Border Crisis Completely Upends Census Bureau’s Population Stats, Report Says

Illegal Immigrants

Immigration into the U.S. has risen so rapidly that it beat out federal projections by decades, according to a report from the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) released on Thursday.

The total number of immigrants in the U.S. rose to a record high of 51.4 million as of February 2024, representing 15.5 percent of the total population,according to CIS. The U.S. Census Bureau published projections in November which estimated that the share of foreign-born nationals in the U.S. would not reach 15.5 percent until at least 2039, making the projections “obsolete,” CIS authors Steven Camarota and Karen Zeigler wrote.

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Immigration Expert Says the Mainstream Media Refuses to Cover How the Biden Administration Caused Haiti’s Current Chaos

Haitian Refugees

Todd Bensman, senior national security fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, said the mainstream media’s refusal to acknowledge how the Biden administration’s compliance in scuttling Haiti’s elections back in 2021 contributes to the chaos currently unfolding in the Caribbean country stems from the fact that the backstory is a “terrible” look for President Joe Biden.

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Immigration Expert Warns: There Will Be a ‘Marine Mass Migration’ if First Boat of Haitian Migrants are Welcomed with Open Arms

Haiti refugees rescued by US Coast Guard, 1999

Todd Bensman, senior national security fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, said the way the Biden administration handles the first boat of Haitian migrants en route to the Florida Keys amid the Caribbean country’s current state of emergency will determine whether or not another mass migration crisis will rock the U.S. in addition to the one unfolding at the U.S.-Mexico border.

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Biden Administration Using ‘Secretive Flights’ to Import 320,000 Illegal Aliens into U.S.

A new report suggests that the Biden Administration has not only been letting illegal aliens into the country through a porous southern border, but that the administration has even been actively importing illegals with “secretive flights.”

As Breitbart reports, the claims were made by Todd Bensman, Senior National Security Fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), who obtained internal records from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) via a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit.

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Todd Bensman with the Center for Immigration Studies: ‘The Biden Administration has Industrialized Parole Authority’

Illegal Immigrants

Todd Bensman, senior national security fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, said the Biden administration has “industrialized parole authority” through its program that has flown 320,000 inadmissible aliens into 43 American airports over the past year.

“[The migrants] are coming in on an authority called parole. That’s supposed to be for two or three immigrants a year on a case by case basis, like an emergency medical treatment or, they need somebody to testify in an important case, and then they turn them right back,” Bensman explained on Monday’s edition of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show. “The Biden administration has industrialized parole authority. Now they’re just letting hundreds of thousands in all at once instead of two or three as the law says on a case by case basis.”

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Immigration Experts Say Both Legal and Illegal Immigration Must Be Reduced to Balance U.S. ‘Social Experiment’ Migration Crisis

CBP Illegal Immigrants

Executive Director Mark Krikorian, Senior National Security Fellow Todd Bensman, and Director of Policy Studies Jessica Vaughan with the Center for Immigration Studies explained how immigration – both legal and illegal – into the U.S. must be reduced in order to balance out the nation’s rapidly rising foreign-born population.

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Immigration Expert: ‘There Is Mass Immigration Asylum Fraud Underway Here’

Illegal Immigrants

Senior National Security Fellow Todd Bensman with the Center for Immigration Studies warned there is “mass immigration asylum fraud” taking place in the U.S.

Bensman, who has interviewed thousands of migrants over the years, explained on Thursday’s edition of The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy how migrants, specifically from Venezuela and Haiti, often live in other more stable countries – including Brazil, Colombia, and Ecuador – for years before making their way to the United States to work and live a prosperous life.

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Center for Immigration Studies Senior Fellow Todd Bensman Says the ‘Entire World’ Knows of the Biden Administration’s Catch and Release Policy

Illegal Immigrants

Todd Bensman, senior national security fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, said the U.S. is on track to encounter more than 600,000 illegal aliens that have traveled through the Darién Gap, which is the only land path connecting Central America and South America, to get to the U.S.-Mexico border this year.

The Darién Gap between Colombia and Panama consists of more than 60 miles of dense rainforest, steep mountains, and vast swamps. Illegal immigrants from South America and other parts of the world use the land path as a passageway to get to North America.

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Center for Immigration Studies Executive Director Mark Krikorian: There’s Very Little Screening of Incoming Illegal Aliens for Health Problems or Criminal Behavior

Illegal Immigrants

Mark Krikorian, the executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, said migrants who are crossing illegally into the U.S. are not being thoroughly screened for illnesses or criminal backgrounds.

