The Volokh Conspiracy

The New York Times has an interesting article on the political attitudes of New York City’s Russian immigrant community. Unlike most New Yorkers and especially most New York Jews (the Russian immigrant community is overwhelmingly Jewish), they tend to support the GOP over the Democrats:

To many Russian and Ukrainian immigrants, the cornucopia in the shops along Brighton Beach Avenue — pyramids of oranges, heaps of Kirby cucumbers, bushels of tomatoes with their vines still attached and a variety of fish, sausages and pastries — seems like an exuberant rebuke of the meager produce that was available to them when they lived in the Soviet Union.

This contrast helps explain a striking political anomaly: immigrants from the former Soviet Union are far more apt to vote for Republicans than are most New Yorkers, who often drink in Democratic Party allegiance with their mothers’ milk and are four times as likely to register as Democrats than as Republicans....

One reason these voters tend to support Republicans is that they see them as more ardent warriors against the kind of big-government, business-stifling programs that soured their lives in the Soviet Union. Their conservative stances on issues like taxes and Israel seem to outweigh their more liberal views on social issues like abortion.

Tatiana Varzar came to the United States in 1979, at age 21, from the Ukrainian seaport of Odessa. She worked as a manicurist and then opened a small restaurant on the boardwalk that grew into Tatiana Restaurant, a spacious magnet for foodies who like a whiff of salt air and a sea view with their pirogen.....

“I am what I am because of capitalism,” Ms. Varzar said, “and Republicans are more capitalistic.”

Obviously, this article is not the first to point out the stark contrast between Russian Jewish political attitudes and those of most native-born Jews. I blogged about the phenomenon here, here, and here, including links to previous commentary on the issue by others.

The Times article does, however, provide a good summary of the major reasons why Russian Jewish voters support the GOP: a combination of a preference for free markets and a relatively hawkish foreign policy. The Times is also correct to point out that Russian Jewish immigrants tend to vote for the GOP despite the fact that most of them are socially liberal (they tend to be highly secular, pro-choice, and generally left of center on most social issues, with the important exception of gay rights, where many immigrants brought with them the homophobia that is rampant in Russia itself). For most Russian immigrants, social issues are not as salient as economics and foreign policy. In many of these respects, as the Times notes, Russian immigrants’ political preferences are similar to those of immigrants from other communist and former communist nations, such as Cuba and Vietnam.

Obviously, as with voters from other groups, Russian immigrants’ attitudes are affected by political ignorance. Many may be unaware of the massive extent to which the GOP has sometimes deviated from support for free markets, especially in the Bush years. At least in my experience, many of them also overestimate the dovishness of the Democratic Party (though I hasten to add that I haven’t seen scientific polling data on this). That said, there is little doubt that, at least in New York – which has one of the most economically liberal Democratic parties in the nation – the GOP is significantly less economically statist than the Democrats.

Because New York is so overwhelmingly Democratic, the GOP leanings of Russian voters make little difference in statewide elections. They do, however, as the Times points out, sometimes make the difference in local and congressional races, which are more closely contested.

For now, the political clout of the Russian Jewish community is severely limited by its small numbers and by its concentration in areas (Boston, New York, Silicon Valley) that are overwhelmingly Democratic. Most Russian immigrants also lack the wealth and political connections that are more common among native-born Jews (though there are some striking exceptions, such as Google founder Sergey Brin). However, as Russian Jews continue to grow as a proportion of the total Jewish population and continue to increase their income and influence, they could have an effect on internal Jewish community politics. There are now some 700,000 Russian Jewish immigrants in the US, about 12% of the total Jewish population. And that percentage may well grow, if only because Russian immigration is continuing (though at a reduced rate), while the native-born Jewish population has a low birth rate.

Russian Jews have also begun to have an impact in the academic and intellectual worlds. Harvard economist Andrei Shleifer and the VC’s own Eugene Volokh are among the best known of a growing contingent of Russian Jewish immigrant academics who have had a significant impact on their fields. In sharp contrast to most other academics, Russian immigrant scholars in the humanities and social sciences are overwhelmingly conservative or libertarian (more commonly the latter), perhaps to an even greater extent than the community as a whole.

