After spending just over a week in Congress, freshman Rep. Anh "Joseph" Cao (R-La.) took on conservative radio host Michael Savage over the topic of immigration.
Responding to comments by Savage arguing immigrants have difficulty assimilating, which then leads them to become "gang-bangers," Cao said he hoped the Republican Party would reject such sentiments.
"A statement like that would be very anti-immigrant, almost to me borderlining to almost being racist, if you ask me," Cao told the liberal blog Think Progress. "So I hope that the GOP will not tolerate those kinds of views and will not take those positions."
Cao, the first Vietnamese-American elected to Congress, is an immigrant from that country.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is suing the federal government to stop its expansion of a program that seeks to verify whether employees are legally allowed to work in the country.
The Chamber, a business-friendly group that has opposed measures expelling illegal immigrant workers, said that the Bush administration has unlawfully used an executive order to require federal contractors and sub-contractors to use the Department of Homeland Security's E-Verify program. The Chamber group said that the executive order discards federal immigration and procurement laws.
"This massive expansion of E-Verify is not only bad policy, it
A new study suggests voters who are illegal immigrants could distort the outcomes of elections.
It estimates that as many as 2.7 million non-citizen immigrants are registered to vote in the United States.
Only American citizens are legally eligible to vote.
Researcher David Simcox found that in some districts in California, Florida, and New York, there were more registered voters according to county election records than eligible voters according to the U.S. Census.
Democratic congressional candidate Sharen Neuhardt has harbored an illegal immigrant from Rwanda on her farm, the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) alleged in a release Wednesday.
Neuhardt had housed Ishema Umuhoza, a 26-year-old Rwandan political refugee, since 2002, according to the Daily News. The refugee had his application for political asylum denied, but Neuhardt and her husband are in the process of appealing the denial.
The NRCC slammed Neuhardt, accusing her of running a "sanctuary city" on her farm, while also playing up Umuhoza's arrest record--four traffic violations, and two charges related to public intoxication.
"Ohio voters want a representative who will help solve the illegal immigration problem, not one who contributes to it," said NRCC spokesman Brendan Buck.
The Neuhardt campaign condemned the attack, saying Republicans were "cowardly attacking a survivor of the Rwandan genocide for political gain."
Neuhardt is running against state Sen. Steve Austria (R) in Ohio's 7th district to replace Rep. Dave Hobson (R), who is retiring. The Cook Political Report says the winner is "likely Republican."
Illegal immigrants "degrade the environment," according to Homeland Security Sec. Michael Chertoff, speaking to the Associated Press.
"Illegal migrants really degrade the environment. I've seen pictures of human waste, garbage, discarded bottles and other human artifact in pristine areas," Chertoff told the AP. "And believe me, that is the worst thing you can do to the environment."
Chertoff was defending the need for a "virtual fence" on the border between the United States and Mexico, which he implied would be an environmental boon in border areas. Some opponents say such barriers are harmful to the environment.
Over 150 miles of fence had been constructed through last week, Chertoff said, less than half of the 370 miles of actual fencing Homeland Security hopes to construct.
Florida Congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart (R) is accusing Barack Obama of pushing a "lie" on John McCain's immigration record.
"It is offensive and dishonest for Barack Obama to lie about John McCain's record on immigration and years of support for the Hispanic community, when it was Barack Obama himself who voted for 'poison pill' amendments that killed the effort at immigration reform," Diaz-Balart said.
"Instead of making false ads with baseless attacks, Barack Obama should be apologizing to the Latino community."
Here is the ad the Florida Republican is referring to:
John McCain accuses Barack Obama of standing against immigrants and blocking comprehensive immigration reform in a new Spanish-language TV ad that will air in Colorado, Nevada, and New Mexico.
"Obama and his congressional allies. Ready to block immigration reform, but not ready to lead," a narrator says (in Spanish) after alleging that Obama sabotaged efforts to pass guest-worker programs, a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants, and border-security measures.
Obama backed several "poison pill" amendments "meant to undermine the bipartisan compromise for reform" hammered out by McCain and Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) in the spring of 2007, McCain's campaign alleges. Obama voted with McCain in favor of the bill's final version.
See the ad and full English text below.
Read more...
John McCain will tell the National Council of La Raza Monday that he has earned the trust of Hispanics by championing "fair, practical and comprehensive immigration reform."
"At a moment of great difficulty in my campaign, when my critics said it would be political suicide for me to do so, I helped author with Senator Kennedy comprehensive immigration reform, and fought for its passage," McCain's prepared remarks for Monday afternoon say. "I took my lumps for it without complaint. My campaign was written off as a lost cause. I did so not just because I believed it was the right thing to do for Hispanic Americans."
"I do ask for your trust that when I say, I remain committed to fair, practical and comprehensive immigration reform, I mean it. I think I have earned that trust," McCain says.
McCain uses his failed attempt to guide immigration reform through the Senate last year to not only justify the trust Hispanics should place in him, but also to explain why Hispanics should not trust in Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential candidate.
"Senator Obama declined to cast some of those tough votes. He voted for and even sponsored amendments that were intended to kill the legislation, amendments that Senator Kennedy and I voted against," McCain says.
A new John McCain ad backs offering a path to citizenship to illegal immigrants. In the ad, to air in Colorado, Nevada, and New Mexico, McCain praises Hispanic citizens for serving in the U.S. military and enriching American culture.
The ad, which the campaign has entitled, "God's Children," tells viewers that a significant portion of U.S. veterans are Hispanic, and that Latin American immigrants "must come into country legally, but they have enriched our culture and our nation as every generation of immigrants before them."
McCain has recently promoted his stance on immigration, which is left of many in his party. McCain has touted a plan that "deal[s] practically and humanely with those who came here, as my distant ancestors did," providing a means for illegal immigrants to attain citizenship while also addressing issues of law enforcement and border security.
McCain has courted Hispanic voters aggressively as well: he has aired Spanish language radio ads in New Mexico, Nevada, Florida, all of which have significant Hispanic populations. One Spanish radio ad directly questioned Obama's commitment to Hispanic voters; another plugged free trade with Latin America.
Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R-N.Y.) said Thursday that Barack Obama is capturing 'an anti-American feeling' responding to Obama telling a town hall audience in Georgia that their children should learn to speak Spanish.
"Well this is why he is a popular candidate in Europe, because there is such an anti-American feeling and he is sort of capturing that," Giuliani said on MSNBC.
Giuliani said he was not as troubled by Obama's suggestion that children learn Spanish as the assumption that immigrant families are learning English.
"It makes sense to teach your children another language," Giuliani said. But, Giuliani added, "the reality is that this is a country that should speak English...and if we can learn an extra language or two that would be terrific."
The former New York City Mayor said Obama is "sliding over" the need for immigrant families to learn English by "making an assumption that isn't true, that all immigrants are learning English. They're not."
Most Viewed RSS Feed »
