US Citizenship Is More Important Than Ever

2020/01/07 Leave a comment

From Jamaican media but expect this advice is widespread:

Now more than ever it is important to become a US citizen. US citizenship offers many protections and advantages. The current Trump administration is focused on enforcement of immigration laws.   This means more and more non-citizens are vulnerable to being removed from the United States.   Being removed can well mean that you will never be able to return to the United States as a visitor or an immigrant.

If you are a legal permanent resident (LPR) you should consult with a qualified immigration attorney about becoming a US citizen.   Generally, to qualify for US citizenship you must be an LPR for five years or if you acquired LPR status through marriage to a US citizen, then three years. You must also be a person of good moral character, generally meant to mean you have not been convicted of a crime.  You do not owe Federal income taxes which are delinquent and unpaid.  You do not owe child support or alimony that is delinquent or unpaid.  You have not been outside the US for more than six months in a calendar year in any of the five- or three-years preceding application for citizenship.  You can read write and speak the English language and you can pass a US government history test.   If you are a male, you registered for Selective Service and you are attached to the principles of the US constitution.   Please note this brief summary of the eligibility requirements is not exhaustive but does cover important requirements.

Being a US citizen allows you the protection of being outside the US for an unlimited amount of time, without any consequences.  As a US citizen you can apply for and hold high paying jobs of national importance to the US.  Being a US citizen means you are not subject to removal from the US for any criminal convictions that occur after you obtain US citizenship, unless you committed the crime before you became a US citizen.   Being a US citizen also makes worldwide travel much easier as US citizens may travel to many counties without a visa.

Because the current Trump Administration is enforcement oriented before you decide to apply for US citizenship you must consult with a qualified immigration attorney and discuss your eligibility in confidence with an immigration attorney.  Do not apply for US citizenship without first having a consultation with a qualified immigration attorney.   I have represented many individuals who have become US citizens and would welcome the chance to consult with you and represent you.

Source: https://jamaicans.com/us-citizenship-is-more-important-than-ever/ 

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Articles of interest over the holidays – USA

2020/01/06 Leave a comment

Source: Is America About to Suffer Its Weimar Moment?

Political impact

Of all the concerns about immigration, perhaps none is more important to politicians than how immigration affects political control. In particular, many Republicans believe that immigration has clearly boosted the Democratic Party and that higher immigration will obviously doom the GOP. But historically (and recently), congressional Republicans have performed much better during periods when the immigrant share of the population is high. By contrast, Democrats dominated the low immigration periods.

GOP Almost Always Controls a House of Congress During High Immigration Periods, Rarely Controls Either House During Low Immigration Periods

The Republican Party came into existence in 1854, and while it quickly dominated, the Civil War and Reconstruction make its early history anomalous. Looking solely at the period since Reconstruction, Republicans have controlled at least one House of Congress 85 percent of years when the immigrant share of the population was greater than 10 percent, while not controlling either House 83 percent of all other years (Fig. 1). Moreover, they have controlled both houses 59 percent of the high immigration years, compared to just 7 percent of the low immigration years.

Source: Congressional Republicans Dominate High Immigration Periods | Cato @ Liberty

Citizenship

The citizenship question the Trump administration wanted to add to the 2020 census would have likely been especially sensitive in areas with higher shares of Latinx residents and noncitizens. That’s among the Census Bureau’s final conclusions from its recent experiment testing public reaction to the question.

If courts had not blocked the question from appearing on census forms, it would have also likely lowered self-response rates in parts of the U.S. where Asian residents make up between 5% and 20% of the population, according to the Census Bureau’s final report on the national experiment conducted earlier this year.

The findings released on Monday flesh out preliminary analysis the bureau put out in October when officials announced the question likely would not have had a significant effect on overall self-response rates.

Digging deeper into specific groups, however, the bureau did find statistically significant differences between certain households asked to fill out a test census form with a citizenship question and those presented with forms without one.

“These differences were small,” wrote Victoria Velkoff, the bureau’s associate director for demographic programs, in a blog post about the bureau’s early findings.

