers retreat further into the shadows. Officials in Colorado have settled on one solution: replacing those workers with prison chain gangs.
Mr. Kennedy clearly believes that the urgent priority is to get the bipartisan coalition for immigration reform back on the bus and to fix problems while the bus is moving. His frustrations are understandable, but he will have to work hard to make sure that he and the bill do not compromise too much. And there is a lot in the Specter bill to be concerned about. Parts of it were cut and pasted from a cruel immigration bill that passed the House, including draconian measures to speed immigrants’ deportation and deny them protection in the courts.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/15/opinion/15thu1.html?ex=1331611200&en=ff4d900341fe4789&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss
As the country waits for Congress and the president to enact immigration reform, the indecency of existing policies is becoming intolerable. The immigrant underclass is in a growing state of misery and fear. States and localities have rushed to fill the vacuum of Congressional inaction with a jumble of enforcement regimes. Farmers are worrying about crops rotting as their immigrant workers retreat further into the shadows. Officials in Colorado have settled on one solution: replacing those workers with prison chain gangs.
Mr. Kennedy clearly believes that the urgent priority is to get the bipartisan coalition for immigration reform back on the bus and to fix problems while the bus is moving. His frustrations are understandable, but he will have to work hard to make sure that he and the bill do not compromise too much. And there is a lot in the Specter bill to be concerned about. Parts of it were cut and pasted from a cruel immigration bill that passed the House, including draconian measures to speed immigrants’ deportation and deny them protection in the courts.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/15/opinion/15thu1.html?ex=1331611200&en=ff4d900341fe4789&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
From Mexico Also, the Message to Bush Is Immigration
As President Bush tried to mend frayed relations with Mexico, the Mexican president gave him a cool reception on Tuesday, calling on Mr. Bush to live up to his longtime promise to make Mexico a priority and criticizing American plans to build a 700-mile fence along the border.
President Felipe Calderón warned that the only way to stem illegal migration and ensure regional security was to raise the standard of living here.
Mr. Bush took the slight chastising in stride and promised, as he has in the past, to push for an immigration bill that would allow more guest workers and provide a path to citizenship for many Mexicans living in the United States illegally.
On Monday, President Óscar Berger of Guatemala complained about the forced deportations of his countrymen who enter the United States illegally.
At nearly every turn, the American president has been faced with anger over what is perceived as the United States’ neglect of the region and frustration with its tougher border-security policies in the wake of the 2001 terrorist attacks.
On immigration, the Mexican leader raised objections, as he has in the past, to the construction of a 700-mile wall along parts of the border, saying that building roads in Mexico would be more useful.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/14/world/americas/14prexy.html?ex=1331524800&en=6b7841e56f8f0504&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss
President Felipe Calderón warned that the only way to stem illegal migration and ensure regional security was to raise the standard of living here.
Mr. Bush took the slight chastising in stride and promised, as he has in the past, to push for an immigration bill that would allow more guest workers and provide a path to citizenship for many Mexicans living in the United States illegally.
On Monday, President Óscar Berger of Guatemala complained about the forced deportations of his countrymen who enter the United States illegally.
At nearly every turn, the American president has been faced with anger over what is perceived as the United States’ neglect of the region and frustration with its tougher border-security policies in the wake of the 2001 terrorist attacks.
On immigration, the Mexican leader raised objections, as he has in the past, to the construction of a 700-mile wall along parts of the border, saying that building roads in Mexico would be more useful.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/14/world/americas/14prexy.html?ex=1331524800&en=6b7841e56f8f0504&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
City's Immigration Restrictions Go on Trial
City officials in Hazleton were the first in the country to adopt ordinances intended to drive away illegal immigrants by punishing local landlords for renting to them and employers for giving them jobs. The restrictions, which have yet to take effect, have been imitated by at least 80 towns and cities.
