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National ID plan may have killed immigration bill The U.S. Senate definitively rejected President George Bush's immigration bill on Thursday, just hours after senators expressed deep misgivings with portions that would have expanded the use of a national ID card. Privacy advocates were quick to claim that a vote against Real ID cards the previous evening doomed the bill. Wednesday's vote showed that senators were willing to delete the portion of the labyrinthine immigration bill that would require employers to demand the Real ID cards from new hires. Because some of the bill's backers had insisted that the ID requirement remain in place--as a way to identify illegal immigrants--they were no longer as willing to support the overall bill. "The proponents of national ID in the Senate weren't getting what they wanted, so they backed away," said Jim Harper, a policy analyst at the free-market Cato Institute who opposes Real ID. "It was a landmine that blew up in their faces." In a press release, the two Montana Democrats, Max Baucus and Jon Tester, said they were happy that a pro-privacy approach killed the bill. "If Jon and I just brought down the entire bill, that's good for Montana and the country," said Baucus, who cosponsored the amendment deleting the employer verification rule. Another section of the immigration bill would have given $1.5 billion to state officials to pay for Real ID compliance. Even if the immigration bill is goes nowhere, however, the Real ID Act is still in effect. It says that, starting on May 11, 2008, Americans will need a federally approved ID card to travel on an airplane, open a bank account, collect Social Security payments or take advantage of nearly any government service....
Forgery suspect seen exploiting 'amnesty' The head of a Mexican forgery ring was convinced he could make phony documents that illegal aliens could use to indicate fraudulently that they were eligible for a new amnesty, says a government affidavit recounting wiretapped phone calls the man made. Julio Leija-Sanchez, who ran a $3 million-a-year forgery operation before he was arrested in April, was expecting Congress to pass a legalization program, which he called "amnesty," and said he could forge documents to fool the U.S. government into thinking illegal aliens were in the country in time to qualify for amnesty, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent said in the affidavit. In recounting a wiretapped telephone conversation, ICE agent Jason E. Medica said he heard Mr. Leija-Sanchez tell an associate the forgery ring could "fix his papers" to meet the requirements of a legalization program such as the bill the Senate is debating this week. "When Leija-Sanchez said 'if there's an amnesty, he can fix his papers,' Leija-Sanchez was referring to the possibility of pending legislation which would allow a certain class of illegal aliens to remain in the United States, as long as they can prove a term of residency in the United States with no convictions," Mr. Medica wrote....
Fla. sheriff targets illegals The sheriff's department has developed a remarkably effective — and controversial — way of catching illegal immigrants: Deputies in patrol cars pull up to a construction site in force, and watch and see who runs. Those who take off are chased down and arrested on charges such as trespassing, for cutting through someone else's property, or loitering, for hiding out in someone's yard, or reckless driving, for speeding off in a car. U.S. immigration authorities are then given the names of those believed to be in this country illegally. "It's not wrong for them to run, but it's not wrong for us to chase them either," said Sheriff Frank McKeithen, who created his Illegal Alien Task Force in April to target construction sites in this Florida Panhandle county. The sheriff said the raids are justified under a long-standing Florida law prohibiting employers from knowingly hiring illegal immigrants. His department has conducted dozens of these raids over the past three months, sometimes using five or six patrol cars, and has reported more than 500 people to immigration officials since November.
FEMA hijacks Midwest broadcast signals with mistaken presidential alert The federal government hijacked radio and TV transmissions in the Midwest yesterday with test signals that triggered the sort of high-level emergency alert that is reserved for use by the president. The Quincy Herald says alerts were sent at 7:33 a.m., 7:49 a.m., 7:55 a.m. and 8:07 a.m. Radio listeners heard nothing but dead air. TV viewers saw a scrolling message that said: "The Emergency Action Notification Network has issued an emergency action notification for the United States, beginning at ..." FEMA tells the Associated Press that the mistake affected Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Wisconsin and Michigan. "While the interrupted morning drive-time broadcasts proved the Illinois system worked, the fact that what's known as an Emergency Action Notification, or EAN -- the highest level of EAS alert, indicating an emergency message is coming from the White House -- could be relayed mistakenly to override stations was a bit of a jolt, sending engineers scrambling at the affected outlets throughout Illinois and in adjacent media markets such as St. Louis," the Chicago Tribune reports. "Compounding the error, an actual presidential code, minus any audio explanation, was sent rather than a lesser alert or a notification of a systems test of some kind."....
U.S. Govt Appeals Enemy-Combatant Ruling National security will be jeopardized if the Bush administration is not allowed to indefinitely hold suspected terrorists as enemy combatants inside the U.S., the Justice Department said Wednesday in appealing a court's ruling against the tactic. The administration asked the full 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reconsider a three-judge panel's ruling that the government should charge Ali al-Marri, a legal U.S. resident and the only suspected enemy combatant on American soil, or release him from military custody. "The scope of the President's authority to combat al Qaeda fighters who come to America to commit terrorist acts is exceptionally important, and the panel majority's ruling that the President lacks the authority to detain such al Qaeda agents militarily poses an immediate and potentially grave threat to national security," the government said in its petition. The Justice Department had said after the June 11 ruling that it would seek a rehearing before the full appeals court. The court could ask al-Marri's attorney for a written response before deciding whether to review the ruling....
Panel urges Lockerbie appeal Nineteen years after a bomb blew up Pan Am Flight 103 in the skies above Lockerbie, Scotland, and six years after a former Libyan intelligence agent was convicted of planning the attack, a judicial review has resurrected lingering doubts about the case. The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, an independent panel that oversees matters brought before Scottish courts, recommended Thursday that Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, the only person convicted in the case, be granted permission to file a fresh appeal. "The commission is of the view, based on our lengthy investigations, the new evidence we have found and other evidence which was not before the trial court, that the applicant may have suffered a miscarriage of justice," the SCCRC said in a statement. The commission's 800-page report has not been made public, but in a brief statement, the commission said that it had concerns about a key witness' identification of al-Megrahi and that other exculpatory evidence had not been made available to the defense. The commission went out of its way to knock down some of the more far-fetched claims by al-Megrahi's supporters and lawyers. This included allegations that the CIA "spirited away" evidence from the crash site and that a "CIA badge" was found at the crash site but not recorded as evidence....
Court: Feds Can Seize Half of House A woman who claimed she was unaware that her husband was growing pot in the basement will get to keep her half of their house, while the government can seize her husband's share, a federal appeals court has ruled. The 2nd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals said in a ruling Wednesday that Harold Von Hofe must forfeit his interest in the home to the federal government. However, his wife, Kathleen, does not have to because she wasn't actively involved in her husband's marijuana cultivation. "The record is devoid of any evidence indicating her use of drugs or her involvement in any criminal activity whatsoever," the appeals court wrote. The Von Hofes' attorney, Jonathan J. Einhorn, said Kathleen Von Hofe could get a mortgage for the government's half-interest in her home. As of Wednesday, the couple remained in the house, valued at $248,000....