11–20 of 184 posts
As a kid I always wanted to go to the USA, maybe even live there. So many things to see, the business opportunities and the propagated freedom were very attractive. During the last decade though, the USA have done a fantastic job of eradicating every bit of what was left of this dream. Nowerdays all you hear from them is how Hollywood is destroying little guys' lifes for downloading a bunch of songs, exporting those…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think that referred to this bit: "By coincidence, Frontline this week is broadcasting a feature, ‘Lost in Detention’, outlining the increasingly aggressive measures to deport immigrants. The key clip begins at the 17-minute mark outlining the arbitrary goal of 400,000 deportations, including “Non-criminal removals”. " From http://mapbrief.com/2011/10/19/political-hypocrisy-economic-...
What does a Non-criminal removal mean? Like who would be in that category? Just people who's visa expired?
As a kid I always wanted to go to the USA, maybe even live there. So many things to see, the business opportunities and the propagated freedom were very attractive. During the last decade though, the USA have done a fantastic job of eradicating every bit of what was left of this dream. Nowerdays all you hear from them is how Hollywood is destroying little guys' lifes for downloading a bunch of songs, exporting those…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think that referred to this bit: "By coincidence, Frontline this week is broadcasting a feature, ‘Lost in Detention’, outlining the increasingly aggressive measures to deport immigrants. The key clip begins at the 17-minute mark outlining the arbitrary goal of 400,000 deportations, including “Non-criminal removals”. " From http://mapbrief.com/2011/10/19/political-hypocrisy-economic-...
What does a Non-criminal removal mean? Like who would be in that category? Just people who's visa expired?
As soon as you commit a crime (and are convicted) you are subject to a criminal removal. The main issue seems to be that criminal removals are procedurally expensive, they take a lot longer and cost more dollars than a non-criminal removal. Having appealed or not is not really a factor here because some people that let their visa expire never went through the appeals process, they just disappeared underground or were forgotten for a long long time. Technically they have no right to be where they are, in practice they're just like everybody else minus the right to vote and the right to social security, and possibly health care issues.
In order to boost the numbers the agencies decided that non-criminal removals are the low hanging fruit that they can use to boost their numbers significantly while cutting costs. After all, it's a lot easier to pick up a hard working guy/girl and their family than it is to go after someone that is aware he's being looked for.
In plenty of cases these people are not just productive members of society, but they also have had children in the long time since they landed and the present, which rips these families apart.
This is the most stunning example of short-sighted behavior by officials that I've ever seen because they effectively shifted their priorities from removing undesirables to removing their polar opposites, the productive, if possibly undocumented members of society.
WP article about this: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03...
What is sad is that it takes high profile cases such as these to bring this strategy to light, for every well connected person that comes up in this dragnet of stupidity there are 100's if not 1000's of nobodies that are just as important to the functioning of society and whose lives and well being are not worth less than any other persons.
Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see anything in the linked post about "meeting quotas". Can we please avoid making headlines unnecessarily hysterical?
Case summary here: http://www.ca3.uscourts.gov/opinarch/104369np.pdf It seems clear to me that at this point he is an economic migrant, rather than a refugee; and as that was the basis of his initial plea to stay (i.e. he was seeking asylum from persecution), the generally brutal machinery of bureaucracy is ejecting him from the country. (Apparently, credible death threats don't constitute sufficient grounds for asyl…
I can understand that he feel's the US is his home and he shouldn't have to leave, but he's basically been trying to play the system for 20 years. He was told what he had to do to get a visa legally, but he wasn't willing to do so.
As a kid I always wanted to go to the USA, maybe even live there. So many things to see, the business opportunities and the propagated freedom were very attractive. During the last decade though, the USA have done a fantastic job of eradicating every bit of what was left of this dream. Nowerdays all you hear from them is how Hollywood is destroying little guys' lifes for downloading a bunch of songs, exporting those…
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Earlier quoted context omitted.
Case summary here: http://www.ca3.uscourts.gov/opinarch/104369np.pdf It seems clear to me that at this point he is an economic migrant, rather than a refugee; and as that was the basis of his initial plea to stay (i.e. he was seeking asylum from persecution), the generally brutal machinery of bureaucracy is ejecting him from the country. (Apparently, credible death threats don't constitute sufficient grounds for asyl…
Well, no, credible death threats aren't sufficient grounds - they would have to show that not only are the death threats credible, but that the government is purposefully not protecting him from the threats. I can understand that he feel's the US is his home and he shouldn't have to leave, but he's basically been trying to play the system for 20 years. He was told what he had to do to get a visa legally, but he wasn'…
People have come to the US in their 40's and have died of old age waiting for their paperwork in cases where everything went A-ok (ditto for Canada), it's no surprise that the negative side is just as slow.
Case not finished in 5 years? Here is your passport.
It's typically not the people that go through this mill that control the speed with which it turns but the government side.
Note that it took more than 4 years before they even had their first hearing.
Say someone from Africa or South America. They can't simply save enough money, get on a plane, land at JFK and then after 10 years or whatever time become citizens. They would have to be persecuted in a terrible way before being granted asylum, have to marry a US citizen, find a company that would hire them.
I think that is very interesting given that this country was founded on immigrants just hoping on the boat and coming here, either to build a better life or because things got terribly bad where they were.
I personally went through the whole process and it is a fucking mess. I knew how to deal with it, because I dealt with bureaucracy in the old country. I can sense an annoyed low level clerk's power trip coming on before they notice it. Such individual need special treatment. You never want to fall into anyone's cross-hairs, it seems like they would destroy you just because they can.
Also know someone who works for immigration. It is quite a dysfunctional entity. Very inefficient. Lots of internal mistakes, unpaid interns do the job searching through databases and picking people out for violations & deportation. Next time you know someone was picked out -- chances are some kid thought their last name sounded funny and it caught their attention.
The person is obviously a great entrepreneur, he probably should have just left on his own accord instead of fighting it to the point where he's thrown in jail.
The ridiculous thing is that he's in the US, paying his taxes, creating income, etc.... why throw him out? I suppose it's because he applied for asylum that was denied, and they are throwing him out to prove a point, but the entire thing is just counterproductive to what we want in this country.