Did You Know?

(Ten Every Day Immigration Law Consequences)

1.  Did you know .... 91 people died in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody since 2003?  These included long-time permanent residents and many, many non-criminals.

2.  Did you know .... a U.S. citizen does not have a right to bring his or her immigrant spouse to the United States?  He or she must prove eligibility, pay steep fees, and often wait a year before a visa is approved.

3.  Did you know .... a U.S. citizen has to wait eleven years to bring his or her brothers and sisters to the United States?  The wait for citizens from the Philippines is 23 years.

4.  Did you know .... each year some 65,000-U.S. raised children graduate from high college but because they lack proper status face unique barriers to college, are unable to work legally in the U.S., and live in constant fear of detection by immigration authorities?  Most of these children came to the U.S. as very young children and consider themselves American. There are no exemptions for honor roll students, star athletes, or National Merit scholars. 

5.  Did you know .... the U.S. will face a shortage of 124,000 physicians by 2025 yet our immigration laws make it extremely difficult for U.S.- licensed, foreign-born medical graduates to remain in the U.S.? Foreign doctors disproportionately staff our emergency rooms and work in underserved regions yet must make special application to become lawful permanent residents.

6.  Did you know .... immigration law permits foreign entrepreneurs to invest in the United States if they create ten U.S. jobs but the rules are so stringent that very few actually take advantage of these provisions?  Such wealthy individuals invest in Canada and other countries instead.

7.  Did you know .... it takes the average legal worker six years to become a permanent resident and another five years to become a U.S. citizen?  Most employers of foreign workers must attest to the Labor Department that the employees they seek to hire will not displace U.S. workers.

8.  Did you know .... a foreign husband whose U.S. citizen wife dies in child birth has no right to remain in this country even if he filed all the right papers on time but the immigration service delayed in making a decision?  The “widow’s penalty” has affected soldiers, police officers, and citizens from all walks of life, not to mention countless single-parented children. Recent legislation has righted this injustice!

9.  Did you know .... a foreign national with no criminal record who has overstayed her visa by a few months can be arrested, jailed for months with criminal offenders, shackled, and then placed on a plane home?  Such nationals are then barred from re-entering the U.S. for ten years.

10. Did you know .... that there are some 50 documented cases in which U.S. citizens have been wrongly arrested and detained for deportation for as long as five years for immigration violations? Of course, U.S. citizens are not subject to deportation, and experts believe there are hundreds of additional such cases.

Our immigration laws must be fixed so that individuals are no longer hurt by an obsolete and inadequate immigration system.

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Learn about the real stories of those who have been affected by our inhumane laws.  Visit us at http://www.immigrantslist.org.

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Immigrants’ List is a bipartisan political action committee that supports pro-immigration candidates for Congress.

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