Thread: High deportation figures are misleading

High deportation figures are misleading

Immigrants living illegally beyond the border area are less likely to be deported under 'deporter in chief' President Obama, contrary to widespread belief.

Family members talk through the U.S.-Mexico border fence at Friendship Park in San Diego. Immigration activists have pressured President Obama to stop the deportation of noncriminal immigrants with close family ties in the U.S. (John Moore / Getty Images / November 17, 2013)

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By Brian Bennett April 1, 2014, 8:55 p.m.

WASHINGTON — Immigration activists have sharply criticized President Obama for a rising volume of deportations, labeling him the "deporter in chief" and staging large protests that have harmed his standing with some Latinos, a key group of voters for Democrats.
But the portrait of a steadily increasing number of deportations rests on statistics that conceal almost as much as they disclose. A closer examination shows that immigrants living illegally in most of the continental U.S. are less likely to be deported today than before Obama came to office, according to immigration data.
Expulsions of people who are settled and working in the United States have fallen steadily since his first year in office, and are down more than 40% since 2009.
On the other side of the ledger, the number of people deported at or near the border has gone up — primarily as a result of changing who gets counted in the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency's deportation statistics.
The vast majority of those border crossers would not have been treated as formal deportations under most previous administrations. If all removals were tallied, the total sent back to Mexico each year would have been far higher under those previous administrations than it is now.
The shift in who gets tallied helped the administration look tough in its early years but now may be backfiring politically. Immigration advocates plan protests across the country this week around what they say will be the 2 millionth deportation under Obama — a mark expected to be hit in the next few days. And Democratic strategists fret about a decline in Latino voter turnout for this fall's election.
Until recent years, mostpeople caught illegally crossing the southern border were simply bused back into Mexico in what officials called "voluntary returns," but which critics derisively termed "catch and release." Those removals, which during the 1990s reached more 1 million a year, were not counted in Immigration and Customs Enforcement's deportation statistics.
Now, the vast majority of border crossers who are apprehended get fingerprinted and formally deported. The change began during the George W. Bush administration and accelerated under Obama. The policy stemmed in part from a desire to ensure that people who had crossed into the country illegally would have formal charges on their records.
In the Obama years, all of the increase in deportations has involved people picked up within 100 miles of the border, most of whom have just recently crossed over. In 2013, almost two-thirds of deportations were in that category.
At the same time, the administration largely ended immigration roundups at workplaces and shifted investigators into targeting business owners who illegally hired foreign workers.
"If you are a run-of-the-mill immigrant here illegally, your odds of getting deported are close to zero — it's just highly unlikely to happen," John Sandweg, until recently the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said in an interview.
Even when immigration officials want to deport someone who already has settled in the country, doing so is "virtually impossible" because of a lengthy backlog in the immigration courts, Sandweg said. Once people who have no prior removals or convictions are placed in deportation proceedings, actually removing them from the country can take six years or more in some jurisdictions, Sandweg said.
Deportations of people apprehended in the interior of the U.S., which the immigration agency defines as more than 100 miles from the border, dropped from 237,941 in Obama's first year to 133,551 in 2013, according to immigration data. Four out of five of those deportees came to the attention of immigration authorities after criminal convictions.
Many of those convictions are related to crossing the border — the other big consequence of the change in the way border removals are handled.
A growing number of people caught trying to cross the border now have a formal deportation order on their records. Entering the country without legal authorization is not a crime. But once a person has been deported, he can be prosecuted if he reenters the country.
The policy of deporting border crossers and then prosecuting people who reenter has increased the number of immigrants charged in federal court. In 1992, immigration offenses accounted for 5% of federal convictions. In the subsequent two decades, the share of immigration cases on the federal docket increased sixfold, according to a study by the Pew Research Center.
In 2012, immigration offenses made up 30% of federal convictions, second only to drug cases, which made up one-third.
The new system has criminalized immigration violations, notes Chris Newman, legal director for the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, based in Los Angeles.
Immigration activists have pressured Obama to use his executive authority to stop deporting immigrants with close family ties in the U.S. and no criminal history other than immigration-related violations.
Deportations at the border can have an impact on families living within the U.S., said Doris Meissner, who headed the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service from 1993 to 2000. An increasing portion of people illegally crossing the border today have lived in the U.S. before and have long-standing links to U.S. communities, she said.
"People trying to get back are increasingly people who have roots in the U.S.," Meissner said.
The administration's move to step up deportations at the border coincided with increased hiring of agents and spending on border security. In 2010, Congress approved a $600-million infusion to add border agents and new surveillance technology. There are now more than 21,000 Border Patrol agents on the border, twice the number of a decade ago.
During the first two years after coming to office, Obama administration officials touted the record-setting deportation figures, hoping that strict enforcement at the border would convince Republicans to come to the negotiating table on immigration reform.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano was "crowing" about the increasing deportations, said Marshall Fitz, an immigration expert at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank in Washington.
The Homeland Security Department "was patting itself on the back for reaching these record numbers," Fitz said. "I think they thought it was important to show they were very serious about this."
Sandweg, the former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, rejected the suggestion that political objectives drove deportation policy. By handing detainees over to immigration officials for deportation, rather than processing them directly, Border Patrol agents could spend more time on patrol, he said.
"From Day One we were following a policy that would emphasize public safety and border security," Sandweg said.
But regardless of motivation, the shift had the effect of emphasizing the administration's enforcement efforts, which over time has angered Latino activists and their allies in the U.S. labor movement.
Meanwhile, the change in enforcement does not seem to have placated Republican lawmakers, who are tough opponents of the administration's border policies.
The turn away from deporting immigrants from the interior of the country amounts to an open invitation for people to come to the U.S. on a legal visa and stay, said Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.).
"It just cannot be the policy of the U.S. that if somebody gets past the border and gets to St. Louis or Memphis or Austin, Texas, or New York, they are not going to be deported," Sessions said. "The administration is systematically failing to enforce immigration law uniformly."
brian.bennett@latimes.com

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-...#ixzz2xkFY6yVy


They are bound and determined to destroy our Country!!!

