From: CampusProgress.org

In a evening conference call held last night, Mar. 8, anti-immigration group Numbers USA—best known for its brute force attacks on Congress to defeat comprehensive immigration reform in 2007—discussed a variety of tactics to thwart an upcoming march on Washington DC by immigrant rights supporters, including one proposal to call immigrant women from Mexico “the new welfare queens in America.”

The call, which was held at 9 p.m EST, was organized by Numbers USA, and included approximately 45 participants from across the country, many of them representing archconservative“Tea Party” affiliates. In a 30 minute time span, Chad MacDonald, the moderator of the discussion and a worker with Numbers USA, walked callers though ways they could create the perception that there was a grassroots opposition to immigration reform, according to notes taken during the phone call. The actions, organized to pressure Congress to stall on immigration reform, are meant to coincide with the “March For America,” a pro-immigration reform march organized for Mar. 21.

During the discussion, listened to by Campus Progress, activists not only talked about how they should paint Mexican women in the United States as “the new welfare queens,” but they also recommended tactics like referring to immigrant children as “dependents,” rather than “babies,” because “babies” is an “emotional” word. All of this was discussed in the presence of MacDonald and Roy Beck, executive director for Numbers USA, who has his own turbulent past with reported connections to white nationalist groups.

According to notes taken on the phone call:
CALLER 1: I would like to speak out on something. I feel the new welfare queen in America today is women coming from Mexico with a bunch of babies. So I feel they’re all coming over here and having all these babies, they are the new welfare queen in America….

New people in America today with a lot of babies, ’cause they coming from Mexico having a bunch of babies. And our tax dollars is taking care of them babies, ’cause the mothers are illegal. So to me, we need to speak out about letting them know they’re the new welfare queens in America.

CALLER 2: That was well said brother!

MACDONALD: We will make a note of that. Thank you very much. I appreciate that.

CALLER 3: One piece of information would be, they aren’t babies, they’re dependents. Don’t use babies. It’s emotional to them. They have dependents. We have babies.
Along with circulating distortions that immigrants somehow use and drain welfare programs—an allegation that has no actual factual basis—Numbers USA and its affiliates are also planning to flood Congressional offices with phone calls and faxes during the pro-immigration march—all with talking points that have been meticulously prepared by Numbers USA—much like the group did in 2007. “I think jobs is the number one way to do it,” said Beck, who noted that growing unemployment during the recession can be fastened to the immigration debate.

“It’s not about reality, it’s all about perception,” Beck said on the call. “What happened in 2007 is that we as a movement created the perception of on Capitol Hill that most American’s did not want amnesty, they did not want comprehensive immigration reform, and that there was an intensity to the people who didn’t want it that could really cause political damage for the careers for the members of Congress. That’s what moves Congress.”

MacDonald added during the discussion, “We are a single issue organization about reducing both legal and illegal immigration. We have an immense amount of resources. We have an incredible coalition and we can answer and frame a question for any ostensible person to reduce overall immigration.”

Popularity: 3% [?]

From: Latinovations

As the highest-ranking female member on the House Armed Services Committee, I have the opportunity to see first-hand the significant contributions of our women in uniform. Women of all races and ages have served in every military conflict since the Revolutionary War, including our current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But despite their many accomplishments, female servicemembers are not always recognized for their role on the battlefield. Nor do they always receive the tools they need to serve safely and effectively in combat.
I recently had the opportunity to lead an all-female Congressional Delegation to Afghanistan. The primary purpose of our trip was two-fold: to see how women in combat are adapting to their increasing role, and to view the situation in Afghanistan from a woman’s perspective. In addition to meeting with top military officials, including General McChrystal, my colleagues and I were able to visit with female servicemembers to learn about some the unique challenges still facing women in combat.
There are currently over 29,000 women serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, yet they continue to encounter barriers not experienced by their male counterparts. Female servicemembers are less likely to be promoted to leadership positions, less likely to receive vital combat training (even though they de facto serve on the front lines), and less likely to have access to women doctors or female-oriented care. But one thing they are more likely to experience is sexual assault or abuse while serving in the Armed Forces.
Last year, the Department of Defense reported a 7.6% increase in the number of sexual assault cases involving military personnel. Part of this increase is accounted for by an increase in the number of victims willing to report their assaults and greater transparency in military reporting procedures. But the underlying issue of sexual assault continues to exist, and female servicemembers continue to be the majority of victims.
When I spoke to women, including Latinas, on the ground in Afghanistan, they said the military has taken significant steps to prevent and prosecute assaults. This is, of course, encouraging. But the reality is that women continue to serve in a military environment that is not always welcoming and is, at times, outright misogynistic. That’s why counselors and rape kits are now common in war zones, and why there is still only one female four-star general in the entire military.
One of my top priorities in Congress has been working with our military leaders to create an inclusive environment for all our women in uniform. In 2005, I successfully revised the Uniform Code of Military Justice to include a meaningful sexual assault statute that better protects victims and empowers prosecutors. And more recently, in the 2009 National Defense Authorization Act, my HASC colleagues and I were able to include a provision to create a sexual assault database, which will document reported cases of assault across the services and encourage greater accountability in each military branch.
Moving forward, we have to continue to expand opportunities for female servicemembers of all races and combat discrimination in all its forms. Sexual abuse and other acts of misogyny violate the core principals of our Armed Forces. The challenges facing female servicemembers – obstacles to promotion, discrimination, and sexual assault – are challenges that affect the strength and integrity of our entire military. Congress and our military leaders must work harder, together, to create a military environment that encourages and supports the women soldiers who serve this country.

