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Vartak has ineligible to work in the U.S. because she is on an H-4 visa. That changed today.

On Tuesday, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced that select H-4 visa holders will be eligible for employment authorization.

It was part of President Obama's executive action on immigration in November, but has been part of a grassroots movement for much longer. It is the first reform to be implemented that's geared toward high-skilled immigrants.

The H-4 visa is given to spouses of those on an H-1B, as well as a handful of other, less common, visas. At present, H-4 visa holders can't earn an income or possess a social security number.

"It's a big win for the Indian community," said Shah Peerally, who heads up an immigration law firm in Newark, Calif. "A lot of people are going to be able to go on with their lives."

The State Department said 96,753 people received an H-4 in 2013, 76% of whom were from South Asia. (Indians also receive the majority of H-1B visas, with most working in science, tech and engineering, according to Neil Ruiz of the Brookings Institution.)

But Ruiz says it isn't just Indian women who have suffered -- the entire U.S. has been losing out because of this policy.

"In a world where everyone is competing, other countries like Canada are more competitive in giving both spouses and high-skilled workers authorization to work as soon as they arrive," he said.

The U.S. misses out on the taxes that these immigrants would contribute. Ruiz said because H-1B visa holders are high skilled, it's likely that their spouses are highly skilled as well.

The new rule requires H-4 holders (whose spouses have applied for green cards) to file an application for employment authorization and $380. The USCIS anticipates as many as 179,600 people might apply this year -- but it won't start accepting applications until May 26.

See the article here:
Immigration reform: Is this the first step?

A poll of 40,000 people reveals that the areas of consensus are broader than many suspect.

On immigration reform, rhetoric has often been out of sync with public opinion. Despite roughly three-quarters of Americans supporting the goals behind President Obamas executive action on immigration, Obamas new immigration plan has run into repeated Republican roadblocks. Republican governors in 26 states are suing the Obama administration, claiming that the order exceeded Obamas authority. A Republican-appointed judge in Texas ruled in favor of the GOP governors and issued an injunction halting the policys implementation. Republican congressional leaders are pursuing a parallel track to block the implementation of the executive action. GOP lawmakers have set up a partisan showdown by attaching riders to the Department of Homeland Security funding bill that would defund Obamas executive action on immigration. That bill, or a continuing resolution, must pass this week in order for DHS to remain open.

Today, the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) released the American Values Atlas, an online interactive map that provides an unprecedented portrait of Americas changing religious and political landscape. The AVA was designed to harness the power of big datamore than 40,000 telephone interviewsin order to provide a lens for understanding public opinion at levels not typically possiblesuch as at the state and metro levelor among smaller subgroups of Americans whose voices cannot be discerned in typical surveys. The AVA includes two measures in the area of immigration, one focused on policy, and the other on how immigrants are perceived. And the results are revealing.

At the national level, the AVA finds solid support for a path to citizenship. When asked to identify the best approach for dealing with immigrants who are living in the country illegally, six in 10 Americans say there should be a way for such immigrants to become citizens provided they meet certain requirements, while 17 percent say they should be allowed to become permanent legal residents but not citizens, and 19 percent say they should be identified and deported. Similarly, Americans hold fairly positive assessments of the economic impact of immigrants, with 55 percent saying that immigrants strengthen the country because of their hard work and talents, while only 36 percent say that immigrants are a burden on the country because they take jobs, housing, and healthcare.

A quick look at the AVA state map reveals that there is a broad consensus across the country about immigration policy solutions. For example, majorities of the residents of all 50 states support a path to citizenship for qualified immigrants currently living in the U.S. illegally. Support for a path to citizenship is fairly consistent across states, ranging from almost two-thirds in Delaware, Kansas, and Vermont, to just over half in Louisiana and Wyoming.

There is a broader span of opinion across states regarding the economic impact of immigrants. At one end, 52 percent of West Virginians and Mississippians say immigrants are a burden because they take jobs, housing, and health care. At the other end, only 26 percent of California residents say immigrants are a burden on the countrywhile two-thirds of state residents report that immigrants strengthen the U.S. because of their hard work and talents.

A couple of key patterns are evident here. First, it is notable that there are only 5 statesWest Virginia, Mississippi, Wyoming, Maine, and Alabamain which half or more of residents say immigrants are a burden on the country. Second, generally speaking, the states that tend to hold the most negative judgments about the economic impact of immigrants are not states that have historically had high levels of immigration. The reverse is also true. The four states in which residents hold the least concerns about immigrants being a burden are California, Hawaii, New Jersey, and New Yorkthe historic centers of immigration in the country.

