We Should Have Listened to Jimmy Carter in 1977 on Illegal Aliens

Undocumented Aliens Message to the Congress. August 4, 1977

To the Congress of the United States:

I am proposing to Congress today a set of actions to help markedly reduce the increasing flow of undocumented aliens in this country and to regulate the presence of the millions of undocumented aliens already here.

These proposed actions are based on the results of a thorough Cabinet-level study and on the groundwork which has been laid, since the beginning of the decade, by Congressmen Rodino and Eilberg and Senators Eastland and Kennedy. These actions will:

• Make unlawful the hiring of undocumented aliens, with enforcement by the Justice Department against those employers who engage in a "pattern or practice" of such hiring. Penalties would be civil--injunctions and fines of $1000 per undocumented alien hired. Criminal penalties could be imposed by the courts against employers violating injunctions. Moreover, employers, and others, receiving compensation for knowingly assisting an undocumented alien obtain or retain a job would also be subject to criminal penalties.

• Increase significantly the enforcement of the Fair Labor Standards Act and the Federal Farm Labor Contractor Registration Act, targeted to areas where heavy undocumented alien hiring occur.

• Adjust the immigration status of undocumented aliens who have resided in the U.S. continuously from before January 1, 1970 to the present and who apply with the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) for permanent resident alien status; create a new immigration category of temporary resident alien for undocumented aliens who have resided in the U.S. continuously prior to January 1, 1977; make no status change and enforce the immigration law against those undocumented aliens entering the U.S. after January 1, 1977.

• Substantially increase resources available to control the Southern border, and other entry points, in order to prevent illegal immigration.

• Promote continued cooperation with the governments which are major sources of undocumented aliens, in an effort to improve their economies and their controls over alien smuggling rings.

Each of these actions will play a distinct, but closely related, role in helping to solve one of our most complex domestic problems: In the last several years, millions of undocumented aliens have illegally immigrated to the United States. They have breached our nation's immigration laws, displaced many American citizens from jobs, and placed an increased financial burden on many states and local governments.

The set of actions I am proposing cannot solve this enormous problem overnight, but they will signal the beginning of an effective Federal response. My Administration is strongly committed to aggressive and comprehensive steps toward resolving this problem, and I am therefore proposing the following actions:

EMPLOYER SANCTIONS

The principal attraction of the United States for undocumented aliens is economic--the opportunity to obtain a job paying considerably more than any available in their own countries. If that opportunity is severely restricted, I am convinced that far fewer aliens will attempt illegal entry.

I am therefore proposing that Congress make unlawful the hiring by any employer of any undocumented alien. This employment bar would be implemented in the following way:

• Enforcement would be sought against those employers who engage in a "pattern or practice" of hiring undocumented aliens, with the Justice Department setting priorities for enforcement.

• Penalties for violation of the employment bar would be both injunctive relief and stiff civil fines--a maximum of $1,000 for each undocumented alien hired by an employer. A violation of a court injunction would subject an employer to a potential criminal contempt citation and imprisonment.

• An employer would be entitled to defend any charge of hiring an undocumented alien by proving that a prospective employee's documentation of legal residence, as designated by the Attorney General in regulations, was seen prior to employment.

• The Social Security card would be designated as one of the authorized identification documents; and we will accelerate the steps already being taken to make certain that such cards are issued, as the law now mandates, only to legal residents. Those steps include requiring personal interviews of card applicants and making the cards more difficult to forge. But no steps would be taken to make the Social Security card, or any other card, a national identification document.

• To further restrict job opportunities, criminal sanctions would be imposed on those persons who receive compensation for knowingly assisting an undocumented alien obtain or retain employment, or who knowingly contract with such persons for the employment of undocumented aliens. These sanctions are directed at the substantial number of individuals who broker jobs for undocumented aliens or act as agents for alien smugglers. It is not directed at those who inadvertently refer an undocumented alien to a job, such as an employment agency or a union hiring hall.

To make certain that all of these new sanctions are uniformly applied, they would pre-empt any existing state sanctions.

In addition to the creation of these new sanctions, efforts to increase enforcement of existing sanctions will be significantly increased. The Fair Labor Standards Act, which mandates payment of the minimum wage and provides other employee protections, would not only be strictly enforced, but its existing civil and criminal penalties would be sought much more frequently by the government. To date, the inability of the government to enforce fully this Act, due in part to a lack of resources, has resulted in the hiring of undocumented aliens at sub-minimum wages, thereby often displacing American workers. Two hundred sixty new inspectors will be hired and targeted to areas of heavy undocumented alien employment. Similarly, the Federal Farm Labor Contractor Registration Act, which prohibits the recruiting and hiring of undocumented aliens for farm work, would be tightly enforced. The Departments of Justice and Labor will work closely in exchanging information developed in their separate enforcement activities.

While I believe that both the new and existing employer sanctions, and their strict enforcement, are required to control the employment of undocumented aliens, the possibility that these sanctions might lead employers to discriminate against Mexican-American citizens and legal residents, as well as other ethnic Americans, would be intolerable. The proposed employer sanctions have been designed, with their general reliance on civil penalties and "pattern or practice" enforcement, to minimize any cause for discrimination. However, to prevent any discriminatory hiring, the federal civil rights agencies will be charged with making much greater efforts to ensure that existing anti-discrimination laws are fully enforced.

BORDER ENFORCEMENT

The proposed employer sanctions will not, by themselves be enough to stop the entry of undocumented aliens. Measures must also be taken to significantly increase existing border enforcement efforts. While our borders cannot realistically be made impenetrable to illegal entry, greater enforcement efforts clearly are possible, consistent with preserving both the longest "open" borders in the world and our humanitarian traditions.

I am proposing to take the following increased enforcement measures, most of which will require Congressional approval for the necessary additional resources:

• Enforcement resources at the border will be increased substantially and will be reorganized to ensure greater effectiveness. The exact nature of the reorganization, as well as the amount of additional enforcement personnel, will be determined after the completion in September of our ongoing border enforcement studies. It is very likely, though, that a minimum of 2000 additional enforcement personnel will be placed on the Mexican border.

• INS will shift a significant number of enforcement personnel to border areas having the highest reported rates of undocumented alien entry.

• An anti-smuggling Task Force will be established in order to seek ways to reduce the number and effectiveness of the smuggling rings which, by obtaining forged documents and providing transportation, systematically smuggle a substantial percentage of the undocumented aliens entering the country. The U.S. Attorneys will be instructed to give high priority to prosecuting individuals involved in alien smuggling.

• The State Department will increase its visa issuance resources abroad to ensure that foreign citizens attempting to enter this country will be doing so within the requirements of the immigration laws.

• Passage will be sought of pending legislation to impose criminal sanctions on those who knowingly use false information to obtain identifiers issued by our Government, or who knowingly use fraudulent Government documents to obtain legitimate Government documents.

• The State Department will consult with countries which are the sources of significant numbers of undocumented aliens about cooperative border enforcement and anti-smuggling efforts.

COOPERATION WITH SOURCE COUNTRIES

The proposed employer sanctions and border enforcement will clearly discourage a significant percentage of those who would otherwise attempt to enter or remain in the U.S. illegally. However, as long as jobs are available here but not easily available in countries which have been the source of most undocumented aliens, many citizens of those countries will ignore whatever barriers to entry and employment we erect. An effective policy to control illegal immigration must include the development of a strong economy in each source country.

Unfortunately, this objective may be difficult to achieve within the near future. The economies of most of the source countries are still not sufficiently developed to produce, even with significant U.S. aid, enough jobs over the short-term to match their rapidly growing workforce.

