Scott Baker, London School of Economics Blog
August 27, 2015
In 2015, the role of undocumented immigrants in US society has become much more prominent, with many arguing for a full amnesty for the 11 million currently in the country. In new research, Scott R. Baker finds that a 1986 amnesty for nearly 3 million undocumented immigrants led to a 3-5 percent persistent fall in crime. He writes that this fall in crime is linked to the much improved labor market prospects of previously undocumented immigrants, which led to a decreased motivation to commit crimes for economic gain.
Beginning in the late 1970’s, rates of undocumented immigration into the United States began to increase dramatically. Fearing negative labor market and social effects, Congress passed the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA). The primary purpose of the bill was to enhance controls on the hiring and recruiting of undocumented immigrants. However, the legislation also represented a near-universal legalization of undocumented immigrants in the United States, a group comprising almost 3 million people, about 1 percent of the nation’s population.
This widespread legalization drove a persistent decline in crime of approximately 3-5 percent, equivalent to 120,000-180,000 fewer crimes committed each year across the nation, primary due to a large fall in property crimes. This decline cannot be explained by pre-existing trends, economic conditions, declines in drug crimes, changes to police forces and prison populations, or other common explanations of changes in crime rates during this period.[...]
Read the full article:
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/2015/08/27/evidence-suggests-that-amnesty-for-undocumented-immigrants-in-1986-significantly-reduced-crime-in-the-us/
Wednesday, September 2, 2015
Tuesday, September 1, 2015
The Pacific Coast Farm-Worker Rebellion
From Baja California to Washington State, indigenous farm workers are standing up for their rights.
By David Bacon, The Nation
August 28, 2015
A burned-out concrete blockhouse—the former police station—squats on one side of the only divided street in Vicente Guerrero, half a mile from Baja California’s transpeninsular highway. Just across the street lies the barrio of Nuevo (New) San Juan Copala, one of the first settlements of migrant farm workers here in the San Quintín Valley, named after their hometown in Oaxaca.
Behind the charred stationhouse another road leads into the desert, to a newer barrio, Lomas de San Ramón. Here, on May 9, the cops descended in force, allegedly because a group of strikers were blocking a gate at a local farm. A brutal branch of the Mexican police did more than lift the blockade, though. Shooting rubber bullets at people fleeing down the dirt streets, they stormed into homes and beat residents.
By then a farm-labor strike here was already two months old. Some leaders say provocateurs threw rocks and egged on a confrontation, but the beatings undeniably set off smoldering rage in the Lomas and Copala barrios. In addition, a government official who’d agreed to negotiate had failed to show up to talk with strike leaders.
By the end of the day, the police headquarters was a burned-out shell.[...]
Read the full article:
http://www.thenation.com/article/the-pacific-coast-farm-worker-rebellion/
By David Bacon, The Nation
August 28, 2015
A burned-out concrete blockhouse—the former police station—squats on one side of the only divided street in Vicente Guerrero, half a mile from Baja California’s transpeninsular highway. Just across the street lies the barrio of Nuevo (New) San Juan Copala, one of the first settlements of migrant farm workers here in the San Quintín Valley, named after their hometown in Oaxaca.
Behind the charred stationhouse another road leads into the desert, to a newer barrio, Lomas de San Ramón. Here, on May 9, the cops descended in force, allegedly because a group of strikers were blocking a gate at a local farm. A brutal branch of the Mexican police did more than lift the blockade, though. Shooting rubber bullets at people fleeing down the dirt streets, they stormed into homes and beat residents.
By then a farm-labor strike here was already two months old. Some leaders say provocateurs threw rocks and egged on a confrontation, but the beatings undeniably set off smoldering rage in the Lomas and Copala barrios. In addition, a government official who’d agreed to negotiate had failed to show up to talk with strike leaders.
By the end of the day, the police headquarters was a burned-out shell.[...]
Read the full article:
http://www.thenation.com/article/the-pacific-coast-farm-worker-rebellion/
Monday, August 31, 2015
America Has Freaked Out Over Birthright Citizenship For Centuries
By Gabriel J. Chin, Talking Points Memo
August 20, 2015
The controversy over whether children of undocumented migrants should be citizens may be heating up now, but it’s just the latest in a string of similar moments in U.S. history. The citizenship status of every non-white racial group has been challenged for literally centuries.
The original Constitution said nothing about who was a U.S. citizen. It gave Congress the power, exclusive of the states, to grant citizenship by naturalization, but it neither addressed the requirements for naturalization nor described the legal status of those obtaining naturalized citizenship. In 1790, Congress linked race to citizenship by allowing only “free white persons” to naturalize; racial restrictions of one kind or another were in effect continuously until 1952. The Constitution also provided that only a “natural-born citizen” could be elected president, but here too, the document failed to explain who was a natural-born citizen, leading to repeated controversies about the eligibility of candidates born out of the United States, such as John McCain, George Romney and Ted Cruz.[...]
