Migrant Arrests Dip, But Many Questioning Why Administration Says It's Deterrence Efforts, But Others Say It's An Economic Slip
By ARTHUR H. ROTSTEIN Associated Press July 28, 2007
Tuscon AZ "” President Bush and the Border Patrol have been citing dramatic declines in illegal immigrant apprehensions this year as evidence that their deterrence efforts are paying off by discouraging crossing attempts.
The Border Patrol, which has been helped for the past 12 months by large numbers of National Guardsmen taking on support roles and added agents and technology, has reported a 24 percent dip in apprehensions along the Mexican border from Oct. 1 through June compared to the same period a year earlier.
But a number of people who observe border developments and migration flows dispute the reasons the agency is giving for that, or say that any deterrence from added enforcement is but one factor among several possible reasons for a decline.
Some contend that more immigrants are staying home because the U.S. economy has soured; others say there's been no reduction in the flow of first-time migrants or that there's no way to know how many people slip across undetected. Even a top Border Patrol spokesman says political, social and economic factors are part of the mix.
"People can read lots of different things into apprehension data," said David Martin, a University of Virginia law school professor and one-time counsel for the old U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service. "Sometimes increases are claimed as successes, and sometimes decreases are claimed as successes."
Take the president. In an April visit to Yuma, Ariz., he noted, "The number of people apprehended for illegally crossing our southern border were down nearly 30 percent. We're making progress."
But 17 months earlier, Bush cited a 42 percent increase in Border Patrol apprehensions over the previous year as "one of the best examples of success."
The agency feels the latest apprehension data indicate a decrease in crossing attempts, said Michael Friel, a Border Patrol spokesman in Washington.
According to agency figures, apprehensions in Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and California reached 682,000 from Oct. 1 through June 30, down from some 894,000 for the same period in the 2006 fiscal year.
Apprehension figures for the comparable period in the two fiscal years prior to that were nearly 874,000 and 886,000, respectively.
Friel pointed to many changes, including the addition of the National Guard last year and new barriers and fencing as reasons for the decline, but he also acknowledged that social and economic factors play a role in border security.
Dawn McLaren, a research economist at Arizona State University, is among those who said she doesn't buy into the deterrence argument. "Why would that make any sense?" she said.
She insists that a slowdown in the U.S. economy is the key. McLaren pointed to gross domestic product growth of only 0.7 percent in the first quarter of 2007, versus 5.6 percent for the same period last year.
Immigrants on the Southwest border are drawn by and react specifically to the economy, she said. "So if the economy is a magnet and our magnet loses strength, we see fewer people crossing the border."
If there were more agents, McLaren added, "wouldn't the number of arrests stay the same or rise, because there are more agents? That's why I think the (migrant) pool has gone down. People are just staying home."
Wayne Cornelius, director for comparative immigration studies at the University of California-San Diego, said via e-mail that a slump in residential construction employment partly accounts for the deflated numbers but that many other construction jobs remain, along with work in other sectors.
For him, a key factor is what he called "reduced circularity," with fewer Mexican migrants returning home seasonally due to the cost and danger involved in coming back.
"If migrants aren't going home, they aren't getting caught when they return to their jobs in the U.S.," he said. "Fewer apprehensions don't equal true deterrence and Border Patrol efficacy."
Cornelius also said there is no evidence that the northbound flow of first-time migrants to the U.S. has diminished. He said that only about a third are caught on their first try and that most try again until they succeed.
Martin, the Virginia law professor, said that if the declines really represent a reduction in the number of attempted crossings, "that's the true measure of success." But he said he doesn't know how to determine that.
Enough patrol agents and Guardsmen have been deployed in different places that this may be the real thing, and at some point those thinking about migrating would say now is not the time for that, he said.
Martin said a change in enforcement strategy tends to cause an initial drop in illegal immigration, but the real test is whether it lasts.
"Circularity has been reduced. But I don't think that explains the full decline. And similarly with the economy," he said. "Migration patterns do tend to rise and fall with economic activity."
He said that if the economic draw is sufficient, the enforcement impact is going to be limited. "It will still mean that some people will take the risk "” people at the margins."
WASHINGTON "” Senate Democrats and Republicans agreed Thursday to devote an additional $3 billion to gaining control over the U.S.-Mexico border.
The move puts Congress on a path to overriding President Bush's promised veto of a $38 billion homeland security spending bill.
The deal, approved by an 89-1 vote, resurrects a GOP plan to pass some of the most popular parts of Bush's failed immigration bill. That includes money for additional Border Patrol agents and fencing along the southern border.
