Interesting Statistic

Did you know that since 1960, 75 Texas midwives have been convicted of fraudulently registering Mexican-born babies as U.S. citizens? Did you know that there are another 250 midwives on the State Department's "suspicious" list?

A group of immigration attornies and the ACLU filed a federal lawsuit because the State Department was using extreme caution in granting passports to these people with questionable citizenship status. According to the lawsuit, the government has "effectively reduced to second-class citizenship status an entire swath of passport applicants based solely on their being of Mexican or Latino descent and having been delivered by midwives in nonhospital settings in Sowthwestern border states." And what, may I ask, is wrong with that?

One example they use is Anna Karen Ramirez. She was born in 1989 in Hidalgo. Her Mexican citizen parents came to Hidalgo for the sole purpose of having her on U.S. soil, then they hightailed it back to Mexico where she has lived ever since. Under such suspicious circumstances, the State Department reasonably denied her request for a passport. She sued. And while the lawsuit was pending, she voted in the U.S. presidential election. And we wonder how Obama got elected!

"Midwived bring citizenship questions." The Dallas Morning News; February 11, 2009; p. 3A.