Source: Census Bureau Releases Final Report On 2019 Test Of Citizenship Question

Evangelicals

At the time of year when Christians around the world are supposed to unite in celebration of their savior’s birth, this Christmas has been a particularly fractious time for white evangelicals in America. Last week, Christianity Today, a leading evangelical magazine, published an editorial condemning Trump’s “immoral character” and calling for his removal from office. “That he should be removed,” the editorial, written by outgoing editor-in-chief Mark Galli, contended, “we believe, is not a matter of partisan loyalties but loyalty to the Creator of the Ten Commandments.”

It was a stance that nearly broke the internet — the publication’s website temporarily went down as millions tried to read the piece — and revealed the fault lines in a religious movement that is often viewed as a monolithic political force. No sooner had Christianity Today published its words than the piece drew heavy and vitriolic pushback from other conservative Christian voices. Ralph Reed of the Faith and Freedom Coalition, scoffed on Fox News that the publication ought to be renamed “Christianity Yesterday” for being “out of step with the faith community” when it came to Trump. Shortly after, nearly two hundred evangelical leaders signed a letterexpressing their “dissatisfaction” with the editorial for supporting what it called the “entirely-partisan, legally-dubious, and politically-motivated impeachment.”

Secular media pounced on the controversy, seemingly surprised that an evangelical outlet had taken such a stand while also deeming the fracas as part of what The Daily Beast called the “spiraling evangelical Christian civil war.” That’s an overstated assessment of a rather imbalanced divide, but the Christianity Today editorial does point to a committed and principled NeverTrump evangelical movement that has held steadfast since 2015 and which draws a sharp contrast with the spineless Congressional Republicans who, in toto, have folded in complete submission to Trump.

Source: The evangelical resistance?

Ever since the 1970s and the birth of the Religious Right, white evangelicals have been closely associated with the Republican Party. Generally speaking, this has meant white evangelicals tend to lean conservative on most social issues like abortion and same-sex marriage.

But recent political events show that what began as a rightward lean has, on at least one issue, become an area of genuine extremism. Inspired by the Christmastime dustup between Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg and blogger Matt Walsh, Eastern Illinois University political scientist Ryan P. Burge did some data analysis on just how white evangelicals feel about immigration in 2019, and what he found was startling.

Using data from the Cooperate Congressional Election Study, Burge found that on the five immigration questions asked by the survey, white evangelicals had a rightward gap from the mainstream Burge characterized as “humungous” — at least 20 percentage points on four of the five questions.

Source: Study: The Average White Evangelical Is Further Right on Immigration Than Abortion

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New Estimate: 72,000 USA Births Annually to Tourists, Foreign Students and Other Visitors (CIS)

2019/12/16 Leave a comment

Bit of an overly simple methodology to use given that it assumes similar behaviours and natality rates between groups. Much more comfortable on the Canadian data despite its limitations, available from CIHI:

Two new analyses by the Center for Immigration Studies estimate that there are 39,000 births a year to foreign students, guest workers and others on long-term temporary visa, plus an additional 33,000 births annually to tourists – 72,000 in total. Those born to these “non-immigrants,” as the government refers to them, are awarded U.S. citizenship because they were born in United States and not because a parent was a U.S. citizen or a Lawful Permanent Resident (green card holders). These births are in addition to the nearly 300,000 births each year to illegal immigrants.

Our analysis does not address the controversial question of whether the U.S. Constitution actually requires “birthright citizenship,” as it is often called, to anyone born in the United States regardless of the parents’ immigration status. Rather, our estimates inform that discussion by estimating the scale of births to non-immigrants, which is one part of the birthright citizenship controversy that is seldom considered.

“Our analysis makes clear that the number of children born to visitors is not trivial; and over time the numbers are substantial,” said Steven Camarota, the report’s lead author and the Center’s Director of Research. “It seems doubtful that the framers of the Fourteenth Amendment could have anticipated that tens of thousands of people each year would automatically be granted citizenship simply because their parents were on a temporary visit to the United States at the time of their birth.”

