The Department of Justice sent a memo to immigration judges Friday outlining new quotas that will require judges to process 700 cases per year and have less than 15 percent of their rulings sent back by a higher court. The quotas will go into effect October 1, 2018 for FY 2019.
On March 25th, a caravan of about 1,350 Central American migrants started a trip from the City of Tapachula on the Mexico-Guatemala border to the United States. The journey is being organized by Pueblos Sin Fronteras (People Without Borders), although the migrants are responsible for their own food and water. The migrants plan to reach the U.S. border and either apply for asylum or slip away from the group to cross illegally.
A recent poll conducted by Survey USA for the Eyewitness News-Southern California News Group reveals that 54 percent of all California voters believe that state and local law enforcement should be permitted to assist ICE in arresting violent criminal illegal aliens, with only 11 percent in favor of 'sanctuary' policies.
The Migration Policy Institute found that the number of H-1B visas issued in fiscal year 2016 exceeded the legal cap of 85,000 by about three times due to approval of petitions from employers exempt from the cap. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services issued 345,262 H-1B visas that year, including 230,759 to universities and nonprofit or government research organizations that are exempt for the cap.
California Attorney General Xavier Becerra and Chief Division of Law Enforcement Kevin Gardner issued new guidance Wednesday clarifying three sanctuary policies the state passed last year barring state and local law enforcement from cooperating with federal immigration authorities. The guidance says that California state and local law enforcement officers are prohibited from assisting federal law enforcement unless state and local law enforcement are also policing an existing state law.
An ad campaign for H-1B reform in San Francisco's BART train stations became a minor national story last week, but to get the reaction of the ad's target audience (American tech workers), you have to skip the news reports and look in the comments.
380 Sheriffs from 40 states sent a letter to all Members of Congress calling for action to secure the border and enforce immigration laws. The letter, spearheaded by Bristol County, Massachusetts Sheriff Thomas Hodgson and backed by the National Sheriffs Association, noted that “(b)ecause Congress has failed to enact the necessary reforms, our citizens and legal residents face even greater dangers, our national security is more vulnerable, and our enforcement efforts have been seriously compromised.”
A group of states joined the Trump Administration’s effort to overturn California laws that block or interfere with federal immigration enforcement. Two local governments in California – Orange County and the City of Los Alamitos -- also voted to join the lawsuit and the Orange County sheriff moved to facilitate the deportation work of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau.
Pres. Trump announced in a memorandum Tuesday the termination of the Deferred Enforced Departure (DED) program which had allowed about 3,500 Liberians to live and work in the U.S. since it took effect in 1999. There are currently 839 Liberians working in the U.S. under the program. To ensure an "orderly transition" for both DED beneficiaries and the Liberian government, the President has granted a "12-month wind-down period", starting March 31, 2018, for Liberian citizens to make arrangements for their return, and the Liberian government to prepare accordingly for receiving and reintegrating them.
The State Senate in New York last week passed a bill (S3698) to crack down on illegal-alien sanctuary cities. The measure requires the state to compile a list of the local governments that adopted policies that interfere with the enforcement of ICE detention requests for illegal aliens under arrest. If the policies are not changed, the entity would lose state funding.
