• The influence of the Minutemen Project and similar groups has diminished

    The Minuteman Project and like-minded groups tried to make their own contribution to stopping illegal immigration by positioning their members across the U.S.-Mexico border, equipped with binoculars, American flags, and sometimes guns. Dwindling financial resources and publicized personal troubles of some of the group’s leaders have diminished the group’s ability to maintain a presence along the Southwest border. Observers say that the project represents the past in the debate over illegal immigration.

  • Canadian citizens fight a section of Canada’s Immigration Act they consider too broad

    Several civilians targeted under Section 34 (1) (f) of Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, are voicing their concerns that the measure is too broad and unreasonable. The bill, in place since 2001 in response to 9/11, blocks national admission to anyone who has supported an organization with possible grounds for acts of terrorism.

  • DHS mulling deportation policy changes

    As part of an ongoing review of immigration deportation policies, DHS secretary Jeh Johnson is considering limiting deportations of undocumented immigrants who do not have serious criminal records. If adopted, the new policy would affect tens of thousands of immigrants who could have been deported because they committed repeat immigration violations such as re-entering the country illegally after being deported, failing to follow deportation orders, or missing an immigration court date.

  • Violence and corruption by drug cartels hits homeland

    While the American media devotes much time and effort to pinpointing the violence and corruption generated by the drug cartels in Mexico, far less attention is devoted to crimes in this country which are a direct result of these same criminal organizations. The corruption of American law enforcement has become a significant problem along the border. The Mexican drug cartels which control drugs and human smuggling are directly responsible for a spiraling level of violence and crime which instills fear among residents on both sides of the border even as it lowers the quality of life for all who call the U.S.-Mexican borderlands their home.

  • New detection technology to help combat nuclear trafficking

    According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the greatest danger to nuclear security comes from terrorists acquiring sufficient quantities of plutonium or highly enriched uranium (HEU) to construct a crude nuclear explosive device. The IAEA also notes that most cases of illicit nuclear trafficking have involved gram-level quantities, which can be challenging to detect with most inspection methods. Special algorithm coupled with commercial X-ray scanners allows detection of small amounts of fissile materials in luggage.

  • U.S.-Mexico border security barriers affect movement of animals

    Security barriers in national parks on the U.S.-Mexican border which aim to deter illegal migrants are affecting the movements of some native animal species while not necessarily restricting the movement of humans, according to new research.

  • Number of undocumented immigrants deported for minor offenses quadrupled

    The Obama administration has dramatically increased the number undocumented immigrants being deported for minor offenses. Figures obtained by the New York Times through a Freedom of Information Act show a four-fold increase in deportations. Two-thirds of the nearly two million deportation cases the NYT studied involved people who had committed minor infractions or had no criminal record. The number of cases relating to people whose most serious offence was a traffic violation has quadrupled, rising from 43,000 over the last five years of George W Bush’s presidency to 193,000 since Obama took office.

  • CBP takes another stab at high-tech border security

    The George W. Bush administration’s effort to build a high-tech border security system – the Boeing-led SBINet – was a failure, and the Obama administration shut it down in 2011. CBP is now trying again, this time with Elbit Systems as the lead contractor. The hope is that the lessons of the doomed SBINet, and Elbit’s experience in building high-tech defensive systems along Israel’s borders, would yield better result this time around.

  • Anti-immigrants backlash in Europe intensifies

    Anti-immigration groups and parties are enjoying a surge in many European countries, including Britain, France, and Austria, as many European economies face high unemployment and declining wages. The open-border policies of the European Union (EU), which allow citizens of EU member states to work and receive social welfare anywhere within the EU, have led many citizens to call for immigration limits and quotas.

  • Critics: administration does not deport deportation-eligible undocumented immigrants

    A recent report by the Center for Immigration Studies(CIS), a Washington, D.C. nonprofit calling for more restrictive immigration policies, says that in 2013, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deported fewer than 195,000 illegal immigrants despite receiving more than 720,000 notices on immigrants who could be eligible for deportation. Moreover, 68,000 immigrants released from pending deportation cases had criminal convictions on their records, the report stated. Pro-immigration advocates say the figures are misleading. “CIS is essentially asserting that a legal-permanent resident or a recently naturalized citizen with a broken tail light should be charged by ICE and removed from the country although there is no basis in law for such action,” said Benjamin Johnson of the American Immigration Council.

  • DHS hits reset button on the Electronic Immigration System (ELIS)

    DHS has awarded InfoZen 3-year, $11.9 million contract — the first of multiple contracts — for the Electronic Immigration System (ELIS), designed to process immigration forms. This is the latest attempt to digitize the processing system after spending roughly $1 billion and five and a half years under a contract led by IBM. IBM’s “design is poorly thought through and inconsistently applied by the developers. The result is duplication of efforts, time spent on rework, slowness in debugging problems, poor quality code, etc.,” said CIS chief information officer Mark Schwartz.

  • Judge rebukes Sheriff Arpaio, his deputy for mocking, defying court orders

    Grant Murray Snow, District Judge for the United States District Court for Arizona, earlier this week rebuked Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County and chief deputy Jerry Sheridan for defying and mocking Snow’s order, issued last year, to stop targeting Latinos during routine patrols, traffics stops and work raids. “Whether or not the sheriff likes it, there is a distinction in immigration law that was not understood by the population and, with all due respect to you, it is not understood by the sheriff, which is that it is not a criminal violation to be in this country without authorization,” Judge Snow said pointedly.

  • Debate intensifies over Obama deportation instruction to ICE

    President Barack Obama’s recent instruction to DHS to find “more humane” ways to deport illegal immigrants has sparked yet another debate between immigration supporters and critics as to what exactly Obama’s directive meant. Supporters of undocumented immigrants hope DHS will cease all deportations deemed unnecessary, while opponents of Obama’s immigration policies urge DHS to carry out the country’s immigration laws as written by Congress.

  • White House to reassess deportation policy internally

    President Barack Obama, after his meeting with key Latino leaders last Friday to discuss further implementation of reform under current law, has announced that the administration will take another look into current deportation policies.

  • Passports of millions of travelers to U.K. not thoroughly checked

    The use of false passports by two passengers on Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 which disappeared a couple of days ago have highlighted the fact that in the United Kingdom, the passport details of more than twenty million people entering and leaving the United Kingdom every year are not being properly checked. The Home Office’s most recent figures show that data is still not being collected and examined for about 10 percent of the 200 million people flying in and out of the United Kingdom every year.