ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) -- Following a hush-hush courtship, top Minnesota lawmakers acknowledged Tuesday that they are compiling a multi-million dollar package of public subsidies and tax breaks to encourage an Illinois-based pharmaceutical firm to add 200 high-paying jobs and undertake a substantial construction project in their state.

The extent of the public offerings is becoming known months into a high-level recruitment. The name of the company, Baxter Healthcare Corp., had been constrained by a confidentiality agreement entered into by Gov. Mark Dayton's administration. Even lawmakers who have begun voting on the package didn't know which firm would benefit.

Brooklyn Park city manager Jamie Verbrugge disclosed the company's name Tuesday at a legislative hearing, and Dayton's administration later confirmed it was hoping to get the Fortune 500 company to make the Minneapolis suburb a significant outpost.

"What they are really doing is presenting an opportunity for the state of Minnesota an emergent industry in health sciences," Verbrugge said of Baxter, a $14 billion-a-year company that makes devices and drugs to treat hemophilia, immune disorders, infectious diseases, kidney disease and other acute conditions.

The Legislature is advancing a sales tax exemption, a $5 million forgivable loan and possibly more from a package that state officials have been trying to quietly assemble.

The first clues surfaced Monday. The tax break was a clause buried in a 330-page tax plan released by House Democrats. The provision offered a sales tax exemption on construction materials for a biopharmaceutical manufacturing facility. The stand-alone bill providing the break was held back until Tuesday, which is notable because plans are normally vetted before inclusion in the giant tax packages.

The $5 million loan, which would come in two parts and is forgivable if certain conditions are met, passed the House with little attention on Monday night as a piece of a broad economic development package. The Minnesota Investment Fund loan is larger than the typical awards.

Asked about the efforts Tuesday, Dayton refused to disclose the name of the company, citing competition from other states for the firm's expansion. If he did, Dayton said, "they won't be a prospect to come to Minnesota anymore."

His Department of Employment and Economic Development said the state had to honor a non-disclosure agreement.

After Verbrugge testified in the House Taxes Committee, the state development agency issued a statement expressing optimism that the Baxter deal would go through. It was the first official acknowledgement of the dealings months in the works.

"We have been working with the company on a competitive economic development incentive package to attract a new industry, new jobs and private investment in the state," the agency statement said. "We are hopeful and excited about Baxter's interest in locating in Minnesota."

The process played out with unusual secrecy.

House Speaker Paul Thissen and Taxes Committee Chairwoman Ann Lenczewski said they didn't know the identity before moving ahead and pointed to a privacy clause agreed to by the administration. Lenczewski said she first heard of it about a month ago.

Thissen, DFL-Minneapolis, said he and Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk, DFL-Cook, signed a letter committing to work on the development. Thissen said the venture was known to him only as "Project Fern."

"It's a code name," he said. "Now that it's in the tax bill we'll get more information about it and understand it."

Bakk said he was not bothered by a deal occurring in the dark.

"Often times, private firms don't want those negotiations to happen publicly," he said. "Ultimately, there's a public record of everything that happens but often times it's the business that requests that the conversations be held confidentially. The project may or may not happen."

A spokeswoman for Deerfield, Ill.,-based Baxter didn't immediately return a phone message from The Associated Press and a lobbyist for the firm also didn't reply.

Documents from the Brooklyn Park Economic Development Authority said the Baxter presence the company wasn't named in those papers would be at a property that has been home to other biotech companies since 2004. The authority was fashioning city tax breaks to foster a two-phase expansion, which could add $300 million in space and equipment to the property. The city materials say the resulting jobs would average $75,000 in base salary plus benefits.

The state's sales tax break would depend on the company adding at least 190 jobs and making $50 million or more in capital upgrades. It would cost the state treasury nearly $1 million at first.

Neither bill formally names the company. But both are structured so the help would go only to a firm engaged in biopharmaceuticals or biologics. Those fields involve making prescription drugs or proteins, antibodies, nucleic acids and vaccines.

The blasts, which were 15 minutes apart and hit the town of Reyhanli's busiest street, raised fears that Turkey could increasingly be drawn into Syria's brutal civil war.

Turkey already hosts Syria's political opposition and rebel commanders, has given shelter to hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees and in the past retaliated against Syrian shells that landed in Turkey.

Deputy Prime Minister Besir Atalay said the assailants were from Turkey, but were linked to Syria's intelligence service.

"We have to a great extent completed our work toward identifying the assailants," he told reporters. "We have established that the organization and assailants have links to the pro-regime mukhabarat (intelligence) organization."

He did not name the group.

Earlier, another deputy prime minister, Bulent Arinc said: "Our thoughts are that their mukhabarat and armed organizations are the usual suspects in planning and the carrying out of such devilish plans," he said.