UPDATE: I suppose I should add that I do not mean to suggest that most Russian Jewish immigrants are consistent economic libertarians. Very few voters are rigorously consistent adherents to any ideology, and Russian Jews are no exception. They are, however, on average more sympathetic to free markets than the average voter – especially in liberal areas such as New York City.

UPDATE #2: Neither the article nor I distinguish rigorously between former Soviet Jews from Ukraine and those from Russia, although obviously these are now two different countries, and Ukrainian nationalists are not fond of Russia. Most Ukrainian Jewish immigrants are Russian-speakers and identify far more with Russian language and culture than Ukrainian. However, it’s worth noting that non-Jewish Ukrainian immigrants (like my wife’s mother’s family) who arrived since the rise of communism also tend towards the political right.

From a Quinnipiac poll, conducted April 11 to April 17:

47. As you may know, in 2010 the state of Arizona passed a law that requires police to verify the legal status of someone they have already stopped or arrested if they suspect that the person is in the country illegally. Do you approve or disapprove of Arizona’s immigration law?

The answers by race/ethnicity: Whites approve 66%-28%, blacks approve 55%-37%, and Hispanics disapprove 49%-47%. I thought the near even division among Hispanics was noteworthy, and indicative of just how broad anti-illegal-immigration sentiment is, including among the group whose citizen and legal resident members are most likely to suffer the side effects of such enforcement (e.g., extended detention if there’s some mistake, or possibly a stop that is motivated partly by a concern about the person’s possibly being an illegal immigrant).

On the other hand, that a May 7-12, 2010 AP-Univision Poll poll, which asked, “Do you think that local police forces should have the power to enforce immigration laws, or do you think the job of enforcing immigration laws should be reserved only for the federal government?,” reported that 16% of Hispanics said local police should have such power, and 81% said it should be reserved for the federal government. (There was similar hostility to the Arizona law in particular, but without details on what the Arizona law does.) I’m not sure how to reconcile these results with the Quinnipiac results, though obviously the text of the question must make something of a difference.

Incidentally, the 2010 AP-Univision poll concluded, among other things, 52% of Hispanics said the U.S. government “should do more to keep illegal immigrants from entering and staying in the U.S.” (42% disagreed), even though 74% of Hispanics said that on balance “illegal immigrants mostly make a contribution to American society [rather than being] mostly a drain on American society” (21% said they were mostly a drain). The sense that the laws need to be enforced — setting aside the question of who should enforce them — is, I think, pretty powerful, even among those who seem to be skeptical of the merits of the laws.

Thanks to Mickey Kaus for the pointer.

Politico’s Arena site recently asked contributors to weigh in on whether the GOP is likely to be “wounded” by its support for severe restrictions on immigration. My answer is available here:

The real tragedy here is not that the GOP might suffer politically, but that so many conservative Republicans have turned against immigration in the first place. Conservatives claim to support free markets, yet many of them also wish to use massive government intervention to close off an international free market in labor. They extol the virtues of self-help, economic opportunity, and individual achievement. Yet many of them also want to build a wall to keep out immigrants who come seeking greater freedom and opportunity than they could hope for in their native lands.

Had the restrictive immigration policies favored by some of today’s conservatives been in force a century ago, the ancestors of most of those conservatives would never have been able to come to America in the first place....

Ronald Reagan said that America should be “a tall, proud city… teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace.. and … doors …. open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here.” More recently, former Florida governor Jeb Bush urged Republicans to rethink their views on immigration. Conservative Republicans should heed their call.

In this post, I explained why conservatives (and some libertarians) are wrong to worry that increased immigration will lead to a larger welfare state. Evidence from many countries suggests that increased immigration and ethnic diversity actually reduces support for welfare state policies.

For this reason, among others, Jeb Bush is right to urge a change in the GOP position on this issue:

Republicans should reengage on this issue and reframe it. Start by recognizing that new Americans strengthen our economy. We need more people to come to this country, ready to work and to contribute their creativity to our economy.... Just as Republicans believe in free trade of goods, we should support the freer flow of human talent.

