Thread: Economy may crimp Obama's pledge on immigration

Economy may crimp Obama's pledge on immigration
Tyche Hendricks, Chronicle Staff Writer

Tuesday, December 9, 2008


(12-09) 17:43 PST SAN FRANCISCO -- The nation's economic crisis could make it tough for President-elect Barack Obama to deliver on his pledge to overhaul the nation's immigration laws, some analysts predict.

With unemployment rising, foreign workers are less welcome, say immigration restrictionists, who have vowed to oppose offering legal status to the nation's estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants.

But as the presidential transition goes into high gear, Democratic political insiders still believe that immigration reform has a good chance. Until a comprehensive bill is introduced in Congress, Obama's pick to head the Department of Homeland Security, Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, will play a key role in refocusing the way the government handles immigration.

"Clearly the economy is job No. 1 for the new administration," said Frank Sharry, director of America's Voice, a pro-immigration advocacy group. "But we fully expect that by the end of year one, that they're going to take a hard run at immigration reform."

Others were not so sanguine. Yale Law School professor Peter Schuck, an immigration expert, doubts lawmakers will take up the issue for a couple of years: "It's going to be on the back burner just because everything else is on the front burner. It's a very, very delicate political issue that nobody deals with with eagerness."

The weak economy - the unemployment rate reached 6.7 percent in November, its highest level in 15 years - combined with increased immigration enforcement, appears to be discouraging illegal immigrants from entering the country and impelling others to head home. Demographer Jeff Passel of the Pew Hispanic Center recently estimated that 11.9 million illegal immigrants are living in the United States now, down from an estimated 12.4 million a year earlier. The U.S. Border Patrol reported making 700,000 arrests over the past year, down from 1.1 million two years prior.

But the illegal immigration issue remains volatile, and the next Congress and new administration will have to decide what to do about the people in the United States without authorization and how to deter future illegal immigration.

Problems in the legal immigration system have festered for years. The agency granting permanent legal residence (the "green card" is the token) and citizenship has long been plagued by epic backlogs and dysfunctional computer networks. Major policy debates over appropriate levels of immigration and whether to prioritize family ties or economic contributions - and high- or low-skilled workers - remain unresolved after "comprehensive" immigration bills died in Congress in 2006 and 2007.

Obama supports allowing illegal immigrants to earn legal status, continuing tough border enforcement and establishing an electronic worker eligibility verification system. He has been largely silent, though, on whether to admit temporary foreign workers, as President Bush and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., proposed, or to accommodate new workers by expanding the number of green cards, as some labor advocates prefer.

Although Democrats now control both houses of Congress, making passage of a broad immigration reform more likely, any new bill is not apt to include a guest worker program or an expansion of green cards, observers believe.

A new bill?
Obama's advisers and Congressional leaders are instead talking about a bill that would include a strong, mandatory verification system to ensure employers are hiring legal workers, combined with a measure to grant legal status to undocumented immigrants and require them to register and pay taxes, said Doris Meissner, a senior fellow at the non-partisan Migration Policy Institute and former immigration commissioner under President Bill Clinton. "If you did something that had those two pieces, you could set up a mechanism to come back down the road and see what does the economy and the nation need longer term," for future immigration flows, she said.

Those who favor greater restrictions on immigration are adamant, however, in opposing both future visas and also "amnesty," or a path to legal resident status for illegal immigrants.

"The rule of law and not rewarding illegal behavior is a basic American concept," said Rep. Brian Bilbray, the San Diego Republican who heads the House Immigration Reform Caucus.

But Bilbray praised Obama for his support of employment eligibility verification and called it an area where Democrats and Republicans could work together.

The combination of toughening workplace enforcement through an electronic program known as E-Verify and barring legalization could force illegal immigrants to "self deport," restrictionists say.

"There are 6 million illegal aliens holding jobs in construction, services and manufacturing," said Roy Beck, director of Numbers USA, an immigration reduction organization. "If you have mandatory E-Verify... and you make it impossible for illegal immigrants to keep those jobs, then you get 6 million jobs that have opened up for the country's 10 million unemployed workers. "

Immigrant rights advocates counter that 12 million people, many of whom have deep ties here, including U.S.-born children, are not going to just disappear. Bringing illegal immigrants already working in the underground economy "out of the shadows" could have economic benefits for the country, some Obama advisers add.

