Rod Tam sorry for saying ‘wetbacks’ | Alohapolitics.comCity Councilman Rod Tam apologized yesterday for his recent use of the ethnic slur “wetbacks” about illegal immigrants from Mexico working in Hawaii. ...
www.alohapolitics.com/?p=435 - 65k - Cached - Similar pages
WHAT ARE THE STATISTICS ON ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION FROM ASIA AND THE SOUTH PACIFIC...OH YEAH, AND EUROPE?
HAWAII IMMIGRATION STATISTICS
Total Population: 1,285,000 (2006)
Foreign Born: 232,000 (2005)
Illegal Immigrants: FAIR Estimate: 52,000 (2005)
USCIS/DHS Estimate: 2,000 (2000)
Pew Hispanic Center Estimate: 2,000-3,500 (2005)
Immigration to Hawaii
During the 1990s, Hawaii's foreign-born population increased 30 percent. Between 1990 and 2000, Hawaii gained 50,000 immigrants, bringing the total number of foreign-born residents in the state to 212,000. The increase in the foreign-born population during the 1990s accounted for 48 percent of the state's overall population increase during the decade. 30 percent of school-aged children in Hawaii have immigrant parents; while five percent are immigrants themselves. Under a 1985 pact between the United States and the newly independent Micronesia and the Marshall Islands, citizens of those territories may freely migrate to the United States. To protect Hawaii from a major resettlement burden, the agreement specified that annual reports would be sent to Congress on the impact on Hawaii and the Pacific territories as a result of the compact to allow remedial actions. However, the Hawaiian government sued the federal government to recoup outlays for the migrants as the Interior Department failed to issue those reports from 1989 to 1996. The suit was dismissed by a federal appeals court as a political matter for Congress to resolve. However, the lawsuit caught the federal government's attention and has led to a new catch-up report and some federal assistance. Then-governor Ben Cayetano cited Census data showing that 4,815 immigrants from the two countries have migrated to Hawaii since 1985 and that nearly 40 percent of them were living below the poverty level, affecting welfare, health care, and crime.
Illegal Immigration to Hawaii
Many states have begun to grapple with the issue of immigration reform in response to Congress' failure to act. Hawaii Legislature has turned the other way, contrary to impressions left in a new nationwide survey, possibly because of worker shortage or liberal leanings. The National Conference of State Legislatures reports that state legislatures considered 1,404 immigration measures this year and enacted 170 of them, including 18 measures approved by the Hawaii Legislature. State lawmakers elsewhere adopted measures to curb employment of unauthorized immigrants and make it more difficult for them to obtain state identification documents, such as driver's licenses.
These Hawaii measures, however, can hardly be interpreted as a crackdown on illegal aliens. For example, a Hawaii bill that the NCSL says "excludes certain alien agricultural workers" from receiving unemployment benefits actually stops forcing them to pay into the program "even though they will never qualify to collect unemployment benefits." A new law, cited by the report, that it says requires that all persons seeking jobs with the state or any county "must be citizens, nationals or permanent residents of the United States or eligible under federal law for unrestricted employment in the United States." However, as of October 2007 Hawaii is among the few states still issuing driver's licenses to illegal immigrants.
This new law is actually less restrictive than the old one, which required that anybody applying for a Hawaii state job must be a Hawaii resident. The American Civil Liberties Union in Hawaii challenged the law on behalf of out-of-state applicants from Florida, and U.S. District Judge David Ezra ruled in June 2006 that it was unconstitutional. The only other bill approved by the Legislature, signed into law by Gov. Linda Lingle and cited by the NCSL was to create a pilot program providing health-care coverage for all children in Hawaii, including aliens who have only temporary visas or who lack documentation of any kind. Children should not be refused health care, regardless of their alien status. According to INS figures, 2,000 illegal aliens resided in Hawaii as of 2000.
