As President Obama and GOP candidate Mitt Romney court Latino voters, CNN takes an In Depth look at what matters most to this diverse group, and how that will influence elections.
By the CNN Wire Staff
(CNN) –Dharun Ravi could face 10 years in prison and be deported to his native India when he is sentenced Monday for spying on and intimidating his gay Rutgers University roommate, who then killed himself by jumping off New York's George Washington Bridge.
The September 2010 death of Tyler Clementi, and Ravi's trial this year, thrust the issue of cyberbullying and prejudices against homosexuals into the national spotlight.
Clementi, an 18-year-old freshman, plunged to his death in the Hudson River after learning that Ravi had secretly spied via a webcam as Clementi kissed another man.
In the months that followed, President Barack Obama released a videotaped message condemning bullying, while New Jersey legislators enacted stricter laws to protect against it in schools.
By Joe Sutton and Gustavo Valdes, CNN
(CNN) - Alabama lawmakers passed a new bill Wednesday aimed at improving the state's controversial immigration law, but critics said the new measure might make things worse.
Demonstrators protested outside the chambers of the Alabama state House and Senate. Seven of them were arrested, said Justin Cox, staff attorney with the ACLU Immigrants Rights Project.
The Southern Poverty Law Center's legal director was among those arrested, said Marion Steinfels, a representative of the organization.
Police could not be immediately reached for comment.
The center is one of the plaintiffs in a federal lawsuit against Alabama's immigration law.
The new immigration bill, known as HB 658, was approved by the state House and Senate Wednesday.
The state's governor will have the final say, with the power to sign the bill into law or veto it.
By Stephanie Siek, CNN
(CNN) – The United States is becoming increasingly international, according to data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau in the 2010 American Community Survey Thursday.
The number of foreign-born people in the United States is at an all-time high, at 40 million - an increase of about 9 million since the 2000 census. The 2010 census put the total U.S. population at almost 309 million.
But the foreign born comprise a smaller proportion of the total population (13%) than they did during the peak immigration years of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
The 2010 American Community Survey also reveals that more than half of the nation’s foreign-born population lives in just four states: California, New York, Texas and Florida. FULL POST
By the CNN Wire Staff
(CNN)– The U.S. Justice Department plans to file a civil lawsuit against Maricopa County, Arizona, and Sheriff Joe Arpaio over civil rights violations.
In a letter sent Wednesday to an attorney for the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office, Assistant U.S. Attorney General Thomas Perez writes that the county's failure to address racial discrimination and other violations found by the federal government in December will go to litigation.
The sheriff's policies are unconstitutional and in violation of federal law, and compliance "cannot be secured through voluntary means," the letter said.
As a result, the Justice Department will file suit against the county, the sheriff's office and Arpaio.
By Jose Pagliery, CNNMoney
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Working for a new company? There's a more than one-in-four chance your new boss wasn't born here.
Immigrants created 28% of all new firms last year. They were also twice as likely to start a new business when compared to those born in the United States.
It's a notable shift. Nearly all new firms are small, and many are hiring new workers, seeking small business loans and shaking up established industries.
What's behind the rise of immigrant entrepreneurs?
El Pichy Films: A joke turned into a company
For one, immigrants are over-represented in lower wage sectors like construction, which was hard hit during the economic crisis, according to Rob Fairlie, a professor at the University of California-Santa Cruz.
(CNN) - A top U.S. Justice Department official warned Alabama's education department that the state's controversial immigration law has had "lasting" and possibly illegal consequences for Hispanic school children, according to a letter released Thursday.
"(The law has) diminished access to and quality of education for many of Alabama's Hispanic children, resulted in missed school days, chilled or prevented the participation of parents in their children's education, and transformed the climates of some schools into less safe and welcoming spaces for Hispanic children," wrote Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez, head of the federal department's Civil Rights Division.
The legislation, known as HB 56, has several provisions, including one requiring police who make lawful traffic stops or arrests to try to determine the immigration status of anyone they suspect might be in the country illegally.
A federal appeals court has blocked some components, however, including one requiring Alabama officials to check the immigration status of children in public schools.
Even with such changes mandated by the courts and others proposed by legislators, Perez argues in a letter to state Superintendent of Education Thomas Bice that the bill already has had negative effects.
He points to data provided by Alabama officials that, he says, shows that "Hispanic students absence rates tripled while absence rates for other groups of students remained virtually flat." That includes a sharp drop in those getting schooling through English as a second language programs, meaning they did not "receive the educational services to which they are legally entitled."
Editor's note: Ruben Navarrette Jr. is a CNN.com contributor and a nationally syndicated columnist with the Washington Post Writers Group.