Congresswoman Sanchez serves as Vice Chair of the House Homeland Security Committee and is the ranking female member on the House Armed Services Committee. She is a recognized leader on national security, intelligence, and counterterrorism issues and is committed to preparing our Armed Forces for a new generation of security challenges. Rep. Sanchez is also a member of the Blue Dog Democrats, the New Democratic Coalition, and the Congressional Human Rights Caucus. In 2005, Congresswoman Sanchez was appointed by Speaker Pelosi to serve on the Joint Economic Committee (JEC), a bicameral Congressional Committee that continually monitors matters relating to the U.S. economy, including unemployment and foreclosures

Popularity: 7% [?]

This could turn into a very big story. According to this Associated Press story written by Suzanne Gamboa Saturday, every person with a Puerto Rican birth certificate will need to get a new one this year. A law passed in December invalidates all birth certificates issued by the Commonwealth as of July 1 of this year.

About a third of the 4.1 million Americans of Puerto Rican descent could be affected, AP reports.

The odd thing is, despite the fact that Puerto Ricans are born U.S. citizens, the reason for the new law relates to immigration. Documents, especially identity documents that have Spanish-sounding names and confer automatic citizenship, are a hot property on the black market.

Puerto Ricans on average get about 20 copies of their birth certificates over their lifetimes, said Kenneth McClintock Hernandez, the commonwealth’s secretary of state.

This is because they are regularly asked to produce them for such events as enrolling children in school or joining sports leagues. Schools and other institutions have typically kept copies, a practice prohibited under the new law since January, McClintock said.

As much as 40 percent of the identity fraud in the U.S. involves birth certificates from Puerto Rico, McClintock said he was told by the State Department.

“It’s a problem that’s been growing and as the need in the black market for birth certificates with Hispanic-sounding names grew, the black market value of Puerto Rican birth certificates has gone into the $5,000 to $10,000 range,” McClintock said.

Puerto Ricans are already getting greater scrutiny because of America’s vexing and often hysterical immigration debate. As motor vehicle departments have gotten into the business of checking people’s immigration status – especially people with Spanish surnames and/or accents – Puerto Ricans are often asked for “green cards” they, of course, don’t have.

With GOP political strategists thinking up new ways each year to erect barriers to voting – especially for people they think may vote against them – the deadline for resolving this identity issue could have electoral implications in important states with large populations of citizens born in Puerto Rico.

But so far, AP reports, the word has not spread widely:

Rep. Jose Serrano, D-N.Y., has been getting a steady stream of calls about the law at his district office. Serrano — who must replace his birth certificate, too — said he is trying to provide answers without triggering a panic.

“No one has thought about what effect this could have, if any, on those of us born in Puerto Rico who now reside in the 50 states,” Serrano said.

Here’s an idea: What if the United States had a functioning legal immigration system that allowed people to come to the U.S. with visas within reasonable limits and within reasonable time frames? What if that were combined with a tightly regulated system to get the millions of immigrants in the U.S. illegally into the system and legal? Maybe then we wouldn’t have such a huge black market for false documents and wouldn’t have to twist ourselves in knots with workarounds like invalidating millions of birth certificates. That’s what immigration reform is for, but the President and Congress don’t seem to be moving forward very quickly.

Read Gamboa’s AP story, but I suspect we’ll be hearing more about this…

Popularity: 12% [?]

From: Reuters

Obama dominated the debate during Thursday’s nearly seven hour cross-party summit on healthcare, always in command not only of the room but also of the most intricate policy details, as he personally rebutted every point he disagreed with.

