Thread: Illinois Republicans for immigration reform

March 20, 2015

Illinois Republicans for immigration reform

By John Rowe
313391

Conventional wisdom says immigration reform is dead for this Congress. Fresh from battle scars over Department of Homeland Security funding, some argue the GOP-controlled Congress will not touch immigration for rest of the year. What conventional wisdom misses is a growing chorus of moderate to conservative Republicans - led by our leaders in Illinois - who are advocating for sensible solutions to grow the businesses that we represent, protect both hard working immigrants and create jobs for American workers.

Last week, Illinois Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner, Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), Reps. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) and Bob Dold (R-Ill.) and former Rep. Aaron Schock joined Chicago Archbishop Blase Cupich and the Illinois Business Immigration Coalition to try to move forward the stalemated national immigration debate.

Chicago’s new Archbishop Cupich received a standing ovation from a packed business audience for his passionate call for a permanent, adult solution to repair our broken system that can also supersede President Obama’s executive order.Gov. Rauner called for a comprehensive federal solution to grow and sustain our industries’ demand for high- and low-skilled workforce that is consistently unmet due to inadequate visa allocations under a system designed for a 1980s economy.

Without a talented and stable workforce, fruits and vegetables rot in the fields, prices for goods and services rise, and fewer job opportunities for American workers.

The most compelling case made by Republican leaders was a conservative think-tank study that estimates it would take 20 years and up to $600 billion to deport every undocumented immigrant, while real GDP would drop by nearly $1.6 trillion and shave 5.7 percent off economic growth. This is a price tag for a shortsighted enforcement-only approach that America and especially Illinois can ill afford.

The fact remains that over the past several decades, our economic laws of labor supply and demand have been stronger than our civil immigration laws. Immigrants come here to fill jobs for both high- and low-skill work. In the process these immigrants have become an integral part of our economy. So if our goal is to grow a dynamic and thriving business environment we must pass immigration reform that reflects the realities of our current economy and protects hardworking immigrant workers. Immigration reform is economically important, morally right, politically smart and more urgent than ever.

The chorus of pro-reform Republicans will continue to grow in the coming months as the political calculus shifts toward 2016. Illinois Republican leaders like Rauner, Kirk, Dold, Kinzinger and Schock are leaders for sensible solutions. We urge Congress to follow.

Rowe is co-chair of the Illinois Business Immigration Coalition and Exelon chairman emeritus. Also signing on the above opinion are coalition members:Dave Bender, executive director of the American Council of Engineering Companies of Illinois; Omar Duque, president and CEO of the Illinois Hispanic Chamber of Commerce; Marc Gordon, president and CEO of the Illinois Hotel and Lodging Association; Rich Guebert Jr., president of the Illinois Farm Bureau; Mark Harris, president and CEO of the Illinois Science and Technology Coalition; Fred Hoch, president and CEO of the Illinois Technology Association; Todd Maisch, president and CEO of the Illinois Chamber of Commerce; Rebecca Shi, executive director of the Illinois Business Immigration Coalition; Sam Toia, president and CEO of the Illinois Restaurant Association; Maryjane Wurth, president and CEO of the Illinois Hospital Association; and Dan Yunker, president and CEO of the Metropolitan Chicago Healthcare Council.

http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-bl...gration-reform

As the old adage says, "Figures don't lie, but liars figure." This report says that a conservative think tank study estimates 20 years and 600 billion dollars to do a full deportation of aliens. Today they use an estimate of 11 million illegals here. About 6-7 years ago we estimated 12 million illegals here. Someone did a study then and estimated 5 years to deport them at a cost of 25 billion. Applying 3% inflation rate (nearly twice the rate for Soc. Sec. increases) the 25 billion estimate would be near 30 billion today, nowhere near 600 billion. Aaron Schrock was in on supporting this, too and he is being investigated for criminal charges, so, well, it is easy to see where credibility is a problem here.

Now, what may be the motivation for such ridiculously inflated numbers? Do you need to ask? Convince the public that it makes more sense to accept them than to deport them! Who wins when this is sold to fools? You know that, too. Employers keep cheap labor and republicans keep receiving huge campaign contributions.

I doubt that there are any more questions. But this is why I do not/cannot trust republicans. Besides this story insults me, too! Shame on them!

Well, I guess now we know why Republican Governor of Illinois, Bruce Rauner, didn't sign Illinois up for the Texas lawsuit. Watch them fall one by one. The only reason a Republican Governor would not join the Texas lawsuit is either because they are so disengaged from the issues of our country like the poor Governor of Wyoming who supports the lawsuit but just doesn't have the time to devote to joining it because he's got his hands full suing the Federal Bureau of Land Management to get rid of another 475 wild horses in his state, or they actually support Obama Amnesty for illegal aliens. So if the voters in these states aren't happy about that, especially Republican voters, then they'll need to make a change next election.

Originally Posted by kevinssdad

As the old adage says, "Figures don't lie, but liars figure." This report says that a conservative think tank study estimates 20 years and 600 billion dollars to do a full deportation of aliens. Today they use an estimate of 11 million illegals here. About 6-7 years ago we estimated 12 million illegals here. Someone did a study then and estimated 5 years to deport them at a cost of 25 billion. Applying 3% inflation rate (nearly twice the rate for Soc. Sec. increases) the 25 billion estimate would be near 30 billion today, nowhere near 600 billion. Aaron Schrock was in on supporting this, too and he is being investigated for criminal charges, so, well, it is easy to see where credibility is a problem here.

