Anger over NY 'immigration game'

A Republican student group in New York has sparked claims of racism by organising a game called "Find the Illegal Immigrant".
Students will act as immigration officers in Thursday's game and try to find a student in a crowd designated with a badge as the illegal immigrant.
The game has sparked protests from other students with hundreds planning to demonstrate against it.
The New York University College Republican club denied it was racist.
It says the game is intended to raise awareness on immigration issues in the United States.
The winner of the game will take home a gift certificate.
Picketing
The game is scheduled for New York's Washington Square Park.
College Republican campaign chairman David Laska told the New York Daily News: "Is it politically correct? No. But is it racist? Absolutely not.
"You have to do something like this to get people's attention."
College Republican President Sarah Chambers added: "Just because we don't want illegal immigrants being able to completely disregard the laws of our country doesn't make us racist."
The Daily News said up to 600 students were expected to protest.
One message on the website where details of the game were given read: "Let's not be lazy; instead, let's be just as organised as they are and bring out as many protesters as possible. Bring banners, voice boxes, picket signs."
Illegal immigration has remained a key issue at all levels of society.

Lawsuit Seeks To Stop NY Immigration Raids

NEW YORK -- Immigration authorities violated Hispanic families’ civil rights by raiding their homes without court warrants, sometimes bursting in before dawn to look for people who didn’t live there, a federal lawsuit claims.
The suit was filed Thursday in a federal court in Manhattan on behalf of 15 people—including seven U.S. citizens—who say their suburban homes were raided earlier this year.
Arguing that the raids violate constitutional protections against unreasonable searches, the suit seeks unspecified damages and a halt on the home raids until Immigration and Customs Enforcement develops legal guidelines for them

ICE spokesman Mark Thorn said he had not seen the legal filing, but the agency does not comment on ongoing lawsuits.
According to the lawsuit, a program dubbed Operation Return to Sender dispatched armed federal agents to homes in search of illegal immigrants thought to have lingered after being ordered to leave the country. But the people sought often weren’t there and couldn’t “reasonably” have been expected to be, according to the legal complaint.
In one case, authorities raided a home in East Hampton, on eastern Long Island, around 4:30 a.m. on Feb. 20 in search of a man who had moved out in 2003, according to the lawsuit. The family still living there were U.S. citizens, except for a child who is a legal resident awaiting naturalization.
“Because the immigrant communities are afraid to publicly challenge these home raids, they’ve been getting away with it,” said Foster Maer, an attorney with the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund.
The advocacy group and a private law firm, LeBouef, Lamb, Greene & McRae, brought the suit. The plaintiffs live on Long Island and in Westchester County.