Friday, February 26, 2016

AMNESTY FOR 40 MILLION MEX FLAG WAVERS? It is LA RAZA Hillary Clinton's vow to voting illegals - NO BORDERS, NO E-VERIFY, NO LAWS FOR ILLEGALS, NO ID REQUIRED OF VOTING ILLEGALS, AND MILLIONS OF JOBS and BILLIONS IN WELFARE JUST WAITING FOR THE NEXT WAVE OF BORDER JUMPING UNREGISTERED DEMS!


TIME TO END MEXICO'S LOOTING?

"As alarming as those numbers are, it's gotten a whole lot worse. It's the reason why in both 2013 and 2015 I introduced legislation, the "Remittance Status Verification Act," to fix this. I call this the "Wire Act" for short."

"My bill would require a fee on remittances for customers who wire money to another country but cannot prove that they are in the United States legally. The fee would be used to enhance border security. Basically, we would be able to dramatically improve border security while making illegal immigrants pay for it."

"We also have evidence that many of those illegals who are remitting money are more likely to be illegal immigrant households receiving Social Security, health care benefits, unemployment insurance and/or stimulus money. Is it really fair for those individuals to live off our tax dollars but send untaxed, under-the-table money abroad?"

ON TOP OF THESE FIGURES ADD THE TENS OF BILLIONS HANDED TO INVADING MEXICANS IN THE FORM OF WELFARE.

ON THE STATE LEVEL ALONE, MEXIFORNIA HANDS LA RAZA $30 BILLION IN SOCIAL SERVICES.

THE COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES CHIPS IN ANOTHER BILLION FOR THE LA RAZA ANCHOR BABY BREEDING FOR GRINGO WELFARE PROGRAM.

NOW..... HOW MUCH DOES THE MEX DRUG CARTELS HAUL BACK? SOME ESTIMATES PUT THE NUMBER AT $40 - $60 BILLION!

BLOG: IT IS ESTIMATED THAT THE COUNTY OF LOS 

ANGELES HAS A MEXICAN TAX-FREE UNDERGROUND 

ECONOMY CALCULATED TO BE IN EXCESS OF $2 

BILLION PER YEAR!


There are the billions of taxpayer dollars used to subsidize illegal immigrants' health care and education. There's the revenue we lose out on when illegal immigrants don't pay income taxes. And there's a less recognized pot of billions — the billions of dollars of earnings that illegal immigrants wire out of the United States with no tax or penalty.

 more here:

We need to crack down on illegal immigrants wiring money out of the U.S.: We need to crack down on illegal immigrants wiring money out of the U.S.






http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2016/02/why_is_everything_amnesty.html

Why is everything amnesty?

Senator Cruz and Rubio will argue a lot about amnesty in the next few days.  I guess that standing against amnesty has become the new flag that every GOP candidate wants to carry.

Yet who is actually calling for amnesty?  Or something like what President Reagan did in 1986?
Have they changed the definition of the word amnesty?  According to the dictionary, amnesty is "the act of an authority (as a government) by which pardon is granted to a large group of individuals."

Who is pardoning any group or letting people stay here without consequences?

The GOP should be for an immigration solution that enforces the law against employers and protects the border.  At the same time, what is wrong with offering some of those here a chance to stay here?  It would go like this:

BLOG: THAT JOB THAT "ALREADY EXISTS" BELONGS TO AN UNEMPLOYED LEGAL!
 
1) The illegal immigrant would be given a chance to apply for a work visa supported by an employer's letter that a job actually exists.

BLOG: LET US REVIEW OBAMA'S SABOTAGE OF OUR LAWS AND PROMISE OF NON-ENFORCEMENT!
 
2) He or she would undergo a full criminal background check including fingerprints.  We will also check with the home country to verify that the applicant is not married here and back home.

BLOG: LET US REVIEW OBAMA'S SABOTAGE OF OUR LAWS AND PROMISE OF NON-ENFORCEMENT!
3) The applicant will pay a fine for violating the law and or not filing tax returns.

BLOG: MEXICANS ARE A CRIME TIDAL WAVE AND OBAMA LETS THEM LOSE ON US WEEKLY!
4) He or she will be under a period of probation where the person could be deported in case of any violation of law.
5) No path to citizenship or green card will be available to this person.

BLOG: UNDER OBAMA AND HISPANDERING HOLDER, THE DEMS HAVE SABOTAGED E-VERIFY NATIONWIDE. AMNESTY IS ALL ABOUT KEEPING WAGES DEPRESSED AND BUYING THE ILLEGALS' VOTES WITH OUR JOBS AND BILLIONS IN WELFARE!
6) Employers will be harshly punished, including jail time, for hiring someone without papers.
How is that amnesty?  Who is getting off free for violating the law?

BLOG: "HUMAN ENFORCEMENT" HALF THE MURDERS IN LA RAZA-OCCUPIED MEXIFORNIA ARE BY MEXICANS! THERE HAVE BEEN MORE THAN 2,000 CALIFORNIANS MURDERED BY MEXICANS WHO FLED BACK OVER THE BOARD TO AVOID PROSECUTION. WE WILL NOT HEAR FROM THE PRO-AMNESTY GROUPS ABOUT THE VIOLENCE OF THE OCCUPYING MEXICANS!

 
We have been arguing about immigration for too long.  It's time to fix the problem rather than just shout at each other.  As Newt Gingrich said in 2012:
And I'm prepared to take the heat for saying, let's be humane in enforcing the law without giving them citizenship but by finding a way to create legality so that they are not separated from their families.
So let's stop shouting about immigration, settle the issue, and move to other topics, like ISIS and the U.S. economy.
P.S. You can listen to my show (Canto Talk) and follow me on Twitter.


Gang of Eight? What Gang of Eight?

By Mark Krikorian

The Corner at National Review Online, February 16, 2016

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/431394/rubios-immigration-excuses?target=author&tid=982

Marco Rubio’s excuse du jour for his central role in passing the monstrous Gang of Eight amnesty/immigration-surge bill is the most shameless yet: “Rubio: Gang of 8 Bill Never Intended to Become Law“. Coulda fooled me!

The Hill wryly noted “This represents a sharp departure for Rubio.”

I’ll say. In his final speech on the Senate floor before voting on S.744, Rubio concluded, “Here in America, generations of unfulfilled dreams will finally come to pass. And that’s why I support this reform.” Not sure how much clearer you can get.

