“Barbara Jordan, the woman who led Clinton’s immigration-reform commission and made recommendations similar to some of what appears in the RAISE Act, was a better spokesperson. She was an African-American Democrat who had been active in the civil rights movement.”

photo: Reuters

The Week

August 29, 2017

Why less is sometimes more when it comes to immigration
James Antle III

Supporting modest immigration restrictions is a perfectly mainstream position. And yet, it has gotten zero support from presidents of either party for 36 years, save for President Bill Clinton briefly entertaining the recommendations of his immigration-reform commission in the 1990s.

Until now, that is. Among the many fights President Trump has picked in recent weeks, his endorsement of legislation that more closely resembles the immigration reforms Clinton abandoned than those pushed by Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama might actually be a good use of his quickly dwindling political capital.

Buried beneath the bluster of his Phoenix rally last week, Trump briefly made the case. “Years of uncontrolled immigration have placed enormous pressure on the jobs and wages of working families, and they’ve put great burdens on local schools and hospitals,” he said. “While this may be good for a handful of special interests, it’s unfair to working people of all backgrounds all throughout our country. We want every American community to succeed, including our immigrant communities, but they can’t do that if we don’t control our borders.”

Porous borders aren’t the only sense in which immigration is “uncontrolled.” The United States admits about 1 million legal immigrants per year. Only 140,000 enter for primarily employment-based reasons. Two-thirds come in based on who their family members are, touching off a wave of chain migration in which new legal immigrants come in, followed by their family members, who are followed by theirs in perpetuity.

That means a lot of new immigrants are unskilled relative to the American labor force, (mostly) unintentionally adding competition to less skilled U.S. workers at the lower and middle ends of the income scale. This group disproportionately includes American-born people of color and other recent immigrants.

A Trump-backed bill introduced by Sens. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and David Perdue (R-Ga.) would create a point system for employment-based immigration, prioritizing English proficiency, technical skills, and job offers. It would also limit family reunification preferences to spouses and minor children, in the process reducing mostly lower-skilled immigration. (Elderly parents of these legal immigrants who require care would be eligible for temporary, renewable visas.)

The RAISE Act, as it is called, probably can’t pass in its current form or under the present composition of the Senate. But it reopens an important debate more than a decade of “comprehensive immigration reform” talk has suppressed. The cuts to legal immigration (from 1 million annually to half a million over a decade) are no more drastic than the increases (from 1 million to 2 million) envisioned by the failed Gang of Eight in 2013.

Some more modest reforms along these lines could perhaps be enacted in exchange for a humane legislative solution for the “DREAMers” caught in the Deferred for Childhood Arrivals program’s legal limbo. The Cotton-Perdue effort is also a countervailing force against those who say immigration must always go up, never down, and must be crafted for the benefit of those who hire nannies rather than workers with high school diplomas.

Yes, more people always means more GDP — by definition. That by itself doesn’t mean much for the most vulnerable Americans who are in direct competition with low-skilled foreign labor. The net impact on the country as a whole is often a wash, but the benefits and costs aren’t distributed evenly.

There are other factors, ranging from global trade to automation, that are arguably more important to these American workers than immigration. But there is no obvious way to reverse many of those trends at a manageable cost. Regulating immigration is a legitimate function of government in a way that repealing the field of robotics is not.

The uninterrupted inflows are also sapping many Americans’ sense of national solidarity, slowing the pace of immigrant assimilation and fueling native resentments. Increasing competition for workers who are disproportionately black and Latino to lower living costs for the affluent or importing low-wage foreign workers to help pay for the retirement of Trump voters does not seem conducive to the social harmony we so desperately need in a post-Charlottesville world…   MORE  HERE.

“Immigration
True national security means securing our borders. The current immigration system is broken, and we MUST fix it. We need to build a wall along our southern border, demand immigration laws be enforced, improve the reliability of temporary visa programs, and create a viable guest worker program. While I understand and appreciate that we are a nation of immigrants, and believe we should be welcoming of those wish to migrate to our great country, we are also a nation of laws, and our laws must be respected.” HERE 

photo: Shoebat.com

From cetusnews.com

More ‘hate facts’ about the parasitic SPLC. Also published in the Wall Street Journal

“And the single biggest effort undertaken by the SPLC? Fundraising. On the organization’s 2015 IRS 990 form it declared $10 million of direct fundraising expenses, far more than it has ever spent on legal services.”

