Monday, July 12, 2010

Group Supporting Illegal Immigration Complains About Enforcement

Argh.

But these days Calderon-Gonzalez and many other illegal immigrants find themselves in deportation proceedings for traffic and various other infractions, says Christine Neumann-Ortiz, director of Voces de la Frontera, a low-wage worker and immigrant advocacy group.

“In the past few years, we have seen a disturbing trend of escalated arrests of non-criminal immigrants who, through collaboration of local law enforcement agencies and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), end up in deportation proceedings,” she wrote in a letter to Milwaukee County Board Chairman Lee Holloway and other county supervisors.

Voces has “documented dozens of cases in the past 12 months in which immigrants, arrested for traffic violations or crime for which they were later found innocent, are now facing deportation,” she wrote.

Why is this disturbing?  They are here illegally and are being deported once they were discovered.  Who cares what prompted them to come to the attention of immigration authorities?

(3) Comments
Posted by Owen at 1713 hrs
Foreign Affairs + Law + Politics + Politics - Wisconsin

  1. It still floors me that people do not understand the word “illegal”.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on July 12, 2010 at 1833 hrs


  2. Love how she believes illegal immigrants are non-criminal immigrants.

    Posted by Jed on July 12, 2010 at 1849 hrs


  3. This has been ramping up for a decade.  Shortly after 9/11 Tom Ridge expanded the definition of “moral turpitude” for INS purposes to include virtually any felony, and several violent misdemeanors.  Then it became all felonies and any violent or property damaging misdemeanors several years later.  Then all felonies and pretty much all misdemeanors.  And now it sounds like even some non-criminal civil violations are grounds for deportation. 

    That’s all well and good with regard to illegal immigrants, but that definition is also important to people who are here legally whether on a work visa, or enjoying some form of citizenship or resident alienage.  Most of those people are subject to deportation for criminal (and now I assume non-criminal) acts too.  Not a great way to encourage people to spend the years and tens of thousands of dollars that it takes to immigrate legally.  But I’m sure it won’t have any unintended consequences.  Nothing ever does!

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on July 13, 2010 at 1201 hrs


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