Two other LEGAL immigration programs of concern

04/14/2014 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

We wish there were more hours in a day to write about other legal immigration programs that are changing the demographics of America and swamping our culture besides refugee resettlement, but alas there are not.

Here are reports on two Visa programs for you to watch. Both offer opportunities for massive immigration fraud.

The first is the Investor Visa, as described in this article from Michigan Live (Hat tip: Dianne):

Michigan luring “entrepreneur aliens” from Asia and the Middle East!

LANSING, MI — Michigan’s new status as a federally designated center for an increasingly popular investor visa program — just the second of its kind in the nation — will uniquely position the state to attract foreign capital and create local jobs, according to experts and stakeholders.

United States Customs and Immigration expedited and approved Michigan’s application to run its own EB-5 Regional Center, the Snyder administration announced this week, citing support from the governor, the state’s entire Congressional delegation and Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan.

The federal EB-5 visa program is designed to attract “entrepreneur aliens” by offering them a green card in exchange for domestic investments that produce at least 10 new jobs in the U.S.

Read it all. The Center for Immigration Studies has done a lot of reporting on problems with this program, here. Michelle Malkin calls it the “cash-for-visas racket,” here.

Religious workers Visa

This isn’t just for the Imams, Priests, Ministers, but for “religious workers” supposedly needed to back-up the leaders. Rep. Honda wants to make the program permanent so Congress doesn’t have to revisit it every few years with the possibility each time of killing it!

From ZeeNewsIndia:

Washington: Aimed at facilitating immigration of religious workers including those of Hindu and Sikh faith, a US lawmaker has introduced a legislation in the House of Representatives.

Introduced yesterday by Congressman Mike Honda, the Freedom of Faith Act (HR 4460), will make permanent the special immigrant provision for non-minister religious workers.

The current religious workers programme is set to expire in 2015.

When passed by the Congress, the Act would cover religious workers, who provide a variety of services, such as translating for Korean Presbyterian churches, singing as cantors in Jewish temples, delivering sermons as mullahs (clerics) in Muslim mosques, and helping with Hindu pujas during Dussehra, Naimittika, Shivaratri, and Sikh ceremonies such as Akhandpath. [What! We don’t have enough religious workers here already? If not, how about training some right here—ed]

Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, Jain, Mormon, Catholic, Hindu, Sikh, and Muslim workers would benefit from this.

“For over two decades, Congress has reauthorised this programme time and time again,” Honda said.

Can you just imagine how broadly the “workers” definition is being interpreted!

The next time you hear someone say: ‘I don’t like illegal immigration, but we welcome legal immigration!’ Think about these kinds of LEGAL immigration and give them a bop over the head!

Washington state: Couple faces extradition for ripping off Romanian government

03/22/2014 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

These aren’t refugees, far from it!

Radu and Diana Nemes, nice immigrant couple next door!

They are a super-rich Romanian couple with most of their millions stashed away in Dubai, but they had somehow gotten into America, overstayed, and were already on a detainer from ICE when it was learned they were wanted in Romania. They are now being held in detention while their lawyers fight the detention.*

So, if they aren’t “refugees” why am I writing about this?

As a hobby at RRW, we have followed probably a hundred food stamp fraud cases perpetrated by immigrant owners of ‘Mom & Pop’ convenience stores and gas stations and I’ve contended that many of those immigrant ‘entrepreneurs’ got in here on an E-2 Investor Visa. Reader ‘pungentpeppers’ read this long news story to the end and reports that they were trying to get an E-2 visa when they bought into a winery.

With an E-2 visa, the immigrant ‘entrepreneur’ with minor children can stay in America for 5 years at a time, and then must renew the visa. The Nemeses expected to be staying for a long time because authorities found illegal guns and an underground bunker in the expensive new home they were building.

The next time you hear the Open Borders lobby bragging about how immigrants are opening businesses, remember the Nemeses.

Just a reminder to you, mostly politically-correct Republicans, when you are tempted to say, ‘I don’t like illegal immigration, but LEGAL is what America is all about!’ think about people like this Romanian pair who got in here through some legal means.

From the Nisqually Valley News:

A U.S. Magistrate judge on Thursday ordered Radu and Diana Nemes to remain detained pending the resolution of their extradition case.

The Nemeses’ lawyer said she would appeal the decision.

Court documents reveal that agents found an underground bunker at the couple’s property where they were building a “luxury home,” and found more than a half dozen firearms, including an AR-15 “assault rifle,” in the residence where the couple was living.