Rubio’s latest excuse would have fooled Harry Reid too; he dedicated the bill to Ted Kennedy and said, when it passed, “And while I am sad that Senator Kennedy isn’t here to see history made, I know he is looking at us proudly and loudly.” Whatever that means, it sure doesn’t sound like he didn’t intend the Gang of Eight bill to become law.

Or Lindsey Graham, after the bill got 68 votes: “This is overwhelming support for the bill … This is incredibly pleasing.”

Pat Leahy didn’t seem to think the bill was just for show either: “Today is another historic day in the Senate. This legislation will reunite families. It will bring millions of people out of the shadows and into our legal system. It will spur job growth and reduce our deficit. And it will make us safer.”

Or Chuck Schumer: “The bill has generated a level of support that we believe will be impossible for the House to ignore.”

If I may steal a line from one of my Twitter followers, next thing you know Rubio will tell us it was really just the Gang of Seven all along.


TSA Airport Credentialing Process Overlooks Terrorists, Criminals, and Illegal Aliens on a Large Scale

By Dan Cadman
CIS Immigration Blog, February 16, 2016
. . .
Calculating those figures, it means that more than 16 percent of the individuals who were subjected to these secondary inquiries (which represent only a small fraction of the workforce) — and, as Roth notes, already recipients of airport clearances — were illegal aliens with no right to work. What's more, Roth also notes that airport authorities routinely fail to annotate their security credentials with the expiration date of aliens' employment authorization documents, meaning that such persons are routinely employed in sterile areas long past their legally authorized right to work.

Which raises the question: Why have rules not been written that simply preclude individuals with limited time authorizations on their work permits or, better yet, who are not legally authorized to live in the United States on a permanent basis, from being employed in secure areas of airports? Is this so onerous, given the importance of securing the safety of the traveling public?

But back to the immediate issue of TSA and its oversight of airport authorities doing the credentialing. There is obviously something seriously amiss.

Why, for instance, is E-Verify not being used in each and every application for credentialing?
. . .
http://www.cis.org/cadman/tsa-airport-credentialing-process-overlooks-terrorists-criminals-and-illegal-aliens-large-sca

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CUNY Devises H-1B Trick, NYT Cheers, DHS Will Probably Accept It
By David North
CIS Immigration Blog, February 18, 2016
. . .
What CUNY is doing, publicly, is approximately what Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio, did quietly. That resulted in such a scandal that two university employees were fired and the WSU Provost was demoted, as we reported earlier. In both cases, the universities used their power to obtain H-1B workers in unlimited numbers in order to benefit private, non-university corporations; at Wright State a member of the WSU Board of Trustees was president of one of the for-profit, benefitting corporations.

The immigration law allows universities, and university-connected entities to bring in H-1B workers outside the 65,000 and 20,000 ceilings — and the Obama administration has done yeoman service to expand the loophole. The connections are sometimes quite tenuous.

There is a long list of problems and potential problems with the CUNY scheme:
. . .
http://www.cis.org/north/cuny-devises-h-1b-trick-nyt-cheers-dhs-will-probably-accept-it

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5.
Another Embezzlement and Three Other Developments in EB-5 Land
By David North
CIS Immigration Blog, February 16, 2016
. . .
GAO quietly made this observation:

However, the study was not intended to address the program's costs which are important for assessing a program's net economic impact. Both USCIS and ESA officials confirmed the study would be an economic valuation which, unlike an evaluation considers only the benefits of economic activity, and does not assess the program costs. (Emphasis Added.)

The slippery term "valuation" is a new one to me in this context, but it fits neatly with the way DHS manipulates things in defense of this program. I can assure you that two of the real costs of the program will not be mentioned by the Department of Commerce, one obvious, and one quite obscure.

The obvious cost of the program is the moral one of selling membership in our society for half a million a pop.

The more obscure one is that, given the workings of immigration law, for every visa sold to a rich alien, a visa is denied to an alien in the first or second employment-based categories — that's where the really skilled immigrants are found. Were there to be a reduction in the number of applications for the EB-5 visas, the unused visas would "fall down" into the categories where one truly finds the best and the brightest.
. . .
http://www.cis.org/north/another-embezzlement-and-three-other-developments-eb-5-land

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6.
Schools Undergo Comprehensive Immigration Reform
By John Wahala
CIS Immigration Blog, February 19, 2016
. . .
Given the obstacles they face, the poor academic performance of immigrant students is not surprising and has been well documented. English-language fluency, test scores, and graduation rates lag far behind. Some researchers have even called the situation a crisis that threatens democracy itself. But more troubling than slow academic progress is the way mass immigration is shifting the educators' focus. When resources and time are diverted from teaching, the quality of education deteriorates. Learning becomes secondary when teachers are trying to keep children safe and well-adjusted.
. . .
http://www.cis.org/wahala/schools-undergo-comprehensive-immigration-reform

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7.
The Divisive, Political Pope
By Marguerite Telford
CIS Immigration Blog, February 18, 2016
. . .
The Catholic Church recognizes that sovereign nations have the right to control their borders and to enforce their laws. The U.S. system of legal immigration is the most generous in the world, allowing in over one million legal permanent immigrants annually, more than all the rest of the nations of the world combined. These numbers do not even include the hundreds of thousands of guestworkers, foreign students, and illegal immigrants offered temporary protected status, parole, or asylum. Our immigration ceilings are set through a democratic process and try to balance openness with the need to screen for national security purposes, to allow immigrants to assimilate, and to avoid disadvantaging American workers at a time of high unemployment, underemployment, stagnant wages, and increasing economic inequality.

Policymakers must recognize the facts about our immigration policy. They do not have the luxury of only measuring those coming across our borders "with names, stories, [and] families".

