Almost eight years after Congress enacted a law meant to protect illegal immigrants who were victims of a crime, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has issued the first U visas, documents that grant victims the right to work and reside in the U.S. for four years. At the time of the U visas’ approval, as part of the 2000 Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act, immigration wasn’t quite the incendiary issue it is today. Now, even the fairly benign goal of encouraging crime victims to call the police without fear of being deported is subject to all sorts of sturm und drang.
Filed under: News Stories Tagged: | illegal immigrants, TIP legislation, victim identification
