Hispanic Students Absent From AL Schools Following Immigration Law

But dey took our jerbs!

thread hop... ish.

I fully agree with Pvt. I would add as a preemptive counter-counter argument that, hey, if they're citizens, they're paying taxes and this contributing to society!

But I mainly came in to post an article about the immigration law: a legal immigrant was jailed because of it.

Now imagine if they had immediately deported that person instead of waiting for the attorney to provide the papers? I think this is exactly what the Hispanic families are afraid of. Being suspected of illegal immigration, arrested without the proof of citizenship on you, and immediately deported regardless of actual immigration status.

If I was in their situation, I'd want to get the hell out of Alabama too.

Yep. Given how vi9olentkly anti-immigrant the right portrays themselves as, you cant really blame them for the paranoia.

besides, the law is ridiculous. I'm a natural born american citizen and I dont have to make sure I carry around paperwork to prove it everywhere I go, why the fuck does someone else have to just because they resemble a potential illegal immigrant? hell, how many people on average happen to carry around their birth certificate and house deed in their pocket?

edited 5th Oct '11 7:41:35 PM by Midgetsnowman

What exactly do we mean by immigration 'reform'? Have there been any proposals? Aside from "let's make everyone carry national IDs so everybody can be miserable".

edited 5th Oct '11 9:24:41 PM by johnnyfog

My idea of immigration reform is... make it so they have to move through less loopholes? There's the issue about potential immigrants having to stay in the country and never go out of the country to visit family that stayed behind. I'd eliminate that. I'd leave it at just having to have residency for however long; people should be allowed to see their family without being penalized by making it take even longer (I think it resets if you leave) to obtain citizenship. I mean, what if someone dies; how fair is it to say "No, you can't go to the funeral or all your progress will be nullified."

I also think Work Visas/Guest Worker program would be a good place for improvement. Make those unlimited, or at least a very high limit, and maybe we can maintain a similarly numerous workforce. But now with registration they have more recourse to obtain their worker's rights like health insurance and better pay. (No, I don't think this will happen any time soon, but it seems a good idea to start out with.)

I got a question for USAF and anybody using the argument: "they should come here legally". Have you tried to get a Visa? I have and it's not easy.

First you have to call the embassy, and pay a lot more than an usual call "because it's for your Visa", then you have to pay a lot of money (I don't remember right now how much, but it's a lot) to get the chance to apply. After you get your application, you have to go the Embassy and spend hours in several lines for the different parts of the process (I spent a whole day there); and at the end it comes down to one Clerk whom might reject your application for no reason. My uncle owns properties in Costa Rica and has a very good stable job, and got his application rejected twice, I was a 21-year-old student with no probable attachment to the country and got accepted. Please tell me that's not arbitrary.

And this is just for a tourist Visa, I don't want to imagine who do you have to kill to get a Working Visa

edited 15th Oct '11 3:17:02 PM by MakiP

No reason to jump people who have been patiently waiting.

I'm confused as to why you would need a tourist Visa; can't your passport count for that?

Anyway, our immigration is still fucked up. And yet it's still a lot easier to get in here than it is in most places in the world. (In Australia they evidently encourage you to live in a ghetto or something.)

@Ace of Spades: Unless there is a treaty between your country and the country you are going to, you *NEED* a visa to get in, no matter whether it is for work or for tourism, or even for *transit* (you need to catch a plane in country X in order to go forward to destination Y? You need a transit visa).

I am Spanish, and I can go to the US without having to apply for a visa because Spain and the US signed an agreement that allowed Spanish citizens to fill a special document called a "visa waiver", which automatically grants the right to stay in the US for 90 days for visiting purposes (tourism, going to see friends, and the like. No right to engage in any kind of paid work, of course). However, these agreements are strictly bilateral, on a country-by-country basis (this particular agreement between Spain and the US was only signed in the 1990s. When I went to the US in 1989, I *needed* to apply for a tourist visa).

The are several E.U. countries that do NOT have the "visa waiver" arrangement, and if you are a citizen from those countries and want to travel to the US, you have to go through the whole rigamarole to ask for a visa.

As another example, I have to apply for a visa each time I want to go to Russia, even if I am only passing through (and if you are an US citizen, you also have to apply for it). Having to ask for a visa in order to enter a foreign country is the *standard* situation. Only if your respective governments have signed agreements can you just take your passport and go there.

edited 19th Oct '11 7:35:37 AM by JoseB

Having an American passport is like having a world visa.

For people who live in undesireble countries, like mine, you need to get a Visa to go any fucking where (thankfully I have naturalised since do).

Also at all the ppl who are whining "Oh noes! Illigal immigrants are cutting in line in front of legal immigratns" that argument is sort of stupid because:

1.By not using the system, illigal immigrats are allowing those people who use the system to get their visas processed and approved much faster.

2. The cost of beginning the process are high, something like 200 dollars which in Mexico or Guatemala, or 1970 Vietnam is a shitload of money, and the embassy can deny your petition (which it ussually and consitently does as Ive seen dozens of times) without explanation and without giving you your money back.

3. Becuse, for a person that starts the process from outside the US, it becomes necessary to travel to an embassy (there are few consulates), and thus, for example, people who live in norther mexico would have to travel hundreads of miles south or east of where they live to get permission to live a couple of miles north of where they live.

4. Thus because of the stated above people who apply for visa are either, higher class, or middle class and when the get to the US they will not be doing janitorial work, I assure you. So illigal immigrants are not directly competting for jobs.

5. People who become naturalised or who have green cards receive better wages than those who dont, and have better access to jobs than those who dont, so in a way that upsets the penalty (well not really since the process is so incredibly tight, long, expensive and unfair) when compared to illigal immigrants. If anything at least they dont live in fear, and thus are not forced to move when states like Alabama pass laws like the one being discussed in this thread.

And to wrap it up, guess who are the people who are more upset about this measure??? 4th generation Alabama (rather conservative) farmers who are being forced out of bussiness because they are unable to aquire labour.

edited 19th Oct '11 7:48:38 AM by Baff

Awwww for crying out loud.

Knock it off.

Everyone go find a freaking on-line dictionary and look up the work "civil". Right now. And while you are at it look up "ON TOPIC". And "discussion".

If you find you cannot or will not behave with the word "civil" in your vocabulary then get the hell out.

If you find you can't keep it "on topic", get the hell out.

And if you find that you can't keep it from turning into some kind of bitchfest with everyone wearing identical asshats then get the hell out.

I would say that the point of me wanting some screening—even if we had free immigration—is to keep criminals/undesirables out. Thus is why I have a problem with them circumventing the system:

They got around the background check.

that is a valid point.