WASHINGTON (April 2008) — A new report from the Center for Immigration Studies demonstrates that most H-1Bs are ordinary people doing ordinary work, not the geniuses claimed by industry lobbyists.

Those arguing for an increase in the number of H-1B visas (ostensibly temporary visas for ’specialty occupations,’ many of them in the computer industry) claim that continued U.S. leadership in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics hinges on our ability to import the world’s best engineers and scientists. But this new data analysis shows that the vast majority of H-1B workers — including those at most major tech firms — are not the innovators industry portrays them to be.

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WASHINGTON (March 2008)* — While presidential candidates promise to secure the border, the other major source of illegal immigration is largely ignored — lax visa policies. Visa overstays account for between one-quarter to one-half of the illegal-alien population, and fencing, unmanned aerial vehicles, National Guard patrols, etc., are irrelevant to controlling this part of the immigration problem.

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

Mexican local and national government seems unwilling to crack down on continual gang-related drug violence. Certainly, many illegals are just seeking jobs in the U.S., but when did America become responsible for solving Mexico’s rampant corruption and unemployment problems? Certainly, a good number of illegals are drug gang members seeking to acquire turf and revenue in the U.S. Read the following, then think about whether the U.S. should have an open-door immigration policy:

Mexican medical investigators are working to identify four burned bodies discovered on a ranch near the Mexican border town of Palomas, which is across the border from Columbus, New Mexico. …

The latest violence in the border town of 8,000 came the day after the town’s chief of police requested U.S. asylum saying that he feared for his safety.

Luna County deputies and border patrol officials said that Chief Emilio Perez was under the protections of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

Also last week, Colmbus Mayor Eddie Espinoza reported he had been getting a root canal in a Palomas dental office when two armed man burst in and robbed the dentist.

Officials believe the surge in violence in and around Palomas signals an escalation of a turf battle by rival drug gangs along the U.S-Mexico border.

DOH! Notice that the Palomas police chief didn’t ask the Mexican government for asylum.

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

“The Dutch government is set to impose a ban on the Muslim burqa in schools and government offices,” reports Reuters. While some argue this is strictly a safety issue — a prophylactic against terrorists who would hide bombs under the Islamic head-to-toe women’s coverall — there is more to the ban: a very subjective, non-”practical” side. This is about cultural reassertion (preserving liberal democracy) as much or more so than it is about pragmatism (preventing bombings).

Many Dutch believe their European roots are being threatened by all their new Muslim immigrants. Their concerns are based in firm reality, e.g., the savage murder of Theo van Gogh in downtown Amsterdam. Many Muslims have expected that their host countries will adapt (submit) to them, as opposed to them assimilating European values (e.g., where stoning your wife is illegal, where drawing a picture of a religious figure is not punishable by death, where other religions are tolerated, etc.).

Yes, this is a limitation on free expression, but in a war to preserve civilized values, a necessary one.

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By Steven A. Camarota

The debate over immigration has become one of America’s most heated. In a new report published by the Center for Immigration Studies, we provide a detailed picture of the nation’s immigrant population. Our conclusions will probably not surprise most Californians: First, legal and illegal immigration is at record levels. Second, immigrants are generally hardworking, yet they create enormous strains on social services. Why? Put simply, many are uneducated.

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By Phyllis Chesler

Last night I finally saw the film based on Khaled Hosseini’s novel The Kite Runner. I loved it—yes, even if it captures a pre-Taliban country more mythical than real. Nevertheless, the musical soundtrack, the recitation of classical poetry, the innocent kite-flying competitions in Kabul, (not to mention Homayoun Ershadi who strongly resembles Marcello Mastroianni), all comprise utterly charming scenes and characters carefully chosen and calibrated to help us distinguish between sophisticated and westernized Afghans who are non-violent, (I know many), and the barbarians amongst them.

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By Phyllis Chesler

Aqsa Parvez, the tragic sixteen year old slain by her father in an honor killing in Canada, was buried secretly and privately. Her teenage friends arrived hours too late at the Islamic Center where they had been told her funeral would take place. The kind of family and culture capable of honor murder (she and her family are all Pakistani immigrants) is also quite capable of denying her Canadian friends the opportunity of paying their last respects.

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New Study Looks at Agricultural Labor Force

By CIS

WASHINGTON (November 2007) — A new Backgrounder from the Center for Immigration Studies challenges assertions by farmers and the media that crops are rotting in the fields for lack of workers. Philip Martin, a professor of agricultural and resource economics at the University of California, Davis, examines workers’ wages, farmers’ earnings, and the prospects of mechanization.

