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The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a necessary slowdown in government operations. Thats frustrating to anyone who needs the Department of Motor Vehicles, or a permit to replace a damaged hot water heater. And the unavailability of certain government services has posed challenges to working people everywhere. However, only immigrant advocates appear to be arguing that their clients deserve a free pass from applicable laws for the duration of shelter-at-home orders.

Since the beginning of the outbreak, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has fielded calls from mass migration advocates to extend immigration filing deadlines and grant automatic extensions to any foreigners whose status is about to expire. Many mainstream media outlets have carried opinion columns that claim allowing more time to file applications would save lives and that USCIS policies make immigration difficult and dangerous.

Thats nonsense. And the recent USCIS announcement directing non-immigrants to seek extensions individually is both legally correct and wise public policy. USCIS has a responsibility to protect both the American public and foreign visitors. It can only fulfill that responsibility by vetting extension requests on a case-by-case basis.

Assertions to the contrary, made by advocates for migrants, are hyperbolic and baseless. The proof lies in the fact that nobody is making similar arguments about comparable government-administered benefits. An approved immigration application is roughly equivalent to a drivers license. It demonstrates that the government has accorded a privilege to an individual who has satisfied a set of legal conditions and demonstrated that he or she merits an exercise of the governments discretion. Nevertheless, no one has been howling that the United States will not survive the COVID-19 crisis as a moral and upstanding nation unless we allow anyone who wishes to do so, licensed or unlicensed, to operate a motor vehicle on our public roadways.

Whats really going on? The open-borders contingent is trying to create a back-door amnesty by capitalizing on a public health crisis. And whats worse, they are suggesting USCIS take actions that it has no statutory authority to implement.

The Immigration and Nationality Act clearly states that aliens seeking temporary admission to the United States must establish, to the satisfaction of the Department of Homeland Security, that they are eligible for nonimmigrant status. To obtain an extension, aliens requesting additional time in the U.S. must individually establish that they either continue to remain eligible for the status in which they were admitted, or that they are qualified for a change of status. USCIS has no legal authority to confer what is, in essence, blanket amnesty without congressional authorization to do so. Anyone arguing otherwise is blinded by partisanship and willfully ignorant of U.S. immigration law.

Even more disturbing than immigration advocates asking that USCIS do something illegal is the fact that they think their request is a good idea. Every immigration program the U.S. has implemented permitting a government agency to offer blanket extensions of immigration status rather than considering them on a case-by-case basis has been a failure.

Take, for example, Temporary Protected Status (TPS). Enacted by Congress in 1990, the program was intended to offer temporary respite to migrants in the U.S., whether here lawfully or not, who came from countries experiencing natural disasters or political upheaval. Instead, for the majority of recipients it became the golden ticket to multi-decade authorization to remain in the U.S. And because the TPS legislation allowed the executive branch to give the status to broad classes of migrants, and then extend the privilege at will, administrations exploited it to pander to immigrant communities.

At present, TPS has been granted to more than 400,000 foreigners, coming from at least 10 countries. Many of them were given protection decades ago. Yet most of them are still here, even if the circumstances allegedly preventing them from going home were resolved long ago. For example, an estimated 86,000 Hondurans were given temporary permission to remain in the U.S. following 1998s Hurricane Mitch; most of them are still here.

So-called temporary extensions almost never are transitory. When aliens are permitted to remain temporarily in the U.S., their advocates inevitably wind up asserting that since we have allowed them to stay so long, it would be cruel to ask them to leave. The longer the allegedly temporary authorization is extended, the more strident those assertions become. And thats how short-term extensions morph into permanent ones.

If the COVID-19 epidemic has demonstrated anything, it is that the U.S. must control its borders. Public health security is national security. And border security is public health security. This is not the time for USCIS, ICE or Customs and Border Protection to be arbitrarily and unilaterally relaxing the laws Congress enacted to protect our borders and maintain our sovereignty.

From a practical standpoint, what immigration advocates seek in this instance simply isnt necessary. The Department of Homeland Security and other government agencies, such as the Postal Service, continue to provide essential services. There is no reason that nonimmigrants with pending applications cant mail required documents prior to deadlines, or furnish written explanations of why their personal situation merits a discretionary extension. And nothing prohibits aliens from mailing, telephoning or emailing USCIS to request an extension.