Over the longer-term, however, I believe that marked improvements in source countries' economies are achievable by their own efforts with support from the United States. I welcome the economic development efforts now being made by the dynamic and competent leaders of Mexico. To further efforts such as those, the United States is committed to helping source countries obtain assistance appropriate to their own economic needs. I will explore with source countries means of providing such assistance. In some cases this will mean bilateral or multilateral economic assistance. In others, it will involve technical assistance, encouragement of private financing and enhanced trade, or population programs.

ADJUSTMENT OF STATUS

The fact that there are millions of undocumented aliens already residing in this country presents one of the most difficult questions surrounding the aliens phenomenon. These aliens entered the U.S. illegally and have willfully remained here in violation of the immigration laws. On the other hand, many of them have been law-abiding residents who are looking for a new life and are productive members of their communities.

I have concluded that an adjustment of status is necessary to avoid having a permanent "underclass" of millions of persons who have not been and cannot practicably be deported, and who would continue living here in perpetual fear of immigration authorities, the local police, employers and neighbors. Their entire existence would continue to be predicated on staying outside the reach of government authorities and the law's protections.

I therefore recommend the following adjustments of status:
First, I propose that permanent resident alien status be granted to all undocumented aliens who have resided continuously in the U.S. from before January 1, 1970 to the present. These aliens would have to apply for this status and provide normal documentary proof of continuous residency. If residency is maintained, U.S. citizenship could be sought five years after the granting of permanent status, as provided in existing immigration laws.

The permanent resident alien status would be granted through an update of the registry provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act. The registry statute has been updated three times since 1929, with the last update in 1965, when permanent resident alien status was granted to those who had resided here prior to 1948.

Second, all undocumented aliens, including those (other than exchange and student visitors) with expired visas, who were residing in the United States on or before January 1, 1977 will be eligible for a temporary resident alien status for five years.

Those eligible would be granted the temporary status only after registering with INS; registration would be permitted solely during a one-year period. Aliens granted temporary status would be entitled to reside legally in the United States for a five-year period.

The purpose of granting a temporary status is to preserve a decision on the final status of these undocumented aliens, until much more precise information about their number, location, family size and economic situation can be collected and reviewed. That information would be obtained through the registration process. A decision on their final status would be made sometime after the completion of the registration process and before the expiration of the five-year period.

Temporary resident aliens would not have the right to vote, to run for public office or to serve on juries; nor would they be entitled to bring members of their families into the U.S. But they could leave and re-enter this country, and they could seek employment, under the same rules as permanent resident aliens.

Unlike permanent resident aliens, temporary resident aliens would be ineligible to receive such Federal social services as Medicaid, Food Stamps, Aid to Families with Dependent Children, and Supplemental Security Income. However, the allocation formulas for Revenue Sharing, which are based on population, would be adjusted to reflect the presence of temporary resident aliens. The adjustment would compensate states and local communities for the fact that some of these residents--undocumented aliens-are currently not included in the Census Bureau's population counts. That undercount deprives certain states and communities of Revenue Sharing funds which, if Census figures were completely accurate, would be received and used to defray certain expenses caused by the presence of undocumented aliens. Those receiving adjustments of status through the actions I am proposing would be included in the 1980 Census, so that the allocation charges would have to be made only through 1980.

Third, for those undocumented aliens who entered the United States after January 1, 1977, there would be no adjustment of status. The immigration laws would still be enforced against these undocumented aliens. Similarly, those undocumented aliens, who are eligible for adjustment of status, but do not apply, would continue to have the immigration laws enforced against them.

In addition, the INS would expedite its handling of the substantial backlog of adjustment of status applications from those aliens entitled to an adjustment under existing law.

Finally, those persons who would be eligible for an adjustment of status under these proposals must not be ineligible under other provisions of the immigration laws.

TEMPORARY FOREIGN WORKERS

As part of these efforts to control the problem of undocumented aliens, I am asking the Secretary of Labor to conduct, in consultation with the Congress and other interested parties, a comprehensive review of the current temporary foreign worker (H-2) certification program. I believe it is possible to structure this program so that it responds to the legitimate needs of both employees, by protecting domestic employment opportunities, and of employers, by providing a needed workforce. However, I am not considering the reintroduction of a bracero-type program for the importation of temporary workers.

IMMIGRATION POLICY

Our present immigration statutes are in need of a comprehensive review. I am therefore directing the Secretary of State, the Attorney General, and the Secretary of Labor to begin a comprehensive interagency study of our existing immigration laws and policies.

In the interim, I am supporting pending legislation to increase the annual limitation on legal Mexican and Canadian immigration to a total of 50,000, allocated between them according to demand. This legislation will help provide an incentive to legal immigration.

I urge the Congress to consider promptly, and to pass, the legislation I will submit containing the proposals described in this Message.

JIMMY CARTER
The White House,
August 4, 1977.




Read more at the American Presidency Project: Jimmy Carter: Undocumented Aliens Message to the Congress.

Illegal Immigrants: We have earned the right to be here.

Thousands rally against strict Ga. law cracking down on illegal immigration at state Capitol

ATLANTA — Thousands of marchers stormed the Georgia Capitol on Saturday to protest the state’s new immigration law, which they say creates an unwelcome environment for people of color and those in search of a better life.

Men, women and children of all ages converged on downtown Atlanta for the march and rally, cheering speakers while shading themselves with umbrellas and posters. Capitol police and organizers estimated the crowd at between 8,000 and 14,000. They filled the blocks around the Capitol, holding signs decrying House Bill 87 and reading “Immigration Reform Now!”

Friends Jessica Bamaca and Melany Cordero held a poster that read: “How would you feel if your family got broken apart?”

Bamaca was born in the U.S., but her mother and sister are from Guatemala. She said she fears they will be deported.

“I would be here by myself,” said Bamaca, 13. “I have a feeling (the governor) doesn’t know the pain affecting families. If he were to be in our position, how would he react?”

Adelina Nicholls, executive director of the Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights, said the crowd was sending a message.




“They are ready to fight,” Nicholls said. “We need immigration reform, and no HB87 is going to stop us. We have earned the right to be here.”

Azadeh Shahshahani of the American Civil Liberties Union of Georgia called the rally inspiring and said she hoped lawmakers would recognize the law’s potential to damage the state.

“I think it’s going to have an impact,” she said. “Unfortunately, the damage has already been done as far as people of color having second thoughts about moving to Georgia.”

Several different groups stood with the largely Latino crowd, including representatives from the civil rights movement. The Rev. Timothy McDonald, an activist who has been supportive of immigration protesters, was among the speakers showing his solidarity.

“You are my brothers and my sisters,” McDonald told the crowd. “Some years ago, they told people like me we couldn’t vote. We did what you are doing today. We are going to send a message to the powers that be ... that when the people get united, there is no government that can stop them. Don’t let them turn you around.”

MiLi Lai, a student at Emory who is Chinese, also attended the rally because the immigration law doesn’t just apply to Latinos, but “all non-American people.”


“We are the same community,” Lai said. “We have to fight for our rights.”

Bellanira Avoytes came to the rally with her husband and three children. Although she is a legal resident and her children were born in Georgia, she does not see herself as separate from undocumented Latinos.

“I have family who are not residents,” she said. “I am together with the Latin people. I love Georgia. I have stayed here for 18 years. I want to buy a house here.”

Saturday’s rally follows a “day without immigrants” organized Friday, when some parts of the law took effect. It was organized by the Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights. The organization asked businesses to close and community members not to work or shop to protest the law.

On Monday, a judge temporarily blocked key parts of the law until a legal challenge is resolved. One provision that was blocked authorizes police to check the immigration status of suspects without proper identification. It also authorizes them to detain illegal immigrants. Another penalizes people who knowingly and willingly transport or harbor illegal immigrants while committing another crime.


Parts of similar measures in Arizona, Utah and Indiana also have been blocked by the courts.

