Andrew Coyne: Andrew Scheer rebrands his party and gets it right on immigration

2019/06/03 Leave a comment

Coyne’s take. The removal of Conservative MP Michael Cooper from the Justice Committee is an early signal that he may have learned from his earlier missteps and that the Bernier’s PPC will have less of an impact:

….The deficit about-face, it should be said, is only part of a larger project on which the Conservative leader is now embarked, the purpose of his current “My Vision of Canada” speaking tour. One part of it is to neutralize any issues on which the party might be vulnerable. The other is to establish himself as a prime minister in waiting and his party as a credible alternative to the governing Liberals.

That this is still necessary is in no small measure due to Scheer’s own actions: speaking at a rally organized by the dubious group known as the Yellow Vests, ranting about fictional plots to subject Canadian immigration policy to United Nations rule, enthusing about Brexit, refusing to say how he would reduce Canada’s carbon emissions. If he was trying to keep voters from straying to Maxime Bernier’s populist People’s Party, it was at the cost of too-closely resembling it.

The most immediate necessity, then, was to rebrand the Conservatives as the Conservatives. The first of the five speeches, on foreign policy, was a solid, if anodyne effort at presenting himself as a statesman; the second, on the economy, an opportunity to recite some familiar Conservative bromides on the virtues of low taxes, balanced budgets and free markets (the deficit climbdown was included in a supplementary effort).

But the third, on immigration, was the most important yet, and the most successful. Not every line rang true, but it was, in the main, an ode to immigration, and to immigrants, as the lifeblood of the country. That it was also an explicit renunciation of the sort of anti-immigrant or racist sentiment that has attached itself to conservative parties across the West was of course also welcome, if essential: not to do so, in view of the suspicions to which he has himself contributed, would have been disqualifying.

But Scheer went much further. At a time when conservative leaders elsewhere, responding to public fears, are demanding the gates be closed, it should be cause for some satisfaction that the leader of the main Canadian conservative party should make such an avowedly pro-immigration speech.

He will have to do much more to make the case for his election. But centrist voters, disenchanted with the Liberals but concerned at the Tories’ flirtation with populism, might be at least reassured enough now to give him a look.

Source: Andrew Coyne: Andrew Scheer rebrands his party and gets it right on immigration

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Federal government could face new lawsuit over family reunification program

2019/06/03 Leave a comment

A challenge for any government given the demand and the quest for balance between the economic, family and refugee classes:

The federal government is facing an angry backlash and the prospect of more legal action by Canadians trying to bring their parents or grandparents into the country.

Outraged applicants are considering their next steps after learning the government made a secret settlement with more than 70 litigants and granted them coveted spots to apply to sponsor their family members.

CBC News reported on the lawsuit resolution this week, which included a confidentiality clause barring the parties from publicly disclosing details. Legal actions were launched in Toronto and Vancouver after the new online application process went live on Jan. 28 — a process that left tens of thousands of people frustrated and furious because they couldn’t access the form or fill it out fast enough.

Shishir Shivhare, who has been trying unsuccessfully to sponsor his parents in India for seven years, is one of those now considering legal action. He said this year’s application process came down to how fast someone could type.

He said he thought that process was unfair — but he called the government’s move to quietly settle with some applicants “outrageous.”

“What I felt personally was shock,” he told CBC News. “Happy … for those people, but I felt it’s unfair and it felt like a third world country, where things can be manipulated and deals can be reached on something which was a government process.

“In a way, they invalidated their own January process, because if they’re reaching a deal with someone that means they admitted there was a flaw to it.”

This year, the federal government offered 20,000 spots for sponsoring parents or grandparents, and confirmed that more than 100,000 had attempted to access an online form to express interest. The online form opened Jan. 28 at noon ET, and closed less than nine minutes later.

Erind Shkurti, who has been trying to sponsor his mother from Albania for three years, was among those who lost out. He’s also considering legal action — not to “undo” the spots the 70 or so litigants received from the settlement, but to challenge what he called “conflicting and contradictory messaging and rationale” from the government.

He has written to his local MP,  Liberal Omar Alghabra, expressing concern about the settlement — noting the irony in the fact that the changes to the application process were designed to ensure people weren’t disadvantaged because of their geographic location, or because they couldn’t afford courier fees.

Frustration over ‘secrecy’

“It seems to me that what our government has done with this settlement is just state that being able to pay a few hundred dollars for a lawsuit can actually get you a spot in the program,” he wrote. “This is very frustrating to hear, especially with all the intended secrecy and justification behind it.”

NDP MP and immigration critic Jenny Kwan said her office has been on the phone non-stop recently with people outraged by the settlement. She said the fact the government offered a “side deal” proves its system is inherently flawed and unfair.

“With this side deal, the minister is effectively telling Canadians that you have to take the Liberal government to court to be treated fairly,” she said. ” And it shouldn’t have come to this. All the families want to do is be reunited with their loved ones. They should have a process available to them that is fair, and people should not have to go through such pain and anguish.”

Kwan said some people bought new computers or upgraded their internet connections to take their best shot at filling out the online form. They’re now angry the government tried to keep its “fix” under wraps.

‘Inappropriate, troubling’

Kwan said the government should lift the cap on the spots for family reunification. She said it’s a myth that parents and grandparents are a drain on the economy, since many bring financial assets and the ability to help with child care.

Conservative immigration critic Michelle Rempel said the legal settlement is an admission the process was flawed and criticized the government for using entry to Canada as a legal bargaining chip.

“It’s not a prize to be given away. It’s not a settlement, and I find this very inappropriate and very troubling,” she said.

A government official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the case, said the government opted to settle the legal challenges because the number of applicants was relatively small, because they included plaintiffs with disabilities and because a court proceeding could have suspended the entire set of applications.

Plagued with problems

The parent and grandparent sponsorship program has been plagued with problems for years.