Democrats liked the money. But they objected to Republican proposals such as allowing law enforcement officers to question people about their immigration status and cracking down on people who overstay their visas.
Efforts broke down Wednesday to make progress on a compromise containing only the border security money.
But Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, resolved their differences overnight and announced agreement Thursday morning. Cornyn won a promise to use some money to pursue immigrants who had entered the United States legally but had overstayed their visas.
Reid had apparently thought that Cornyn wanted harsher language.
"I was wrong and Sen. Cornyn was right," Reid acknowledged.
The measure initially was opposed by the White House, top Republicans said, and it clearly puts the president in a box. Bush had promised a veto of the overall homeland security bill for spending $2.3 billion more than he requested.
But the White House signaled it would at least accept the added money for the border.
"To the extent Congress supports additional emergency funding, we want to work with them to make sure it is spent on the highest border security priorities," White House spokesman Scott Stanzel said.
Now, Bush's stalwarts in Congress, including Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., are poised to override the president's veto on the entire bill.
Cornyn predicted the bill would "pass by a veto-proof margin" and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told reporters the bill might get 90 votes in the 100-member Senate.
The measure probably will be the first spending bill for the budget year beginning Oct. 1 that will arrive on Bush's desk. The president, however, demanded on Thursday that the Democratic-controlled Congress focus on delivering the Pentagon's budget to him before lawmakers take their August vacation.
The money approved Thursday would go toward seizing "operational control" over the U.S.-Mexico border by using additional Border Patrol agents, vehicle barriers, border fencing and observation towers. In addition, there is Cornyn's effort against people who overstay their visas.
Graham said the $3 billion would pay for "more boots on the ground, more people patrolling our border making it harder for somebody to come across illegally. We should have done this a long time ago."
Bush and Republicans such as Graham and Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona had argued during last month's immigration debate that a comprehensive approach to overhauling immigration policy was the only way to attract bipartisan support.
The bill was condemned by conservative talk radio and congressional foes as offering "amnesty." After it failed to pass, Graham and others changed their minds and offered the border security plan.
Graham and Kyl said the public will not accept the more contentious parts, especially the plan to give millions of illegal immigrants a way to earn U.S. citizenship, until the border with Mexico is made more secure.
"Border security is the gate that you must pass through to get to overall comprehensive reform," said Graham. The senator is up for re-election next year and faces political heat at home for backing Bush's unpopular immigration plan.
Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said he is circulating a plan that would grant some legal status to illegal immigrants but would stop short of giving them citizenship.
That approach "would take the teeth out of the amnesty argument," Specter said. "I think we can act this year. I think this bill is very close to doable." SENATORS COMPROMISE ON BORDER SECURITY
Mexico Anti-Drug Aid Plan Reported $700 Million Deal Could Help Calderon's Effort
By PABLO BACHELET McClatchy-Tribune July 27, 2007
WASHINGTON "” Mexican President Felipe Calderon, locked in a bloody confrontation with drug cartels, is negotiating a massive counter-drug aid package with the Bush administration worth hundreds of millions of dollars, several officials say.
Officials on both sides are working out the details of a package that resembles a U.S. aid plan for Colombia. The talks have been taking place quietly for several months and will be a central item on the agenda when President Bush and Calderon are expected to meet in Quebec Aug. 20-21.
Mexican officials have been reluctant to go public with the discussions, mindful of anti-U.S. sentiments harbored by many Mexicans.
But the conservative Calderon believes he has little choice but to enlist U.S. help given the cross-border nature of drug trafficking and the ruthlessness of Mexico's drug gangs, officials and observers said.
U.S. officials would say little other than to acknowledge the discussions.
"We're working very closely with the Mexicans on counter-narcotics on a variety of fronts and at all levels of government," said National Security Council spokeswoman Katherine Starr. "Presidents Bush and Calderon look forward to discussing this and other issues when they meet in Canada in August."
'Can't do this alone' But officials view the talks as a bold initiative by Calderon that underscores his resolve to tame drug-related violence "” most of it between rival cartels "” that has cost the lives of 3,000 Mexicans in the past year alone and forced the intervention of 20,000 federal troops.
"I think the Mexicans realize it's going to get worse before it gets better," said Roger Noriega, a former assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere and now with the American Enterprise Institute think tank.
"They can't do this alone, and should not have to do this alone," Noriega said.
One problem in the talks is that U.S. law enforcement agencies are wary of sharing crucial intelligence information with their Mexican counterparts, viewed as splintered and infiltrated by drug gangs.
Noriega says such prejudices ought to be set aside and the two countries should carry out joint operations "seamlessly integrated across the border."