“They often screen them before they go to detention, but they’re not being detained,” Krikorian explained on Thursday’s episode of The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy. “As far as criminal behavior, they do run their names through some databases before they let them go, but that only works if we have records of them having committed crimes in the United States. The problem always with vetting is garbage in, garbage out. Do you think that the Somalia DMV or the medical records office or whatever in Venezuela is going to tell us anything about people? Of course not. So, yes, there is some kind of pro forma screening but it doesn’t really screen very much.”

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Report: Sixty Percent of Illegal Alien Households are Supported by Taxpayer-Funded Welfare

Illegal Immigrants

A new analysis by the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) reveals that almost 60% of all illegal aliens households in the United States are benefiting from at least one form of taxpayer-funded welfare benefits.

Breitbart reports that the study, written by CIS’ Steven Camarota and Karen Zeigler, found that illegal aliens households, as well as legal immigrants, use “significantly more” welfare than actual American citizens. Of illegal aliens currently occupying land in the U.S., 59% are on welfare that is funded by legal American citizens; 52% of legal immigrants are also using welfare. Meanwhile, less than 40% of American citizens use welfare.

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Report: Arizona Taxpayers on the Hook for $3.2 Billion in Illegal Immigration Costs

Dr. Robert Trenschel, chief executive officer of Yuma Regional Medical Center l told the House Committee on Homeland Security in February that the influx of illegal immigrants seeking medical services has skyrocketed over the past two years.

Guess who’s picking up the tab for the uninsured patients, many of who arrive suffering from major illnesses or ailments?

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Lawsuit: Biden’s DHS Withholding Information on Terror Suspects Caught Crossing the Border

An immigration think tank has filed a lawsuit against the Biden Administration’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS), alleging that the agency has been deliberately withholding crucial information on terror suspects who have crossed the southern border.

As reported by Breitbart, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) sued the DHS after the agency refused to respond to the group’s prior Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, demanding access to  “records reflecting the nationalities and group affiliations of the record-breaking 270 illegal border-crossers who have flagged on the FBI terrorism watch since 2021.”

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Report from the Southern Border: Interview with Todd Bensman

Working as a reporter and now as a Fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, you have done a lot of “shoe leather” reporting at the U.S. southern border — covering the Mexican drug wars and, in the last years, immigration. Unlike so many immigration reporters who rely on second hand reports, you have personally interviewed at least 1,000 immigrants. Why do you do this and how does what you learn differ from the prevailing narrative?

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Pennsylvania House Democrats Want to Ban Law Enforcement from Pursuing Illegal Immigrants

Pennsylvania House Democrats this week proposed a measure called the “Police and Community Safety Act” whose sole purpose is barring police and campus-security agencies from enforcing immigration laws. 

Spearheaded by Philadelphia Democrats Jose Giral and Chris Rabb, the bill resembles legislation the latter introduced unsuccessfully in 2017.

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Pennsylvania Lawmaker Proposes Notifying ICE of Illegals Trying to Buy Guns

A Pennsylvania state lawmaker is urging colleagues to back emerging legislation ensuring illegal aliens who try to get firearms are reported to federal and state authorities. 

State Representative Ryan Mackenzie’s (R-Macungie) measure would direct the Pennsylvania State Police (PSP) to inform the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (ICE) and the Pennsylvania Attorney General of all such purchase attempts. 

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Biden Blamed by Own Ex-Border Chief for Soaring Asylum Cases, Record Immigration Court Backlog

The Biden administration is to blame for soaring asylum cases that have created a record years-long backlog in U.S. immigration courts, according to President Joe Biden’s own former Border Patrol chief.

“Several factors have contributed to this backlog, but the massive increase that we’re seeing today can be directly attributed to the Biden administration’s border and immigration policies,” said Rodney Scott, who headed the Border Patrol in both the Trump and Biden administrations.

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Large Number of Criminal Juveniles Entering U.S. Through DACA: Report

Democrats and immigration activists have long claimed that amnesty for illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. as children wouldn’t include young people with a criminal history, but many of the juvenile beneficiaries of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA) were affiliated with gangs and had arrest records when granted the program’s benefits, according to a new report.

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House Democrats from Philadelphia Tout ‘Sanctuary City’ Status as Illegals’ Bus Arrives

Democrats in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives’ Philadelphia Delegation on Thursday took the arrival of 28 illegal immigrants into their municipality as occasion to celebrate Philadelphia declaring itself a “sanctuary city.” 

State Representative Morgan Cephus (D-Philadelphia), chair of the delegation, also disputed the notion that the migrants bussed in from Texas should be deemed unlawful entrants, despite the fact that they crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally. He noted that they secured “temporary protective status” by U.S. border agencies. 

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Arizona Attorney General Brnovich Leads Coalition of States Suing Biden Administration over New Rule to Speed Up Asylum When Title 42 Is Rescinded

Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich has filed another lawsuit against the Biden administration over its lack of defending the southern border. Leading a coalition of 14 states, the lawsuit challenges a new asylum rule that switches much of the authority over granting asylum away from federal immigration judges, giving it to asylum officers with the Department of Homeland Security.

