10 Problems with the Senate Amnesty Bill – Heritage
Tag: Immigration
Scrap the Senate Immigration bill
“You have to have some detailed knowledge of evangelicalism and the people involved to recognize that EIT and its acolytes represent a fringe element of political activism, and not the duly adopted positions of thousands of evangelical congregations and their local leadership. American evangelicals haven’t changed their views on Congress’s approach to immigration; rather, a small group of left-wing activists has been funded by Soros to urge evangelicals to act in a certain way – and to advertise its agenda as an evangelical one.”
It’s as bad as the Tea Party thinks it is. It’s worse. In some ways, it’s a pig in a poke: it’s not about immigration as much as it is about changing the way government business is done in the United States.
A couple of points up front.
Legal immigration is good
First, I am a pro-immigration voter. Not only am I pro-immigration, I am happy to accept immigrants who aren’t Ph.D.s, IT professionals, and bioengineers. I have nothing against credentialed professionals, but the truth is that they are not the economic accelerators that small business entrepreneurs are. America has had tremendous success with legal immigration; we should do more of it than we do today, and we should not seek to admit only those who come laden with wealth and credentials. That is not the path to national prosperity.
America does need to repair other failures,
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Four Words to Watch in the Immigration Debate – Re-Blog The Foundry
Four Words to Watch in the Immigration Debate – The Foundry
Amy Payne June 7, 2013 at 7:16 am
The Senate Judiciary Committee works on the immigration bill. (Photo: Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call/Newscom)
The Senate will begin debate on the Gang of Eight’s immigration proposal next week. Here are four words to watch out for as the Senators make their case—and warnings about what they might mean.
1. COST “Cost” is one word that should come up in the immigration debate, because the Gang of Eight’s amnesty proposal has a cost that is simply too high for Americans to bear. Heritage analysis found that amnesty would cost taxpayers trillions of dollars. Amnesty means that illegal immigrants become legal—and become eligible for Obamacare benefits, Social Security, welfare, and Medicare. But they won’t pay enough into the system in taxes to cover the cost of all these benefits, meaning the rest of the taxpayers will have to bear the burden. This simply isn’t fair to hard-working Americans.
2. BORDER Despite claims of security—and talk of amending the bill—the Gang of Eight immigration bill doesn’t secure the border. Instead, it “delivers nothing new—other than the promise of spending a lot more money and running up our debt.” As James Carafano, Heritage’s E. W. Richardson Fellow, explains: “Amnesty immediately creates an incentive for illegal border crossings and overstays. Thus, the bill’s strategy would drive up the cost of securing the border.”
3. AMNESTY Heritage President Jim DeMint has said that it’s a false choice for people to say that amnesty is necessary to immigration reform. Amnesty encourages more illegal immigration, and that is not what immigration reform is supposed to do. Former Attorney General Ed Meese, Heritage’s Ronald Reagan Distinguished Fellow Emeritus, reminds us that America has tried this before, and it didn’t work:
Today they call it a “roadmap to citizenship.” Ronald Reagan called it “amnesty.” And he was right. The 1986 reform did not solve our immigration problem—in fact, the population of illegal immigrants has nearly quadrupled since that “comprehensive” bill.
4. “COMPREHENSIVE” Beware the word “comprehensive.” As Meese notes above, the amnesty of 1986 was also called a “comprehensive” approach to immigration reform. It doesn’t work, and it’s not what we need. We need a separate, step-by-step approach to immigration reform. An approach that works—that the American people can trust—would start with reforming the legal immigration system and enforcing the security measures that are supposed to be in place.
Read the Morning Bell and more en español every day at Heritage Libertad.
Quick Hit: Jose Aldana, an immigrant who came to the United States in 1997 and is still working to become a citizen, explains why he opposes the Gang of Eight amnesty bill.
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