6/23/2022 The Surprise Issue Driving GOP CampaignsKatie Britt won the Alabama GOP Senate primary runoff last night, and one of the main issues she ran on was immigration. Britt has endorsed Senator Tom Cotton’s 2017 RAISE Act, which was a plan to decrease legal immigration by 50 percent. Britt is not the only Republican Senate candidate to come out in favor of stricter immigration policies. Blake Masters, running for the GOP nomination in the Arizona Senate race, wants to triple the size of the Border Patrol, wants to finish the border wall, and opposes all amnesty for illegal aliens. While he has espoused liberal immigration policies in the past, he now pledges to “end illegal immigration.”
The winner of the Ohio GOP Senate primary, J. D. Vance, is focusing part of his campaign on illegal immigration, promising changes similar to Masters’s. Yet Vance goes a step further, seeking to overhaul the current legal immigration system: “Millions of people want to come here, and we should only allow them if they contribute something meaningful to our country.” Vance wants to curb the number of legal immigrants coming into the country, prioritizing skilled immigrants. In one of his primary-campaign ads, called, “Are You a Racist?,” Vance said, “Joe Biden’s open border is killing Ohioans, with more illegal drugs and more Democrat voters pouring into this country.” These Republicans clearly believe immigration is an issue that can drive voters to the polls, even in an election year dominated by inflation and other economic concerns. The RAISE Act, endorsed by Katie Britt, was a plan pushed by Senator Cotton and former Georgia senator David Perdue in 2017. The bill, reintroduced in 2019 by Cotton and Perdue as well as Senator Josh Hawley (R, Mo.), was pitched as a way to boost job and wage growth, end chain migration, and welcome the highest-skilled immigrants to the country. The Reforming American Immigration for Strong Employment Act would cut the number of green cards issued on an annual basis from 1 million to 500,000. Until recently, Republicans generally maintained a position on immigration that illegal immigration needs to be halted, but legal immigration is good and should be encouraged. And after Mitt Romney lost the presidential election to Barack Obama in 2012, Republicans believed that in order to cater to the Hispanic vote, they would have to move their immigration stance to the left. Some, including former Florida governor Jeb Bush and Senator Marco Rubio (R., Fla.), endorsed amnesty for some illegal immigrants. Even the staunchly pro-Trump Fox host Sean Hannity suggested in 2012 that some law-abiding illegal immigrants should be granted citizenship. Donald Trump’s clinching of the nomination in 2016 and the ascent of populism within the GOP pushed immigration restrictionism to the forefront of Republican politics. Trump campaigned on building a wall on the southern border and deporting illegal immigrants. Illegal immigration, Trump maintained, undermines the American workforce by taking American jobs and lowering wages for native-born Americans. Ever since he was a boy in the border city of Nogales, Ariz., Santa Cruz County Sheriff David Hathaway says people have been crossing over into America looking for a better life. Only recently, he says, has this become red meat for national politicians. "Caravans staging in Mexico, they're heading this way and it's gonna be a mass invasion," he says, chuckling. "It's never materialized the way they describe it." On a recent afternoon, it was quiet in the high desert along the US-Mexico border several miles east of town. It's usually this way, Hathaway says. "There you go, that's Mexico right there," he says, getting out of his SUV along a dirt road. Hathaway is a former former DEA agent in Nogales and in South America. But he dresses more like the old west: cowboy hat, suspenders, key chain dangling off his belt. A hundred feet or so to his left, he points to a section of newer border fence, with its coils of razor wire dangling off the American side. Construction stopped when Donald Trump left office. A few construction rigs and some fencing lie on the other side of the road near the dried Santa Cruz River, where some of the first Spanish explorers entered what is today the U.S. in the 16th Century. It was long before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, the sheriff likes to note.
"It's very peaceful right where we're standing here right by the border where you can just walk right through and be in Mexico," he says. Or crouch under some short vehicle barrier fencing and walk right into the U.S. People are continuing to do that in places like this, even despite a recent federal judge's ruling allowing the pandemic border restrictions known as Title 42 to stay in place. President Trump used that order to block most migration from Mexico. Under Title 42, most Mexicans and Central Americans who are caught are being sent back immediately. But there appear to be plenty of exceptions. This Tucson Shelter Is Still Seeing Record Numbers People seeking asylum are still crossing and at least one shelter for them in Arizona is seeing record numbers. Seventy miles to the north of Nogales, the Casa Alitas Welcome Center in Tucson is taking in 375 people in a day, just a few days after the judge kept the closures in place at official southern ports of entry. One Colombian Family Is Hoping to Get to Atlanta Colombian Wilmar Romero has been staying at Casa Alitas with his wife and two young children for two weeks. Speaking in Spanish through an interpreter, Romero says he had to leave Bogota because an armed gang made a threat to his family. They first flew to Mexico City, then traveled by bus for three days to Mexicali. Soon after, they crossed at a known gap in the border fence near Yuma, Arizona. A Lot of the Federal Funding Supporting Aid Is Set to Run Out A good deal of the funding to support the growing humanitarian need in cities near the border like Tucson is coming from the federal government. Much of it is set to run out by the end of the month, warns Tucson Mayor Regina Romero. "I'm concerned that Congress will not allocate funding for a mess in terms of a broken immigration system that they refuse to fix," Romero says. A border sheriff calls Title 42 'dishonest' Back in Nogales, Santa Cruz County Sheriff David Hathaway says he's mostly given up on federal leaders, after two decades of an impasse on immigration reform. He's also concerned that just continually using taxpayer money to build up more humanitarian aid infrastructure in cities like Tucson will only serve as an incentive for more illegal crossings. Here are some things you should know about recent changes in immigration law and policy.
Automatic Employment Authorization Document extensions. The Department of Homeland Security has extended EADs 180 days in many categories. If you applied for an extension but haven’t heard back from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and your EAD is about to expire, print this page uscis.gov/eadautoextend and show it to your employer with your filing receipt. If you have a job particularly important to your employer, or to society in general, you may be able to get a USCIS appointment for EAD extension proof by calling (800) 375-5283. Even if your job is more typical, you might qualify for an EAD extension if you are about to be evicted or have another financial emergency. USCIS has agreed to expedite EAD requests for health care and child care workers. Temporary Protected Status for Cameroon, Sudan and Ukraine. TPS allows certain individuals to live and work in the United States without fear of deportation. They may also get permission to travel abroad. Natives of Cameroon and people who last lived there who have been here since April 14 qualify for TPS. The residence date for Sudan is March 1. For Ukraine, April 11. USCIS will now decide most I-751 cases without an interview. Certain permanent residents, mainly those who got green cards through marriage, get conditional permanent resident cards valid for two years. If USCIS approves your I-751, it issues you a permanent card — valid for 10 years and renewable. Prior to the new guidance, USCIS required interviews of all I-751 petitioners. Now, if you present enough evidence that your marriage is bona fide or “real,” USCIS will waive the interview. Typical proof includes joint bank or credit card accounts, letters or bills sent to you and your spouse at the same address, and proof that you have listed your spouse on your employment insurance or retirement account. You need not provide any particular type of proof. USCIS may call you in for an interview if you have a criminal record or your case is particularly complicated. |