NEW HAVEN - As more and more immigrants begin to come to New Haven, CT, many government officials are urging for ICE to be disestablished.

ICE, otherwise known as Immigration and Customs Enforcement, deports, detains, and arrests illegal immigrants in the United States. ICE determines if the immigrant needs to be removed from the country. The goal of ICE is to remove immigrants who have failed to receive asylum, or have done crimes, and to keep America safe by not letting in terrorists.

Many want to get rid of this law, because they believe ICE only highlights the negative side of immigration. One of these is Connecticut democratic state senator Gary Winfield.

In a recent panel discussion, Winfield said, “ICE is different than other organizations. It was made to do some of the negative things that we’ve seen the news talk about in the last couple of months… ICE should be completely eliminated.” He is saying that he does not support ICE because...

Chris George & IRIS

Imagine being Chris George. A man who has worked extremely hard to let in as many immigrants in need, to America as he can for 12 years, and for all of that work to hit a wall in 2017. According to New Haven Register, ever since President Trump got elected Chris George and his team (IRIS) has had many troubles letting immigrants into America and went from 530 immigrants in 2016 to 330 immigrants the next year.

Many people recognize Mr. George’s efforts to resettle persecuted families from Syria, Iraq and other nations in war, that the New Haven Register named Chris George the 2017 Person of the Year.

More Obstacles

According to New Haven Register, President Trump signed executive orders when he took office, that would ban nearly all refugees from entering America. Luckily, the courts tried to shut that down, but Trump was able to stop refugee arrivals for 120 days. Also he...

NEW HAVEN - On Wednesday October 24, 2018, a rally and overnight prayer will take place outside of ICE offices. At 3pm, a press conference will happen at Hartford with Senator Blumenthal and other lawyers filing a stay request for Nelson Pinos. Later at 6 pm, a prayer will begin for Nelson and his family outside the offices. Nelson Pinos (age 43) lives in a church due to ICE rules. He has been living in the First and Summerfield United Methodist church for almost a year. ICE (Immigrations and Customs Enforcement), has a policy that they will not deport immigrants who are living in a church, hospital, or school. Pinos is an illegal immigrant, so if he leaves the church, then there is a chance that ICE could deport him.

Although, in a recent interview with Assistant Chief Counsel of ICE Courtney Gates-Graceson, she said that it is probably a political statement, because ICE would probably not take him away if he has not done crimes.

Kelly Pinos (Nelson’s 16 year old daughter) wrote to New York Times. She said that for five years her father has been going to immigrant officials to request to stay...

Just over a year ago, statues of Christopher Columbus were defaced before Columbus day. On Wednesday we went to the museum of the Knights of Columbus and interviewed one of their employees on that matter. Interestingly enough, though Columbus was an Italian immigrant, the founding members of the Knights of Columbus were Irish immigrants. They chose the name Knights of Columbus because they were facing discrimination from Americans. They felt that by forming a support organization for Irish immigrants, and naming it after Columbus, a huge hero at the time, they would show their similarity to everyone else.The Knights of Columbus has survived for more than 100 years and has since then evolved into a charity organization. Though it has been revealed that Columbus was not a good person, when we asked a member if they ever intended to change their name he responded with “never”. When it comes to the recent defacing of Columbus statues, he replied that the people of today look at Columbus in a different way than people in the old times did. In the old times the things that Columbus did were normal, and his less morally correct actions were perfectly fine to most people back then. They still...

ICE, the Immigration of Customs Enforcement, has caused much conflict recently. Many believe that ICE needs to be abolished, but others believe that it is integral to the protection of the country. However, the more and more we learn about ICE, the easier it is to see that ICE needs to be reworked. One reason I believe makes this obvious is that ICE takes a very long time to approve requests for asylum, and they do not approve many. Additionally, many immigrants who do receive asylum still do not live the “American Dream.” ICE currently is not doing very much to protect our country, like it was created to.

In a recent interview with the Assistant Chief legal-counsel of ICE, I discovered that within the first 6 months of entering the country, an immigrant receives no help, and should hire an attorney. After that, they have around 2 years to plan their request for asylum, and they are not allowed to get a job during this time. Once 2 years have passed, if accepted, the immigrant can get get a green card, citizenship, and job. But if declined, they can either stay illegally, or leave the country. This is unacceptable because the immigrant came to America as a refugee, and they cannot go back to their country. If declined, they would have nowhere to go. ICE is ultimately breaking their own rules. They are forcing immigrants...

Many people think that immigrants cause crime and steal American jobs. But are these accusations true? Well according to recent reports and data they are not true. All immigrants do not steal American jobs. In fact Chris George, a member of IRIS, says that immigrants usually take jobs that Americans do not want. For example, garbage collectors. Not many people want to wake up early and throw around trash for little pay. But immigrants who are desperate for jobs, money, and food, will do anything they can to succeed. Furthermore, Chris also stated that immigrants are actually great for the economy. According to Chris the amount of local businesses that immigrants usually open really help many areas. Also, studies show that immigrant families cost the government 57 billion dollars for the first generation of immigrants, but the second generation makes 30 billion dollars each year. In fact, by the third generation, they contribute 223 billion dollars a year to government funds.

The second accusation many people make is that immigrants increase crime rates. This is not true because over the years immigrant populations in New Haven and even the nation have gone up exponentially. However,...