His tone was at times professorial, occasionally combative and at one point even dismissive of his 2008 rival for the presidency, Republican Senator John McCain.

“Let me just make this point, John, because we’re not campaigning anymore,” he told McCain. “The election’s over.”

“Well, I’m reminded of that every day,” McCain replied.

It remains to be seen if the American public was more convinced by Obama’s detailed exposition of policy or the Republicans’ more visceral argument against an expansion of Washington’s powers.

What is certain is that there was little progress toward

generating a greater bipartisan consensus around a reform of the mammoth healthcare industry.

“There are some fundamental differences between us that we cannot paper over,” Jon Kyl, the No. 2 Senate Republican, told Obama. “We do not agree about the fundamental question of who should be in charge.”

Perhaps it was no surprise that there was little progress on Thursday. Democrats said there had already been more than 100 bipartisan meetings on healthcare since Obama came to power a year ago, yet the two sides seem to have drifted further apart than ever.

Arguably the event was more about trying to win popular support for Obama’s healthcare plan — and shoring up his own Democratic base — than it was about bridging the ever widening gulf between America’s two main parties over healthcare.

Convening nearly 40 lawmakers around a cramped square table in the Blair House guest quarters across from the White House, Obama was at his most schoolmasterly as he warned participants against turning the event into “political theater” or an exercise in pointscoring.

He was almost scornful of Republican Congressman Eric Cantor for sitting behind a copy of the 2,700-page Democratic legislation the Republicans say is overly complex and beholden to special interests.

“We don’t care for this bill,” Cantor said.

Obama accused him of using the pile of papers as “a prop”.

“The truth of the matter,” he added, “is that healthcare is very complicated.”

Nevertheless, Obama’s fellow Democrats were as guilty of playing to the gallery, as they recounted tales of constituents denied healthcare coverage for pre-existing medical conditions or struggling to cope with rising premium costs.

Congresswoman Louise Slaughter told of one constituent who had to wear the false teeth of her dead sister because she couldn’t afford dental care.

And fellow Democrat George Miller offered himself as an example of someone who could be denied coverage for pre-existing health conditions, with a list of ailments including two artificial hips, arthritis and a kidney stone.

Obama himself tried to tug at America’s heartstrings with tales of family scares, when his daughter Malia had to be rushed to the emergency room with asthma and the time his other daughter Sasha came down with meningitis as a baby.

“In each of those instances I remember thinking while sitting in the emergency room what would have happened if I didn’t have reliable health care,” the president said.

The marathon event was inspired by a showdown Obama had with Republican members of the House of Representatives last month at their annual retreat in Baltimore.

The White House felt Obama won the debate in Baltimore, successfully portraying himself as above the partisan fray.

While it had its moments of drama, the Blair House summit had less back-and-forth than Baltimore, with participants resorting to the kind of lengthy statements typical of Capitol Hill hearings.

Obama took notes occasionally, at times resting his head on his hand. He smiled rarely. His most common expression was one of serious contemplation and thoughtful consideration of the opposing arguments.

Only a handful of aides attended the event, in a room barely big enough for those crowded around the table in wooden chairs.

Beneath a crystal chandelier, and between marbled walls, the room echoed and magnified the sounds of people shuffling paper or getting up from their seats for a break.

Several times, Obama reminded them of the need to be more disciplined about keeping their remarks shorter, although he acknowledged he had gone over his allotted time too.

Afterwards, Kyl complained Obama had talked too much.

“I just don’t think the president was listening.”

Popularity: 8% [?]

From: Herald Tribune

Univision on Tuesday started a multiyear campaign to boost academic achievement among Latinos in the United States by telling parents about what it takes to ensure their children finish high school and graduate from college.

The campaign, entitled in Spanish “The Moment is Now,” comes as Latino high school and college graduation rates are far below the national average and the Latino unemployment rate is among the nation’s highest at 12.6 percent.

With Latinos making up about a fifth of the nation’s kindergarten through 12th-graders, that is a major concern for the entire nation, said Univision Networks President Cesar Conde. The nation’s largest Spanish-language network is teaming with the U.S. Department of Education, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and nonprofits to highlight best practices from communities nationwide.

Conde said Latino parents, like most Americans, value education. And many came to the U.S. to provide better educational opportunities for their children. But once here, they often do not know how to navigate the system.

“We want to raise the standards and the expectations that we in the Hispanic community have for the youth,” Conde said. “And we want to educate parents who may not think some opportunities are within their children’s grasp.”