The Drug Enforcement Administration estimates that 90 percent of the cocaine consumed in the United States comes in from Mexico, which also supplies the United States with large quantities of marijuana, heroin and methamphetamine.
'No wall high enough' For Washington, the stakes in Calderon's anti-drug push go beyond law and order issues.
"If Calderon loses this battle," says Noriega, "then there will be no wall high enough to keep out Mexicans who are displaced by violence and by the security threat that undermines Mexico's growth."
Bush and Calderon hinted at an aid package when they met in Merida, Mexico, on March 14. Bush praised Calderon for his tough stand against organized crime and drugs and recognized that as a consumer nation, "the United States has a responsibility in the fight against drugs."
People familiar with the talks say Mexico drew up a list of needs that included equipment, training and technology, including Black Hawk helicopters, which are difficult to come by given the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The price tag on the more ambitious aspiration is $1.2 billion, but a more modest proposal has emerged in recent weeks in the area of $700 million, said one person familiar with the talks.
Congress Must Do Much More To Fix Immigration Our View: Kyl's Amendment Is One Step Toward A Comprehensive Solution Of Border Problems
Tucson, Arizona Published: 07.28.2007
The Senate's passage Thursday of the Border Security First Act must be the first step in a series of acts that eventually reform the nation's immigration system comprehensively.
The legislation, an amendment to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security appropriations package, would allocate $3 billion to fund more
Border Patrol officers, fencing, unmanned aerial vehicles and other mechanisms that would help plug the porous U.S.-Mexico border. The measure is similar to the security-only portion of the comprehensive immigration-reform package that died earlier this summer.
Thursday evening, Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., who championed the failed comprehensive plan and the new security act, got the Senate to add $60 million to the amendment for improvements to the Basic Pilot Program, the federal database of those able to work in the country legally.
Kyl said Thursday that he has not given up on the comprehensive approach, but it will be hard to accomplish this session.
Thus, he said, he "took advantage of an opportunity on the Homeland Security appropriation bill to send a strong message that we're serious about enforcement."
Kyl said the public is reluctant to accept reform until there is action on enforcement. Without question, security must be part of immigration reform. The Star's long-held position is that immigration reform must be comprehensive and include security, as well as a guest-worker program, workplace controls and an equitable system for dealing with the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants working in our country and contributing to its economy.
Kyl told us he hopes enforcement funding will encourage people to look toward other areas of reform. We hope he's right and that the security boost placates the enforcement-only factions and that other aspects of immigration reform will be able to move forward.
The $60 million boost for the Basic Pilot Program should help Arizona employers smacked by a draconian state law that requires verification of new employees' legal status using the iffy system. Under the ill-conceived employer-sanctions law, a business' license could be suspended and the workplace shut down "”leaving all employees out of work "” if the business knowingly hires an undocumented worker.
The law was a knee-**** response by a frustrated Arizona Legislature to Congress' inaction in solving the illegal-immigration problem. The law penalizes businesses and gives them responsibility for immigration enforcement without giving them adequate tools to meet the task.
The unintended consequences of the law may be that U.S. citizens and folks legitimately in the country are denied employment because of an inaccurate database. This is a civil rights lawsuit against the state waiting to happen.
The law goes into effect Jan. 1. If the security amendment gets congressional approval and the president's signature, it must be a beginning to solutions on illegal immigration. It will not end the problem.
By Gabriela Rico Arizona Daily Star Tucson, Arizona 07.28.2007
Who are you? Where are you from? What are you doing in this country? How long have you been here?
While many Mexican citizens may be accustomed to that sort of quizzing from U.S. officials, over the next 12 months those questions will be posed on behalf of the state tourism agency in an effort to find out how to keep them coming to Arizona.
It'll be looking to survey people like Marcos Robles Arredondo.
Robles, a mechanical engineer from Hermosillo, Sonora, travels to Tucson four to five times a year with his family to shop at the malls. Over breakfast Friday morning at the Hampton Inn Suites, 5950 N. Oracle Road, he said there is one deterrent to the visits: the long lines at the ports of entry in Nogales. "If it wasn't for the crossing (waits) we'd come more often," Robles said in Spanish.
The last such survey, done in 2001, showed that Mexican visitors to Arizona spent $962.9 millionin the previous year and the highest percent of those dollars "” $301.6 million "” was spent in Pima County.
With their spending power likely exceeding $1 billion a year, Mexican shoppers such as the Robles family, have become an attraction for businesses considering a move to Tucson.
Earlier this year, a Los Angeles-based electronics mega-store, which conducts its business primarily in Spanish, announced plans to open a Tucson location. Officials from La Curacao said they were drawn to Tucson because of cross-border shoppers.