Provisions that took effect Friday include one that makes it a felony to use false information or documentation when applying for a job. Another provision creates an immigration review board to investigate complaints about government officials not complying with state laws related to illegal immigration.

Mexican Security Risk to The United States

Very Graphic

Mexico: bleeding to death in the war on drugs
Another 72 corpses found in a new mass grave. Feuding cartels blamed for displays of mutilated bodies. Death toll in four-year crackdown passes 28,000

By Guy Adams in Los Angeles
Thursday, 26 August 2010 Independent

The shootout left four people dead, but that was just the beginning. As dust began to settle on a ranch in north-eastern Mexico, thought to have been owned by one of the world's most powerful drug cartels, the battle-hardened Marines stumbled upon their first decomposing corpse.

Minutes later, they found a second, then a third. By the time troops had finished searching the remote property, roughly 90 miles from the US border, a total of 72 contorted bodies had been laid out in rows beneath the summer sunshine. The 54 men and 18 women had all been recently murdered.

A lone wounded survivor, who was left for dead but later stumbled upon a military checkpoint, told local newspapers yesterday that he and the victims were illegal migrants from Central America trying to make their way to the US. They had been taken hostage by the Zetas, a gang of drug-runners who have recently taken to kidnapping and human trafficking. The Ecuadorian man said his group was taken to a ranch by gunmen and shot after they refused to pay ransoms.

Troops originally raided the ranch near San Fernando, in the Gulf coast state of Tamaulipas, after a man with gunshot wounds approached a military checkpoint and said he had been attacked by a narcotics gang. Naval helicopters were dispatched to the ranch but, as they approached, several gunmen opened fire with automatic weapons and tried to flee in a convoy of vehicles. In the ensuing shootout, a Marine and three suspected cartel members were killed.

At the ranch, the Marines seized 21 assault rifles, shotguns and rifles, with 6,000 ammunition rounds. Then they discovered what a spokesman called "the lifeless bodies of 72 people". It was not clear whether the victims were separately, or in a single massacre.

Mass graves are becoming an increasingly common by-product of the wave of drug-related violence sweeping the country. In May, 55 bodies were pulled from abandoned mine near Taxco, just south of Mexico City. Last month, 51 more were unearthed from a field next to a rubbish tip near the northern city of Monterrey.

They provide stark reminders of the growing cheapness of life in a conflict that is constantly plumbing new depths of barbarity. Over the weekend, four decapitated bodies, their genitals and index fingers cut off, were hung upside down from a bridge just outside the nation's capital. Two more were dumped nearby on Tuesday.

"The federal government categorically condemns the barbarous acts committed by criminal organisations," the Navy said of the latest atrocity. "Society should condemn these acts, which illustrate the absolute necessity to continue fighting crime with all rigour."

Tamaulipas, on the north-eastern tip of Mexico bordering Texas, provides a stark illustration of the problems facing the forces of law and order across the country, as they attempt to crack down on gangs smuggling cocaine from South and Central America, where it is produced, to the US, where most of it is consumed.

For years, local supply routes were controlled by the Gulf Cartel, a long-established criminal organisation which kept its activities largely beneath the public radar. But in 2007, shortly after the newly-elected President Calderon announced a crackdown on the drugs trade, several of the group's leaders were arrested. Instead of finishing off the cartel, though, that led to the rise of a rival group, the Zetas. The subsequent turf war has claimed hundreds of victims.

It is also thought to have led to widespread corruption at the highest levels of the police and civil service, together with the murder of Rodolfo Torre Cantu, a popular candidate for state governorship, who was shot dead in his car in June in Mexico's worst political killing in 16 years. Mr Calderon told Mexicans this week to brace themselves for further killings. But he argued that the spate of deaths showed that his crackdown, which has involved replacing often-corrupt police forces with government soldiers in many regions, is slowly working.

"I do not rule out that there might be more bouts of the violence we are witnessing, and what is more, the victory we are seeking and will gain is unthinkable without more violence," he said. "But this is a process of self-destruction for the criminals."

Although most Mexicans support Mr Calderon for now, a growing minority believe that the drugs war will be impossible to win. Earlier this month, former president Vicente Fox, a staunch supporter of the US crackdown on drugs, said recent events had won him over to the cause of legalisation. "It does not mean drugs are good," he said. "But we have to see it as a strategy to weaken and break the economic system that allows cartels to earn huge profits."

To legalise or not to legalise: the drugs war in words

Mexican President Felipe Calderón, June 2010

"It is as though we have a neighbour next door who is the biggest addict in the world, with the added fact that everyone wants to sell drugs through our house... If we remain with our arms crossed, we will remain in the hands of organised crime, we will always live in fear, our children will not have a future, violence will increase and we'll lose our freedom."

Former Mexican President Vicente Fox August 2010

"We should consider legalising the production, sale and distribution of drugs... Radical prohibition strategies have never worked."

US President Barack Obama April 2009

"At a time when the Mexican government has so courageously taken on the drug cartels that have plagued both sides of the border, it is absolutely critical that the United States joins as a full partner in dealing with this issue... also on our side of the border, in dealing with the flow of guns and cash south."

Samuel Gonzalez, former anti-drugs prosecutor, August 2010

"In almost four years the government cannot claim any kind of victory and the debate is the result of the crisis of legitimacy in the strategy. But at least it is now being discussed and that has to be a good thing."

Ignore Immigration Reform- Nail the Employers

As usual we are doing it all wrong. We are debating the absurdity that illegal immigrants are illegal. Think about that, better yet, stop thinking about it.

We often hear that the illegals are here because they want a better life. No they are not.

Illegals are here because their US employers want a better life. From landscape firms to meat processors to construction companies the same game is played; they all are fighting for a competitive advantage by forcing down wages and associated taxes and operating costs.

This is easily fixed. Go after the US employers.

Go after all of them: be they three man landscaping firms, cleaning services or large processing firms. Fine them, sanction them, prosecute them. You will be amazed at how quickly the problem is resolved.

The fine should be twice the annual wage of a domestic worker. Get caught hiring a worker, who if US would be making $40,000, fine the employer $80,000 and do it per worker. One worker, an $80,000 fine, ten workers $800,000. Problem solved.
__________________________

Customs commissioner neglected to file forms on household employees


By Ed O'Keefe
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 14, 2010

Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Alan D. Bersin said Thursday he didn't know he's required by law to file paperwork verifying that his household employees were authorized to work in the United States.

Bersin told senators that he and his wife tracked the immigration status of a nanny, house cleaners and babysitters "on a piece of paper that was on file in our home."

"No employee ineligible to work in the United States has ever worked in our household," Bersin said. "No employee who has worked in our household has not had taxes paid for."

According to a memo by the Senate Finance Committee, Bersin has employed 10 household employees since 1993 and failed to complete I-9 forms for all of them. The I-9 form is issued by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which shares immigration enforcement responsibilities with CBP and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

President Obama nominated Bersin in September and issued a recess appointment for him and 14 other nominees in March. Obama said all of the nominees would remain in the Senate for confirmation.

The Finance Committee considered Bersin's nomination Thursday, but Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) told Bersin that his failure to file the paperwork was "unacceptable."

"Part of the agency's responsibilities is to secure our borders. To credibly enforce the law, you must first follow the law," Baucus said, adding later that Bersin's term "will expire at the end of the next session." Nominees installed during a congressional recess serve until the end of the next congressional session, meaning Bersin's term will expire in late 2011 if the Senate does not confirm him.

Bersin previously served as Obama's U.S.-Mexico border czar, advising Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano on border security matters. The former California education secretary, San Diego schools superintendent and private-practice lawyer also served as a U.S. attorney during the Clinton administration. He maintains the full support of the White House.

"Mr. Bersin has responded honestly and candidly to all questions from Committee staff," White House spokesman Nicholas Shapiro said in an e-mail. "He has displayed the integrity and forthrightness that have been hallmarks of his career in government, academia, and the private sector."

