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Border politics

12:00 AM PST on Tuesday, December 13, 2005
The Press-Enterprise

House Republicans, tired of being snookered by a Senate that has broken countless promises to strengthen illegal immigration enforcement, showed last week that they are in no mood to get fooled again.

An immigration reform bill, H.R. 4437, scheduled for a vote this week, says nary a word about the "guest worker" program being pushed by President Bush and numerous senators. Rather, it is chock full of measures that would crack down on illegal immigration at the border and, equally important, deep inside the United States.

The bill would require all employers to use the Basic Pilot Program, a database that checks the validity of an employee's Social Security number. It also would make illegal presence in the country -- now a civil offense -- a federal crime; turn a third drunken driving conviction into a deportable offense; increase penalties against human smugglers; and enlist support from the military and local law enforcement to assist in border enforcement.

Democrats, steamed that the bill did not include measures to help integrate an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants currently in the United States -- an idea with some merit -- called it "stupid," "atrocious" and "un-American." The bill is none of those things. Ending the wink-and-a-nod policy by which employers use illegal labor with near impunity is long overdue. And who could oppose stiffer punishment for human smuggling, a practice that has too often turned deadly?

Democratic Rep. Howard Berman of North Hollywood is right, however, when he says this bill will not pass the Senate. But he misses the main point of this exercise in political muscle. Without this bill -- a clear signal that the House is serious about controlling America's borders before approving sweeping steps to legitimize illegal immigrants -- the Senate would likely ignore enforcement altogether.

That was the case in 1986, when a comprehensive immigration reform bill pushed by Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., granted amnesty to nearly 3 million illegal immigrants, but never delivered on promised enforcement. Congress repeated that pattern in 1994, 1997 and 2000, and now is the time to put an end to it.