Asian Birth Tourism, Numbers In Perspective

By Karthick Ramakrishnan. Cross-posted from AAPI Data.


Photo Credit: New York Times
In a recent press conference, Jeb Bush clumsily (and erroneously) said that the phenomenon of so-called "anchor babies" was "frankly, more related to Asian people."

As others have noted, the phenomenon of birth tourism is distinct from most conventional understandings of the offensive term "anchor baby," which tends to imply that people use birthright citizenship from their children to avoid deportation or eventually gain U.S. citizenship for themselves.

There has been a fair amount of sensationalist reporting on birth tourism by Chinese immigrants, with little understanding of the number of estimated "birth tourists," and how they compare to the overall number of Chinese immigrants or visitors to the United States. Below, we provide some numbers in perspective.

'Twilight' director to film love epic set in ancient China... starring a white person! Of course.

Catherine Hardwicke will direct 'Loulan,' a "sweeping romantic epic" set in an ancient Silk Road kingdom.


Director Catherine Hardwicke
Another Hollywood production tries to get in on that China money. The latest effort comes from Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke, who recently announced that she is making "a sweeping romantic epic" set in an ancient Silk Road city. Of course, the movie will likely star a white person. Because Hollywood.

'Twilight"s Catherine Hardwicke to film love epic in China

Loulan, set in the city of the same name circa 200 B.C., is about a princess caught in the middle of warring kingdoms at the nexus of the Silk Road, now known as the Xinjiang region in present-day western China.

But hey, it wouldn't be a proper Hollywood movie without throwing a white person in there somewhere, even in ancient frickin' China. So how are they going to explain that? In 1980, researchers in the region discovered a remarkably well-preserved female mummy with Caucasian features. She was dubbed the "Loulan Beauty."

School board member accused of possible wrongdoing in foreign student recruitment

If there's new money to be made -- particularly from China -- someone is going to find a way to exploit it.

What the hell is going on in the Hacienda La Puente Unified School District? A recent investigation in the school's international students program lays out serious problems, including host homes with no heat and inadequate food, students subject to verbal abuse, as well as a board member's potential conflict of interest: Report outlines problems with foreign student recruitment at Hacienda La Puente schools.

Here is the situation as I understand it... Basically, a recruiting company has been making a ton of money by bringing over Chinese students who want to study in the United States. But when they get here, the students are completely neglected and even abused. An employee of the recruiting company blew the whistle on what's been going down, prompting the district to conduct an independent investigation that verified his claims.

You can read the full report here. (It's long.) But that just got the ball rolling...