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May 13, 2008
Immigrant Assimilation — Good News or Bad News? Today’s Washington Post reports “Study Says Foreigners In U.S. Adapt Quickly.” The lead-in sentence is, “Immigrants of the past quarter-century have been assimilating in the United States at a notably faster rate than did previous generations, according to a study released today [by the Manhattan Inst.].” If you read far enough down in the article to find out that this report raises red flags. “Vigdor [a Duke University professor and author of the study] also said his findings included cause for concern: most notably, the fact that the 2006 assimilation index of 28 is less than the previous low point of 42 in 1920. The difference indicates the substantial change in the composition of today's immigrants compared with earlier immigration waves.” [FAIR Comment: The dichotomy between this headline good news and the red flags sounds like the fact that any group that starts at a very low number does not have to move very far up the scale to be double or triple the starting point, i.e. you only have to add one to one to increase by 100 percent. And it sounds as if the assimilation scale created by the author starts most of today’s immigrants much lower on the scale than earlier immigrants.] Sen. Obama Courts Latinos with Driver’s Licenses According to the head of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF), Illegal Alien Raid at Iowa Kosher Meat-Packer A raid by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents yesterday apprehended about 300 Temporary Workers Denied Transportation IDs "A German graduate student in oceanography at M.I.T. applied |
"Clinton and (Sen. John) Edwards have said no driver's licenses for unauthorized immigrants. Sen. Obama has said you get a driver's license if you know how to drive. And that message I think will resonate in the Latino community as we get closer to California." According to Federico Pena, former Denver mayor and Clinton cabinet member, "Barack Obama has not backed down [on driver's licenses for illegal immigrants]. I think when the Latino community hears Barack's position on such an important and controversial issue, they'll understand that his heart and his intellect is [sic] with Latino community." This position of Sen. Obama contrasts with Sen. Clinton’s position. After she sided with New York governor Spitzer in his decision to allow driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants, she reversed course and opposed that policy after Spitzer announced that he had backed off that decision.
illegal workers at the nation's largest kosher slaughterhouse and meat-packing plant, Agriprocessors Inc. in Postsville, Iowa. According to the USA Today account of the raid, the agents also found evidence of a methamphetamine lab at the site and weapons. An estimated 80 percent of the plant’s workforce was composed of illegal alien workers.
to the Transportation Security Administration for a new ID card allowing him to work around ships and docks. What the student, Wilken-Jon von Appen, received in return was a letter that not only turned him down but added an ominous warning from John M. Busch, a security administration official: “I have determined that you pose a security threat.” Similar letters have gone to 5,000 applicants across the country who have at least initially been turned down for a Transportation Worker Identification Credential, an ID card meant to guard against acts of terrorism, agency officials said Monday," the New York Times reports. "Ms. Howe and Maurine Fanguy, who oversees the new ID card program, said that most foreign students did not qualify for the identity cards, but that the letters were not intended to label the recipients as potential terrorists. (Some applicants are also turned down because of criminal records.)"