MESA, Ariz. (AP) - The Republican candidates say more must be done to combat illegal immigration.

The topic was a natural for Wednesday night's debate in Mesa, Ariz.

Newt Gingrich says he would devote as many resources as necessary to securing the U.S.'s southern border and that he would build two separate fences at the border to make it more difficult to cross illegally. He also ... Read More

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. (AP) - The Obama administration's top immigration official said Wednesday he wants to keep more foreign-born high-tech entrepreneurs in the U.S. But to make that happen, he said he needs those entrepreneurs to turn their creativity to immigration itself.

Members of Silicon Valley's startup community met with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service Director Alejand... Read More

FREMONT, Neb. (AP) - A Nebraska city's attempt to fight illegal immigration with a newly court-approved ordinance appears likely to be more of an inconvenience for legal residents than a deterrent to illegal immigrants.

Backers of Fremont's voter-approved measure say they're still glad a federal judge signed off on most of the ordinance's provisions Monday because it represents at least... Read More

HONG KONG (AP) - Hong Kong's government argued Tuesday against a landmark ruling that could let foreign maids gain permanent residency as it appealed a case that has raised concerns about ethnic discrimination and strains on social services.

In the ruling in September, a lower court judge found that an immigration provision denying foreign maids the right to apply for permanent residenc... Read More

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) - When Honduran-born Antonella Cecilia Packard converted to the Mormon Faith 20 years ago, she said it was like "coming home."

The Catholic-educated Packard, who grew up in "the middle of Mayan ruins," appreciated the faith's strong sense of family and conservative values. She also saw her own history in the Book of Mormon with stories of migrations, tragedies and... Read More

FLORENCE, Ariz. (AP) - Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu built a reputation as a rising, conservative star by taking a hardline stance against illegal immigration, attacking the Obama administration and appearing alongside Sen. John McCain in a 2010 re-election ad in which McCain urged federal officials to just "complete the danged fence."

But, on Saturday, Babeu's conservative image took... Read More

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) - When Honduran-born Antonella Cecilia Packard converted to the Mormon Faith 20 years ago, she said it was like "coming home."

The Catholic-educated Packard, who grew up in "the middle of Mayan ruins," appreciated the faith's strong sense of family and conservative values. She also saw her own history in the Book of Mormon with stories of migrations, tragedies and... Read More

FLORENCE, Ariz. (AP) - Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu built a reputation as a rising, conservative star by taking a hardline stance against illegal immigration, attacking the Obama administration and appearing alongside Sen. John McCain in a 2010 re-election ad in which McCain urged federal officials to just "complete the danged fence."

But, on Saturday, Babeu's conservative image took... Read More

FLORENCE, Ariz. (AP) - Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu built a reputation as a rising, conservative star by taking a hardline stance against illegal immigration, attacking the Obama administration and appearing alongside Sen. John McCain in a 2010 re-election ad in which McCain urged federal officials to just "complete the danged fence."

But, on Saturday, Babeu's conservative image took... Read More

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) - Ana Jimenez and her husband were so terrified of being sent back to their native Mexico when Alabama's tough crackdown on illegal immigrants took effect that they fled more than 2,000 miles to Los Angeles, cramming into a two-bedroom apartment with more than 20 other relatives.

Now they are among the families coming back to cities like Birmingham, as the mass dep... Read More

LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) - A federal agent accused of shooting a supervisor engaged in a serious struggle for his gun with another colleague who subsequently shot and killed him, an official said.

The shooting occurred after Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Ezequiel Garcia discussed his job performance with the agency's second-in-command in the Los Angeles region, ICE spokeswoma... Read More

LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) - An Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent accused of shooting a supervisor died after an "intense" struggle for his gun with a colleague who burst into the office after he heard shots fired, an official said Saturday.

The shooting Thursday happened after Ezequiel Garcia had a discussion about his job performance with ICE's second-in-command in the Los Angele... Read More

WASHINGTON (AP) - The deadly office shooting in California involving a federal immigrations supervisor and a special agent is the latest mark against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the law enforcement agency created after the 2001 terror attacks.