The Arizona Office of Tourism is partnering with both the Phoenix and Tucson visitors' bureaus and the University of Arizona to conduct the survey.
The goal is to interview 2,665 Mexican citizens as they return to Mexico and determine their spending habits, said Alberta Charney, senior research economist for the Eller College of Management at the University of Arizona.
Surveyors will interview visitors as they prepare to return to Mexico at both Tucson and Phoenix Sky Harbor airports and at Arizona's seven ports of entry.
Charney said there is anecdotal evidence that border crossings by Mexican shoppers may be declining.
"They may be spending more, but they're coming less frequently," she said. "It raises a lot of questions. Is it because of long lines?"
Along with wanting to know how much money Mexican tourists spend in Arizona, Charney said the survey will help determine how to better serve these visitors.
She said questions will include what malls they like, what products they buy and where they live in order for businesses to market to them in their hometown.
Lupita Dueñas de Balderrama liked that idea. "They should place more ads in our newspapers and magazines so we know about the sales," she said.
Clothing stores in Hermosillo are more expensive and have less variety than Tucson stores, she said Friday morning, preparing to head out for Park Place with daughters Ana Lucia and Rebecca.
As he kept a watchful eye on his three children in the pool at La Posada Lodge and Casitas, 5900 N. Oracle Road, Hernan Chávez, an Hermosillo civil engineer, said he comes to Tucson for electronics, home furnishings and clothing. He estimates spending about $1,000 each time he visits "” about five times a year.
Chávez said he waited an hour and 20 minutes to cross into Arizona at the DeConcini Port of Entry in Nogales. Expediting that entry would encourage him to visit Tucson more, he said. Charney said the survey results and subsequent report should be ready for the tourism department by next summer.
â— Contact reporter Gabriela Rico at 573-4232 or grico@azstarnet.com.
Death Toll Mounts For Border Crossers 2 More Bodies Put Area On Grim, Record-Setting Pace
By Brady McCombs Arizona Daily Star Tucson, Arizona 07.28.2007
The discovery Thursday of the bodies of two illegal border crossers northwest of Tucson has added to a record-breaking year in Pima County for border deaths.
There were 152 illegal border crossers found dead in the county from Jan. 1 through July 25, a pace that is well ahead of 2006 and eclipses the record set in 2005, when there were 131 at this same time, said Dr. Bruce Parks, chief medical examiner at the Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner.
"It's scary," Parks said. Deputies were called at 7:45 a.m. Thursday by two residents who found a body southwest of Marana at North Trico and West Magee roads, said Dawn Hanke, spokeswoman for the Pima County Sheriff's Department.
Deputies could not determine the *** or age of the decomposed body, she said. Later Thursday, deputies assisted the Border Patrol at about 3:30 p.m. after residents called to say they found a body at 5400 N. Agua Dulce Ranch Road, southwest of Marana in the Ironwood Forest National Monument. Muddy roads forced the deputies to travel north to Toltec "” a small town between Eloy and Casa Grande "” and then take dirt roads to reach the remote area where the body was found, Hanke said.
The 152 bodies found in Pima County this year are 21 more than in the same period in 2005, a 16 percent increase. The total for all of 2005 was 197 deaths, Parks said.
It is also 31 more bodies that were found during the same period in 2006, a 25 percent increase. The 2006 final year tally was 174 deaths, he said.
The increased number of deaths calls into question the Border Patrol's assertion that reduced apprehensions in the Tucson Sector "” down 11 percent from 2006 through June "” indicate a decrease in border crossings.
To the contrary, says the Rev. Robin Hoover, the founder of Tucson-based Humane Borders, which places water tanks throughout the desert. About 30 percent to 40 percent more people are crossing this summer than usual, said Hoover, who travels often to Altar, Sonora, where people come from all across Mexico and Central America to prepare to cross in the Altar Valley.
"The economy is the biggest player, always has been and always will be, so jobs must be picking up somewhere," Hoover said. The other factor might be the weather, which has been harsher this year compared with last summer when cool cloud cover was more common, he said.
The increase demonstrates again that the Department of Homeland Security's border enforcement strategy is part of the problem, said Isabel Garcia, co-chair of Tucson-based Coalición de Derechos Humanos, and Melissa McCormick, senior research specialist at the Binational Migration Institute at the University of Arizona. The increasing number of agents and presence of the National Guard pushes illegal entrants into more remote routes.
"The more difficult you make it for people to cross without taking care of the underlying issues, the more deaths we're going to see," Garcia said.