Arizona Under Siege by Illegals, Drug Cartels, Liberals and Federal Inaction

American citizens support the law that was signed in Arizona last Friday.

Of course the contemptible Barack Hussein Obama does not. Today, President Obama released a new video calling on “young people, African-Americans, Latinos, and women” to help the Democrats in 2010.

A new Rasmussen Reports poll shows 60 percent of Americans favor the law. In Arizona, where so many people cross the border, the approval is 70 percent.

In Tucson, those opposed to the new law protested, saying their civil liberties will be violated when police check the immigration status of suspects.

There are currently an estimated 460,000 illegal immigrants in Arizona.

Al Sharpton is Unhappy

Al Sharpton promised to bring "freedom walkers" to Arizona to challenge the new law and force arrests, invoking the memory of the freedom riders who challenged segregation on interstate buses during the 1960s.

"The Arizona Immigration Bill is an affront to the civil rights of all Americans and an attempt to legalize racial profiling," said Sharpton, an asshole of impeccable credentials.

The Mexican President is Unhappy

The Mexican government will act against a new law targeting immigrants in the U.S. state of Arizona, which borders the Mexican state of Sonora, President Felipe Calderon told a broadcast public event on Monday.

"We are going to act, we have begun and we will do more," Calderon said.

"No one can sit on their hands faced with decisions that affect compatriots so clearly, including those that have contributed to the U.S. growth for generations, not only new arrivals," he said.

"The Mexican government will use all the resources within its reach to defend the rights of those Mexicans who will be affected by this legislation," Calderon said.

Say what? "defend the rights of those Mexicans who will be affected by this legislation."

Arizona Democrat Enforces Laws Ignored by National Republicans

Gov. Janet Napolitano, Democrat

Business on the Border

Arizona gets tough on employers to solve its immigration problem.

By Terry Greene Sterling | Newsweek Web Exclusive
Dec 28, 2007 |

Eighteen years ago, when John Eisenhower opened his Scottsdale, Ariz., tree care business, he vowed to honor a 1986 federal law that prohibited hiring undocumented immigrants. The former Christian missionary named his company Integrity Tree Service Inc., but his decision not to hire undocumented workers quickly put him at a financial disadvantage. He chose to abide by the law, but his competitors hired undocumented immigrants for substandard wages and "made big money riding the backs of illegals," says Eisenhower, now 53. He survived by building a devoted clientele. Today his six to eight Latino and Anglo employees enjoy benefits and paid vacations, and his manual laborers earn up to three times the hourly rate that some companies pay their illegal workforce.

Now a controversial state law—with national implications—is slated to take effect Jan. 1 and promises to level the playing field for Eisenhower's company and thousands of other law-abiding Arizona businesses. The employer sanctions law imposes tough penalties on businesses that knowingly employ undocumented immigrants. First offenders may have their business licenses suspended for up to 10 days and must sign an affidavit promising not to hire undocumented workers in the future. Fail to comply, and companies could lose their licenses to operate altogether. What's more, the law requires all of Arizona's 150,000 companies to run new hires through a free online federal database that checks immigration status.

Foes of the law include immigrant rights activists and representatives of the construction, agriculture, hospitality and manufacturing industries, which employ large numbers of unskilled immigrant laborers. The law's opponents questioned its constitutionality in federal court, but that case was dismissed on Dec. 7. Then, on Dec. 21, Judge Neil Wake of the U.S. District Court in Phoenix cleared the way for the law to take effect on New Year's Day. Critics of the law received another blow recently, when the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco refused to grant an injunction aimed at preventing the law from taking effect.


Gov. Janet Napolitano, a moderate Democrat, became a target of criticism after she signed the law last July, after Congress had failed to reform federal immigration policy. Arizona is particularly hard-hit by illegal immigration woes, because its nearly 400-mile border with Mexico is the preferred gateway for most immigrants traveling north. An estimated 500,000 to 600,000 undocumented people live in Arizona, Napolitano says, and sanctioning employers who hire them is part of an overall strategy to fix a problem the feds have long ignored. "Without the federal government taking action, the states must move ahead," she tells NEWSWEEK. "If Arizona is a laboratory for democracy, then so be it."

The Arizona law has divided the state's business community. Some are already finding the law easy to live with. The Salt River Project, a Phoenix-based utility with about 4,300 employees, says it has run about 900 new hires through the database in the last 18 months without a major problem. Jolynn Clarke, the utility's manger of staffing, says the database check mandated by the new law is a quick and easy way to ensure that employees "really are who they say they are."

Other employers, particularly those that rely on low-skilled labor, are taking a different view. Critics say undocumented workers provide an essential workforce in a state with a relatively low unemployment rate of between 3 and 4 percent. "We are literally shutting down immigration, and as we shut down immigration, we shut down the economy," says Joe Sigg, director of government relations for the Arizona Farm Bureau, a statewide coalition of farmers and ranchers.

"This is law by hysteria," says John Augustine, whose family has farmed and ranched in Arizona since 1950 and employs about 150 workers. Augustine and other business owners have prepared for the law by retaining lawyers and auditors to review hiring and record-keeping procedures. He says his cotton and alfalfa farm doesn't hire illegal immigrants, but that doesn't mean the law won't affect his businesses. "I have a hard time finding labor now," he says. "Because there will be fewer people in the workforce, it will be even harder to find labor, and you'll pay more for it."

The law has already had a negative effect on some businesses, says Maria Arredondo, owner of Meubeleria Central, a Phoenix furniture store that caters to Latino immigrants—both legal and illegal. Customers started dwindling when news of the law first broke in the summer, and now Arredondo wonders how long she can survive. Prospective customers tell her they like her furniture and they like her prices, but they're saving their money in case they get deported. With little business income to make her home mortgage payments, Arredondo rented her house and moved with her three young children into the furniture store. "I am an American citizen," she says, "and I don't know how much longer I can hold on."

It's proving to be a difficult time for Latinos in Arizona. It didn't help that Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon recently shocked the Latino community by appointing a panel to explore whether the Phoenix police should regularly check for immigration status. Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio has arrested nearly 1,400 undocumented immigrants, with the blessing of County Attorney Andrew Thomas. Arpaio relies on state laws that outlaw human smuggling and federal laws that allow officers to check citizenship or residency status in the course of their duties, for instance a routine traffic stop. "We don't arrest randomly," says Lisa Allen, a spokeswoman for the sheriff's office. But immigrants fear they may be deported if they have even one traffic violation. And now the employer sanctions law looms.


"What you have is a slow-growing panic," says Alfredo Gutierrez, who was a state senator for 14 years and now owns a Phoenix-based lobbying firm and hosts a Spanish-language radio talk show. "You have a community feeling besieged," he says. "People are saving their money and waiting. They talk about leaving, but few have. The great and overwhelming majority of people are just going to stay here. They have very few resources to go check out jobs in places like Ohio."

In the near future, safe havens in other states may be hard to find. Arizona's law is viewed as a test case by other states, "trying to create order inside of chaos" caused by federal inaction, says Sheri Steisel, director of the immigration task force for the National Conference of State Legislatures. Steisel says state legislatures passed at least 244 laws related to immigrants and immigration in 2007, a three-fold increase over 2006. Although Arizona's new law imposes the toughest sanctions on employers, 19 other states passed measures related to employment of undocumented immigrants. Oklahoma now makes it a felony to harbor, transport or shelter illegal immigrants and, like Arizona, requires employers to verify immigration status through online databases.

Opponents of Arizona's law vow they'll continue to try block the law's debut on Jan. 1. Time, however, is not on their side.

Enforce the Existing Laws on Illegal Immigration...

...and the problem will resolve itself. That makes sense to me.

