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Immigrant In US
An Afghan national who worked with the CIA in his native country and immigrated to the US in 2021 drove from Washington state to shoot two West Virginia National Guard members deployed in Washington, DC, just blocks from the White House, US officials said Thursday. The suspect had worked in a special CIA-backed Afghan Army unit before emigrating from Afghanistan, according to a cousin who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals. Jeanine Pirro, the US attorney for the District of Columbia, declined to provide a motive for Wednesday afternoon's brazen act of violence, which comes as the presence of troops in the nation's capital and other cities around the country has become a political flashpoint. Pirro identified the guard members at a news conference as Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and Staff Sgt Andrew Wolfe, 24. Both remained hospitalised in critical condition. Pirro said that the suspect, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, launched an ambush-style att
An Arizona judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration's effort to remove Guatemalan and Honduran children living in shelters or foster care after coming to the US alone, according to a decision Thursday. US District Judge Rosemary Marquez in Tucson extended a decision made over the Labor Day weekend. Lawyers for the children said their clients have said they fear going home, and that the government is not following laws designed to protect migrant children. A legal aid group filed a lawsuit in Arizona on behalf of 57 Guatemalan children and another 12 from Honduras between the ages 3 and 17. Nearly all the children were in the custody of the US Health and Human Services Department's Office of Refugee Resettlement and living at shelters in the Phoenix and Tucson areas. Similar lawsuits filed in Illinois and Washington, DC, seek to stop the government from removing the children. The Arizona lawsuit demands that the government allow the children their right to present their c
Jacob Vasquez began working at a clothing warehouse in Los Angeles soon after arriving from Mexico less than three years ago. He is among dozens of workers detained by federal immigration authorities in a series of raids in LA's fashion district and at Home Depot parking lots in Southern California. More than 100 people have been detained. The raids have triggered days of turbulent protests across the city and beyond and led President Donald Trump to deploy National Guard troops and Marines to the LA area, the latest development in the administration's immigration crackdown. Protests in the city's downtown have ranged from peaceful to raucous, with demonstrators blocking a major freeway and setting cars on fire over the weekend. Immigrant advocates say the workers who were detained do not have criminal histories and are being denied their due process rights. Vasquez has a three-month-old baby, according to his family who spoke to reporters outside the Ambiance Apparel warehouse, a
Federal immigration authorities carried out enforcement activities at businesses across Los Angeles on Friday, prompting clashes outside at least one location as authorities threw flash bangs to try to disperse a crowd that had gathered in protest. Immigration advocates confirmed at least 45 people were arrested without warrants across seven locations, including two Home Depots, a store in the fashion district and a doughnut shop, said Angelica Salas, executive director for the Coalition of Humane Immigrant Rights, or CHIRLA, at an afternoon press conference denouncing the activity. Federal immigration authorities have been ramping up arrests across the country to fulfil President Donald Trump's promise of mass deportations. Todd Lyons, the head of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, defended his tactics earlier this week against criticism that authorities are being too heavy-handed. He has said ICE is averaging about 1,600 arrests per day and that the agency has arrested ...
The Republican-led House on Wednesday gave final approval to a bill that requires the detainment of unauthorised migrants accused of theft and violent crimes, marking the first legislation that President Donald Trump can sign as Congress, with some bipartisan support, swiftly moved in line with his plans to crackdown on illegal immigration. Passage of the Laken Riley Act, named after a Georgia nursing student who was murdered last year by a Venezuelan man, shows just how sharply the political debate over immigration has shifted to the right following Trump's election victory. Immigration policy has often been one of the most entrenched issues in Congress, but a crucial faction of politically vulnerable Democrats joined with Republicans to lift the strict proposal to passage on a 263-156 vote tally. "For decades, it has been almost impossible for our government to agree on solutions for the problems at our border and within our country," said Senator Katie Britt, an Alabama ...
When Balu Natarajan became the first Indian American champion of the Scripps National Spelling Bee in 1985, a headline on an Associated Press article read, Immigrants' son wins National Spelling Bee, with the first paragraph noting the champion speaks his parents' native Indian language at home. Those details would hardly be newsworthy today after a quarter-century of Indian American spelling champs, most of them the offspring of parents who arrived in the United States on student or work visas. This year's bee is scheduled to begin Tuesday at a convention centre outside Washington and, as usual, many of the expected contenders are Indian American, including Shradha Rachamreddy, Aryan Khedkar, Bruhat Soma and Ishika Varipilli. Nearly 70 per cent of Indian-born US residents arrived after 2000, according to census data, and that dovetails with the surge in Indian American spelling bee champions. There were two Indian American Scripps winners before 1999. Of the 34 since, 28 have been
A group of eminent Indian-Americans have come together to announce a commitment of USD100 million for startups towards the socio-economic development of Amritsar, the first of its kind initiative for any Indian city by the diaspora. In collaboration with the Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industries (FICCI) and the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF), a group of eminent Indian-Americans and Indians living in the US had their first meeting in a Maryland suburb of Washington DC to announce the formation of Viksit Amritsar Initiative. The mega initiative, its founding members said, is inspired by former Indian envoy to the US, Taranjit Singh Sandhu, who after an illustrious diplomatic service, including the last four years in Washington DC, has returned to his home town with the mission of helping the city develop as one of the best in the world both in terms of economic and industrial growth but also as an attractive tourist destination from across the ...
Freddy Tomas was working in his yard in Lahaina when the fire advanced with stunning speed right up to his fence. He rushed to save valuables from a safe inside his house but realised he didn't have time and fled, his face blackened with soot. Days after fleeing in his pickup truck, amid smoke so thick he could only follow the red taillights of the vehicle in front of him and pray they were going the right way, the retired hotel worker from the Philippines returned to his destroyed home with his son to look for the safe. Tomas, 65, said it had contained passports, naturalisation papers, other important documents and USD 35,000. After sifting through the ashes, father and son found the safe, but it had popped open in the fire, whipped by hurricane-force winds, and its contents were incinerated. For immigrants like Tomas, Lahaina was an oasis, with nearly double the foreign-born population of the US mainland. Now, those workers are trying to piece their lives back together after the