The Liberal government moved to a first-come, first-served online application system this year after scrapping a controversial lottery system for reuniting immigrant families. The lottery system was contentious, with critics claiming it essentially gambled with peoples’ lives.

The lottery process had replaced another first-in system which itself was unpopular because it led to a “mad rush” every January, with people lining up overnight at the doors of processing centres or paying placeholders to stand in line and deliver applications prepared by consultants or lawyers.

Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen’s office said the government is committed to family reunification and will continue to listen to a variety of stakeholders to ensure it moves forward with the program in “a thoughtful and responsive way.”

“Any specific comment on the litigation would be inappropriate at this time,” reads a statement from Hussen’s office.

Source: Federal government could face new lawsuit over family reunification program

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Quebec: Crimes haineux: «On ne voit que la pointe de l’iceberg»

2019/06/03 Leave a comment

Not unique to Quebec:

Les crimes et incidents haineux comptabilisés au Québec ne sont que la « pointe de l’iceberg » d’un phénomène beaucoup plus large, selon un chercheur rattaché au Centre de prévention de la radicalisation menant à la violence.

« C’est difficile à évaluer précisément, mais mon impression est qu’il y a quasiment 90 % du phénomène qui n’est pas mesuré », affirme Benjamin Ducol, responsable de la recherche pour le centre. Selon lui, cette sous-estimation fait en sorte qu’il est impossible de se fier aux statistiques pour comprendre l’évolution des crimes haineux au Québec, a fortiori pour intervenir efficacement pour les contrer et protéger les victimes.

Deux indices font dire à Benjamin Ducol que les crimes haineux sont massivement sous-estimés au Québec. Le premier est qu’il y a eu 489 crimes haineux rapportés à la police au Québec en 2017, ce qui veut dire qu’ils ne toucheraient que 0,006 % de la population. Or, en Angleterre et au pays de Galles, on a rapporté la même année 94 098 crimes haineux pour une population de 59 millions d’habitants, soit un taux de 0,16 %. C’est 27 fois plus que chez nous.

« Soit nos amis britanniques sont extrêmement haineux, soit on a un problème de mesure chez nous. » – Benjamin Ducol, chercheur rattaché au Centre de la prévention de la radicalisation menant à la violence

Pour en avoir le coeur net, son groupe de recherche a mené un sondage auprès de 1843 Québécois formant un échantillon représentatif de l’ensemble de la population. Résultat : 0,7 % des Québécois ont rapporté avoir subi un tel crime, un taux 100 fois plus élevé que ne le disent les statistiques officielles.

Sous-déclaration, sous-enregistrement

Que se passe-t-il ? M. Ducol estime que deux phénomènes sont à l’oeuvre. Le premier est le sous-signalement des crimes haineux. Pour toutes sortes de raisons, qui vont de la crainte de ne pas être cru à de mauvaises expériences passées avec la police, bien des victimes préféreraient se taire plutôt que d’aller cogner à la porte des policiers pour rapporter un crime.

« On sait qu’à Montréal, une des populations particulièrement ciblées par les incidents haineux est les travailleurs du sexe trans, illustre M. Duclos. Or, ce sont des gens qui ont énormément de conflits avec les autorités policières. On comprend qu’ils n’auront pas tendance à aller signaler une victimisation auprès de ces autorités », dit-il.

Les incidents haineux – des actes comme des insultes ou des graffitis haineux, mais qui ne correspondent pas à la définition de crimes – sont sans doute encore plus sous-déclarés, de nombreuses victimes jugeant qu’il ne vaut pas la peine de les rapporter. Le fait qu’une partie de ces actes se produisent en ligne les rend aussi plus difficiles à cerner.

Le deuxième problème est le sous-enregistrement. Lorsqu’une plainte est bel et bien déposée, il est loin d’être sûr que les policiers la catégoriseront comme un acte haineux.

« Il y a des pratiques variables, par exemple entre deux policiers qui n’ont pas la même sensibilité ou qui n’ont pas été formés de la même manière », avance M. Ducol.

Le Royaume-Uni s’attaque au problème

Le chercheur affirme que le Royaume-Uni est l’un des seuls endroits où on s’est rendu compte que les crimes haineux échappaient au radar des autorités et où on s’est attaqué au problème. Les policiers ont été formés et des campagnes publiques ont été lancées pour inciter les victimes à déclarer les actes.

Benjamin Ducol estime qu’il est urgent de faire la même chose ici. Il soupçonne toutefois que la volonté politique de le faire est faible.

« Un truc qui bloque certaines villes ou certaines institutions à mieux mesurer, c’est qu’elles ont peur qu’on vienne ensuite leur dire qu’il y a une hausse. » – Benjamin Ducol

« Imaginez qu’on commence à mieux mesurer [le phénomène] au Québec et qu’on trouve beaucoup plus de crimes haineux. Les gens vont dire : “Ah, le Québec ! C’est incroyable comme les gens sont plus racistes !” Alors que ça voudra peut-être seulement dire que la province a été meilleure, collectivement, à mesurer ces actes. »

Devant les vrais chiffres, serait-il plus difficile de soutenir qu’il n’y a pas d’islamophobie au Québec, comme l’ont affirmé par exemple le premier ministre François Legault et d’autres commentateurs ?

« C’est vrai qu’actuellement, on peut dire tout et n’importe quoi, tellement les chiffres sont mineurs », dit-il. Benjamin Ducol soutient par ailleurs qu’on ne peut pas non plus se fier aux statistiques qui montrent que les crimes et incidents haineux sont en forte hausse au Québec depuis quelques années (184 crimes rapportés en 2013, contre 489 en 2017).

« L’échantillon de base est tellement minime que ça ne veut rien dire, dit-il. La hausse, à mon avis, montre seulement un meilleur enregistrement des crimes haineux ». Selon lui, il est « presque absurde de publier des données quand on sait qu’elles ne sont pas représentatives ».

