Greg Siskind on Immigration Law and Policy

Election Night Races to Watch to See Impact of Latino Voters

America's Voice has posted several interesting analyses of House and Senate races with information on the the size of the Latino eligible voting population and how immigration has factored in to the races.

USCIS Starting to Reopen Offices

Most offices in NY and NJ remain closed, but offices are beginning to reopen in other Sandy-affected states.

Polls Undercounting of Latino Votes May Be Worth Full Percent to Obama

Latino Decisions, Mother Jones and others have been reporting that the major polling firms are underestimating President Obama's share of Latino votes because they are not polling in Spanish as well as English. And those US citizens who don't feel comfortable speaking English in an opinion poll are less likely to vote Democratic.

Latino Decisions has been polling weekly and is showing a 50%+ margin for the President. That result is consistent with other Spanish language optional polls.  In the latest Polltracker average of all polls, the President is only winning 62% of Hispanic voters, a difference that is almost certainly due to the English-only format of those polls.

Hispanics cast about 12,000,000 votes in 2008 and are expected to cast an even greater number this year. But if we just stick to 12,000,000, the actual number of votes for the President at the higher estmate is an increase of 1,300,000 (the difference between 62% (Polltracker's current number) and 73% (Latino Decisions) for the President). There were about 130 million votes case in 2008 and if the voter turnout is similar this year, then we're looking at an extra 1% for Obama just from the undercount in the polling of Latinos.

Why Obama Has the Power on DACA

Gary Endelman and Cyrus Mehta lay out the legal reasons why the President had the authority to implement the new deferred action program.

Sandy Immigration Agencies Update

ICE: DC Headquarters closed.

CBP: Case by case depending on location. No public list yet of affected locations.

Joint statement from CBP and ICE from before the storm:

To the extent that Tropical Storm/Hurricane Sandy (Sandy) impacts law enforcement operations and/or the storm triggers the need for an officially ordered evacuation or an emergency government response, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection's (CBP) highest priorities are to promote life-saving and life-sustaining activities, the safe evacuation of people who are leaving the impacted area, the maintenance of public order, the prevention of the loss of property to the extent possible, and the speedy recovery of the impacted region.

As such, to the extent that Sandy impacts law enforcement operations and/or the storm triggers the need for an officially ordered evacuation or an emergency government response, there will be no immigration enforcement initiatives associated with evacuations or sheltering related to Sandy, including the use of checkpoints for immigration purposes in impacted areas during an evacuation. If a state or local law enforcement agency determines that individuals in their custody should be transferred or released due to Sandy, the state or local law enforcement agency should not decline to do so solely on the basis of an immigration detainer issued by ICE or CBP.

If a state or law enforcement agency does decide to release an individual subject to an ICE or CBP detainer based on Sandy, the agency should, wherever possible, contact the local ICE or CBP office prior to any such release to ensure that the release does not pose a danger to the community. When determining how to handle individuals in state or local detention during an emergency, state and local law enforcement agencies should act consistently with the safety needs of their local communities and the individual detainees.

The Department's law enforcement components will be at the ready to help anyone in need of assistance. The laws will not be suspended, and we will be vigilant against any effort by
criminals to exploit disruptions caused by Sandy. Nevertheless, in the event of an evacuation or response, we are committed to making sure that we can assist local authorities quickly, safely, and efficiently.

ICE and CBP also seek to provide for the safety and security of those in our custody and to
protect them from bodily harm in the event of a hurricane or a major destructive storm. Should the need arise because of Sandy, ICE will transfer detainees from affected detention facilities. In the event of a transfer, the detainee's attorney of record will be notified, the Online Detainer Locator will be updated, and the transfer will be temporary in nature.

USCIS offices in ten states still closed today. Regarding appointments scheduled for when an office is closed:

All applicants appointments will be rescheduled to the next available appointment date; applicants do not need to do anything to request a rescheduled date.  However walk-ins will be processed on a case-by-case basis.

If you plan to visit a USCIS office in an area affected by the severe weather or you believe may be affected by severe weather, please call the

National Customer Service Center (NCSC) 1-800-375-5283

to ensure the office is open for business and for further instructions on rescheduling your appointment if the office is closed. Please continue to monitor this page for changes.

USCIS Moving in to Disaster Mode

USCIS and its sister agencies have certainly gotten better over the last few years when it comes to dealing with natural disasters. Katrina taught them a lot and now we'll see the agency tested again in what is likely to be one of the largest natural disasters to hit the Northeastern US in many years.

USCIS has not posted information yet on how they'll operate after the storm, but as I did a considerable amount of writing about Katrina and it's after-effects on immigration processing, I'll certainly be covering that subject.

In the mean time, USCIS announced closures today of USCIS facilities up and down the eastern seabord.

DACA Work Permits Starting to Get Approved

The San Antonio Express-News reports on a medical student who just got his DACA work card. Most applicants for DACA still haven't received their initial approvals, much less their work cards so people should not read too much in to this news. Still, it's nice to start hearing some of these stories emerge.

Latest Latino Decisions Poll Shows Obama Lead Expands Again

The President's lead over Mitt Romney with Hispanic voters has reached its widest point in the ten weekly tracking polls Latino Decisions has conducted this year. He is up 73 to 21% a 2 point improvement over last week and 18 points better than after the Republican National Convention. 8% of Hispanic voters have already cast their votes and only 2% of those polled say they will probably not vote. The number saying they are more enthusiastic this year than in 2008 also jumped from 40% to 45%, the highest point this cyclehttp://www.latinodecisions.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Tracker-toplines-week-10.pdf, indicating that Latino voter turnout will be high.

Napolitano: 200,000 DREAM Cases Filed

The slow start has picked up, but we also are hearing from many who are waiting to see who wins the election. DHS also just announced that only about 5000 cases have been approved.

USCIS Still Can't Get H-1B Numbers Straight

When David Rubman pinned USCIS down on how many H-1Bs were being issued each year and learned that they were dramatically undercounting, the appropriate next step would be for USCIS to figure out why this has been happening and explain what they will do to ensure it doesn't continue to happen. Instead they've responded by just issuing new numbers which don't make a lot of sense. I understand USCIS is now including amendments in their data which are completely irrelevant and will skew the approval data to make it sound like the approval rate is a lot higher than it is.

Here is David's latest correspondence with USCIS.

 

H-1B FOIA follow-up.Andoh.Oct 22