Bush's New Immigration Initiative

I was reading today that the President is going to make a couple of major policy speeches this week on the issue of Immigration Reform. This is, I think, a good thing provided he does something more than just talk about it.

According to the article I read on CNN he is making several suggestions which, if carried out, could go a long way toward stemming the tide of illegal immigration into the United States.

His first suggestion is that we beef up both the Border Patrol and the number of patrols along the southern border. This is an excellent idea and should go far toward cutting the absolute flood of illegals into this country.

His second suggestion ties into the first. He wants reparated illegals to be sent to the interior of Mexico before they are released rather than our current practice of sending them just across the border to try again tomorrow. This will serve as a deterent in a couple of ways. First off it will just plain take them longer to get from where they are released back to the area of the border. Second, it will increase the expense of such illegal immigration to the border jumpers directly. Both of these can make some of them think twice anyway.

His third suggestion would make it harder on those who do get caught inside the country, but not at the border, to just disappear. He wants to build large holding camps in the Southwest to stop once and for all the catch and release policy we now follow because there just isn't space to hold all these people. This could serve a secondary purpose, and one that the President doesn't actually address...a place to put people we catch during Immigration sweeps. If the President actually decided to make an issue of illegal immigration to the point he begins ordering routine roundups, then we need very large, geographically isolated camps to hold them in. I suggest tents in the desert.

His final suggestion is the often mentioned Guest Worker Program. First off, let me note that I actually approve of a guest worker program. If employers can prove that Americans won't take the jobs they have at minimum wage, then they should be able to hire people who do. However, currently one of the reasons that illegals are used in these jobs is that the employers use their illegal status to pay sub-minimum wages. Enforcement of this will be interesting.

Where the President and I part ways is that he wants to make this Guest Worker Program apply to workers already here illegally, thus giving a seal of approval to their illegal activities, granting them amnesty for breaking our laws, and encouraging a flood of illegal immigration just as the last amnesty did. I want to see this program made available only to those who apply at a U.S. Embassy from within their own country. To qualify they would have to produce a legal proof of identity from their home country and a letter from an American employer showing that they have a job to come to. I would add to this a requirement that every one of these people has to report their current address monthly. We need a database that tracks them by location, fingerprints, retinal scans and, if possible, DNA.

My reasoning on this is simple. If they commit a crime or break the conditions of their legal stay here I want to see a way for them to be caught and deported easily. Such deportation should result in the person being barred from re-entry either for a very long time or permanently, depending on the crime.

The Guest Worker Program is going to cause the most flack because so many Americans believe as I do....don't reward people for illegal behavior.

The thing I didn't see in this article, and one that's vital, is a crackdown on employers of illegals. It should be punitive enough to discourage people from even wanting to try to employ illegals. Personally I advocate jail time for the first offense for anyone caught employing an illegal after the program goes into effect since checking should be easy with fingerprints. I would also advocate jail time for those trying to circumvent the program by claiming no American wanted the job when in fact there were plenty of Americans willing to take it at the wage being offered, but the employer didn't want to deal with it, or wanted to stiff the immigrant worker on salary.

I also see nothing in the article about the worker or families etc. being ineligible for any public service while the worker is here. I would also advocate making it part of our law that in order to be considered an American citizen, at least one of your parents has to be a citizen or legal resident (not guest worker). In other words, no more granting citizenship because someone sneaks across our border pregnant and then gives birth in this country. And make any new reform apply to Cubans as well.

The other aspect of immigration reform that the article doesn't touch on at all is the issue of it taking literally 5 years or more for an application to come to the U.S. to be approved, and the fact that we determine who can come here by way of a lottery as opposed to using a criterion to ensure that we get people who will be an asset rather than a drain on our national resources. This may be for another series of speeches.

As I said, I agree with the principles Bush is espousing up to a point. However, in the final analysis the proof will be in what he actually tries to do rather than what he says he wants to do. When he goes to Congress with a request for bills and funding for this immigration reform and actually puts those Border Patrol people on the border, we'll see. It's been my observation that Bush cares a lot more for what Vincente Fox thinks about our policies than what the average American does. It's about time that stopped. Nobody has a right to come across our borders uninvited. It's a national security issue as well as a matter of fairness. Let's try to do it right this time.