Its officers and agents have themselves been arrested for crimes, accused of improper relationships with informants, convicted in e... Read More

LONDON (AP) - The British government has paid out just over 1 million pounds (roughly $1.6 million) in compensation to dozens of child asylum seekers wrongly held in detention centers before 2005, lawyers said Saturday.

London law firm Bhatt Murphy said in a statement that the government made the payments to 40 former teenage detainees between 2009 and 2010 after the government acknowle... Read More

BAGHDAD (AP) - Lugging clothes, tables and whatever else they could carry, roughly 400 members of an Iranian exile group reluctantly moved Saturday from their camp in northwestern Iraq to a deserted military base outside the capital in what they called a show of good faith that they eventually will be allowed to leave the country peacefully.

It was the first group to move of the more th... Read More

LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) - It had all the ingredients of workplace violence: a manager, an angry employee, a discussion about job performance and at least one gun.

But in this case, both people were federal agents. And when gunfire erupted in a government office building, a third agent drew his handgun and took out the shooter, helping save the manager's life.

Investigators on Frid... Read More

LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) - A federal immigration agent who shot and injured a colleague in their office Thursday was killed when a third agent drew his weapon and fired, the FBI said.

Several shots were fired about 5:30 p.m. in the Immigration Customs Enforcement office, leaving one man wounded, said Steven Martinez, assistant director in charge of the FBI's Los Angeles office.

"An... Read More

LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) - Two people were fatally shot and one was wounded Thursday at a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Long Beach, a law enforcement official told The Associated Press.

The Long Beach police official said the shooter killed one person, wounded another with a shot to the stomach, and then was killed. It was not immediately clear if the shooter died fr... Read More

LOS ANGELES (AP) - A Los Angeles radio station has pulled two popular talk radio hosts off the air for comments they made about Whitney Houston.

KFI AM 640 suspended John Kobylt and Ken Chiampou, the hosts of the "John and Ken Show," for "making insensitive and inappropriate comments about the late Whitney Houston," it said in a statement Thursday.

"Management does not condone, su... Read More

QUITO, Ecuador (AP) - President Rafael Correa said Thursday he was considering a pardon for Ecuador's main opposition newspaper after the nation's highest court upheld a $42 million criminal libel verdict against it.

Correa told reporters he would consult with his closest political allies about whether to forgive El Universo the debt and nullify the three-year prison terms meted out to ... Read More

WASHINGTON (AP) - Interracial marriages in the U.S. have climbed to 4.8 million - a record 1 in 12 - as a steady flow of new Asian and Hispanic immigrants expands the pool of prospective spouses. Blacks are now substantially more likely than before to marry whites.

A Pew Research Center study, released Thursday, details a diversifying America where interracial unions and the mixed-r... Read More

QUITO, Ecuador (AP) - Ecuador's highest court on Wednesday heard the final appeal in a criminal libel case filed by President Rafael Correa in which three executives and a columnist of the opposition newspaper El Universo were each sentenced to three years in prison.

The defendants were also appealing awards totaling $42 million that they said represented an effort by Correa to bankrupt... Read More

NOGENT-SUR-MARNE, France (AP) - Residents are blasting a plan to erect a statue with a face resembling that of France's Italian-born first lady in an effort to honor this small town's immigrants from Italy.

Opponents say that Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, the elegant former top model from Turin, Italy's moneyed class, has no link to this blue-collar town east of Paris.

Mayor Jacques Martin... Read More

BROWNSVILLE, Texas (AP) - Max Pons is already anticipating the anxiety he'll feel when the heavy steel gate shuts behind him, leaving his home isolated on a strip of land between America's border fence and the violence raging across the Rio Grande in Mexico.

For the past year, the manager of a sprawling preserve on the southern tip of Texas has been comforted by a gap in the rust-colore... Read More

GENEVA (AP) - The U.N. refugee agency says at least 11 people have drowned and 34 are missing after a smuggling boat headed for Yemen capsized off the coast of Somalia this week.

A spokesman for the office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees says survivors reported their boat carrying 3 smugglers and 58 passengers was adrift without power for five days before overturning Wednesda... Read More