J.P. Morgan’s Hate List

What is its gift to the Southern Poverty Law Center telling bank customers?
By

Kimberley A. Strassel

Corporate America will do almost anything to stay on the safe side of public opinion—at least as it’s defined by the media. CEOs will apologize, grovel, resign, settle. They will even, as of this month, legitimize and fund an outfit that exists to smear conservatives.

The press is still obsessing over President Trump’s incompetent handling of the violence in Charlottesville, Va., and that has suited some profiteers just fine. The notorious Southern Poverty Law Center is quietly cashing in on the tragedy, raking in millions on its spun-up reputation as a group that “fights hate.” Apple CEO Tim Cook informed employees that his company is giving $1 million to SPLC and matching employee donations. J.P. Morgan Chase is pitching in $500,000, specifically to further the SPLC’s “work in tracking, exposing and fighting hate groups and other extremist organizations,” in the words of Peter Scher, the bank’s head of corporate responsibility.

What Mr. Scher is referring to is the SPLC’s “Hate Map,” its online list of 917 American “hate groups.” The SPLC alone decides who goes on the list, but its criteria are purposely vague. Since the SPLC is a far-left activist group, the map comes down to this: If the SPLC doesn’t agree with your views, it tags you as a hater.

Let’s not mince words: By funding this list, J.P. Morgan and Apple are saying they support labeling Christian organizations that oppose gay marriage as “hate groups.” That may come as a sour revelation to any bank customers who have donated to the Family Research Council (a mainstream Christian outfit on the SPLC’s list) or whose rights are protected by the Alliance Defending Freedom (which litigates for religious freedom and is also on the list).

Similarly put out may be iPhone owners who support the antiterror policies espoused by Frank Gaffney’s Washington think tank, the Center for Security Policy (on the SPLC’s list). Or any who back the proposals of the Center for Immigration Studies (on the list).

These corporations are presumably in favor of the SPLC’s practice of calling its political opponents “extremists,” which paints targets on their backs. The group’s “Field Guide to Anti-Muslim Extremists” lists Mr. Gaffney (who worked for the Reagan administration); Maajid Nawaz (a British activist whose crimes include tweeting a cartoon of Jesus and Muhammad ); and Ayaan Hirsi Ali (a Somali refugee who speaks out against Islamic extremism).

The SPLC has tarred the respected social scientist Charles Murray, author of the well-regarded book “Losing Ground,” as a “white nationalist.” Mr. Murray has been physically assaulted on campus as a result. He happens to be married to an Asian woman and has Asian daughters, so the slur is ludicrous. But what’s a little smearing and career destruction if J.P. Morgan Chase gets some good headlines?

It isn’t only the lists. An honest outfit tracking violent groups would keep to straightforward descriptions and facts. Instead, the SPLC’s descriptions of people are brutally partisan, full of half-truths and vitriol designed to inspire fury.

We’ve seen what this kind of fury can do in Europe, with the murder of Theo Van Gogh, the controversial filmmaker, by a Dutch-Moroccan Islamic fanatic. Ms. Hirsi Ali, who had worked with Van Gogh, still travels with security—and J.P. Morgan thinks it appropriate to further target her? In 2012 a gay-marriage supporter named Floyd Corkins smashed into the Family Research Council’s headquarters and shot a security guard. He told police he was inspired by the SPLC’s “hate group” designation.

Had the companies done a bit of homework, they’d have discovered the SPLC isn’t even considered a sound charity. Karl Zinsmeister excoriated the outfit in a recent article for Philanthropy Roundtable: “Its two largest expenses are propaganda operations: creating its annual list of ‘haters’ and ‘extremists,’ and running a big effort that pushes ‘tolerance education’ through more than 400,000 public-school teachers. And the single biggest effort undertaken by the SPLC? Fundraising. On the organization’s 2015 IRS 990 form it declared $10 million of direct fundraising expenses, far more than it has ever spent on legal services.”

Apple did not return a call to its media center. J.P. Morgan Chase, in an emailed statement, said only that it has a “long history of supporting a range of organizations that are committed to addressing inequality.”

The corporate donations are nonetheless appalling, as they legitimize a group that already exercises inappropriate influence. The SPLC’s list is cited regularly by the media and congressional Democrats, ignorant or uncaring of its falsehoods. The charity tracker GuideStar for a time attached warning labels to philanthropies flagged by the SPLC.