Pope Francis mistakenly declares, without any support from the Catholic Catechism, that the U.S. government, the majority of her citizens, the majority of America Catholics, and Mr. Trump are not Christian, as we do not support allowing tens of thousands of illegal aliens to flood across our border. The Church has encouraged it and, as the Pope pointed out this week, an enormous number of people have died making the trip and an even larger number have been victimized and injured, both physically and emotionally.
. . .
http://www.cis.org/telford/divisive-political-pope

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8.
Pope Francis and Immigration in Mexico
By Kausha Luna
CIS Immigration Blog, February 18, 2016
. . .
On Wednesday, the Pope headed to the northern border of Mexico. In Ciudad Juarez, a city that sits opposite El Paso, Texas, Pope Francis delivered the most anticipated message in terms of migration. During the homily, Pope Francis finally alluded to Central American migrants, "Here in Ciudad Juarez, as border zone, thousands of migrants from Central America and other countries are concentrated, without forgetting the many Mexicans who also look to pass 'to the other side,' a path, a pathway loaded with terrible injustices, enslaved, kidnapped, extorted, any of our brothers are the result of the business of human trafficking, trafficking in persons." He went on:
. . .
Originally, the Pope had planned to cross the border into the United States, which would have been an extremely political statement amidst the immigration debate in the United States. Even though he did not cross the border, Pope Francis managed to insert himself into the U.S. immigration debate. On the sixth and final day of his visit, just before returning to Rome, Pope Francis made one last statement on migration when asked about Donald Trump: "A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian."
. . .
http://www.cis.org/luna/pope-francis-and-immigration-mexico

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9.
Deportation Protesters Arrested after Blocking Chicago Street; Follow the Money
By Jerry Kammer
CIS Immigration Blog, February 17, 2016
. . .
The protest was organized by a group called Organized Communities Against Deportations, whose fiscal sponsor is the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (ICIRR). On January 1, shortly after the Department of Homeland Security announced plans to deport Central Americans whose asylum petitions have been denied, ICIRR received a $450,000 grant from the Marguerite Casey Foundation. The Seattle-based foundation's website says the grant was intended: "For leadership development and engagement of immigrant and refugee families in organizing and advocacy."

The grant award does not mention Organized Communities Against Deportations. But in January the ICIRR issued a press release declaring that it had "joined Organized Communities Against Deportations (OCAD), the National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC), and other community leaders this morning to condemn the new campaign of raids."
. . .
http://www.cis.org/kammer/deportation-protestors-arrested-after-blocking-chicago-street-follow-money

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10.
Mr. Clooney, Would You Be Willing to Welcome Refugees into Your Home?
By Nayla Rush
CIS Immigration Blog, February 16, 2016
. . .
When asked by the French journalist "Would you be willing to welcome refugees into your home?", Clooney replied:

Amal and I discussed it. It happens that no refugee can set foot in the United States, but we would be ready to do it. I spend two or three days a week trying to raise funds for Syrian refugees, this counts more than anything in my life, actually. I understand your suggestion but I have the impression I am dedicating a lot of energy and time to this cause. Simply because I am lucky. I am not a politician but one thing I can do is attract attention. (Emphasis added)

Is Mr. Clooney misinformed? Syrian refugees not only can and have come to the United States recently, the U.S. government has made arrangements for 10,000 more to arrive in FY 2016 (as he himself pointed out in the interview).

In any case, Mr. Clooney makes a valid point even if he is not quite up front about it. His message seems to be the following: he is deeply touched by this humanitarian crisis, and he wants to help but does not necessarily want his life disrupted. His answer is to raise funds in order to ease the plight of these refugees while keeping his own door closed. Who can blame him for that?
. . .
http://www.cis.org/rush/mr-clooneywould-you-be-willing-welcome-refugees-your-home

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11.
Border Surge Solution: Send ‘Em to Camp David!
By Michelle Malkin
Human Events Online, February 17, 2016
. . .
As Brandon Judd of the National Border Patrol Council testified on Capitol Hill recently: “The cartels understood that the unaccompanied minors would force the Border Patrol to deploy Agents to these crossing areas in order to take the minors into custody. I want to stress this point because it has been completely overlooked by the press,” he told the House Judiciary Committee. The unaccompanied minors could have walked right up to the port of entry and requested asylum if they were truly escaping political persecution or violence. “Why did the cartels drive them to the middle of the desert and then have them cross over the Rio Grande only to surrender to the first Border Patrol Agent they came across?” Judd challenged.

“The reason is that it completely tied up our manpower and allowed the cartels to smuggle whatever they wanted across our border.”

This is just another maddening example of Obama’s warped priorities at work. Instead of building effective walls and enforcing our borders to prevent the coming illegal immigration waves manufactured by criminal racketeers, this administration rushes to build welcome center magnets that shelter the next generation of Democrat voters.
. . .
http://humanevents.com/2016/02/17/border-surge-solution-send-em-to-camp-david/

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12.
GOP Baffled As Voters Rally to Popular Candidate
By Ann Coulter
Human Events Online, February 17, 2016
. . .
I wish he’d stop showing off, the little scamp, but maybe the GOP establishment will finally get the message that voters have been waiting a really long time for a candidate who would put Americans first. Not donors, not plutocrats, not foreigners, and certainly not foreign plutocrats (i.e., Fox News).

Trump is the first presidential candidate in 50 years who might conceivably: (1) deport illegal aliens, (2) build a wall, (3) block Muslim immigration, (4) flout political correctness, (5) bring manufacturing home, and (6) end the GOP’s neurotic compulsion to start wars in some godforsaken part of the world.

That’s all that matters! Are you listening yet, RNC?

There is not another candidate who agrees with Trump on all these positions. Maybe one issue, but not all of them — and if it’s immigration, they would be lying.

Even Ted Cruz still refuses to say he’d deport illegal aliens (unless they’re arrested for breaking some other law), build a wall (instead he talks about “border security,” which is code for: No Wall), or reduce legal immigration at all.
. . .
http://humanevents.com/2016/02/17/gop-baffled-as-voters-rally-to-popular-candidate/

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13.
Pope Francis Rips Capitalism, American Immigration Policy at Mexican Border
By Ben Shapiro
Breitbart.com, February 18, 2016
. . .
The reason for the humanitarian crisis driving people north is the corrupt anti-capitalist governance so common to Latin America – the same sort of governance the pope believes is apparently more godly than the capitalism drawing people like a magnet to the United States. So the same system the pope decries is the system the pope wants inundated with victims of those who oppose that system. How ironic. Even more ironic: the Vatican remains one of the most immigration-restrictive states on earth.

This is nothing new from Pope Francis, who has spent much of his tenure bashing capitalism and American border policy. Back in September, Pope Francis spoke on the National Mall, where he explained, “Thousands of persons are led to travel north in search of a better life for themselves and their loved ones, in search of greater opportunities. Is this not what we want for our own children? We need to avoid a common temptation nowadays: to discard whatever proves troublesome. Let us remember the Golden Rule: ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’”
. . .
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/02/18/pope-prays-for-migrants-at-mexican-border/

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14.
Pope Slimes Trump, Agitates for Open Borders
The liberation theology-loving pontiff thinks America is evil for having a border.
By Matthew Vadum
FrontPageMag.com, February 19, 2016
. . .
Although Vatican City, recognized as a sovereign nation, has very strict immigration controls, Francis spent Wednesday afternoon blasting U.S. immigration policy and condemning capitalism during a mass strategically located near the fence that separates Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, from El Paso, Texas. He previously hoped to make an even bigger spectacle of himself by walking in solidarity with other aliens across the border, but U.S. officials nixed that plan.