Le chercheur soutient qu’au bout du compte, de meilleures mesures des crimes haineux serviraient les victimes. « Prendre toute la réalité du phénomène permettrait concrètement de réfléchir à des mesures politiques et institutionnelles, dit-il. Notre sondage, par exemple, montre qu’une grande partie des actes a lieu dans l’espace public. Mon hypothèse est que le métro est propice à ce genre d’incidents. Si on le confirme, on peut alors faire des campagnes avec la STM, du genre : les crimes haineux dans le métro, c’est non. On peut cibler les actions. »

Source: Crimes haineux: «On ne voit que la pointe de l’iceberg»

Filed under Hate crimes, Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

They Know That America Isn’t Great

2019/06/03 Leave a comment

Sharp commentary on the ongoing and deepening citizenship census question scandal:

The president may be a fool, but that doesn’t make him an ineffective racist. That would presuppose that it takes great talent to be good at hating people and furthering that hatred through policy. Donald Trump is quite adept at finding America’s weaknesses, a trait he shares with the Russians who helped him win the election. Both his White House and the Kremlin know just where to look first: America’s persistent racism. It is always easier to find holes in the boat and to punch new ones, than to devise methods for plugging them and keeping everything afloat.

One such weakness is the Census, which this administration has sought to weaponize as an undocumented immigrant address book for ICE and, as a consequence, a way to erode Hispanic and Latinx influence at the ballot box. We knew that the Trump administration’s proposed citizenship question for the 2020 Census was racist. But the ACLU revealed Thursday new proof that the question, which the group is now challenging before the Supreme Court, was explicitly crafted with the purpose of helping white people become more politically powerful.

Most everything Republicans do is to protect their power these days, and virtually all of them are white, so this isn’t a difficult calculus. Intent isn’t required for a racist act, but there still was plenty here. Thomas Hofeller — the late Republican strategist with a special talent for shaping racially discriminatory districts in places like North Carolina — “played a significant role in orchestrating the addition of the citizenship question to the 2020 Decennial Census” before his death last summer and intended to shape the citizenship question “in order to create a structural electoral advantage for, in his own words, ‘Republicans and Non-Hispanic Whites.’” Hofeller also added that it “would clearly be a disadvantage for the Democrats” and successfully predicted that implementing the question would “provoke a high degree of resistance from Democrats and the major minority groups in the nation.”

The administration also had the nerve to offer false justification for the citizenship question. In testimony before Congress in the spring of 2018, Ross insisted that the question’s intent was to enforce the 1965 Voting Rights Act — which, of course, prohibits racial discrimination in voting. It says a lot that the Trump administration sees these ramparts of our civil-rights infrastructure as devices to exploit.

The mechanism for diluting that power is simple: intimidation. A citizenship question introduces chaos into the Census, which counts everyone in the nation regardless of naturalization or immigration status. Since its possibility first arose in late 2017, experts have speculated that such a question would discourage participation in Hispanic and Latinx communities, so much so that people may not even open the door for Census takers. Why not? Why would they when they have every right to suspect that the Trump administration has weaponized the survey to use as an address book for ICE, allowing them to review the Census as a collection list for any and all undocumented people with the gumption to respond?

So, the administration appears to think it can erase people unlikely to vote Republican either by deporting them or by discouraging their responses. That includes the folks who may be citizens or are otherwise here legally, but may have mixed-status families and don’t feel that in this political climate, they can even open the door for a U.S. Census taker. They’re erased, too

Thirteen Democratic Senators, including five of their current presidential contenders, sent a letter Friday requesting the inspectors general of the Justice and Commerce Departments to investigate the ACLU’s findings. They want to know why the administration hid Hofeller’s participation from the public, thereby obscuring the rather obvious “impermissible racial and partisan motivations” for adding the question in the first place.

As if to put an exclamation point upon this, Trump imposed a 5-percent tariff effective June 10 upon all goods imported from Mexico that he plans to escalate until authorities in that country stop migrants from crossing our southern border (even, presumably, if they are not Mexican and are doing so to engage in the legal process of seeking asylum). To boil down the stupidity of this: the president, by fiat and without the approval of Congress, said he will impose a tax on the American people so as to discourage them from from buying products imported from Mexico. He will double this tax to 10 percent on July 1 unless the migration flow “is alleviated through effective actions taken by Mexico.”

This speaks to a more inherent American flaw that the ACLU is trying to correct with their challenge before the highest court. “I think this is bigger than voting rights or the Census,” Ho tells me. “It goes to whether, in the Trump era, we will have a federal government that is accountable to the courts, and ultimately, to the public. The administration is saying it’s doing something for one reason, while we all know that it’s doing it for the exact opposite reason — and if we are powerless to stop it, then we really have reached an Orwellian moment.”

Americans would do well to understand that, especially right now. Democrats, in particular. They have a primary frontrunner in Joe Biden who is campaigning (to the extent that he is at all) as if he has a flux capacitor in his DeLorean, promising to take voters back to a time before Trump, when apparently Republicans confirmed Merrick Garland and weren’t birthers and all was well. I hope he takes a cue from some of his competitors—folks like Kamala Harris, who proposed an abortion-rights law based upon that same Voting Rights Act, including federal preclearance for states who restrict reproductive access; or Elizabeth Warren, who called for Congress to pass a measure allowing for a president to be indictable.

Whoever is planning to replace this president has to not just plan for the considerable triage ahead. They have to fully understand that the America they want to lead into the future has a lot of structural weaknesses that are due purely to the consistent refusal of its powerbrokers to rid it of the identity-based inequities that have provided white men unearned advantages since day one of the republic.

Democrats, no matter how much they wish to sell the halcyon days of the Obama years or wish away the trauma of the present, cannot ignore the horror of that reality. Trump is showing it to them unvarnished. He is exposing every hole in the boat and punching out new ones every day. Any true patriot would understand that the kind of racism like what we see at work in the Census citizenship question is not what makes America great. It is sabotage.