The COVID-19 pandemic presents a real threat to public health. It does not, however, furnish an excuse to foolishly abandon immigration vetting procedures that have kept us reasonably safe in the decades since the 9/11 terror attacks.

Matt OBrien is director of research at the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), a nonprofit group advocating for legal immigration. He is a former assistant chief counsel with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and a former U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) division head.

See the original post:
The coronavirus is no reason to waive the rules for immigrants | TheHill - The Hill

Some of you may have read the book The Ugly American (published 1958), or seen the movie, starring Marlon Brando, in the mid-1960s. JFK was so appalled by U.S. government agencies rampant exploitation of European, Asian, African, and other countries throughout the world, as documented in the book, that when he was elected president his administration created the Peace Corps, sending thousands of Americans into those countries to teach and work with their citizens on education, health, agriculture, construction, water systems, etc.

Todays Ugly Americans occupy the White House, Fox News, the U.S. Senate and House, governors mansions, state legislatures and the judiciary and most, if not all, have an R after their names.

Prior to the 2017 inauguration, the Trump administration was warned of an impending pandemic and provided with a 69-page report documenting Presidents Bushs and Obamas experiences in coping with SARS, H1N1, bird flu, Ebola and other viruses encountered during their presidencies.

Is that report still on the shelf in the White House and why has it never seen the light of day?

Republicans will never vote for affordable health care, much less single-payer. They will never vote to raise taxes on big business, billionaires or Wall Street. They will never vote for comprehensive immigration reform or for a living wage for American workers essential to our everyday lives.

Well remember in November.

Excerpt from:
'Ugly Americans' show their faces once again | Letters To Editor - Greensboro News & Record

The federal government, along with local and state governments, prioritize illegal aliens more than its own veterans, according to a new analysis from the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR).

The report examines federal, state, and localgovernment expenditures on items such as education, healthcare, and legal aidfor illegal aliens and veterans. Its findings reveal that providingbenefits and services to illegal aliens outstrips theresources dedicated to providing for the needs of veterans.

By Fiscal Year 2021, the U.S. will need to spend roughly $243 billion to assist its veterans, the reportfinds. However, the open borders lobby continues to prioritize funding forillegal aliens, even though money would be better spent on law-abidingindividuals who defended the country. Currently, an estimated 14.3 million illegalaliens live in the United States, which costs taxpayers about $132 billion annually.

Veterans require anddeserve a significant amount of assistance as many struggle with issues relatedto their service. Homelessness, substance abuse andmental health issues are greater among veterans than the general population.Adding to these challenges, job competition withillegal aliens makes it more difficult for veterans to find work, as illegalaliens depress their wages and fill jobs that might otherwise go to veterans.

The study identifies that an estimated 1.2million veterans are either unemployed or underemployed, while 7 million illegal aliens continue to work in the UnitedStates. Despite having roughly a million individuals who fought for our freedomin need of employment assistance some looking to upgrade their careerprospects, others just looking for a paying job illegal aliens continue to bepreferred by some employers.

And it is not just jobs. Veterans continue to struggle with unmet healthcare needs, even as federal, state and local governments choose to provide free medical care to the nations growing illegal alien population. The open-borders lobby is attempting to expand the Affordable Care Act to include low-income illegal alien populations, which would cost approximately $10 billion annually and could potentially reach $23 billion, the analysis reveals. Meanwhile, VA clinics, which need significant upgrades, continue to fall short of the mark, argue advocates for our nations veterans.

Veterans can also face discrimination when itcomes to education funding. For example, in April 2019, the New York statelegislature set aside $27 million in college tuition assistance for thechildren of illegal aliens but refused to add a few hundred thousand dollars toa program that funds university education for the children of deceased anddisabled veterans, the study points out.

Governments should not be prioritizingthe needs of illegal aliens while veterans areshort-changed, the study argues. In sanctuary citiesfrom coast to coast, this trend is rampant. In 2018, officials in Oakland,California, created a $300,000 fund for illegal aliens facing possibledeportation. In the same year, Baltimore, Maryland, approved $200,000 worth ofspending to protect illegal aliens from deportation.

Simply put, taxpayer money should not be spent on illegal aliens with no allegiance to the United States, while the needs of veterans, to whom the U.S. owes a significant debt, continue to go unmet. Instead, the scarce resources being spent on illegal aliens should be allocated to programs that address veteran unemployment, healthcare, and homelessness. However, this goal can only be achieved if governments at all levels recalibrate their priorities and stop favoring illegal aliens over American veterans.