Temple law professor Peter Spiro has an interesting New York Times column arguing that supporters of immigration should not fear a Supreme Court decision upholding Arizona’s draconian anti-illegal immigrant law, because interjurisdictional competition is likely to take care of the problem. By contrast, he fears that if the Court strikes down the law, the result could be the enactment of much more dangerous federal legislation:

Arizona is one of several states, including Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and Indiana, that, frustrated by Congress’s idling on immigration reform, have challenged federal authority by taking it upon themselves to devise draconian policies for undocumented immigrants....

Such laws are misguided at best, mean-spirited and racially tainted at worst. The conventional wisdom among immigration advocates is that immigrant interests will be best served if the Supreme Court makes an example of Arizona’s law by striking it down.

But in the long run, immigrant interests will be better helped if the Supreme Court upholds S.B. 1070....

Undocumented immigrants may themselves be politically powerless, but they have powerful allies. In Alabama and Georgia, dismayed farmers have watched crops rot in the fields for want of immigrant labor. Arizona is estimated to have lost more than $140 million from convention cancellations made in protest.

Even more important is the prospect of lost foreign investment. Caught in the net of Alabama’s law in November was a German Mercedes-Benz executive, who left his passport at home while out for a drive and as a result found himself in a county jail. Mercedes has a plant in Tuscaloosa that employs thousands of Alabamians and adds many hundreds of millions of dollars to the state economy. That embarrassment will make the next foreign company think twice as it scouts out a location for a manufacturing facility in the United States....

In those states that have enacted laws, there are moves to roll them back. The Alabama House of Representatives has approved a Republican-sponsored bill to soften its current law....

Even if some of these state immigration laws survive political, corporate and consumer opposition on the ground, it’s better to have the scattered imposition of state laws than the blanket coverage of a federal measure. Other states and localities are welcoming immigrants, legal or not. That fact gets lost in the common indictment of state and local immigration measures as a “patchwork.” One of federalism’s core virtues is the possibility of competition among states. Competition in this context is likely to vindicate pro-immigrant policies.

I am much less certain than Spiro that a decision striking down the Arizona law is likely to be followed by punitive federal legislation. Congress is deeply divided on the subject, and the Obama administration is likely to oppose any such law. Even if Mitt Romney becomes president and has a narrow Republican congressional majority, passage of draconian federal legislation is far from certain, especially given the large number of competing political priorities that a new GOP administration would face.

That said, Spiro is right to suggest that interjurisdictional competition is likely to constrain the spread of Arizona-style illegal immigration laws, and possibly lead to the repeal or reform of some of the laws already enacted in various states. Even if a few states do retain these sorts of laws, businesses and individuals can effectively “vote with their feet” against them by moving to other states. As Spiro points out, this makes ill-advised state laws in this field much less dangerous than comparable federal ones.

UPDATE: I have revised some parts of this post for clarity.

UPDATE #2: I should note that there is one way in which the Arizona immigration law may be worse than a comparable federal law would be. I explained in detail in this 2010 post.

The Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society has just published a book of thirty immigration memoirs by Soviet Jewish immigrants, which is available for sale here. My father, Yefim Somin, and I are among the contributors. There are also several well-known contributors such as novelist Gary Shteyngart and artist Marc Klionsky.

I blogged about my contribution here.

This Sunday from 3 to 5 PM, I will be at an event sponsored by the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society in New York City, for the launch of a book of memoirs of immigration by Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union.

The book includes contributions by thirty different immigrants, including a short version of my own immigration memoir. Among the speakers at the event are several authors of chapters in the book, and Gal Beckerman, author of an important recent work on Jewish emigration from the USSR that I commented on here. The location is the Center for Jewish History, 15 West 16 Street (between Fifth and Sixth Avenues) New York, NY 10011. You can get tickets at the door or here.

For readers who may be interested, Immigration Daily recently reprinted my November post on “What’s Distinctive About America.”

In this recent Washington Post op ed on how the GOP can increase its appeal to Hispanic voters, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush says the following about immigration:

The American immigrant experience is the most aspirational story ever told. Immigrants left all that was familiar to them to come here and make a better life for their families. That they believe this is possible only in America is the best expression of American exceptionalism I know. And on this score, Republicans have a winning message and record as the party of the entrepreneur....