Births to Long-Term Temporary Visitors

  • The government estimates that in 2016 there were 800,000 women age 18 to 44 in the country on long-term non-immigrant visas, primarily foreign students, guest workers, and exchange visitors.
  • Based on a comparable population of women in Census Bureau data, we estimate there are 49 births per thousand to these women for a total of 39,000 births annually or 390,000 each decade.
  • The birth rate for non-immigrants aged 18-44 is relatively low compared to the 77 births per-thousand for immigrant women generally. However the total number of births to temporary visitors is still large because so many foreign students, guest workers and exchange visitors have been allowed into the country.
  • We estimate that at least 90 percent of the fathers of children born to non-immigrant women were not U.S. citizens, almost all them on temporary visa themselves or illegal immigrants. This means at least 35,000 children were born to a non-immigrant mother and were awarded U.S. citizenship at birth solely because they were born on U.S. soil and not because their parents were citizens or Lawful Permanent Residents (green card holders).

Birth Tourism

  • Many news stories in recent years have focused on “birth tourism,” which describes the phenomenon of pregnant women coming to America shortly before their due dates so their children are born in the United States and are awarded U.S. citizenship.

  • Based on a comparison of birth records and Census Bureau data, we estimate there were 33,000 births to women on tourist visas in the second half of 2016 and the first half of 2017. This translates to perhaps 330,000 such births each decade.

  • While there is significant uncertainty around this number, our new estimate is very similar to our prior estimate for second half of 2011 and first half of 2012.

  • It should be emphasized that the small number of mothers who provide a foreign address on birth documents are probably not birth tourists, as those engaged in birth tourism likely list a U.S. address so they can receive birth certificates and passports before returning to their home countries. These addresses are typically a relative’s or a residence arranged by those “selling” birth tourism services.

Source: 372000 Born to Illegal Aliens and Visitors Every Year, 33000 to ‘Birth Tourists’

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This Is What Racism Looks Like in the Banking Industry

2019/12/12 Leave a comment

Good long read and good to see that this was documented:

Jimmy Kennedy earned $13 million during his nine-year career as a player in the National Football League. He was the kind of person most banks would be happy to have as a client.

But when Mr. Kennedy tried to become a “private client” at JPMorgan Chase, an elite designation that would earn him travel discounts, exclusive event invitations and better deals on loans, he kept getting the runaround.

At first, he didn’t understand why. Then, last fall, he showed up at his local JPMorgan branch in Arizona, and an employee offered an explanation.

“You’re bigger than the average person, period. And you’re also an African-American,” the employee, Charles Belton, who is black, told Mr. Kennedy. “We’re in Arizona. I don’t have to tell you about what the demographics are in Arizona. They don’t see people like you a lot.” Mr. Kennedy recorded the conversation and shared it with The New York Times.

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When U.S. Citizenship Starts Looking Like a Bad Deal

2019/12/09 Leave a comment

Of note:

When Donald J. Trump was elected president in 2016, some people, many of them Democrats, talked about renouncing their United States citizenship and moving abroad as a political protest. But now, a different group of Americans say they are considering leaving — people of both parties who would be hit by the wealth tax proposed by two senators seeking to oppose Mr. Trump in his race for re-election, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders.

Wealthy Americans often leave high-tax states like New York and California for lower-tax ones like Florida and Texas. But renouncing citizenship is a far more permanent, costly and complicated proposition.

Many who do so to save on taxes and free themselves from American financial regulations and filing requirements are also making a larger statement.

“America’s the most attractive destination for capital, entrepreneurs and people wanting to get a great education,” said Reaz H. Jafri, a partner and head of the immigration practice at Withers, an international law firm. “But in today’s world, when you have other economic centers of excellence — like Singapore, Switzerland and London — people don’t view the U.S. as the only place to be.”

According to the United States Treasury, which publishes figures on expatriation, 231 Americans renounced their citizenship in 2008; the next year, 742 did. By 2016, the number hit 5,411, up 26 percent from 2015. It was roughly the same in 2017 before dropping to 3,983 last year.

Immigration lawyers said the numbers would be higher if embassies had the staff to accommodate the volume of requests. David Lesperance, a Canadian immigration lawyer living in Poland who specializes in helping American citizens expatriate, said many embassies around the world had backlogs in making appointments.

