The San Francisco Chronicle ran an article today about the success story of the immigrant owner of the Mi Pueblo Food Center. There is an outlet of this grocery store in nearby San Rafael. The market’s owner, Juvenal Chavez came to America from his native Mexico when he was 24. He spoke only a bit of English and he had no money. His brother asked him to help start a small Mexican market in Redwood City. During the years he worked with his brother, he scrimped and saved $100,000 to use as a down payment on his first grocery store, a small meat market on Story Road in San Jose. He pulled his last $480 out of savings to stock the store with produce and supplied it with meat from the one vendor who would give him credit. Back then, the market’s staff was just he, his wife, Maria, his sister and a few workers. Now he has 3,000 employees, 20 supermarkets and a sprawling corporate headquarters , just across the street from his original meat market. The stores have not only been a good business venture, but a way for Chavez to preserve his culture, he said. By offering immigrants, as well as multi-generations of Mexican Americans, the foods of their roots and a shopping atmosphere that mirrors their homeland, he’s keeping his ancestors’ history alive.
You can read more of the article at: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/06/11/BUQB1JQT67.DTL&ao=all#ixzz1PGavdkEd
The U.S. government will unveil a national initiative to combat immigration services scams this week. The Departments of Homeland Security (DHS) and Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) are leading this effort. DHS’s U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) will announce the initiative on June 9. These immigration scams include the unauthorized practice of immigration law and deceptive practices. These scams cause harm to our immigration system and victimize members of the immigrant community. Federal, state and local partners will come together to combat immigration services scams through three approaches: enforcement, education, and continued collaboration.
The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld Arizona’s law that penalizes businesses for hiring workers who are in the United States illegally. The decision rejected arguments that states have no role in immigration matters. The Arizona law requires that employers use the federal E-Verify online system to check the eligibility of their employees to work in the U.S. This ruling may lead to many other states passing laws that require employers to use the federal E-Verify system. Arizona is appealing another ruling that blocked key components of a second, more controversial Arizona immigration enforcement law, SB1070, that would allow police to decide who to detain, and illegal immigrants could be prosecuted in state court for immigration violations.
You can read more about this case at: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/05/26/national/w072016D17.DTL#ixzz1NwrhDDMH
The San Francisco Chronicle reported last week that Susan Su of Pleasanton was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges that her school, Tri Valley University, was a front for foreign students seeking to establish U.S. immigration status. Federal prosecutors say she illegally obtained visa documents “without regard to the students’ academic qualifications or intent to pursue a course of study required to maintain a lawful immigration status.” Authorities said Indian nationals paid $2,700 a semester in tuition for visa-related documents that allowed them to live and work in the country on student immigration status.
The original article can be found on SFGate.com here:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2011/05/03/BAC01JAS0N.DTL
President Obama gave a speech today in El Paso, Texas on the need for immigration reform. He asked for a bipartisan effort to overhaul the nation’s immigration laws to deal with the millions of skilled and unskilled workers already here illegally. The President’s trip was part of a series of events to promote his support for immigration reform legislation. The President urged Congress to act on this issue and reiterated his legislative aims: A path to citizenship for illegal immigrants that would require them to come forward, pay taxes and a penalty, and learn English; legal status to encourage foreign college graduates and other skilled non-citizen residents to remain and start businesses; and the so-called Dream Act, providing citizenship to young people who were brought to the United States as children and receive an education or want to enter the military.
Here is a link to the text of his speech: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/11/us/politics/11obama-text.html
As numerous media outlets have announced this week, on Friday, April 23rd, Governor Jan Brewer signed a bill that made it a crime to be an undocumented immigrant in the state. After reading the text of the law, I was shocked that a state legislature AND a governor could enact a piece of legislation so clearly unconstitutional.
What is almost more disturbing than the law itself, is the statistic that one radio show touted: Seventy percent of Americans agree with Arizona’s law. My question is: what part of the law? Fixing a broken immigration system? Yes. Arresting people with “reasonable suspicion” that they are illegal which will undoubtedly lead to racial profiling? Not so much. This law is going to have disasterous consequences on many fronts. It is true that something needs to be done, but this is a horrible misguided effort.
Jon Stewart offers some humor on a very humorless situation:
Looking for the silver lining, maybe Arizona’s folly will finally breathe life into comprehensive immigration reform. One can only hope.
Edward M. Kennedy was a stalwart champion of immigration law. At the defeat of his immigration reform bill which failed to pass in 2007, he stated, “immigration is an opportunity to be true to our ideals as a nation. Our Declaration of Independence announces that all of us are created equal. Today, we failed to live up to that declaration for millions of men and women who live, work, and worship beside us. But our ideals are too strong to be held back for long.”
The Late Senator Kennedy with President Obama
His record on immigration related measures in the Senate is unparalleled:
1965
The first major bill that Senator Kennedy managed on the Senate floor was the Immigration Act of 1965. It was enacted and stood as a major turning point in immigration and civil rights policy because it eliminated discriminatory immigration quotas which favored European immigration, but restricted immigration from other parts of the world. The 1965 Act gave priority to immigrants based on their skills and family relationships.
1990
Senator Kennedy was also sponsor of the Immigration Act of 1990 to expand immigration quotas to reunite families in the U.S. and to meet economic needs, which was signed into law.
2005
Senator Kennedy also begins a four-year effort to achieve comprehensive immigration reform, including a legalization program for immigrants who have been working in the United States, a reduction of the backlog of petitions to unify immigrant families, a temporary worker program, and strict security to protect the nation’s borders.
2007
Following an immigration raid on a factory in Massachusetts, Senator Kennedy worked with the Department of Homeland Security to develop guidelines on humanitarian screening for workers arrested in such raids.
Unfortunately, Senator Kennedy did not live to see his dream of immigration reform become a reality. Click here to read the post by the American Immigration Lawyers Association which explains the loss the immigration community feels without this champion of immigrant rights serving his country. The country needs more immigration advocates who are willing to take a stand and speak out for immigrant rights and champion immigration reform, an issue which is politically charged, yet needs to be addressed.
Aung San Suu Kyi, photo by AP
By DENIS D. GRAY, Associated Press Writer Denis D. Gray, Associated Press Writer –
Tue Aug 11, 7:20 pm ET
BANGKOK – Myanmar’s generals have again succeeded in isolating democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, but her fleeting emergence during a grueling trial showed that her steely resolve and charisma remain intact.
A Myanmar court on Tuesday convicted the 64-year-old Nobel Peace laureate of violating her house arrest by allowing an uninvited American to stay at her home. Her sentence of three years in prison with hard labor was quickly commuted to 18 months house arrest after an order from the head of the military-ruled country, Senior Gen. Than Shwe.
To read the rest of the story in its original context, please click here.
Immigration Law in the News, Putting a Face on Immigration Law | melissa | 
June 14, 2011 10:48 am | 
Comments (23) 
Subscribe