Kris W. Kobach, a law professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, described a surge in violent crime and gang warfare since 2005 that city officials attribute to a growing population of illegal immigrants.
The rights groups say the ordinances encourage discrimination against Hispanic residents, violate federal and state housing laws, and overstep the powers of a local government to deal with immigration, which has been almost exclusively a federal matter.
Witold Walczak, the legal director for the Pennsylvania A.C.L.U., said Hazleton did not have the authority to inquire into its residents' immigration status. "Law regarding immigration can and must be passed only by Congress." Mr. Walczak said in an opening statement, warning that the ordinances could unleash racial vendettas in which neighbors would make complaints about Hispanic residents based on their appearance.
Hazleton’s mayor, Louis J. Barletta, the driving force behind the laws, said his basic purpose remained the same: to make Hazleton hostile territory for illegal immigrants.
Mr. Barletta said that some Hispanic businesses had complained of losing customers and that some immigrants had moved away. We witnessed many people leaving in the dark of night,” he said. “We have to assume they were illegal aliens.”
Still, the court testimony left an impression of a harsh social change in Hazleton for some Hispanic residents.
Last year, Hazleton also adopted an ordinance making English the city’s official language. That law is the subject of a temporary restraining order issued by Judge Munley, but it is not at issue in this trial.
Kris W. Kobach, a law professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, described a surge in violent crime and gang warfare since 2005 that city officials attribute to a growing population of illegal immigrants.
The rights groups say the ordinances encourage discrimination against Hispanic residents, violate federal and state housing laws, and overstep the powers of a local government to deal with immigration, which has been almost exclusively a federal matter.
Witold Walczak, the legal director for the Pennsylvania A.C.L.U., said Hazleton did not have the authority to inquire into its residents' immigration status. "Law regarding immigration can and must be passed only by Congress." Mr. Walczak said in an opening statement, warning that the ordinances could unleash racial vendettas in which neighbors would make complaints about Hispanic residents based on their appearance.
Hazleton’s mayor, Louis J. Barletta, the driving force behind the laws, said his basic purpose remained the same: to make Hazleton hostile territory for illegal immigrants.
Mr. Barletta said that some Hispanic businesses had complained of losing customers and that some immigrants had moved away. We witnessed many people leaving in the dark of night,” he said. “We have to assume they were illegal aliens.”
Still, the court testimony left an impression of a harsh social change in Hazleton for some Hispanic residents.
Last year, Hazleton also adopted an ordinance making English the city’s official language. That law is the subject of a temporary restraining order issued by Judge Munley, but it is not at issue in this trial.
In Mexico, Bush Seeks to Bolster Uneasy Alliance
The note complained that United States Border Patrol agents had crossed the border and ventured a couple of dozen feet into Mexico to put out a rapidly spreading brush fire.
In large measure, the relationship has stagnated in recent years as Mr. Bush has failed to deliver on a promise of changing immigration laws to allow more guest workers, while conservatives in his party have pushed through tougher measures to control the border, among them a giant wall.
For the United States, there is more at stake in the talks with President Felipe Calderón, a conservative free-trade advocate, than possible progress on an age-old list of frictions between the neighbors: drug trafficking, trade barriers, border security and illegal migration.
For political reasons, however, Mr. Calderón has been reluctant to become the anti-Chávez standard-bearer in public. He said in a recent interview with The Associated Press, "I am not interested in playing a role with Bush in that respect."
His aides say he wants to mend fences with the United States' antagonists, Cuba and Venezuela, as well as with the rest of Latin America. “The United States has a lot to do to regain respect in Latin America,” he said.
The Mexican president would dearly love to see a comprehensive immigration bill passed that would allow more migrants to work temporarily in the United States and would offer citizenship to many of the 6.4 million illegal workers already there. It is unlikely that Mr. Bush can deliver on that now, given the divisions within his own party on the issue and the approaching presidential election, political analysts say.