At the service Francis honored "migrants who have perished trying to reach the United States just a stone's throw away." The pope also blessed crosses beside "shoes of migrants who died," adding "No more death! No more exploitation!"

Sounding like a Marxist community organizer, Francis blamed U.S. immigration policies for causing a "humanitarian crisis" and declared that "the flow of capital cannot decide the flow of people."

The pope erected a cross in memory of border crossers who have died invading the United States.
. . .
http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/261885/pope-slimes-trump-agitates-open-borders-matthew-vadum

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15.
Trump and New Hampshire: It’s the Immigration, Stupid!
Investors Business Daily, February 10, 2016

After Donald Trump ran away with the New Hampshire GOP primary, the Huffington Post huffed: “NH GOES RACIST SEXIST XENOPHOBIC.” Nice try. Clearly Democrats are rattled. Trump threatens their open-borders schemes.
. . .
A Trump supporter recently summed up the concern to a reporter: “Who’s cutting off people’s heads? Who’s bombing buildings? Who’s bombing airplanes? It’s not the Christians, it’s not the Jewish, it’s not the Buddhists, it’s the Muslims. You got that, sport?”

Trump says the nation can’t take the risk of bringing more terrorists into the country, when the FBI can’t even handle the 1,000-plus terrorism cases it’s investigating now.

Democrats hope to twist such common-sense thinking into racism. Good luck with that. Trump won every demographic, and among both conservatives and independents.

Unlike any other candidate, Trump has locked into people’s anger over illegal immigration. It’s plain that the electorate is tired of being pushed around by multiculturalists and Islamic apologists in both parties.

If current trends continue, the U.S. will admit some 1 million new Muslim-origin immigrants over the next decade, plus hundreds of thousands of foreign Muslim students and guest workers.

That’s a death wish when you consider polls showing alarming shares of Muslim-Americans favoring violent jihad and the supremacy of Islamic law.
. . .
http://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/trump-and-new-hampshire-its-the-immigration-stupid/

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16.
U.S. Failed Three Times to Deport Illegal Alien Who Murdered Woman
Judicial Watch Corruption Chronicles, February 18, 2016
. . .
Here’s what we already know from local media reports in Norwich, the city of about 40,000 residents where the murder occurred; the DHS agency responsible for deporting illegal immigrants, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), failed to remove Jacques at least three times dating back to 2002. As if this weren’t atrocious enough, Jacques spent 17 years in prison for attempted murder before authorities released him—instead of deporting him—in January of 2015, the Norwich Bulletin reports. Six months later the 41-year-old illegal alien convict stabbed 25-year-old Casey Chadwick to death. Police said Chadwick died of sharp forced injuries to the head and neck. Jacques is being held on a $1 million bond.

Unfortunately, this is not an isolated case. In the last few years illegal immigrants with lengthy criminal histories have been allowed to remain in the U.S. despite being repeat offenders. Judicial Watch has investigated several of the cases and obtained public records from the government. For instance, back in 2008 JW launched a California public records request with the San Francisco Sheriff’s Department to obtain he arrest and booking information on Edwin Ramos, an illegal alien from El Salvador who murdered three innocent American citizens. Ramos was a member of a renowned violent street gang and had been convicted of two felonies as a juvenile (a gang-related assault on a bus passenger and the attempted robbery of a pregnant woman) yet he was allowed to remain in the country.
. . .
http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2016/02/u-s-failed-3-times-to-deport-illegal-alien-who-murdered-woman/

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17.
Pope Francis: Tear Down the Vatican Wall!
By John Nolte
Breitbart.com, September 24, 2015
. . .
And then there’s the issue of immigration.

Pope Francis urged Catholic bishops in the United States to open their doors to immigrants, asserting that “these people will enrich America and its Church.”

As a Latin American, the Pope apologized for “pleading my own case,” when speaking about the influx of Hispanic immigrants into the United States. He also thanked the bishops for the work they have done for immigrants in this country. …

“Perhaps you will be challenged by their diversity,” he said. “But know that they also possess resources meant to be shared. So do not be afraid to welcome them.”

The Pope also urged the bishops to offer immigrants “the warmth of the love of Christ.”

Again, I mean no disrespect but this is coming from a man who lives in a city-state completely surrounded, literally, by giant walls. Vatican City is a literal fortress.

What would happen to Vatican City if it was to do what Francis is asking America to do?

I’m assuming Pope Francis could order such a thing tomorrow, and after the walls came down he could also choose to greet the wave of “pilgrims” with the “warmth of the love of Christ.”

Of course Pope Francis would never do such a thing because he knows what would happen: Vatican City would be no more, everyone’s security and well-being would be compromised, and the standard of living for close to a thousand residents would be destroyed. Chaos would completely destroy the home of St. Peter.

Just as the loss of Vatican City would be detrimental to the world, so too will the loss of an America as we know it if our culture and free enterprise system is exploded into a giant welfare state by waves of immigrants embraced by mercenary, power-hungry Democrats desperate to use them to increase the power of the State.
. . .
http://www.breitbart.com/2016-presidential-race/2015/09/24/pope-francis-tear-down-the-vatican-wall/

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18.
Trump is Right, the Pope is Wrong:
Like it or not, one of the most loathsome public figures got the better of one of the most beloved
By Sarah E. Cupp
The New York Daily News, February 19, 2016
. . .
While one could certainly characterize Trump’s immigration policy as “unwelcoming,” there's nothing un-Christian about securing the border and protecting the homeland, even through the use of a wall. It’s why Vatican City originally erected walls. It’s why Jerusalem erected walls. It’s why Rome had walls. Does the Pope believe the only Christian approach is open borders? I doubt it, but if so, he’s pretty naive.

Furthermore, it seems seriously unfair to judge a political figure’s faith by his policies alone. By this standard, no war-time President would be considered Christian. No pro-abortion-rights President would be considered Christian. Is reforming welfare un-Christian? Is cutting entitlements?
. . .
http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/s-e-cupp-trump-pope-wrong-article-1.2537546

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19.
Scalia’s Impact on Patriotic Immigration Reform — in Life and Death
By John Reid
VDare.com February 16, 2016
. . .
I could go on and on about Scalia’s great legacy. But I want to now focus on the immediate implications of his death.