This undermines the fight against truly hateful groups. Comparing pro bono lawyers at the Alliance Defending Freedom to hood-wearing KKK members only make the Klan seem more innocuous. Blackballing mainstream groups only silences the moderate voices the country needs to fight hate and bigotry.

Corporations have a role to play in calming today’s divisions. This is the opposite. HERE

Write to kim@wsj.com.

photo; i.yting.com

Denver Post
August 24, 2017

Here are some facts about immigration’s cost to Americans

Re: “Stephen Miller needs to get the facts on immigration, legal and otherwise,” Aug. 22 Megan Schrader column.

Megan Schrader writes that she’s seen no documentation from the White House to back their assumption that “a million green cards a year is too many and that unskilled laborers are flooding the market and driving down wages.”

The National Academy of Sciences found that, on average, immigration causes the wages of competing American workers to go down by 5.2 percent. Immigration redistributes approximately $500 billion in wages from American workers to employers of low-wage immigrants.

From the Rockefeller Commission in 1969 to the Jordan Commission in 1996, federal commissions have long recommended that immigration be reduced to at least 500,000 per year.

Heritage Foundation studies have documented the tremendous costs of immigrants to American taxpayers.

And it is fairly obvious that households with illegal immigrants presently consume far more in benefits than they can ever pay in taxes.

The American taxpayer cannot afford the continuing flood of immigrants into the country.

Michael Stertz, Thornton

HERE

photo: AJC

AJC
Aug. 22, 2017

Gwinnett sends first-ever batch of bilingual letters to local voters

“Gwinnett County sent out its first-ever batch of bilingual letters to voters last week, a significant milestone in its mission to comply with a new federal designation that requires it to better serve Spanish-speaking residents come election time.

The roughly 12,000 letters mailed Friday by the Gwinnett County Voter Registrations and Elections Division notified voter in Lilburn and Snellville that city polling places were changing for November’s election.

Voters in Lilburn, which has two city council seats up for grabs, will now cast their ballots at the new city hall and library building at 340 Main St. Residents of Snellville, which will have three city council seats on November’s ballot, will now vote at the Snellville Senior Center located at 2350 Oak Road…” MORE HERE.

IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF COBB COUNTY
                     STATE OF GEORGIA
Re; 17. 1. 5863. 28 Amendment to Petition

D.A. King
Plaintiff

Vs.
Spencer R. Moore
Commissioner, Department of Driver Services

and

David W. Connell

Chairman, Board of Drivers Services

Defendants

AMENDMENT TO PETITION

PURPOSE:

a) To correct and clarify inaccuracy created by Plaintiff’s unintentional one-word typo omission in original petition.

b) To add document (now Exhibit ‘I’) intended to quantify statement in original petition regarding Defendants’ participation in and knowledge of issuance of driver’s licenses and official ID Cards to recipients of deferred action on deportation.

c) To note and correct misspelling of the word “Plaintiff” in original petition.

a) Plaintiff asks to correct a typo emission of the word ‘some’ in a sentence contained in original petition section numbered “6” with the addition of the word ‘some’ as follows:

“6

Under federal law, some aliens in these categories do not have lawful status, which is set by congress.”

The omission of the word ‘some’ makes the sentence inaccurate. It is Plaintiff’s intention to be as accurate as possible. I regret the accidental typo error/omission.

This error does not effect the Plaintiff’s main, well-documented argument that the Defendants oversee the DDS processing and issuance of drivers licenses and official ID Cards to aliens whose deportation proceedings have been delayed because they have granted Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) status and to aliens who have been granted deferred action on deportation outside of the DACA executive amnesty of 2012.

As noted throughout the petition, the federal government makes it clear that “deferred action does not provide lawful status.”

b) Plaintiff requests that attached response letter dated August 16, 2017 from Defendant Spencer R. Moore to Georgia state Senator Josh McKoon be made part of the original petition and regarded as Exhibit ‘I.’

This letter contains official statements regarding the number of driver’s licenses and official ID Cards issued by the Department of Driver Services – under the direction and authority of the defendants – to aliens who have received federal deferred action on deportation. The letter was written and sent after the original petition was filed and not available to the Plaintiff at that time.

c) Plaintiff recognizes a separate typo and offers an embarrassed apology for the typo misspelling of the word ‘Plaintiff’ in the original petition.

