U.S. Wants Comprehensive Immigration Reform
The immigration debate is as soon as again dominating the information as members of Congress deal with the long-neglected drawback of fixing our nation's failed immigration laws.
American lawmakers are actually at a essential point. Enforcement-solely legislation will not work and hasn't worked. Previous efforts to resolve this downside by focusing solely on border security have failed miserably.
In truth, through the past decade, the U.S. tripled the number of brokers on the border, quintupled the funds, toughened our enforcement strategies and closely fortified city entry points.
Yet throughout the same time period, America saw record levels of illegal immigration, porous borders, a cottage trade created for smugglers and document forgers and tragic deaths in our deserts.
We should study from our mistakes, not repeat them. What we want is comprehensive, bipartisan immigration reform that deals neatly with the estimated eleven million undocumented immigrants living and working within the U.S.
Most are kin of U.S. citizens and lawful residents or employees holding jobs that Americans don't want. People already here who are usually not a risk to our security, but who work arduous, pay taxes and are learning English, must be allowed to earn permanent residence.
The Secure America and Orderly Immigration Act, launched by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., and others, includes the required parts of reform and provides the premise for fixing our system. It combines toughness with equity, creating a new non permanent visa program that gives a legal movement of workers.
This "break-the-mould" worker program would considerably diminish unlawful immigration by creating a legal avenue for folks to enter the U.S., something that hardly exists today. Current immigration legal guidelines supply just 5,000 annual permanent visas and sixty six,000 short-term visas for essential lesser-skilled workers, under no circumstances meeting the annual demand for 500,000 such workers.
As well as, decreasing the last decade-long backlog in household-based immigration would reunite households sooner and make it unlikely that individuals would cross the border illegally as a way to be with their liked ones.
Congress and the administration should act correctly as they weigh their choices. We've had enough "quick fixes" that have made an already unworkable system worse. We can't control our borders -; or improve our nationwide security -; till we enact comprehensive immigration reform.
Deborah Notkin is president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. - NU
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