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© 2009 Spar & Bernsteins 'Law link' Blog
This past Tuesday evening, in his State of the Union address, President Barack Obama called on Republicans and Democrats to work together to “win the future” by taking on challenges that have been decades in the making – challenges like updating our current immigration laws to meet the needs of the country. The President outlined an ambitious agenda focused on innovation, education, and reform designed to expand economic growth and personal opportunity for all Americans. He specifically called on Congress to work with him to reform our laws so that we are able to attract the best and brightest minds from around the world, retain highly educated foreign students by making it easier for them to live and work in the United States, stop wasting the talent of students brought to this country illegally as children, and to end the problem of illegal immigration once and for all.
This is all well and good except that we’ve heard all this before. And not just from the President. He surely wants to do the right thing and focus on immigration reform. We all know that immigration reform is needed and badly. Both sides of the political balance sheet recognize that immigration policy has a huge impact on our nation’s economic standing in the world.
What we need at this point, even beyond more jawboning on the merits of this or that proposal is ACTION. Enough words.
President Obama addresses Congress tonight on the State of the Union. Last year, Mr. Obama paid only lip service to immigration in his SOTU address, which was a factor, albeit small, in keeping some Democratic supporters at home in November 2010, leading, in small part to the shellacking that the Democrats then received. This year, Mr. Obama will undoubtedly focus on jobs, the budget and the economy, these being the issues on which the 2012 election will largely turn. But not entirely.
We believe immigration will be an issue in New Mexico, Nevada and Colorado for 2012. Charting a course to the White House without these three states is not easy, the electoral math for a Democrat is difficult without the Southwest, where the immigrant vote is no artifact of the future, but a reality today (just ask Sharon Angle). Mr. Obama faces a choice. He can pay more lip service to immigration again, perhaps a few more words than last year, undoubtedly that’s what would please the Republicans most, being as they are about to launch an E-Verify blitzkrieg. Or he can pledge to take concrete steps entirely within his own unfettered Executive discretion – just as granting TPS to all – and guarantee real support from important voters in the Southwest and elsewhere.
Either way, Mr. Obama can be sure that an interested and increasingly sophisticated immigrant press will be watching, and will deliver their judgment on his SOTU address where it matters most – the ballot box.
(Courtesy of American Immigration Lawyers Association)
Have an immigration question?
Spar & Bernstein President & Senior Attorney Brad Bernstein will give you the opportunity to have your immigration questions answered LIVE on our new BlogTalkRadio show on Thursday, February 3, 2011 from 3:00pm to 3:45pm eastern time. Just go to www.blogtalkradio.com/sparbernstein on 2/3/11 at 3:00pm and you’ll be able to listen in and call during this LIVE radio show airing.
We’re already burning up the lines on our regular Immigration Link Radio that we’ve been running for 14 years on 93.5FM in the NY/Metro area, we we’re greating another way for you to get the immigration information you need.
We have limited lines available, so make sure you call in early. We will also be opening up the instant messaging lines during the show, so you can send us your immigration question via IM as well.
Don’t miss this opportunity to ask your immigration questions directly to Brad on
When Arizona decided in mid-2010 to take immigration policy and make it their own, there were many other states that echoed the same thought. Mississippi is now working to complete its own immigration policy, styled along the same lines as the Arizona law. Ignoring the fact that immigration is a national policy and knowing that our own Congress has ducked the issue, states like Mississippi and others are going headlong into creating even more chaos on the subject of immigration reform.
Is there any good that comes out of this? Immediately or longer term, no. If in the long term more states move to act on their own immigration reforms independent of our federal government, perhaps the feds will finally act. Perhaps we’ll have a balanced discussion based on facts and not rhetoric. Perhaps.
In the meantime, the Mississippi bill has successfully moved through its Senate and moves on for approval in the other side of the house.
One important note: While having states create their own immigration policies is the worst that can happen, the Mississippi bill draw one major difference from the Arizona bill: immigration status checks can only be done during the course of lawful stops for other offenses.
Regardless, the lack of federal action on immigration reform will echo in other states this year with a state-by-state policy of immigration reform.
There are a lot of myths and untruths circulating about birthright citizenship and the fourteenth amendment. I recently read a great mythbuster published by the American Immigration Lawyers Association (I’m a member) that I thought I’d share with you.
Myth: We can easily change the Constitution and eliminate birthright citizenship.
Fact: Wrong. The Fourteenth Amendment is a fundamental piece of American history, law, and values. As Eric Ward of the Center for New Community writes, “For African Americans, the Fourteenth Amendment is a cornerstone for key civil rights laws such as the right to vote, equal access, and protection against job discrimination.”
Attempting to change this amendment and fundamental right is irresponsible. Immigration attorney Margaret Stock adds: Eliminating birthright citizenship would be un-American. Birthright citizenship has been the rule since the dawn of the Republic. We should have a compellingly good reason to eliminate it-one better than frustration with the federal government’s inability to enforce existing immigration laws.
Myth: Denying birthright citizenship to the children of immigrants would decrease illegal immigration.