Victor David Hanson in an essay at Real Clear Politics on the recent immigration bill concludes with an obvious observation:

...Illegal immigration and the efforts to accommodate it have come about from either bureaucratic prerogative - under pressure from employers and ethnic lobbyists - or court decisions. In contrast, polls, referenda and legislative action all reflect a public desire to reduce illegal immigration and close the borders now. In fact, in a June Rassmussen poll, 70 percent of the public supported an immigration bill that does that - and only that.

If the American public wants the border closed first, and discussion of everything else later, is that really such a bad thing?

Were the government to enforce laws already passed - fine employers for hiring illegal aliens, actually build the approved fences, beef up the border patrol, issue verifiable identification - we would then soon be dealing with a static population of illegal aliens. And that pool would insidiously shrink, not annually grow.

Some of the 12 million here illegally would willingly return home. Some with criminal records could be deported. Some would marry U.S. citizens. Some could be given work visas. Some could apply for earned citizenship.

The point is that our formidable powers of assimilation would finally catch up and have time to work on a population that would be at last fixed, quantifiable and identifiable. As aliens were more readily integrated with the general citizen population, Spanish would evolve into a helpful second, not a single alternate, language. Wages would rise for workers already here - many of them soon to be Mexican-American citizens - without competition from a perpetual influx of illegal aliens who work more cheaply.

Mexico would be forced to deal with rather than export its own problems. Billions in earnings would stay in the United States to help our own entry-level and legal immigrants from Mexico, not be sent back as remittances to relatives.

In short, a savvy public is neither racist nor hysterical in wanting the border closed now. It's the only comprehensive solution to the present mess of illegal immigration.

_________________

Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and author, most recently, of "A War Like No Other: How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War." You can reach him by e-mailing author@victorhanson.com.

Keeping the Home Fires Burning.

Illegals light border fires to sidetrack U.S. agents
By Jerry Seper
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
June 19, 2007

U.S. Border Patrol agents seeking to secure the nation's border in some of the country's most pristine national forests are being targeted by illegal aliens, who are using intentionally set fires to burn agents out of observation posts and patrol routes.
The wildfires have destroyed valuable natural and cultural resources in the National Forest System and pose an ongoing threat to visitors, residents and responding firefighters, according to federal law-enforcement authorities and others.
In the Coronado National Forest in Arizona, with 60 miles of land along the U.S.-Mexico border, U.S. Forest Service firefighters sent in to battle fires or clear wild-land fire areas are required to be escorted by armed law-enforcement officers.
Armed smugglers of aliens and drugs have walked through the middle of active firefighting operations, the authorities said.

More here.

Why are We Ruled by Self -Loathing White Liberals like Lindsey Graham and George Bush?

Non-Self Loathing White American Men

The amnesty bill is back and true to form the self-loathing Republicans have to come up with this artifice: The new bill includes a proposal by Sens. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) to establish a $4.4 billion fund, paid for by fees and fines collected from undocumented immigrants, exclusively for financing border security. The implication here is that Americans cannot even pony up the change to protect our own borders. We need some idiotic convoluted scheme put together by two spineless Republicans. They make me sick with disgust. It may be time for some revolution.

Illegal Immigration And The Fall Of Rome

By: Patrick Burke, For The Bulletin
06/18/2007

For centuries historians have debated the reasons for the fall of the Roman Empire. The ancient authors pointed to invasions by barbarian armies. But why did the Romans succumb to the invaders when they had been able previously to resist them? Gibbon attributed it to internal weakness: the conversion to Christianity deprived the Romans of their fighting spirit. For many years now scholars have favored an economic explanation: high taxes and heavy economic regulation impoverished the empire. But a recent book by English historian Peter Heather argues that Rome was overcome by illegal immigration.

The Germanic tribes did not want to destroy the empire but only to participate in its wealth and the protection it offered its citizens. Though living outside the empire's borders (the Rhine and the Danube) for several hundred years, from roughly the first to the fifth century, they had been able to trade with Rome and had grown much wealthier in the process. But wealthier meant more powerful. When the Huns appeared behind them out of the Asian steppes, the Germans became determined to get into the safety of the empire by any means. The Romans, for their part, were not opposed to their desire. On the contrary, Rome from its beginnings was an inclusive society and had always welcomed immigrants. It routinely gave them employment in the Roman army. But immigrants were welcome only under certain conditions: They had to assimilate. They had to disperse throughout the empire's territory and not insist on remaining in their own groups or maintaining their own culture but adopt Roman ways of living. Above all, the Romans admitted immigrants only when they could control the process militarily. Any time a tribe of immigrants was permitted to enter, Rome made sure that the empire's armies outnumbered them by a wide margin so that there could be no question as to who was in charge. If the visitors got obstreperous, they would quickly find themselves quelled.

But in the fifth century the Romans lost control of the immigration process. Armies were sent to the Middle East to counter a hostile, newly invigorated Persia, leaving the West open. The Germanic tribes were allowed in, but once inside the empire they were not assimilated but retained their cultural and political identities, eventually combining to form armies within its borders that the Romans could no longer overcome.
Patrick Burke is director of the Wynnewood Institute.

©The Evening Bulletin 2007

One of Sixty US Senators Must Understand This: Say no.

When we vote for mediocre representatives, we get the expected results. Recently we learn that the people we trusted to run our government, did not bother to read the intelligence reports about Iraq. They did not bother to read reports that could have affected their decisions to take our country to war. Our country to war! How could they not have read those reports?

Today we arrive at a decision on a complicated bill that is so convoluted it is barely readable. It is two inches thick. If this law were any good, it could be one page long. Hyperbole this is not. This proposed law can end the Unites States of America as we know it. It can undo a document that was written on one page. Will one US Senator out of sixty have have the courage to say no?

What follows is an article that looks at the issue.

Borderlands and Immigrants
StraforApril 04, 2006 17 57 GMT

By George Friedman

The United States has returned to its recurring debate over immigration. This edition of the debate, focused intensely on the question of illegal immigration from Mexico, is phrased in a very traditional way. One side argues that illegal migration from Mexico threatens both American economic interests and security. The other side argues that the United States historically has thrived on immigration, and that this wave of migration is no different.

As is frequently the case, the policy debate fails to take fundamental geopolitical realities into account.

To begin with, it is absolutely true that the United States has always been an immigrant society. Even the first settlers in the United States -- the American Indian tribes -- were migrants. Certainly, since the first settlements were established, successive waves of immigration have both driven the American economy and terrified those who were already living in the country. When the Scots-Irish began arriving in the late 1700s, the English settlers of all social classes thought that their arrival would place enormous pressure on existing economic processes, as well as bring crime and immorality to the United States.

The Scots-Irish were dramatically different culturally, and their arrival certainly generated stress. However, they proved crucial for populating the continent west of the Alleghenies. The Scots-Irish solved a demographic problem that was at the core of the United States: Given its population at that time, there simply were not enough Americans to expand settlements west of the mountains -- and this posed a security threat. If the U.S. population remained clustered in a long, thin line along the Atlantic sea board, with poor lines of communication running north-south, the country would be vulnerable to European, and especially British, attack. The United States had to expand westward, and it lacked the population to do so. The Americans needed the Scots-Irish.

Successive waves of immigrants came to the United States over the next 200 years. In each case, they came looking for economic opportunity. In each case, there was massive anxiety that the arrival of these migrants would crowd the job market, driving down wages, and that the heterogeneous cultures would create massive social stress. The Irish immigration of the 1840s, the migrations from Eastern and Southern Europe in the 1880s -- all triggered the same concerns. Nevertheless, without those waves of immigration, the United States would not have been able to populate the continent, to industrialize or to field the mass armies of the 20th century that established the nation as a global power.