Radu Nemes, 39, and his wife Diana Nemes, 38, who were arrested on Tuesday under an extradition treaty with Romania, are accused of defrauding the Romanian government of the equivalent of about $73 million, according to court documents. The Nemeses are also accused of laundering money, and allegedly used the funds to purchase vehicles, business interests and living expenses, and to construct a luxury home. Court documents also state they purchased a 67 percent interest in Eagleview Hill, LLC, the corporation that owns Eagleview Hill Winery in Rainier and Salida Wine Bar in Yelm.

[….]

Diana Nemes initially expressed she wanted to invest in the company to obtain an E-2 visa, McCrea (winery owner) said. Such a visa allows a non-citizen to stay in the United States predicated on their being the majority owner of a business.

Amazing story, read it all.

Come on mainstream media! Why can’t some real investigative reporter dig into this Investor visa scam which definitely involves some American immigration lawyers and help expose this immigrant ‘entrepreneur’ mythology.

* Did you know that the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services, a federal refugee contractor, opposes detention for immigrants.

Investigation: Nearly 20,000 ‘Mom and Pop’ stores involved in trafficking food stamps

02/22/2013 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

First, according to Hot Air which tipped us off to this news:

During President Obama’s first term in office, participation in the federal food stamp program increased from about 32 million Americans in 2009 to approximately 48 million by October of 2012 — an average growth rate of just over 11,000 recipients per day…..

And, now the Obama Agriculture Department is going to crack down (they say!) on the practice of swapping food stamps for cash—a practice I believe is behind the sharp rise in food stamp use (not that we have more hungry people)!

RRW readers know that Food Stamp Fraud has been a side interest of mine ever since I noticed a trend in who is actually committing the fraud—immigrant store owners and their customers.* If you search RRW for ‘food stamp fraud’ you will very quickly see exactly who I mean (LOL! the ‘Mohammad’ coefficient is very high).

Mohammad Khan was busted for trafficking food stamps in this convenience store in Hagerstown, MD in 2008. Joe Crocetta, Staff Photographer Hagerstown Herald Mail

I believe there is an international understanding that all one needs to do is to get an “investor” visa, buy a cheap convenience store and set up the “trafficking” of SNAP (taxpayer) dollars from the patsies in the federal government to one’s wallet and to wallets across the world.

It works like this: customer exchanges his benefit by receiving approximately 50 cents on every dollar exchanged. The store owner then submits the charge for the full dollar to the government agency administering the program as if food has been purchased in that amount. Some stores I’ve reported on have scammed the taxpayer to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars before being caught—prison terms are for less than 5 years generally (and although there may have been deportations, I don’t recall seeing one).

Here is The Hill yesterday (the last line is the best):

The Obama administration is taking additional steps to crack down on cash payments for food stamps.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) on Thursday announced it would take action against the “bad actors” who abuse the program by extending the legal definition of “trafficking” to include indirect ways of receiving cash for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits.

It is already illegal to sell SNAP benefits directly for cash, but the new rules would also bar cash refunds for products purchased with food stamps.

“Where there is a will to commit malfeasance, bad actors will try to find a way, and we must do everything we can to stay ahead of the curve,” said Agriculture Under Secretary Kevin Concannon. “Today’s announcement reaffirms USDA’s ongoing commitment to cracking down on abuse and protecting taxpayers’ investment in this critical nutrition lifeline.”

The USDA is also mulling a proposal to immediately freeze the payment of SNAP benefits to retailers “suspected of flagrant trafficking violations,” rather than waiting for an investigation to suspend the store’s ability to redeem the SNAP benefits. Comments are being accepted on the proposed rule. [The investigations can take more than a year, as we saw in our local bust in 2008, so this is an important change.—ed]

Last year, the USDA permanently disqualified almost 1,400 retailers from participating in SNAP for exchanging cash for benefits or falsifying applications.

According to the most recent SNAP fraud report by the USDA, food stamp trafficking “diverted an estimated $330 million annually from SNAP benefits –— or about one cent of each SNAP dollar — between 2006 and 2008.”

Out of the nearly 240,000 stores active in the SNAP program, about 8.2 percent trafficked, according to the 2011 investigation.

Get that! They disqualified 1,400 stores, but they estimate 8.2% are crooks! If my math is correct 8.2% of 240,000 stores is 19,680 stores! They have a long way to go!

*Note to “customers” who sell their stamps for cash, you are criminals and can be prosecuted too!

Update! Here is a story from New Mexico with a greater variety of food stamp scamming techniques. What does this tell you!

She said the biggest issue is people who sell their EBT card and report it lost or stolen. Out of the 138,927 cards issued to New Mexicans in 2012, more than 93,000 were replacement cards, Squier said. That’s about 70 percent.