The French have banned burqas in defiance of their liberal tradition. The Swiss have banned new minarets despite their reliance on Arab bank deposits. The Japanese have shut off most immigration though they grow demographically decrepit. Perhaps the most self-defeating act is taking place in the UK. Last summer, the…

An international event. How appropriate. What a show it will be. One is a former member of Croatia’s Parliament. His main forte is kickboxing. He once fought before 71,000 fans in Japan. Another gentleman is a native of Iran who wrestled for his adopted nation, Great Britain, in the Olympics….

The US deported more illegal immigrants than ever before during the first 2 years of President Obama’s administration. “In both fiscal years 2009 and 2010, Immigration and Customs Enforcement removed more illegal immigrants than ever before, with more than 779,000 removals nationwide in the last 2 years,” Homeland Security Secretary…

The Obama administration says its top immigration enforcement priority is deporting illegal immigrants who pose a threat to the community–namely, convicted criminals. But local law enforcement officers have employed part of the 1996 law that lets them enforce federal immigration law–a provision known as 287 g–without recourse to that standard,…

There were an estimated 11.2 million undocumented immigrants living in the US in March 2010, the Pew report finds, a number statistically unchanged from the year before. “The US economy is still doing better than the Mexican economy, and the figures suggest these immigrants are finding enough here to hang…

Immigration and Customs Enforcement Deputy Director Kumar Kibble has announced that cost at a House subcommittee hearing. The hearing focused on whether the Obama Administration is doing enough to round up people working illegally in the U.S. ICE deported almost 393,000 people from the US in 2010, an alltime record….

to speak at a school. So I did it. It was very cool. They handed me a microphone and put me in the auditorium and I spoke for 90 minutes and answered questions about Immigration Law (I know, shocking). I am used to talking to lawyers and professionals, which is…

The stats helpers at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and the Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow.  Crunchy numbers: A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 7,700 times in 2010. That’s about 19 full 747s.  We have over 900 followers on Twitter, as…

He is celebrated as the humble Italian weaver who ended up discovering the Americas. But the conventional wisdom relating to Christopher Columbus is under threat after academics concluded the explorer was actually a Polish immigrant. An international team of distinguished professors have completed 20 years of painstaking research into his…

Many companies face difficulty in obtaining financing today. When traditional sources of financing are unavailable, Companies can turn to an unexpected resource to acquire capital — immigration law. Specifically, the EB-5 immigrant investor visa program can provide U.S. companies with an innovative source of financing. The EB-5 program enables foreigners…

Under US immigration law, gay Americans don’t have a right to sponsor their foreign partners for green cards. Instead, these couples must separate or leave the country, forced into exile because their families are not recognized under federal law. In San Jose, Judy Rickard will spend Thanksgiving without her partner…

Feel free to contact us on any Immigration Law matter. We understand Immigration Law. It is all we do. We know that you work hard. So do we. We will answer your questions in a way that you can understand, without complicated legal jargon. We charge reasonable fees. Attorneys work…

Listed in both Best Lawyers in America and Super Lawyers, Harlan York is Former Immigration Chair of the New Jersey State Bar Association. For fifteen years, Mr. York has practiced exclusively in the area of immigration law. Mr. York notes among his most memorable cases: o   Visa petitions for winners…

In 2007, 50 % of Latinos surveyed told the Pew Hispanic Center that the growing number of illegal immigrants was a positive force for the existing Latino population. In a Pew survey released Thursday, that number had plummeted to 29% of Latinos.   31% said illegal immigration had a negative effect,…

Houdini’s first important magic trick was called the Metamorphosis. “Bess Houdini would be put into a sack, and she would go into the trunk. A curtain would be closed around it for a moment, bang, the curtains would open, Bess would be standing on top of the trunk. And inside…

Henry Velandia is married to a U.S. citizen, but he might be deported anyway.  That’s because the Venezuelan-born salsa teacher’s legal same-sex marriage in Connecticut isn’t recognized by the federal government. So his husband — Josh Vandiver, a Princeton University doctoral student from Colorado — can’t sponsor him for residency…

Allan Angel is an immigrant from the Philippines, now living the American dream as a comic book artist in San Jose, California. He has created his own comic book publishing house which he calls “Integrity Comics,”  a place where he gives young people the chance to be published albeit on…

from Irish Emigrant: good summary The Diversity Immigrant Visa Program is administered annually by the State Department and to give up to 55,000 visas to persons from countries with low rates of immigration to the US. Applying for the lottery is free and needs to be done on-line directly with…

this data comes from a WSJ piece published earlier this year Most foreigners who came to the U.S. to earn doctorate degrees in science and engineering stayed on after graduation—at least until the recession began—refuting predictions that post-9/11 restrictions on immigrants or expanding opportunities in China and India would send…

Edward Schumacher-Matos on Social Security and illegals: By 2007, the Social Security trust fund had received a net benefit of somewhere between $120 billion and $240 billion from unauthorized immigrants, representing 5.4% to 10.7% of the trust fund’s total assets ($2.24 trillion) that year. Unauthorized immigrants paid a net contribution…

ICE is rapidly expanding its Secure Communities Project, a strategy that enables the government to identify any immigrant booked into custody by local law enforcement. Before this, an arrestee’s fingerprints were checked during the booking process for criminal history information only against the FBI database. Now, fingerprint information is checked…

As part of the Administration’s effort to remake the enforcement of immigration laws, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) have aggressively stepped up various enforcement activities, including a 10 percent increase in deportations (400,000 people are expected to…

On August 6, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency announced the implementation of a $14 fee beginning September 8 for applications made through the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA). This fee affects all travelers visiting the United States under the Visa Waiver Program, which is available to nationals…