American Jewish Committee
Latino & Latin American Institute
Issue 58. Thursday, May 13, 2010.
IN THE NEWS
LATINO-JEWISH AGENDA
AJC Chicago Brings Law Enforcement, Labor, Education, Ethnic and Health Care Organizations Together in Push for Comprehensive Immigration Reform
The Bridging America AJC Project Task Force in Chicago comprised of comprehensive immigration reform stakeholders from a wide variety of sectors in Illinois released last April a set of principles regarding this vital issue. Task force members ranged from the Chicago Commission on Human Relations to many of the city’s key ethnic organizations to its law enforcement community. The participation of such a broad array of organizations is strong evidence of the positive impact that comprehensive immigration reform would exert on everyone in the Chicago area.
To read and sign-up in support of the Statement of Principles, click here. For more information about AJC Chicago's immigration efforts and to find out how you can be an advocate for immigration reform, click here.
On this topic, the Director of the AJC Chicago’s Office Dan Elbaum was recently quoted in the Chicago Tribune.
Dallas's Jewish-Latino Alliance Spoke Out against Arizona's Stance on Immigration
Leaders from Dallas's Jewish-Latino Alliance responded to the anti-immigrant law recently enacted in Arizona by submitting a joint statement denouncing the new regulation and reinforcing the need for Comprehensive Immigration Reform to move to the top of lawmakers' agendas.
Miami Latin American Jewish Taskforce Lobbies in D.C.
Eighteen members of AJC Miami’s newly formed Latin American Task Force (LATF) attended the Strategic Forum for Latin American Jewish Representatives organized by AJC’s Latino and Latin American Institute in Washington D.C. at the end of April. The group held meetings with Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Mario Diaz-Balart and Ron Klein. Issues discussed included the urgent need for comprehensive immigration reform, U.S.-Israel relations, Iran sanctions, and energy.
Even though nobody knows for certain how many Latin American Jews live in the U.S., there are estimates of around 100,000 who hare arrived at different times throughout the last decades. AJC is in the process of creating task forces, similar to the one in Miami, which would bring together Latino Jews to act as a bridge with other Hispanics in the country and help promote stronger relations between the U.S., Latin America and Israel.
Latino Jewish Coalition Crystallizes in Orange County
The Orange County AJC regional office is in the process of expanding its outreach and activities with Latinos involved in the legal community. It has already held programs with the Mexican consulate and the Hispanic Bar Association. Norma Garcia Gullien, a past Judge Learned Hand Award recipient and former president of the Hispanic Bar Association has pledged coalition between Latino leadership and AJC.
The Judge Learned Hand Award is given every year by AJC to members of the legal community whose life-long accomplishments and achievements have enhanced the lives of others through philanthropy, volunteerism, and activism.
MONTHLY FEATURE
Five Myths about Immigration
By Doris Meissner, Senior Fellow at the Migration Policy Institute.
For the complete article please click here.
1. Immigrants take jobs from American workers.
Although immigrants account for 12.5 percent of the U.S. population, they make up about 15 percent of the workforce. They are overrepresented among workers largely because the rest of our population is aging: Immigrants and their children have accounted for 58 percent of U.S. population growth since 1980. This probably won't change anytime soon. Low U.S. fertility rates and the upcoming retirement of the baby boomers mean that immigration is likely to be the only source of growth in what we call the "prime age" workforce -- workers ages 25 to 55 -- in the decades ahead. As record numbers of retirees begin drawing Social Security checks, younger immigrant workers will be paying taxes, somewhat easing the financial pressures on the system.
Moreover, immigrants tend to be concentrated in high- and low-skilled occupations that complement -- rather than compete with -- jobs held by native workers. And the foreign-born workers who fill lower-paying jobs are typically first-hired/first-fired employees, allowing employers to expand and contract their workforces rapidly. As a result, immigrants experience higher employment than natives during booms -- but they suffer higher job losses during downturns, including the current one.
It's true that an influx of new workers pushes wages down, but immigration also stimulates growth by creating new consumers, entrepreneurs and investors. As a result of this growth, economists estimate that wages for the vast majority of American workers are slightly higher than they would be without immigration. U.S. workers without a high school degree experience wage declines as a result of competition from immigrants, but these losses are modest, at just over 1 percent. Economists also estimate that for each job an immigrant fills, an additional job is created.
2. Immigration is at an all-time high, and most new immigrants came illegally.
The historic high came more than a century ago, in 1890, when immigrants made up 14.8 percent of our population. Today, about two-thirds of immigrants are here legally, either as naturalized citizens or as lawful permanent residents, more commonly known as "green card" holders. And of the approximately 10.8 million immigrants who are in the country illegally, about 40 percent arrived legally but overstayed their visas.
It's worth noting that although the unauthorized immigrant population includes more people from Mexico than from any other country, Mexicans are also the largest group of lawful immigrants. As for the flow of illegal immigrants, apprehensions along the U.S.-Mexico border have declined by more than 50 percent over the past four years, while increases in the size of the illegal population, which had been growing by about 500,000 a year for more than a decade, have stopped. This decline is largely due to the recession, but stepped-up border enforcement is playing a part.
