The Department of Homeland Security announced Thursday it is immediately terminating its immigration enforcement agreements with the office of Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Ariz.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano delivered a speech today at American University about border security, immigration enforcement and her department’s controversial Secure Communities program.
The National Day Laborer Organizing Network and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) called Wednesday for a national day to protest the Legal Workforce Act of 2011 (.pdf) filed by Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, which would make the E-Verify system mandatory for all employers within three years.
The Department of Homeland Security issued a letter on Thursday that says it will implement prosecutorial discretion measures to review deportation proceedings laid out in a June memo issued by John Morton, director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
New York Judge Shira A. Scheindlin yesterday ordered Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI and the Executive Office of Immigration Review to produce further information about whether and how localities may opt out of or limit participation participation in Secure Communities.
It has long been clear that Secure Communities allows local law enforcement officials to check a detainee’s fingerprints with an FBI database to check his or her criminal background. But a press release issued by the National Day Laborer Organizing Network Wednesday also claims that Secure Communities is “a key component of a little-known FBI project to accumulate a massive store of personal biometric information on citizens and non-citizens alike.”
John Morton, director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, announced Friday changes to the embattled immigration-enforcement program Secure Communities, which allows local law enforcement agencies to check the fingerprints of people they arrest with FBI and Department of Homeland Security databases to make sure they are not undocumented criminals.
The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday passed a resolution to ensure voluntary participation in Secure Communities, a federal immigration enforcement program that has been seriously questioned because it has jailed and deported undocumented immigrants who have committed no crime.
The reaction from different pro-immigrant organizations to President Obama’s speech this week on immigration was mixed, but all tend to agree the administration needs to lead with action.
In his speech President Obama spelled out on his administrations increases…
President Obama held a meeting in the White House Tuesday at which administration officials and other stakeholders discussed immigration reform. Immigrant rights groups are praising the president’s attention to the issue, while criticizing what they see as a lack of immigrant voices “at the table.”
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