Arinc said the attacks were still being investigated, but that If it's proven that Syrian was behind the attack, Turkey would "do whatever is necessary," without specifying if that included military action.

One of the car bombs exploded outside the city hall while the other went off outside the post office. Reyhanli, a main hub for Syrian refugees and rebels in Turkey's Hatay province, is just across the border from Syria's Idlib province.

Images showed people frantically carrying the wounded through the rubble-strewn streets to safety. Black smoke billowed from a tall building.

The explosions came days before Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is scheduled to travel to the U.S. for talks, which are expected to be dominated by the situation in Syria. The car bombings also follow allegations by Erdogan the Syrian regime has fired about 200 missiles tipped with chemical weapons.

Syrian mortar rounds have fallen over the border before, but if the blasts turn out to be linked to Syria it would be by far the biggest death toll in Turkey related to its neighbor's civil war.

Syria shares a more than 500-mile (800-kilometer) border with Turkey, which has been a crucial supporter of the Syrian rebel cause. Ankara has allowed its territory to be used as a logistics base and staging center for Syrian insurgents.

Atalay said 43 people were killed and 140 others were wounded in the blasts. There was no immediate information on the identities or nationalities of the victims.

The bombings" will increase the pressure on the U.S. president next week to do something to show support to Turkey when Erdogan visits him in Washington," said Soner Cagaptay, an expert on Turkey at the Washington Institute. "Washington will be forced to take a more pro-active position on Syria, at least in rhetoric, whether or not there is appetite for such a position here."

Salman Shaikh, director of the Brookings Doha Center, said the attack may force Turkey to take action.

"Itshould be a defining moment for Turkey," Shaikh said. "It has been supporting the rebels, and there has been strong rhetoric. But this may be a moment where it really has to assert itself if it is the Assad regime (behind the bombings), and it is quite conceivable it is."

Turkey's opposition criticized the government's policy on Syria, saying its active support of the rebels had put the country's security at risk.

"Erdogan's discourse of hatred toward Assad and provocations against the administration in Damascus is coming back to us in the form of attacks and provocations," said Devlet Bahceli, chairman of a nationalist opposition party.

The force of Saturday's explosions gutted some buildings, and the charred shells of cars littered the streets.

"Three buildings partly collapsed and became unusable," Talat Karaca, who witnessed the second explosion from his rooftop, told The Associated Press by telephone. "We couldn't approach the scene for a long time because of the blaze."

Khawla Sawah, the medical director of the Union of Syrian Medical Relief Organizations in Reyhanli, said the town's main hospital was full and many of the wounded were taken to the nearby city of Antakya and to a clinic set up by the Syrian medical relief group on Reyhanli's outskirts. The center received 11 wounded, including one Turk and 10 Syrians.

She said some of the injured told her that the cars that exploded had Syrian license plates.

Both Sawah and another witness, Suzan Alhasoglu, said the incident raised tension in Reyhanli with angry youths attacking Syrians cars and other targets.

"The authorities are asking Syrians to stay home and not drive around in Syrian cars," Sawah said. "Syrian doctors at the Reyhanli hospital were asked to go home too."

Turkey's military released a statement condemning the attack and Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu vowed from Berlin that Turkey would act.

"Those who for whatever reason attempt to bring the external chaos into our country will get a response," he said.

The U.S. Embassy in Ankara issued a statement condemning the "murderous attack" in Reyhanli and said Washington "stands with the people and government of Turkey to identify the perpetrators and bring them to justice."

The main Syrian opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, condemned the attack and said it stands together with the "Turkish government and the friendly Turkish people."

The coalition sees "these heinous terrorist acts as an attempt to take revenge on the Turkish people and punish them for their honorable support for the Syrian people," it said.

The frontier area has seen heavy fighting between rebels and the Syrian regime.In February, a car bomb exploded at a Syrian border crossing with Turkey, just a few kilometers from Reyhanli, killing 14. Turkey's interior minister at the time blamed Syria's intelligence agencies and its army for involvement.

Four Syrians and a Turk are in custody in connection with the Feb. 11 attack at the Bab al-Hawa frontier post. No one has claimed responsibility, but a Syrian opposition faction accused the Syrian government of the bombing, saying it narrowly missed 13 leaders of the group.

In that bombing, most of the victims were Syrians who had been waiting in an area straddling the frontier for processing to enter Turkey.

Tensions also flared between the Syrian regime and Turkey after shells fired from Syria landed on the Turkish side, prompting Germany, the Netherlands and the U.S. to send two batteries of Patriot air defense missiles each to protect their NATO ally.