By Ruben Navarrette Jr., CNN Contributor
San Diego, California (CNN) - In Washington, a lot of the meetings that take place between lawmakers amount to nothing. But recently, there was a get-together that was really something.
The participants: Reps. Luis Gutierrez, D-Illinois, and Charles Gonzales, D-Texas, along with Sens. Marco Rubio, R-Florida, and Robert Menendez, D-New Jersey.
The problem: What this country should do with so-called DREAM'ers, undocumented young people who were brought here by their parents as children and who face the threat of deportation.
One proposed solution that didn't go anywhere was the DREAM Act, a bill that politicians passed around like a hot potato for more than a decade. It would offer legal status and a pathway to citizenship to anyone who goes to college or joins the military.
The good news is that there was bipartisan support; the last time it was put to a vote, in December 2010, a slew of Senate Democrats voted for it, but so did three Senate Republicans - Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Richard Lugar of Indiana and Bob Bennett of Utah. The bad news is that there is bipartisan opposition; a slew of Republicans opposed the legislation, but so did five Senate Democrats - Jon Tester and Max Baucus of Montana, Kay Hagan of North Carolina, Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Mark Pryor of Arkansas.
Clearly we need a new approach. Enter Rubio.
Editor's note: Jeffrey S. Passel is a senior demographer at the Pew Hispanic Center and a nationally known expert on immigration to the United States and the demography of racial and ethnic groups. D'Vera Cohn is a senior writer at the Pew Research Center. From 1985 to 2006, she was a reporter at The Washington Post, writing chiefly about demographic trends and immigration.
By Jeffrey S. Passel and D'Vera Cohn, Special to CNN
(CNN) - To those of us who have studied the largest wave of immigration in history from a single country to the United States - the four-decade-long influx of millions of Mexicans - it seemed inconceivable that it would ever come to a halt. Yet, as our new Pew Hispanic Center report has shown, it has.
Study: Mexican immigration to United States slows to a standstill
Our analysis of Mexican and U.S. data sources indicates that at least as many Mexicans and their families are leaving the United States as are arriving in the United States from Mexico. As a result, the Mexican-born population in the United States decreased from 12.6 million in 2007 to 12 million in 2011. This appears to be the first sustained decline in the number of Mexican immigrants since the Great Depression, and it is entirely because of a reduction in illegal immigration - more going home and fewer coming. Today, we estimate that 51% of all Mexican immigrants living in the United States are unauthorized. In 2007, that figure was 56%.
Editor's note: Ali Noorani is executive director of the National Immigration Forum Action Fund, an organization based in Washington that advocates for the value of immigrants and immigration to the nation. Follow him on Twitter: @anoorani.
By Ali Noorani, Special to CNN
(CNN)– A month after defending the health care law, the Obama administration again confronted the buzz saw of skeptical Supreme Court justices on Wednesday - this time on immigration. But come November, Republicans may very well be on the losing end of the argument.
As has been widely reported, oral arguments regarding Arizona's SB 1070 illegal immigration law began with an unusual interruption: Chief Justice John Roberts broke in during U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli's opening comments to ask assertively, "No part of your argument has to do with racial or ethnic profiling, does it?"
And, while it is difficult to predict how the justices will rule, Justice Sonia Sotomayor signaled the tough road ahead when she said of the administration's argument, "You can see it's not selling very well."
By Emanuella Grinberg, CNN
(CNN) - The past few years haven’t been the best for a man trying to make an honest living selling tortillas in Arizona. Business owner Sergio Paez estimates that he has lost 20 businesses as customers in the past three years, from small neighborhood taquerias to chain restaurants.
In 2010, his tortilla business was suffering thanks to the nationwide recession. Then Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer signed into law the state's controversial immigration enforcement policy known as SB 1070, and things got even worse, he said.
“The law affected the immigrant population dramatically,” said Paez, a naturalized citizen from Mexico whose Phoenix-area factory produces about 200 dozen tortillas an hour.
“The economy had already been going down with the housing crisis – construction stopped, people were losing homes, jobs, cars. That triggered the recession, but I think this law aggravated it here.”
With oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court this week for the Obama administration’s constitutional challenge to the law, the outcome will have far-reaching implications for Arizona and other states that have implemented similar policies since 2010.
What defines you? Maybe it’s the shade of your skin, the place you grew up, the accent in your words, the make up of your family, the gender you were born with, the intimate relationships you chose to have or your generation? As the American identity changes we will be there to report it. In America is a venue for creative and timely sharing of news that explores who we are. Reach us at inamerica@cnn.com.
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