Immigration – Page 3 – Silicon Valley One World

25Jun

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Zhang Sights Freedom

By Sharon Simonson SAN JOSE — A U.S. magistrate judge is likely to grant the pre-trial release of a Chinese professor who has been held without bail in the Santa Clara County jail, accused of espionage and trade-secret theft. Judge Nathanael Cousins said during a June 24 detention hearing that he was inclined to allow 36-year-old Hao Zhang to leave confinement so long as the right mix of incentives and safeguards could be set in place. Defense attorneys told the court that they could offer assets valued at roughly $500,000, including $225,000 in U.S. retirement accounts benefitting Zhang and his wife, to assure the professor would not flee in the face of the federal charges. They are also offering the equity in a Florida house owned by a Zhang relative. Zhang would live in ...

U.S. Magistrate Judge Says Zhang Must Stay in County Jail—for Now

11Jun

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U.S. Magistrate Judge Says Zhang Must Stay in County Jail—for Now

By Sharon Simonson SAN JOSE—A Chinese professor accused of economic espionage and theft of trade secrets from two Silicon Valley technology companies will remain in the Santa Clara County jail until at least June 24. U.S. Magistrate Judge Nathanael Cousins told Hao Zhang’s defense attorneys June 10 that he would reconsider the defendant’s status but that he needed stronger proof that Zhang stood to lose personally in the event of his flight to evade the federal charges. Zhang was arrested May 16 at the Los Angeles International Airport after federal agents boarded his plane from China as it remained on the tarmac. He is accused of stealing trade secrets with commercial and military applications from a former employer in conspiracy with five other Chinese scientists and the Chi...

San Jose Federal Court Takes Up Case Against Chinese Professor Zhang

10Jun

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San Jose Federal Court Takes Up Case Against Chinese Professor Zhang

The link between the treatment of immigrants in the United States and the relationship between the U.S. government and their home countries is well-documented by historians. Doubters need look no farther than the entrance to the federal courthouse in downtown San Jose and the memorial to Japanese-Americans imprisoned during World War II by the U.S. government after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor. Relations between the U.S. government and the Chinese government have deteriorated in recent months. (Photo by S. Simonson) By Sharon Simonson SAN JOSE — A federal magistrate judge has agreed to reopen a detention hearing for a U.S.-educated Chinese citizen arrested May 16 in Los Angeles on accusations of trade-secret theft involving two semiconductor companies with Silicon Valley ties. Lo...

New Era for Vietnamese-Americans As English-Speaking Children Come of Age

29Apr

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New Era for Vietnamese-Americans As English-Speaking Children Come of Age

By Sharon Simonson Expect to hear more from the Silicon Valley Vietnamese community in coming years, beginning Thursday, the 40th anniversary of the fall of Saigon. A people long gagged in America by the trauma of war and displacement, economic struggle, psychological loss, and perhaps most of all, by language, is finally finding a voice. In Silicon Valley, home to the second-largest Vietnamese community in the country with more than 126,000 people, that voice is coming from their English-speaking daughters and sons, young millennial-generation adults with strong cultural ties to Vietnam and America and a deep desire to be heard. The Viet Nam Project Not quite three years ago, four such young Vietnamese-Americans founded the Vietnamese-American Roundtable with a mis...

Asians Outnumber Whites In Silicon Valley

20Apr

By Editor3 Comments

Demographics

Asians Outnumber Whites In Silicon Valley

By Sharon Simonson Asians and Pacific Islanders now form the largest racial block in Santa Clara County, exceeding the proportion of non-Hispanic white residents for the first time. According to new demographic findings from the Population Dynamics Research Group at the University of Southern California, in the next 25 years, Silicon Valley’s Indian, Chinese, Vietnamese, Filipino and other Asian populations plus a smattering of Pacific Islanders are expected to grow to more than 43 percent of the county total. That is approximately 30 percentage points higher than Asians’ projected proportion nationally. In the same 25 years, the share of non-Hispanic whites in Silicon Valley is expected to fall to less than 25 percent, down from 33 percent today and 70.5 percent in 1980. ...

Reshaping the Vietnamese-American Identity

13Apr

By Editor1 Comment

Culture

Reshaping the Vietnamese-American Identity

By Sharon Simonson In 1974, less than a year before the fall of Saigon, Luong La lived a summer alone in a hut on his family’s tiny farm on Ship Island in Vietnam’s Mekong River Delta. While catching and harvesting the bulk of his own food — his mother left him a staple of rice — he avoids grenade-spiked booby traps and navigates a thin strip of political neutrality between roving pro-Communist Viet Cong soldiers and the U.S.-backed South Vietnamese Army. La was 11-years-old. The Viet Nam Project His recollections of those days and nights appear halfway through “Catching Shrimp with Bare Hands: A Boy from the Mekong Delta.” The new memoir, published in this 40th anniversary year of South Vietnam’s final capitulation, captures the tenor and tension of daily life for the La ...

H-1B Visa Demand Strong and Growing, Attorneys Say

10Feb

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H-1B Visa Demand Strong and Growing, Attorneys Say

By Sharon Simonson Silicon Valley H-1B visa season is in full bloom, but not everything is rosy. As the April 1 opening date approaches to apply for the coveted foreign-worker permission slips, regional attorneys who write and file the petitions say demand tops even last year’s when so many applications were made so fast, the federal government stopped accepting them after a week. Stakes are high for workers and the high-tech and consulting companies that rely most on the work visas and that today compete fiercely for technical talent worldwide. The earliest a company could hope to hire a potential H-1B worker passed over in this year’s selection is October 2016. “This is the big talk right now among the HR (human resources) people,” said Palo Alto immigration attorney Marc...

Immigrants Are Driving the Bay Area Housing Market

3Nov

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Immigrants Are Driving the Bay Area Housing Market

By Sharon Simonson Immigrants to this country who have become U.S. citizens are driving the Bay Area housing market, owning their homes at rates as much as 13 percentage points higher than the American-born, according to new U.S. Census Bureau estimates for 2013. In Santa Clara County, that coincides with foreign-born citizens’ greater representation in management, business, science, and art occupations and with an outsized presence in manufacturing industries. It also matches with a greater likelihood of living in a bigger house and a higher median household income—$97,000 for foreign-born U.S. citizens versus $91,325 for the U.S.-born. In San Francisco, not quite half of households of foreign-born U.S. citizens own and occupy their own homes compared to 35 percent of U.S.-bo...