"In this economic crisis, one could make a case that everyone who's in this country must be required to be legal and pay their fair share of taxes," said Maria Echaveste, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress and former Clinton appointee.

Straddling the divide
Obama's choice of Napolitano may help straddle the political divide on immigration. If confirmed as Secretary of Homeland Security, she will have wide-ranging responsibilities - from preparing the country for hurricanes to preventing terrorist attacks. But she will also oversee the three major agencies that handle immigration.

Napolitano has a reputation as a hard-nosed chief executive and former prosecutor. She was one of the first elected officials to call for National Guard troops at the southern border, but she has criticized the border fence and has long said that border security will not work without an increase in the number of work visas to allow immigrants to enter legally.

Congressional Democrats have praised Napolitano for both her thorough knowledge of immigration policy and her credibility and political savvy, which they said could help accomplish her goals. And she has drawn praise even from conservatives for her understanding of the border.

"She's going to see taking care of the problem as a law enforcement issue rather than being pressured by the chamber of commerce," said Bilbray, who criticized Bush's Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff for being too close to employers looking for cheap, illegal labor. "I'm very encouraged about having a border governor running homeland security ... Phoenix is much closer to San Diego than Washington is."

The immigration agencies
Three agencies in the U.S. Department of Homeland Security handle immigration matters. They are:

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services: Oversees lawful immigration, deciding on applications for asylum and refugee status, lawful permanent residence and U.S. citizenship.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection: Secures the nation's borders and ports of entry, monitoring legal trade, travel and immigration while intercepting smuggled goods, illegal migration, agricultural pests and potential terrorists.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement: Enforces immigration laws inside the country, focusing on illegal aliens and employers who hire them, and targets criminal organizations trafficking in people, drugs, weapons and other contraband.

www.sfgate.com

Were looking forward to making this fool the next Lame Duck irrelevant President!!!!

With all this construction that BHO wants to do....he probably will say that we need the illegals to do the construction

Originally Posted by grandmasmad

With all this construction that BHO wants to do....he probably will say that we need the illegals to do the construction

He better get his butt to work placing americans in those jobs! Made in america by an american is what I want!

Originally Posted by grandmasmad

With all this construction that BHO wants to do....he probably will say that we need the illegals to do the construction

Indeed. Obama-crony Blagojevich wanted to be head of this 7 million member union:
Change To Win
http://www.changetowin.org/issues/worke ... ights.html

we need to see if we can sign petitions to get them to stop all legal immigration as well as deport or should I say enforce the laws to eliminate illegal aliens.

Obama's advisers and Congressional leaders are instead talking about a bill that would include a strong, mandatory verification system to ensure employers are hiring legal workers, combined with a measure to grant legal status to undocumented immigrants and require them to register and pay taxes, said Doris Meissner, a senior fellow at the non-partisan Migration Policy Institute

This is the same amnesty claptrap that the OBL has been peddling for a long time. And our answer remains NO. We demand that our laws our enforced with none of this amnesty.

Economy may crimp Obama's pledge on immigration

"Crimp"? Nice play on words!!!!!!! LOL!

Added to Homepage:
http://www.alipac.us/article-3812--0-0.html

IT IS MY OPINION THAT THE ILLEGAL ALIENS ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM OF THE DOWN TURN IN OUR ECONOMY. THEY ARE ABOUT THE ONLY ONES HERE THAT ARE NOT HURTING FOR A JOB. THEY DON'T HAVE ANY WORRIES AS FAR AS THEIR MEDICAL CARE AND WHERE THEIR NEXT MEAL IS COMING FROM. OUR GOVERNMENT MAKE SURE THAT THEY ARE WELL TAKEN CARE OF. THERE ARE SO MANY AMERICANS OUT OF WORK AND IT REALLY MAKES ME SICK TO SEE THAT THESE ILLEGALS ARE WORKING RIGHT ON. SOMETHING IS VERY WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE.