illegal aliens

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A Mexican man living unlawfully in the United States for decades was arrested Tuesday in an identity theft scheme that was so ingenious that prosecutors say a court unwittingly changed the name of the U.S. citizen whose identity he assumed to his own real name.

The 33-count indictment outlining one of the most unusual identity theft cases in the country....

Unsealed Tuesday in federal court in Wichita, the indictment against Perez-Rivera and his 82-year-old wife, Antonia Vargas-Ortega, outlines a sporadic history of unlawful entry into the United States that dates as far back as the 1950s...

The government contends Perez-Rivera succeeded in fooling scores of state and federal agencies — with the exception of the times he tried to get Supplemental Social Security Income benefits from the Social Security Administration, where the scam finally unraveled...

Assistant U.S. Attorney Brent Anderson, who has prosecuted hundreds of immigration-related cases, said he has never seen one in which a defendant allegedly changed the identity theft victim's name to his own name.

The couple settled in California around 1980. Immigration officials arrested Perez-Rivera in 1981 for being in the country unlawfully, but did not take his wife into custody because of three adolescent children in the home, according to the indictment. Instead of surrendering herself to immigration officials the next day as promised, she fled. Court documents not indicate the outcome of his arrest...

In June 2011, an investigator from the Social Security Administration interviewed Perez-Rivera and seized all his identity documents. He was not charged at the time. The government says Perez-Rivera got a new Kansas driver's license less than a month later by claiming he had lost his old one. Prosecutors say he tried in 2012 to replace the seized U.S. passport, falsely declaring again he was U.S. citizen. That time, his application was denied. Read more about Impostor changed name of ID theft victim

On Wednesday, 50 sheriffs from around the country will converge on Washington, D.C. to demand that the GOP block House Speaker John Boehner's (R-OH) plans to fund Obama's executive amnesty.

According to the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), "the sheriffs will speak out against the president's recent executive amnesty which grants deferred action to millions of illegal aliens."

Sheriff Thomas M. Hodgson of Bristol County, Massachusetts organized the trip to the nation's capital. He will be joined by the other sheriffs at "a joint press conference with Sens. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) and David Ritter (R-LA), and other members of Congress."

The press conference is being held on December 10 because that comes less than two days "before government funding expires." To date, FAIR reports that Boehner has been hesitant to say he will not fund Obama's amnesty, choosing instead to say "there are a lot of options on the table" or "we have limited options in terms of how we can deal with this."

In reality, Boehner can see to it that Congress separates Department of Homeland Security (DHS) funding "from the larger omnibus appropriation measure" and explicitly states that no funds can be used to fund Obama's amnesty. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) is all but certain to oppose and attempt to block this move. Therefore, another avenue -- one of less resistance -- is to "kick the can down the road on DHS funding until early 2015 when the Republicans control both houses of Congress." This option takes Reid out of the scenario but it also means Boehner will have to be pressured all over again in January when the measure comes back up.

Option three is to pass a bill that simply defunds amnesty. This is a straightforward approach. And although it would face "a near certain veto" it would also force Obama to come out and "hold DHS hostage to his amnesty program."

Boehner's fourth option is to simply ignore the will of midterm election voters and obey Obama's wishes. But the sheriff's are coming to D.C. to ask the GOP to stop Boehner from doing this.
  Read more about Sheriffs to Converge On DC, Demand GOP Block Boehner's Plan to Fund Obama's Amnesty

The GOP’s draft 2015 “omnibus” spending bill reportedly includes $948 million to help poor and unskilled Central American migrants establish themselves in the United States, but includes no effective restrictions on President Barack Obama’s plan to provide work permits and tax payments to millions of resident illegal immigrants.

That new spending works out to $16,928 for each of the 56,000 youths, young adults and children who crossed the border during the 12 months up to October 2014.

Prior to October, Obama’s officials sent only 1,901 of the migrants back home to Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua, according to a federal report.

Much of the $948 million may also be used to care for the next wave of illegals who could flood across the border during the summer. The influx in the summer of 2015 is expected to be large, because Obama is offering work permits and social security numbers to at least five million illegals already in the country.

The $948 million fund is part of the one-year, $1 trillion 2015 spending plan described in a late-night report from The New York Times.

The GOP leadership has given merely lip service to supporting the opposition among GOP legislators and much of the public to Obama’s welcome for foreign migrants, and is now refusing to direct the Department of Homeland Security not to spend any funds on implementing the Obama amnesty.

Instead, the leadership, led by House Speaker John Boehner, drafted a bill imposing a 60-day spending limit for Obama’s immigration agencies.

The planned 60-day spending limit is largely symbolic, because the most important immigration agency can operate on fees paid by the illegals.

