House to Act on Jobs Bill This Week

The U.S. Senate passed Majority Leader Harry Reid’s $15 billion jobs bill last Wednesday by a 70-28 vote. Reid introduced the “Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment Act” (HIRE Act), S.AMDT. 3310, to address the issue of jobs and the economy, but disappointed immigration reformers by leaving out any mandate that jobs created by the bill go to U.S. workers. The bill has two major tax provisions, an exemption from payroll taxes for employers who hire new employees in 2010 and a $1,000 tax credit for employers who keep those employees for at least 52 weeks. Unfortunately, the bill does not require that these new workers be legal or that employers use E-Verify to confirm their work authorization.

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Illegal Aliens Committing Identity Fraud, Theft to Sneak Past E-Verify

A recently released report has revealed that illegal aliens are using fraudulent methods to obtain employment with employers who are enrolled in E-Verify the online, electronically operated system that allows employers to confirm that their new hires have established their authorization to work in the United States. The report was conducted by Westat, a Maryland-based social science research firm under contract with the federal government. According to Westat, approximately half of illegal aliens run through E-Verify are inaccurately found to be work authorized, primarily due to identity theft.

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Obama’s Top Civil Rights Prosecutor Misrepresents Hate Crimes Statistics

The nation’s top civil rights prosecutor last week blatantly misrepresented FBI crime statistics by claiming that hate crimes against Latinos are on the rise. Mr. Thomas Perez, who took over the Justice Department’s civil rights unit for the Obama Administration, said last Wednesday, “The data and my own experience is that hate crimes are on the rise: Hate crimes against every group are on the rise.” According to the Seattle Intelligencer, Perez then expressed particular concern that hate crimes directed at Latinos are on the rise and that Hispanic leaders and organizations are receiving threats, in his opinion, “because they had the audacity to stand up for immigration reform.” (Id.).

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Obama Health Care Plan Silent on Immigration Issues

Last week, President Obama attempted to kick-start the stalled health care debate by offering his own proposal to reform the U.S. health care system. While the White House states that the proposal “incorporates the work the House and the Senate have done and adds additional ideas from Republican members of Congress,” the president’s plan is more akin to a list of ideas rather than actual legislative text. (Proposal). Importantly, the White House proposal is completely silent with respect to the immigration-related issues FAIR and other groups had raised concerning the House and Senate-passed health care bills.

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Rep. Tiahrt Introduces Bill to Prevent Illegal Aliens from Accessing SCHIP Benefits

On Thursday, February 25, Congressman Todd Tiahrt (R-KS) introduced the “Reinstatement of Personal Responsibility for Immigrants Act” (H.R. 4708). H.R. 4708 would reverse several troubling changes that were made to the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) when President Obama signed the SCHIP Reauthorization bill (H.R. 2) into law in February 2009. Specifically, the Reinstatement of Personal Responsibility for Immigrants Act would require applicants for taxpayer-subsidized benefits under SCHIP to be verified through a well-established verification system that requires applicants to present documentation to establish both their identity and citizenship. In addition, the legislation would reinstate the five-year waiting period before legal immigrants could access benefits under SCHIP. Finally, the bill would require that legal immigrants who apply for SCHIP have their eligibility verified through the proven Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) system. H.R. 4708 has already garnered four co-sponsors, including Reps. Brian Bilbray (R-CA), Dean Heller (R-NV), Sue Myrick (R-NC), and Walter Jones (R-NC).

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State Bills Would Require School Districts to Collect Data on Foreign-Born Students

Last week, committees in the Oklahoma and Arizona state legislatures passed landmark bills that would require school districts to collect information on the number of foreign-born students enrolled in their schools.

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State of the Union Disappoints Amnesty Forces

President Obama disappointed many amnesty advocates last week with only a passing mention of immigration during his State of the Union speech. This reference, consisting of just 38 words near the end of the more than hour-long speech, was noticeably ambiguous: “And we should continue the work of fixing our broken immigration system to secure our borders and enforce our laws and ensure that everyone who plays by the rules can contribute to our economy and enrich our nation.” Absent was any mention of “comprehensive” immigration reform, a path to citizenship, or even legalization. This passing reference to immigration reform has amnesty proponents questioning whether President Obama truly intends to push for such legislation as part of the agenda he laid out for his second year.