“The current reality is that an American who wants to renounce needs to first book an appointment in a processing system that has reached capacity — as evidenced by the significant backlogs in the granting of interview slots,” Mr. Lesperance said in an email. “In fact, the backlogs have grown so bad (up to and sometimes over a year) that most of the U.S. missions no longer publish the appointment date information online and haven’t been doing so since the system appeared to reach capacity a few years ago.”

Once that appointment is secured, the process seems to have sped up. Mr. Jafri said he had clients who waited over a year for the letter confirming they were no longer American citizens. Now, he said, that letter can come in two weeks.

“Somewhere in the system, the decision has been made to issue these more quickly,” he said. “We haven’t seen any slowdown in renouncing.”

Historically, the bulk of expatriates fell into two categories: older, wealthy people hoping to save on taxes and the “accidental Americans,” who were born in the United States but lived and worked abroad or who were born abroad but lived in the United States long enough to come under the Internal Revenue Service’s taxing authority.

Now many inquiries are also coming from younger entrepreneurs upset about the political situation in the United States and from people who want to operate their businesses overseas and not be subject to American financial reporting requirements.

“That younger person is also thinking of it as impact citizenship, like impact investing,” Mr. Jafri said. “They don’t want to be American. They’re not happy with how we’re perceived overseas.”

Mr. Jafri said he had been hearing of several other reasons, too. There are people motivated by fear. “We have people who are totally spooked about the prospect of a Warren presidency and a wealth tax,” he said. “And there are people who are equally spooked about a Trump re-election.”

There are also businesspeople who either don’t want to be subject to I.R.S. scrutiny or believe that the annual Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts has become too time-consuming or costly.

“I’ve never seen this before,” Mr. Jafri said. “People used to say, ‘If so-and-so becomes president, I’m moving to Canada.’ Well, no one did.”

But now, the price may be right to leave. While the cost of expatriating varies depending on a person’s assets, the wealthiest are betting that if a Democrat wins next year, leaving now means a lower exit tax.

For anyone with assets below $2 million or an average salary over five years of about $165,000, there is no exit tax. For everyone else, the exit is calculated on a person’s assets, as if they were sold on the day of expatriation. Someone with a portfolio of appreciated stock, for example, would be taxed at the capital gains rate.

Where it gets tricky is when people own private businesses that have to be valued. Even if they’re not selling the business, they have to come up with tax money to pay the I.R.S. But as with the tax on estates, there are ways to reduce the value of the business, including the argument that a closely held family business lacks marketability.

Mr. Jafri said he had a client who just paid a $58 million exit tax, though it had been 40 percent higher before a valuation company took various deductions.

The wealthy who are considering renouncing their citizenship fear a wealth tax less than the possibility that the tax on capital gains could be raised to the ordinary income tax rate, effectively doubling what a wealthy person would pay, Mr. Lesperance said.

“I have a client, a relatively young guy, who made a lot of money as a founder and is just not bullish on the U.S. long term, but the thing that is getting him to lock in and renounce now is he did the numbers,” he said. “He said if the least of the Democratic plans come in — taxing capital gains like ordinary income — it makes sense to renounce now.”

Regardless of wealth, anyone looking to give up their American citizenship needs to have fully complied with all tax forms for the past five years. That is one of the main stumbling blocks, said Jerald David August, chairman of the international taxation and wealth planning groups at the law firm Fox Rothschild.

“The prototype is a U.S. citizen living overseas who is tired of paying worldwide tax twice,” Mr. August said. “The specter of this five-year look back and the awareness there wasn’t total compliance can be intimidating. I’ve had situations where clients, after they’ve been fully advised, have decided not to push forward with an expatriation.”

Had they done so, without having spotless tax returns, they could have been forced to amend tax returns or, worse, be audited for tax evasion.

Even if their returns are compliant, any money they leave to their children who are still citizens will be subject to a 40 percent inheritance tax.

“If someone never stepped foot in the U.S. and died and left $100 million to someone’s children who moved to the U.S., the children wouldn’t pay the tax,” Mr. August said. “But if they left with $10 million, the U.S. retains jurisdiction to tax the person who migrated.”

Those who leave also need to consider their reputations since the Treasury Department publishes a list of people who are expatriating.

