News Bytes 

A government estimate released last week reveals that the number of Mexican-born immigrants who became US citizens swelled by nearly 50% last year, an increase attributable to a massive campaign by Spanish-language media and immigrant advocacy groups to help eligible residents apply for citizenship.  The Los Angeles Times reports that 122,000 Mexicans attained citizenship in 2007, up from 84,000 from the previous year.  The number of citizenship applications filed doubled to 1.4 million last year.   

Mexican immigrants, who have had historically low rates of naturalization compared to other countries’ immigrants, have defied historical trends the past year; Hispanic advocates attribute the positive statistic to the ever-growing issue of undocumented immigration.  “Immigrants are tired of the tone and tenor of the immigration debate, which they feel is humiliating and does not recognize their contributions,” said Rosalind Gold of the National Assn. of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials’ Educational Fund in Los Angeles.  That climate has fueled their desire to have their voices heard.   

The increase in Latino citizens could affect the political landscape in November, according to analysts.  Louis DiSipio, a UC-Irvine political science professor, said one of the biggest impacts could be in Florida, a key battleground state that posted 54,500 new citizens last year, adding that the typically conservative-leaning Cuban population of the state has been outnumbered by other Latin American citizens; for the first time this decade, more Florida Latinos were registered as Democrats than Republicans, according to DiSipio. 

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After numerous delays, the Bush administration announced last week that it plans on moving forward to admitting as many as 27,500 endangered Iraqis who have rendered “faithful and valuable service” to the US since the invasion of Iraq.  According to The Houston Chronicle, the Department of Homeland Security has been authorized to admit up to 5,000 additional Iraqis in each of the next five years who face “an ongoing serious threat” stemming from their ties to US forces.  These numbers are a far cry from the previous visa limit, 500 Iraqis in each of the past two years. 

The announcement implements congressionally mandated changes from House members who have long pressed the White House to admit Iraqis imperiled by their roles as translators for the US military.  Some critics have accused the Bush administration of resisting the admission of large number of the refugees because it would signal setbacks in Iraq.  But DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff defended the delays, citing concerns that terrorists might sneak into the US as refugees, as well as the logistics and personnel challenges of interviewing thousands of refugees in Syria and Jordan.   

Amid criticism from House and Senate members, the administration have dramatically stepped up Iraqi refugee screening and admissions over the past year, even before expanding the separate program to grant admission to Iraqis with US ties.  Since Oct. 1, immigration officials have interviewed at least 14,376 Iraqis for admission, approved at least 9,903 Iraqis for resettlement, and admitted at least 4,872 – almost five times the rate by authorities the year before.  

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Over 170,000 Oregon jobs and $17.7 billion in annual state production could be lost if a proposed federal immigration rule were enacted, says a study released by a coalition of 20 Oregon employer associations. According to Oregon’s The Forest Grove News Times, the study was commissioned by the Coalition for a Working Oregon, an organization that includes Oregon’s Farm Bureau, Restaurant Association, and Association of Nurseries, and represents over 300,000 state employees. 

The proposed “No Match” rule, designed to locate and remove undocumented workers from the country, will significantly reduce the number of jobs in the state, says Oregon State University resource economics professor/Coalition study director William Jaeger.  Additionally, by driving out the estimated 100,000 undocumented workers in Oregon without having a contingency plan to replace them, the impact on state businesses will be devastating, according to Jeff Stone, director for the Oregon Association of Nurseries.  “The time is here and now for us to stand up and be the voice of reason in this debate,” said Stone. 

Jaeger gathered data for the peer-reviewed study by researching previous national studies on undocumented immigrants.  In addition to the job losses and lost revenue, Jaeger also found that state tax revenues would decrease by nearly $600 million. His analysis further shows that within the next couple of years, with full “no match” rule enforcement, Oregon could lose 76,000 domestic workers – 7.7% of Oregon’s workforce.   

The economic report is available online at: http://www.oregoncanwork.org.  

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An immigration activist is questioning the White House decision to give foreign nationals with HIV/AIDS a special waiver to obtain short-term visas to enter the country, OneNewsNow.com reports.  William Gheen, president of Americans for Legal Immigration PAC, takes issue with the move, in which President Bush directed the Secretary of State to provide a categorical waiver for HIV-positive people wishing to enter the US, in an effort to create a more streamlined process. 

“Whether you feel that people with HIV should or should not be allowed into the country for treatment or short-term visas – regardless of how you feel about that – that should be debated by the American public [and] debated in Congress.  Bush is playing king again,” said Gheen, warning that easing restrictions on AIDS visas will open the floodgates for those individual to come to the US.  “It says that the president is ordering a short-term visa – a blanket waiver – which means people who might have been looking to immigrate to the US can now actually use the HIV-positive status to obtain a short term visa,” Gheen contends.

The president, according to Gheen, overstepped his authority in issuing this directive.  Gheen believes granting short-term visas, even for people with infectious diseases like AIDS, would be more tolerable if Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials were doing their job of deporting those who overstay their visas.