Post by admin on Aug 8, 2007 4:56:40 GMT -5
Good Job, Richard! The APP just forgot to mention that you are a moderator for the Freehold Voice. An honor that few have.
www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070808/OPINION/708080360/1030
Real reform must make illegal immigration harder
Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 08/8/07
BY RICHARD KELSEY
Now that the amnesty immigration bill is dead, it's time for real immigration reform.
Real reform means creating deterrents for illegal immigrants, their supporters and those who exploit and profit from them. We welcome immigrants. We want them, we need them, and we all are better for having them.
We want them here legally. We want them invested in our country. We want to know who they are, where they are, and that they have come here to join us, grow our common prosperity and be contributing members of society. That is why reform must make legal immigration easier, and illegal immigration harder and more painful.
Real reform must begin with an overhaul of the current immigration system. That system causes immigrants to wait up to 10 years for a visa. The system is frustrating, encourages cheating and must be streamlined to promote lawful immigration.
Real reform must stop focusing U.S. enforcement efforts solely on the border. Catching illegal immigrants at the border has proven ineffective. Enforcement strategies should focus on three principal areas:
First, we must disincentivize foreign governments from allowing and actively assisting illegal aliens to cross our border. Mexico and other sending countries reap enormous economic benefits from these crossings, and therefore must be motivated to secure the borders. Reducing U.S. aid to sending countries based on the discovery of their foreign nationals in the U.S. would be a great start. In addition, punitive tariffs and sanctions for failure to enforce borders would further eliminate the benefit some countries now receive from exporting their poor.
The second enforcement mechanism would be the redistribution of border agents throughout the U.S. and into cities where illegal immigrants now enjoy sanctuary. Illegal aliens live in our cities, not on our borders.
The third piece of the enforcement equation is to expand the 287(g) program. This program permits localities to send officers to federal training for immigration enforcement. It requires a written agreement between U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the locality as to the scope of the enforcement. Currently, ICE permits only enforcement actions against illegal aliens involved in gangs and other felony activity. The reason why 287(g) is under-utilized is because it does not give localities the right to investigate, arrest and process illegal aliens here illegally — unless they are committing felonies. Broaden the scope of 287(g) and localities will be standing in line to commit resources to the battle.
Real reform is about deterrence. Deterrence means illegal immigrants must believe it is no longer profitable to come here illegally. Deterrence means that businesses must fear the risk of using illegal immigrants. Currently, businesses exploit illegal labor at below-market wages, provide no benefits, few workplace protections and pay no taxes. These pirates shift the costs of funding schools, hospitals, prisons and police to taxpayers.
Real deterrence means aggressively pursuing these businesses with heavy fines, loss of licenses and piercing of the corporate veil to make management personally responsible for the fines if the companies they control or direct use illegal labor. The U.S. has already embraced this concept in the post-Enron era, making directors of public companies liable for misreporting financial information.
Sanctuary cities must change their practice of inducing illegal aliens to come to the United States. Existing law makes it a federal felony to "induce an illegal alien to enter or stay" in the United States. Refusing all public access and public benefits to illegal aliens is a great deterrent, and forcing sanctuary cities to enforce these laws could be done by ending federal aid to non-compliant cities. We inspired the states to change the drinking age to 21 by threatening to withhold highway funds. Incentives work.
Finally, the two biggest changes that would immediately end the illegal invasion involve complex changes critical to combating illegal immigration. Stopping the children of illegal aliens from stealing educational services would be the first major change. When the divided Supreme Court wrongly held that local schools could not exclude children based on lawful U.S. status, the court created a circumstance where the children of poverty-stricken, illegal immigrants would be guaranteed a K-12 education in the U.S. That case is ripe for reversal.
The second strongest driver of illegal immigration is the current constitutional interpretation that allows an illegal alien to enter the country illegally, give birth and bestow on the child U.S. citizenship. The Constitution never contemplated such a circumstance. Nowhere in civil or criminal law is such illegal activity rewarded. Like Great Britain did, we too must change that antiquated, immigration practice.
In the interim, however, real enforcement that targets employers, sending countries and cities and organizations that harbor illegal aliens will slow and reverse the tide of illegal immigration. In addition, a strong will to refuse assistance, housing, transportation and other benefits to illegal aliens will stop the urgency to come here illegally. These steps, together with a commitment to making the immigration line move faster, will stop people from choosing to cut the line and become toll-breakers and line-cutters to the American dream.
Real reform is needed today, not in 2009 after the next presidential election.