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/brief-history-of-birthright-citizenship-freakouts
August 20, 2015
The controversy over whether children of undocumented migrants should be citizens may be heating up now, but it’s just the latest in a string of similar moments in U.S. history. The citizenship status of every non-white racial group has been challenged for literally centuries.
The original Constitution said nothing about who was a U.S. citizen. It gave Congress the power, exclusive of the states, to grant citizenship by naturalization, but it neither addressed the requirements for naturalization nor described the legal status of those obtaining naturalized citizenship. In 1790, Congress linked race to citizenship by allowing only “free white persons” to naturalize; racial restrictions of one kind or another were in effect continuously until 1952. The Constitution also provided that only a “natural-born citizen” could be elected president, but here too, the document failed to explain who was a natural-born citizen, leading to repeated controversies about the eligibility of candidates born out of the United States, such as John McCain, George Romney and Ted Cruz.[...]
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/brief-history-of-birthright-citizenship-freakouts
Sunday, August 30, 2015
The Racist Roots of the GOP's Favorite Immigration Plan
Birthright citizenship is enshrined in the 14th Amendment, but Donald Trump and other candidates are keeping alive the idea that some Americans should not have equal rights at birth.
By Zoë Carpenter, The Nation
August 19, 2015
The year 1866 was an alarming one for xenophobes: Congress passed the Civil Rights Act, declaring “all persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power…to be citizens of the United States.” Though explicitly intended to grant citizenship to African-Americans, who’d been denied it by the Supreme Court’s ruling in the 1857 Dred Scott case, wouldn’t the law also “have the effect of naturalizing the children of Chinese and Gypsies born in this country?” wondered Pennsylvania Senator Edgar Cowan. “Undoubtedly,” responded Senator Lyman Trumbull of Illinois. When President Andrew Johnson vetoed the act, he too raised the specter of the Chinese and “the people called Gypsies.”
Congress overrode the veto, and went on to enshrine the principle of birthright citizenship in the Constitution’s 14th Amendment. Needless to say, fears about the children of the gypsies proved unfounded. Yet the idea that people with certain types of parents should be denied citizenship—and the associated rights—persisted.[...]
Read the full article:
http://www.thenation.com/article/the-racist-roots-of-the-gops-favorite-new-immigration-plan/
By Zoë Carpenter, The Nation
August 19, 2015
The year 1866 was an alarming one for xenophobes: Congress passed the Civil Rights Act, declaring “all persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power…to be citizens of the United States.” Though explicitly intended to grant citizenship to African-Americans, who’d been denied it by the Supreme Court’s ruling in the 1857 Dred Scott case, wouldn’t the law also “have the effect of naturalizing the children of Chinese and Gypsies born in this country?” wondered Pennsylvania Senator Edgar Cowan. “Undoubtedly,” responded Senator Lyman Trumbull of Illinois. When President Andrew Johnson vetoed the act, he too raised the specter of the Chinese and “the people called Gypsies.”
Congress overrode the veto, and went on to enshrine the principle of birthright citizenship in the Constitution’s 14th Amendment. Needless to say, fears about the children of the gypsies proved unfounded. Yet the idea that people with certain types of parents should be denied citizenship—and the associated rights—persisted.[...]
Read the full article:
http://www.thenation.com/article/the-racist-roots-of-the-gops-favorite-new-immigration-plan/
Friday, August 28, 2015
ICE Officer Will Not Be Charged in Death of Terrance Kellom, Killed During Detroit Arrest
By Kate Abbey-Lambertz, The Huffington Post
August 19, 2015
DETROIT -- An officer who fatally shot a 20-year-old black man four times at his home will not be charged, Wayne County’s prosecutor said Wednesday.
Prosecutor Kym Worthy announced during a morning press conference that U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agent Mitchell Quinn's shooting of Terrance Kellom was justified.
A fugitive apprehension task force made up of Quinn and six other officers from local and federal agencies came to serve two arrest warrants for Kellom, a suspect in the armed robbery of a pizza delivery man, on the afternoon of April 27.
Officers and Kellom’s father, Kevin Kellom, offer conflicting accounts of what happened during the attempted arrest. Quinn said Terrance Kellom advanced on him, holding a hammer, despite orders to stop, and he shot in self-defense while moving backwards. Kevin Kellom has said Terrance was unarmed and not resisting when he was shot multiple times.[...]
Read the full article:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/mitchell-quinn-terrance-kellom_55d414aee4b0ab468d9ef88f?utm_hp_ref=detroit&ir=Detroit§ion=detroit&kvcommref=mostpopular
August 19, 2015
DETROIT -- An officer who fatally shot a 20-year-old black man four times at his home will not be charged, Wayne County’s prosecutor said Wednesday.
Prosecutor Kym Worthy announced during a morning press conference that U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agent Mitchell Quinn's shooting of Terrance Kellom was justified.
A fugitive apprehension task force made up of Quinn and six other officers from local and federal agencies came to serve two arrest warrants for Kellom, a suspect in the armed robbery of a pizza delivery man, on the afternoon of April 27.