Source: They Know That America Isn’t Great

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Danish Muslims feel backlash as immigration becomes election issue

2019/06/03 Leave a comment

Of note how a far right party can influence political discourse and shift the positions of mainstream parties:

Growing numbers of Danish Muslims say they have faced verbal abuse, exclusion and hate crimes since mainstream political parties began adopting anti-immigrant policies previously the preserve of the far right.

The ruling centre-right Liberal Party and the opposition Social Democrats both say a tough stance in immigration is needed to protect Denmark’s cherished welfare system and to integrate the migrants and refugees already in the country.

But Manilla Ghafuri, 26, who came to Denmark from Afghanistan in 2001 as a refugee, fears that anti-Muslim attitudes could harden further as the immigration debate heats up ahead of a general election on June 5.

“In 2015 I thought: ‘Wow, what’s happening?’ and I think it has got a lot worse over the last few years,” she told Reuters.

Ghafuri, who has more than once been told to go back to her “own country”, said she has been kicked out of a supermarket while shopping with her family. While she was working at a bakery a male customer refused to be served by her.

“I asked if I could help him, but he didn’t look at me at all. He just stood and waited for another girl who is an ethnic Danish girl,” said Ghafuri, who also works as a teacher and has a degree in Danish.

The number of immigrants from non-Western countries and their descendants who have experienced discrimination because of their ethnic background rose to 48% last year from 43% two years earlier, according to the National Integration Barometer.

“If people are ready and willing to be part of Danish society and want to contribute to it, then we invite them to become part of one of the best-functioning societies in the world,” said Mads Fuglede, the Liberal Party’s immigration spokesman.

“But we need to be able to discuss openly if there are problems with groups of people,” he said, citing the large number of immigrant women from the Middle East who have not found work in Denmark.

He did not see any connection between racist incidents and the tone of the immigration debate.

Tarek Ziad Hussein, 26, a Danish-born Muslim of Palestinian origin, has written a book about being Muslim in Denmark. He told Reuters he has received death threats.

“An environment has been created where you can say crazy things without too many people even raising an eyebrow,” said Hussein, who works as a lawyer.

“I and a lot of others from my generation feel that no matter what we do, we are not good enough in the eyes of society,” he added. “No matter how educated we are or how integrated we become, we are not good enough because of our skin colour or our religion.”

The number of racially or religiously motivated hate crimes registered by Danish police jumped to 365 in 2017 from 228 the year before. That could be higher as not all cases are reported.

The Danish Institute For Human Rights has urged politicians to draw up plans to combat racism and hate crimes, especially against Muslims and Jews.

“The politicians are moving very close to the boundaries of human rights,” said Louise Holck, the institute’s deputy director.

Denmark’s 320,000 Muslims are about 5.5 percent of the population, a slightly higher proportion than in the rest of Europe, according to Danish and U.S. estimates.

The shift to the right by Denmark’s mainstream parties runs counter to outsiders’ traditional views of liberal Scandinavia, but has its parallels elsewhere in Europe, particularly since large numbers of migrants arrived there in 2015.

CAKE

The immigration minister, Inger Stojberg, has meanwhile been criticised for celebrating her 50th piece of legislation tightening immigration laws with a big cake. A tracker on the ministry’s website shows immigration law has been tightened 114 times under the present government.

Earlier this year, the government passed a law that would mean more refugees could be repatriated, the latest move to discourage non-western immigration.

The law was passed with support from the anti-immigration Danish People’s Party, a key ally of the minority government, and the Social Democrats, the country’s biggest party, which has hitherto had a softer stance on immigration.

It means residence permits for refugees will be temporary, there will be a limit on the number of family reunifications, and a cut in benefits for immigrants.

The law has been criticised by the Danish Institute for Human Rights and the United Nations refugee agency. Trade organisations and unions have warned that tight immigration policies could worsen labour shortages and put a brake on growth.

Fuglede of the Liberal Party said lower benefits would encourage people to work.

Around 43% of refugees who have lived in Denmark for more than 3 years were employed by the end of 2018, up from just 20% by the end of 2015. However, only 19% of women had jobs compared to 57% of men.

But while employment has risen, assimilation of immigrants has not always kept pace. More young men descended from non-western immigrants commit crimes than Danes, official figures show.

HISTORY BOOKS

The Social Democrats declined to comment for this article because of a tight pre-election schedule, but they have repeatedly said they want to limit the number refugees.

“You are not a bad person, just because you are worried about immigration,” party leader Mette Frederiksen said earlier this month.

With the mainstream parties toughening up on immigration, Denmark’s biggest populist group, The Danish People’s Party (DF) has lost some of its appeal and opinion polls show it is likely to shed almost half of its voters in the election.

This is partly because voters are moving to the Social Democrats. DF also faces competition from far-right parties the New Right and Hard Line, the latter a new grouping that wants Islam banned and Muslims deported.

But even though the DF is losing voters fast, its impact on Danish politics is undeniable.

“They have completely changed the discussion and politics in Denmark over the past 20 years,” according to Rune Stubager, professor of political science at Aarhus University. “For the history books, this is definitely a big victory for them.”

Source: Danish Muslims feel backlash as immigration becomes election issue

Filed under Immigration, Multiculturalism Tagged with ,

Prosperity Reigns Where Immigrants Live

2019/06/01 Leave a comment

Correlation or causation? Immigrants go to where the jobs are:

The hypocrisy of Trumponomics is laid bare by the demonizing of undocumented workers as the Trump Organization profits from them. With so many Trump hotels, residential buildings and golf courses located where migrants are numerous, Employer-in-Chief Donald Trump has enjoyed the economic benefits of immigration. That’s because states with the greatest concentration of immigrants create the most jobs and biggest increase in personal income. Where immigrants are relatively scarce, states generate the fewest jobs and smallest rise in income.