Because of the AVAs large sample size, users are able to look at attitudes of demographic subgroups with an unprecedented degree of confidence. For example, the AVA demonstrates that the consensus across states on a path to citizenship largely holds across subgroups, including conservative subgroups. Majorities of Republicans (52 percent), white evangelical Protestants (54 percent), seniors (56 percent), and non-Hispanic whites (59 percent) all support a path to citizenship for immigrants currently living in the country illegally. Those numbers are based on interviews among random samples of over 9,400 Republicans, 7,900 white evangelical Protestants, 11,500 seniors, and 27,700 non-Hispanic white Americans.

This broad level of support is not always reflected in the polarized political debate, but not because of state-level differences. Residents of the 26 states bringing legal action against the Obama administration are only slightly more likely than average to say that immigrants are a burden on the country (39 percent vs. 36 percent respectively), and their support for a path to citizenship, at 59 percent, is statistically indistinguishable from the national average. These 26 states are set apart less by the views of their residents than the actions of their governors.

The pioneers of modern public opinion polling understood their craft as providing a vital democratic function in an increasingly fast-paced world. George Gallup promised that surveys would allow the American people to speak for themselves, and Elmo Roper referred to scientific surveys as democracys auxiliary ballot box. The immigration debate is a clear example of a terrain on which the pitched partisan battles waged by politicians have obscured the broad agreements of their constituents. If the public opinion data from the AVA can serve to remind our leadersand even ourselvesthat there is common ground available on an important issue like immigration, it has come close to realizing some of its civic and civilizing potential.

More:
What Americans Actually Think About Immigration

Updated: 02/25/2015 10:33 AM Created: 02/25/2015 9:07 AM WNYT.com By: Ben Amey

ALBANY - The immigration debate in Washington, D.C. is also of interest to farmers in New York. They use a lot of migrant labor. The president of the New York Farm Bureau is traveling from Albany to Washington Wednesday to talk to members of Congress.

Dean Norton, president of the New York Farm Bureau, says that immigration reform is the bureaus top legislative priority this year, the same as it was last year. The Farm Bureau supports a flexible visa plan for migrant workers, rather than a plan that supports amnesty or one that solely focuses on enforcement.

An article in the New York Times from a year ago quotes an American Farm Bureau study as saying if an enforcement-only policy was adopted, fruit production could drop up to 60 percent and food prices would increase 5 percent over the next five years.

Part of the flexible visa program would involve the replacement of the season visa to one that would let workers get a three-year visa to work on a farm. The New York Farm Bureau says that without a stable, legal workforce to help work on farms, it will become more difficult to provide food.

Other topics that the farm bureau will discuss with New Yorks congressional delegation include President Obamas immigration executive order, food safety, trade policy, and funding for federal school and local food programs.

Continue reading here:
New York Farm Bureau pushes immigration reform

Arizonas former governor is claiming First Amendment protections, and she may have a point

My law school mentor used to joke that the First Amendment has protected a bunch of unsavory characters: separatists, chauvinists, white supremacists, communists, jingoists, bigotsand on its darkest days, he would say, the First Amendment has even protected journalists.

Now, we might be able to add one more to the list: Jan Brewer, the former Arizona governor, who has some unsavory marks on her record and is kind of a journalist, she claims. Double the First Amendment fun!

Opponents of Arizonas tough immigration law, known as SB 1070, recently asked a federal judge to order Brewer to comply with a subpoena for the notes and materials she used to write her 2011 book Scorpions for Breakfast.

The opponents, mostly civil liberties organizations, subpoenaed Brewer as part of a lawsuit against the sheriff of Apache County. The groups are challenging SB 1070 on various grounds, and they argue that Brewer, who is not a party to the suit, possesses notes and materials relevant to the case.

Those materials would be the source documents Brewer presumably relied on to write her book, much of which discusses SB 1070, and which she says she wrote in her personal, not official, capacity. And those documentsemails, letters, memoranda, notes of meetings, recordings of interviews, etc.would shed light on certain facts at issue in the case, the laws opponents claim. The groups requested the materials from Brewer twice before, in August and November 2014, but both times she refused to disclose anything, citing several reasons.

One of them: the First Amendment.

Journalists privilege: Not just for journalists

In part, Brewer is arguing that the First Amendment-based journalists privilege allows her to shield her notes and source materials.

She may be right. In the Ninth Circuit, which covers Arizona, and in the majority of other circuits, the journalists privilege is a recognition that the free flow of information to the public is an interest of sufficient social importance to justify some incidental sacrifice of sources of facts needed in the administration of justice.

Link:
Why Jan Brewer is sounding like James Risen

Hillary Clinton #39;s EPIC Fail on Vaccines!
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Hillary Clinton's EPIC Fail on Vaccines! - Video