by James R. Edwards, Jr.
02/16/2010


President Obama’s budget proposal for fiscal year 2011, which he unveiled recently, matches funding requests to a policy agenda that’s played out his first year. In particular, the Obama budget sells America short on border security -- though there are a couple of notable exceptions.

In general, the Department of Homeland Security would receive $43.6 billion. That’s a 3 percent bump from this year’s discretionary funding level.

First, the good news. The administration proposes to increase the budgets of immigration status verification and criminal alien deportation.

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services bureau gets an extra $103 million to support and expand its twin verification programs.

The E-Verify program offers employers nationwide a robust, reliable, free system for electronically verifying that new hires are eligible to work in the United States. This vital program plays a pivotal role in shutting off the “jobs magnetâ€