In the newly published Opening the Floodgates: Why America Needs to Rethink Its Borders and Immigration Laws, its author Kevin R. Johnson provides a reality check for current U.S. immigration laws and policies asserting that a nativist approach works against a globalized economy. In addition to the economic benefits that would flow to the U.S. and its trade partners with the removal of antiquated border controls, Johnson writes that such reform “would end the sheer brutality inherent in current immigration enforcement, which results in physical abuse, promotes racial discrimination and relegates certain groups of U.S. citizens and lawful immigrants to second-class status, both inside and outside and United States.” Kevin R. Johnson is Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Mabie-Apallas Professor of Public Interest Law and Chicana/o Studies at the University of California at Davis and is also President of the Board of Directors of Legal Services of Northern California (LSNC). For more on this new publication and to read an excerpt, see Putting Immigration in perspective, LSNC Advocate Feed, November 18, 2007.