Please visit our YouTube and Facebook pages.

1. CIS awards San Fran. reporter
2. Senate bill recognizes unions
3. Audit: MN gov't failing to verify
4. KS police chief fed action
5. ACLU challenges detentions

1.
Chron Reporter Honored for Immigration Reporting
BayNewser (San Francisco), June 11, 2009

Chronicle reporter Jaxon Van Derbeken was honored yesterday by the right-leaning Center for Immigration Studies for his series of stories about San Francisco's illegal alien sanctuary policy.

His reporting on the topic included coverage of a violent gang member who, instead of facing deportation, was supported by city programs. The man was later arrested in connection with the murder of a father and two sons.

"In the best tradition of journalism," wrote CIS in the release announcing the award, "(Van Derbeken's) reporting shone light on hidden aspects of government conduct, forcing city officials to abandon their policy of shielding the juvenile offenders after the first story broke."

Van Derbeken was awarded the center's annual Eugene Katz Award for Excellence in the Coverage of Immigration.
. . .
http://www.mediabistro.com/baynewser/san_francisco_chronicle/chron_repor...

********
********

2.
Binational same-sex couples hope immigration bill passes
By Sumathi Reddy
Newsday (NY), June 11, 2009

They've been together eight years, marrying last month in Canada. Only Roy can't sponsor his partner for a green card because they're a same-sex couple.

"I don't understand how I have a legal document from Canada saying that we are legally married and why I can't bring him to the country," said Roy, 54, of Amityville, who did not want his last name disclosed because he is concerned about his partner's immigration status. "It's absolutely nuts."

Now, Roy and his partner - like an estimated 36,000 gay and lesbian binational couples in the United States - are hopeful that a bill gaining some traction in the U.S. Senate will allow them to live in the country together. Called the Uniting American Families Act, the bill has been introduced every congressional session since 2000, but finally received a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week. The bill, which has a House companion, is being pushed by its sponsor Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), who became chair of the Judiciary Committee this year.

Opposition against the bill includes groups that oppose same-sex marriage as well as those that advocate for restrictions on immigration.

The Family Research Council called it a "back door effort to redefine marriage."

"The law in this country is very clear on what constitutes family," said Tony Perkins, the group's president. "People are connected by blood, marriage or adoption. This immigration policy is none of the above."

Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, said the bill has the potential for "enormous" fraud since there's little way of determining the legitimacy of the relationships.
. . .
http://www.newsday.com/news/printedition/nation/ny-liimmi1112856456jun11...

********
********

3.
E-Verify system only loosely enforced in Minnesota
No state agency - not even the governor's office - is electronically verifying immigration status in hiring.
By Jean Hopfensperger
The Minneapolis Star Tribune (MN), June 11, 2009

Eighteen months after Gov. Tim Pawlenty ordered state agencies and contractors to more aggressively verify workers' immigration status, a state audit has found that the governor's own office has yet to implement the program.

In fact, none of Minnesota's state agencies, which hired about 7,000 workers last year, has used the federal electronic identity-check system known as E-Verify, according to the office of the Legislative Auditor. The agencies hire workers ranging from janitors at the Capitol to health aides at nursing homes to highway work crews.

About 43 percent of the 1,400 private businesses required to use the electronic verification system are doing so, the audit said. Another 16 percent have registered to use the system but haven't yet done so.

"It's a concern that 18 months after an executive order was signed, it's not being implemented'' said Deb Junod, the audit's evaluation manager. "The entire executive branch was directed to use E-Verify and it is not using it.''

The state Office of Management and Budget said it will launch the identity checks by the end of August. The state has been working with a vendor to create a centralized system for screening new hires and is ironing out security issues, said OMB Assistant Commissioner Judy Plante.
. . .
http://www.startribune.com/politics/state/47521292.html?elr=KArks7PYDiaK...

********
********

4.
Chief: Immigration a U.S. problem
By Ann Marie Bush
The Capital Journal (Topeka), June 11, 2009

LULAC state director Elias Garcia is pleased that Topeka Police Chief Ron Miller is joining in on a national effort to bring immigration reform to the forefront for discussion.

