Immigration News and Press Releases

Reporting from Washington—Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer appealed to the Supreme Court to revive the state's disputed immigration policing law, seeking a ruling that could free states to take aggressive enforcement action against illegal immigrants.

Alabama asked a U.S. judge to refer to the state’s highest court the question of how two provisions of its newly passed immigration law must be interpreted in light of a state constitution’s protection of religious freedom.

 Alabama  officials are fighting the assertion by civil rights groups that the state’s new immigration law will lead to profiling, and they’re pushing for the law to be implemented on Sept. 1.
 

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- State officials say a federal judge should deny a request by those who want to block enforcement of Alabama's new immigration law.

As Congress debates a bill to crack down on undocumented immigrants, California farmers are angling for a way to bring foreign guest workers into the U.S., saying it may be the only way they can stay in business.

Mexico and 15 Central American and South American countries have asked a federal court to consider their briefs in support of lawsuits seeking to overturn Alabama's new immigration law. The law, which is slated to go into effect Sept. 1, undermines U.S.-Mexico relations, according to Mexico's brief, Birmingham News writer Kent Faulk reports.

Arguing that the federal government sets immigration policy, the Justice Department has filed a lawsuit to stop Alabama’s toughest-in-the-nation law before it takes effect on Sept. 1.
 

An analysis by the Transactional Records Clearinghouse at Syracuse University shows that two immigration judges in El Paso, Tex., have a much higher denial rate than the national average. El Paso borders Juarez, Mexico, a city known for its out-of-control drug violence; there have been about 1,220 homicides this year, while there were 3,100 in 2010.

Rep. Dennis Ross’ support for proposed immigration enforcement bills has earned him a place in Numbers USA’s “5-for-5 Club.” Numbers USA’s motto is “For Lower Immigration Levels.”

The Mexican journalist Emilio Gutiérrez has sought political asylum in the United States since June 2008, when he and his teenage son fled the small town of Ascensión, Chihuahua, in the pre-dawn hours and arrived at the Antelope Wells, N.M., border crossing.

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- Groups opposed to Alabama's new immigration law this morning filed a motion asking a federal judge for a preliminary injunction to block the state from enforcing the law, which is slated to go into effect Sept. 1.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit Thursday by a group of would-be immigrants who were told they had won a chance to apply for a U.S. visa, saying the State Department was right to void the results of its annual visa lottery because a computer error had occurred.

In an immigration case being closely watched by same-sex marriage advocates, a federal judge in San Francisco on Wednesday granted a Venezuelan man a two-year reprieve to stay in the U.S. with his partner.

Trinity Park, south of downtown Los Angeles, is bustling on a late Friday afternoon. I scan the crowd: teenagers on skateboards, a heated game of pickup basketball, a couple holding hands. Then I see a man lying back in the grass, a crumpled brown paper bag in his lap, staring into the afternoon sun with clouded yellow eyes. He looks like a regular here; maybe he knows. "Disculpe señor," I start, "I'm looking for a man named Miguel. He used to live around here. Late 50s, early 60s. A big scar on the top of his head. Have you seen him?"
 

Roman Catholic priest Robert Vitaglione has been taking on a huge caseload of legal representation of immigrants in court for decades. The only problem: he is not a lawyer. Find out more from Gavel Grab.

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For more than three decades, Robert Vitaglione never turned down a client, representing thousands of immigrants in New York’s overburdened federal immigration  courts. But he is not a lawyer. He is a Roman Catholic priest without formal legal training or supervision — and it showed.

Law360, New York (June 27, 2011) -- Rep. Ruben Hinojosa, D-Texas, introduced a bill Friday in the U.S. House of Representatives that would add 38 new permanent judgeships and seven temporary judgeships to overburdened federal district courts in four U.S. states along the Mexican border.

On a recent morning, Judge Michael W. Straus is dispatching the business of the federal immigration court in Hartford with the precision of a polite drill sergeant.

Alabama’s Republican governor has signed an anti-illegal-immigration bill into law that’s being heralded and derided as the toughest crackdown in the nation.
 

WASHINGTON (Dow Jones)--A new report released Tuesday found that the number of backlogged federal immigration court cases in May 2011 is edging toward 300,000, an all-time high, representing a 48% increase since the end of 2008.

The nation’s immigration system is in “crisis” with courts struggling to cope with mounting caseloads, an American Bar Association representative told the Senate Judiciary Committee. Read details in Gavel Grab.

The mother from Cameroon came to immigration court bearing scars: She'd been imprisoned back home, she said, beaten with cables, burned with cigarettes and raped repeatedly, contracting HIV. Her husband had died behind bars; her three children she'd left behind were struggling to survive. She was seeking asylum, hoping to...

EL PASO, Texas -- U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has acknowledged an investigation of alleged personal misconduct by employees a day after court testimony that a top agency official was suspended amid questions about bogus travel expenses. ICE spokesman Brian Hale said Thursday the agency is working with the Department...

All of Wisconsin’s 72 counties are now members of a controversial program that connects state fingerprint databases with a federal immigration registry. The new federal program, called Secure Communities, says its foremost goal is the deportation of aliens convicted of serious crimes, but by the government’s own admission, a large...

Judges in Virginia may not use an obscure writ to reopen the cases of immigrants who say they weren't told that a criminal conviction could lead to their deportation, the Virginia Supreme Court ruled Thursday. The high court's ruling came in an Alexandria case in which a Circuit Court judge...