A record 43.7 million immigrants were living in the U.S. in 2016, representing 13.5% of the population, according to the Pew Research Center. That’s more than a fourfold increase since 1960, when 9.7 million immigrants represented 5.4% of the total. The relationship between prosperity and immigrants — authorized or not — is definitive, according to data among the 20 largest states compiled by Bloomberg.

California and Texas, the top two manufacturing states in 2017, relied on at least 6% of their labor from undocumented immigrants, according to Pew. In agriculture, where California dominates the nation with $35.6 billion of annual receipts, unauthorized immigrants can make up as much as 17% of the workforce each year.

Personal income in the five states with the highest proportion of immigrants — California (26.6%), New York (23%), New Jersey (22.2%), Florida (19.3%) and Texas (16.1%) — has increased 10.1 percent since Trump became president nearly two-and-a-half years ago. Personal income for New York City, home to some of Trump’s signature businesses, advanced 11 percent since 2017, enabling New York to outperform 42 of the 50 states. Income for the five states with the lowest immigrant ratios — Indiana (5%), Wisconsin (4.8%), Tennessee (4.8%), Ohio (4.3%) and Missouri (4%) — improved 8.3 percent. Missouri, which has the lowest percentage of immigrants among the 20 most-populous states, experienced income growth of 8.2%, just below the national average, according to the data compiled by Bloomberg.

The job market in the five states with the highest immigrant ratios grew 3.9% since Trump was inaugurated on Jan. 20, 2017. Employment in Florida, home to Trump’s 128-room, 62,500-square-foot mansion at the Mar-a-Lago resort, increased 5.7% during the past 12 months. Jobs in the health-care industry, where Pew says as much as 25% of the immigrant population is employed, increased 31%.

“Here in Central Florida, the business community is bolstered by the presence of immigrant entrepreneurs who have made their homes here, started businesses, created jobs and contributed to the communities in which they’re headquartered,” wrote Kelsey Sunderland and Cindy Barth in the Orlando Business Journal in February.

Job creation in the five states with the lowest immigrant ratios suffers by comparison, averaging 2.3% since 2017, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Missouri could manage nothing more than a 1.5% increase in employment during the same period. But even in the Show-Me state, immigrants were the best part of the growth story: Health-care jobs surged 38% last year, outperforming every other industry, according to Bloomberg data.

Strong regional economies with lots of jobs, high wages and other advantages naturally attract migrants looking for opportunity. They then become an essential force in extending prosperity in the places that welcome them.

“The state benefits from immigrants’ active participation in the economy — from working in Missouri’s service industries to accounting for nearly 15% of residents working in the life, physical and social sciences,” says an October report by the American Immigration Council. “As workers, business owners, taxpayers and neighbors, immigrants are an integral part of Missouri’s diverse and thriving communities and make extensive contributions that benefit all.”

As Trump continues to assail and limit immigration, he might want to be careful what he wishes for. He does business where the immigrants are because they get the job done.

Source: Prosperity Reigns Where Immigrants Live

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Republican operative was behind U.S. census citizenship question: filing

2019/06/01 Leave a comment

Why I am not surprised:

The Trump administration concealed evidence that its proposal to add a question about citizenship to the 2020 U.S. census was intended to help Republicans draw favorable electoral maps, according to immigrant advocacy groups that sued the administration over the question last year.

In a filing in Manhattan federal court on Thursday, the groups said that the administration hid the fact during the course of the lawsuit that went to trial last year that Thomas Hofeller, a longtime Republican specialist on drawing electoral districts, played a “significant role” in planning the citizenship question.

The conservative-majority Supreme Court is due to issue a final ruling by the end of June on whether the question can be added in time for next year’s census.

The challengers notified the high court about the new documents in a letter filed at the court on Thursday afternoon. They did not ask the Supreme Court to take any specific action.

The plaintiffs, which include the Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee and Make The Road New York, learned of Hofeller’s role after his files came to light in separate litigation in North Carolina in which Republican-drawn electoral districts are being challenged.

A Justice Department representative said the allegations were a “last-ditch effort to derail the Supreme Court’s consideration of this case.”

“The Department looks forward to responding in greater detail to these baseless accusations in its filing on Monday,” the person said.

Manhattan-based U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman blocked the question’s inclusion following the trial, but the Supreme Court appeared poised to overturn that ruling at April’s oral argument.

According to Thursday’s filing, Hofeller concluded in a 2015 study that asking census respondents whether they are U.S. citizens “would clearly be a disadvantage to the Democrats” and “advantageous to Republicans and Non-Hispanic Whites” in redistricting.

Hofeller went on to ghostwrite a draft letter from the U.S. Department of Justice to the Department of Commerce, asking for a citizenship question on the grounds it would help enforce voting rights, according to the plaintiffs.

The plaintiffs, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, said that administration officials gave false testimony about the origin of the question during the lawsuit, and have asked Furman to consider imposing unspecified sanctions against them.

Furman has scheduled a hearing on the request for June 5.

Reuters reported in April that the Trump administration believed its citizenship question could help Republicans in elections by enabling states to draw electoral maps based only on citizen population, rather than total population.

Opponents have said a citizenship question would cause a sizeable undercount by deterring immigrant households and Latinos from filling out the census forms, out of fear the information would be shared with law enforcement. That would, they argue, cost Democratic-leaning areas electoral representation in Congress and federal aid, benefiting President Donald Trump’s fellow Republicans and Republican-leaning parts of the country.

Source: Republican operative was behind U.S. census citizenship question: filing

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For India’s Muslims, palpable fear of what another Modi term brings

2019/06/01 Leave a comment

Of note:

Last week, as results started trickling in from India’s election, I was in Stockholm, delivering a keynote speech on the power of journalism in India. I was speaking to a crowd of 400 Swedish journalists and academics about Indian democracy, its secular character and the importance of investigative journalism under a strongman such as Narendra Modi, when my phone started to beep.