Univision will use its television and radio networks and its mobile and Internet platforms to provide information to parents about how to make sure their children are ready for college, as well as where to turn for student loans and scholarships — a key component that can be daunting even for those familiar with U.S. financial and academic systems.

According to federal data, about 13 percent of Latinos in the U.S. have a college degree, compared with about a quarter of the population as a whole. Less than half of Latinos who attend college graduate, compared to a national average of 54 percent.

An exact cost of the program has not been determined but is expected to be several million dollars in cash and donations.

Among Univision’s first programs will be a March 6 special hosted by top Univision news anchor Jorge Ramos that brings together children and their families to talk about the obstacles they face in continuing their education.

Univision worked with the Gates Foundation to focus its campaign beyond high school graduation to helping students master the skills needed to make it in college, said foundation spokesman Chris Williams.

Juan Sepulveda, head of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans, said the government will help “on the content side,” providing experts such as federal officials, educators and grass-roots groups. He said it was important to dispel the notion that Latino youths are not succeeding because they do not speak English, or that such campaigns mainly target those in the country illegally.

“It’s really a small population of students with undocumented status,” he said. “The majority are U.S. citizens.”

Sepulveda said the administration chose to work with Univision because of the success it has had in previous campaigns, including its citizenship and voter-registration efforts in the run-up to the 2008 election.

Conde acknowledged it will not be easy to convince parents to forgo the immediate financial help a high school graduate can bring to the household if he goes straight to work.

“But we need to ensure our parents and community as a whole understand the long-term benefits of a college degree not just for the individual, but for the family.”

Popularity: 9% [?]

From: Wall Street Journal

Some high-profile Republicans are adopting a softer vocabulary on immigration and trying to recruit more Hispanic candidates, a response to the party’s soul-searching about tactics that many strategists believe have alienated the country’s fastest-growing voter bloc.

In Texas, George P. Bush, the half Mexican-American son of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, has founded Hispanic Republicans of Texas, a political action committee to promote Hispanics running for state and local offices.

In California, GOP gubernatorial front-runner Meg Whitman, the former eBay Inc. chief executive officer, tells Hispanics she would have voted against a Republican-backed 1994 measure barring illegal immigrants from receiving social services.

And Rep. Tom Price (R., Ga.), chairman of the conservative Republican Study Committee and an opponent of past efforts to make a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, has been meeting with Hispanic leaders to find a new tone on that and other points of contention between Hispanics and conservatives.

For Republicans, such efforts carry risks, especially as conservative activists try to push GOP candidates to be more ideologically pure. Opposition to “amnesty,” a buzzword used by critics of proposals to legalize the 12 million illegal immigrants believed to be living in the U.S., remains a reliable applause line.

Nonetheless, many in the party have concluded that opposition to immigration legislation, a debate that is sometimes racially charged, has alienated millions of otherwise conservative Hispanic voters.

Republicans won just 31% of Hispanic votes in the 2008 presidential election, according to exit polls, down from more than 40% four years earlier, as the party took a hard line on immigration policy. That was a big factor in handing President Barack Obama his Electoral College victory and a seven-point win over Republican Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.). If current demographic and voting trends continue, Hispanics’ growing share of the electorate could make Republican electoral college victories a near impossibility as early as 2020.

The Republican efforts could prove crucial in Hispanic-heavy states in this year’s elections. Party strategists fear a heavily Democratic Hispanic vote could hurt Republican chances in governors races in Texas, California and Florida, and make it harder for a Republican presidential nominee in the future to win states with fast-growing Hispanic populations.

Former Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie, who is coordinating some of the party’s internal discussions, called the tandem effect of rising Hispanic population and dwindling Republican support an “untenable delta.”

Mr. Gillespie blamed the problem on past Republican rhetoric. He said the GOP needed to think about “tone and body language” in discussing the issue. “We have to make clear to Latino voters that we care as much about welcoming legal immigrants into our country as we do about keeping illegal ones out,” he said.

Mr. Gillespie and other strategists say the party needs to win more Hispanic voters through economic and social issues. Focus groups in Florida and Nevada conducted by Resurgent Republic, a group co-founded by Mr. Gillespie, found big concerns about debt among Hispanics.

The Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles, a group set up by Princeton University Professor Robert George, a leading intellectual voice among Christian conservatives, plans to spend at least $500,000 spread over a handful of races to help pro-immigration Republican candidates, according to Alfonso Aguilar, a former Bush administration immigration official who runs the group. A key position for the group, said Mr. Aguilar, is legalizing illegal workers.

