Thread: Scare raids - Slap-dash raids are not the way to do it

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/edi ... 31630.html

Dec. 28, 2006, 6:39PM
Scare raids
Immigration laws need to be enforced. Slap-dash raids are not the way to do it

Dozens of lawbreakers strolled out of custody this month. Naturally, they avoided their crime scenes — six Swift & Co. meatpacking plants, where they'd worked carving pig and cow carcasses. Instead, the detainees went home, to children being fed by strangers or sick parents left alone when their caregivers were arrested for working without papers.

The large-scale "humanitarian release," as the government calls it, shows the pointlessness of cramming ill-planned raids into the vacuum where good immigration policy should be. Children and ailing relatives aren't the only ones hurt by this patchwork law-enforcement. Employers, consumers and anyone who wants laws aligned to real labor needs get punished too.

This month's roundups, in which about 1,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents snared about 1,300 undocumented workers, took even state officials by surprise. In towns including Cactus, Texas, good Samaritans reportedly cared for children left alone by the arrests.

Religious and political leaders protested across the country. Iowa Gov. Tom Visack wrote President Bush to complain that the Iowa raid's scope and secrecy left the state unable to identify many of the workers' dependents. The raid ''created undue hardship for many not at fault, and led to resentment and further mistrust of government," Visack fumed.

Swift, which denies knowingly hiring illegal aliens, of course suspected many of its employees were undocumented. For hiring them anyway, it should be sanctioned. Yet the corporation had gone to considerable lengths to obey the law. Swift's bloody, punishing meatpacking jobs attract mainly immigrants, even though the pay averages $25,000 yearly. In the past, Swift had investigated suspected document fraud among these workers. For its trouble, Swift got sued by the Justice Department for discrimination.

In 1997, the company joined a federal program to verify workplace documents. But the system can't detect identity theft — the crime that brought ICE sweeping down this month. So although Swift certainly capitalized on this illegal work force, it also effectively was punished when it tried to follow the law. Smaller companies lack the resources Swift had.

Meanwhile, snaring even a thousand workers at a time is a hopeless way to challenge labor reality. About 12 million undocumented immigrants package our meat, pick our vegetables and care for our children. No raid or raids can dislodge more than a fraction of them.

Raids do make impressive TV, though, giving cover to a Congress charged with protecting our nation and its economy with good law. A healthy immigration policy would give employers legal access to the workers they need. Right now, the United States offers only 5,000 year-round visas for the unskilled workers though there are half a million unfilled jobs calling for such labor. Any logical immigration law must expand the number of visas so the labor supply conforms to demand.

Instead, an inordinate number of otherwise law-abiding Americans think they need to break the law to do business. Illegality breeds illegality — and a shrinking from public life for all who have something to hide.

One Swift plant reportedly found nonimmigrants to fill its empty jobs — albeit at higher salaries and benefits. At least in the short term, this suggests that Americans will take undesirable jobs at the right wage.

Can the company sustain that wage? Would consumers accept a resulting price hike? Congress has to weigh these data honestly, then create more legal forms of entry for foreign workers who are needed.

The sight of hairsprayed, suited lawmakers mulling labor quotas is less titillating than pictures of a police raid. On the other hand, an economically sound labor and work policy would do far more to benefit Americans. It certainly does more than shutting productive businesses and leaving children terrified and alone.

First of all these people are criminals. Maybe they should realize that for starters. How many American families have a parent or child arrested with officers showing up with guns drawn. Look at the case with Elian Gonzalez where the SWAT team entered the house and got him. The officer who openned the closet door was holding a sub machine gun.
Second of all these companies claim that we get a price break if they use illegals. I have seen no price break in many products. It is the companies greed.