The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) has made the rather un-astounding discovery that unemployment in the recession-plagued U.S. economy is high, especially among less-educated workers. In a new report, entitled A Huge Pool of Potential Workers, CIS dissects the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers on unemployment and underemployment among the native-born, and notes that there are between seven and eight million unauthorized immigrants currently working in the United States. The report then makes the casual claim that “if the United States were to enforce immigration laws and encourage illegal immigrants to return to their home countries, we would seem to have an adequate supply of less-educated natives to replace these workers.” What the CIS report fails to mention is that the costly and destructive measures which have been proposed to “encourage” unauthorized workers to leave the country have yet to work and adversely affect native-born workers; that many unemployed natives would have to travel half way across the country to reach the low-wage jobs formerly held by unauthorized immigrants; that removing unauthorized workers from the country also means removing unauthorized consumers and the jobs they support through their purchasing power; and that none of this would aid the nation’s long-term economic recovery.
Read the rest of this entry »

In October, the restrictionist group Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) released another report singing the praises of the 287(g) program. In The 287(g) Program: Protecting Home Towns and Homeland, the authors ignore the evidence and arguments put forward by law enforcement experts—such as the Police Foundation, the Major Cities Chiefs Association, and the International Association of Chiefs of Police—and dismisses them as “national advocacy organizations.” In doing so, CIS puts itself forward as apparent “law enforcement experts,” adding to their impressive resume that includes biblical scholar and environmental expert.
Read the rest of this entry »

Any serious researcher would probably tell you that trying to use a single public-opinion poll to gauge the likely impact of a policy initiative as complex as immigration reform is about as reliable as consulting a psychic. Yet that is precisely what some opponents of comprehensive immigration reform are now attempting to do. For instance, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) is trumpeting the results of a poll conducted in Mexico to suggest that creating a pathway to legal status for unauthorized immigrants currently living in the United States would trigger a tsunami of illegal immigration from south of the border. CIS completely ignores the fact that the last legalization program in 1986 did not spur an increase in unauthorized immigration (it actually reduced it in the short run). Instead, CIS acts as if popular beliefs and attitudes about immigration among Mexican citizens are a means of predicting the future. But popular perceptions are no substitute for hard data—and the data is not on CIS’s side.
Read the rest of this entry »

For many years now, religious leaders and diverse faith groups have contributed much to the ongoing immigration debate. Grounded in faith and good works, the faith community has been and continues to be steadfast in their outreach to immigrants through a myriad of support and service programs, faith rallies and support of those in need. That being said, there are restrictionist groups who would rather sully the debate by co-opting faith-based terminology and tease anti-immigrant agendas out of Scripture.

Yesterday, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) held such a panel discussion on the immigration debate from a faith-based perspective. CIS Fellow, James R. Edwards Jr., an apparent biblical scholar, was on hand to discuss his recently released report, A Biblical Perspective on Immigration Policy—the latest in a series of CIS publications on faith which writes off “compassion” as the practice of “religious elites” and attempts to speak for the majority of “rank-and-file” Christian laity who apparently “oppose legalization and support enforcement of immigration laws.” Edwards’ report attempts to examine the biblical role of civil government.
Read the rest of this entry »

Photo by thatlegalguy.

Once again, opponents of immigration reform have actually made a strong case for comprehensive immigration reform. At an event this morning sponsored by the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), various speakers argued that ID theft by unauthorized immigrants is a problem that needs to be solved. While they seemed unwilling to offer any real solutions, the issues raised in the discussion clearly point toward the need for comprehensive immigration reform—including a legalization program for current undocumented immigrants—which would be a large and important step toward curbing the use of fraudulent documents by unauthorized immigrants.
Read the rest of this entry »

Photo by def101.

Today, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) released a new fact sheet about immigrants and the health care system. At a public event, CIS made it clear that while immigrants may not be to blame for all the problems with the U.S. health care system, they certainly are part of the problem, and the only solution is to step up immigration enforcement and reduce future immigration. Hmmm, isn’t that their solution to everything?

While stating that free health care for “illegals” is a problem (even though the bills in Congress explicitly deny coverage to undocumented immigrants), CIS focused on health care benefits for legal immigrants, implying that legal immigrants should be denied affordable health care and that comprehensive immigration reform would destroy the health care system. This is simply the latest attempt to silence any constructive discussion about important issues and scare the American public by using immigrants as a handy scapegoat.
Read the rest of this entry »

Photo by timlewisnm.

In a pair of new reports released yesterday, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) presents an array of demographic and employment data from the U.S. Census Bureau to obliquely suggest that the recession-plagued U.S. economy doesn’t really “need” immigrant workers. Although both of these reports are surprisingly nuanced in their analysis compared to many previous CIS efforts, they nevertheless present a portrait of immigration and the U.S. economy that is over-simplified and off the mark. In gauging the potential impact of immigrant workers on native-born workers, for instance, CIS fails to fully account for the many differences between immigrants and natives in terms of where in the country they live, how much education they have, what occupations they’ve worked in, and how long they’ve been in the labor market. In contrast, an IPC report that was also released yesterday explores all of these variables.
Read the rest of this entry »

Photo by *0ne*.

What’s the best way to help workers form a union in a workplace where managers have spent years wantonly violating labor laws by threatening and intimidating workers into resisting unionization? If you’re the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), the answer would seem to be “get rid of the workers.” At least, that is one of the main recommendations contained within a rather confusing new CIS report on the aftermath of the January 2007 immigration raids conducted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents at the Smithfield pork plant in Tar Heel, North Carolina. Holding up Smithfield as a prototype for the nation, the CIS report vaguely suggests that destructive immigration raids and a flawed electronic employment-verification system will not only succeed in draining millions of unauthorized immigrants from the United States, but bolster unionization for American workers, too. These are fanciful notions at best.
Read the rest of this entry »

Photo by guuleed.

In a new “special report” released on July 1, the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) regurgitates an old and deeply flawed argument: that immigration causes pollution. Specifically, the report claims that, because immigration increases the size of the U.S. population, it also increases U.S. energy consumption, which increases U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, which contributes to global warming. If this line of reasoning seems a tad weak, that’s because it is. As Andrea Nill writes for the ThinkProgress Wonk Room, the report relies largely on “anecdotes and inferences” in an “attempt to pander to progressive soft spots” on the environment.
Read the rest of this entry »

Photo by freefotouk.

Today, the Washington Post highlighted a report by civil rights leaders linking the recent spike in hate crimes against Hispanics and people perceived to be immigrants with inflammatory rhetoric present in the immigration debate.

The report, published by the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights Education Fund (LCCREF), looks at FBI hate crime statistics and calls for a more civil discourse that informs progress rather than “dehumanizing, racist stereotypes and bigotry” that so often permeate the debate. Michael Lieberman, Washington counsel for the Anti-Defamation League, echoed these sentiments, “The tone of discourse over comprehensive immigration reform needs to be changed, needs to be civil and sane.”
Read the rest of this entry »