[W]e need to think of immigration reform as an economic issue, not just a border security issue.....

Republicans should reengage on this issue and reframe it. Start by recognizing that new Americans strengthen our economy. We need more people to come to this country, ready to work and to contribute their creativity to our economy. U.S. immigration policies should reflect that principle. Just as Republicans believe in free trade of goods, we should support the freer flow of human talent.

These points are not new. That immigration “strengthen[s] our economy” is the longstanding consensus view of most economists. Others have previously noted that there is a deep contradiction between anti-immigration conservatives’ support for free markets and their opposition to the free flow of labor across national borders. Ronald Reagan recognized this many years ago, and supported freer immigration throughout most of his political career, even touting an America whose “doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here” in his 1989 farewell address to the nation. The importance of Bush’s op ed is not that it says anything new, but that the person saying it is a prominent Republican whom many conservatives see as a preferable alternative to the party’s current presidential candidates.

Unfortunately, Bush did not address what is perhaps the most important objection many conservatives have to increased immigration: the fear that it will lead to the growth of the welfare state. I covered that issue here. Contrary to conservative conventional wisdom, increased immigration not only does not lead to a bigger welfare state, but may well boost efforts to cut it back.

The Metafilter site has an interesting thread consisting of comments by foreigners about what they think is most distinctive about the US [HT: Tyler Cowen]. I’ve lived in the US since I was six, so I can’t really see the country from the perspective of a foreigner or a recent immigrant. On the other hand, I did grow up in an immigrant family, have spent time in many foreign countries (including teaching at universities in Germany and Argentina), and have lived in several different parts of the US. So I have some perspective on the issue.

Obviously, there are the ideological and political differences that some of the commenters cite: compared to most other advanced democracies the US is more politically decentralized (though a few European nations, such as Switzerland, are even more so); more pro-free market (though Canada is now roughly equal to the US on various measures of economic freedom); more religious; and less class-conscious. These traits are, I think, well-known. The Metafilter commenters focus mostly on differences in everyday life, and so will I.

Some of the points they stress strike me as valid. Compared to most other countries, America has much better customer service and Americans are more friendly than Europeans and Asians in casual social interactions. My father (who has visited some thirty countries) jokes that the US and Canada are the only truly civilized nations because they’re the only ones that have really good customer service. I would add Japan to that list.

However, outside customer service settings, the US edge in niceness over some European countries is not as great as many people suppose. I was, for example, impressed with how nice people were in Germany, despite the country’s mediocre reputation in that regard.

It is also true that Americans are, on average, less likely to know foreign languages than Europeans or East Asians. Some of that is indeed due to American insularity, as many foreigners suppose. However, it’s also because Americans have less incentive to learn foreign languages due to the status of English as the dominant international language.

Here are a few points that the Metafilter commenters have largely ignored:

Perhaps the biggest one is attitudes towards immigrants. Despite the xenophobia evident in the political backlash against illegal immigration, Americans are, on the whole, far more accepting of immigrants than most Europeans and Asians. You can live in France or Germany for decades and still not be accepted as a true Frenchman or German. It’s much easier for an immigrant to become a “real American.” I have relatives and acquaintances who are Russian immigrants in several European countries and in Israel. The difference in degree of acceptance and assimilation between Russians who settled there and in the US is very striking. Only Anglophone Canada is comparable to the US in this respect (though I don’t know enough to be able to tell if Australia and/or New Zealand also qualify).

Many of the Metafilter commenters emphasize how Americans are more open with strangers than Europeans. This is true to some extent. But not on all topics. Relative to people in many European countries, Americans are much less likely to ask how much money you make, or to criticize your political or religious opinions. Russians are at the opposite end of this continuum: they will brazenly demand to know how much you make even if you just met, and forcefully attack your political views at the drop of a hat. Western Europeans and Argentinians are somewhere in between these two extremes.

More generally, the US has a strong culture of self-esteem that makes it socially awkward to openly criticize people in many contexts. For example, American professors have to be much more careful about criticizing students than European ones. Russia is, once again, at the opposite end of the continuum from the US. This aspect of American culture is not entirely positive.

