Last week California became the ninth state in the United States to fully deploy the Secure Communities program, which automatically runs an arrested individual’s fingerprint through a national database to determine their immigration status; each year law enforcement officials arrest an estimated one million non-U.S. citizens; ICE has deported more than 62,500 aliens convicted of crimes under the program; critics of the program believe that use of the system has led to the arrest and deportation of noncriminal immigrants and are also concerned about the mandatory use of the system; a report found that in Illinois 78 percent of all detainees identified by ICE were non-criminals

Last year, U.S. exports to Mexico totaled $163 billion, and imports from Mexico totaled $229.6 billion; nearly 80 percent of that trade crosses through land border ports on trucks and railcars; the 1.8-million strong Border Trade Alliance says bottlenecks at border crossings hamper this trade and make it more costly to grow it; the Alliance urges Congress and the Obama administration to invest in border ports of entry, including hiring more staff; Obama’s proposed 2011 budget includes only 300 new Customs and Border Protection officers, while Republicans propose shrinking the Border Patrol by 870 agents

Western Washington University has received $49,000 to conduct field research on wait times and lane reconfiguration at the U.S.-Canada border; the university’s Border Policy and Research Institute will collect and analyze data on wait times as part of a pilot to examine alternative use of the dedicated Free and Secure Trade truck lane at the Blaine crossing

Cassidian, the renamed defense and security division of EADS, is showing its new security radar; the company says that SPEXER 2000 is the first security radar using the newest radar technology of Active Electronically Scanning Array (AESA); by electronic guidance of the radar beam, this technology enables the sensor to fulfill several tasks at the same time while increasing the detection capability substantially; therefore, one SPEXER 2000 can replace two or more conventional radars

Chipotle, in a filing last week with the Securities and Exchange Commission, disclosed that it had let go of 450 people in its Minnesota restaurants after the employees failed to prove they were eligible to work in the United States; the Denver-based chain has been subject to DHS audit for employees’ documents

As Congressional lawmakers look to expand the E-Verify program to crack down on undocumented workers, businesses have become increasingly uneasy with the proposal; Arizona, Utah, and Mississippi have required all employers to use the system, and House GOP leaders are following their lead and pushing to make the system compulsory for all businesses across the United States; critics fear that making the program mandatory could destabilize critical sectors of the economy; the agriculture industry is particularly concerned as they depend heavily on undocumented workers for labor and worry that mandating the system could potentially jeopardize millions of jobs in the industry; proponents of expanding E-Verify believe that it is a better alternative to the existing I-9 screening process which has been easily circumvented with forged documents

Last August, with virtually unanimous bipartisan support, Congress increased border funding by $600 million, adding 1,000 new agents to the Border Patrol; Republicans complained this was not enough — citing a GAO report that said that by the Border Patrol’s own standards, the agency had “operational control” over only 873 miles of the 2,000-mile border with Mexico in 2010, or about 44 percent; Lamar Smith (R-Texas), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said administration officials “are either blissfully unaware of the massive holes in security along the Southern border or are intentionally misleading the American people”; trouble is, as part of their $60 billion in budget cuts, Republicans propose shrinking the Border Patrol by 870 agents and cut $272 million in funds for surveillance systems to monitor the border with Mexico

Republican lawmakers in Minnesota have recently introduced a bill that would require city, county, and other local governments to enforce immigration laws and prohibits them from passing local ordinances to the contrary; currently St. Paul and Worthington have ordinances that direct city resources away from immigration enforcement, leaving it in the hands of the federal government; if passed the new GOP bill, HF358, would effectively invalidate these local ordinances as it contains a provision that would make it illegal for local governments to pass laws overriding federal immigration enforcement laws; last year GOP lawmakers introduced a tough Arizona-style immigration law that would require law enforcement to stop individuals who they have reasonable suspicion for entering the country illegally

The Security Industry Association (SIA) has called for the incorporation of biometrics into the E-Verify program to prevent fraud and increase accuracy; a recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found that the E-Verify system was vulnerable to fraud and identity theft; a recent audit of Chipotle by ICE agents revealed that many employees are using forged documents to work in the United States; SIA recommends using biometrics to bind an individual to their identity documents, requiring biometric authentication of individuals when they apply for employments, and distributing smart cards to individuals that contain their biometric data; in 2009 nearly 8.2 million new employees were identified using the E-Verify system and this number is set to steadily grow as more states mandate employers to use the program for new hires; roughly 1,400 employers are joining the system each week