Like other Latin Americans, many Mexicans have also grown tired of the free-trade policies that were trumpeted in the 1990s as the solution to their economic ills.
In large measure, the relationship has stagnated in recent years as Mr. Bush has failed to deliver on a promise of changing immigration laws to allow more guest workers, while conservatives in his party have pushed through tougher measures to control the border, among them a giant wall.
For the United States, there is more at stake in the talks with President Felipe Calderón, a conservative free-trade advocate, than possible progress on an age-old list of frictions between the neighbors: drug trafficking, trade barriers, border security and illegal migration.
For political reasons, however, Mr. Calderón has been reluctant to become the anti-Chávez standard-bearer in public. He said in a recent interview with The Associated Press, "I am not interested in playing a role with Bush in that respect."
His aides say he wants to mend fences with the United States' antagonists, Cuba and Venezuela, as well as with the rest of Latin America. “The United States has a lot to do to regain respect in Latin America,” he said.
The Mexican president would dearly love to see a comprehensive immigration bill passed that would allow more migrants to work temporarily in the United States and would offer citizenship to many of the 6.4 million illegal workers already there. It is unlikely that Mr. Bush can deliver on that now, given the divisions within his own party on the issue and the approaching presidential election, political analysts say.
Like other Latin Americans, many Mexicans have also grown tired of the free-trade policies that were trumpeted in the 1990s as the solution to their economic ills.
Bush administration's medical rule
A new federal rule intended to keep illegal immigrants from receiving Medicaid has instead shut out tens of thousands of United States citizens who have had difficulty complying with requirements to show birth certificates and other documents proving their citizenship. The largest adverse effect of this policy has been on people who are American citizens.
The numbers alone do not prove that the decline in enrollment was caused by the new federal policy. But state officials see a cause-and-effect relationship.
Medicaid officials report that some pregnant women are going without prenatal care and some parents are postponing checkups for their children, while they hunt down birth certificates and other documents.
Barry E. Nangle, the state registrar of vital statistics in Utah, said, “The new federal requirement has created a big demand for birth certificates by a group of people who are not exactly well placed to pay our fees.” States typically charge $10 to $30 for a certificate.
The numbers alone do not prove that the decline in enrollment was caused by the new federal policy. But state officials see a cause-and-effect relationship.
Medicaid officials report that some pregnant women are going without prenatal care and some parents are postponing checkups for their children, while they hunt down birth certificates and other documents.
Barry E. Nangle, the state registrar of vital statistics in Utah, said, “The new federal requirement has created a big demand for birth certificates by a group of people who are not exactly well placed to pay our fees.” States typically charge $10 to $30 for a certificate.
Muslims in US
"We are all brothers and sisters, they live in another world."
For many African-American converts, Islam is an experience both spiritual and political, an expression of empowerment in a country they feel is dominated by white elite. For many immigrant Muslims, Islam is an inherited identity, and America a place of assimilation and prosperity.
The divide between black and immigrant Muslims reflects a unique struggle facing Islam in America. Perhaps nowhere else in the world are Muslims from so many racial, cultural and theological backgrounds trying their hands at coexistence. Only in Mecca, during the obligatory hajj, or pilgrimage, does such diversity in the faith come to life, between black and white, rich and poor, Sunni and Shiite. "The more separate we stay, the more targeted we become," Dr. Khan said.
For many African-American converts, Islam is an experience both spiritual and political, an expression of empowerment in a country they feel is dominated by white elite. For many immigrant Muslims, Islam is an inherited identity, and America a place of assimilation and prosperity.
The divide between black and immigrant Muslims reflects a unique struggle facing Islam in America. Perhaps nowhere else in the world are Muslims from so many racial, cultural and theological backgrounds trying their hands at coexistence. Only in Mecca, during the obligatory hajj, or pilgrimage, does such diversity in the faith come to life, between black and white, rich and poor, Sunni and Shiite. "The more separate we stay, the more targeted we become," Dr. Khan said.
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