The good news: assuming the Republican-controlled Senate has the backbone to hold off confirming any Obama appointee for the remainder of the year, Scalia’s passing will not affect the two most important cases for VDARE readers: U.S. V. Texas (whether the Court upholds the 5th Circuit’s injunction against Obama’s executive Amnesty) and Fisher v. Texas (on the constitutionality of Texas’s Affirmative Action policies).

The 5th Circuit ruled against the Obama administration in U.S. vs. Texas, so if there is a 4-4 tie, its ruling stands. Ties do not create any national precedent, but the lower court’s ruling blocks the Amnesty nationwide.

In Fisher v. Texas, Elena Kagan has already agreed to recuse herself because, while serving as Obama’s Solicitor General, she had involved herself in the litigation. Thus the Court could strike down Affirmative Action in a 4-3 vote.

Of course, this does not mean that these cases will necessarily cone out that way. Roberts and Kennedy could vote with the liberals (though I’m not too worried about Roberts in Fisher.) However, if they switched votes, we would still have lost if Scalia were alive. (In Fisher, the Fifth Circuit ruled in favor of Affirmative Action, so if Scalia were alive and Kennedy voted with the liberals, the court would be deadlocked 4-4. However, unlike U.S. v. Texas, the lower court ruled in favor of Affirmative Action, so a tie would maintain it.)
. . .
http://www.vdare.com/articles/scalias-impact-on-patriotic-immigration-reform-in-life-and-death

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20.
The President Doesn’t Deserve an EZ-Pass in Replacing Scalia
By Betsy McCaughey
Family Security Matters, February 18, 2016
. . .
In 2007, New York Sen. Charles Schumer called on his Democratic colleagues to vote against any nominees proposed by George W. Bush, because Schumer feared the court was moving to the right. He said, "We should reverse the presumption of confirmation."

Fast-forward to 2016, and Schumer, Biden and Leahy have had a change of heart. They say Obama's nominee should be speedily confirmed without regard to politics. In Leahy's words, the Supreme Court is "too important to our democracy to be understaffed for partisan reasons." Hypocritical nonsense.

The danger is that some GOP Senators actually buy that baloney. When Obama nominated radical judicial activists Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, Lindsey Graham (R-SC) voted for them, saying the Senate should defer to the president on court nominees. On Sunday, Graham pledged that "if Hillary Clinton wins the White House and she puts a liberal who's well qualified, I'll vote for them."

As if senatorial courtesy trumps the survival of freedom.

The court, currently divided 4-4, is on the brink of an activist majority. An activist court will - for starters - perpetuate racial preferences, uphold amnesty for illegals, and concoct new "rights" as fast as they eviscerate conscience rights, the Second Amendment and the rest of our written Constitution.

If Obama replaces Scalia, it will be his third appointment to the court. What's to stop Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg or Stephen Breyer from retiring this fall, making way for a fourth or even fifth Obama appointment? That could reshape the court for 40 years.
. . .
http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/the-president-doesnt-deserve-an-ez-pass-in-replacing-scalia?f=immigration


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21.
One Decision Scalia’s Absence Likely Won’t Change? Immigration
By Siobhán O'Grady
ForeignPolicy.com, February 14, 2016
. . .
Hiroshi Motomura, a law professor at the University of California at Los Angeles, said he doesn’t expect Scalia’s death to have a significant impact on the outcome of the immigration case. Because Texas already won an injunction to freeze the program in lower courts, it will rely on conservative justices to ensure those earlier decisions prevail in the Supreme Court. A tie will automatically maintain the earlier freeze on implementing the program.

Motomura said he believes Scalia would not have voted to reverse the earlier decision, and that in general, “Scalia’s absence matters if and when he would have been a vote to reverse.”

“This means that reversal (thus, allowing DAPA to go into effect) would require five other votes, and his absence won’t change that fact,” he wrote to FP in an e-mail Sunday.
. . .
http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/02/14/one-decision-scalias-absence-likely-wont-change-executive-action-on-immigration/

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22.
Did Scalia's Death Just Win The Texas Immigration Case For Obama?
An interview with Randal Meyer, legal associate in the Cato Institute’s Center for Constitutional Studies
By Jared Meyer
Forbes.com, February 16, 2016
. . .
JM: Is it possible that the Supreme Court will still rule against President Obama’s executive actions on immigration?

RM: Dan Stein on SCOTUSBlog notes that “Even those Justices on the Court who might agree with the president’s views on immigration policy generally should appreciate the precedent-setting decision they would be making by allowing the president to run roughshod over the constitutional separation-of-powers doctrine.” So there is some chance that at least some of the liberal justices will “switch sides” to reign in presidential lawlessness, as executive authority can be wielded by both parties. For example, the 2014 decision in National Labor Relations Board v. Noel Canning, which voided President Obama’s so-called recess appointments, was unanimous.

But as of now, the four liberal justices are expected to side with the federal government and permit the president to unilaterally rewrite the law. If none of the conservatives join them—Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kennedy are possible targets for the government’s arguments—the best that can be expected is a 4-4 outcome, which creates no new law and affirms the lower court’s decision that sustained the injunction against DAPA. But even if the Court decides to hold this case over until there’s a ninth justice, that still means that the injunction stands into the next administration—at which point a Republican president would presumably scrap the plan, while a Democratic one would change it in some way that moots the case.
. . .
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jaredmeyer/2016/02/16/did-scalias-death-just-win-the-texas-immigration-case-for-obama/#6c9a376673de

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23.
Pope Francis: I'm Only a Material Guy
By Deborah C. Tyler
American Thinker Blog, February 19, 2016
. . .
The pope is a dream come true for the ruling class of Mexico. Francis is the world's preeminent bourgeois reactionary, exhorting people to skip the class struggle and reject the revolution. Just run away from your homes, families, and country and invade the United States. Plenty of people there insist that other Americans take care of you and your extended families.
. . .
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2016/02/pope_francis_im_only_a_material_goy.html

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24.
'El Papa' Embraces Raul Castro But Calls Donald Trump Anti-Christian!
By Silvio Canto, Jr.
American Thinker, February 19, 2016
. . .
As he left Mexico, Pope Francis made a terrible mistake by saying that Donald Trump is not a Christian. I am not sure if he was answering a question or speaking at a meeting. He had finished a Mass on the El Paso-Ciudad Juarez border.

First, El Papa should stay away from presidential elections, here, there, and everywhere.

Second, the Vatican is one gigantic place surrounded by walls.

