Thursday, August 18
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THE FORUM DAILY

Rio Grande City, Texas, Mayor Joel Villarreal says it will take
Democrats and Republicans working together to solve our broken
immigration system, reports Jon Michael Raasch of Fox News
. 

"You cannot have one state or a few municipalities deal with the brunt
of this immigration," he said. "We have to find a plan - a national
plan." 

Securing the border is an effective and humane way is possible. Our
latest policy paper

helps define what makes the border secure, including recommendations to
build a healthier dialogue around border policy and security. 

And in The Hill
,
Theresa Cardinal Brown, managing director of immigration and
cross-border policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center, offers a border
framework to consider - beyond deterrence.  

Among Brown's recommendations are increasing Mexico's capacity to
process and integrate more asylum seekers and refugee claims, expanding
and streamlining work visa processes, increasing resources and staffing
to mitigate backlogs, and processing asylum claims more rapidly while
ensuring due process.  

"[P]ushing the same deterrence policies isn't working. We need to try
something new, and soon," Brown concludes.  

Welcome to Thursday's edition of The Forum Daily.  I'm Dan
Gordon, the Forum's strategic communications VP. We're pausing the
Daily on Fridays this month, so we'll be back Monday. If you have a
story to share from your own community, please send it to me at
[email protected] . 

**VISA BACKLOGS** - The backlogged immigration system is putting
workers and employers in a difficult situation, reports Andrew
Kreighbaum of Bloomberg Law
.
Workers who need to renew expired visas must do so at a consular office
outside the U.S., but delays at short-staffed offices could mean a
months-long wait abroad. In turn, employers may be stuck without workers
for extended periods. The Trump administration's two-year pause on
processing guestworker visas during the pandemic has exacerbated these
challenges. Workers "just don't trust that even if they can get an
appointment, it will be honored," Leon Fresco, an attorney at Holland &
Knight, said. One potential solution: allowing workers to renew their
visa stamps here, rather than abroad. 

SOLVING SHORTAGES - The Chicago Welcome Back Center, which launched
Tuesday, will help immigrant workers in health care obtain professional
licenses in the U.S., which can address sector's shortages, reports
Andrea Flores of WTTW
.
"This center will help our international community to continue their
profession of choice and follow their dreams," said Janine Janosky,
president of Richard J. Daley College, where the center is located.
Added Dr. José Ramón Fernández-Peña, executive director of the
Welcome Back Initiative , "In
addition to the lack of diversity, there are serious shortages in all
areas of the health workforce, from nurses to mental health
professionals, physicians, public health professionals, speech
pathologists, etc." 

FAITH LENS - I'm not Catholic, but I pray that more of us might
listen to the words of New York Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan regarding
welcoming migrants bused from Texas. Per Catholic News Service
:
"[Jesus is] the one who said to us, 'When I was a stranger ... an
immigrant, you welcomed me.' ... Our perspective is to help them ...
(with) a sense of honor that we are able to help these people in whom we
see the face of God." More than 6,000 migrants have been brought to the
city. Catholic Charities of the New York Archdiocese has supported 1,500
of them, offering food, clothing, and resources for shelter and
assistance with immigration attorneys. 

**PATHWAYS** - Resettled Afghans and Ukrainians lack a certain pathway
to legal residence in the U.S. after fleeing their home countries,
Courtney Rozen reports in Bloomberg Law
.
Humanitarian parole

allows people to live and work in the U.S. for just two years, and the
clock is ticking. In the case of Ukrainians, the U.S. government
believes most will want to return to Ukraine after the war, but
"[i]t's very difficult to ask people who rebuilt their lives to then
leave," said Nili Yossinger, executive director of Refugee Congress. The
recently introduced Afghan Adjustment Act would offer certainty to
resettled Afghans, Rozen notes. (Read the Forum's summary

of the bill, including its vetting and screening provisions.) 

WAR

**AND FRIENDSHIP** - A U.S. marine and his Afghan interpreter have
joined forces on a new memoir, "Always Faithful: A Story of the War in
Afghanistan, the Fall of Kabul, and the Unshakable Bond Between a Marine
and an Interpreter," Eunice Alpasan of WTTW

reports. Maj. Tom Schueman and Zainullah "Zak" Zaki, who co-wrote the
book, served alongside each other during the war. Schueman led a
successful social media campaign to help Zaki and his family get out of
Afghanistan. "He took great danger to his own life and really fought
alongside us," Schueman said of Zaki. 

Locally: 

* Medical student Maie Zagloul, founder of nonprofit Books for Chance,
recently partnered with the International Institute of Wisconsin to
collect books for Afghan families throughout the state, with the goal of
improving their English. (Aly Prouty, Spectrum News 1 Wisconsin
) 

* A pilot resettlement housing program at Notre Dame de Namur University
in Belmont, California, has been providing Afghan evacuees with housing
for up to three months. "Our goal is to not only support these refugees
as individuals but to set an example for our peer institutions to follow
our lead," University President Beth Martin said. (Curtis Driscoll, The
Daily Journal
) 

* Former Afghan national soccer player Suliman Dawood and his family
have found "renewed purpose" serving Afghan dishes at their new
restaurant in Santa Rosa, California. While the family is starting to
find some stability, thanks in part to help from a local church, they
still worry about the loved ones left behind in Afghanistan and are
working to bring them to the safety in the U.S. (Liz Kreutz, ABC7
) 

Thanks for reading, 

Dan 

 

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