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U.S. Suspends then Resumes Transport of Haitians as Florida Hospitals Become Overwhelmed

Last week, the government announced that it was halting the transport of Haitians to U.S. hospitals due to the uncertainty of who would pay for the cost of care.  On Wednesday, January 27, Florida Governor Charlie Crist sent a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius asking the federal government to pay some of the costs for treatment. In the letter, Crist wrote that his state did not have capacity to support plans to transport 30-50 critically ill patients to Florida for an indefinite period of time. Governor Crist’s office later added: “Florida stands ready to assist our neighbors in Haiti, but we need a plan of action and reimbursement for the care we are providing.”  However, upon receiving “assurances that additional capacity exists both [in the United States] and among [the U.S.’] international partners,” the White House resumed the evacuations on Sunday, January 31.

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Christmas Day Bombing Highlights Turf War Over Visa Authority

One of the most disturbing revelations in the wake of the foiled Christmas Day attack, in which Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab allegedly attempted to set off explosives on a plane bound for Detroit, was that the suspect had a valid United States visa.  In a recent hearing on the attack held by the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, Ranking Member Susan Collins (R-ME) stated that “the most obvious error” in handling this case was that the State Department did not revoke his visa. This particular issue has fueled a debate that has raged since September 11th over who has ultimate authority to revoke visas.

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Representatives Introduce Bill to Block Illegal Aliens from Accessing In-State Tuition

On Wednesday, January 27, Congressmen Todd Tiahrt (R-KS), Rodney Alexander (R-LA), Brian Bilbray (R-CA), and Duncan Hunter (R-CA) introduced the “Fairness for American Students Act” (H.R. 4548). This commonsense legislation would amend the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act to clarify that illegal aliens who attend a postsecondary educational institution are ineligible for in-state tuition unless the institution offers those rates to all American citizens. To help enforce this provision, the bill provides out-of-state students legal standing to file civil actions against states and institutions that violate the law. Finally, H.R. 4548 would bar any college or university that provides in-state tuition to illegal aliens from receiving any Federal funding.

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New Jersey Lawmakers Push to Grant Tuition Breaks for Illegal Aliens Lawmakers in New Jersey are poised to give in-state tuition to illegal aliens following a recent flurry of activity from pro-amnesty groups. The special interest groups have launched an eleventh-hour attempt to grant in-state tuition to illegal aliens before Governor Corzine leaves office this month. The outgoing governor supports the long-stalled legislation and has said it is one he would “put high on the agenda.” Corzine lost his re-election bid to Gov.-elect Christie, who opposes the idea and has stated that only lawful taxpayers deserve a tuition break because they help subsidize in-state tuitions. Id. The bill, which advocates have been pushing for eight years, passed state Senate and Assembly committees last week. However, a vote on the controversial legislation scheduled for last week was postponed by state Senators, which could indicate the bill lacks the votes needed to pass. Both the Senate and the Assembly will take up the bill Monday, which is the last day of the legislative session. Id.Read the full article

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Liberal Think Tank Claims Amnesty Would Benefit Economy Last week, the Center for American Progress (CAP) a well-known liberal think tank headed by John Podesta, former chief of staff to President Clinton released a report claiming that amnesty would boost the U.S. economy. The report, entitled “Raising the Floor for American Workers: The Economic Benefits of Comprehensive Immigration Reform” is the latest attempt by amnesty supporters to persuade Americans to support legalizing millions of illegal aliens currently in the U.S. Authored by a professor of Chicana and Chicano studies at UCLA, Dr. Raúl Hinojosa-Ojeda, the report argues that granting amnesty to the more than 11 million illegal aliens currently residing in the United States would actually benefit the economy.Read the full article