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Suzan Fraser reported from Ankara. Associated Press writers Ezgi Akin in Ankara, and Bassem Mroue, Yasmine Sakher and Karin Laub in Beirut contributed to this report.

Marc Gasol scored 24 points and Zach Randolph added 15 as the visiting Grizzlies out-scored the Thunder 30-19 in the fourth quarter. Game Three is in Memphis on Saturday.

Kevin Durant had 36 points, 11 rebounds and nine assists in another big performance for Oklahoma City. Derek Fisher tallied 19 points and went 4-for-5 from three-point range, but the Thunder were hurt by 21 turnovers.

The Grizzlies took a 92-90 lead when Conley drained a three-pointer with 1:58 to play and he followed that up by knocking down an 18-footer with 1:04 left and a free throw with 29.4 seconds remaining to make it a five-point game.

Randolph hit two free throws and Tony Allen slammed home a dunk to cap a 10-0 run and give Memphis a 99-90 advantage.

Gasol had 17 first-half points as Memphis took a 54-51 lead into the break. Durant scored 13 points in the third quarter as Oklahoma City held the Grizzlies to 15 points and led 74-69 entering the final stanza. (Editing by John O'Brien)

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - "The Office" series finale has been supersized.

The swan song for NBC sitcom, which airs its final episode May 16, has been extended from an hour to 75 minutes, the network said Tuesday. The "Office" series finale will now air from 9 p.m. to 10:15 p.m.

The season finale of NBC's freshman drama "Hannibal" will air after the "Office" send-off, with limited interruption.

The series finale of "The Office" will take place months after the airing of the documentary about the Dunder Mifflin paper company. Dunder Mifflin employees past and present will gather for a wedding and a final round of interviews.

"Mysteries are solved, hatchets are buried, pranks are prunked," the network said of the finale.

Guest stars for the "Office" swan song will include Mindy Kaling, B.J. Novak, Rachael Harris, Dakota Johnson, Joan Cusack, Ed Begley Jr., Malcolm Barrett, Matt Jones, Andy Buckley, Mike Schur and Bobby Ray Shafer.

The Commerce Department said on Thursday wholesale inventories rose 0.4 percent, just above the median forecast in a Reuters poll for a 0.3 percent gain.

The increase in inventories could reinforce the view that the pace of economic growth picked up in the first three months of the year, bolstered by businesses restocking their shelves. In March, inventories of cars rose 1.2 percent, as did stocks of machinery.

Sales by wholesalers, however, unexpectedly fell in March, down 1.6 percent. It was the biggest drop in four years and confounded economists' expectations for a 0.1 percent increase.

(Reporting by Jason Lange; Editing by James Dalgleish)

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The White House is inviting lawmakers over to discuss the growing number of sexual assaults in the military.

Officials say a bipartisan group of about a dozen senators and representatives were invited to attend the discussion with White House staff Thursday. President Barack Obama won't attend since he is traveling to Texas.

A new report shows up to 26,000 military members were sexually assaulted last year. Obama has said he has no tolerance for the problem and the Pentagon must address it.

The officials weren't authorized to speak on the record and thus requested anonymity.

The discussion was to be led by Obama senior adviser Valerie Jarrett and Tina Tchen, the first lady's chief of staff. Both are members of the president's Council on Women and Girls.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wall Street was set for a higher open on Friday after data showed U.S. employment rose more than expected in April, pushing the unemployment rate to a four-year low of 7.5 percent, which could ease concerns of a slowdown in the economy.

The data showed non-farm payrolls rose 165,000 in April, while March's payrolls were raised to 138,000 and February's were revised up to 332,000. Investors welcomed the gains after weeks of disappointing data that suggested the economic recovery was losing steam.

The strong data is likely to push the S&P 500 index above the 1,600 mark.

"The April numbers were clearly better than expectations, and the fairly large dip we saw in March was largely erased," said Cam Albright, director of asset allocation at Wilmington Trust Investment Advisors in Wilmington, Delaware.

"This will probably give the (equity) market at least a near-term boost, particularly given the revisions that we saw."

Data on Thursday showed a narrowing of the U.S. trade gap in March, although drops in imports and exports were viewed as warning signs about the strength of domestic and foreign demand.

In other macroeconomic news, the Institute for Supply Management's non-manufacturing sector data will be released along with the Commerce Department's factory orders report for March at 10 a.m. (1400 GMT).

S&P 500 futures added 11.6 points and were above fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration of the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures gained 117 points while Nasdaq 100 futures added 22 points.

On Thursday, Wall Street rallied after data showing U.S. weekly jobless claims dropped to a five-year low. Also helping was the European Central Bank with a cut to its benchmark interest rate.

