Border Cities Demonstrate Importance Of U.S.-Mexico Relations

VOXXI, 5/19/2013

For those who live along the U.S.-Mexico border, especially in large cities, the relationship between the two countries is different than for those who live elsewhere in the U.S. It’s difficult for those outside this area to understand, because despite the line that legally separates the two countries, the people both north and south of it, are neighbors. They depend on each other for economic vibrancy, personal relationships and cultural attachment. In spite of the backlash against illegal immigration and the fear of out-of-control drug violence along the Mexican side of the border, border cities in the U.S. have a unique relationship with their neighbor to the south.

Recently, San Diego’s Mayor Bob Filner looked across the border to Tijuana as a new business partner. For him, as for most of the politicians in the San Diego area, it’s not about “us versus them.” It’s about all of us. Together. According to a recent New York Times article, Filner has opened a satellite office in Tijuana. He also says he plans to place a bid for the 2024 Summer Olympics to be hosted jointly with Tijuana. When either Filner or the Mayor of Tijuana, Carlos Bustamante, refer to the area, they speak of us—not of “us and them.”

Read more…

Slim, Mexico’s biggest broadcaster take fight to soccer field

Associated Press, 5/19/2013

Mexicans often feel that billionaire Carlos Slim owns everything in their country, from telephone and Internet companies to banks and chain stores, but his latest acquisitive foray is meeting resistance after touching a national passion: soccer. Slim recently bought part of two of Mexico’s first division soccer teams, setting up another showdown with television giants Televisa and TV Azteca, major players in the soccer field that are in turn trying to push their way into Slim’s telecommunications and Internet markets.

The owners of the 18 Mexican first division clubs are scheduled to meet Monday to decide whether one person or one company can own more than one first-division soccer team, and many see Slim as the target. Each team has one vote in decisions by the Mexican Football Federation, so purchasing more teams would give Slim more power in the federation. Recently, there have been rumors in sporting circles and on social networks that Slim also plans to buy or acquire the broadcast rights for Chivas, one of Mexico’s two most popular teams, along with Televisa’s America. The billionaire’s spokesmen have denied that.

Read more…

U.S. Immigration Plan Encounters Business-Labor Rift

Bloomberg, 5/20/2013

Movement in both the House and Senate on revising U.S. immigration law belies a long-running rift between business and labor that could derail the bill. After four years of negotiations, a bipartisan group of House members who struck a deal on a broader immigration bill last week have given up on finding a compromise over how many temporary workers to allow into the U.S.

As another bipartisan measure advances in the Senate, a series of amendments backed by technology and construction companies and opposed by the AFL-CIO labor federation risk upsetting a delicate balance. With Democrats and Republicans in both chambers intent this year on achieving the first major revision of immigration law in a generation, the reopening of fissures between business and labor serves as a reminder of how tough the challenge is. That divide is the one that scuttled the last attempt in 2007.

Read more…

The Health Toll of Immigration

The New York Times, 5/18/2013

Becoming an American can be bad for your health. A growing body of mortality research on immigrants has shown that the longer they live in this country, the worse their rates of heart disease, high blood pressure and diabetes. And while their American-born children may have more money, they tend to live shorter lives than the parents. The pattern goes against any notion that moving to America improves every aspect of life. It also demonstrates that at least in terms of health, worries about assimilation for the country’s 11 million illegal immigrants are mistaken. In fact, it is happening all too quickly.

“There’s something about life in the United States that is not conducive to good health across generations,” said Robert A. Hummer, a social demographer at the University of Texas at Austin. For Hispanics, now the nation’s largest immigrant group, the foreign-born live about three years longer than their American-born counterparts, several studies have found. Why does life in the United States — despite its sophisticated health care system and high per capita wages — lead to worse health?

Read more…

The Immigration Bill Presses On

The New York Times, 5/18/2013

When the Senate Judiciary Committee meets on Monday to resume marking up an immigration bill, it will have two weeks of solid achievement to build on. The bipartisan “Gang of Eight” that drafted the deal has so far held together. The full committee has rejected an array of amendments designed to cripple or kill the bill, while adopting technical fixes and other amendments to make the system fairer, smarter and more generous.

Perhaps the most encouraging victory was the crushing defeat on Tuesday of an amendment from Senator Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama, to reduce the future legal flow of immigrants — a proposal that laid bare the restrictionist intent at the heart of Mr. Sessions’s broad and tenacious opposition to bill. The other Republicans on the committee, even the border hawk Ted Cruz of Texas, balked. Mr. Cruz used the moment to profess his belief in America as a nation that welcomes immigrants, and voted with everyone else to rebuff Mr. Sessions, 17 to 1.

Read more…

Mexico to create special police unit to search for the missing

Associated Press, 5/17/2013

Mexico’s government says it will create a special investigative unit to search for the missing, heeding a request by relatives of the disappeared who have been on a hunger strike for nine days. Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam made the announcement Friday after meeting with a group of parents who have been on a hunger strike and living in tents outside his office.

Murillo Karam says the special unit will guarantee that the same investigators and forensic experts remain on the cases until they are completed. He said more details about the new unit will be made public in a week. President Enrique Pena Nieto’s government has said it has a database containing the names of least 26,121 people who went missing during his predecessor’s six-year administration.

Read more…

Arizona’s limits on immigrant driver’s licenses upheld

Los Angeles Times, 5/18/2013

Young people granted immigration relief and work permits under a new Obama administration program still won’t be able to obtain driver’s licenses in Arizona, a federal judge has ruled. Although the decision is a win for Republican Gov. Jan Brewer, who issued the executive order denying driver’s licenses to this particular group, it’s just the first battle in a case that will probably be argued on constitutional grounds.

U.S. District Judge David G. Campbell on Thursday turned down a request for a preliminary injunction blocking Brewer’s order but stated that the plaintiffs — a contingent of immigrant rights groups — would probably prevail on their claim that the governor’s order violates guarantees of equal protection under the U.S. Constitution. Arizona lets some immigrants with work permits obtain driver’s licenses, the plaintiffs note, while denying the same benefits to other immigrants protected by President Obama’s program.

Read more…