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As Introduction of Senate Amnesty Bill Looms, McCain and Graham Face Repercussions at Home Senators Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) are expected to introduce an immigration bill in the U.S. Senate early this year. Pro-amnesty advocates are urging the Senate Judiciary Committee to take up the issue by February, and just last week a Schumer spokesman stated, “We’ve said we can have something that can be ready to go whenever the president chooses, as soon as early this year.”Read the full article

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Senate Immigration & Health Care Debate Continues Last week our Legislative Update included information about two possible amendments to the Senate health care bill, but we were unable to disclose the identities of the Senators who had indicated they would offer those amendments. We are now able to do so.Read the full article

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Napolitano: DHS Taking “Unprecedented Action” to Enforce Immigration Laws On Wednesday, December 9, Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee as part of a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) oversight hearing. Napolitano who President Obama has designated as his “point person” on amnesty legislation used the hearing to make the argument that the Obama administration has been tough with respect to immigration enforcement. True immigration reformers, however, remain unconvinced.Read the full article

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Congress May Attempt to Sneak PASS ID Through Before Year End This time of year causes a lot of speculation about whether certain bills will pass before Congress adjourns. This year is no exception. In fact, several sources have indicated that Congress, with the help of the DHS Secretary Napolitano, may attempt to repeal current provisions of law that ensure states are issuing secure drivers’ licenses. This repeal would occur through passage of the PASS ID Act.Read the full article

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Has the Time Come for an Immigration Time-Out? On December 11, 2009, former Rep. Virgil Goode, who represented Virginia’s Fifth Congressional District from 1997 to 2009, wrote an editorial making the case for why the United States should enact an immigration moratorium.Read the full article

Senate Health Bill: Verification Loopholes Will Allow Illegal Aliens to Access Benefits

FAIR’s Government Relations team has just finalized a Legislative Analysis of the Senate health care reform bill (H.R. 3590) and its impact on immigration. As with FAIR’s previous analysis of the House health care bill, FAIR’s analysis of the Senate bill discussed three key immigration related issues: (1) changes to current law that would circumvent the provision of current law that requires legal aliens to wait five years before they can access certain taxpayer-funded health benefits; (2) the existence of verification loopholes that would allow illegal aliens to access these benefits; and (3) language that would not effectively prevent illegal aliens from accessing the taxpayer-subsidized “Exchange” marketplace.

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Jobs, Jobs, Jobs: Illegal Immigration Continues to Harm Out-of-Work Americans

Later this week, FAIR will release an updated version of its report on Amnesty and Joblessness to reflect the latest nationwide unemployment numbers issued by the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). This report discusses how Americans are facing the worst job market in 25 years and points out that the passage of amnesty legislation would allow the approximately 8.3 million illegal aliens who are part of the American workforce to keep jobs they should never have had.

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Obama Systematically Dismantling Immigration Enforcement

A report to be released by FAIR later this week reveals that, since taking office, President Obama has undermined nearly every immigration enforcement measure available to him. Entitled The Road to Amnesty, the report notes that, since winning the 2008 election, President Obama has systematically surrounded himself with individuals who support granting amnesty to millions of illegal aliens living in the United States. The report highlights ten separate statements from members of the Obama administration including the president himself indicating that this administration supports amnesty and will attempt to push legislation through Congress in 2010.

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Illegal Immigration Hurts Maryland Families When They Can Least Afford It

This week FAIR released simultaneous studies that document the true costs of illegal immigration in Maryland and demonstrate strong voter objections to the burdens placed on them by illegal immigration. (The Costs of Illegal Immigration to Marylanders; English Learners and Immigration: A Case Study of Prince George’s County, Maryland). According to The Costs of Illegal Immigration to Marylanders, the price tag associated with providing education, health care, and incarceration of criminal illegal aliens is at least $1.4 billion a year. The impact of this staggering cost has not gone unnoticed by Maryland voters. A new Pulse Opinion Research Poll of 1,000 likely voters across the state found that, by a large margin, Marylanders believe that illegal immigration is harming their state.

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