Good news for immigration patriots: The current (3/30 issue) of The Jewish Week reports that the Bush-Kennedy-McCain amnesty drive is stalling (“Presidential Politics Could Scuttle Border Reform: Jewish leaders fear immigration bill, a top communal priority, now longshot”, by James D. Besser). Reason: fierce opposition from patriots in the GOP presidential primary states.

This time around, the biggest hurdles are in the Senate because of rules that allow a single lawmaker to hold up legislation. On the hot-button issue of legal immigration, it will be hard for immigration advocates to win the 60-vote majority needed to overcome filibusters.

And there’s the presidential election.

“You already have one [presidential] campaign based mostly on opposition to illegal immigration,” said an official with one group, referring to Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.). “And the right-wing press continuing to call this a dire emergency. It’s 2008’s gay marriage issue.”

In lib-speak, that’s serious. The gay marriage issue was on the ballot in several states in 2004 and is widely credited with turning out the troops who then put W back in the White House.

The bad news for immigration patriots: what appears to be the continued knee-jerk committment of Jewish organizations to facilitating the immivasion:

A Jewish community divided on a range of other issues is mostly united behind the need for comprehensive immigration reform and regards the House bill as a good first step.

“Once you get past the Israel issue, it’s near the top of the list of priorities for a lot of groups,” said Haddar Susskind, Washington representative for the Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA).

“It’s one issue where there’s mostly agreement between progressive grass-roots groups and the big national organizations,” said Mik Moore, director of policy for the Jewish Funds for Justice. “There is a real sense of common cause.”

In a previous article I pointed out that a high percentage of Mexican emigrants to the U.S. previously had jobs in Mexico. Well, according to a recent survey conducted by the Banco de Mexico, 6 of 10 Mexican emigrants had jobs in Mexico before emigrating to the U.S. [Seis de cada 10 migrantes dejan trabajo en México Jose Manuel Arteaga, Feb. 13th, 2007, Universal]

The Banco also revealed that 3/4 of Mexican emigrants surveyed had lower than a high school education, and only 5.6% had any college.

The most lucrative jobs for Mexicans in the U.S., according to the survey, are found working in construction, as chauffeurs or auto mechanics .

According to The Chronicle of Higher Education:

“The United States plans to issue 20 percent more visas to Indian students in 2007 than in 2006, a State Department official said during a visit to India this week, according to domain-b.com, an online Indian business magazine.

During a weeklong tour of India to promote American higher education, Karen P. Hughes, under secretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs, said that the United States wanted to assure “every Indian student admitted to a legitimate institution of higher education in the U.S. that he or she will be granted a visa on time.”

Some 24,600 visas were issued to Indian students in 2006, up 32 percent over the previous year, a senior U.S. official said. According to the latest figures from an annual report on international students and scholars in the United States, about 76,500 students from India studied at American institutions in 2005. That number was down about 5 percent from the previous year.”

(U.S. Plans Increase in Number of Visas for Students From India, by Beth McMurtrie. Chronicle of Higher Education 3-29-07)