Another GOP-affiliated group, the Hispanic Leadership Fund, plans to target three races this year, supporting conservative Hispanic candidates and promoting other Republicans who back more liberal immigration laws.

Mr. Price, the Georgia lawmaker, said in an interview he began meeting with Hispanic groups in recent months to open a “line of communication so there is a reserve of trust.” But he said he wasn’t ready to talk about a path to legalization until he was convinced the U.S.-Mexico border is secured.

Javier Ortiz, a Georgia-based GOP consultant who grew up in Puerto Rico and has participated in the meetings with Mr. Price, said the congressman was “formulating his views on immigration through these discussions, and he hasn’t decided to go one way or the other. And that’s something I find encouraging.”

The new GOP language on immigration was evident in a recent appearance by Sarah Palin on Fox News. The former Alaska governor said that conservatives needed to be “welcoming and inviting to immigrants” and recognize that “immigrants built this great country.”

The party nonetheless remains home to conservatives who thwarted attempts by President George W. Bush to push the GOP to accept more liberal immigration laws.

To court anti-illegal immigration advocates, even the GOP’s most prominent Hispanic candidate of the year, Florida Senate hopeful Marco Rubio, a Cuban-American former state House speaker, has taken an immigration position to the right of his primary rival, Gov. Charlie Crist. He drew fire from Hispanic leaders, including some Republicans, when he argued recently that illegal immigrants should not be counted in the Census for purposes of drawing congressional and legislative districts.

Roy Beck, executive director of Numbers USA, a group that advocates for strict limits on immigration, said strategists who urge a softer stance will be hard-pressed to find “any Republicans who want to stay in office who want to take their advice.”

A more conciliatory approach, Mr. Beck said, would turn off independent voters, who tend to support more restrictive immigration policies, particularly at a time of high unemployment, and whose movements back to the GOP in recent months are likely to spur big gains for the party this November.

The views of independent voters also complicate matters for Democrats, who are trying to retain Hispanic voters while wooing independents and satisfying labor unions, which are divided on immigration. Mr. Obama has said he supports an overhaul, including a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, but the issue has been overshadowed by the White House’s primary focus on jobs and the economy.

Popularity: 5% [?]

From: National Mortgage Professional

NCLR (National Council of La Raza), the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Center for Community Capital have released The Foreclosure Generation: The Long-Term Impact of the Housing Crisis on Latino Children and Families, a study which uses interviews with Latino families who have suffered a foreclosure to shed light on the damage inflicted by the loss of their home.

The report is the first to provide a glimpse into the far-reaching impact that record-high foreclosures are likely to have on the millions of American families and children expected to lose their home in the coming years, and it calls for a bold response from federal policymakers.

“An estimated 1.3 million Latino families will lose their homes to foreclosure between 2009 and 2012. This represents a shocking loss of wealth and a major blow to community stability. This study brings to light the human and social costs of foreclosure and the urgent need for stronger government intervention to help homeowners, including those who are unemployed,” said Janet Murguía, NCLR president and chief executive officer.

The Foreclosure Generation documents the experiences of families who are forced to leave their homes due to a foreclosure. Families interviewed generally had exhausted all available resources in an effort to keep their homes, were unable to secure assistance from their mortgage servicer, and often relied on relatives and friends for shelter and assistance. Marital discord, anxiety, depression, children’s poor performance in school, financial loss, and strained relationships between parents and children were among the consequences reported.

“Our findings on the impact of home foreclosures on families are disturbing. Children in particular experience problems in school and are deeply affected by instability in the home. More research is needed to better understand the long-term impact of foreclosures on our communities and to find the best interventions to meet those needs,” said Roberto Quercia, Director, Center for Community Capital, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Key findings include:

?Job loss and jumps in mortgage payments were the most common triggers that led to default and foreclosure. Families interviewed reported an average loss of $89,155 due to the foreclosure. The dramatic financial loss forced parents to pull back on plans to help their children pay for life expenses, such as college, a car, or a home.

?Despite having reached out for help to avoid their foreclosure, none of the families interviewed were offered a sustainable forbearance, workout, or loan modification from their financial institutions.

?Parents, spouses, and children felt a heavy emotional burden including depression, increased anxiety, tension, and feelings of guilt and resentment.

?More than half of the families reported that their children had academic or behavioral problems in school and had trouble getting along with siblings and making new friends.

?All but one family were left without reserves that they could tap into in case of a financial emergency, and many skimped on needed medical care to save money.

