Thread: Editorial: Sham sanctions Border reform means enforcing the

http://www.sacbee.com/content/opinion/s ... 9403c.html


Editorial: Sham sanctions
Border reform means enforcing the law

Published 2:15 am PDT Saturday, June 25, 2005
A piece in The Bee the other day by Michael Doyle of our Washington bureau illustrated one reason U.S. immigration laws don't work.

In part due to shifting priorities, U.S. authorities have all but stopped enforcing immigration law in the workplace. The Government Accountability Office found that the number of employers sanctioned for employing illegal immigrants dropped from 417 in 1999 to three - that's right, three - in 2003. Similarly, the number of workplace arrests of unauthorized workers fell from 2,849 to 445 over the period.

Sanctions against employers, a key part of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act, have never been effective, partly because of the counterfeiting of identity documents and partly due to the reluctance of government to crack down on industries that need workers for jobs they can't fill from the legal U.S. work force. But the latest figures make a mockery of the very notion of enforcement.

One reason for this steep fall is a shift of immigration enforcement personnel to finding and deporting undocumented workers in such places as airports, power plants and other sites vulnerable to terrorist attack. Whether it also reflects a reluctance by the Bush administration to deprive employers of workers - in hotels, restaurants, farms, construction sites - is a good question. But if immigration is ever to be controlled, enforcement is critical to deterring illegal immigrants from crossing the border.

There may be no ideal remedy, but a promising idea in bipartisan legislation in both the Senate and House strikes a sensible balance between enforcement and amnesty. Undocumented workers already here could stay and work, with the possibility of permanent residency. But they would not be given a blanket amnesty. Workers would have to meet several strict criteria: Register with the government, pay all back taxes and a $2,000 fine, pass a series of background checks, work for six years before being allowed to apply for a green card, learn English and a bit of U.S. history and government and get in line behind those already seeking legal resident status.

If that seems onerous, it is far less so than being deported or living in the shadows and being exploited by unscrupulous employers. But even this sensible plan can work only if Congress puts teeth in employer sanctions that compel the government to enforce them. Congress should act this year to make immigration law conform with reality, and make the country safer in the process.

...have never been effective, partly because of the counterfeiting of identity documents and partly due to the reluctance of government to crack down on industries that need workers for jobs they can't fill from the legal U.S. work force. But the latest

The government lacks the guts to do anything much at all. Most of the jobs can be filled with American workers. The problem is that employers do not want to pay American labor rates.