“This is nothing more than a radical attempt to set up a system that encourages illegal immigration and undermines the rule of law,” said Brnovich in a statement. “President Biden may not care about the American people, but I do. I will continue to push back against his unlawful policies and imperial edicts.”

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Connecticut Attorney General Joins Brief Against ‘Remain in Mexico’ Policy

William Tong and Kwame Raoul

Connecticut Attorney General William Tong (D) joined 17other state attorneys general in signing onto an amicus brief urging the U.S. Supreme Court to end the federal “remain in Mexico” immigration policy.

Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul (D) has spearheaded the effort among liberal state prosecutors to persuade the high court to reverse the Trump-era policy, also known as the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP). The policy stipulates that asylum seekers generally must await their U.S. asylum hearings in Mexico. The Biden White House has criticized the protocols but the courts have prevented him from reversing it.

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Exclusive: Wisconsin U.S. Congressman Tiffany Blames Biden for Thousands of Dead Migrants

The freshman Wisconsin Republican congressman who traveled to witness the mass migration through Panama’s Darien Gap told The Wisconsin Star President Joseph R. Biden Jr., is responsible for thousands of deaths and other abuses suffered by migrants he invited to the United States.

“What’s very clear is that every state is how a border state and people are being resettled across America—it doesn’t matter if they are coming from across the Southern Border, part of the Afghanistan evacuation—these migrations are going to affect every community,” said Rep. Timothy P. Tiffany, who sits on the Immigration and Citizenship Subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee.

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‘Private’ Church Group Funded by Government Resettling Refugees in Tennessee

This week, 35 Afghan refugees were resettled in Knoxville with the help of two nonprofits whose sole focus is bringing refugees to America. 

Bridge Refugee Services Inc. is a Tennessee nonprofit whose mission is “to help refugees, those people who are fleeing because of persecution based on race, religion, political opinion, a pertinence to social group or escaping wars and violence, to be self sufficient as soon as possible,” according to its Executive Director Drocella Mugorewera. 

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Report: Democrats’ Stalled Budget Bill Includes $8 Billion a Year for Illegal Immigrant Parents

Democrats’ stalled budget bill includes $8 billion a year for 10 years for illegal immigrant parents, the Center for Immigration Studies announced on Tuesday.

The bill would replace a program that requires parents to work to receive welfare and increase the funds available to illegal immigrant parents because some who work “off the books” can’t verify their employment, according to the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS). Any illegal immigrant with a child born in the U.S. would be able to apply for aid through the program.

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The Border Crisis Is Killing Americans, Data Shows

The drugs flowing over the border are leading to an uptick in fentanyl deaths, and experts are split about how to solve it.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency has called fentanyl the “primary driver” of the record 92,183 drug overdose deaths in 2020. Many drug dealers use fentanyl to make money and smuggle it through the southern border mixed with other drugs like heroin, methamphetamine, and cocaine to make them more potent — and more deadly — according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency.

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Director of Policy Studies at the Center for Immigration Studies Jessica Vaughan Weighs in on the Seriousness of America’s Southern Border Surge

Friday morning on the Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed the Director of Policy Studies at the Center for Immigration Studies Jessica Vaughan to the newsmakers line to explain the urgency at the southern border as a result of the Biden administration’s encouraging unofficial policies.

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BOOK REVIEW: Author Jerry Kammer Exposes the Left-Right Coalition to Undermine Immigration Reform

The Democrats’ 2020 choice for vice-president of the United States is Kamala Harris, a U.S. senator from California who has compared our courageous, underpaid, overworked, and often Latino, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to the Ku Klux Klan. How did we get here exactly?

Let us look back and examine how immigration enforcement has been undermined for decades and then discuss what it means for the 2020 presidential election.

The Sunlight Foundation reports that between 2007 and 2012, 678 lobbying groups – including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, American Nursery and Landscape Association, the dairy industry, agribusiness, high-tech companies, major universities, the ACLU, the Service Employees International Union, the National Council of La Raza (now UnidosUS), and many other lobbyists – spent $1.5 billion to influence immigration policy. 

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272,000 Legal Immigrants Arrived in the U.S. in 2016 with Entitlement to Welfare Programs Like U.S. Citizens

272,000 legal immigrants arrived in the United States during 2016 with an entitlement to the full menu of welfare programs, just like any U.S. citizen, attendees were told at the Conservative Caucus in Murfreesboro on Saturday.

The information was presented by one of the afternoon’s speakers, Don Barnett, a fellow with the Center for Immigration Studies who has followed refugee resettlement for over 20 years.

