South Salt Lake • Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff and an adviser to New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg asked mayors Wednesday to help refocus the debate and show how fixing immigration could boost the economy and create jobs. “The immigration issue really is an economic issue,” Shurtleff told a Utah League of Cities and Towns forum attended mostly by area mayors. That’s partly because the economy still depends heavily on labor by undocumented workers, he said, and ways must be found to fill that need within the rule of law.

SALT LAKE CITY — Smart immigration reform would lead to more American jobs. That\'s the message Jeremy Robbins, policy adviser to New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, left with Utah political and business leaders Wednesday. It\'s a notion, he said, that is lost in the debate about how to fix a broken immigration system.

Hope and frustration seemed to be the mood of Congressional Hispanics who had come to the White House on Tuesday for a meeting on immigration with President Obama and his top aides. Rep. Luis Gutierrez, chair of the Democratic Caucus Immigration Task Force, said that he emerged from the meeting “hopeful” but that the assembled members pressured Obama to use his executive authority to unilaterally bring relief to law-abiding immigrant families—especially children who would qualify for citizenship under the DREAM Act—even as the administration prosecutes and deports criminals.

President Barack Obama is ramping up his push to overhaul the immigration system, launching a sustained personal campaign that will rely in part on recruiting outsiders to pressure Congress to take up the controversial issue. “He is committed and will be leaning into this issue in a very serious and very vigorous way,” Melody Barnes, director of the Domestic Policy Council, said Tuesday. “We are upping the intensity on this issue, and hopefully the information and facts about this issue will compel people to act.”

The legislation, the “Mobilizing Against Sanctuary Cities Act,” would crack down on more than a hundred American cities, Barletta said during a press conference today. “Local officials who choose not to enforce immigration laws are aiding illegal immigrants,” Barletta said. “My bill makes sure that sanctuary cities no longer get federal money as long as federal officials ignore federal law.”

A year after suing Arizona over its tough immigration law, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. told Congress on Tuesday that his department is prepared to sue Utah for going the other way and creating its own guest-worker program - though he is giving the state some time to change its law. “That’s a law that doesn’t go into effect until 2013,” Mr. Holder told the House Judiciary Committee. “We will look at the law, and if it is not changed to our satisfaction by 2013, we will take all the necessary steps.”

A year after suing Arizona over its tough immigration law, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. told Congress on Tuesday that his department is prepared to sue Utah for going the other way and creating its own guest-worker program - though he is giving the state some time to change its law. “That’s a law that doesn’t go into effect until 2013,” Mr. Holder told the House Judiciary Committee. “We will look at the law, and if it is not changed to our satisfaction by 2013, we will take all the necessary steps.”

An enforcement-only immigration law set to take effect next week is unconstitutional and will foster racial profiling in Utah, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday in federal court by several civil-rights groups. The lawsuit targets HB497, a bill sponsored by state Rep. Stephen Sandstrom, R-Orem, originally modeled after Arizona’s SB1070 enforcement-only law. The Arizona law, signed more than a year ago, ignited a firestorm of controversy and had major sections of it thrown out after it was the target of a lawsuit in federal court.

SALT LAKE CITY — Alicia Cervantes fears Utah\'s new illegal immigration enforcement law will subject her to police questioning because she is Latina. A U.S. citizen born in Utah, Cervantes also believes the passage of HB497 has already led to anti-immigrant sentiment in the state. Recently, her daughter\'s classmates have said things such as \"send the Mexicans home.\"

SALT LAKE CITY — Alicia Cervantes fears Utah\'s new illegal immigration enforcement law will subject her to police questioning because she is Latina. A U.S. citizen born in Utah, Cervantes also believes the passage of HB497 has already led to anti-immigrant sentiment in the state. Recently, her daughter\'s classmates have said things such as \"Send the Mexicans home.\"

MIAMI (AP) — Stepping up his demand to change the nation\'s immigration laws, President Barack Obama on Friday promised graduates at a vast, multicultural community college that he\'ll keep working to help students not legally in the U.S. to become American citizens. The president\'s renewed endorsement of the DREAM Act, which has become a rallying cry for Hispanic and other students around the country, drew enthusiastic applause from more than 3,000 graduates of Miami Dade College at their commencement ceremony. The students are part of an increasingly important political constituency in a state that will be crucial to the president\'s 2012 re-election hopes.

A local Mormon leader is being held in a Utah County jail awaiting deportation after federal authorities arrested him and his family nearly two weeks ago for being in the country illegally. Felix Callejas, an LDS branch president in Draper, oversaw a congregation of about 100 and was picked up by U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE) agents April 19 after a failed attempt to obtain legal asylum from his native country of El Salvador.

DRAPER — A local leader of an LDS Church Spanish-speaking congregation who faces deportation unwittingly finds himself in the sights of Latino activists looking to further their position in the ongoing illegal immigration debate. Immigrations agents arrested Felix Joaquin Callejas-Hernandez, his wife and two teenage children April 19 and they all now face deportation to their native El Salvador. Callejas served as president of the Eastridge 9th Branch in Draper until his release last week.

SPANISH FORK — To cheers, jeers and rowdy applause, Utah County Republicans approved a resolution to repeal the controversial HB116 — the guest worker immigration bill — by a vote of 443 to 365. HB116, passed by the Utah Legislature in its 2011 general session, creates an enforcement mechanism and requires employers to verify the immigration status of employees they hire.

Vehement HB116 opponent Ron Mortensen is in a fierce rhetorical battle with an equally articulate foe over the LDS Church’s involvement in the passage of a bill that provides for guest-worker status to those in the country illegally. That foe? Ron Mortensen.

Spanish Fork • A resolution seeking to repeal a guest worker immigration bill scored a major victory Saturday when it narrowly won endorsement in Utah County — the backyard of one of its key architects and cheerleaders. The resolution passed 443-365 shortly after a series of speakers stood in front of more than 1,000 at the Utah County Republican Organizing Convention and faced a series of standing ovations and catcalls from both sides of the divisive issue.