At least in the educated classes, Americans are more sensitive than Europeans and Asians to anything that smacks of racism or ethnic prejudice. Russians are again at the opposite end of the continuum, with Western Europeans in between (the exception to this generalization is the strong sensitivity to anti-Semitism in Germany, for which there are obvious historical reasons). Even well-educated, liberal-minded Russians will sometimes say things about nonwhites that only the most hidebound racists would dare to state here. As with the culture of self-esteem, concern about racism sometimes shades into counterproductive hypersensitivity. On balance, though, I think it’s less dangerous to be overly sensitive about racism than not sensitive enough.

Finally, Americans generally expect greater respect for “personal space” than Europeans and especially Asians. In the US, people are careful to avoid bumping into each other in public spaces. Not so in Europe and East Asia, though there is some variation between countries.

How can the U.S. maintain its standard of living, and its position of world leadership (technological, economic, and political)? Obviously it’s getting harder, partly because we’ve been so successful at sharing our free enterprise economic model with the world (a model that we itself inherited from others, though we improved on it), so that countries that once couldn’t effectively compete with us economically now can compete. And though the surge in international trade benefits us as consumers — and often as producers — as well as competing with our producers, competing with lower-wage countries has naturally gotten harder as international trade has gotten freed up.

Of course, we might be able to improve our competitiveness in various ways, such as improving our educational system, removing counterproductive regulations and taxes, and so on. But again these sort of ideas can be copied by our competitors — to everyone’s aggregate benefit, but in a way that reduces our leadership position.

We do, however, have one huge advantage over many countries that is hard to compete with: We have a long-term history of political freedom, political stability, economic freedom, military security, and relative freedom from corruption. This is something that other countries can’t reliably copy, partly because it takes a long time to establish relatively certain protections along these lines.

Moreover, I think that on balance size does matter when it comes to national influence. China and India are especially important players partly (though of course not solely) because they’re so big, and we have long benefited from this as well. A materially larger population would obviously cause density problems, including in places like my own Los Angeles, but I suspect that it is on balance something that would help the country as a whole.

This suggests that one of the most valuable competitive advantages we have is our ability to allow immigration by people who we think are going to add to our national prosperity — whether wealthy investors, skilled knowledge workers, or industrious laborers. We’ve done it before, and it seems likely we can keep doing it for quite a while into the future, especially since political, economic, and military instability continue to be serious threats in much of the world.

Such immigration will indeed likely cause some problems for some, whether because some places get more crowded, because some occupations get more competitive, or for various other reasons. But my sense is that substantially increased immigration (albeit increased in a somewhat targeted fashion) will improve the welfare of the nation as a whole. And I’d go further and say that it is likely necessary, and not just desirable, if we want to maintain (to the extent possible) our edge over others.

One of the unfortunate things about recent illegal immigration debates, it seems to me, has been that they have distracted from the much more important debate about how we can increase — perhaps dramatically increase — legal immigration in a way to maximize net benefit for the nation. To some extent, it is inevitable that we will constantly have competitors who are close to our level of prosperity, at least so long as other countries can avoid bombing each other into rubble (which is one of the things that contributed to our huge advantage shortly after World War II) or choosing ridiculously ineffective economic policies (which helped to contribute to our huge advantage during the Cold War). But to the extent that we want to stay ahead, or even keep up, for as long as possible, it seems to me that we have to use the strongest advantage we have: being a great place for productive people to live.

This isn’t even near my core area of expertise, so perhaps I’m mistaken on this; and it’s also rather obvious in certain ways — others have said it before. But at the same time, however obvious it may be, it seems to me that political leaders are not focusing much on it. I think it’s about time they did.

Conservative and libertarian critics of immigration like to cite Milton Friedman’s observation that “[y]ou cannot simultaneously have free immigration and a welfare state,” which co-blogger Ken Anderson recently endorsed. The fear is that, given relatively open borders, immigrants from poor countries will flock to wealthy ones and undermine their economies by consuming huge amounts of welfare benefits.

