RE-THINK IMMIGRATION
A Monday-through-Friday, non-partisan blog covering the most
contentious policy issue of our time: immigration.

viernes, agosto 08, 2008

Cartoon of the day



Titled "McCain's trip to Latin America." By Dario Castillejos, El imparcial de México (Mexico City).

Escrito Por Daniela a las 02:24 PM| 3 Comentarios


The state of Texas executed Jose Medellin, a Mexican citizen convicted of rape and murder, this week, despite objections by both the White House and international authorities, the NYT reports.

Medellin's case is at the center of a debate about whether or not Mexicans in the U.S. are denied fair trials because they were never given an opportunity to talk to a consul. Further, Medellin was a citizen of a country where the death penalty is not allowed.

Both Mexico and the International Court of Justice sent diplomatic missions to the U.S. in an attempt to block or delay the execution. The White House also sent similar messages to Texas.

Escrito Por Daniela a las 01:02 AM| 9 Comentarios


We told you earlier this week about undocumented immigrants being privately repatriated by the hospitals treating them here in the United States. The New York Times published a series of letters to the editor with all sorts of reactions. Here’s a sampling—

  • "There was no simple right versus wrong here. Rather than deal with the conflict, we too often gloss over the surface by advocating that we “do the right thing” regarding financial costs but turn our backs on our own compassionate feelings by compelling the illegal immigrant to leave the United States to get medical assistance back home, in this case in Guatemala, knowing full well that proper medical assistance is not available in Guatemala."
  • "Your article did not convince me that the hospitals are behaving badly. The brutal truth is that allowing unregulated millions of illegal immigrants into the country can only result in the destruction of American institutions such as hospitals and schools."
  • "What is the moral mandate for a Florida acute-care hospital that has already spent $1.5 million of its own money caring for a foreign citizen to also provide him with long-term care?"

Escrito Por Daniela a las 12:56 AM| 4 Comentarios


jueves, agosto 07, 2008

Cartoon of the day



By Dario Castillejos, El Imparcial de Mexico.

The cartoon is titled "The cycle of migration."

On the building's lower sign is written: "Welcome, fellow citizen."
On the sign above is the word, "Unemployment."

Escrito Por Daniela a las 12:23 AM| 2 Comentarios


A pilot self-deportation program was launched today by the ICE. Here are some fast facts, courtesy of the AP—

PARTICIPATING CITIES: Chicago; Santa Ana, Calif.; San Diego; Phoenix and Charlotte, N.C.

WHO QUALIFIES FOR THE PROGRAM? Immigrants who have ignored deportation orders to leave the U.S. and do not have a criminal history. Federal Immigration officials estimate 457,000 are eligible nationwide.

HOW LONG WILL THE PROGRAM RUN? It started Tuesday and runs through Aug. 22.

WHERE DO PARTICIPANTS REPORT? Local ICE offices. Individuals are asked to bring whatever form of identification they have, such as an expired passport. A hot line is also available for more information: 1-866-880-6344

And Chicago public radio provides us with more context—

(Ken Carlos, ICE official:) "They're able to come in to avoid detention because they're going to come in and they're working with ICE. They're going to be able to work with their families to make arrangements to go home so it's not where all of a sudden theres a knock on the door and they're being arrested."

Carlson says it isn't clear how many people might take advantage of the program between now and the August 22 deadline.

But immigration rights advocates say it won't be many.Fred Tsao is policy director for the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights. He says the program offers no incentives for fugitives to surrender to ICE, rather than just leave the country on their own.

Escrito Por Daniela a las 06:36 PM| 0 Comentarios


martes, agosto 05, 2008

Cartoon of the day



Reader Matthew S. sent this cartoon in.  (By Gary McCoy, CagleCartoons.com)

Escrito Por Daniela a las 06:28 PM| 1 Comentarios


Blog CQPolitics reports that presidential scholars who have studied Obama and McCain's voting records on immigration say that their past votes are really "no guide" to how either man would actually govern as President.

The main argument centers around the idea that a legislator and an executive take a wholly different approach to just about everything. Take a look at the article—it's worth a read.

Escrito Por Daniela a las 03:37 PM| 1 Comentarios


Last week we told you about a Center for Immigration Studies report that indicated that immigration raids were behind a drop in undocumented immigrants in the country. Today, a tipster sent us an article that claims that other immigrant experts find a great many faults with the CIS study.

Here's an excerpt of a piece from the New American Media—

Using the Current Population Survey by the Census Bureau as the quantitative basis for their report, CIS notes that "since hitting a peak in the summer of 2007, the illegal population may have declined by 11 percent through May of 2008."

This data leads them to conclude that "it seems that increased enforcement is at least partly responsible for this decline."

However, Stephen Buckner, a spokesman for the US Census responded to this report by saying: "The Census Bureau does not produce estimates or counts of illegal immigrants living in the United States."

Additionally, the Immigration Policy Center (IPC) took issue with the report. "The persuasiveness of CIS' argument is undermined not only by an absence of hard data, but by the faulty logic and contradictory statements of the report itself" and added "the authors report confidently about a population that is nearly impossible to accurately measure."

In addition, IPC took exception with CIS' conclusion that immigrants are leaving because of stepped-up immigration enforcement. If there is indeed movement, IPC contends, something that has not yet been proven, then it's likely more because of economic conditions rather than immigration-enforcement measures, as has been the case historically.


Escrito Por Daniela a las 03:27 PM| 2 Comentarios


The big immigration feature story of late was the NYT's story on the deportation of undocumented immigrants by American hospitals.

We particularly enjoyed the extensive slideshow which tells the story of one undocumented patient, a Luis Jiménez from Guatemala, who was a patient at a U.S. hospital for a long time before the hospital "forceably" re-patriated him. The slideshow tells the story of his accident and follows him up to his present locale in the mountains of Guatemala.

Anyway, back to the main story of private repatriations by American hospitals. An excerpt from the story—

Mr. Jiménez’s benchmark case exposes a little-known but apparently widespread practice. Many American hospitals are taking it upon themselves to repatriate seriously injured or ill immigrants because they cannot find nursing homes willing to accept them without insurance. Medicaid does not cover long-term care for illegal immigrants, or for newly arrived legal immigrants, creating a quandary for hospitals, which are obligated by federal regulation to arrange post-hospital care for patients who need it.

American immigration authorities play no role in these private repatriations, carried out by ambulance, air ambulance and commercial plane. Most hospitals say that they do not conduct cross-border transfers until patients are medically stable and that they arrange to deliver them into a physician’s care in their homeland. But the hospitals are operating in a void, without governmental assistance or oversight, leaving ample room for legal and ethical transgressions on both sides of the border.

Indeed, some advocates for immigrants see these repatriations as a kind of international patient dumping, with ambulances taking patients in the wrong direction, away from first-world hospitals to less-adequate care, if any.

“Repatriation is pretty much a death sentence in some of these cases,” said Dr. Steven Larson, an expert on migrant health and an emergency room physician at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. “I’ve seen patients bundled onto the plane and out of the country, and once that person is out of sight, he’s out of mind.”


Escrito Por Daniela a las 03:23 PM| 1 Comentarios


jueves, julio 31, 2008

Cartoon of the day



By Angel Boligan, El Universal (Mexico).

Escrito Por Daniela a las 12:55 PM| 4 Comentarios



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