The move follows Wednesday's Federal Reserve statement in which the U.S. central bank said it would continue its bond buying scheme to keep interest rates low and spur growth, and would step up purchases if needed.

Mining stocks were the top gainers in premarket trade including Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc , up 3 percent after prices of copper posted their biggest daily gain in almost 1-1/2 years.

LinkedIn Corpshares were likely to come under pressure after the social network late Thursday reported disappointing revenue forecasts, suggesting that a revamped mobile app and other new products designed to keep smartphone users engaged will not deliver on advertising growth as quickly as anticipated. The stock was off about 9 percent in premarket trade.

The S&P ended at a record level on Thursday after hitting a record high intraday level of 1,598.58. About 74 percent of stocks traded on the New York Stock Exchange closed higher while 73 percent of Nasdaq-listed shares closed up.

(Reporting By Angela Moon; Additional reporting by Rodrigo Campos; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Kenneth Barry)

For now, all eyes are on an 844-page Senate proposal with the you-said-a-mouthful title of the "Border Security, Economic Opportunity and Immigration Modernization Act of 2013."

Look for the Senate Judiciary Committee to take its first votes on the legislation on Thursday.

What's in that bill? Is there a Plan B? And who are all these immigrants, once you get past the big round numbers?

A big dose of facts, figures and other information to help understand the current debate:

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WHY NOW?

Major problems with U.S. immigration have been around for decades.

President George W. Bush tried to change the system and failed. President Barack Obama promised to overhaul it in his first term but never did.

In Obama's second term, he's making immigration a priority, and Republicans also appear ready to deal.

Why the new commitment?

Obama won 71 percent of Hispanic voters in his 2012 re-election campaign, and he owes them. Last year's election also sent a loud message to Republicans that they can't ignore this pivotal voting bloc.

It's been the kind of breathtaking turnaround you rarely see in politics. Plus, there's growing pressure from business leaders, who want to make it easier for the U.S. to attract highly educated immigrants and to legally bring in more lower-skilled workers such as farm laborers.

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WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?

Talk about "comprehensive immigration reform" generally centers on four main questions:

What to do about the 11 million-plus immigrants who live in the U.S. without legal permission.

How to tighten border security.

How to keep businesses from employing people who are in the U.S. illegally.

How to improve the legal immigration system, now so convoluted that the adjective "Byzantine" pops up all too frequently.

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WHAT'S THE GANG OF EIGHT?

A group of four Democrats and four Republicans in the Senate that crafted a bill to address all four questions. In a nutshell, this proposal would tighten border controls, allow more high- and low-skilled workers to legally immigrate, require employers to verify their workers have legal status, and create an opportunity for those who are in the U.S. illegally to eventually become citizens.

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IS THERE A PLAN B?

And C and D.

Obama has his own backup plan in case congressional talks fail, but he's given his support to the Senate bill as a worthy compromise.

In the House, Republican Rep. Bob Goodlatte, the head of the House Judiciary Committee, says his committee will tackle the main immigration issues one by one, instead of starting with a single sweeping bill.

Separately, there's a bipartisan House group working on legislation.

Obama says he will keep an open mind about the various proposals, but the final deal has to address all the big issues.

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COMING TO AMERICA

A record 40.4 million immigrants live in the U.S., representing 13 percent of the population. More than 18 million are naturalized citizens, 11 million are legal permanent or temporary residents, and more than 11 million are in the country without legal permission, according to the Pew Hispanic Center, a private research organization.

Those in the U.S. illegally made up about 3.7 percent of the U.S. population in 2010. While overall immigration has steadily grown, the number of immigrants in the U.S. illegally peaked at 12 million in 2007.

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WHERE FROM?

Twenty-nine percent of the foreign-born in the U.S., or about 11.7 million people, came from Mexico. About 25 percent came from South and East Asia, 9 percent from the Caribbean, 8 percent from Central America, 7 percent South America, 4 percent the Middle East and the rest from elsewhere.

The figures are more lopsided for immigrants living here illegally: An estimated 58 percent are from Mexico. The next closest figure is 6 percent from El Salvador, says the government.

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WHERE TO?

California has the largest share of the U.S. immigrant population, 27 percent, followed by New York, New Jersey, Florida, Nevada, Hawaii and Texas, according to the Migration Policy Institute, a private group focused on global immigration issues.

California has the largest share of immigrants in the U.S. illegally, at 25 percent, followed by Texas with 16 percent. Florida and New York each has 6 percent, and Georgia has 5 percent, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

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GETTING IN

Here's one way to think about the ways immigrants arrive in the U.S: Some come in the front door, others the side door and still others the back door, as laid out in a report from the private Population Reference Bureau.

Arriving through the front door: people legally sponsored by their families or employers. Also refugees and asylum-seekers, and immigrants who win visas in an annual "diversity" lottery.

