Thread: SC: Immigrants departing South Carolina

Immigrants departing South Carolina

Downturn Diminishes Appeal
By James Rosen - Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON, D.C.

The number of illegal immigrants in South Carolina has dropped significantly in recent years and continues to drop as illegal immigrant workers deterred by the state's poor economy try to go elsewhere for work.

While the national total has dropped only slightly since 2007 - from 12 million to 11.2 million, or 6.7 percent - South Carolina's share of illegal immigrants has declined by 21.4 percent - from 70,000 to under 55,000 - in the same period.

North Carolina's illegal immigration population has stayed somewhat stable at an estimated 325,000 last year after taking a slight dip the year before.

Jeff Passell, a demographer with the Pew Research Center who wrote the Washington group's report released Tuesday, said economic woes in South Carolina and beyond have slowed the influx of illegal immigrant workers from Mexico and other countries.

"Certainly when the economy is bad, the attraction for new unauthorized immigrants just isn't there," Passell told McClatchy. "In places where the economy is bad, what we've seen historically is that the flow of new illegal immigrants drops dramatically."

Myriam Torres, director of the Consortium for Latino Immigration Studies at the University of South Carolina, said the state's crackdown on illegal immigrant workers has dissuaded foreigners from coming.

"The state [General Assembly] is currnently looking to pass an Arizona type of law," Torres said. "This has people - not only illegal, but legal immigrants as well - scared."

Then-Gov. Mark Sanford signed a bill in June 2008 that increased fines on businesses that hire undocumented workers, with the law phased in over 2009 and 2010.

Sen. Larry Grooms, a Bonneau Republican, is aggressively pushing legislation similar to a controversial law Arizona enacted last April authorizing state and local police to enforce federal immigration laws.

Illegal immigration has been a political flashpoint in South Carolina for several years.

Republicans Lindsey Graham and Jim DeMint, the state's two U.S. senators, clashed in 2007 during a prolonged Senate battle over immigration reforms.

Despite the reduced number of illegal immigrant workers, Graham has toughened his stance on immigration, backing a constitutional amendment that would deny American citizenship to illegal immigrants' children born in the United States.

Graham in December joined other GOP senators in defeating a bill that would have granted legal residency, with a path toward citizenship, to children of illegal immigrants.

But the number of illegal immigrant workers in South Carolina is much less as a share of its overall population - 1.2 percent of its 4.63 million residents - than the national share of 3.6 percent.

That means the state has one-third the proportion of illegal immigrants that the country as a whole has.

The gap between South Carolina and the whole nation is somewhat narrower when comparing illegal immigrants' presence in the work force.

About 45,000 illegal immigrant foreigners hold jobs in the state, making up 2.1 percent of its work force, compared with the 8 million illegal immigrant workers across the country who make up 5.2 percent of all employees.

Torres said the relatively small number of illegal immigrants in South Carolina raises questions about whether the cash-strapped state government is using its limited resources wisely in further cracking down on illegal immigrant workers and weighing even tougher measures.

Read more: http://www.thesunnews.com/2011/02/02/19 ... g-sc.html##ixzz1CpJGMiI8

damn .. dont send them to Florida .. its already out of control down here

AS more states pass laws to protect their Citizens from the ILLEGALS and their anchors the ILLEGALS will continue to scurry to states that have failed to protect their Citizens because of the Elitist Political Contributors and Special Interest Groups who will hire the cheap ILLEGAL labor allowing the Citizen Taxpayers to furnish the benefits for their ILLEGALS such as the additional cost to our Education System and utilizing the Hospital ER's as their Primary Care without any intention of ever paying after all that is what the ILLEGALS and ILLEGAL EMPLOYERS demand, correct Senator Graham.

Read more: http://www.thesunnews.com/2011/02/02/19 ... g-sc.html##ixzz1Cq3G6aTo