Link:
New Study: America Takes Better Care of Illegal Aliens Than Its Veterans - ImmigrationReform.com

(April 17, 2020 / JNS) The depth of the coronavirus pandemic took the world by surprise. The international economy has completely crashed, unemployment is rampant, and as of Friday, the disease hasclaimed more than 150,000 lives worldwide, with a reported 2.2 million cases of infection.

While scientists around the world continue to decipher the many surprises delivered by this virus, the illness did not disappoint those who have studied the history of anti-Semitism. Europes Black Plague, Russias 1917 Communist Revolution and Germanys economic turmoil following the conclusion of World War I all saw a disproportionate rise in anti-Semitism. The logic is simple: When a crisis hits, the Jews will serve as worthy scapegoats. Following the Nazis systematic extermination of 6 million Jews, it seemed that the world had finally understood the dangers of anti-Jewish hatred. If it did, it only lasted a short while.

Only 75 years have passed since the Russian and American forced freed Birkenau and Treblinka. Survivors of the Holocaust continue to find the strength and resilience to travel the world and speak of the horrors they saw. No one needs to pay a fee to hear them, nor do people need to travel hundreds of miles to hear their stories, which now are ubiquitous online.

So what do Americans know about the Holocaust in 2020?

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According to a pollpublishedby Pew Research Center, the results are rather frightening.

As many as 55 percent of Americans are unaware that 6 million Jews were systematically murdered by the Nationalist Socialist Party, with 57 percent not knowing that Adolf Hitler took power in Germany through a democratic process.

What does this mean?

The majority of Americans are completely unacquainted with one of the most fundamental lessons that modern history has left us withthe fact that anti-Semitism can be easily mainstreamed and weaponized.

And it has been in this age of corona.

In an attempt to aggressively flatten the curve of the virus, the United Stateslike most governments around the worldhas requested that all individuals practice responsible social distancing and, if possible, stay home and practice self-quarantine

Within hours of this request, the memes and jokes went viral. Sadly, the memory of the Holocaust was rapidly cheapened. In fact, if you were to search the name of Anne Frank on Twitters search bar, you would most likely encounter the followingposts:

Quarantine is just the Anne Frank challenge.

Anne Frank did this for two years with no TV or video games. Impressive.

At least Anne Frank had a boyfriend.

The last of these is perhaps the most disturbing. The reason being that the individual who tweeted out this despicable comparison must have been somewhat familiar with Anne Franks story. Even with that knowledge, the individual decided to compare the quarantine, brought upon by this pandemic, to the memory of a young girl who had her citizenship revoked, was forced into hiding with her entire family, and then eventually captured and murdered, all because she was Jewish.

Members of Congress have also used rhetoric to cheapen analogies to the Holocaust.

You may recall last yearscomments by Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), regarding the immigration centers at the U.S.-Mexico border:

The U.S. is running concentration camps on our southern border, and that is exactly what they are. If that doesnt bother you I want to talk to the people that are concerned enough with humanity to say that never again means something.

The invocation of the terms concentration camp and never again were strategically used to spark a partisan debate on immigration reform in the United States. Doubts that they were strategically used were put to rest after an interview a few days after the controversial comments were made. When asked why she used these terms, she responded:

If I didnt say it that way,no one would be talking about concentration camps. Weve got members [of Congress] going to the border every single weekend because we jostled this discussion. And we named it for what it was.

The congresswoman succeeded. Immigration reform, at least for a few weeks, took the spotlight in national discourse on policy reform.

The price? Dishonoring the memory of millions of Jews who were gathered and transported like cattle across Europe for extermination. It was an obvious and erroneous comparison to the World War II and the Holocaust.

Perhaps the individuals referencing Anne Franks experience during their time in quarantine subconsciously dismissed any regard for the continuedriseof anti-Semitism in America, or maybe they are willingly participating in it. Maybe they had no idea. It doesnt matter. The consequences of cheapening the memory of the Holocaust remain the same under any circumstance.

While it needs to be pointed out that Ocasio-Cortezs political activism should not be compared to the recent jokes found on social media, there is a question worth asking: Does the occasional minimization of the Holocaust by the highest members of the U.S. government, by the media and even by academics fuel or even enable the comfortability of the American public to engage in anti-Semitic rhetoric?

The memory of the Holocaust must be sanctified.