Side door: legal temporary arrivals, including those who get visas to visit, work or study. There are dozens of types of nonimmigrant visas, available to people ranging from business visitors to foreign athletes and entertainers. Visitors from dozens of countries don't even need visas.

Back door: Somewhat more than half of those in the U.S. illegally have come in the back door, evading border controls, Pew estimates. The rest legally entered, but didn't leave when they were supposed to or otherwise violated terms of their visas.

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IS IT A CRIME?

Simply being in the United States in violation of immigration laws isn't, by itself, a crime; it's a civil violation.

Entering the country without permission is a misdemeanor criminal offense. Re-entering the country without authorization after being formally removed can be felony.

Pew estimates that a little less than half of immigrants who lack legal permission to live in the U.S. didn't enter the country illegally. They overstayed their visas, worked without authorization, dropped out of school or otherwise violated the conditions of their visas.

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WHAT'S IN A NAME?

There are varying and strong opinions about how best to refer to the 11 million-plus people who are in the U.S. without legal permission.

Illegal immigrants?

Undocumented workers?

Unauthorized population?

Illegal aliens?

The last has generally fallen out of favor. Some immigrant advocates are pressing a "Drop the I-Word" campaign, arguing that it is dehumanizing to refer to people as "illegal."

"Undocumented worker" often isn't accurate because many aren't workers, and some have documents from other countries. Homeland Security reports refer to "unauthorized immigrants," but the agency also reports statistics on "aliens apprehended."

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DEFINITIONS, PLEASE:

Legal permanent residents (LPRs): people who have permission to live in the U.S. permanently but aren't citizens. They're also known as "green card" holders. Most of them can apply for citizenship within five years of getting green cards. In 2011, 1.06 million people got the cards.

Refugees and asylees: people who come to the U.S. to avoid persecution in their home countries. What's the difference between the two terms? Refugees are people who apply for protective status before they get to the U.S. Asylees are people who apply upon arrival in the U.S. or later.

Naturalization: The process by which immigrants become U.S. citizens.

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GOING GREEN

Is there an actual green card? Indeed there is.

It's the Permanent Resident Card issued to people who are authorized to live and work in the U.S. on a permanent basis. In 2010, the government redesigned them to add new security features and make them green again.

The cards had been a variety of colors over the years. New green cards are good for 10 years for lawful permanent residents and two years for conditional residents.

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PATH TO CITIZENSHIP

There's a lot of talk about creating a "path to citizenship" for immigrants who are in the U.S. without legal status.

But there's vigorous debate over what conditions these immigrants should have to satisfy to get citizenship among them are paying taxes, fines and fees, and passing background checks.

Some legislators want to set additional conditions, such as improvements in border security and in tracking whether legal immigrants leave the country when required. Others want to limit immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally to some sort of legal status that stops short of citizenship.

But more than 60 percent of Americans think those who are here illegally should have a way to become citizens, according to an Associated Press-GfK poll conducted in April.

The Senate bill would allow those in the country illegally to obtain "registered provisional immigrant" status six months after the bill was enacted if they met certain conditions.

Additional border security improvements would have to go into place before anyone obtained green cards or citizenship.

It would take immigrants living here illegally at least 13 years to get all the way to citizenship. They'd have to pay taxes, fees and $2,000 in fines. No one who entered the country after Dec. 31, 2011, or had a felony conviction or more than three misdemeanors would be eligible.

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THE A-WORD

Nothing stirs up a hornet's nest like talk of amnesty for immigrants who are in the country illegally, although there's a lot of disagreement over how to define the term.

A 2007 effort to overhaul the immigration system, led by Bush, failed in part because Republicans were dismayed that it included a process to give otherwise law-abiding immigrants who were in the country illegally a chance to become citizens. Critics complained that would be offering amnesty.

All sides know it's not practical to talk about sending 11 million-plus people back to their countries of origin. So one big challenge this time is finding an acceptable way to resolve the status of those who are in the country illegally.

Backers of the Senate bill stress that those who are in the country illegally would have a longer and more difficult path to citizenship under their plan than would immigrants who followed all the rules.

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GETTING A REPRIEVE

While the larger immigration debate goes on, the government already is offering as many as 1.76 million immigrants who are in the country illegally a way to avoid deportation, at least for now.

Obama announced a program in June that puts off deportation for many people brought here as children. Applicants for the reprieve must have arrived before they turned 16, be younger than 31 now, be high school graduates or in school, or have served in the military. They can't have a serious criminal record or pose a threat to public safety or national security.

Applications for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program are averaging more than 3,000 a day. By mid-April, nearly 489,000 people had applied and more than 268,000 had been approved, with most of the rest still under consideration.

