US Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-CO) continues to figure prominently in the news because of his hard anti-immigration stances. Many of his recent comments, especially his call for the deportation of a Colorado student and his family, who are in the US unlawfully, have created significant tensions with the Mexican government. Now, in a recent interview with a news agency, Tancredo has called for the militarization of the US border with Mexico, saying that the Mexican government encourages undocumented immigration in an effort to regain land lost to the US in 1848, after the Mexican-American War.
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A tiny town in the Florida Keys has filed suit against the Justice Department, seeking to block a proposed Border Patrol stations. Layton, Florida, with a population of less than 200, say that the government did not sufficiently consider the environmental impacts a new facility would have.
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A professor at an Atlanta college has been charged, along with one other person, with visa fraud in connection with a scheme to help at least 17 people fraudulently obtain student visas. Both of those charged a Indian citizens and permanent residents of the US, and most of the students involved are believed to be from India and Pakistan.
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The INS recently settled a lawsuit brought by a 17-year veteran of the INS who alleged that the agency unlawfully retaliated against him after he spoke to the press about anti-Cuban sentiments in the Miami office. Ricardo Ramirez made his comments after the raid seizing Elian Gonzalez from his Miami family. He claimed that the anti-Cuban bias in the office helped add to the circus like environment during the raid. The terms of the settlement have not been disclosed, but the court will monitor the INS to ensure that it complies.
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The Lebanese government has reportedly kicked Mazen Al-Najjar out of the country. Al-Najjar was deported last month following a protracted battle with the INS over the use of secret evidence in immigration proceedings. Held for three and a half years without being able to see the evidence against him, Al-Najjar was finally released in 2000. Then, in November 2001, he was arrested again and deported on charges of overstaying his visa. He did have a six-month visa to stay in Lebanon, but, according to a Lebanese paper, Al-Najjar has been moved to Iran, most likely because Lebanon was angry at being given essentially no say in the deportation.
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This week a State Department spokesperson spoke about delays in visa processing. According to Richard Boucher, improved communication between agencies, as well as streamlined procedures, have made substantial improvements in processing, including the approval of 10,000 applications that had been pending. Applications processed under the Visas Condor” security check program should shortly take no more than a month.
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A school in Fairview, New Jersey recently appeared in the news after the superintendent of the small school system ordered five children in the US without permission to leave school because their parents are in the US illegally. A 1982 Supreme Court decision ruled that all children in the US have the right to a public education, regardless of their immigration status. Attorneys for the families of the children said that the school did not even have the right to inquire into the parents’ immigration status. School officials said that once they learned the families were here unlawfully, they were legally obligated to prevent them from enrolling in school. The decision was reviewed by the state, and the children were readmitted.
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This week the Senate Judiciary Committee held hearings into the nomination of Miguel Estrada to the US Court of Appeal in Washington, DC. If confirmed, Estrada, who came to the US from Honduras at 17, would become the first Hispanic to sit on the court. Estrada is very conservative, and many political analysts think that it will be impossible for Democrats to oppose him on ideological grounds without alienating the influential Hispanic vote.
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This week three INS agents were charged with civil rights violations in connection with a raid on a home. During the raid, agents beat Serafin Olvera-Carrera so severely that he was left paralyzed, and died 11 months after the March 2001 raid. Olvera had been in the US legally, but his visa had expired shortly before the raid. If convicted, the agents could face up to 10 years in prison.
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In what is being called an extraordinary decision, the immigration judge hearing the cases of four Arizona students facing deportation because they are in the US unlawfully has given the students 14 months in which to prepare their cases. Advocates for the students, who came to the INS’s attention after trying to enter Canada while in New York for a science competition, say the judge may be trying to give them enough time to benefit from the passage of a law that would allow undocumented students to obtain permanent residency. Support for such a bill has been growing.
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The Justice Department this week announced that it was seeking the deportation of a Pennsylvania man found to have served as an armed guard at three Nazi concentration camps. In July 2000, a federal court stripped Theodor Szehinskyj of his US citizenship. If the government is successful, Szehinskyj will be the 58th Nazi removed from the US since 1979.
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A Sudanese national this week wrested a gun away from a security guard at the INS office in Houston and fired two shots into a wall. It was initially reported that the man was tired of waiting in line, but the INS later said it was part of the man’s effort to get himself deported back to Sudan. Philip Ajaak Chan is a permanent resident of the US, coming to the country in 1994 as a refugee. Sadly, even if Chan is convicted of a crime that would lead to his deportation, Sudan will not accept deportees with felony convictions.
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The Justice Department this week announced that it was dropping its efforts to keep immigration proceedings for Rabih Haddad closed. Haddad was arrested last December on charges of overstaying his visa. Because the government believes he may have links to terrorist organizations, it has kept him in detention and closed his bond hearings to the public. Haddad will have another bond hearing next week in which “substantial portions” will be open to the public. The Justice Department has reserved the right to close portions of the proceedings. The Department has said that this new position does not mean it will not continue to appeal decisions ruling that closed proceedings violate the Constitution.
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INS officials recently revealed that the agency had failed to investigate a statement by Hesham Mohamed Hadayet that the Egyptian government had accused him of membership in a terrorist organization. Hadayet went on a killing spree at the Los Angeles International Airport on July 4, killing two and wounding several others. The INS admitted that had these allegations been fully investigated, Hadayet would most likely have been deported. His statement was made as part of an asylum application. He was not granted asylum but eventually obtained permanent residence through his wife, who won the diversity visa lottery. The news prompted Attorney General John Ashcroft to order the INS to review asylum applications to determine whether anyone in the US has admitted to being accused of terrorist involvement. A number of members of Congress have also called for hearings into the matter.
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