The Border Patrol objects to the blame and says that preventing deaths is a top priority. The agency has 45 agents in Borstar (the agency's search, trauma and rescue team) and brought in 14 more this summer from California and Texas.
That means there are 10 to 12 Borstar agents in the Tucson Sector per shift. From Oct. 1 through June 30, agents had rescued 318 people in 118 incidents in the Tucson Sector, which covers New Mexico to the Yuma County line, agency numbers show.
â— Contact reporter Brady McCombs at 573-4213 or bmccombs@azstarnet.com.
U.S. RULES ON CUBANS BRING COMPLAINTS OTHER HISPANICS CLAIM UNFAIRNESS
By Erin Gillespie egillespie@news-press.com Originally posted on July 24, 2007
CUBAN POLICY "¢ The Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966 said any Cuban who was admitted into the United States can become a permanent resident, or green card holder, after living in the country for one year.
"¢ The act includes the immigrant's spouse and children.
"¢ The immigrant does not have to use established immigration methods, such as being sponsored by a family member or business, to apply for a green card.
"¢ In addition, immigrants do not have to prove they will have sufficient income not to depend on government funds.
"¢ In 1984, the United States and Cuba agreed to allow 20,000 Cubans to emigrate to America every year.
"¢ In 1995, the United States agreed to begin sending back anybody that was intercepted at sea.
Because of the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966, the 27 migrants who walked onto Sanibel's shores Sunday night will be able to become permanent U.S. residents in one year and then citizens.
But some local Hispanic immigrants don't like the policy that singles out one country. To them, Cubans receive special treatment under U.S. immigration laws. The policy is a holdover from the days of the Cold War, when the United States squared off against the Soviet Union and its communist allies.
"I consider this completely unfair," said Nelson Acosta, a 56-year-old American citizen who emigrated from Colombia. "Cubans do not deserve any preferential immigration treatment."
The Cuban policy, known as wet foot/dry foot, lets Cubans who make it to land stay in the country, while the government returns Cubans who are intercepted at sea.
"It's just dirty politics," said Acosta, who lives in Cape Coral. "There are other countries with more people dying every year than Cuba."
But Veronica Culbertson, a U.S.-born citizen from El Salvador, said Cubans shouldn't be sent back home.
"If these people are coming on a boat all the way here, risking their life, I don't think we can fathom that," she said. "That policy is an opportunity for these people, and it shows them the humanitarian side of the United States."
However, Culbertson, 39, president of the Southwest Florida Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, thinks immigrants from other countries with severe problems should also be allowed in.
"The dangers that a lot of these people live in "” political persecution, so many dangers and so much poverty "” it doesn't have to be a communist country for there to be problems," she said. "There are some countries in horrible situations."
Juan Romero, a Mexican immigrant and Hispanic activist in Bonita Springs, said the policy toward Cubans is not fair toward other immigrants.
"People from Mexico, they come to the border and they're illegal. The Cubans "” no, they just get here and they can stay," said Romero, 47. "All of the people that are coming without a visa should be undocumented and treated the same way."
The Adjustment Act of 1966 was passed seven years after Cuba's takeover by Fidel Castro, who transformed the island into a communist country.
Since Castro took hold, more than 1 million Cubans have come to the United States, according to the State Department.
In addition, 20,000 Cubans are eligible to come to the United States every year through a special visa program, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
Immigrants who apply to come to the United States must undergo extensive background checks, and if they don't pass, they aren't allowed in, Acosta said. Migrants arriving on the shores aren't sent back, although they are checked out by immigration officials.
"They could be terrorists," he said. "Nobody knows and nobody cares."
The Cuban Adjustment Act should be re-evaluated, Romero said.
"Maybe it was the best way to do it, but at this time, it may not be the best way to continue," he said. "The Constitution says it's equal for all."
Con el sistema de verificación, un empleador escribe el nombre de un trabajador, su fecha de nacimiento y número de seguro social en un programa de internet. Si la información es correcta, en segundos aparece una autorización para trabajar.
Sin embargo, si la información del empleado no coincide con los datos de la computadora, se recibe un mensaje de "no confirmación", y el trabajador debe acudir a la Oficina del Seguro Social a corregir el problema.
Ana Santiago, gerente de medios para el Servicio de Inmigración y CiudadanÃa, que encabeza el sistema de verificación, dijo que el programa está creciendo.
De acuerdo con la Administración del Seguro Social, 1.7 millones de verificaciones a empleados se hicieron en 2006, y más de 1.8 millones de accesos se registraron en junio.