“I’m so glad Chief Miller was a part of the national dialogue,” said Garcia, who is Kansas’ director of the League of United Latin American Citizens. “We need to support him and do what we can locally to ensure the community as a whole works together.”

Miller was one of three police chiefs who took part in a national media teleconference Thursday to discuss immigration reform. He joined Police Chief Art Acevedo, of Austin, Texas, and Police Chief Jon Zumalt, of North Charleston, S.C. The three spoke in anticipation of Wednesday’s White House meeting on immigration reform.

“Local communities should be engaged in the discussion, and local police chiefs should be heard at the national level,” Miller said after the teleconference.

Garcia listened in on the teleconference along with media members from several states.

“The fact that it is being discussed nationally is good,” he said. “It’s such a complex issue.”

Miller said the teleconference was well attended and to the point. “A variety of positions were stated,” he said. “Some good questions came from the press. The purpose of the press conference was to get this issue out in the public and have the police chiefs involved in the debate. The key issue is that the United States is currently dealing with a problem of illegal immigration that needs to be addressed as a nation.”
. . .
http://www.cjonline.com/news/local/2009-06-11/chief_immigration_a_us_pro...

********
********

5.
Immigrant’s Criminal Past Colors a Group’s Legal Challenge to Detentions
By Nina Bernstein
The New York Times, June 11, 2009

The news media campaign was all set to go. There was even a Web site ready with a sympathetic profile of Alexander Alli, 49, the man the American Civil Liberties Union had chosen as the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit seeking custody hearings for more than 1,000 legal immigrants long locked up while they challenged the government’s efforts to deport them on the basis of criminal convictions.

Alexander Alli with his family. The lead plaintiff in a lawsuit, he was part of an identity theft ring.

But at the last minute someone at the civil liberties union checked the details of Mr. Alli’s criminal history. It turned out that Mr. Alli, a native of Ghana whose wife and three children, all United States citizens, live in the Bronx, had taken part in one of the biggest cases of identity theft in this country.

At least 30,000 people nationwide had been victimized in an intricate scheme by a loosely knit ring of 30 people, mostly Nigerian immigrants, according to law enforcement authorities and court documents. More than $50 million had been drained from credit cards and bank accounts.

Oops.

Not a perfect poster boy. The press release and the Web site were scuttled, and lawyers even considered dropping Mr. Alli in favor of a plaintiff whose offense was less serious. But last month, the lawsuit went forward in his name — without publicity.

The case shows the difficulties of making an important constitutional argument on behalf of a not-always-sympathetic group: people battling deportation based on past crimes. Maria Archuleta, a spokeswoman for the civil liberties organization, called the original plan to showcase Mr. Alli a mistake, saying, “We have learned a very hard lesson to more thoroughly check all of our clients.”

Still, the lawyers said, his case illustrates the lawsuit’s central argument: that it is illegal for the government to lock someone up for months or years without a hearing to determine if prolonged detention is justified.

“The facts aren’t very sympathetic,” Michael Tan, one of the lawyers involved in the lawsuit, said of Mr. Alli’s 2005 guilty plea to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and related charges, for which he served two years in prison. “But the principle is still important. The crime is serious, but that in itself is not a reason to say he can just be detained, willy-nilly, without due process.”

By definition, the detainees represented by the lawsuit are not the kind of immigrants that advocates prefer to highlight. All have been convicted of a crime that the government contends is legal grounds for deportation and for mandatory detention until an immigration court determines whether they can be sent back to their native lands.

But such crimes, which include violent felonies, can also be as minor as evading a subway fare. All the detainees have already been punished, and many have a legitimate claim to stay in the United States that can take months or years to resolve. Meanwhile, they remain behind bars at taxpayer expense, advocates say, often to the detriment of relatives who are citizens.

The lawsuit, filed on May 27 in federal court in Williamsport, Pa., as a habeas corpus petition on behalf of detainees held in Pennsylvania, lists federal immigration officials and Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. as defendants. Government officials said they could not comment on pending litigation.
. . .
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/12/nyregion/12detain.html?ref=nyregion