Richard Kelsey, a native of Freehold, is an attorney and president of a computer forensic company in Reston, Va.
www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070808/OPINION/708080360/1030
Real reform must make illegal immigration harder
Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 08/8/07
BY RICHARD KELSEY
Now that the amnesty immigration bill is dead, it's time for real immigration reform.
Real reform means creating deterrents for illegal immigrants, their supporters and those who exploit and profit from them. We welcome immigrants. We want them, we need them, and we all are better for having them.
We want them here legally. We want them invested in our country. We want to know who they are, where they are, and that they have come here to join us, grow our common prosperity and be contributing members of society. That is why reform must make legal immigration easier, and illegal immigration harder and more painful.
Real reform must begin with an overhaul of the current immigration system. That system causes immigrants to wait up to 10 years for a visa. The system is frustrating, encourages cheating and must be streamlined to promote lawful immigration.
Real reform must stop focusing U.S. enforcement efforts solely on the border. Catching illegal immigrants at the border has proven ineffective. Enforcement strategies should focus on three principal areas:
First, we must disincentivize foreign governments from allowing and actively assisting illegal aliens to cross our border. Mexico and other sending countries reap enormous economic benefits from these crossings, and therefore must be motivated to secure the borders. Reducing U.S. aid to sending countries based on the discovery of their foreign nationals in the U.S. would be a great start. In addition, punitive tariffs and sanctions for failure to enforce borders would further eliminate the benefit some countries now receive from exporting their poor.
The second enforcement mechanism would be the redistribution of border agents throughout the U.S. and into cities where illegal immigrants now enjoy sanctuary. Illegal aliens live in our cities, not on our borders.
The third piece of the enforcement equation is to expand the 287(g) program. This program permits localities to send officers to federal training for immigration enforcement. It requires a written agreement between U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the locality as to the scope of the enforcement. Currently, ICE permits only enforcement actions against illegal aliens involved in gangs and other felony activity. The reason why 287(g) is under-utilized is because it does not give localities the right to investigate, arrest and process illegal aliens here illegally — unless they are committing felonies. Broaden the scope of 287(g) and localities will be standing in line to commit resources to the battle.
Real reform is about deterrence. Deterrence means illegal immigrants must believe it is no longer profitable to come here illegally. Deterrence means that businesses must fear the risk of using illegal immigrants. Currently, businesses exploit illegal labor at below-market wages, provide no benefits, few workplace protections and pay no taxes. These pirates shift the costs of funding schools, hospitals, prisons and police to taxpayers.
Real deterrence means aggressively pursuing these businesses with heavy fines, loss of licenses and piercing of the corporate veil to make management personally responsible for the fines if the companies they control or direct use illegal labor. The U.S. has already embraced this concept in the post-Enron era, making directors of public companies liable for misreporting financial information.
Sanctuary cities must change their practice of inducing illegal aliens to come to the United States. Existing law makes it a federal felony to "induce an illegal alien to enter or stay" in the United States. Refusing all public access and public benefits to illegal aliens is a great deterrent, and forcing sanctuary cities to enforce these laws could be done by ending federal aid to non-compliant cities. We inspired the states to change the drinking age to 21 by threatening to withhold highway funds. Incentives work.
Finally, the two biggest changes that would immediately end the illegal invasion involve complex changes critical to combating illegal immigration. Stopping the children of illegal aliens from stealing educational services would be the first major change. When the divided Supreme Court wrongly held that local schools could not exclude children based on lawful U.S. status, the court created a circumstance where the children of poverty-stricken, illegal immigrants would be guaranteed a K-12 education in the U.S. That case is ripe for reversal.
The second strongest driver of illegal immigration is the current constitutional interpretation that allows an illegal alien to enter the country illegally, give birth and bestow on the child U.S. citizenship. The Constitution never contemplated such a circumstance. Nowhere in civil or criminal law is such illegal activity rewarded. Like Great Britain did, we too must change that antiquated, immigration practice.
In the interim, however, real enforcement that targets employers, sending countries and cities and organizations that harbor illegal aliens will slow and reverse the tide of illegal immigration. In addition, a strong will to refuse assistance, housing, transportation and other benefits to illegal aliens will stop the urgency to come here illegally. These steps, together with a commitment to making the immigration line move faster, will stop people from choosing to cut the line and become toll-breakers and line-cutters to the American dream.
Real reform is needed today, not in 2009 after the next presidential election.
Richard Kelsey, a native of Freehold, is an attorney and president of a computer forensic company in Reston, Va.