Fact: Wrong again. Denying birthright citizenship to children of immigrants would actually increase the number of illegal immigrants in the U.S. because babies would be born without status. The myth that immigrants come to the U.S. illegally to give birth to “anchor babies” and obtain legal status is simply not true. Children born in the U.S. have to wait until they’re at least 21 to petition for their parents. Even then there are many legal obstacles to getting a green card for their parents. In reality, ending birthright citizenship would mean that thousands of children would be born every year in the United States with no citizenship in any country.
Myth: Denying birthright citizenship to the children of immigrants would result in cost savings.
Fact: On the contrary, changing the simple rule that we have now (everyone born in the U.S. is automatically a citizen) would result in a significant burden on all Americans who would no longer have an easy and inexpensive way to prove their citizenship. The U.S. would have to create a national registry of citizens, and everyone born in the U.S. would have to have their citizenship adjudicated by a professional. Eliminating birthright citizenship would mean everyone would have to prove they are actually citizens-an even greater burden for minorities, the poor, and the uneducated. In other words, changing our citizenship laws would be incredibly costly for all Americans.
In sum, eliminating birthright citizenship would be unconstitutional, impractical, expensive, and complicated. Furthermore it would constitute an assault on the letter and the spirit of the U.S. Constitution as well as on the civil rights of all Americans. Margaret Stock concludes:
The policy arguments in favor of retaining birthright citizenship are very strong. The policy arguments against it are weak. Even if we believe that it is possible to interpret the Fourteenth Amendment differently than we have been interpreting it for more than a hundred years, it is not clear why we would want to do so. Trading an easy and egalitarian birthright-citizenship rule for one that would cause hardship to millions of Americans is not a smart way to approach our complex immigration problems.
“Immigrants confirm America’s status as the one great global power not just in its trade and influence but in its people and culture.”
Joel Kotkin, Forbes
What has been lost in whatever discussion there has been nationally on the issue of immigration reform is the how immigration policy is key to economic growth. Anytime there is a debate, the only focus seems to be on keeping aliens out of the country and building more concrete walls and the need for more enforcement and electronic ‘eyes’ on our borders. It’s like discussion about rational and balanced immigration policy comes down to what we’ve seen states like Arizonia do when they decide to take national policy into their own hands.
What gets lost in all the hysteria and rhetoric is the fact that importing highly educated and highly skilled immigrants who can convert that energy into economic value is critical for our future success.
I like and heartily second Kotkins voice on this:
“Only immigration can provide the labor force, the expanding domestic markets and, perhaps most important, the youthful energy to keep our society vital and growing. Many bustling sections of American cities–the revived communities along the number 7 train line in Queens, N.Y., Houston’s Harwin Corridor, Los Angeles’ San Gabriel Valley–are dominated by immigrant enterprise. In contrast, the cities without large-scale immigration, such as Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, have stagnant and even declining populations.
In the future successful immigration will distinguish America from most key competitors. Globally, resistance to immigration or any form of linguistic, religious or ethnic diversity has become more commonplace. Over the past few decades Iran, Egypt, Turkey, Russia, Indonesia and the nations of the former East Bloc have constricted their concept of national identity. In Malaysia, East Africa and even the province of Quebec preferential policies have led successful minorities such as Jews, Armenians, Coptic Christians Indians and Chinese to find homes in more welcoming places, often in the U.S.”
One way to insure our economy is vibrant, growing, and long-lasting is to be sure we encourage those from around the globe who want to be part of the American Dream.
Well, 2010 wasn’t much a banner year for immigration reform..again. Here’s to hoping that 2011 is a year of good, solid and balanced debate and then ACTION. A few months back, I posted my list of 20 action items that would move our immigration policy into the 21st century. Now’s a great time to review them again:
1. Pass the DREAM Act.
2. Eliminate the three- and 10-year bars.
3. Remove requirement of lawful entry in application for adjustment of status for persons who entered as a minor.
4. End mandatory detention as we know it.
5. Pass legislation such as the Uniting American Families Act (HR 1024/S. 424) and end discrimination against LGBT immigrant families.
6. Change technical statute for clarification of 8 USC 1229(a)(b)(5)C)(i).
7. Eliminate quotas to the family-based petitions.
8. End country preferences for employment-based immigrant visas.
9. Increase the number of H1B visas, so that the cap does not get filled so quickly. Allow more people to apply.
10. Narrow the definition of “aggravated felony” and bring back the discretionary authority of the Immigration Judge.
11. Establish an appeal process for consular processing denials.
12. Extend 245(i) to include all petitions filed on or before a date selected in the future, so that non-citizens who have entered the United States without inspection may be able to adjust their status in the United States.
13. Individuals should be eligible to file a waiver of his/her inadmissibility because of false claims to USC citizenship regardless of the date of action.
14. Eliminate the harsh discriminatory requirements for fathers filing for “illegitimate” children (i.e. children born out of wedlock).
15. For fraud related waivers, the laws should allow children to be included as “qualifying relatives.”
16. Allow people to work while appealing a denial.
17. Eliminate bars to cancellation of removal for aggravated felons.
18. Provide appellate review of administrative decisions denying adjustment of status.
19. Force every CIS Officer, first to get hired, then to continue keeping their job, to study immigration law, including court decisions, as well as pass a final exam and, subsequently, periodic ones just to confirm their knowledge of immigration law.
20. Prohibit undocumented children from ever being detained.