3. Today's immigrants are not integrating into American life like past waves did.
The integration of immigrants remains a hallmark of America's vitality as a society and a source of admiration abroad, as it has been throughout our history. Although some people complain that today's immigrants are not integrating into U.S. society as quickly as previous newcomers did, the same charge was leveled at virtually every past wave of immigrants, including the large numbers of Germans, Irish and Italians who arrived in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
Today, as before, immigrant integration takes a generation or two. Learning English is one key driver of this process; the education and upward mobility of immigrants' children is the other. On the first count, today's immigrants consistently seek English instruction in such large numbers that adult-education programs cannot meet the demand, especially in places such as California. On the second count, the No Child Left Behind Act has played a critical role in helping educate immigrant children because it holds schools newly accountable for teaching them English.
Information taken from The Washington Post
QUOTES AND FIGURES
More laws have been enacted to help undocumented immigrants than restrict them
A recent study released by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars shows that across the country, more laws expanding immigrants' rights are enacted than those contracting them.
The study, "Context Matters: Latino Immigrant Civic Engagement in Nine U.S. Cities," found that areas long accustomed to an influx of immigrants tend to focus more on trying to accommodate them rather than restrict them. An analysis of 1,059 immigration-related bills in 50 state legislatures in 2007 found that 19 percent of 313 bills expanding immigrant rights were enacted, while 11 percent of 263 bills contracting rights were enacted, the report says.
Another important finding is that immigrants tend to become more civically engaged in the face of a threat, such as a harsh immigration law, and that Latinos have become increasingly involved politically in recent years, with their voter registration surging 24.7 percent between 2004 and 2008.
Information partly taken from the Washington Post
Country of Origin Profiles of U.S. Hispanics
According to a survey conducted by the Pew Hispanic Center, nearly two-thirds of Hispanics in the U.S. self-identify as being of Mexican origin. Nine of the other ten largest Hispanic origin groups—Puerto Rican, Cuban, Salvadoran, Dominican, Guatemalan, Colombian, Honduran, Ecuadorian and Peruvian—account for about a quarter of the U.S. Hispanic population. There are differences across these ten population groups in the share of each that is foreign born, citizen (by birth or naturalization), and proficient in English. They are also of varying age, tend to live in different areas within the U.S, and have varying levels of education, homeownership rates, and poverty rates.
To read more about these and other characteristics, please visit the Center’s interactive graphic. Each population is also compared with all Hispanics and the U.S. population overall.
Information partly taken from the Pew Hispanic Center.
LATIN AMERICA AND MIDDLE EAST PERISCOPE
AJC HIGHLIGHTS
Hispano-American Jewish Leaders Meet in DC
Over 40 leaders of 15 Jewish Communities of Latin America and Spain attended a biannual strategic forum prior to the American Jewish Committee’s 104th Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. Participants met with experts, including writer and journalist and former editor of Foreign Policy magazine, Moises Naim and the Director of the Spanish newspaper El Pais, Javier Moreno. The group also held conversations with Arturo Valenzuela, Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs at the U.S. Department of State, and the former President of Peru, H.E. Alejandro Toledo.
Secretary Clinton, Minister Barak and Others Present at AJC’s Annual Meeting
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Israel Defense Minister Ehud Barak addressed more than 1500 attendees at AJC’s Gala, the high point of the global advocacy organization’s Annual Meeting that took place in Washington D.C. from April 28-30.
The 48-hour conference brought together AJC activists from across the United States and leaders of Jewish communities from around the world, including more than 40 representatives from Latin America. Participants had the chance to engage in policy conversations with diplomats, academics and government officials. The Iran nuclear threat, Israel’s quest for peace, and the Jewish future are among the top issues on the agenda.
Among those honored during the meeting was Senator Robert Menendez, who received AJC’s Congressional Leadership Award for his work championing Israel and his leadership on immigration reform. Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos was distinguished with the Jan Karski Award, AJC’s tribute for those who display moral courage in the struggle against anti-Semitism.
Check out the Annual Meeting highlights, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's address, as well as the much-discussed Iran debate between the Wall Street Journal's Bret Stephens and New York Times' Roger Cohen.
AJC Calls Arizona Law Setback for Immigration Reform
AJC has condemned Arizona’s new immigration law, calling it "a setback in national efforts to achieve immigration reform." The Arizona law, expected to go into effect this summer, will allow local law enforcement to stop anyone, if there is reason to suspect they are illegal immigrants, and arrest those unable to produce proper immigration documents.
“We regret Gov. Brewer’s decision to sign this misguided law,” said Richard Foltin, AJC’s Director of National and Legislative Affairs. “This law essentially allows police to question and arrest people on little more than suspicion. It will encourage racial profiling, fear of police and further distrust in a community already wary of law enforcement.”
AJC’s Arizona Regional Office had advocated against passage of the bill by the state legislature. AJC joined with other national and Arizona religious leaders in letters encouraging the Governor to veto the bill.
|
