Stop me if you've heard this one: the border between Mexico and the United States is an open highway for undocumented immigrants and before we fix our broken immigration system we must secure our porous border.

Given all of the progress made along our border, crime is...

President Barack Obama's move to prioritize the deportation of criminal immigrants, while giving exemplary undocumented immigrants the ability to remain in the country through deferred action, is smart and fair enforcement policy.

In the face of increasingly clogged deportation courts, constrained...

"The sky is falling," is a familiar refrain from politicians on both sides of the aisle when it comes to, well just about everything in an election year. Such is the case when it comes to our southwest border region.

Despite numerous reports showing a marked decrease...

It is election time and things are getting pretty heated on all sides of the political spectrum. The summer heat has already forced some pundits to go overboard in their political commentary. Take one Ruben Navarrette, who is quick to throw charges of racism around. Navarrette's latest

Speaking at the NCLR national conference Vice President Joe Biden mused that Mitt Romney wants Hispanics to show their (citizenship) papers even though he refuses to disclose his own (tax) "papers." While this may seem like an inconsequential throwaway election speech line, it does highlight a disturbing dichotomy...

Not too long ago the Pew Hispanic Center released a survey which posed a simple question: does the Latino community have a national leader? In 2010 that answer was a resounding no. When asked in an open-ended question to name the person they consider "the most important Latino...

Anyone who witnessed Arizona Governor Jan Brewer's rambling, borderline incoherent press conference on the Supreme Court's SB1070 ruling must have been struck by two things. First, she had written her speech well before actually hearing the court's verdict, and secondly she had no idea what had...

Mitt Romney has unveiled his immigration platform and it is the definition of anti-climactic. Romney's speech at the National Association of Latino Elected Official's (NALEO) conference had been billed as an opportunity for a candidate, who is struggling to connect with Hispanic voters, to re-orient his message to...

It is a new day in the contentious debate over our broken immigration system, well for most of us anyway. The President has granted deferred action on the deportation of low priority immigrants, giving 800,000 of our best and brightest undocumented immigrants a future in this country. House...

Today the President has shown true courage in granting deferred deportation actions for our best and brightest undocumented youth. He has shown true leadership by allowing younger undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. as children and have since led law-abiding lives, the ability to defer their deportation for two...

This may come as a shock to some political analysts, but Senator Marco Rubio is not the solution for the GOP's Hispanic problems. To be sure he is charismatic, smart, young and to the Republican Party most importantly, Hispanic. However he is a single man, in a party badly out...

Here is an uncomfortable truth for the GOP: government investment in the southwest border region is paying dividends. Undocumented Mexican migration through our southwest border has gone down, legal Mexican travel and trade with the United States has increased. Legal immigration and increased trade are two...

At a recent Capitol Hill forum on Arizona's ethnic studies ban, a young Latina, Diana Villatoro, all of thirteen years old spoke passionately about how ethnic studies inspire her classmates and teach a powerful sense of belonging in their community and their country, America. After her speech, her...

With the advent of new media and advances in access to technology the internet is supplementing, complimenting and slowly siphoning viewers from television. While the delivery mechanisms for viewing video are changing, mainstream content providers remain frustratingly rooted in a world which ignores the demographic changes...

If someone asked if you would support a law that allowed local police officers with minimal cause, to arrest and indefinitely detain American citizens for not providing legal documentation, what would you say? In Arizona, Sheriff Joe Arpaio has been doing just this for the last three...

Mitt Romney's polling numbers with Hispanic voters are abysmal. The media has attributed this to his extreme statements on immigration. This is only part of the story. Romney's campaign outreach to Hispanics faces deep structural and policy deficits. His campaign does not have the necessary tools...

For most Hispanics, education and the search for a better life is the reason they or their ancestors immigrated to the U.S. Many young Hispanics hear the mantra; we came to the U.S. so that you could go to college and be educated. Tienes que ser una persona educada. You...

Over the next several months the Supreme Court will hear arguments over Arizona's state-passed immigration law. Regardless of the outcome one thing should be very clear: the anti-immigrant movement has no long-term strategy to fix our broken immigration system. All these laws have done is...

Army National Guard Spc. Hector Nunez's wife was brought to the United States when she was six years old, in 2005 she married her husband and they gave birth to a child who was born with medical problems. In 2007, after seeking legal advice and trying to naturalize, Hector's wife...

With so much of the current debate around immigration caught up in the heated rhetoric of an upcoming Presidential election year, it is easy to gloss over the fact that these barbs being thrown around are about real people. The most at risk, exploited and vulnerable populations caught...