Third, is a border now un-Christian? How did we get to the point that defending borders and promoting legal immigration is now inhumane?

Fourth, El Papa has given Mr. Trump a huge gift. I am not a Trump supporter, but I believe that the U.S. has every right to protect and defend its borders. I don't know whether building a wall from Laredo to San Diego is the best answer. However, it may work in some isolated regions currently used by cartels to bring drugs and people.

Last, but not least, El Papa just visited Cuba. He hugged and embraced Raúl Castro, a man who has executed priests, harassed religious leaders, and closed Christian schools years ago. Did he call the Castro brothers un-Christian?
. . .
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2016/02/el_papa_embraces_raul_castro_but_calls_donald_trump_antichristian.html

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25.
Trump, the Pope, and the Bible
By Rabbi Aryeh Spero
American Thinker, February 19, 2016
. . .
If it is un-Christian to engage in self-defense, then it is un-Christian to fight a defensive war. For sure, this is not a biblical attitude and, I imagine, not in sync with the Protestant outlook upon which this country was founded. In fact, acts of self-defense constitute not only virtue, but also morality. Morality is what we ought to do, and, first and foremost, we are required, in the name of personal responsibility, to meet our obligations toward those whom we have freely chosen in relationship. Mr. Trump has suggested not using weapons, but merely a static, non-aggressive wall to protect Americans who are pleading for protection. Up until now, nothing has worked; our borders are porous. A wall would be a major remedy.

Perhaps the good pope has not read of the dozens of Americans who have been physically harmed, their property invaded and trashed, and threatened by those crossing the border illegally. Worse, under the burden of caring for illegals, many communities, especially in rural areas, have been forced to shut down clinics and hospitals that have gone bankrupt and are made dysfunctional by schools no longer able to teach and educate due to the excessive burdens of unprepared newcomers.

I ask the pope the following question. No doubt, religion asks that we make sacrifices for others. But are those sacrifices to be so open-ended and so unpredictable that one is actually required to suffer…and have his children suffer? At stake here is not merely doing without certain luxuries and opulence; rather, it is actual suffering by tens of thousands of innocent Americans. The elites asking that we make these enormous sacrifices are not, nor their children, having to sacrifice to any similar degree.
. . .
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2016/02/trump_the_pope_and_the_bible.html

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26.
How The Left’s Immigration Tactics Created Donald Trump
Unapologetic liberal hegemony explains the rise of Donald Trump and the European Right.
By Greg Jones
The Federalist, February 15, 2016
. . .
Even after the Boston Marathon bombing, the San Bernardino shooting, and several would-be attacks fortunately intercepted by law enforcement, the administration insists that accepting even more refugees, this time from North Africa and the Middle East, is in America’s best interest.
. . .
Those who feel otherwise have been dismissed by left-wing mouthpieces as racists or right-wing terrorists, despite the fact that most simply insist the president enforce the law and put their interests above those from elsewhere. You know, do the job he was elected to do. Is it any wonder that Trump’s pledges to build a wall on our southern border and halt Muslim immigration, at least temporarily, are gaining steam?

The president and his ideological cronies have created a monster, and he has terrible hair. But rather than incurring the wrath of the mob himself, the monster is leading it straight to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, pitchforks in hand.

As Martin Luther King once said, “A riot is the language of the unheard.” This is a riot alright, albeit a moral and philosophical one, and those making the noise have been repeatedly rebuffed by an administration that feels it can run roughshod over a country that stripped it of both houses of Congress.

All animals, humans included, turn aggressive when threatened. Trump is merely Middle America’s way of flashing its fangs, a warning that if you keep it up, you might get bit.
. . .
http://thefederalist.com/2016/02/15/how-the-lefts-immigration-tactics-created-donald-trump/

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27.
Conservatives Beware of Immigration “Guru” Ron Hira
RedState.com, February 19, 2016
. . .
It might be understandable for a few progressive interlocutors to slip through the cracks with the presidential primary debate frenzy underway.

But the two left-wing activists Langer highlights, Ron Hira, a researcher at the George Soros-funded Economic Policy Institute (EPI), and Democratic operative Curtis Ellis have routinely been welcomed with open arms by Breitbart, WorldNetDaily, National Review, the Daily Caller, and others, including well before the intensity of primary season arrived.

Unfortunately, it’s not just conservative outlets that are giving them quarter. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has twice provided a platform as well to Mr. Hira, inviting him to testify first in 2013, and again as recently as last spring.

Is Mr. Hira, who recently became an associate professor at Howard University, the best expert conservatives can muster to point out what are otherwise important and needed areas of debate around temporary worker programs?

Let’s take a deeper look at Mr. Hira, who’s opposition to our guest worker programs offers intrigue for its motivations – and its personal hypocrisy.
. . .
http://www.redstate.com/diary/freedomlover1776/2016/02/19/conservatives-beware-immigration-guru-ron-hira./

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28.
Who Really Understands the Threatened End of Europe — Trump or Rubio?
By James Kirkpatrick
VDare.com, February 13, 2016
. . .
Rubio runs ads warning that “what happened in France could happen here.” But he seems utterly oblivious to how uncontrolled immigration enables Islamic terrorists to strike within Western societies.

Rubio epitomizes the common trend among Beltway Right operatives: compensate for their cowardice with eagerness to flaunt American military power abroad. Rubio’s foreign policy promises a return to the George W. Bush years. But geopolitically, Bush’s policies were a disaster. And domestically, they tarred Republicans in the eyes of the young as the “War Party.”

What’s more, the foundation for American power, and more broadly, Western power, is crumbling before our eyes. The sweeping demographic changes in Europe are a world-historical event. The homeland of Western Civilization, for all intents and purposes, may cease to exist within our lifetimes.

What happens to NATO when countries like the United Kingdom become Islamic, or start having Islamic parties in government? What happens to American military bases in Germany if anti-American Muslims start winning democratic elections? What happens to the nuclear weapons in an Islamic France?
. . .
http://www.vdare.com/articles/who-really-understands-the-threatened-end-of-europe-trump-or-rubio

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29.
Pope Should Read Bible, Catechism
By Bob Lonsberry
BobLonsberry.com, February 19, 2016
. . .
Which must come as a surprise to the 51 percent of Americans who, in the most recent poll, believe that a wall along the Mexican border is a good idea. Presumably those people did not realize that their political belief stripped them, in the eyes of the pope, of their religious standing and doomed them to an eternity in hell.
. . .
American immigration policy -- namely that one must come to our country in accordance with our law -- is exactly in step with the official teachings of the Catholic Church. A physical means to enforce the law -- a wall -- has no bearing upon that.