Applications have come from all 50 states, with the largest number coming from California and Texas. Nearly 75 percent of the applicants are originally from Mexico.

In some ways, the program closely tracks the failed DREAM Act, which would have given many young illegal immigrants a path to legal status. Obama's program doesn't give them legal status but it at least protects them from deportation for two years.

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HISTORY: DOING THE WAVE

The U.S. is in its fourth and largest immigration wave.

First came the Colonial era, then an 1820-1870 influx of newcomers mostly from Northern and Western Europe. Most were Germans and Irish, but the gold rush and jobs on the transcontinental railroad also attracted Chinese immigrants.

In the 1870s, immigration declined due to economic problems and restrictive legislation.

The third wave, between 1881 and 1920, brought more than 23 million people to the U.S., mostly from Southern and Eastern Europe, aided by cheaper trans-Atlantic travel and lured by employers seeking workers.

Then came the Great Depression and more restrictive immigration laws, and immigration went into decline for decades.

The fourth wave, still underway, began in 1965 with the end of immigration limits based on nationality. Foreign-born people made up 1 in 20 residents of the U.S. in 1960; today, the figure is about 1 in 8.

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HISTORY: HERE A LAW, THERE A LAW

Until the late 1800s, immigration was largely a free for all. Then came country-by-country limits. Since then, big changes in U.S. immigration law have helped produce big shifts in migration patterns.

Among the more notable laws:

1965 Immigration and Nationality Act: Abolished country-by-country limits, established a new system that determined immigration preference based on family relationships and needed skills, and expanded the categories of family members who could enter without numerical limits.

1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act: Legalized about 2.7 million immigrants living in the U.S. illegally, 84 percent of them from Mexico and Central America.

1990 Immigration Act: Increased worldwide immigration limit to a "flexible cap" of 675,000 a year. The number can go higher in some years if there are unused visas available from the previous year.

1996 Immigrant Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act. Expanded possible reasons for deporting people or ruling them ineligible to enter the U.S., expedited removal procedures, gave state and local police power to enforce immigration laws.

Post-2001: In 2001, talk percolated about a new immigration plan to deal with unauthorized immigrants, guest workers and violence along the Mexican border. But the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks of 2001 put an end to that, amid growing unease over illegal immigration.

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ABOUT LAST TIME. ...

The last big immigration legalization plan, in 1986, took six years to get done.

The law, signed by President Ronald Reagan, had three main components: making it illegal to hire unauthorized workers, improving border enforcement and providing for the legalization of a big chunk of the estimated 3 million to 5 million immigrants then in the country illegally.

The results were disappointing on two central fronts: The hiring crackdown largely failed because there was no good way to verify eligibility to work, and it took a decade to improve border security. As a result, illegal immigration continued to grow, fueled by the strong U.S. economy.

What did work as intended: Close to 3 million immigrants living in the U.S. without permission received legal status. By 2009, about 40 percent of them had been naturalized, according to Homeland Security.

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LATINOS RISING

Census figures show that between 1960 and 2010, immigration from Europe declined while the numbers coming from Latin America and Asia took off. As the immigrants' points of origin changed, so did their destinations. Concentrations shifted from the Northeast and Midwest to the South and West.

A few Census Bureau snapshots:

In 1960, there were fewer than 1 million people in the U.S. who were born in Latin America. By 2010, there were 21.2 million.

In 1960, 75 percent of foreigners in the U.S. came from Europe. By 2010, 80 percent came from Latin America and Asia.

In 1960: 47 percent of the foreign-born lived in the Northeast and 10 percent in the South. By 2010, 22 percent lived in the Northeast and 32 percent in the South.

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THE FENCE

The fence between the U.S. and Mexico runs off and on for 651 miles along the 1,954-mile border. Most of it has been built since 2005. At some points, it's an 18-foot-high steel mesh structure topped with razor wire. At others, it's a rusting, 8-foot-high thing, made of Army surplus landing mats from the Vietnam War.

The fencing is one of the more visible manifestations of a massive effort over the past two decades to improve border security. The results of that effort are dramatic. Those images of crowds of immigrants sprinting across the border illegally while agents scramble to nab a few are largely a thing of the past.

Two decades ago, fewer than 4,000 Border Patrol agents worked along the Southwest border. Today there are 18,500.

Plummeting apprehension statistics are one measure of change: 357,000 last year, compared with 1.6 million in 2000. The numbers are down in part because fewer are trying to make it across.

The border isn't sealed but it is certainly more secure.

The Senate bill would require the government to have even tougher border security plans before those who are in the country illegally could become legal permanent residents.

