Dear Readers:

A new year begins and we expected a relatively slow run of news until Congress would get in to gear. But early 2011 has surprised immigration watchers.

The first shockwave came with the surprise announcement that Steve King, the firebrand anti-immigrant Congressman from Iowa, would be passed over for Chair of the House Immigration Subcommittee. I can remember testifying a few years back in front of the House Immigration Subcommittee and waiting for Mr. King to come after me after I testified about a bill I helped to draft to create an appeals system for consular denials. To my surprise, he saved his questions for my friend Chuck Kuck who had the temerity to speak in favor of bill language to grant due process rights to immigrants in deportation proceedings. Mr. King’s colleague Elton Gallegly probably doesn’t have a voting record that is much better, but he’s not going to be the lightning Mr. King would have been, especially over King’s signature issue – repealing birthright citizenship.

Last week we all know about the murder of six people and the wounding of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and more than a dozen others in Tucson. The immigration debate in Arizona’s increasingly hostile, violent tone was brought in to the public conversation especially given the death of Federal Judge John Roll who had ruled in a controversial immigration case. The assassination attempt and the memorable speech by President Obama at the University of Arizona are raising hopes that a sense of civility might return to Washington and progress on issues like immigration might be possible.

Perhaps we’re seeing signs of that new civility this week. Aside from Steve King’s being passed over for the Immigration Subcommittee Chair, we saw speeches from Republican presidential contenders Jeb Bush and Newt Gingrich urging their party to move to the center on immigration issues. We also saw the normally no-compromising anti-immigrant Center for Immigration Studies publish a proposal for a new DREAM Act – certainly not the one pro-immigrants groups would have written, but one with potential room for negotiation.

Maybe I’m reading too much in the tea leaves, but I’m an optimist by nature and hope the new year ends with progress on immigration, something that we have not been able to report in nearly a decade.

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In firm news, I have co-written an article for Bloomberg on immigration compliance issues facing the health care industry and we include that article in this issue.

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Readers are reminded that they are welcome to contact my law office if they would like to schedule a telephone or in person consultation with me or one of my colleagues. If you are interested, please call my office at 901-682-6455.

Regards,

Greg Siskind