When Eduardo Saverin, a founder of Facebook who was born in Brazil but educated in America, renounced his United States citizenship shortly before the social network went public, he was criticized for avoiding taxes. But his spokesman said he had been living in Singapore for several years. Either way, several estimates said that renouncing his citizenship before Facebook went public saved him $700 million in taxes.

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Suddenly, the Chinese Threat to Australia Seems Very Real

2019/11/30 Leave a comment

Australia has always been the cautionary tale for Canada and others, with comparable challenges:

A Chinese defector to Australia who detailed political interference by Beijing. A businessman found dead after telling the authorities about a Chinese plot to install him in Parliament. Suspicious men following critics of Beijing in major Australian cities.

For a country that just wants calm commerce with China — the propellant behind 28 years of steady growth — the revelations of the past week have delivered a jolt.

Fears of Chinese interference once seemed to hover indistinctly over Australia. Now, Beijing’s political ambitions, and the espionage operations that further them, suddenly feel local, concrete and ever-present.

“It’s become the inescapable issue,” said Hugh White, a former intelligence official who teaches strategic studies at the Australian National University. “We’ve underestimated how quickly China’s power has grown along with its ambition to use that power.”

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Judge rules woman who joined ISIS is not US citizen based on birthright citizenship exception

2019/11/18 Leave a comment

Child of a diplomat. Clear cut case:

A federal judge in Washington, D.C., ruled from the bench Thursday that an Alabama woman who joined the Islamic State group and traveled to Syria is not a U.S. citizen because of an exception to the Constitution’s grant of birthright citizenship.

U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton ruled in the case of Hoda Muthana, who is with her 2-year-old son in a Syrian refugee camp. Her father filed the lawsuit before Walton in a bid to bring Muthana and her son home and to obtain a declaratory judgment that she is a citizen.

The New York Times, the Guardian and BuzzFeed News have coverage.

Muthana had at one time advocated terrorist attacks in social media posts, but she since said she was young and ignorant and she wants to return to the United States. She surrendered to Kurdish forces after fleeing ISIS-controlled territory in December 2018. She says she is willing to face prosecution here.

Muthana’s father, Ahmed Ali Muthana, had been a United Nations diplomat from Yemen. Under federal regulations and international law, children born to diplomats in the United States aren’t subject to the 14th Amendment’s citizenship requirement because they are under the jurisdiction of another country, according to BuzzFeed News.

The 14th Amendment partly reads: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.”

Ahmed Ali Muthana was fired from his diplomatic post shortly before his daughter was born in 1994. He did not notify the United Nations of his firing, however, until after the birth. The U.N. then notified the United States, which now contends that diplomatic status applied until it received the notice.

Ahmed Ali Muthana stayed in the United States after his firing, and he and his wife obtained permanent residency. Although he applied for naturalized citizenship for his other children born overseas, he did not make out an application for Hoda Muthana because he thought she was a citizen.

Hoda Muthana had received a passport in 2005 after her father supplied proof of the date of his firing. The U.S. government revoked the passport in January 2016.

Walton expressed sympathy for Ahmed Ali Muthana, but he ruled that there was enough evidence that Hoda Muthana was born while her father still had diplomatic status, according to BuzzFeed News.

“Kids do crazy things,” and parents don’t quit loving their children no matter what they do, Walton said. But that perception can’t influence his decision, he said.

Walton also said he was not intimidated by messages that he had received that were “spewed with hate” and threatened consequences if he was to rule for Hoda Muthana. Walton said his office received at least 6,000 communications, and most were hateful.

Muthana’s lawyer, Christina Jump, said she thought there was a likely basis for appeal, but she would wait until she sees Walton’s written decision.

Source: Judge rules woman who joined ISIS is not US citizen based on birthright citizenship exception

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How many undocumented immigrants are in the United States and who are they?

2019/11/15 Leave a comment

Good overview:

Ascertaining the size of the undocumented population is difficult. Estimates vary according to the methodology used. While anti-immigrant groups maintain that the flow of undocumented immigrants has increased, estimates show that over a longer period the number has declined. An often-overlooked fact is that many illegal immigrants pay payroll taxes and sales taxes.

  • Estimates of the number of undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. range from 10.5 million to 12 million, or approximately 3.2%–3.6% of the population.
  • Immigrants from Mexico have recently, for the first time, fallen to less than half of the undocumented population.
  • In evaluating the cost of illegal immigration, both benefits consumed and taxes paid must be counted.