"AyudarÃa a aumentar la seguridad en el paÃs, y al mismo tiempo, ayudarÃa a empleadores a la hora de contratar trabajadores", dijo Santiago.
En 2005, Source Interlink, una compañÃa de distribución de medios en Bonita Springs, firmó para sumarse al sistema, dijo la representante de Recursos Humanos, Kathy Glover.
"El programa... es una manera muy efectiva de que una compañÃa verifique y confirme si los empleados pueden trabajar en Estados Unidos", dijo.
Copyright 2006, Gaceta Tropical. Uso de este sitio significa que usted esta de acuerdo con nuestras Condiciones del Servicio y Politica de Privacidad, Actualizado Junio 7, Copyright 2005.
IMMIGRANTS PAY PRICE AS FEES CLIMB SKY HIGH AGENCIES SWARMED BEFORE COSTS RISE AVERAGE OF 66 PERCENT
FT. MYERS FL FORMS ASSISTANCE
By Erin Gillespie egillespie@news-press.com Originally posted on July 28, 2007
Andrew West/news-press.com Rose Casseus, 25, left, and Marie Casseus, 45, listen Friday to immigration specialist Christina Leddin of the Amigos Center. Rose was studying options for applying for a green card for her husband, Jean Gourdet, center. Application fees for immigration papers are rising as of Monday. andrew west/the news-press "¢ Rocio Cavatta, 42, left, says she had to work extra hours to pay the fee to renew her green card application. She worked with immigration specialist Christina Leddin at the Amigos Center in Fort Myers on Friday. Had she waited until Monday, she would have paid much more.
FEE CHANGES "¢ I-90 Replace Permanent Resident Card (green card): $390, up from $260 "¢ I-129 Petition for Nonimmigrant Worker: $320, up from $190 "¢ I-130 Relative Petition: $355, up from $190 "¢ I-140 Petition for Immigrant Worker: $475, up from $195 "¢ I-290B Appeal of immigration denial decision: $585, up from $385 "¢ I-485: Adjust status to become a permanent resident (get green card): $1,010, up from $395 "¢ I-526: Investor Petition: $1,435, up from $480 "¢ I-765 Employment Authorization: $340, up from $180 "¢ N-400 Application for Naturalization (citizenship): $675, up from $400
GET HELP People who need help with immigration forms can get it at local agencies, including:
"¢ Nations Association, 4625 Palm Beach Blvd., Fort Myers. 332-7575
"¢ Catholic Charities Haitian Center, 3430 Cleveland Ave., Fort Myers. 334-2234
"¢ Amigos Center, 3634 Central Ave., Fort Myers.
MULTIMEDIA I-140, Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker I-485, Application to Register Permanent Residence or Adjust Status Form I-290B, Notice of Appeal or Motion I-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker N-400 Application for Naturalization I-765, Application for Employment Authorization I-90, Application to Replace Permanent Resident Card I-130, Petition for Alien Relative I-526, Immigrant Petition by Alien Entrepreneur
Rocio Cavatta rushed to finish up the paperwork Friday to extend her green card.
Cavatta, a 42-year-old native of Peru, heard a few days ago that the costs for immigration paperwork were rising and decided to get hers finished.
"It was very difficult" to get the money to pay for it, she said.
Cavatta, a Wal-Mart associate, and her husband, a cook, had to work extra hours to come up with the $275 to extend her two-year green card.
But that's far less than the $545 she would have had to pay Monday, the day prices go up for applications for green cards, citizenship, work authorizations and more.
In February, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced higher fees, and local social service organizations and immigration attorneys have seen a jump in the number of clients coming in.
Fees are going up an average of 66 percent. But an application for a green card, or permanent residency, is going to $1,010 from the current $395. In 1994, a green card application cost $130.
"The fee increase from one day to the next was a little drastic," said Steve Culbreath, an immigration attorney for Jaensch Immigration Law Firm, which is based in Sarasota and has an office in Cape Coral.
"You mail something on Friday, and it costs one thing. You mail something on Tuesday, and it costs twice as much."
A minimum-wage worker in Florida, making $6.67 an hour, would have to save every penny for four weeks to pay for a green card application. In the rest of the country, where the minimum wage was recently raised to $5.85 an hour, it would take 41Ú2 weeks.
And that's not counting the other costs that accompany some immigration applications, such as getting copies made of many documents, translating everything into English and undergoing medical exams.
In the February announcement, USCIS said the fees were increased to cover the costs of processing the 9.3 million applications and background checks that must be done each year.
The increases are expected to raise $1.1 billion annually.
Rush is on
At the Amigos Center office in Fort Myers, certified immigration specialist Christina Leddin has been booked for the entire month of July since early June.
