The Brookings-Duke Immigration Policy Roundtable
Breaking the Immigration Stalemate: From Deep Disagreements to Constructive Proposals
Immigration, Migration, Justice and Law, Labor Markets
The Brookings-Duke Immigration Policy Roundtable
The Brookings Institution, The Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University
October 06, 2009 —
Executive Summary
The Obama administration has committed itself to immigration reform. Yet despite all the shortcomings of current policy — threats to the rule of law, exploitation of vulnerable newcomers, real and perceived competition with Americans for jobs and public resources — reasonable compromise on immigration will be exceedingly difficult. The divide between elite and public opinion on this issue remains deep and wide. It is a critical factor in the lack of trust that pervades today’s political culture.
Breaking the Immigration Stalemate
The Brookings-Duke Immigration Policy Roundtable
Tuesday, October 06, 2009
2:00 PM to 3:30 PM
Washington, DC.
Audrey Singer, July 22, 2009
Russell Wheeler, The Brookings Institution, July 21, 2009
This distrust was readily apparent in November 2008 when the Immigration Policy Roundtable first convened its twenty participants. The Roundtable is a joint undertaking of the Brookings Institution and the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University. The group’s distinctive feature is that its members came to the table with divergent, often conflicting perspectives on immigration. In fact, the range of political and ideological views represented at the Roundtable is unprecedented in recent immigration policymaking.
Some of us were clearly attuned to the opportunities and realities of an increasingly interconnected global economy, which necessarily involves substantial movements of workers and their dependents around the world. Others of us were just as clearly concerned with the domestic costs and strains precipitated by these global forces.
Some empathized with Americans who are outraged that immigration law is not enforced, and is even being flouted. Others held that as currently written, our immigration laws are unworkable and must be reconciled with social and economic realities.
During our deliberations, we came to recognize that we would never resolve our principled disagreements. Nonetheless, progress at the policy level turned out to be possible, and the results fruitful. In the end, we were able to agree on a set of recommendations that address the most vexing and controversial issues stymieing immigration reform.
Reduce Illegal Immigration by Linking Workplace Verification and Legalization
The Roundtable’s approach to illegal immigration emphasizes the enforcement of immigration law at the workplace and a simultaneous effort to move illegal immigrants toward legal status. We propose a legalization program that would allow unauthorized workers who have been in the country for five or more years to start down a path to legalization. But this process would not proceed until a workplace verification system, authorized and funded by Congress, reaches an agreed-upon level of use and effectiveness that would be certified and continuously monitored by the Government Accountability Office.
Reorient Immigrant Admissions Criteria
We must reorient the nation’s immigrant admissions criteria to better serve Americans and our economic goals. Family unification should remain a bedrock principle of U.S. immigration policy, but we believe that “familyâ€
No jobs, welfare, education or health care and they will go
Cut illegals off from ALL services, education for anchors, and welfare and they will leave,