Population Density and Economic Returns

Logic would have it that immigration should undermine the economic well-being of those who already live in the United States. But this logic assumes that there is a zero-sum game. That may be true in Europe or Asia. It has not been true in the United States. The key is population density: The density of the United States, excluding Alaska, is 34 people per square kilometer. By comparison, the population density in the United Kingdom is 247 per square kilometer, 231 in Germany and 337 in Japan. The European Union, taken as a whole, has a population density of 115. If the United States were to equal the United Kingdom in terms of density, it would have a population of about 2 billion people.

Even accepting the premise that some parts of the United States are uninhabitable and that the United Kingdom is over-inhabited, the point is that the United States' population is still small relative to available land. That means that it has not come even close to diminishing economic returns. To the extent to which the population-to-land ratio determines productivity -- and this, in our view, is the critical variable -- the United States still can utilize population increases. At a time when population growth from native births is quite low, this means that the United States still can metabolize immigrants. It is, therefore, no accident that over the past 40 years, the United States has absorbed a massive influx of Asian immigrants who have been net producers over time. It's a big country, and much of it is barely inhabited.

On this level, the immigration issue poses no significant questions. It is a replay of a debate that has been ongoing since the founding of the country. Those who have predicted social and economic disaster as a result of immigration have been consistently wrong. Those who have predicted growing prosperity have been right. Those who have said that the national character of the United States would change dramatically have been somewhat right; core values have remained in place, but the Anglo-Protestant ethnicity represented at the founding has certainly been transformed. How one feels about this transformation depends on ideology and taste. But the simple fact is this: The United States not only would not have become a transcontinental power without immigration; it would not have industrialized. Masses of immigrants formed the armies of workers that drove industrialism and made the United States into a significant world power. No immigration, no United States.

Geography: The Difference With Mexico

Now, it would seem at first glance that the current surge of Mexican migration should be understood in this context and, as such, simply welcomed. If immigration is good, then why wouldn't immigration from Mexico be good? Certainly, there is no cultural argument against it; if the United States could assimilate Ukrainian Jews, Sicilians and Pakistanis, there is no self-evident reason why it could not absorb Mexicans. The argument against the Mexican migration would seem on its face to be simply a repeat of old, failed arguments against past migrations.

But Mexican migration should not be viewed in the same way as other migrations. When a Ukrainian Jew or a Sicilian or an Indian came to the United States, their arrival represented a sharp geographical event; whatever memories they might have of their birthplace, whatever cultural values they might bring with them, the geographical milieu was being abandoned. And with that, so were the geopolitical consequences of their migration. Sicilians might remember Sicily, they might harbor a cultural commitment to its values and they might even have a sense of residual loyalty to Sicily or to Italy -- but Italy was thousands of miles away. The Italian government could neither control nor exploit the migrant's presence in the United States. Simply put, these immigrants did not represent a geopolitical threat; even if they did not assimilate to American culture -- remaining huddled together in their "little Italys" -- they did not threaten the United States in any way. Their strength was in the country they had left, and that country was far away. That is why, in the end, these immigrants assimilated, or their children did. Without assimilation, they were adrift.




The Mexican situation is different. When a Mexican comes to the United States, there is frequently no geographical split. There is geographical continuity. His roots are just across the land border. Therefore, the entire immigration dynamic shifts. An Italian, a Jew, an Indian can return to his home country, but only with great effort and disruption. A Mexican can and does return with considerable ease. He can, if he chooses, live his life in a perpetual ambiguity.

The Borderland Battleground

This has nothing to do with Mexicans as a people, but rather with a geographical concept called "borderlands." Traveling through Europe, one will find many borderlands. Alsace-Lorraine is a borderland between Germany and France; the inhabitants are both French and German, and in some ways neither. It also is possible to find Hungarians -- living Hungarian lives -- deep inside Slovakia and Romania.

Borderlands can be found throughout the world. They are the places where the borders have shifted, leaving members of one nation stranded on the other side of the frontier. In many cases, these people now hold the citizenship of the countries in which they reside (according to recognized borders), but they think and speak in the language on the other side of the border. The border moved, but their homes didn't. There has been no decisive geographical event; they have not left their homeland. Only the legal abstraction of a border, and the non-abstract presence of a conquering army, has changed their reality.

Borderlands sometimes are political flashpoints, when the relative power of the two countries is shifting and one is reclaiming its old territory, as Germany did in 1940, or France in 1918. Sometimes the regions are quiet; the borders that have been imposed remain inviolable, due to the continued power of the conqueror. Sometimes, populations move back and forth in the borderland, as politics and economics shift. Borderlands are everywhere. They are the archaeological remains of history, except that these remains have a tendency to come back to life.

The U.S.-Mexican frontier is a borderland. The United States, to all intents and purposes, conquered the region in the period between the Texan Revolution (1835-36) and the Mexican-American War (1846-48). As a result of the war, the border moved and areas that had been Mexican territory became part of the United States. There was little ethnic cleansing. American citizens settled into the territory in increasing numbers over time, but the extant Mexican culture remained in place. The border was a political dividing line but was never a physical division; the area north of the border retained a certain Mexican presence, while the area south of the border became heavily influenced by American culture. The economic patterns that tied the area north of the Rio Grande to the area south of it did not disappear. At times they atrophied; at times they intensified; but the links were always there, and neither Washington nor Mexico City objected. It was the natural characteristic of the borderland.

It was not inevitable that the borderland would be held by the United States. Anyone looking at North America in 1800 might have bet that Mexico, not the United States, would be the dominant power of the continent. Why that didn't turn out to be the case is a long story, but by 1846, the Mexicans had lost direct control of the borderland. They have not regained it since. But that does not mean that the borderland is unambiguously American -- and it does not mean that, over the next couple of hundred years, should Washington's power weaken and Mexico City's increase, the borders might not shift once again. How many times, after all, have the Franco-German borders shifted? For the moment, however, Washington is enormously more powerful than Mexico City, so the borders will stay where they are.

The Heart of the Matter

We are in a period, as happens with borderlands, when major population shifts are under way. This should not be understood as immigration. Or more precisely, these shifts should not be understood as immigration in the same sense that we talk about immigration from, say, Brazil, where the geographical relationship between migrant and home country is ruptured. The immigration from Mexico to the United States is a regional migration within a borderland between two powers -- powers that have drawn a border based on military and political history, and in which two very different populations intermingle. Right now, the United States is economically dynamic relative to Mexico. Therefore, Mexicans tend to migrate northward, across the political border, within the geographical definition of the borderland. The map declares a border. Culture and history, however, take a different view.

The immigration debate in the U.S. Congress, which conflates Asian immigrations with Mexican immigrations, is mixing apples and oranges. Chinese immigration is part of the process of populating the United States -- a process that has been occurring since the founding of the Republic. Mexican immigration is, to borrow a term from physics, the Brownian motion of the borderland. This process is nearly as old as the Republic, but there is a crucial difference: It is not about populating the continent nearly as much as it is about the dynamics of the borderland.

One way to lose control of a borderland is by losing control of its population. In general, most Mexicans cross the border for strictly economic reasons. Some wish to settle in the United States, some wish to assimilate. Others intend to be here temporarily. Some intend to cross the border for economic reasons -- to work -- and remain Mexicans in the full sense of the word. Now, so long as this migration remains economic and cultural, there is little concern for the United States. But when this last class of migrants crosses the border with political aspirations, such as the recovery of lost Mexican territories from the United States, that is the danger point.

Americans went to Texas in the 1820s. They entered the borderland. They then decided to make a political claim against Mexico, demanding a redefinition of the formal borders between Mexico and the United States. In other words, they came to make money and stayed to make a revolution. There is little evidence -- flag-waving notwithstanding -- that there is any practical move afoot now to reverse the American conquest of Mexican territories. Nevertheless, that is the danger with all borderlands: that those on the "wrong" side of the border will take action to move the border back.