I am a great admirer of Friedman and his scholarship. But he was not an expert on immigration, and, as far as I can tell, he never systematically studied the evidence on the impact of immigration on political support for the welfare state. That evidence overwhelmingly shows that ethnic heterogeneity greatly reduces support for welfare state spending because voters are less willing to support welfare programs if they believe that a large percentage of the money is going to members of a different racial or ethnic group.

I cite some of the relevant studies in a recent article in the International Affairs Forum on Immigration (pg. 43). The research shows that this effect holds true even in a strongly left-wing country like Sweden. This book by political scientists Donald Kinder and Cindy Kam presents the evidence for the United States (and to a lesser extent, several European countries). Historically, the greater ethnic diversity of the US is one of the main reasons why we have a smaller welfare state than most European nations; the evidence on that point is summarized in a well-known study by Edward Glaeser and Alberto Alesina. Because people are most likely to support welfare programs when the money goes to recipients who are “like us,” immigration actually undermines the welfare state rather than reinforces it. Even if the new immigrants themselves vote for expanded welfare state benefits (which is far from always a given), their political impact is likely to be offset by that of native-born citizens who are generally wealthier, more numerous, and more likely to vote and otherwise participate in politics.

This feedback effect creates a difficult dilemma for liberals and leftists who support immigration but also want to expand the welfare state. Paul Krugman calls the welfare-immigration tradeoff an “agonizing issue” for liberal Democrats. But for libertarians and other supporters of economic liberty, immigration is a win-win game. It is both an important exercise of economic freedom in its own right, and has the secondary effect of constraining the welfare state.

It may be lamentable that immigration fails to expand the welfare state primarily because of ethnic bias. I would rather that voters had more admirable motives. But in politics, we often face tradeoffs where it’s better to do the right thing for the wrong reason than not do it at all. Moreover, it is no more bigoted to oppose welfare state benefits because they go to members of other ethnic groups than to support them because they go to members of your group. For example, Kinder and Kam find that strongly “ethnocentric” white voters are more likely to support Social Security benefits than other whites, because they see it as a program that primarily benefits non-Hispanic whites like themselves. In relatively homogeneous states, voters tend to support higher levels of welfare benefits than they would otherwise because they see them as supporting members of their own ethnic or racial group. In more diverse societies, the public supports relatively lower benefits because of a perception that too much of the money goes to racial or ethnic “others.” The former attitude is no less biased than the latter.

Finally, it’s worth noting, as Bryan Caplan emphasizes, that we need not choose between limiting immigration and cutting welfare benefits across the board. We can, instead, selectively deny such benefits to new immigrants and/or require them to pay special taxes to offset any fiscal burden they might impose on natives. Conservative critics of immigration who recognize these alternatives fear that they won’t be politically viable. But the feedback effect discussed above implies that their political prospects are quite good. Most voters are quite happy to support cutting welfare benefits for recent immigrants or making the latter “pay for themselves.” That’s why the extensive restrictions on immigrant welfare embedded in the 1996 welfare reform act were very popular, as are similar measures proposed in various European countries.

Some on the left fear that such measures are inhumane or unfair to immigrants. That may be so; I’m not an unequivocal fan of these policies myself, particularly the taxes (I’m more sympathetic to welfare restrictions). But they’re a lot less unjust than consigning would-be migrants to a life of Third World poverty and oppression, which is what happens to those whom we deny the right to enter in the first place.

The decision came Wednesday, in Suradi v. Holder; it’s not unprecedented, but my sense is that such decisions are rare enough to be noteworthy. An excerpt from the memorandum signed by Judges D.W. Nelson and Bybee, together with a dissent by Chief Judge Kozinski:

Iman Khalil Suradi (“Suradi”), a native and citizen of Jordan, petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (BIA) rejection of her application for deferral of removal under the Convention Against Torture (CAT). We grant the petition and remand to the BIA for further proceedings consistent with this disposition.

To establish eligibility for deferral of removal under CAT, Suradi must demonstrate “only a chance greater than fifty percent that [she] will be tortured if removed” to Jordan. The torture may be “inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity.” “Acquiescence of a public official requires that the public official, prior to the activity constituting torture, have awareness of such activity and thereafter breach his or her legal responsibility to intervene to prevent such activity.” ...

