Immigration Reform - It IsTime

Earlier this week, eight Senators evenly split on party lines advanced a new immigration bill that will enact significant reforms in our immigration system.  This is wonderful news except for some of the details.

The bill supports amnesty, of sorts, for undocumented aliens already living and working in the US but does not offer a unique path to citizenship.  Rather they must "...go to the back of the line..." to get access to a green card and/or citizenship.  The logic advanced by the bill's sponsors is that by coming to this country illegally they violated our laws and are not as worthy as someone who is outside the US waiting for a visa.  This argument is wrong.  The undocumented aliens in this country, by and large, are law-abiding members of society that have been contributing value to our economy, our country, and our society.  While they did come here illegally (or overstayed their visas), they have been contributing members of society and should be recognized as such.



While undocumented aliens do present a security risk, they are undocumented, mostly their presence in the US is a result of the enablers that our society has made available to them.  Employers hire them on the flimsiest of evidence, individuals hire them in day labor settings, several states, including New Mexico, make driver's licences available to them without requiring citizenship.  Our produce, our food, our services are less expensive because they are here.  We have had an immigration policy that made it illegal to work here while our society has encouraged people to come here.  If the undocumented aliens somehow broke our laws, our society made it easy to do so.  Let's quit talking about illegals as being unworthy of consideration and recognize our complicity in their presence and their value added to society.

The other problem with the proposed bill is that this so-called amnesty is being conditioned on securing our borders.  While we still have a somewhat porous border, we have taken extraordinary measures during both the Bush and Obama administrations.  If we start making work permits easy to get, most of the pressure on the border will be reduced to drug trafficking and terrorists.  Who will pay a coyote hundreds of dollars to get passage here if permits are readily available?

Too much of the anti-immigration bias in this country is poorly disguised racism.  While we all want secure borders, it does not excuse us from having an immigration system that is outrageously complicated and blocked into quotas, etc.  Even science and technical people who want to come here to work face an unreasonable path and thousands of dollars of legal fees to get access to a green card.

Let's get behind this initiative and push.

PS:  A change that would have eliminated New Mexico licensing of  undocumented aliens, favored by Governor Susana Martinez, was again blocked bu Democrats in a straight line partisan vote.  I understand the argument for licensing undocumented aliens, I just believe that the risks outweigh the rewards.  As noted above, granting driver's licenses to undocumented aliens is one of the enablers making illegal immigration attractive to those who would come here.  While I recognize the value added that undocumented aliens bring here, we should stop enabling what we supposedly don't want.  Keep track of the lawmakers who are opposing Governor Martinez's bills and vote them out for the next election.  Their usefulness is at an end.  I will publish the names of the legislators later.