The full report, entitled Farm Labor Shortages: How Real? What Response?, is available at:
http://www.cis.org/articles/2007/back907.html

Among the findings:

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

The Left would have you believe that opposing illegal immigration makes you a “racist,” but according to a story in the Albuquerque Journal, “Many Hispanics are among the strongest opponents of illegal immigration.” Here’s more:

…But more than half of Hispanics say that the United States has too many immigrants from Latin America. …

These viewpoints have a voice on the national level with You Don’t Speak for Me, a Hispanic group appalled at what they see as anti-American acts by the pro-immigration movement.

Al Rodriguez, a retired U.S. Army colonel, said he started the organization in May 2006 when he saw pro-immigrant marchers take down American flags.

“That’s what really hurt me as I’m a military retiree,” he said. “I said, ‘Well, wait a minute, these folks aren’t speaking for us.’ ”

Rodriguez said his group quickly grew to more than 5,000 members. …

Of course, the usual suspects label people like Rodriguez as “traitors” (Uncle Toms).

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New Estimate Shows Another 1.4 Million Family Members Could Also Stay

By Mark Krikorian, CIS

The Senate is currently considering the DREAM Act (S.2205). Some have argued that only 60,000 illegal immigrants would be granted amnesty annually under the Act, but a new analysis by the Center for Immigration Studies of 2007 Census Bureau data shows millions of potential beneficiaries.

# An estimated 800,000 illegal immigrants under age 17 have been here long enough to qualify for legalization under the DREAM Act. There are a total of 1.7 million illegal aliens estimated to be under age 17.

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By Andrew L. Jaffee

As Hillary moves towards the political middle, her lead in the polls over her Democratic rivals has widened, and her rivals have moved further left. Hillary is smart enough to know that America’s strength lays in the center. Her Democratic rivals are just, well, plain loons. Here’s Edwards:

Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards has spent two weeks questioning Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s judgment in voting to declare the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization. On Sunday, he questioned her sincerity. Last month, Clinton was one of 75 senators who voted for a resolution giving the president the authority to call the guards terrorists. She has characterized the vote as a way to gain leverage for U.S. negotiations with Iran, but some of her rivals, including Edwards and Sen. Barack Obama, argue it amounted to giving Bush another blank check to go to war. …

The Revolutionary Guard IS a terrorist organization. Edwards position will gain him about as many votes as Obama’s foolish call for “allowing illegal immigrant students to receive college aid.”

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By Mark Krikorian*

There are two questions to consider when deciding whether to stop welcoming illegal aliens. First, do we even need the flow of labor that illegal immigration represents? And second, whatever immigration policy we do adopt, can it be enforced if we make it easy to live here illegally, as we do now?

The answer to both questions is No.

There is no economic need for foreign labor, legal or illegal. There are an estimated 12 million illegal aliens in the United States, with perhaps 7 million of them in the labor market — either working or actively looking for work. But contrary to myths about “jobs Americans won’t do,” there is no major job category that is dominated by these illegal workers. The Census Bureau groups all jobs in the country into 473 categories, and in 2003-2004, only three small categories had even the tiniest majority of immigrant workers, legal and illegal. The large majority of America’s taxi drivers, housekeepers, janitors, dishwashers, landscapers and construction laborers are native-born Americans.

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by Uriya Shavit*

The veil has become the center of a European fight over how to balance expressions of Muslim identity with the Western idea of citizenship.[1] How can states achieve a balance between republicanism and minority rights? Can majorities in liberal, Western nation-states, force a dress code upon minorities? While Muslim societies have debated various garments and coverings for women through the twentieth century,[2] the issues are broader. Often, Muslim commentators in the West couch their arguments in the Western discourse of the balance between individual rights and public interest.[3] However, the personal freedom versus integration debate is only one context of the polemic; another is the dichotomy between two types of nationality and between two sources of legitimacy. Here, Muslim scholarship on migration sheds more light than Western political theory.

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By Mark Krikorian*

(Click here to read “Fixing Immigration”)

I was delighted to see Yuval Levin engage the issue of immigration, particularly its most basic element — the shape of our policy for legal immigration — rather than the conceptually simpler matter of enforcement. I also welcome some of Mr. Levin’s specific recommendations, especially that family-based immigration should extend only to the nuclear family and that assimilation into American society should be given a higher priority.

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New Report Takes Detailed Look at Different Levels of Admissions

WASHINGTON (August 30, 2007) — A new report from the Center for Immigration Studies projects how different levels of immigration would impact the future size of America’s population. The findings, carefully modeled on earlier projections by the Census Bureau, show that the current level of immigration will add 105 million to the population by 2060, while having a small effect on the aging of society.

The report, entitled ‘’100 Million More: Projecting the Impact of Immigration on the U.S. Population, 2007 to 2060,'’ will be online at http://www.cis.org. Among the other findings:

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