In today’s immigration news: Democrats and Republicans play politics with immigrant lives; Haitian deportations; falling numbers of border crossings; more
The Biden administration and Senate Democrats are pushing another border bill. This will likely amount to just more campaign positioning, as Republicans will not allow it to come to pass, even in the Senate. But the bottom line message is real: many Democrats are willing to bar asylum seekers to win votes in November.
[New York Times] “Among other changes to immigration law, the measure would make it more difficult to gain asylum in the United States and increase detentions and deportations of those crossing into the country without authorization. It would also effectively close the border altogether if the average number of migrants encountered by immigration officials exceeded a certain threshold — an average of 5,000 over the course of a week or 8,500 on any given day. The bill also would give the president power to close the border unilaterally if migrant encounters reach an average of 4,000 per day over a week.
“While crossings have fallen substantially in recent months, the average number per day over the month of March far exceeded those thresholds, at just over 6,000, according to Customs and Border Protection.”Trump’s deportation plans target 11 million undocumented U.S. residents, the vast majority of whom have lived here for more than a decade. Apart from the gratuitous cruelty, such a mass deportation would also sweep up U.S. citizens and would leave millions of U.S. citizen spouses and children with the cruel choice of abandoning spouse/parent or country.
But that’s not all. Such a mass deportation would cripple the U.S. economy.
[Washington Monthly] “Despite the popular misconception that most of these unauthorized immigrants are farm workers, only 4 percent, or 283,000, work in agriculture. Mass deportation would be particularly damaging to the construction industry, which employs 1.5 million or 21 percent of all working unauthorized immigrants, and hospitality companies, which employ 1.1 million or 16 percent. Another 1 million or 14 percent of working unauthorized immigrants have jobs providing professional, scientific, technical, or administrative services; 10 percent or 714,000 work in manufacturing; and 8 percent or 570,000 have jobs in retail. …
“Doing the math, we find that a mass deportation program could depress national wage and salary income by $317.2 billion or 2.7 percent of labor income in 2023. This would be a much larger percentage loss than during the 1980, 1991, and 2002 recessions. It also would be more than half the 5 percent decline in 2009 at the height of the Great Recession. By these measures, too, a severe recession would likely accompany Trump’s draconian program.
“There would be more costs because a mass deportation program could revive inflation.”
And in other news
The United States continues to deport Haitians back to a country that is ungoverned and wracked by crime.
[Al Jazeera] “The United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) has called on the United States to stop forcibly returning Haitians to their home country, which is facing a months-long surge in gang violence and continued political instability.
“In a social media post on Friday, UNHCR urged US President Joe Biden’s administration “to refrain from forcibly returning Haitians who may face life-threatening risks or further displacement” in the Caribbean nation.”
Border crossings continued dropping in April.
[Border Report] “The El Paso Sector of the U.S. Border Patrol reported 30,393 migrant encounters in April compared to 30,421 in March, a difference of only 28 apprehensions. In all the Southwest border, surrenders and apprehensions fell by 8,583, or more than 6 percent.
“Since Oct. 1, though, El Paso has seen a 41 percent decrease compared to the first seven months of the record Fiscal Year 2023, in which the sector led the country in migrant encounters.”
One more immigration related poll: this one shows Americans opposed to massive detention camps.
[Reuters] “About half of U.S. voters oppose putting immigrants in the country illegally into detention camps while awaiting deportation, a new Reuters/Ipsos poll shows, suggesting Americans may be wary of harsher enforcement plans Donald Trump is considering.
“Some 54% of registered voters opposed the use of detention camps while 36% supported such a move and 10% said they did not know or did not respond, the poll found. Still, 56% said most or all immigrants in the U.S. illegally should be deported.”
A federal judge in California ordered limits on ICE enforcement tactics.
[Courthouse News] “A federal judge this week ordered U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to stop using so-called knock-and-talk tactics, a method for immigration arrests in which field officers enter a property without a judicial warrant or consent, then arrest undocumented immigrants when they come to the door.
“In a decision on Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Otis Wright II, a George W. Bush appointee, said the practice amounts to “knock-and-arrest” and violates Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures. These protections, he noted, include the curtilage around one’s home, such as yards and porches that are part of the property.
“By entering this curtilage armed with only an administrative arrest warrant — not a judicial one — immigration officers were violating these protections, Wright said. He noted that while officers pretended they only wanted to talk when they knocked, the real purpose was making immigration arrests.”
Last week the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments on the floating barrier that Texas installed in the Rio Grande river.
[Houston Public Media] “The full bench of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments Wednesday in a case involving a controversial effort by Texas to crack down on illegal immigration. The case involves a floating wall the state has installed on the Rio Grande to keep people from entering the country from Mexico.
“Texas Gov. Greg Abbott ordered the installation of the 1,000-foot floating wall last summer as a part of Operation Lone Star, Abbott’s border security initiative. At the district court level, attorneys for Texas invoked the argument that the Constitution allowed states to guard against “invasion,” in this case by people migrating across the U.S.-Mexico border illegally. The lower court denied the self-defense argument.
“Arguing before the 5th Circuit, attorneys for both Texas and the U.S. Department of Justice largely focused on the question of whether the floating barrier violates the Rivers and Harbors Appropriation Act of 1899. That law bans the creation of any obstruction of a navigable waterway unless approved by Congress and permitted by the Army Corps of Engineers.”
Immigration news 