For the United States, this makes the question of Mexican immigration within the borderland different from that of Mexican immigration to places well removed from it. In fact, it makes the issue of Mexican migration different from all other immigrations to the United States. The current congressional debate is about "immigration" as a whole, but that makes little sense. It needs to be about three different questions:

• Immigration from other parts of the world to the United States
• Immigration from Mexico to areas well removed from the southern border region
• Immigration from Mexico to areas within the borderlands that were created by the U.S. conquests

Treating these three issues as if they were the same thing confuses matters. The issue is not immigration in general, nor even Mexican immigration. It is about the borderland and its future. The question of legal and illegal immigration and various solutions to the problems must be addressed in this context.

Ten Republicans Fly with the Democrats

Craig- Idaho
Domenici- New Mexico
Graham- South Carolina
Hagel- Nebraska
Kyl- Arizona
Lugar- Indiana
Martinez- Florida
McCain- Arizona
Spector- Pennsylvania
Voinovich- Ohio


Senate OKs amnesty for deportees
By Stephen Dinan
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
June 7, 2007

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas discusses his amendment to the immigration bill yesterday. (AP)
The Senate voted yesterday to grant amnesty to hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens who have already been caught and ordered deported but are defying a court order, preserving their path to citizenship as part of the immigration bill.

Another showdown is scheduled for this morning on Democrats' effort to cut off the debate and force a final vote on the bill. Republicans have vowed to block that through a filibuster unless they are given assurances they can offer enough amendments before the final vote.

For now, the small bipartisan group of senators that crafted the bill behind closed doors has been successful in fending off any major changes, though the coalition took a couple of hits from Republican-sponsored amendments last night.

Yesterday's major fight was over part of the bill that wipes out the immigration charges against illegal aliens who have already faced a judge and been ordered deported, known as alien absconders, and over part of the bill that applies to aliens who have already been deported but sneaked back into the country again.

Sen John Cornyn offered an amendment to prevent those aliens from gaining legal status, arguing they have already shown disrespect for the law and should be sent home.

"We are going to continue to be viewed as non-serious about workability, about enforcement, about restoring respect for the rule of law, unless we vote to exclude those who show nothing but defiance for our laws," the Texas Republican said.

But Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat, said they were only guilty of "common, garden-variety immigration offenses" that should not disqualify them.

"Our employers beg them to come back and our broken borders make that possible," he said.

Other Democrats, including Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, Rhode Island Democrat, said Mr. Cornyn's amendment would remove due process rights for illegal aliens. But Republicans said those being affected are illegal aliens who are already in the country without authorization, and in the case of absconders have even had their day in court.

"Nobody has a constitutional legal right to demand entry into the United States," said Sen. Jeff Sessions, Alabama Republican. "It amazes me the lack of understanding and comprehension of what it's all about."

Mr. Cornyn's amendment was defeated 51-46, with 10 Republicans joining most Democrats and the chamber's two independents in voting to preserve the path to citizenship for absconders.

"If someone else has a better idea, I'd love to have them give it to us."- John McCain

... so said John McCain about the the immigration bill during the presidential debate. McCain may not be hearing from the American people, but the others who were on stage with him have. Amnesty ended McCain's political career. That much is obvious from the tone of the debate, but the others, who want to lead on the Republican side, have heard the American people. That is great news.

Caution!

Do not give up the fight to stop this foolish and defeatist bill. When it is stopped, it will be time to deal with the fools and knaves that tried to foist it onto to us. It will be time to give a lesson on representative democracy. It will be long past time to let politicians know that party loyalty follows principle, not the obverse.

And speaking of principle, will the knave in the oval office pardon his loyal jester, Scooter Libby?

Fate of Senate immigration bill in doubt
Tue Jun 5, 2007 9:53PM EDT

By Donna Smith

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Republicans on Tuesday accused Democrats of trying to rush a vote on immigration reform, casting doubt on the fate of the White House-backed bill that would tighten border security and legalize millions of illegal immigrants.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he wanted to close debate on the bill by this week's end despite Republicans' objections, which could doom the fragile compromise legislation that backers say would help fix a broken immigration system through which millions of illegal immigrants have slipped into the United States.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said his fellow Republicans had a number of amendments they wanted considered before voting on the bill.


But Reid, a Nevada Democrat, said Republicans were stalling.

"What we have heard today are buzzwords for 'this bill is going nowhere,'" Reid said in a Senate floor exchange with McConnell.

Reid said he planned to set a Senate vote for Thursday on his motion to limit debate, and it was unclear with Republican objections that it would garner the 60 votes needed in the 100-member chamber to advance the bill toward passage.

Sen. Jon Kyl, an Arizona Republican who helped broker the bill, said cutting off debate "would be a big mistake" that could "risk the bill not passing at all."

The bill, worked out by a bipartisan group of senators and the White House, ties tough border security and workplace enforcement measures to a guest-worker program and a plan to legalize the millions of immigrants.

It has come under attack from the right and left, with conservatives arguing it will give amnesty to people who broke U.S. laws and unions saying the temporary worker program will create an underclass of cheap laborers.

As Senate leaders argued over timing, the bill's backers sought to hold the bill together after senators returned from a week-long break having heard concerns from constituents and armed with amendments that could shatter the compromise.

Senators on Tuesday overwhelmingly accepted an amendment that would require employers to try to recruit American workers before employing someone from another country under the guest worker program.

But they rejected a measure that would have made it more difficult for illegal immigrants to obtain permanent resident status.

The bill faces other challenges, including an amendment by Sen. John Cornyn, a Texas Republican, that would bar immigrants who ignored deportation orders and other felons from taking advantage of the legalization program. Democrats argued the proposal would exclude many farm workers and other immigrants whose only crime was to enter the United States seeking jobs.

Proposed Democratic amendments to change limits on family-based immigration could undermine Republican support for the bill, senators said.

The Senate debate is being closely watched by members of the House of Representatives, which will take up its own version of immigration legislation if the bill passes the Senate. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, has said she wants significant Republican support, but that could be difficult.

Don't Put Down Your Lance. . .

...until they cry for mercy.

Senate Refuses to Limit Debate on Immigration Plan (Update3)
By James Rowley and Nicholas Johnston

June 7 (Bloomberg) -- The Senate refused to limit debate on overhauling U.S. immigration law as Democrats urged President George W. Bush to rally Republicans to rescue the legislation.

The 33 votes to shut off debate were 27 short of the 60 needed by Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada to bring to a conclusion debate on legislation to grant legal status to 12 million undocumented aliens. He said he would seek another vote later today. If it fails, ``the bill's gone,'' Reid said. ``What else can I do?''

Reid appealed to Bush to twist the arms of Republicans who voted against limiting debate, saying an inability to pass the legislation would produce headlines that the ``president fails again.''

``This is the president's bill. He has worked long and hard,'' Reid said. ``This bill that's on the floor is not a Democratic bill, it is a bill that was worked on by Democrats and Republicans in cooperation with the president.''

Since he took office six years ago, Bush has championed an overhaul of immigration law, including a guest-worker program in the legislation to help U.S. employers fill jobs Americans won't take. The Senate imperiled the legislation earlier today when it voted 49-48 to force expiration of the guest-worker plan in five years unless Congress renews it.

No Republicans voted to limit debate, and 15 Democrats voted with the Republicans to continue debate on the measure.

Gingrich Does Not Think It Is Too Hard to Lead

Truth or Consequences on Amnesty for Illegal Immigrants

Joe Murray: One Criminal Immigration Response Deserves Another
By: Joe Murray, The Bulletin
05/25/

"Compromise used to mean that half a loaf was better than no bread. Among modern statesmen it really seems to mean that half a loaf is better than a whole loaf," mused famed English writer G.K. Chesterton. With decades passing since Chesterton penned those words, it appears the U.S. Senate has not only agreed to give away its half of the loaf in regards to immigration reform; it is also throwing in the keys to the store.

