Immigration News

The billionaire Koch brothers, big donors to Republicans, are pushing Republican candidates in he mid-term elections to stress support for tax cuts and amnesty...

Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), Chairman of the Democratic National Committee, recently wore a t-shirt at a May Day parade which stated in Spanish: "Yo no creo en fronteras" (I don't believe in borders).  President Trump sharply criticized Ellison "as an example" of what he called the Democratic Party's extremism on immigration.  

Seventeen Republican House members have signed a "discharge petition" to bring a vote on the DACA amnesty to the floor of the House. Almost all Democrats are expected to sign it. If a total of 25 Republicans sign on, the petition will pass, and a vote will take place. The bill is strictly to grant amnesty, and offers no concessions to genuine immigration reformers such as an end to chain migration or funds to build a border wall.  Without an end to chain migration, the amnestied DACA illegal aliens will be able to bring in a stream of their relatives in the future. Many Democrats favor chain migration as a means of building their party's political clout. The Republicans supporting the discharge petition seem to think that this will help them win their up-coming mid-term elections. 

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has ended Temporary Protected Status (TPS) granted to Hondurans in the United States. This status allows foreigners to stay in the U.S. if their countries have suffered natural disasters or some other calamity. They are supposed to go home after conditions improve. The Hondurans received TPS in 1999 after a hurricane struck their country. Critics of TPS it is anything but temporary, and point to the fact Honduras recovered from the hurricane quite some time before now.

A survey by The Polling Company Inc. found that most Americans want less immigration. People surveyed were told that the U.S. now admits one million legal immigrants  a year, and were given six options as to how many they thought should be admitted. The largest percentage (49 percent) chose 250,000 or less. Only 17 percent supported the current level or more. By a margin of 63 percent to 20 percent, respondents opposed an amnesty for illegal aliens in the DACA category unless there were substantial cuts in legal immigration and the requirement that businesses use the E-Verify system to determine if the workers they hire are legal residents.

With his party now holding two-thirds of the Hungarian parliament, Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orban is pushing for a constitutional amendment to limit immigration. The amendment would prevent enactment of policies by the European Union that would change the religious and ethnic makeup of Hungary.  Said Orban, "We will defend [our] Christian culture, and we will not give the country to foreigners. I feel obliged to implement this constitutional amendment now." The Prime Minister also accused billionaire currency speculator George Soros of being a major force to erase European identity with mass migration. "George Soros," said Orban, "has an army of shadows working in Hungary. We want to unmask it. We want to show that migration is not a human rights issue, but a national security issue."

Illegal immigration across the Mexican border was 230 percent higher during April of this year than April of 2017. A major reason is that illegal aliens are becoming more aware of the "catch and release" policy the Border Patrol has to follow. Illegal aliens who claim asylum under this policy are commonly released on their promise to show up for an asylum hearing. Often they don't show up. Their claim was just a ruse to get into the U.S. Brandon Judd, president of the Border Patrol Council, estimates that 75 percent of illegal aliens apprehended by the Border Patrol get catch and release. This loophole, he maintains, encourages illegal immigration. He noted , "If you can cross the border illegally without any consequence, why not? As long as the catch and release policy-program exists, large numbers of people are going to cross the border illegally."

Texas is leading a legal challenge to the DACA amnesty, a legalization of some illegal aliens unilaterally decreed by former President Obama. President Trump has tried to phase out DACA, but recent federal court rulings have upheld the program. The action of Texas, joined by Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Nebraska, South Carolina and West Virginia, will serve as a challenge to those rulings. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton stated that "Texas has argued for years that the federal executive branch lacks the power to unilaterally grant unlawfully present aliens lawful presence and work authorization. Left intact, DACA sets a dangerous precedent by giving the executive branch sweeping authority to ignore the laws passed by Congress and change our nation's immigration laws to suit a president's own policy preferences."

Although federal policy seeks to prevent illegal aliens from accessing taxpayer-funded health care, specifically Medicaid and Obamacare, they still receive substantial support for the use of medical services. An article in Forbes magazine calculates that "All told Americans cross-subsidize health care for unauthorized immigrants to the tune of $18.5 billion a year. O this total, federal taxpayers provided $11.2 billion in subsidized care to unauthorized immigrants in 2016."

More than one hundred and fifty members of the migrant "caravan" have arrived at the U.S. border at Tijuana, Mexico. They will try to gain entry into the United States by claiming asylum. Critics of this strategy note that if these Central Americans were truly seeking refuge from persecution, they could could have requested it in Mexico. The reason they want it here is that the U.S. offers more benefits and economic opportunities than Mexico.