The record compels the conclusion that Suradi will more likely than not be killed in an honor killing if she is removed to Jordan. Suradi testified that it is “something definite” that she will be killed due to the shame of her extramarital affairs and drug conviction. Under § 1208.16(c)(2), this testimony alone, even if not corroborated, may be sufficient to sustain her burden. However, her brother corroborated her testimony, stating, “It’s not I think. I know that she will [be killed].” In addition, Suradi provided several articles and country reports describing the problem of honor killings in Jordan, a fact which the IJ acknowledged.

Substantial evidence does not support the IJ’s finding that Suradi has not reported any threats from her family or husband. This finding is directly contrary to Suradi’s credible testimony; her declaration in support of her asylum application asserts that her husband has explicitly threatened to kill her to “cleanse the dishonor” caused by her extramarital affairs in the U.S. Suradi also declares that her family has “threatened that I must end [an extramarital] relationship otherwise I would pay the price.”

Because the IJ and BIA were required to accept Suradi’s testimony as true, Ornelas-Chavez, 458 F.3d at 1056, and the testimony of both Suradi and her brother indicate it is nearly certain that Suradi will be killed, the record compels the conclusion that it is more likely than not that Suradi will be subjected to an honor killing by her family or estranged husband. There is no evidence in the record rebutting her credible testimony....

The IJ’s finding that the Jordanian government does not acquiesce in honor killings is not supported by substantial evidence. Purporting to rely on the State Department’s human rights report on Jordan, the IJ found that there were only sixteen honor killings in Jordan in 2008, and that these killings were prosecuted by the government. Therefore, the IJ concluded that Suradi had failed to meet her burden to show that the government would more likely than not be unable or unwilling to prevent the harm. However, the IJ’s finding was based on a clear misreading of the State Department report.

Continue reading ‘Ninth Circuit Panel Finds (by 2-1 Vote) That Jordanian Government Acquiesces in Honor Killings, Holds Jordanian Woman May Not Be Deported’ »

In this post, Tyler Cowen asks why Russian Jewish immigrants tend to overwhelmingly support the GOP rather than the Democrats. The reasons are actually no mystery. As I have previously explained here and here, Russian Jews are hawkish on foreign policy and their experience with communism leads them to be suspicious of domestic policies that seem socialistic. Also, they dislike the Democratic Party because it was relatively dovish during the Cold War. Immigrants from other communist countries, such as the Cubans and Vietnamese, tend to be Republican for much the same reasons. So Russian Jews are not unusual in this regard. They only seem so by comparison with native-born American Jews, who are overwhelmingly liberal Democrats.

Tyler asks why Russian Jews tend to be opposed to affirmative action and gay marriage. But the vast majority of all white Americans are opposed to affirmative action (64% in this 2009 poll). So Russian immigrant attitudes on this issue are not surprising. They only seem so by comparison with native-born American Jews, who are the only white ethnic group that tends to support affirmative action.

As for gay rights, Russian Jews are indeed far more opposed to them, on average, than native-born whites. The reason, unfortunately, is probably simple homophobia. Anti-gay prejudice is widespread in Russia, with 74% of Russians endorsing the view that gays and lesbians are “morally dissolute or mentally defective persons,” according to a 2010 poll. At least in my experience, Russian Jews are no exception to this general tendency, though younger, more assimilated immigrants are less likely to be anti-gay than those who were older when they arrived. Homophobia aside, most Russian Jews are not socially conservative generally. For example, the vast majority are secular and pro-choice.

Tyler is probably wrong to suggest that Russian Jews’ anti-gay attitudes are part of a general willingness to “affiliate with the American brand of Christianity found in the Republican Party” because “[r]elated strains of thought have been prevalent in Russia for a long time.” The Russian Orthodox Church has little in common with conservative American Protestantism, though both tend to be anti-gay. In any event, most Russian Jews feel little affinity for the Orthodox Church because it has a long history of anti-Semitism and (more recently) collaboration with Communism and Vladimir Putin’s authoritarianism.

It is probably the case, however, that Russian Jews have less fear of the religious right than native-born American Jews. In recent Russian history, unlike in the US, the main fomenters of anti-Semitism have been communists and secular Russian nationalists. Russian Jews are therefore less likely to see conservative Christians as natural political enemies, even if the two groups have little in common in terms of their religious and social attitudes.