"We've got appointments at Friday at 4 p.m.," she said. "I've got people mailing (applications) up until the end."
The Amigos Center, a Bonita Springs-based social service organization that helps immigrants, assists about 65 people a week with immigration issues.
Most Amigos clients are lower income workers "” nursing assistants, housekeepers, farm and construction workers and landscapers "” who can't afford higher fees, Leddin said.
"But the reality is, you've still got to do what you've got to do," she said.
Naturalized U.S. citizen Marie Casseus, 45, of Fort Myers, planned to beat the deadline to apply to bring her brother and sisters from Haiti.
But because of a backlog in processing passports, Casseus' naturalization certificate hasn't been sent back to her.
On Friday, she would have been able to pay $190 to apply for each of her siblings, but now she'll have to pay $355 each.
"I'll have to do it one by one because it costs too much," she said.
Casseus' daughter, Rose, a 25-year-old naturalized citizen, came to ask Leddin about applying for a green card for her husband, Jean Gourdet, 32.
Gourdet is appealing a denial for asylum after escaping from Haiti. The couple decided not to file the application Friday, even though they know they'll have to pay more if they file later.
Pierette Faustin, director of Catholic Charities' Haitian Center in Fort Myers, said her office has also seen a big increase.
"Once the people woke up to the prices, they started calling," she said. "People didn't think that it was going to go through."
The Haitian Center sees between 50 and 65 immigration clients a week in Fort Myers.
Faustin said the prices will be a hardship on immigrants, but most of them will sacrifice to get their paperwork in order.
"This is something that they need to do," she said. "If gas goes to $4 a gallon, you still have to get it."
Starting to save
The Jaensch firm has seen a steady increase in clients over the past few months, Culbreath said. Most were past clients trying to complete paperwork before the price increase.
"Even without the fee increase, I always advise people to start saving money because these things are expensive," he said.
A family with multiple children could end up spending two or three months of salary to pay the government fees, he said.
"Immigration doesn't care," he said. "It's their filing fee, and they won't even look at (the application) without the fee."
When USCIS announced a planned increase, Leddin wrote a letter on behalf of Amigos Center and its clients asking that the fee increase not be so high.
"It's just totally unfair," she said. "It's like treating the immigrants as second-class citizens."
Congress Must Do Much More To Fix Immigration Our View: Kyl's Amendment Is One Step Toward A Comprehensive Solution Of Border Problems Tucson, Arizona Published: 07.28.2007
It's Sen. Grahams Amendment (you can read it under amendment to Senate amendment to House Appr. Bill on Thomas).
It is a good start, a proper direction, and it should be pursued in a way that produces visible results , so all the people can see that the actual changes are taking place.
Surgical procedure can be painful, yet that's what the caring doctor will do, and do without hesitation - so that the whole body can be healed and brought back to good health.
Some Immigration Bills Aim for Little Victories Individual remedies a Controversial Last Resort
By Karin Brulliard Washington Post Staff Writer Monday, July 30, 2007
Congress has repeatedly snubbed plans that would hand out green cards to millions of illegal immigrants. But how about one for Genevieve Vang?
Vang's 17-year quest to gain political asylum through normal channels has been frustrated at every turn. But under Senate Bill 1648, permanent U.S. residency would be granted to Vang, her husband and two of their children -- Laotians living in Michigan -- and to them alone.
The bill, sponsored by Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.), is one of nearly 60 pending "private" bills that would grant permanent residency, or green cards, to specific immigrants battling deportation, including a Bangladeshi man facing a death sentence in his homeland, a Kenyan woman whose American husband died before he could make her a legal resident and a German teen who has spent half his life in Ohio.
"He's still in danger of being deported, and so we want to get him some kind of legal status," said Rep. Paul E. Gillmor (R-Ohio) of his bill on behalf of the German teen, Manuel Bartsch, who was brought to America by his step-grandfather and jailed two years ago after contacting immigration authorities for records he needed to take a college entrance exam.
For those whose requests have been denied by federal officials and rejected by immigration judges, Congress is the court of last resort. Touched by their stories and convinced of the need for occasional flexibility, lawmakers have introduced more than 500 private immigration bills since 1996.
The method has critics. Conservative blogger Michelle Malkin calls it "instant amnesty." Some immigrant advocates call it special treatment for people with common problems. Those concerns have contributed to a low success rate. Since 1996, just 36 private immigration bills have passed.
Still, dozens of bills are introduced, sometimes several sessions in a row. Immigration authorities typically postpone deportation while a private bill awaits action.