It was a text from my brother: “Modi has won with a massive majority.”

My thoughts drifted as I gazed at the audience, wondering if my words – or career as a journalist in this country – had any significance. As an investigative reporter, covering the politics of Mr. Modi for more than a decade, I have had a front-row seat watching him dehumanize India’s Muslim population.

In 2002, roughly 1,000 Muslims were butchered in the Hindu-Muslim riots in the state of Gujarat, which was under Mr. Modi’s leadership.

As a 19-year-old relief worker at the time, I spent days in the relief camps after the riots, watching women who had been traumatized by rape, children who had witnessed the blood bath of their family members. Each relief camp was representative of the hate that had been peddled by leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party leading to the carnage. In one of his speeches, Mr. Modi spokeabout dismantling the relief camps: “Should we run relief camps, open child-producing centres?” The question was a direct reference to Muslim women and children who were affected by the anti-Muslim riots.

In a verdict in one of the riot cases, the Supreme Court of India called the Modi government “modern-day Neros” who “looked the other way as innocent children and women were butchered.” The United States later refused a visa to Mr. Modi after human-rights organizations protested his entry into the country because of his anti-Muslim track record during the riots.

In 2005, I covered the involvement of Amit Shah, the first serving Home Minister of State of Gujarat, in connection to the deaths of two Muslims: Mr. Shah was initially charged with murder and later acquitted.

He has now been reinstated as the president of the ruling party and is now the second-most powerful man in India, after Mr. Modi. In the run-up to the 2019 general election, he not-so-subtly insulted one specific group of migrants – Muslims. In a campaign rally, Mr. Shah said, “the BJP would find these termites and throw them out,” adding that citizenship would, however, be granted to every Hindu and Buddhist refugee. That, of course, leaves just one group to fall into the “termite” category.

But this country’s Muslims have always been acutely aware of how Mr. Modi feels about them.

In 2010, I went undercover to expose complicity of the state in the violence against Muslims. I posed as a Hindu nationalist from the United States, as an American filmmaker seeking to glorify Mr. Modi for an American audience. In a span of eight months I met some of the top bureaucrats, officials who worked under Mr. Modi in 2002. They confessed his complicity in the Gujarat riots; one bragged to me that Mr. Modi let the violence worsen, so it would help him in his re-election.

The last person I met, disguised as Maithili Tyagi (my undercover name) was Narendra Modi. I praised his international image in United States; he blushed. He directed my attention to a copy of a book on Barack Obama and said, “Maithili, one day I want to be like him.” Of course, his political career has proven otherwise.

In 2014, Mr. Modi was voted in as the 14th Prime Minister of India, a campaign he fought the basis of Sabka saath Sabka Vikaas (inclusive leadership for all). Skeptics who had observed his political career were not convinced; Mr. Modi did not disappoint. In the five years of Modi rule, India has turned into a nightmare for Muslims, with routine lynchings for alleged consumption of beef; Mr. Modi’s cabinet minister, Jayant Sinha, has been criticized for garlanding a group of men who had been convicted of murdering a Muslim man.

Further, in the run-up to the elections, Mr. Modi’s party fielded Pragya Thakur, a priestess who has been charged with plotting a bomb attack in a Muslim-dominated area, a bombing that took 10 lives. Recently, she won the parliamentary seat, and will enter the Indian government after a campaign focused on anti-Muslim rhetoric.

The attempts made in the past five years have made Indians fear for the secular character of our republic: a leader with absolute majority, drunk on power and reckless disregard of institutions, with dreams of being a right-wing mascot a generation that is swaying to his majoritarian utopia.

Indians pride themselves on being a diverse country of 1.3 billion, with a culture that has refused nationalist influence, despite attempts by various right wing ideologies. The world’s largest democracy has remained resilient to authoritarian regimes, and yet retained its essential syncretic character envisaged by the founding fathers of independent India.

The Modi regime could choose to restore the cracks it has caused, if the Prime Minister would reveal a moral compass that aims to unite. If he continues to revel in this majoritarian and hyper-nationalist malaise that afflicted his previous term, the wound will fester and the cracks could be well beyond repair.

Source: For India’s Muslims, palpable fear of what another Modi term brings Rana Ayyub

Filed under Multiculturalism, Religion Tagged with , ,

Almost 5000 immigrants to the US every year are clergy or religious

2019/06/01 Leave a comment

Small number compared to the total number of immigrants (1.1 million in 2017). Haven’t seen a breakdown for non-Christian religious leaders. For Canada, opendata doesn’t provide a breakdown, grouping charitable and religious temporary residents together, about 5,000 in 2015:

Much has been written, and for many years, about immigration and its various policy and practical aspects.

But what about that “weekend associate” at your parish? Or that group of nuns who reopened the old convent? They, too, may be immigrants.

There are close to 5,000 people from all denominations hailing from other countries who come to the United States each year as “religious workers.” Among Catholics, they are usually clergy, sisters and brothers, but there are lay missioners, some of them married and with families. U.S. immigration law makes provisions for them to carry out their ministry through the R-1 visa.

The Catholic Legal Immigration Network (CLINC) has a hand in about 800 cases each year, according to Miguel Naranjo, director of CLINIC’s Religious Immigration Services. It was one of CLINIC’s first programs, established more than 30 years ago, and the numbers suggest it remains a valued initiative. “We certainly have a very busy practice,” Naranjo told Catholic News Service.

CLINIC works with nearly half of U.S. dioceses in doing the visa work for religious workers. The remainder, according to Naranjo, either are connected with attorneys who can guide the process for immigrant clergy and religious, or work through a local Catholic Charities affiliate or similar agency on sponsorship issues. “We work more with religious orders. There is a large number of religious orders in the United States,” he said.

Naranjo, who has been with CLINIC for 13 years and has led its Religious Immigration Services division for about half that time, walked through the process.

