The News-Times of Danbury, CT has this interesting report about undocumented workers from Ecuador.
Some stuff I didn’t know:
If all the people who boarded boats in Ecuador last year and sailed toward the United States gathered in one spot, they could fill the University of Connecticut’s 40,000-seat Rentschler Field — and then some.
And that doesn’t count the tens of thousands who tried coming to America by land and by air.
Danbury officials have noticed for years the unusual influx of people from the South American nation that has 13 million people in a land area slightly smaller than Nevada.
Now national officials are taking notice as well.
Last week, U.S. Rep. Dan Burton, R-Ind., attached an amendment dealing specifically with Ecuador to the $22 billion Foreign Relations Act, which was approved by the U.S. House of Representatives by a wide margin.
Burton’s amendment asks the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security to study ways to thwart illegal immigration and human trafficking in Ecuador. Burton wants the federal agencies to report back in six months.
And:
The small country is now South America’s largest exporter of illegal immigrants to the United States, according to the report.
Between 1990 and 2000, the number of illegal immigrants from Ecuador to the United States nearly tripled, from 37,000 people a year to about 108,000 people.
As well as:
Ecuador is the second-most corrupt country in South America, according to the research report prepared for Congress. Its corruption is on the same level as Iraq and Sierra Leone.