Tag: immigration

Uncle Sam Kicks Out Legal Immigrants for Down Profits in Recession

By
Ilya Shapiro

And now another story about the inanities of our immigration non-system.  Two Britons, Dean and Laura Franks, have run a restaurant in Maine for nearly ten years.  Fine, upstanding people who contribute to the economy and whose business is apparently much beloved in their town.

The problem is that the economic downturn decreased the restaurant’s profits, to a level where the “investment” they’re making in the country is too “marginal” to warrant renewal of their E-2 visa (one of the few immigration statuses I have not had).  Yes, that’s right, the business is making a profit, employing people, creating wealth, nobody’s a drag on the welfare state or law enforcement, but… not enough.  The feds say shut it down.

Unbelievable. At least the Franks can continue their fight to stay in their adopted country from a place more welcoming of productive members of society who happen to be foreigners:   Canada.

Topics: 
Government and Politics, Law and Civil Liberties, Trade and Immigration

Feds Challenge Arizona Immigration Law

By
Tim Lynch

Yesterday, the Obama administration filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Arizona’s recently enacted law that is designed to curb illegal immigration. The Arizona law has not yet taken effect – that will occur on July 29.  To generate more discussion and debate, Cato will be hosting a policy forum on the legal challenge and related issues on July 21.  If the weather in DC continues to cooperate, it will feel like we are actually in Arizona.

Go here for Cato work related to immigration policy.

Topics: 
Law and Civil Liberties, Trade and Immigration

President Obama’s Incomplete Speech on Immigration

By
Daniel Griswold

President Obama spoke this morning at American University on the need for comprehensive immigration reform. The president deserves credit for turning his attention to a thorny problem that desperately needs action from Congress, but the speech failed to hit at least one important note.

While the president called for comprehensive reform, he neglected to advocate the expansion of legal immigration in the future through a temporary or guest worker program for low-skilled immigrants. Even his own Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano, has said such a program is the necessary “third leg” of immigration reform, the other two being legalization of undocumented workers already here and vigorous enforcement against those still operating outside the system.

As I’ve pointed out plenty of times, without accommodation for the ongoing labor needs of our country, any reform would repeat the failures of the past. In 1986, Congress passed the Immigration Reform and Control Act, which legalized 2.7 million workers already here illegally, while beefing up enforcement. But without a new visa program to allow more low-skilled workers to enter legally in future years, illegal immigration just began to climb again to where, two decades later, we are trying once again to solve the same problem.

On the plus side, President Obama reminded his audience of the important role immigrants play in our open and dynamic country. And he rightly linked immigration reform to securing our borders:

“[T]here are those who argue that we should not move forward with any other elements of reform until we have fully sealed our borders. But our borders are just too vast for us to be able to solve the problem only with fences and border patrols. It won’t work. Our borders will not be secure as long as our limited resources are devoted to not only stopping gangs and potential terrorists, but also the hundreds of thousands who attempt to cross each year simply to find work.

Unfortunately, given the political climate in Washington, an election looming only four months away, and the president’s unwillingness to press for an essential element of successful reform, the illegal immigration problem will still be on the agenda when a new Congress comes to town in 2011.

Topics: 
Trade and Immigration

Take Our Jobs, Please

By
Jason Kuznicki

Check out this invitation from the United Farm Workers:

There are two issues facing our nation—high unemployment and undocumented people in the workforce—that many Americans believe are related.

Missing from the debate on both issues is an honest recognition that the food we all eat—at home, in restaurants and workplace cafeterias (including those in the Capitol)—comes to us from the labor of undocumented farm workers.

Agriculture in the United States is dependent on an immigrant workforce. Three-quarters of all crop workers working in American agriculture were born outside the United States. According to government statistics, since the late 1990s, at least 50% of the crop workers have not been authorized to work legally in the United States.

We are a nation in denial about our food supply. As a result the UFW has initiated the “Take Our Jobs” campaign.

Farm workers are ready to train citizens and legal residents who wish to replace them in the field, we will use our knowledge and staff to help connect the unemployed with farm employers. Just fill out the form to the right and continue on to the request for job application.

Perhaps some U.S. citizens really will work these jobs. Somehow I doubt there will be very many.

It’s too bad I learned about this site only just after my most recent piece at the Washington Examiner Opinion Zone, in which I talked about how so much of the American economy now depends on the benign neglect of our immigration laws.

I almost wish we could see the consequences of having an America free of illegal immigrants. Based on past precedent, it wouldn’t make much difference in stopping terrorism. But it would really, really hurt American agriculture and business.

Topics: 
Trade and Immigration

What Would Reagan Do on Immigration?

By
Daniel Griswold

Former Reagan speechwriter Peter Robinson tries to answer that very good question in an op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal. It’s a question my conservative Republican friends should ask themselves as the party tries, once again, to turn public opposition to illegal immigration into political success at the polls.

Robinson correctly observes that Reagan would have had nothing to do with the anger and inflamed rhetoric that so often marks the immigration debate today. “Ronald Reagan was no kind of nativist,” he concludes, noting that Reagan was always reaching out to voters beyond the traditional Republican base, including the fast-growing Hispanic population.

It’s worth remembering that Reagan signed the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA), which opened the door to citizenship for nearly 3 million people who had been living in the country illegally. Robinson is confident Reagan would have supported the kind of comprehensive immigration reform championed by President George W. Bush and approved by the Senate in 2006.

For the record, I made similar observations and included a few of the same Reagan quotes in an op-ed I wrote soon after Reagan’s passing in June 2004

My only quibble with Robinson is his assertion that Reagan would have insisted that we successfully enforce the current immigration law first before contemplating any changes. It’s true that the 1986 IRCA contained new enforcement measures and launched an exponential rise in spending on border enforcement. But by all accounts the 1986 law failed to stem the inflow of illegal immigration.

My hunch is that President Reagan would not have simply favored spending more money on an approach that has so clearly failed to deliver. Although he embraced the conservative label, Reagan was always ready to challenge the status quo and change the law to further his vision of a free society and limited government.

I wish more of the Gipper’s admirers today shared his benevolent attitude toward immigration.

Topics: 
General, Trade and Immigration

Feds Propose Forfeiture as Immigration Employer Sanction

By
Walter Olson

As recent posts in this space indicate, advocates of individual liberty have a variety of views on the proper policy response to illegal immigration. Whatever the disagreements, I suspect there’s some degree of consensus that certain proposed remedies are entirely too Draconian. From the California Labor and Employment Law Blog:

The U.S. Attorneys Office in San Diego has recently criminally prosecuted a French bakery for allegedly engaging in an intentional pattern and practice of hiring unauthorized workers. As part of the indictment, the Government is seeking hefty monetary fines, prison time for the owner and management, and asset forfeiture of the entire business to the Government. While the Government does not have experience running a French bakery, they are getting very serious about enforcing I-9 regulations.

More details on the French Gourmet prosecution can be found at the San Diego Union-Tribune and Restaurant Hospitality.

When government began pushing for asset forfeiture powers, some imagined that the formidable power would remain mostly confined to use in, say, illegal drug or money laundering prosecutions. But that’s not how it has worked. And immigration is hardly the only area in which employers should be worried about the expanding bounds of criminalization. Bills pending in Congress would criminalize “misclassification” of employees – which commonly consists of disagreeing with the government or with labor unions as to whether particular employees should count as independent contractors not covered by overtime and similar federal labor laws. Are we far from the day when prosecutors will start proposing forfeitures against employers over such infractions?

Topics: 
General, Trade and Immigration

Pages