“This is a program that did undergo some changes a decade ago. They changed it to make it similar to other visas. What they require — which they did not require 10 years ago — was to file a petition. They have to file a petition with the Immigration Service: The organization’s legit; it has the financial means to sponsor the person they want to sponsor,” he said.

For someone who qualifies as a religious worker, he says they “could fall under a traditional religious occupation, somehow involved in promoting the belief system of the denomination. You need a lot of documentation. The standard the immigration service will use is that the documentation must be verifiable. We can submit affidavits. You’re looking at 3-6 months to prepare the petition,” Naranjo noted.

“There is a site visit the immigration service will conduct. And there’s a fraud investigator that makes sure everything you said you were going to do in the petition was true. It’s certainly not a simple process,” he added.

Organizations calling CLINIC on religious immigration issues “express some frustration how the process can take a lot of time. Inevitably, there comes a time when you have to troubleshoot issues. Immigration service will request further evidence — evidence on why this person is qualified, or do you have the means to support.

“Like people who use an accountant to prepare their taxes,” Naranjo said, “with immigration you can do it yourself, or you can use a service like ours.”

One priest who used CLINIC is Fr. Marinaldo Batista, a Brazilian priest with dual Italian citizenship who ministered in Victoria, British Columbia, for 13 years before arriving last year in Bristol, Rhode Island. He needed some CLINIC troubleshooting.

“My coming was a little bit complicated last year,” Batista told CNS. “I faced some trouble because I came and there was a lawyer who was supposed to take care of my immigration process. So then things went not good with him. I was here already, working,” he said, laughing afterward. “But everything was by mistake. … I was relying on the Diocese of Providence, because they are the ones who called me here.”

Batista said, “Things were stuck. I spoke to the diocese: ‘We have to solve it, otherwise I’m going back, because I’m not going to be here this way.’ “

A priest he knew in New Hampshire gave him Naranjo’s name. “I knew he was working with Catholic immigration, but I was not sure if he was working with CLINIC. So then I spoke to the bishop, [Providence Auxiliary] Bishop [Robert] Evans, and he told me to have a conversation with CLINIC. That is when things started with him and the diocese. They started the process, the petition, everything. So then, I think, it took like, two months if I’m not mistaken. Two months. It was faster than I thought.”

Since he had business in Italy, he flew to Rome and made an appointment for an immigration interview. He left Dec. 5 and was able to return to the United States, visa in hand, before Christmas. “So, no, I didn’t have any complications in this regard,” Batista said.

“I am here because I know that there is a need in this parish. There is a need for these people. And these people are God’s people. They need my ministry. That’s why I’m here,” Batista said he told the diocesan chancellor. “Otherwise, I don’t need this travel. I can go back to where I was. To have this move in our lives is not easy.”

The experience of immigrant sisters

Venturing to new territory is the subject of a new book, Migration for Mission, published in April and co-written by Sr. Mary Johnson, a Sister of Notre Dame de Namur who teaches at Trinity Washington University; Sr. Patricia Wittberg, a Sister of Charity; Sr. Thu T. Do, a Lover of the Holy Cross-Hanoi; and Mary Gauthier. They are staffers at the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) in Washington.

The book included results from a survey of nearly 1,000 immigrant sisters. The average age of the sisters is 58, making them much younger than U.S.-born sisters, whose average age is in the high 70s.

“Most of the sisters are satisfied with the practical aspects of their living situation in the United States: their housing, food, health care, transportation and financial support. But there are age and ethnic differences,” the book said, and the sisters’ lives weren’t entirely free of trials and tribulations.

“The percentage of sisters who say they are very satisfied with these aspects is higher among the Europeans, Australians and Canadians than it is among the respondents form other parts of the world, and among older respondents than among younger respondents. These patterns may be related, since many of the sisters from Europe tend to be older and to have lived in their own, U.S.-based institutes for many years,” the book said. “The sisters’ satisfaction depends, to some extent, on their living arrangements,” with more dissatisfaction reported if they are not living with other members of their own order.

When asked, “In your experience, what is most needed to improve the life and ministry of international women religious?” practical aspects received scant attention: Financial difficulties were mentioned by 5.3 percent, health insurance by 2.5 percent, housing by 2.2 percent, food by 1.5 percent, and there were just six mentions of transportation. Nuns from Europe, Canada and Australia more likely to mention health care,” the book said, “which might be expected, given their older median age.”

Some sisters’ comments were printed in the book, although identifying information was not included.

“In my own country, we don’t pay the rent, we don’t talk about the rent. So we don’t know how to pay rent. If we tell [our superiors in our home country], they don’t believe it, that you have to pay rent here yourself,” one sister said.

Another said, “Some of [our sisters], when they came here, they saw how we live in simple houses. And they said, ‘Oh, I expected more luxury,’ and everything. … So, actually, we live in old convents. We don’t have luxury.”

“It is often hard to attend daily or Sunday Mass due to lack of transportation. There is no public transport in some places, and this makes it hard for international women religious to carry out their mission or studies effectively,” a third sister said. “Depending on rides sometimes does not work.”

The sisters’ experience with the U.S. health care system was eye-opening.

“Doctors!” exclaimed one nun. “It was difficult because I was sick, but when I tried to make a doctor’s appointment, they wanted $304 up front before they would even see me.”

“I feel so afraid to go and see a doctor,” another sister said. “I was informed if I want to have a CT or MRI, ‘You should go and take a flight to [country] because seeing a doctor will be cheaper than if you do it here.’ ”

“Currently, my religious community provides health care for me, but it is very expensive. I would wish for some kind of program for international religious in the United States, when health care could be made more affordable.”

In other survey questions, routinely three out of four sisters reported being “very satisfied” with the social aspects of their life in the United States.

“When I came to the airport, I didn’t know anybody. … They had told me, ‘You have to meet other sisters over there. They will be waiting for you.’ So when I came, I saw somebody holding a sign saying, ‘Welcome Sister X.’ So I just went to them and they were so thoughtful,” one sister reported. “They said, ‘We know that you are so lonely and we are here for you. Just make yourself at home. And if you need anything, please let us know.’ So I felt like I was at home.”