Last week, a group of U.S. senators proved that politics (or, in this case, special interest) makes strange bedfellows. This Tequila troupe of piñata politicos, led by Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), created an immigration bill unlike any seen before. This dynamic duo, however, was not without assistance, as Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), Mel Martinez (R-Fla.), and Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) were more than happy to hold the pencil as an eraser was taken to the border.

For a number of weeks Senators and White House officials had been working behind closed doors to draft a comprehensive immigration reform package that would protect America's bleeding border while simultaneously dealing with the 12 million-plus illegal immigrants already in the nation. The result? A Corona Compromise.
Despite the preemptive proclamations by Sen. Specter that the Senate bill "is not amnesty," the devil is in the details of this legislation, and it is clear that while the amnesty may not be de jure, it is clearly de facto.

Just what exactly does the bill do? Well, it immediately legalizes the 12 million immigrants who evaded the U.S. Border Patrol and broke into the country. Rather than facing deportation, these immigrants now face open arms and a "Z visa." Put simply, this bill not only allows illegals to stay in the country; it makes Uncle Sam roll out the red carpet of citizenship for them.

Under the bill, the path to citizenship, starting with a Z visa, will be an 8-13 year journey. During that journey, only the head of household will have to return the native country, briefly, to file papers and obtain citizenship. And to quell any fears, the right to re-entry back into America is guaranteed.

While the Gang of 12 argues that the denial of instant citizenship is proof that the deal is not amnesty, such an argument is as hollow as Nicole Richie, because even though the illegal immigrant may not be technically a citizen, he will be treated like one. Just look at the details hidden within the Z visa program.

A Z visa is available only for an illegal alien, and, according to the Federation for American Immigration Reform, the probationary benefits include work authorization, protection from removal, and a Social Security number. These benefits are granted immediately and are subject only to the submission of an application (with fingerprints) and a 24-hour wait on a background check.

And what about the border security concerns (i.e., triggers) the Gang of 12 argue must be realized before the humanitarian elements of the bill kick in? The Z visa probationary benefits are not subject to such triggers and begin as soon as the bill is signed by President Bush -border security be damned.

Another interesting tidbit is that the illegal immigrant who "comes out of the shadows" does not have to become a U.S. citizen. A Z visa is valid for four years and can be renewed indefinitely. An applicant for a Z visa need not understand English but merely demonstrate "an attempt to gain an understanding of the English language" upon renewal of the visa.

Translation: Those Mexican immigrants that broke into America out of love of currency rather than love of country will be permitted to stay indefinitely. Their wallets will be filled with money while their hearts are retained by Mexico.

Make no mistake, this bill is de facto amnesty and will create a tsunami of immigrants that will crash upon America's shores. If a person can break into this nation and obtain citizenship without significant repercussion, what does that say to the rest of the world?

It says America does not value citizenship; it values cheap labor. It does not value a sense of national pride; it values the Wall Street bottom line. It says we granted amnesty twice, and we will be sure to do it again. It says America is on the road to becoming a third-world nation that will be unrecognizable in the next 50 years.
This immigration bill is a watershed moment for America, as it will determine whether she retains her status as a great nation or becomes the "polyglot boarding house" feared by Teddy Roosevelt. The face of America is changing and the white population that used to claim the majority mantle is no longer reproducing-it is no longer sustaining the population.

Rather, third-world people of different races are coming to America in droves, and unlike the Germans, Irish and Italians that came before them, these people are not assimilating into the culture. They are holding onto the apron strings of the Motherland and establishing cultural barrios in the hearts of American cities.
If this immigration deal passes and 12 to 20 million illegal immigrants are thrust into the U.S. population, the character of America will be under siege. America will no longer be one people united by a common history, language, culture, literature and history. She will become a people whose only common denominator is the almighty dollar. And as Texas taught Mexico a century or so ago, a country needs more than currency to command loyalty.

"The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities," Roosevelt told the Knights of Columbus. This is what the immigration debate is all about.

It is clear that the American people do not want this Corona Compromise jammed down their throats, as a Rasmussen poll showed only 26 percent of voters favor the proposal. Sensing the storm clouds over the horizon, President Bush, so desperate for a legacy that he would turn over our borders to Mexico City, has dispatch Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff to quell dissent.

"If they don't leave, then you are going to give them silent amnesty. You're either going to let them stay or you're going to be hypocritical," Chertoff said. Translation: Chertoff will not do his job. Such an understanding was further realized when Chertoff proclaimed that the deportations sought after by some Congressmen were "not going to happen."

Enough is enough. This Administration, while more than willing to secure the borders of a desert nation who wants neither our presence nor our aid, has told America that it has no intention of filling the gaps in America's borders. Such an act is criminal.

©The Evening Bulletin 2007

The Facts Behind the Immigration Liars at The New York Times

The NY Times headlines, widely quoted by the MSM read, "Immigration Bill Provisions Gain Wide Support in Poll".

Not too encouraging to the opponents of this bill. Could it be that it was printed to encourage our masters and rulers in DC, who will not read the details behind the headlines, as they will probably not read the bill itself? I asked myself, how is this possible?

I decided to do something quaint. Read the data.

The poll itself covers many subjects. It contains over one hundred questions. The published pdf version has been edited.

I simply highlight some of the questions in the same poll that would point to a far different picture from the propaganda and outrageous distortion portrayed by the New York Times. Could it be that the New York Times has an agenda?

8. Do you approve or disapprove of the way George W. Bush is handling the issue of
immigration?

approve 27% disapprove 60%

41. Which comes closer to your opinion: 1) America should always welcome all immigrants, OR 2) America should always welcome some immigrants, but not others, OR 3) America cannot afford to open its doors to any newcomers?

Welcome all 24% Welcome some 48% No newcomers 24%

42. Which of the following three statements comes closest to expressing your overall view of immigration policy in the United States? 1) On the whole, our immigrationpolicy works pretty well and only minor changes are necessary to make it work better. 2) There are some good things in our immigration policy, but fundamental changes are needed. 3) Our immigration policy has so much wrong with it that we need to completely rebuild it.

Only minor changes 8% Fundamental changes 41% Completely rebuild 49%

46. In the long run, do you think the people who are emigrating to the United States
today will make American society better, will make American society worse, or do you
ink today's immigrants won't affect American society one way or the other? th

Better 28% Worse 35% Won’t affect society 29%


51. What about ILLEGAL immigration – How serious a problem do you think the issue of
ILLEGAL immigration is for the country right now — very serious, somewhat serious, not too serious, or not at all serious?

Very 61% Somewhat 30% Not too 6% Not at all 1%

52. What, if anything, is your main concern about immigrants in the U.S.?

They use public services 17%
They don’t pay taxes 8%
Terrorism/security threat 8%
Take jobs away from residents 13%
Breaking law by being here 11%
Don’t learn to speak English 5%
Commit crimes 6%

56.Do you think illegal immigrants do more to strengthen the U.S. economy because they provide low-cost labor and they spend money or do illegal immigrants do more to weaken the U.S. economy because they don't all pay taxes but can use public services?

Strengthen 23% Weaken 70%


59. As a result of LEGAL immigration into the United States, do you think the threat of terrorism against the United States has increased, decreased, or stayed about the same? ASKED OF HALF THE RESPONDENTS N=568

Increased 42% Decreased 3%

60. As a result of ILLEGAL immigration into the United States, do you think the threat of terrorism against the United States has increased, decreased, or stayed about the same? ASKED OF HALF THE RESPONDENTS N=564

Increased 45% Decreased 2%

74. Should illegal immigrants be prosecuted and deported for being in the U.S. illegally, or shouldn't they?

Should be prosecuted 69% Should not 24%

The full poll pdf here