This is from Numberusa newsletter


Help us blow the lid off of the Obama administration's deceptive deportation statistics. Share this story everywhere you can.
Brian Bennett of the Los Angeles Times ran his breakthrough story last night. the headline and sub-head could not be better:
High deportation figures are misleading

Immigrants living illegally beyond the border area are less likely to be deported under 'deporter in chief' President Obama, contrary to widespread belief.

Bennett reports:

"...the portrait of a steadily increasing number of deportations rests on statistics that conceal almost as much as they disclose. A closer examination shows that immigrants living illegally in most of the continental U.S. are less likely to be deported today than before Obama came to office, according to immigration data.

"Expulsions of people who are settled and working in the United States have fallen steadily since his first year in office, and are down more than 40% since 2009.

"On the other side of the ledger, the number of people deported at or near the border has gone up -- primarily as a result of changing who gets counted in the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency's deportation statistics.

"The vast majority of those border crossers would not have been treated as formal deportations under most previous administrations. If all removals were tallied, the total sent back to Mexico each year would have been far higher under those previous administrations than it is now.

"The shift in who gets tallied helped the administration look tough in its early years but now may be backfiring politically...."

The story gets even better from there, with Bennett quoting former ICE Director John Sandweg about just how little everyday immigration enforcement there is:

"'If you are a run-of-the-mill immigrant here illegally, your odds of getting deported are close to zero -- it's just highly unlikely to happen,' John Sandweg, until recently the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said in an interview.

"Even when immigration officials want to deport someone who already has settled in the country, doing so is 'virtually impossible' because of a lengthy backlog in the immigration courts, Sandweg said. Once people who have no prior removals or convictions are placed in deportation proceedings, actually removing them from the country can take six years or more in some jurisdictions, Sandweg said.

"Deportations of people apprehended in the interior of the U.S., which the immigration agency defines as more than 100 miles from the border, dropped from 237,941 in Obama's first year to 133,551 in 2013, according to immigration data. Four out of five of those deportees came to the attention of immigration authorities after criminal convictions...."

This is a "The Emperor Has No Clothes" moment that we must take full advantage of. Most of the mainstream media has been reluctant to expose the deceptive deportation statistics. The LA Times and Bennett have thrown down the gauntlet. Let's force the rest of the media to tell the truth about Obama's immigration enforcement record. Help us share this story on social media and in the comments on every immigration story and every deportation story.
Thank you,

P.S. If you find a specific story that needs comments, please send it to me here.

Why It Pays for Democrats to Keep People on the Welfare Roles

Posted on March 31, 2014 by Gary DeMar

A few years ago, I read an article by Walter Williams that stated that if all the money spent on welfare was added up and then divided by the number of people on welfare, a family of four would receive around $40,000 per year. At that time, $40,000 was a very respectable income.
Of course, much of this money is lost in the bowels of the Government’s immense bureaucracy and never reaches the poor.
Why would someone on welfare want to get off welfare if a non-welfare income is less than what they are getting free and clear with no taxes and little or no work? There's a report of a millionaire couple who have been collecting welfare for seven years. Nobody knows and only a few people care how much fraud is behind the programs.
Why would a welfare recipient want to vote for a political party that promises to cut back on welfare payments?
Moreover, why would a political party like the Democrats want to cut welfare spending when they know that it pays off politically for them by keeping them in power?
It’s a lot worse today than when Walter Williams wrote on this subject.
The Cato Institute released an updated 2013 study (original study in 1955) showing that welfare benefits pay more than a minimum wage job in 33 states and the District of Columbia. Even worse, welfare pays more than $15 per hour in 13 states.



According to the study, welfare benefits have increased faster than minimum wage
It’s now more profitable to sit at home than it is to earn an honest day’s pay.
Hawaii is the biggest offender, where welfare recipients earn $29.13 per hour, or a $60,590 yearly salary, all for doing nothing.
Here is the list of the states where the pre-tax equivalent “salary” that welfare recipients receive is higher than having a job:
1. Hawaii: $60,590
2. District of Columbia: $50,820
3. Massachusetts: $50,540
4. Connecticut: $44,370
5. New York: $43,700
6. New Jersey: $43,450
7. Rhode Island: $43,330
8. Vermont: $42,350
9. New Hampshire: $39,750
10. Maryland: $38,160
11. California: $37,160
12. Oregon: $34,300
13. Wyoming: $32,620
14. Nevada: $29,820
15. Minnesota: $29,350
16. Delaware: $29,220
17. Washington: $28,840
18. North Dakota: $28,830
19. Pennsylvania: $28,670
20. New Mexico: $27,900
21. Montana: $26,930
22. South Dakota: $26,610
23. Kansas: $26,490
24. Michigan: $26,430
25. Alaska: $26,400
26. Ohio: $26,200
27. North Carolina: $25,760
28. West Virginia: $24,900
29. Alabama: $23,310
30. Indiana: $22,900
31. Missouri: $22,800
32. Oklahoma: $22,480
33. Louisiana: $22,250
34. South Carolina: $21,910
As a point of reference the average Middle Class annual income today is $50,000, down from $54,000 at the beginning of the Great Recession. Hawaii, DC, and Massachusetts pay more in welfare than the average working folks earn there. Is it any wonder that they stay home rather than look for a job. Time for a drastic change. America is virtually bankrupt.

Read more at http://godfatherpolitics.com/15004/p...O7qICtyWHik.99