The pope was wrong in regard to the Catechism.

And he was wrong in regard to the Bible.
. . .
http://www.boblonsberry.com/writings.cfm?go=4

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30.
Making Sense of The Pope Versus Donald Trump
W. James Antle III
The Washington Examiner, February 18, 2016

Catholics are certainly willing to tolerate a disagreement between Trump and the pope, but some may not appreciate this kind of language. At least Trump didn't him a liar or have his lawyer send a cease-and-desist order (yet).

Catholic teaching on immigration is complex, the call to love thy neighbor is straightforward. Catholics aren't really called to some kind of open-borders ideology, as Trump supporters are likely to point out. And the pope didn't actually say it was illegitimate to build border walls. He said Christians should only be focused on building walls at the expense of building bridges, a metaphor as much as a reference to literal, physical walls.
. . .
http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-pope-and-donald-trump-1455840457

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31.
Univision News Howls 'Anti-Immigrant' at Proposed Wisconsin Laws
By Jorge Bonilla
NewsBusters.org, February 12, 2016

Univision News' national broadcast continues to howl at any legislative attempt to protect local communities by enforing our immigration laws. The latest instance comes from efforts in Wisconsin.

Wednesday evening's newscast featured a story about two enforcement proposals recently filed in Wisconsin: one to ban sanctuary city policies, and the other to ban local governments from issuing official alternate ID's to illegal immigrants.

Anchor María Elena Salinas' introduction to the story was less incendiary than her late-night counterpart, which we covered last week. The "anti-immigrant" framing was presented indirectly ("activists say"...), as opposed to Ilia Calderón's direct indictment of Florida's HB675 (which overwhelmingly passed the House but seems destined to die in the Senate). Nonetheless, the screengrab above (which reads "anti-immigrant proposals") reflects a reversion to classic form.
. . .
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/latino/jorge-bonilla/2016/02/12/univision-news-howls-anti-immigrant-proposed-wisconsin-laws

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32.
Immigration Law is Torn Between Administrative Law and Criminal Law
By Michael Kagan
Notice & Comment, February 12, 2016
. . .
Immigration law is now torn between two alternative paradigms, which compete with each other and with the vestiges of traditional plenary power. One alternative paradigm is certainly administrative law. In a sense, administrative law has been in the background all along. As Alina Das has observed, the government has increasingly turned to administrative law doctrines to shield its immigration decisions from judicial scrutiny. Where in the past the government might have cited the Chinese Exclusion Case, now the government will cite Chevron or Heckler.

But we should remember that plenary power declined in large part because the Supreme Court became less willing to tolerate the civil liberties costs that came with unrestrained government authority over individuals. This was the essential problem in Zadvydas. But if this is the central problem with plenary power, it is not clear that administrative law will be an entirely satisfactory replacement. Administrative law lacks the tools to cope with the loss of individual liberty which is intrinsic to immigration enforcement. (Prof. Das’s article does an excellent job illustrating this problem in the context of habeas review of immigration detention.)

To put it bluntly, the EPA, the FDA, the VA, the NLRB and the myriad other agencies that are the focus of administrative law do not operate private detention centers. By contrast, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detains more than 400,000 people per year. The draconian use of government force that is inherent in immigration enforcement raises a very different set of constitutional concerns than the regulatory contexts that produced Chevron, Skidmore, Overton Park, Auer, Brand X, and the other leading cases of administrative law. But that does not mean that immigration is an island unto itself. We do have very well developed legal doctrines to regulate deprivations of liberty like those involved in immigration enforcement. We call it criminal procedure. That is the other paradigm that now competes to drive the evolution of immigration law.
. . .
http://www.yalejreg.com/blog/immigration-law-is-torn-between-administrative-law-and-criminal-law-by-michael-kagan

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33.
Will Republicans Return to Reagan's Voice on Immigration?
By Javier Palomarez
CNN.com, February 17, 2016
. . .
While the policy solutions proposed here are striking -- work visas, open borders and the recognition that the United States should maintain good relations with Mexico -- what really sets this apart from the current discourse on immigration is the tone. Both Bush and Reagan spoke from a place of understanding and compassion, and they both went on to act on it -- Reagan won the Republican nomination, but Bush became his vice president, and eventually President.

In fact, as President of the United States, Reagan would later sign legislation creating a pathway to citizenship for 3 million undocumented immigrants. This act earned him the support of many in the Hispanic community, some of whom now vote Democratic, but remember and praise Reagan as the President who made it possible for them to stay in the United States, build lives here, start businesses and raise families. Their children are now voters, too.
. . .
http://www.cnn.com/2016/02/17/opinions/will-republicans-return-to-reagan-on-immigration-palomarez/index.html

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34.
Contraception, Immigration, and Hypocrisy
By A. Barton Hinkle
The Richmond Times-Dispatch, February 16, 2016
. . .
The two sides took the same stances in the various cases concerning whether bakers, photographers, and others who object to gay marriage on religious grounds should be forced to provide services for gay weddings. Conservatives said religious liberty trumped equal-protection guarantees; liberals said the opposite.

And then everybody switched.

Well, maybe not everybody — generalizations are dangerous. But plenty of people on the right started sounding like leftists, and plenty of those on the left started sounding like rightists. Why?

Illegal immigration.

As Christianity Today reported recently, “US Churches Defy Federal Law and Offer Sanctuary to Illegal Immigrants.” Federal immigration raids have prompted at least 50 churches across the country to take in scores of unlawfully present foreigners.

And boy, how the tunes have changed.

“U.S. Churches Offer Safe Haven For A New Generation Of Immigrants,” reported NPR, which characterized the action as “civil disobedience.” In November, it interviewed an undocumented immigrant who had been staying in a Texas church for 15 months. NPR really put the screws to her with hard-hitting questions about “how she would respond to people who say that sanctuaries like the ones she used shouldn’t be allowed” (“When I hear these words of hate, I don’t understand them,” she answered) and what she thought of “the objection that she has violated the law” (“I don’t really see it that way”).

The liberal ThinkProgress — a sharp critic of Hobby Lobby — has likewise painted the movement in golden hues with a paean to its “activist roots.” But it recognizes there are difficulties, too. For instance, “there is no single national organization dedicated to helping churches find a suitable sanctuary case.” Gosh, if only there were!