“Leadership is basically giving in to every facet of Obama’s amnesty. We’re giving up an astonishing amount of leverage on every issue imaginable,” said one Hill aide.

The struggle between Boehner’s business wing and the populist conservative wing, has received little coverage in the established media, even though GOP legislators are calling for the public to protest their leadership’s policies. Top GOP officials have said they would like to pass their own amnesty and foreign worker bill in 2015.

Obama’s amnesty, announced Nov. 21, minimizes enforcement of immigration law against all 12 million illegals in the United States, and creates enforcement loopholes for new migrants coming over the border or flying into U.S. airports on temporary visas.

The plan also puts many illegals on a fast-track to citizenship, and increases the inflow of university-trained migrants who can gain citizenship if they compete for any professional jobs sought by U.S. college graduates.

The cost of Obama’s amnesty is expected to reach $2 trillion over 50 years, or roughly $22,000 per new U.S. college graduate.

In 2014, Obama’s agencies accepted the children, youths and adults delivered to them at the border by paid escorts, before providing them with health screenings and air transport to parents and family members throughout the United States.

Obama’s deputies are also spending at least $7 million to provide free lawyers to the migrants so they can win court cases to remain in the United States. Up to 1,901 were sent home by October.

The money likely will also be used to support family units of women and children that cross the border.

In fiscal 2014, roughly 66,000 people in family units crossed the border. Only 582 were repatriated before October. Nearly all were allowed to apply for residency, and either attend American schools or apply for work permits. Read more about GOP Spending Bill Gives Nearly $1 Billion To Aid Border Migrants

WASHINGTON — The federal judge assigned to rule in the lawsuit over President Barack Obama's changes to immigration rules last year accused the Obama administration of participating in criminal conspiracies to smuggle children into the country by reuniting them with parents living here illegally.

... Homeland Security Department should be arresting parents living in the U.S. illegally who induce their children to cross the border illegally...

"DHS has simply chosen not to enforce the United States' border security laws," the judge wrote. ...

Hanen was assigned through an automated system to be the judge who will preside over a lawsuit filed by 20 states trying to block Obama's expansive executive actions to spare nearly 5 million people living in the U.S. illegally from deportation...

Last December, Hanen wrote a 10-page order in an immigrant smuggling case in which he his frustration over four cases in a month in which a child who arrived in the U.S. illegally alone was reunited with a parent also in the country illegally.

"Instead of arresting (the child's mother) for instigating the conspiracy to violate our border security laws, the (Homeland Security Department) delivered the child to her — thus successfully completing the mission of the criminal conspiracy," Hanen wrote.

...The order highlighted the growing problem of unaccompanied child immigrants being caught at the border in South Texas. During the fiscal year that ended in September, the government apprehended more than 68,000 unaccompanied children at the border....

Texas is leading a coalition of states suing the government. It argued in the lawsuit filed last week that Obama's decision "tramples" key portions of the Constitution. The states, including Arizona, Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana and the Carolinas, aren't seeking monetary damages but want Hanen to block the president's actions...

"Texas is uniquely qualified to challenge the president's executive order, and South Texas is at the epicenter of where border security is of concern for Texas and the entire nation," Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said in a statement. Abbott was elected last month to be the next governor of Texas.

The Justice Department, which is defending the case, declined to comment on the case.

Obama announced the executive actions in November, saying lack of action by Congress forced him to make sweeping changes to immigration rules on his own.

The administrative actions don't provide legal immigration status or green cards to those in the country illegally, but millions of eligible immigrants will be able to apply for permission to stay in the country for up to three years and get a work permit.
  Read more about US judge ruling on Obama immigration changes criticized gov't leniency on kids crossing border

Francisco Aguirre, the labor activist accused of illegally reentering the U.S. after his 2000 deportation to El Salvador, is going to his home in Fairview.

The 35-year-old Fairview resident has been living at Augustana Lutheran Church in Northeast Portland since September, when congregants took him in as part of the sanctuary movement.

Aguirre's latest troubles began Aug. 9, when he was stopped for drunken driving ...

...national and local community groups -- including Voz Worker's Rights Education Project, Jobs with Justice and Migrant Workers Collective -- banded together to raise money and support for Aguirre....

Aguirre stayed in the church until November, when he headed to the Clackamas County courthouse to face the drunken-driving charge. He was briefly jailed then returned to the church. Immigration and Customs Enforcement dropped the detainer it had placed on Aguirre. He will go to trial on the illegal reentry charge in January...

"This was no mistake," Aguirre said in a statement. "Thanks to the efforts of hundreds who protest our inhumane immigration policy I can now return home. I thank each and every person who supported our campaign, and ask them to support my brothers and sisters who are not as fortunate."

  Read more about Labor activist Francisco Aguirre leaves Augustana Lutheran Church sanctuary, heads to Fairview home