Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., this week said Senate Republicans are “committed to helping the president get wall funding” during the lame duck session. The Senate included $1.6 billion for wall funding in its 2019 spending bill for the Department of Homeland Security but McConnell wants to match the $5 billion figure set by the House Appropriations Committee.
Polling consistently shows that U.S. voters want to reduce the level of annual immigration. NumbersUSA polling in mid-term battleground states found that in all 25 states polled, a strong majority of likely voters prefer cuts to immigration over continuing to hand out one million lifetime work permits annually.
Vice President Mike Pence called on the leaders of the Central American counties that make up the Northern Triangle to take more steps to discourage illegal immigration to the United States. Many of the illegal border crossers in recent years have come from the Northern Triangle countries that include Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala, including the majority of family units and unaccompanied alien children apprehended at the border.
Children born to illegal-alien parents cost U.S. taxpayers $2.4 billion each year according to a new report from the Center for Immigration Studies. The report concludes that of all births likely paid for by U.S. taxpayers, $5.3 billion is spent each year on children born to illegal alien or immigrant parents.
A federal judge in San Francisco placed a temporary injunction against the Trump Administration's actions to end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for approximately 300,00 illegal aliens. Judge Edward Chen ruled on Wednesday that TPS recipients from El Salvador, Haiti, Nicaragua and Sudan would suffer irreparable harm and hardship if the status is terminated.
Under Trump Administration policy, those with expired F-1 student visas who are waiting for approval of a H-1B visa application can no longer work after October 1st. This "cap-gap" rule will force thousands of foreign graduates with degrees in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM) to cease working under the Optional Practical Training (OPT) program or risk accruing "unlawful presence."
National Public Radio reports the Trump Administration is considering stripping asylum status from those who won it fraudulently. During a 2012 investigation into New York asylum mills, federal prosecutors arrested 30 immigration lawyers, paralegals and interpreters who had enabled asylum-seekers to acquire benefits fraudulently. The 3,500 asylees they helped, and possibly more than 10,000 family members who obtained “derivative asylum status,” could be deported if officials find fraud occurred.
Orange County Superior Court Judge James Crandell ruled that California’s law limiting police cooperation with ICE violates Huntington Beach’s status as a charter city under the state constitution. The ruling makes Huntington Beach and California’s other 120 charter cities exempt from complying with the state sanctuary law.
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau announced the arrest of criminal aliens and immigration violators in North Texas and Oklahoma (98), Wisconsin (83), and the Los Angeles area (150). Commenting on the arrests by the Chicago Enforcement and Removal office, Director Ricardo Wong said, “This operation targeted criminal aliens, public safety threats, and individuals who have violated our nation’s immigration laws. Operations like this reflect the vital work our ERO officers do every day to protect our communities, uphold public safety and protect the integrity of our immigration laws.”
Speaking before the United Nations General Assembly yesterday, President Donald Trump touted the “right of every nation… to set its own immigration policy in accordance with its national interests.” He addressed instances of “uncontrolled migration” and confirmed the United States will not participate in the new Global Compact on Migration, saying “Migration should not be governed by an international body unaccountable to our own citizens.”