?Almost eight million homeowners in the U.S. are behind in their mortgage payments and an estimated 400,000 Latino families were expected to lose their homes to foreclosure in 2009 alone. By 2050, Latinos will make up 30 percent of the U.S. population, compared to 14% today, and immigrants and their children will account for 82 percent of household growth between now and 2050.

The Foreclosure Generation: The Long-Term Impact of the Housing Crisis on Latino Children and Families offers policy recommendations to stabilize the housing and financial situations of families affected by foreclosure and reestablish homeownership as a wealth-building tool for Americans of modest means. In particular, the report points to the shortcomings of current federal efforts and calls on federal policymakers to take bold steps to stop the loss of wealth through home loss.

“To help the nation recover from the devastation caused by foreclosures, Americans need three things: relief from foreclosures, even if they are out of work; the opportunity for qualified families to purchase newly affordable homes; and stronger consumer protections and accountability standards to prevent future crisis,” said Murguía.

Interviews for this study were conducted by five non-profit community organizations that belong to the NCLR Homeownership Network and provide housing counseling to Latinos. They are Southwest Housing Solutions in Detroit, Michigan; Visionary Homebuilders in Stockton, California; Tejano Center for Community Concerns in Houston, Texas; the Housing Education Alliance in Tampa, Florida; and the Dalton-Whitfield Community Development Corporation in Dalton, Georgia.

For more information, visit www.nclr.org.

Popularity: 6% [?]

From: NY Times

Elizabeth Drummond was a single mother from a hardscrabble family whose roots go back to the Mayflower and an American Indian tribe. The man she married, Segundo Encalada, was a relative newcomer to the United States, sent illegally by his parents from Ecuador when he was 17.

He soon became “Daddy Segundo” to her little boy, coached her through the Caesarean births of two daughters, and worked construction and landscaping jobs here on Long Island to support them all.

In an earlier era of America’s immigration history, they could have stayed together, and Mr. Encalada might still be alive. But in July 2006, when Mrs. Encalada was pregnant with their third daughter and immigration crackdowns were sweeping the country, her husband was ordered by immigration authorities to take “voluntary departure” back to Ecuador.

They thought of hiding, she says, but chose to follow the rules, accepting the wrenching separation that has become the only path to a legal family life for hundreds of thousands of such couples. Under laws affecting those who married after April 2001, foreign spouses who entered without a visa must leave and seek one from a United States Consulate in their native land.

Their lawyer said that would take two months to a year. Instead, one year turned into three; Mrs. Encalada lost their apartment, and her son was hospitalized for depression at age 8. In July, after she flew to Ecuador for a joint interview at the United States Consulate in Guayaquil, officials there rejected the couple’s application with a form letter saying they had “a marriage of convenience.”

Mrs. Encalada, 32, wrote the White House, the State Department and Congressional offices to plead for help. When most did not respond, she found a new lawyer and started over. But her husband, 28, apparently lost hope. On Dec. 15, facing another Christmas far from his family, he drank poison.

Over the years, many couples who had to separate have managed to reunite; others split up for good. Some lawmakers see the hurdle as necessary to deter illegal immigration and marriage fraud, while others say it needlessly tears families apart.

But no one really keeps track of the results. The visa ordeal that left Mrs. Encalada a widow with four young children hints at a hidden toll.

Public attention has focused on the visa a United States Consulate in Nigeria granted to the man accused in the Christmas bombing attempt. But under tougher immigration laws enacted in 1996, the system also gives distant consulates vast power to delay or deny visas to would-be immigrants trying to return to their American families.

“The State Department should be ashamed of itself in this case,” said Representative Steve Israel, a Long Island Democrat whose staff found American consular officials unresponsive to several e-mail messages sent on Mrs. Encalada’s behalf from August to November. “Immigration policy in the United States is dysfunctional no matter which side of the issue, or the border, you stand on.”

Adriana Gallegos, a spokeswoman for the State Department, would not comment on the case. “It’s against the law to talk about visa records,” she said. “We can’t explain why it was denied or what was the process.” She added that her own efforts to learn more from consular officials in Guayaquil had been unsuccessful.

Aspects of the case are mystifying. Although Mrs. Encalada said she showed the consular interviewer copious evidence of her Feb. 3, 2005, marriage, including family photo albums and apartment leases, the consulate later informed Mr. Israel’s office that it had no record of her being there.

Mrs. Encalada protested that assertion in an urgent e-mail message to the consulate on Oct. 22: “How can there be no proof at all that we were there for our interview on July 20th 2009 with an interview time of 2:00? Please let me know what our next step is in this process, I need my husband home and my children need their father back!!!”