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WHO'S HANGING AROUND

With tighter border security and years of economic difficulty in the U.S., it turns out that most of the immigrants who are in the U.S. without permission have been there for a while. Just 14 percent have arrived since the start of 2005, according to Homeland Security estimates. In contrast, 29 percent came during the previous five years.

At the peak in 2000, about 770,000 immigrants arrived annually from Mexico, most of them entering the country illegally. By 2010, the pace had dropped to about 140,000, most of them arriving as legal immigrants, according to Pew.

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WHO'S LEAVING?

Mexicans, mostly. Since 1986, more than 4 million noncitizens have been deported. Deportations have expanded in the Obama administration, reaching 410,000 in 2012 from 30,000 in 1990. Most of those deported 75 percent are sent back to Mexico. Nearly half of those removed had prior criminal convictions. So far, the Obama administration has deported more than 1.6 million people.

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TO NATURALIZE OR NOT

Lots of U.S. immigrants who are eligible to become naturalized citizens don't bother. As of 2010, about two-thirds of eligible immigrants had applied for citizenship, according to the Migration Policy Institute. That lags behind the rate in other English-speaking countries such as Australia and Canada, which do more to promote naturalization.

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WHY BOTHER?

What's so great about citizenship?

Naturalization offers all sorts of rights and benefits, including the right to vote and run for office. Naturalized citizens are protected from losing their residency rights and being deported if they get in legal trouble. They can bring family members into the U.S. more quickly.

Certain government jobs and licensed professions require citizenship. Citizenship also symbolizes full membership in U.S. society.

In 2010, there was a 67 percent earnings gap between naturalized citizens and noncitizen immigrants, according to a report from the Migration Policy Institute. Even after stripping out differences in education, language skills and work experience, naturalized citizens earned at least 5 percent more.

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SKIPPING IT

Nearly two-thirds of the 5.4 million legal immigrants from Mexico who are eligible to become U.S. citizens haven't done so, according to a Pew study released in February. Their rate of naturalization is half that of legal immigrants from all other countries combined. The barriers to naturalization cited by Mexican nonapplicants include the need to learn English, the difficulty of the citizenship exam and the $680 application fee.

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WORKERS

How do immigrants who are in the U.S. without permission fit into the nation's jobs picture?

In 2010, about 8 million were working in the U.S. or trying to get work. They made up about 5 percent of the labor force, according to Pew. Among U.S. farm workers, about half are believed to be in the country illegally, according to the Government Accountability Office.

Business groups want a system to legally bring in both more highly skilled workers and more lower-skilled workers such as agricultural laborers. The idea is to hire more when Americans aren't available to fill jobs. This has been a sticking point in past attempts at immigration overhaul. Labor groups want any such revamped system to provide worker protections and guard against displacing American workers. Current temporary worker programs are cumbersome and outdated.

The Senate bill would establish a agriculture worker visa system and create more visa programs for high- and low-skilled workers. Farm workers already here illegally would be able to qualify for green cards after five years if they'd already worked in agriculture in the U.S. for two years and if they kept working in the industry.

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EMPLOYERS

Current law requires employers to have their workers fill out a form that declares them authorized to work in the U.S. Then the employer needs to verify that the worker's identifying documents look real. But the law allows lots of different documents, and many of them are easy to counterfeit.

The government has developed a mostly voluntary employment verification system called E-Verify, which has gradually gotten better. But so far just 10 percent of employers are using it, according to the Migration Policy Institute. The system is now required in varying degrees by 19 states.

The Senate proposal would require all employers to implement it within four years.

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FAMILIES VS. JOBS

A big question in the immigration debate centers on how much priority to give to the family members of U.S. citizens and permanent residents.

Under current law, the U.S. awards a much larger proportion of green cards to family members than to foreigners with job prospects here. About two-thirds of permanent legal immigration to the U.S. is family-based, compared with about 15 percent that is employment-based, according to the Migration Policy Institute. The rest is largely humanitarian.

Some policymakers think employment-based immigration should be boosted to help the economy. Advocates for families want to make sure any such action doesn't come at the expense of people seeking to join relatives in the U.S.

The Senate plan would prevent citizens from bringing in siblings and would allow them to sponsor married sons and daughters only if the children were under 31. It would raise the cap on visas for high-skilled workers, create a startup visa for foreign entrepreneurs, and set up a new merit visa that would award points to prospective immigrants based on their education, employment, length of residence in the U.S. and other factors.

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WHO CARES?

For all the attention being devoted to immigration right now, it's not the top priority for most people, even for most Hispanics. It ranked 17th on a list of policy priorities in a recent Pew Research Center poll. Among Hispanics, one-third said immigration was an extremely important issue to them, behind such issues as the economy and jobs, education and health care.