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Center for Immigration Studies Fellow Don Barnett Details His Trip From Russia Back to the USA with No Coronavirus Screening at Customs

Fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies Don Barnett joined The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – Monday morning on the newsmakers line.

During the third hour, Barnett detailed his recent trip to and from Russia and how he was discouraged to see no special treatment for coronavirus temperature screening upon arrival at US customs.

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Refugees Get Full Access to U.S. Welfare Programs, Expert Says

  One out of five legal immigrants in this country in recent years has come here as a client of the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement — and they arrive with instant access to all welfare programs the United States has to offer. This, according to Don Barnett,  a fellow with the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Immigration Studies and a resident of Williamson County. Barnett spoke in Lebanon Monday as part of  The Tennessee Star Wilson County Town Hall on Refugee Resettlement at the Lebanon D.T. McCall and Sons’ location. Barnett delivered an extensive and detailed presentation on the history and costs of the Refugee Admissions Program, which began 40 years ago with the passage of the Refugee Act of 1980. More than 3 million refugees have been legally resettled in the United States under that program over four decades, Barnett said. The Office of Refugee Resettlement is an agency of the Department of Health and Human Services. “In 2016 we had 212,000 individuals with instant access to the welfare system,” Barnett told audience members. In 2016, 85,000 of those 212,000 entered through the federal Refugee Admissions Program, while the remainder came through other programs. “In addition, there’s another category called…

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Two Bills Introduced in the Florida Legislature Would Go a Long Way to Discourage Illegal Aliens

In the wake of the hard fought win by former House of Representatives Republican Ron DeSantis in the Florida governor’s race, legislators in the state House and Senate are inspired to try again to move two bills that would have a chilling effect on the ability of businesses to hire illegal aliens and for local governments to harbor them from federal law enforcement. An immigration restriction group headquartered in Washington, DC, the Federation for Immigration Reform (FAIR), reported the news about the bills to its members on Friday. Although the legislature does not reconvene until March 2019, committees will discuss the bills during January and February. E-Verify On December 11, Representative Thad Altman (R-Melbourne/Indialantic) introduced HB 89 which would among other provisions: ~ Require all private employers to register with E-Verify and use it for all employees hired after January 1, 2020; ~ Require all state agencies, local governments and public contractors to verify new employees hired after July 1, 2019; ~ Set up an enforcement process where private employers could lose their business licenses for employing illegal aliens; ~ Require the state’s Department of Economic Opportunity to report illegal aliens to ICE. Many, including the leadership of FAIR, believe that mandatory…

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Immigration Activists to Hold Vigils in Nashville and Memphis Tonight to Promote DACA Amnesty

Supporters of allowing DACA recipients to remain permanently in the U.S. will hold a vigil this evening outside the Nashville offices of Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and Bob Corker (R-TN) on West End Avenue. The vigil at 6:30 p.m. is organized by the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC) and JUMP (Jóvenes Unidos por un Mejor Presente, or Youth United for a Better Present). A similar vigil sponsored by TIRRC and the Memphis Youth Association will be held at City Hall in Memphis at 6 p.m. The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program was started by former President Obama with an executive order and granted illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. as children temporary permission to live and work in the U.S. if they met certain criteria. In September, President Trump rescinded DACA and turned the issue over to Congress to consider a legislative solution. Nearly 800,000 young people nationally have been granted DACA status and there currently are around 690,000 recipients, including more than 8,300 in Tennessee. Activists want Congress to pass a “clean” DACA bill granting residency without approval for the legislation being contingent on funding for a border wall and strengthened interior immigration enforcement, as President…

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Plyler v. Doe: The Supreme Court Ruling That Influences Today’s Debate Over In-State College Tuition For Illegal Immigrants

SCOTUS

  Long before there was debate over in-state college tuition for illegal immigrants in Tennessee and around the country, there was debate over illegal immigrant students in grades K-12. The matter was settled in 1982, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 in Plyler v. Doe that public schools must grant illegal immigrant children a free K-12 education as they would for any other student. Doing otherwise would violate the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, the court said. The ruling helped set the stage for future wrangling over providing young illegal immigrants with benefits for continuing their education and finding work after graduating from high school. In Tennessee, a bill that would provide in-state tuition for illegal immigrants is moving through the state legislature. The proposed legislation is sponsored by two Republicans, Sen. Todd Gardenhire (R-Chattanooga) and Rep. Mark White (R-Memphis). A similar bill was passed by the Senate two years ago but failed in the House by one vote. Currently, at least 18 states offer in-state tuition for illegal immigrants, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Proponents say it’s not fair to create hurdles for college-bound illegal immigrants after they were welcomed and encouraged in their K-12…

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