When asked what could be improved about the sisters’ lives, one sister replied: “It would be helpful if the members of the dominant culture would treat the members of the minority culture with mutuality and encourage the minority culture to preserve the richness of one’s native tongue and culture. Forced enculturation for the sake of uniformity is a very violent experience of ‘colonization.’ ”

Another sister answered, “I cannot recall being fully welcomed and supported by the diocese. There are situations of feeling isolated because of my accent. I offered help in situations I knew I can help, but there was not a response from the diocesan staff.”

Source: Almost 5000 immigrants to the US every year are clergy or religious

Filed under Immigration, Religion Tagged with ,

On immigration, Scheer is trying to please two different audiences at once

2019/06/01 Leave a comment

Aaron Wherry’s take, noting his silence on the Conservative Party’s opposition to the global compact on migration :

Andrew Scheer’s immigration speech on Tuesday night rested its arguments on a debatable premise.

“With each passing day,” he said, “Justin Trudeau and the Liberals undermine” Canada’s “proud legacy” of immigration. “They have managed,” Scheer said, “to undermine the long-standing consensus that immigration is indeed a positive thing for this country.”

Public polling on this topic is mixed, but a recent survey by Environics suggested that general views on immigration have changed little over the last eight years. In 2011, 47 per cent of respondents said immigration made Canada a better place, while 16 per cent said it made Canada a worse place. In 2019, those numbers were 44 per cent and 15 per cent.

In 2011, 58 per cent disagreed with the statement that immigration levels were “too high.” In 2019, 59 per cent disagreed.

There’s a crucial partisan division in the 2019 numbers, however. On the question of whether immigration levels were too high, 75 per cent of Liberal voters and 70 per cent of NDP supporters disagreed. Just 44 per cent of Conservative voters disagreed.

It’s that breakdown of consensus that leaves Andrew Scheer trying to address two different audiences — to reassure the wide swath of voters who are basically happy with immigration, while also speaking to the sceptics who support his party.

The resulting tension was barely concealed in Scheer’s remarks on Tuesday.

How many is too many?

He expounded on the contributions that successive waves of immigrants have made to this country and explained the economic imperative for continued immigration. He promised that, if he becomes prime minister, his government would move to increase private sponsorship of refugees.

But Scheer made a point of declining to say exactly how many immigrants Canada would accept under a new Conservative government. He described the whole topic of setting a number as “a little bit of a red herring.” That seemed to be an excuse to avoid being pinned down.

Those calling for the current levels to be cut, he said, are making “rash promises.” But those who advocate for “high targets” are also doing so for political ends, he argued.

Scheer, apparently, would arrive at some kind of objectively correct number. But not unless or until he becomes prime minister. And even then, he said, “that number may change every year.”

The Conservative leader was more categorical in condemning racism and intolerance.

“I’d like to make something absolutely crystal clear,” he said. “There is absolutely no room in a peaceful and free country like Canada for intolerance, racism and extremism of any kind. And the Conservative Party of Canada will always make that absolutely clear.”

Polishing the party’s immigration image

That Scheer felt he needed to say so might be viewed as evidence of an image problem. If, for instance, he had not appeared at a protest attended by members of the so-called ‘yellow vest’ movement, and if his party hadn’t had to retract an attack ad about asylum-seekers that featured an image of a black man crossing into Canada, he might not have felt it necessary to clarify his position on racism.

But Scheer also condemned the Liberals for too harshly condemning their critics. “We should be able to have an immigration debate in this country without the government calling people who criticize its failure racists and bigots,” Scheer said.

Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen did once describe his Ontario counterpart’s language on the issue of irregular immigration as “not Canadian.” And Trudeau has challenged Scheer to condemn white supremacists.

But in the one case where Trudeau directly accused someone of racism, he was speaking to a woman in Quebec who had referred to “your illegal immigrants” and “Québécois de souche” — an inflammatory phrase that refers to the original descendants of French colonists. Scheer criticized Trudeau’s comments at the time.

On Tuesday night, Scheer dwelled on the issue of irregular migration along Canada’s southern border, just as his party has over the last two years. “The numbers are almost hard to believe,” he said of the more than 40,000 people who have come to Canada in that time.

Choosing to present that situation as a pressing problem might strike some as understandable. But it’s also a political choice — one that no doubt speaks to those who think Canada is currently accepting too many immigrants.

In that respect, Scheer’s speech was most interesting for what he did not mention: the UN’s global compact on migration.

Last December, Scheer publicly and prominently condemned the Trudeau government’s decision to sign the non-binding statement of principles that’s meant to frame an international approach to the emerging challenge of migration. Canada joined 151 other countries in ratifying the compact.

International opposition to the initiative was later traced to far-right activists. In opposing the pact, Scheer’s Conservatives found themselves on the same side with Donald Trump’s administration and several nationalist parties in Europe. Scheer said the compact was a threat to Canada’s national sovereignty. “It gives influence over Canada’s immigration system to foreign entities,” he claimed.

Chris Alexander, the former Conservative immigration minister, was moved to say that Scheer’s assessment was “factually incorrect.”

Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer has called Justin Trudeau’s immigration plan “irresponsible” and “broken.” So what would his approach be? David Cochrane breaks down Scheer’s latest policy speech leading up to this fall’s election. 2:13

The Conservative party’s website still features a condemnation of the compact and an invitation for Canadians to add their names to an online petition opposing it.

But six months after saying he’d pull Canada out of the compact, Scheer gave a 3,000-word speech about immigration without mentioning it once.

Maybe Scheer is ready to forget what he said in December. But if he’s still opposed to the compact, it’s an odd omission.

Source: On immigration, Scheer is trying to please two different audiences at once

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , ,

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