There was no reply until Christmas Eve, the week after Mr. Encalada’s suicide, when the consulate suddenly apologized for the delay and professed great concern about her case. Its e-mail message asked for her airline boarding pass, a description of the person who interviewed her and other information.

Mrs. Encalada has not replied. “Now he’s gone, it doesn’t matter anymore,” she said.

She still seemed stunned on a recent afternoon, surrounded by clamoring children in a battered house they share with her divorced father, a 58-year-old Marine Corps veteran recently laid off from his construction job, and her sister, a receptionist with two children.

Mrs. Encalada and her parents said the family’s troubles started with a gathering at her mother’s house one Friday night in July 2004, when a drunken guest meddled in a family dispute, then summoned the police, claiming Mr. Encalada had threatened her. Mr. Encalada eventually pleaded guilty to harassment in the case, a misdemeanor, and served 30 days in jail in 2006.

Legally, the offense was too minor to affect the couple’s pending petition for his green card, but in practice it resulted in his transfer to immigration custody. Released on $7,500 bond, he agreed to leave for Ecuador and seek a visa.

As Mrs. Encalada sifted through photos of their vanished life and their week’s reunion in Ecuador, her children crowded around. Selena, 5, back from kindergarten, waved a picture she had found.

“Daddy’s holding me; he’s changing me when I was a baby,” she crowed.

Hailey, 4, grabbed another photo and ripped it. Alanna, 3, born five months after her father left, was tired of being told she was not the baby photographed in his arms. “I want to be there, too!” she cried, throwing herself on the floor.

Only Griffin, 9, was silent, lying face down on a couch.

“He did take it very hard,” Mrs. Encalada said later, recalling how the boy cried himself to sleep in his stepfather’s arms the night before they parted, then began to misbehave at school or refused to go.

She had no car, she said, and as Griffin’s absences mounted, she took him on foot, an hour’s walk. Twice the school called Child Protective Services to investigate possible neglect, and twice the caseworker determined the allegation was unfounded, she said, only to have the school make a new referral.

“It got to the point I had to put him in a mental institution or C.P.S. would take him away,” she said.

Griffin, a third grader, spent a week on a psychiatric ward with a diagnosis of “mood disorder,” and given Risperdal, an antipsychotic drug. He returned to a home where he and his mother sleep on recliners in the living room and the girls share two couches.

“The C.P.S. worker said they need beds,” Mrs. Encalada said, after patiently doling out noodle soup. “I have no money to buy beds.”

Thousands of dollars went to legal expenses and filing fees, much of it borrowed, she said. Mrs. Encalada, who formerly worked as a cashier and for an insurance company, was warned by lawyers not to apply for public aid because it would jeopardize the immigration case.

“Thank God for my dad,” she said. “If it were not for him, I wouldn’t have a roof over my head for me and the children.”

Recent research on children separated from parents through immigration enforcement has found that psychological distress and family hardship are typical. A bill sponsored by Representative José E. Serrano, a New York Democrat, would give immigration judges discretion to take family situations into account in deportation proceedings — leeway largely eliminated by the tougher laws of 1996.

But opponents see such measures as a back door to amnesty and a reward to illegal immigrants for having children.

Such policy conflicts mean little to Mr. Encalada’s in-laws, who reproach him only for ending his life. “He was a wonderful father and a wonderful husband, a very hard worker,” said Mrs. Encalada’s mother, Liz Volz. “If he was here right now, I would yell and scream at him. But I have a lot of sympathy for what he was going through.”

Only after the consulate denied the validity of their marriage, when Mrs. Encalada consulted a new lawyer, did the couple learn about a separate hurdle. The law imposes a 10-year ban on re-entry for having stayed a year or more in the United States without permission; it can be waived only through a show of extreme hardship.

The second lawyer had started that process when Mr. Encalada gave up.

Popularity: 6% [?]

From: USC News

Latino baby boomers in the United States make up a population group so diverse and heterogeneous that the common practice of lumping them into a disadvantaged underclass is entirely inappropriate, according to a new report from the USC Davis School of Gerontology and the UCLA Center for Policy Research on Aging.

The article, in the current issue of the Journal of Aging & Social Policy, used data from the 2000 U.S. Census to identify financial disparities within the Latino baby boomer population based upon citizenship status.

“U.S. citizens and naturalized citizens are much better off economically than non-citizens and those born in U.S. territories,” said lead author Zachary Gassoumis, a Ph.D. student at USC.

