Illegal Immigration

Something unorthodox occurred on Capitol Hill on Tuesday. The House Republican leadership began pushing a “discharge petition” — a procedural maneuver designed to force a floor vote — on a piece of Democratic legislation. The bill in question is the SAVE Act, authored by freshmen Congressman Heath Shuler (D., N.C.).

"Congress' failure to pass comprehensive immigration reform, immigration crackdowns, Arizona's new employer-sanctions law and a sluggish economy have combined to create a climate families such as the Francos no longer find hospitable.

The number returning to Mexico is difficult to calculate, but there is no question that many families are leaving, according to Mexican government officials, local community leaders and immigrants themselves.

At Numbers USA, anti-illegal immigration think tank, the primary concern is the automatic citizenship offered to these children and, more indirectly, their parents. It says the 14th Amendment — essentially granting citizenship to any child born on American soil — is being misinterpreted to include the children of illegal immigrants.

The children, often referred to as "anchor babies,” provide an enticement for illegal immigration into the U.S, said Rosemary Jenks, director of government relations for the group.

"In the panel discussion, Roy Beck, a former environmental journalist who now heads the grass roots activist organization NumbersUSA, called the report 'thoroughly depressing' and said it foreshadows steady deterioration in the quality of life..."http://signonsandiego.printt

"Illegal immigrants are starting to leave Arizona months in advance of a new state law that will require employers to verify the employment eligibility of their workers. ... "I would say we are losing at least 100 people a day," said Elias Bermudez, founder of Immigrants Without Borders and host of a daily talk-radio program aimed at illegal immigrants."http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/ss/local/61804.php

By Daniel Gonzalez -- The Arizona Republic

"When a comprehensive immigration bill collapsed last month on the Senate floor, it was a victory for a small group that had been lobbying Congress for a decade to reduce the number of immigrants — legal and illegal — in the United States. The group, Numbers USA, tracked every twist and turn of the bill. Its members flooded the Senate with more than a million faxes, sent through the organization’s Web site. It supplied arguments and information to senators opposing the bill. 'It was a David-and-Goliath struggle,' said Roy H.

"[S]tarting at 6 a.m. Wednesday, two days after the Board of Aldermen overwhelmingly approved the identity card plan, federal agents swept into the largely Hispanic Fair Haven community and arrested some 31 people suspected of being illegal immigrants, many in their homes. Within hours, any sense of sanctuary that the city and advocates for immigrants advocates had developed over the years was turned upside down, replaced with fear..." http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/08/nyregion/08haven.html

""Already by Friday afternoon, we had some of the Republican offices calling us and saying: 'Would you tell your members we're definitely going to vote no, and will you call off the phone calls?' said Roy Beck, executive director of NumbersUSA, which has deemed the bill an amnesty for illegal aliens and whose members already have sent 185,000 faxes to Senate offices."

The Washington Times

"NumbersUSA, a Virginia-based group that supports reducing immigration to the U.S., says granting legal status to illegal immigrants will only perpetuate the problem. 'It's about enforcing the laws we have and changing the perception that if you can find a way to get here that eventually you can get citizenship,' said NumbersUSA spokeswoman Caroline Espinosa. 'If we keep giving people who break the law to get here what they want then why would they stop?'"

TCPalm.com (Fla.)

"'We'd like to see mandatory employment verification in any bill that passes,' Caroline Espinosa of Numbers USA told BNA. 'We'll take it any way we can get it.' Describing her group as an "immigration reduction organization," Espinosa said that the goal of reducing the number of illegal immigrants in the U.S. could be achieved by 'attrition through mandatory enforcement...'"

Bureau of National Affairs Daily Labor Report; April 16, 2007

"'For 18 years, I only spoke to my daughter by telephone,' Clara Rivas, 72, said in Spanish. 'Now I want to go home...'" http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/19/AR2007031901906.html

The Washington Post, March 20, 2007