Arizona congressman Raul Grijalva, who denounced the Hobby Lobby ruling as a giant step backward, thinks the sanctuary church movement is wonderful: “It speaks to faith and it speaks to the humanity of this issue.”

Meanwhile, conservatives are not thrilled to see churches fulfill their God-given mission of helping the poor and downtrodden. “Do Churches Have a Responsibility to Turn over Illegal Immigrants?” asks Fox News, which helpfully introduces the topic by bringing up “The murder of Kate Steinle by illegal immigrant Francisco Sanchez.”
. . .
http://www.richmond.com/opinion/our-opinion/bart-hinkle/article_09f487cc-883c-5af5-996d-a1618da05fd8.html

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35.
Marco Rubio’s Immigration Fog: His Stance on His Own Reform Legislation is Impossible to Discern
Marco Rubio worked feverishly to pass an immigration reform bill that he also says was never meant to be a law
By Simon Maloy
Salon.com, February 16, 2016
. . .
At one level, Rubio was just stating the obvious: very few bills passed by either house of Congress make it to the president’s desk without going through some significant changes. As it was poised to pass the Senate, though, Rubio specifically addressed conservative critics of the legislation and told them that while it obviously wasn’t their idea of the perfect immigration bill, it was conservative enough and merited passage. “I realize that in the end, many of my fellow conservatives will still not be able to support this reform,” Rubio said. “But I hope you will understand that I honestly believe it is the right thing for our country. To finally have an immigration system that works, to finally have a fence, more agents and E-Verify, and to finally put an end to de facto amnesty.”
. . .
http://www.salon.com/2016/02/16/marco_rubios_immigration_fog_his_stance_on_his_own_reform_legislation_is_impossible_to_discern/

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36.
Immigrants Are Assets For Innovation
By Vijay K. Mathur
Huffington Post, February 15, 2016
. . .
In this blog I discuss the impact of immigrants on innovation and productivity. Immigrants are self-selected people. In general, in free societies like the US, where there is opportunity and encouragement for individual achievement, immigrants are willing to take risks by moving to a different country with different cultural, economic, political, social and institutional environments with uncertain future prospects for economic survival and success. However, the attitude toward risk taking is an essential ingredient for innovations.

Research by Peter Moser et al., American Economic Review, 104(10), 2014, shows that Jewish émigré scientists, who were forced out of their professions by Nazi Germany, revolutionized US innovations. Moser finds that "US inventions increased by 31 percent after 1933 in fields of German émigrés." This inventive activity, evidenced by patent activity in chemical fields, increased not only due to entry of new researchers in the fields of émigrés but also due to research collaborations with the émigrés. This spillover effect affirms other research on human capital. Innovations provide a fertile ground for jobs creation and employment opportunities.
. . .
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/vijay-k-mathur/immigrants-are-assets-for-innovation_b_9228290.html

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37.
Immigration Tussle Shows Why Bernie Sanders is Leading Hillary Clinton
By Jon Healey
The Los Angeles Times, February 12, 2016

This all-or-nothing approach simply doesn't work in Washington, and Sanders acknowledges as much on his site. While he pledges to act unilaterally to prevent the deportation of relatives of citizens and lawful permanent residents, the rest of those in the country illegally will have to wait for the "political revolution" needed to pass legislation giving them a path to citizenship. Good luck with pulling that off in the majority of state legislatures that Republicans control today and are likely to control for years because they hold the power to draw congressional districts.
. . .
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/la-ol-bernie-sanders-immigration-uncompromising-20160212-story.html

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38.
Mrs. Clinton’s Mixed Immigration Message
The New York Times, February 12, 2016

In Thursday night’s Democratic debate, Hillary Clinton defended her past statements that Central American migrant children needed to be sent home from the border to “send a message” to other families: Don’t come.

Wrong answer — which Bernie Sanders immediately pointed out.
. . .
Over the years, Mrs. Clinton has shown an unfortunate tendency to oscillate between harshness and compassion on immigration questions. She seems to reach instinctively for the tougher-sounding policy before coming around, eventually, to positions that more closely reflect American ideals of welcome — ideals that Mr. Sanders voiced fluently on Thursday night.
. . .
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/13/opinion/mrs-clintons-mixed-immigration-message.html

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39.
Pope Francis Joins the 2016 Race at Key Time
By Elizabeth Dias
Time.com, February 18, 2016
. . .
Pope Francis’ words inject sharp focus about immigration into the presidential campaign, but his critique is larger than Trump. The pope called out any politician who aims to build walls not bridges, which would implicate other GOP presidential candidates such as Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. His words force all the candidates, especially Republicans, to take note of his broader perspective on immigration.
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http://time.com/4229473/pope-francis-donald-trump-analysis/

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40.
A Little Reality on Immigration
By David Brooks
The New York Times, February 19, 2016
. . .
There are more Mexicans leaving the United States than coming in. According to the Pew Research Center, there was a net outflow of 140,000 from 2009 to 2014. If Trump builds his wall, he’ll lock more Mexican immigrants in than he’ll keep out.

Trump plays up the alleged threat of crime committed by immigrants. But the overall evidence is clear. Immigrants make American streets safer. Roughly 1.6 percent of immigrant males between ages 18 and 39 wind up incarcerated, compared with 3.3 percent of native-born American men of the same age. Among native-born men without a high school diploma, about 11 percent are incarcerated. Among similarly educated Mexican, Guatemalan and Salvadoran men here, only 2 or 3 percent get incarcerated.

One study of 103 cities between 1994 and 2004 found that violent crime rates decreased as the concentration of immigrants increased. Numerous studies have shown that a big share of the drop in crime rates in the 1990s is a result of the surge in immigration.

Trump plays up the threat of terrorism. But the real threat is that our border agencies spend so much time tracking down people who want to be gardeners that they don’t have the resources to track down the people who want to be suicide bombers. Fighting terrorism by going after the whole swath of immigration policy is like fighting germs with a sledgehammer.
. . .
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/19/opinion/a-little-reality-on-immigration.html

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41.
The Pope and Donald Trump
The Wall Street Journal
February 18, 2016

Mr. Trump called it “disgraceful” to have his faith questioned this way. Characteristically, he also took the occasion to double down on his complaints about Mexican emigration to the U.S., and he fired back that if the Vatican is attacked by Islamic State, the pope would have “wished and prayed” Mr. Trump had been President.

But he’s right on the main point: Pope Francis was wrong—on many levels—to question Mr. Trump’s Christianity. To start with, Americans naturally resent a foreign leader who uses his office to introduce a religious test into American politics. We say this even though on the substance of immigration and

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