That should be one of Americas first steps in its fight to combat the rise of anti-Semitism exacerbated by the pandemic.

Yoni Michanie, a former paratrooper in the Israel Defense Forces, holds a masters degree in diplomacy and international security from IDC Herzliya. He is an Israel advocate, public speaker, Middle East analyst, and a campus adviser and strategic planner at CAMERA.

See more here:
Minimizing the Holocaust during the COVID-19 pandemic - JNS.org

From Texas Standard:

Editor's note: Between the reporting and airing of this story, Austin Resource Recovery's director, Ken Snipes, told the Texas Standard that masks are now provided for employees.

Interstate 35 is a vital transportation artery cutting across Texas, south to north. It stretches from Mexico, through Dallas and eventually ends up in Canada. The highway is essential for keeping goods flowing between the three largest countries in North America everything from produce to medical equipment is trucked along it. And it's especially important during the pandemic as people are more aware of the vulnerability of the supply chain.

But the highway is also a divider. It splits the population of Texas into two very uneven sectors. A large majority of Texans live east of I-35, says Texas State Demographer Lloyd Potter.

Its 87% of our population, he says.

And it creates local divisions, too. In Austin, I-35 divided the city by race, starting in the mid-20th century. And it wasnt by accident. Eliot Tretter, author of Shadows of a Sunbelt City: The Environment, Racism and the Knowledge Economy in Austin, says I-35 became a monument that separated white Austin from non-white Austin a means of segregation.

Some people call [Austin] the Dual City or the Apartheid City, Tretter says.

That duality is especially apparent during the COVID-19 pandemic, and particularly during the early morning. In west Austin at that time of day, there's an atmosphere of peacefulness. The west side tends to be wealthier, and many people there work from home right now. So, at, say 5:30 a.m. or 6:00 a.m., many residents are still asleep. But in parts of east Austin, there's a buzzy atmosphere as some residents head to work in jobs deemed essential by the state. But that buzziness can also make it feel like an alternate reality, as if the virus doesn't exist.

Daniel Perez is an eastsider with an essential job. He starts work at 5:30 a.m., installing kitchen cabinets. People like Salvador and Erica are also ready to work early in the morning. They are unauthorized immigrants, so Texas Standard decided to only use their first names. Salvador is a roofer. Erica works for a house cleaning service.

Even the grocery stores in east Austin open early to service the constant stream of workers who stop by to grab a case of bottled water, or cleaning supplies or a bite to eat before heading to work.

Andrew Roberson works for the city of Austins waste management department, Austin Resource Recovery. As he climbs into a recycling truck, armed with his breakfast in one hand and an orange juice in the other, the protective gear that is ubiquitous in the city nowadays is, strangely, nowhere on his body.

Im on the front line every day and I havent got no pension for it. Im not even given a mask. [And, yet], I touch everyones recycle and trash cans, Roberson says.

Without a vaccine, the primary weapons against COVID-19 are staying home, washing hands and wearing masks. Roberson doesnt have any of those protections.

The new coronavirus doesnt discriminate; anyone can become infected. But some people, like Roberson, face more risk because of their race, job or socioeconomic status. It's unclear why the city of Austin hasn't provided him with a protective mask.

Tretter says these oversights could be explained by looking at how our culture treats these workers under regular circumstances. Things that we've accepted as "normal" risks in certain jobs, like environmental hazards, can be rationalized as part of a course of how we build cities, he says.

From exposure, to pollution on highways, to lead paint, to where people live, to who has the right to live and die" all of that has been absorbed into a sort of ethos that a resident might buy into while living in the city.

Democratic state Rep. Donna Howard says COVID-19 has revealed troubling attitudes about whose lives are valued and whose aren't.

Its in our faces, she says.

Howards district covers parts of east and west Austin both sides of the Dual City. And the differences have become increasingly evident to her. The only way to change things, she says, is through political reform, and she hopes the pandemic will be a catalyst for that. She especially wants immigration reform to protect people who were vulnerable even before the pandemic.

These are the people that are there making sure that [the] food supply chain is continuing to function. [These] people allow us to enjoy the lives that we have and to have food on our table, Howard says.

Texas has called them essential. But some of them dont feel that way. One person recently commented on social media that instead of essential, we feel disposable.

Digital story edited by Caroline Covington.

View original post here:
When It Comes To COVID-19, The 'I-35 Divide' Determines Who's More At Risk - KUT