From Bologna v. City & County of San Francisco (Cal. Ct. App. Jan. 31, 2011):

This case arises from the tragic and senseless killings of Anthony Bologna and his sons Michael and Matthew, who were stopped in traffic in San Francisco when Edwin Ramos, an illegal immigrant, allegedly shot and killed them.... The narrow question posed in this appeal is whether the surviving family members can proceed in tort against the City under a theory that San Francisco’s policy to provide sanctuary to illegal immigrants was a legal cause of decedents’ murders because it shielded Ramos from deportation in violation of state and federal statutes. We conclude, as did the trial court, that the alleged breaches of those statutes support neither a legally viable claim of negligence per se [i.e., negligence found because of a violation of a statute -EV] under Evidence Code section 669 nor breach of mandatory duties under Government Code section 815.6. We therefore affirm the judgment....

Central to claims asserting both negligence per se and violation of a mandatory duty is the requirement that the harm allegedly caused is of the precise nature a statute was designed to prevent....

Section 11369 of the Health and Safety Code (section 11369) provides: “When there is reason to believe that any person arrested for a violation of [any of 14 specified drug offenses] may not be a citizen of the United States, the arresting agency shall notify the appropriate agency of the United States having charge of deportation matters.” Plaintiffs contend the City violated this provision by “adopting, and enforcing [its] illegal sanctuary policies so as to cause Ramos to not be reported to ICE and to not be subjected to deportation proceedings. As a result, Ramos was free to commit crimes on the streets of San Francisco.” Assuming the truth of plaintiffs’ allegation for purposes of the demurrer, no tort liability can arise solely as a result of the statutory violation unless the injury was either “of the precise nature the provision ... was specifically designed to prevent” or “resulted from an occurrence of the nature which the statute, ordinance, or regulation was designed to prevent.” We agree with the trial court that plaintiffs cannot make either showing.

The conduct and harm sought to be prevented by section 11369 was discussed in Fonseca v. Fong (2008) 167 Cal.App.4th 922. There, Division Two of this court rejected a claim that section 11369 is preempted by federal law because it impermissibly regulates immigration. Based on its consideration of the pertinent legislative history, the Fonseca court concluded that section 11369 was enacted for the purpose of combating the sale and use of illicit narcotics....

Plaintiffs have provided neither authority nor additional legislative history to contradict Fonseca’s conclusion that the Legislature enacted section 11369 to combat the illegal drug trade, and we find it compelling. This legislative purpose is fatal to plaintiffs’ claims. The fact that reporting suspected illegal immigrants arrested for drug offenses to the federal immigration authorities may also prevent them from committing violent crimes is not enough to warrant our conclusion that section 11369 creates an actionable tort on behalf of the general public. “[S]ection 815.6 requires that the mandatory duty be ‘designed’ to protect against the particular kind of injury the plaintiff suffered. The plaintiff must show the injury is ‘one of the consequences which [the enacting body] sought to prevent through imposing the alleged mandatory duty.’ Our inquiry in this regard goes to the legislative purpose of imposing the duty. That the enactment “confers some benefit” on the class to which plaintiff belongs is not enough; if the benefit is ‘incidental’ to the enactment’s protective purpose, the enactment cannot serve as a predicate for liability under section 815.6.” While section 11369 may benefit the public by removing violent drug offenders from our midst, the legislative history and the statute’s limitation to specified drug offenses confirm that this benefit is incidental....

Here’s a much longer excerpt:

Continue reading ‘Per Se Negligence, the Police, and Illegal Immigration’ »

Decision here. Not decided on Second Amendment or other RKBA grounds. Very straightforward application of existing doctrine on equal protection and legal aliens. In short, state (but not federal) discrimination against legal aliens is subject to strict scrutiny. There is an exception for “governmental functions” which involve discretion in self-governance of the polity–such as voting, teaching in public schools, being a peace officer, etc. Those exceptions were not relevant here, so the South Dakota limitation of concealed carry permits to citizens only is preliminarily enjoined.