A Closer Look

The issue of undocumented immigrants has been front and center in American elections since 2016; it has elicited passionate responses from all parts of the political spectrum. Here are a few facts voters need as they wade through the thicket of rhetoric on this issue.

How do we count people who are here illegally?

Ascertaining the size of the illegal population is difficult because, as is obvious, people who are here illegally don’t always want to tell pollsters their legal status (or absence thereof.) The first step estimators use is to take data from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, or ACS, which interviews over 2 million households a year. This survey asks people where they were born and whether they are U.S. citizens, but it does not ask if they are here illegally. This yields a total number for the “foreign-born” population.

The next step is to subtract from that total the number of foreign-born residents who we know for certain are here legally. Among them are naturalized citizens, people who have permanent resident status (green cards), and people who have been admitted as refugees. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) keeps careful records of the first two groups and the Department of Health and Human Services keeps careful records of the third. By subtracting the number of people who we know for certain are here legally from the overall number of foreign-born in the ACS survey we can estimate the number of undocumented residents.

Of course, not all undocumented people take part in surveys, and for good reason—they do not want to be found out. So, most estimates assume that there is an “undercount.” The Pew Research Center relies, in part, on survey and census data from Mexico. They estimate the undercount to be somewhere in the range of 5 to 15 percent, which is then added to the number of undocumented immigrants. DHS believes that the undercount is 10% and adjusts its estimates accordingly.

The size of the undercount is a matter of controversy. Opponents of illegal immigration such as FAIR (Federation for American Immigration Reform) argue that the undercount is in fact much bigger. To get to their estimates they analyze other data such as the percentage of migrants who failed to show up for their immigration hearings and those who have overstayed their visas.

So, what are the numbers?

The numbers of undocumented vary according to the methodology used, and there’s also a lag in the estimates because it takes time for accurate data to become available. The last estimate released by the Office of Immigration Statistics at DHS came in December 2018: As of January 1, 2015, there were 11.96 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. The most recent Pew Research estimate puts the total number of unauthorized immigrants at 10.5 million in 2017. Overall, this represents a minority of the foreign-born population, which in 2017 numbered 44.5 million—45% of whom are naturalized citizens, and 27% of whom are lawful permanent residents.

While anti-immigrant groups maintain that the flow of illegal immigrants has increased, estimates show that over a longer period the number of undocumented immigrants has declined, from 12.2 million in 2005 to 10.5 million in 2017 according to Pew’s estimates. DHS figures don’t go beyond 2015, but they estimate that the population of undocumented immigrants increased by 70,000 people per year between 2010 and 2015, compared to increases of 470,000 per year between 2000 and 2007.

Who are the undocumented?

Immigrants from Mexico have recently, for the first time since 1990, represented less than half of the undocumented population. According to Pew, in 2017, about 4.95 million of the 10.5 million undocumented population were from Mexico, 1.9 million from Central America, and 1.45 million from Asia. About two-thirds of undocumented immigrants have been in the U.S. for 10 years or longer. In 2017, just 20% of undocumented, adult immigrants had lived in the U.S. for 5 years or less.

In contrast to the President Trump’s rhetoric about building a wall at the Mexican border, illegal migration has shifted since 2010 from border-crossing to visa overstays—the latter share has been greater than border crossings since 2010. The Center for Migration Studies estimates that in 2016, 62% of the undocumented were here because they overstayed their visas versus 38% who crossed the border illegally.

Another controversy is over how much illegal immigrants cost the system. An often overlooked fact is that illegal immigrants are taxpayers. The anti-immigrant lobby tends to ignore the money the immigrants often pay in payroll and sales taxes while counting the money spent on educating children born in the United States to immigrants. Numbers vary widely depending on the source, but undocumented immigrants are not eligible for most federal benefit programs, like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. In evaluating the cost of illegal immigration, the voter has to make sure that the argument takes in both benefits consumed and taxes paid.

What about the Dreamers?

Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) was implemented by President Obama to allow many undocumented individuals who came to the U.S. before their 16th birthday to work in the U.S. and defer any action on their immigration cases for a renewable two-year period. About 800,000 immigrants have been covered by DACA at some point since it was implemented; 690,000 are currently in the program. According to Pew, the gap consists of approximately 70,000 who were rejected for renewal or opted not to renew, and 40,000 who were able to obtain a green card. At present no new applications are being accepted by USCIS, so the number of Dreamers is not likely to grow.

What are the candidates saying?

In the 2020 campaign, President Trump has continued his push for a wall at the southern border, on top of increased enforcement both at the border and in the interior. On the Democratic side, all the candidates support a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, which would require getting legislation through Congress. There are also shorter-term proposals that a new president could enact on their own, like Elizabeth Warren’s plan to reinstate DACA and to expand deferred action to include more than the Dreamers. Kamala Harris has said she would reinstate DACA and implement DAPA, the shelved policy to protect the Dreamers’ parents. Pete Buttigieg has stated that he would restore the enforcement priorities set by the Obama administration. A number of the Democratic candidates have voiced support for repealing the law that makes it a crime to cross the border without authorization.

As we have seen during the Trump administration, the president can do a great deal even absent legislation to affect the situation of those seeking to come to the United States.

Source: How many undocumented immigrants are in the United States and who are they?

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Study: Diversity is Shaping Pet Owner Population

2019/11/14 Leave a comment

Part of integration may be getting a pet:

Pets live in 67 million U.S. households, a statistic that is being driven by the increase in multicultural pet owners, according to a new report by market research firm Packaged Facts. Compared to a decade ago, pet owners are now more likely to be a member of a multicultural population segment, 28 percent in 2018 versus 22 percent in 2008, the report further noted.

“Between 2008 and 2018 the increase in the number of Hispanic, African American, Asian and other multicultural pet owners was five times higher than the increase in the number of non-Hispanic white pet owners,” said David Sprinkle, research director of Packaged Facts, which is headquartered in Rockville, Md.

Pet Population and Ownership Trends in the U.S: Dogs, Cats and Other Pets, 3rd Edition also revealed the following findings:

  • The number of Latinos owning pets increased 44 percent from 15 million in 2008 to 22 million in 2018, a growth rate vastly greater than that experienced among non-Hispanic white pet owners, according to the researchers.
  • Although a much smaller population, the number of Asian pet owners grew at the same rate (45 percent), between 2008 and 2018.
  • During the same period, the number of African American pet owners increased 24 percent.

The impact of Latinos on dog or cat ownership has been especially pronounced, the researchers also noted. Over the past decade, the number of Hispanic dog owners increased 59 percent. Likewise, the number of Latino cat owners increased 50 percent.

Overall, the report found that out of the more than half (54 percent) of American households that have a pet, dogs and cats are the most popular, coming in at 39 percent and 24 percent, respectively. One in eight households has other pets, including fish, birds, reptiles or small animals such as rabbits, hamsters or gerbils.

Source: Study: Diversity is Shaping Pet Owner Population

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Trump wants to nearly double US citizenship application fees

2019/11/11 Leave a comment

Yet another deliberate barrier to citizenship. Hard to see how the processing costs could be that high (over twice Canada’s, which, of course, the re-elected Liberal government has promised to eliminate):

The Trump administration is considering raising the cost of U.S. citizenship applications, according to a Department of Homeland Security rule filed on Friday.

The fee for the U.S. citizenship application would increase to $1,170 – from $640, as first reported by The Wall Street Journal.

A number of other cost increases were proposed, as well as the addition of a $50 fee for asylum applications.

According to the document, a biennial fee review determined that current fees “do not recover the full costs of providing adjudication and naturalization services” at the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. Without an increase in funding, the government predicts the agency would experience an average annual shortfall of $1.2 billion.

The Department of Homeland Security has proposed adjusting U.S. Citizenship and Immigration fees “by a weighted average increase of 21 percent,” in addition to adding fees for some benefit requests. U.S. immigration services is primarily funded by fees charged to applicants and petitioners.

Written comments must be submitted within 30 days from the date the rule is published in the federal register, which will be on Thursday.

The last time the fee schedule was adjusted was at the end of 2016.

Source: Trump wants to nearly double US citizenship application fees

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