We need town halls on immigration

Commentary
By Julianne Malveaux

Mexican President Felipe Calderon's recent visit to the U.S. included comments that he "strongly" disagreed with Arizona's controversial immigration law that will take effect in two months. Our own president, Barack Obama, called the law "misguided."

Some of the law's provisions are onerous — state agencies that hinder enforcement of the laws can be fined or sued. Still, the law may have been passed out of frustration that the federal government has not done more about illegal immigration.

Because immigration issues affect our entire nation, federal law, not state actions, ought to deal with any policies or reform. With the 2010 elections looming, we won't see new federal laws on immigration before 2011. But the federal government might take steps toward forging an immigration policy by sponsoring town hall meetings across the U.S. to really delve into the issue.

Hasn't enough been said? Not really. I'd like to see teachers, social workers and hospital workers confirm or rebut beliefs that services can't be provided because there are so many undocumented people to serve. I'd like to hear employers, especially farmers, be candid about what the costs of produce would be if there were fewer migrant workers available. I'd like to hear from parents and children about what happens when families are shattered because one parent is not documented. Last week, a second-grader told Michelle Obama about the student's undocumented mother. How many other parents are subject to deportation, and what does this say about our "family values"?

I'd like to see people talk to each other with data, life stories and complexity, not with slogans and invective. I'd like to see town halls held in the porous border states; in states such as North Carolina and Michigan, where there are rising immigrant populations; and in states where immigration is not necessarily brown.

President Obama once noted, "We are not a collection of Red States and Blue States, we are the United States of America." If anyone can cultivate common ground on this issue, it is the president as well as savvy facilitators such as journalists Soledad O'Brien and Ray Suarez, and law professors like Charles Ogletree.

Town hall meetings can be imperfect and are no substitute for considered public policy. But convening national conversations about immigration that provide a platform for people to talk with — not at — each other might prove to be informative as well as productive.

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