Non-citizens, many of whom have been living and working in this country for more than 15 years, make up roughly one-third of the 8 million Latino baby boomers. A lack of English fluency and fewer high school graduates account for higher poverty rates among this population.

“Although older Latino non-citizens have been paying into Medicare and Social Security, many of them will not have access to these benefits and will be left with precious few resources when they retire,” Gassoumis said.

The needs of this group, considered a “hidden population” within the Latino boomers, highlight the importance of immigration and naturalization policy to the next generation of U.S. elders, according to the researchers.

“Any discussion of entitlement reforms should consider the impending retirement of the baby boomers’ most vulnerable members, a group that includes many non-citizen Latinos,” said co-author Fernando Torres-Gil, director of the UCLA Center for Policy Research on Aging and adjunct professor at the USC Davis School. “Policies concerning the Latino boomer population will serve as a barometer of the willingness of U.S. politicians to address the emerging Latino population as a whole.”

Of the original baby boom generation, the article reveals that 5 million U.S. boomers have been lost to death or emigration. Still, with an influx of 9 million immigrants, about 50 percent of whom were Latino, “there are now approximately 80 million baby boomers in the U.S.,” said co-author Kathleen Wilber, a professor at the USC Davis School. “This number is significantly larger than the figure of 76 million that is often cited by policymakers, press reports and other sources.”

Research was funded by the Ford Foundation.

Popularity: 7% [?]

From: Yubanet

The Latino vote has grown exponentially since 2000, changing the political landscape in more than a dozen states across the country, and is poised to be pivotal yet again in the 2010 cycle. According to experts on the politics of the Latino vote, who gathered on a telephonic press conference today, candidates and parties need to do more than say a few words in Spanish — they need to understand and embrace the policies that motivate and influence Latino voters. How both parties handle such issues as comprehensive immigration reform will have a real impact on Latino political behavior, including turnout and party preference, in the congressional mid-terms and beyond.

Eliseo Medina, International Executive Vice President of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Janet Murguia, President and CEO of the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), and Frank Sharry, Executive Director of America’s Voice, analyzed the findings of a new report from America’s Voice that reviews the impact Latino voters will have on scores of battleground congressional races this cycle.

“The record influence of the Latino vote in 2008 was not a fluke; not an accident; not a random one-time occurrence,” said SEIU International Executive Vice President Eliseo Medina. “It was the result of a growing shift in awareness among Latino voters in every corner of the U.S. about the real power of politics to change lives. As a result of this growing awareness, today we stand witness to the growing might of a diverse, highly-motivated electorate that will change American politics into the future.”

“The hope for immigration reform has been a powerful force behind the Latino vote,” said Janet Murguia, President and CEO of NCLR, the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States. “Like all Americans, Latinos believe it’s time for politicians to stop playing politics with a problem we could have solved a long time ago. And as all voters, we will hold accountable those in either party who continue engaging in obstruction or avoidance.”

The report, The Power of the Latino Vote in the 2010 Elections, provides a wealth of statistical information on Latino voters and analyzes trends in Latino voting behavior and the impact it will have on competitive races in 2010. Specifically, the report analyzes:

* Trends in Latino Political Participation: Although the Latino electorate has been trending Democratic for years, the Democratic Party does not hold a lock on these voters. How both parties handle such issues as immigration reform will have a serious impact on Latino political behavior, including turnout and party preference. The 40% of Latino voters who are foreign-born, naturalized citizens have proven to be a crucial swing vote in recent elections, and the immigration issue is of particular importance to them.

* Races to Watch: The report tracks 40 races for 2010 in 12 states-29 U.S. House races, eight U.S. Senate races and three gubernatorial races-and analyzes Latino voter percentages as well as the candidates’ positions on immigration reform. All of these races are close, and Latino voters will make a decisive impact in choosing the winners.

* Highest Latino % Congressional Districts: The report also highlights the 79 congressional districts in which Latinos comprise at least 25% of the population, and a significant number of the voting electorate as well. Fifty-four of these seats are currently controlled by Democratic Members of Congress and 25 are controlled by Republican Members of Congress.

“In 2010, how Latino voters behave and how both parties deal with the litmus test issue of immigration reform will be of huge consequence,” said Frank Sharry, Executive Director of America’s Voice. “Both parties have a significant stake in connecting with these voters, leaning into and leading on the issue of immigration reform, and getting on the right side of the fastest growing group of new voters in the nation.”

America’s Voice The Power of the Latino Vote in the 2010 Elections: http://www.americasvoiceonline.org/LatinoVoterReport

Popularity: 6% [?]