Officers and Kellom’s father, Kevin Kellom, offer conflicting accounts of what happened during the attempted arrest. Quinn said Terrance Kellom advanced on him, holding a hammer, despite orders to stop, and he shot in self-defense while moving backwards. Kevin Kellom has said Terrance was unarmed and not resisting when he was shot multiple times.[...]
Read the full article:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/mitchell-quinn-terrance-kellom_55d414aee4b0ab468d9ef88f?utm_hp_ref=detroit&ir=Detroit§ion=detroit&kvcommref=mostpopular
Thursday, August 27, 2015
Donald Trump’s immigration tab: $166 billion
[This is an interesting article, but the author significantly underestimates the price tag. For example, the total cost of deportating one person, including detention expenses, has been estimated at $25,000. But of course Trump's "plan" is just political rhetoric meant to move the discussion to the right. --TPOI editors]
By Seung Min Kim, Politico.com
August 19, 2015
Donald Trump’s immigration plan is huge in every aspect — including its price tag.
Think $166 billion. And that’s on the low end.
The Republican business mogul is turbocharging his tough-on-illegal-immigration reputation that he’s used to ride to the top of the GOP presidential polls by pushing to deport everyone here illegally, ramping up immigration enforcement and even calling for an end to birthright citizenship. He’s managed in the process to pull the GOP field to the right on an issue that could be critical in the general election — and cause plenty of heartburn for party bosses still experiencing flashbacks from Mitt Romney damaging call for “self-deportation” in 2012.
“As far as immigration’s concerned, we need the wall,” Trump said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday, the same day he unveiled his proposal on his website. “We want people to come in. I want people to come in. They have to be wonderful people. They have to come in legally.”
But Trump has said little about how much his plan would cost or how he’d pay for it, other than a dubious assurance he’d make Mexico foot the bill for the wall.[...]
Read the full article:
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/08/donald-trumps-immigration-tab-166-billion-121500.html
By Seung Min Kim, Politico.com
August 19, 2015
Donald Trump’s immigration plan is huge in every aspect — including its price tag.
Think $166 billion. And that’s on the low end.
The Republican business mogul is turbocharging his tough-on-illegal-immigration reputation that he’s used to ride to the top of the GOP presidential polls by pushing to deport everyone here illegally, ramping up immigration enforcement and even calling for an end to birthright citizenship. He’s managed in the process to pull the GOP field to the right on an issue that could be critical in the general election — and cause plenty of heartburn for party bosses still experiencing flashbacks from Mitt Romney damaging call for “self-deportation” in 2012.
“As far as immigration’s concerned, we need the wall,” Trump said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday, the same day he unveiled his proposal on his website. “We want people to come in. I want people to come in. They have to be wonderful people. They have to come in legally.”
But Trump has said little about how much his plan would cost or how he’d pay for it, other than a dubious assurance he’d make Mexico foot the bill for the wall.[...]
Read the full article:
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/08/donald-trumps-immigration-tab-166-billion-121500.html
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
Border Enforcement Policies Are Backfiring
Kate Wheeling, Pacific Standard
August 19, 2015
Not so long ago, migration between Mexico and the United States followed a circular pattern, whereby migrants moved regularly between the two countries, chasing seasonal jobs. But recent research published in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies finds that immigration policies—and the militarization of our Southern border—have disrupted this pattern, effectively caging in undocumented immigrants rather than keeping them out as intended.
Throughout much of the 20th century, scores of laborers would arrived with six-month work visas in hand as part of the Bracero Program, working in the U.S. for half the year before returning home to Mexico. When the program ended in 1964, migrants continued to circulate between the two countries undocumented. Then in 1986, the U.S. Congress passed the Immigration Reform and Control Act, which cracked down on undocumented hiring and increased the number of border patrol officers.
For every million-dollar increase in budget, the odds a migrant would return home to Mexico in any given year dropped by 89 percent.[...]
Read the full article:
http://www.psmag.com/politics-and-law/the-irony-of-border-enforcement-policies
August 19, 2015
Not so long ago, migration between Mexico and the United States followed a circular pattern, whereby migrants moved regularly between the two countries, chasing seasonal jobs. But recent research published in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies finds that immigration policies—and the militarization of our Southern border—have disrupted this pattern, effectively caging in undocumented immigrants rather than keeping them out as intended.
Throughout much of the 20th century, scores of laborers would arrived with six-month work visas in hand as part of the Bracero Program, working in the U.S. for half the year before returning home to Mexico. When the program ended in 1964, migrants continued to circulate between the two countries undocumented. Then in 1986, the U.S. Congress passed the Immigration Reform and Control Act, which cracked down on undocumented hiring and increased the number of border patrol officers.
For every million-dollar increase in budget, the odds a migrant would return home to Mexico in any given year dropped by 89 percent.[...]
Read the full article:
http://www.psmag.com/politics-and-law/the-irony-of-border-enforcement-policies
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