Common beneficiaries are foreign children adopted by U.S. citizens after their 16th birthdays, making the adoption irrelevant for immigration purposes, and immigrants whose American spouses perished. Many have attracted media attention to the point that they are local celebrities.
"Some have been working for a number of years, and the family is getting ready to be broken up," said Rep. Bobby L. Rush (D-Ill.), who has sponsored a bill for the second year that would give legal residency to 34 Mexican, Polish, Tanzanian and Serbian immigrants, not all of whom Rush has met. "I was inspired by the harm that would take place in the families."
Private bills were once more popular -- and fruitful. Thousands were enacted during the first hundred Congresses. But today's heated immigration debate and other factors have led to a decline, experts say.
A 1965 law emphasized family reunification as a criterion for immigration, and that previously was the basis of many private claims. At the same time, scandal has been a deterrent to private bills. In the 1980 Abscam sting, FBI agents posing as Arab sheiks offered payments to members of Congress for private immigration bills, leading to the ouster of seven lawmakers. Two decades later, Rep. Bill McCollum (R-Fla.) faced censure for a private bill to aid the son of a state Republican Party leader.
Some members of Congress refuse to sponsor private bills because they fear "an onslaught of requests," said Christopher Nugent, a Washington immigration lawyer who represents Malik Jarno, a mentally retarded teenager from Guinea.
Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), who sponsored two unsuccessful private bills to help Jarno in previous sessions, said he wanted to send "a very strong signal to immigration authorities" that Jarno had "not received just treatment." Jarno's case is now back in court.
No pending private immigration bills are sponsored by members of the Washington region's congressional delegation.
Rep. Donald M. Payne (D-N.J.) with Malik Jarno, a teen from Guinea on whose behalf private bills have been filed. The bills did not pass. (Courtesy Of International Friendship House)
The most prolific sponsors are Democrats. Levin has eight pending; Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) has nine. Feinstein's cases include three her staffers say were botched by immigration lawyers and the case of Jacqueline W. Coats, a Kenyan whose American husband died saving two children from drowning in San Francisco Bay days before Coats's green card application was filed.
"In the immigration world, there are heartbreaking stories of people who face hardship through no fault of their own," Feinstein said in a statement. "Sometimes it is important to step back, be human and act with compassion."
Among the Republican sponsors is Sen. Saxby Chambliss (Ga.), who helped prepare this year's Senate immigration bill and later cast a vote that contributed to its defeat. Another is Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), an outspoken critic of "amnesty" for illegal immigrants and champion of the Mexican border fence. Hunter, a presidential candidate, sponsored Fouad Yousef Hakim Mansour and Saheir Gamil Shaker Mansour, Coptic Christians who fled religious persecution in Egypt, overstayed visitor visas and lived illegally in the United States for 10 years before applying unsuccessfully for asylum. They recently won permanent residency in Canada.
Asked if the private bill would have granted the Mansours "amnesty," Hunter's spokesman, Joe Kasper, said Hunter decides private bills on a "case-by-case basis."
Hunter "couldn't knowingly turn his back on the Mansours," Kasper said. "This is one of those situations where the end result quite possibly could have been death."
Some observers say plenty of immigrants have similarly compelling reasons to stay but lack access to lawmakers. That disparity is one reason private bills should be axed, said Jonathan Turley, a George Washington University law professor.
"Awarding special treatment often leaves the legal or administrative problem untouched," Turley said . " If a person was unable to get relief, then new avenues of relief should be created for all such persons."
Gillmor said private bills should be "very rare." To help people like Bartsch, Gillmor said, he has sponsored legislation that would provide green cards to some illegal immigrants who entered the United States as children.
Jason Peltz, the Vangs' attorney, said their case is without parallel.
Genevieve Vang, 42, and her husband fled Laos's communist government for France in the 1970s. After Guy Vang learned that his siblings were in the United States, the Vangs came to this country with their two daughters in 1990. They applied for asylum and were told for the next decade that their case was pending. When their file was unearthed, Peltz said, the Vangs were told that their application was rejected because they were already citizens of a "safe haven" -- France. Their appeals were denied.
Meanwhile, they opened a popular Dearborn, Mich., restaurant and had two more children. The delay forced them to put down roots, Peltz said. "When an immigrant messes up, the government can deport them," Peltz said. "When the government messes up, there's no remedy."
Vang said she is not sure whether other illegal immigrants should be helped. But she is sure about her family, which she said has no ties to France. "This is a mistake of paperwork, but it's not from my side," Vang said in a telephone interview. "They should know that and just fix it."
Staff researcher Meg Smith contributed to this report.
Add to del.icio.us