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A VIEW FROM THE SOUTH

Is life actually better in the U.S.? A little more than half of Mexican adults think so, according to a 2012 Pew Global Attitudes poll. Thirty-eight percent said they'd move to the U.S. if they had the chance. Nineteen percent said they'd come even without authorization.

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Sources: Pew Hispanic Center, Migration Policy Institute, Department of Homeland Security, Census Bureau, Government Accountability Office, Population Reference Bureau, Encyclopedia of Immigration.

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Associated Press writers Alicia Caldwell and Erica Werner contributed to this report.

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Follow Nancy Benac on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/nbenac

The space-funding company Uwingu announced this "Adopt-a-Planet" effort today (May 1), asking the public to propose and vote on names for the many and varied worlds now known beyond our .

Any moniker that receives at least 1,000 votes earns its nominator the chance to "adopt" (and name) the of his or her choice. Such winners will also receive an adoption certificate, links to detailed information about the adopted planet and $100 in Uwingu store credits, company officials said. []

Adopt-a-Planet is similar to a month-long contest Uwingu staged recently to give a people's-choice name to Alpha Centauri Bb, the closest known exoplanet to Earth at just 4.3 light-years away. (.)

The new adoption effort, however, is open-ended and seeks names for many different alien worlds.

"We're happy to have winner after winner after winner," Uwingu CEO Alan Stern, a former NASA science chief who also heads the agency's New Horizons mission to Pluto, told SPACE.com. "There are plenty of exoplanets out there."

Nominating a name costs $4.99, and voting will set you back 99 cents. Uwingu (whose name means "sky" in Swahili) will use the money raised by Adopt-a-Planet to fund grants in space exploration, research and education, which is the company's main purpose, Stern added.

Uwingu also sees the campaign as a fun way to get people more interested and involved in science.

"We're engaging the public with the sky and astronomy in a way that's never been possible before," Stern said.

The names people propose for Adopt-a-Planet won't become the alien worlds' "official" astronomical names, Uwingu officials say. Rather, they'll be common monikers, much like "The Milky Way" or "The Whirlpool Galaxy."

The International Astronomical Union has traditionally approved official names for celestial bodies. So far, the organization has not moved to change the planet-naming status quo, in which alien worlds take the name of their host star along with a lowercase letter. The first planet discovered in a particular system is designated "b" (since the star is implicitly "a"), the second "c" and so on.

Astronomers first confirmed an alien planet orbiting a sunlike star in 1995. Since then, they've discovered more than 700 exoplanets (or more than 800, depending on whose tally is consulted), with thousands more awaiting confirmation by follow-up observations.

For more information on the Adopt-a-Planet campaign, .

Follow Mike Wall on Twitterand.Follow us , or . Originally published on

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Reproductive-rights groups that sued the Food and Drug Administration over access to the "morning-after" pill will ask a judge to hold the agency in contempt if it fails to comply with a court order directing it to make emergency contraception available to women of all ages.

The FDA said on Tuesday it will allow girls as young as 15 years old to buy without a prescription the Plan B One-Step emergency contraceptive, made by a unit of Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd.

The groups, which include the Center for Reproductive Rights and the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund, said the FDA must remove all age limits and point-of-sale restrictions on emergency contraception, also known as the "morning-after" pill, by Monday.

If not, they said they would ask a federal judge in Brooklyn to hold the agency in contempt of an April 5 order giving the FDA 30 days to make emergency contraception available over-the-counter to girls of all ages.

The FDA could also seek to temporarily stop the court order from taking effect if it files an appeal. It has not done so yet, and the FDA said on Tuesday that the Department of Justice was considering its options.

The ruling from District Judge Edward Korman came in response to a lawsuit originally filed in 2005 by the reproductive-rights groups.

A spokeswoman for the FDA declined to comment Wednesday.

The dispute is the latest twist in a long legal battle over the morning-after pill that has sparked both political and religious debates. If taken up to 120 hours after unprotected sex, it is designed to prevent pregnancy.

The FDA said Tuesday's decision was made in response by an administrative petition from Teva Women's Health, a unit of the Israeli, drug-maker Teva, and was unrelated to Korman's ruling.

The agency said its decision to lower the age limit for Plan B One-Step was based on scientific data submitted by Teva that showed girls as young as 15 could safely use the drug without the intervention of a healthcare provider. Cashiers will still have to verify the customer's age before selling it, the FDA said.

Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights, said in a statement, that the FDA's decision "does nothing to address the significant barriers that far too many women of all ages will still find if they arrive at the drugstore without identification or after the pharmacy gates have been closed for the night or weekend."

(Reporting by Jessica Dye; editing by Noeleen Walder and Leslie Gevirtz)