This week’s Immigration Blog Roundup will cover new research on immigration and the economy, immigration policy, state news, and more…
A report released by the Fiscal Policy Institute shows the importance of immigrants to the economy. In a study of the 25 largest metropolitan areas of the U.S., research shows that immigrants, documented and undocumented contribute to GDP proportionally to their share of the population. Read the full report here (PDF).
New public opinion research by the Pew Research Center shows that while there is a large percentage of people that favor stronger border/immigration enforcement, there is a consistently strong majority of people (63%) that favor a legal path to citizenship for undocumented people living in the United States.
The debate as to whether undocumented immigrants should be included in comprehensive immigration reform continues. In the case of California, approximately one in six people will be excluded from a plan that does not account for undocumented immigrants. Immigrant advocates maintain that taxpayers will ultimately end up paying- last year California spent $1.2 billion because it cannot turn away patients based on their immigration status.
Under the Dream Act, Wisconsin has become the 11th state to offer in-state tuition to undocumented immigrants that have lived in Wisconsin for at least three years, graduated from a Wisconsin High School or have earned an equivalency degree.
In Texas, a peaceful demonstration in observance of International Human Rights Day on December 10th will be held outside of GEO Group, a private prison company that manages the Reeves County Detention Center where two prisoners died last year and sparked two uprisings at the facility.
The Immigration Policy Center‘s new research on the impact of immigrants, Latinos, and Asians in Iowa:
-The purchasing power of Latinos totaled $2.4 billion and Asians totaled $1.7 billion in 2007.
-Unauthorized immigrant families in Iowa paid between $42 million and $62 million in state and local taxes in 2007.
-If all unauthorized immigrants were removed from Iowa, the state would lose $1.4 billion in expenditures, $613.4 billion in economic output, and approximately 8,819 jobs.
Read summary and full report (PDF).
A Tucson, Az. federal court’s mass ciminal investigation hearings have been deemed unlawful. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled that the court has violated Rule 11 which requires that each defendant be read their rights and given an explanation of what a guilty plea means.
Lastly, Several recent reports have documented the failings of our expensive and highly flawed immigration detention system. Using government data obtained and analyzed by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) of Syracuse University, Human Rights Watch has just released research documenting the staggering 1.4 million detainee transfers in the last 10 years. The Constitution Project has also issued a report (PDF) detailing their recommendations for reforming our broken Immigration Detention System.