Respectfully submitted,
D.A. King

photo: us123f.com

 

“Lizandro and Diego, now 22, used fraudulent visas and passports to come to the United States in 2009”

Washington Post
August 22, 2017

He had a college scholarship, but was deported. Now the former soccer star must build a life in El Salvador.

SAN SALVADOR — Lizandro Claros Saravia was supposed to be at college in North Carolina by now. At soccer practice. At the library.

Instead, the 19-year-old soccer star from Germantown, Md., is hundreds of miles away, in a sweltering Central American nation he barely recognizes and sometimes fears.

U.S. immigration officials swiftly deported him and his older brother, Diego, on Aug. 2, days after Lizandro told them during a routine check-in that he had a scholarship to attend Louisburg College.

“I don’t know what we’re going to do,” Lizandro, his gaze flat, said in an interview here last week as he and his brother waited to pick up their 83-year-old grandfather — who had been visiting the United States on a visa when his grandsons were deported — from the airport. “I feel like in this country, I don’t have a future.”

The expulsion of the brothers, both of whom graduated from Quince Orchard High School in Gaithersburg and neither of whom had been accused of any wrongdoing once in the United States, outraged Democratic lawmakers and advocates for immigrants, as well as their teachers, friends and teammates.

The expulsion of Lizandro Claros Saravia, 19, left, and his older brother, Diego Claros Saravia, 22, has outraged Democratic lawmakers as well as their teachers and friends. (Sarah L. Voisin/The Washington Post)
Lizandro and Diego, now 22, used fraudulent visas and passports to come to the United States in 2009 and reunite with their family; some of whom were also here illegally. Lizandro was 10, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement; his brother was 14.

They were ordered deported in 2012 and granted a stay in 2013. Two subsequent requests for stays were denied. But with their clean records and high school diplomas, the brothers were not a priority for deportation under the Obama administration.

Under President Trump, however, the “handcuffs” are off, in the words of ICE Acting Director Thomas Homan. Anyone in violation of immigration law can be targeted for deportation. Officials say that they want to reduce the United States’s population of undocumented immigrants, currently about 11 million, and dissuade would-be migrants from making the illegal, and sometimes deadly, journey north…. MORE HERE

Dustin Inman Society

–> FYI: A 2016 bill (SB6, committee substitute) was introduced in the Republican-ruled Georgia senate (thank you, Senator Josh McKoon) to formally bar illegal aliens from practicing law in Georgia – it was never allowed a hearing.

“Seven states including California, Florida and New York have already begun admitting undocumented immigrants to the state bar. The ABA resolution will serve as a guideline for other states to follow.”

The National Jurist
August 21, 2017

ABA calls for bar admission of undocumented law grads

“Suspended, expelled or disciplined? No. Criminal history? No. Fired from a job for dishonesty? No.

Status of U.S. Citizenship . . .

These are questions that most bar candidates encounter on their character and fitness application. How a candidate answers the last question could prevent them from being admitted to the practice of law, depending on which state bar they apply to.

For law student Thomas Kim, who wants to practice law in the state of Oregon, his presence in the U.S. as an undocumented immigrant will bar him from admission. But a recent resolution, championed by Kim and passed by the American Bar Association, may soon change that.

At the ABA’s annual meeting in New York, the ABA House of Delegates approved a resolution that urges Congress to allow state courts to permit undocumented immigrants seeking legal status to obtain a law license.

“This resolution on which my team and I worked diligently lets undocumented students, as well as documented students, know that America is still a land of opportunity,” Kim said. “Passing of this resolution reminds me that I can continue to make substantive, positive impact in my community and in this country.”

Kim was born in Korea and entered the U.S. legally with his family as a teenager. He was captain of his cross-country team, a speaker at his high school graduation and was the first in his family to attend college. Then, in 2011, he discovered that his family’s green card application had been denied.

Although he was no longer eligible for federal financial aid, Kim worked his way through college and set his sights on becoming a lawyer to help other immigrant families. Kim received a full-tuition scholarship to Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University, where he is a rising third-year student.

Not all delegates supported the resolution. Jack Long of the State Bar of Georgia argued that undocumented immigrants were in violation of the law, similar to other bar applicants who receive a DUI while applying to the bar. Long also expressed concern that law graduates with undocumented status are barred from certain employment opportunities…” Read the rest HERE.

Bonus reading: Illegal alien lawyer hires illegal aliens lawyer in California.