Now, what may be the motivation for such ridiculously inflated numbers? Do you need to ask? Convince the public that it makes more sense to accept them than to deport them! Who wins when this is sold to fools? You know that, too. Employers keep cheap labor and republicans keep receiving huge campaign contributions.

I doubt that there are any more questions. But this is why I do not/cannot trust republicans. Besides this story insults me, too! Shame on them!

You're right! Plus if we acknowledge and authorize states rights to enforce US immigration law, then we can solve this problem in a year or less, 2 years at the most, at almost no additional costs.

60% of all the illegal aliens in the country are from Mexico, and another 14% are from Central America.

http://immigration.procon.org/view.r...ourceID=000845

5 million illegal aliens are in California (2.82 million), Texas (1.83 million) and Arizona (350,000).

3.04 million illegal aliens are in Florida (730k), New York (580k), Illinois (540k), New Jersey (430k), Georgia (400k) and North Carolina (360k).

So the majority of the illegal aliens are from a border country, like Mexico or nearby countries like those in Central America, and a majority of those are in states that either border Mexico or have the resources within their state to transport illegal aliens to the Mexican border. We know Texas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia and North Carolina will not only cooperate but will actively engage to solve the illegal immigration problem in their states, which accounts for almost half of those. If California were to engage, then that almost doubles the numbers and takes care of the removal of almost half of all illegal aliens in the country who can be deported and removed by the states who want to do that.

If you look at Arizona, you'll see from the link I posted above that in 2008, Arizona had over 560,000 illegal aliens in their state. They took action and passed a state immigration law, and even though the feds wrongfully and substantially restricted their enforcement under that law, many of the provisions of their state statute passed federal court muster, leaving them with some enforcement capacity, not all that they wanted but some. Even with their limited enforcement capability and the delays due to court challenges, they were able to reduce their illegal alien population in less than 2 years from 560,000 to 350,000. The 560,000 figure was from 2008, so by 2010 when SB 1070 passed and they were able to start enforcing it, that population was probably far more than 560,000 by 2010. So they were able to reduce their numbers by at least 40% maybe 50% by just enforcing their own limited state immigration law. We have 26 States who want this disaster brought to and end who have joined the Texas lawsuit, and there are far more states whose citizens want engagement to stop this travesty but who are being betrayed by their state officials. This will soon change with election changes.

In the US, we have over 800,000 sworn trained equipped ready, willing and able police officers who collectively have a 15 person per year arrest record per officer, between 1 to 2 arrests per month per officer, according to FBI statistics. So, there is ample existing law enforcement capacity within our states to arrest all illegal aliens within a year whose states have the court and other resources available to complete the deportation and removal process. Now certainly, because the federal government claims it has responsibility for immigration, national taxpayers should assist those states financially to some degree, not all, perhaps not even a major portion, but a significant portion, perhaps using the same formula we use for federal participation in education which is about 1/3. But while that process is being worked out and a trustworthy plan arranged to accommodate that assistance, States need to just move forward and take care of the illegal alien issues themselves, which is why we need to put a priority on passing a bill in Congress that acknowledges and authorizes state enforcement of US immigration law, like Trey Gowdy's bill, HR 2278.

The cost of removing illegal aliens is not that high if we do it in a common sense fashion utilizing existing resources within the states for the primary job of arresting and adjudicating these crimes and transporting those being returned to Mexico and Central and South America. The same would be true for those being returned back to Canada, although I believe those numbers are very small.

The next largest group of illegal aliens are from Asia and India, the Philippines (310k), India (260k), Korea (230k) and China (210k). While it's possible that this group is sneaking in through Mexico hiding in speaker boxes and car trunks, I don't see that as a typical or even common event. These illegal aliens are visa overstays which means the US government already knows who they are, where are they and I would imagine what they're doing, which is working illegally for their employers. So since the federal government let them in, it is definitely their responsibility to get them out. And that is true for all the visa overstays including tourist, student and business visitors as well as all the work visas. There would be no new cost associated with these removals, from the above mentioned countries or all the other countries whose citizens have obtained and violated a visa into the United States.

According to wikipedia, half of all illegal aliens are visa overstays. Whether this is accurate or not, I don't know, but apparently the illegal alien issue contains a large number of visa overstays, and this is just unacceptable. These people should have been hunted down and sent packing when their visa expired and they hadn't as yet left the country. Employers need to be responsible if they aren't already for ensuring that their foreign workers leave the country on time and in a verifiable manner by the employers and if necessary at their expense, and the same would be true for colleges and universities who admit students from foreign countries, collect money from them, and then saddle US with the problem of illegal immigration when the students failed to leave on time. So colleges and universities need to be held financially responsible for the cost of removing such persons who are or were students attending their institution.

The expired tourist visas will be the trickier part of the deal because even though the feds know who they are, they probably don't have a clue where they are or what they're doing, so these removals need to fall into the responsibility of the states to remove them as they would the illegal aliens who entered illegally.