5.15.2005
Enter McCain-Kennedy (WashingtonPost.com)
Saturday, May 14, 2005; Page A20
IMMIGRATION legislation introduced Thursday by Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) is not the first, and may not be the last, attempt to forge a realistic, comprehensive and bipartisan national immigration policy. In the last Congress, Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) and Senate Minority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (D-S.D.) also tried it, and others have introduced bills containing similar elements. But there are reasons to hope that this bill will move further. The authors have struggled, with one another and with widely varying advocates, to find compromise answers to some of the more difficult immigration issues.
The bill requires new investment in border security and technology. But it also allows employers to hire foreigners under a temporary visa program if they can prove they are unable to hire American workers for the same job. Visa-holders will be able to change jobs (which the discredited bracero guest-worker programs of the past did not allow); will be able to apply to stay (eliminating a potential source of new illegal immigration), and will be issued tamper-proof identity documents (ending the use of faked Social Security numbers).
Most controversially -- but ultimately sensibly -- the bill allows illegal immigrants already here to regularize their status, but not easily; they would have to go to the end of the line, and that only after paying a hefty fine, staying employed for a prescribed period and paying back taxes. The bills' authors argue that this is not an amnesty, because it requires a recognition of wrongdoing. They also argue that establishing the temporary visa will prevent a new pool of illegal immigrants from arriving because it will become politically realistic to fine employers who continue to employ illegals. Most of all, this provision for illegal immigrants makes sense because any legislation that does not deal with the approximately 10 million illegals will ultimately result in more lawbreaking.
(More ... Enter McCain-Kennedy) ¶ 11:09
IMMIGRATION legislation introduced Thursday by Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) is not the first, and may not be the last, attempt to forge a realistic, comprehensive and bipartisan national immigration policy. In the last Congress, Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) and Senate Minority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (D-S.D.) also tried it, and others have introduced bills containing similar elements. But there are reasons to hope that this bill will move further. The authors have struggled, with one another and with widely varying advocates, to find compromise answers to some of the more difficult immigration issues.
The bill requires new investment in border security and technology. But it also allows employers to hire foreigners under a temporary visa program if they can prove they are unable to hire American workers for the same job. Visa-holders will be able to change jobs (which the discredited bracero guest-worker programs of the past did not allow); will be able to apply to stay (eliminating a potential source of new illegal immigration), and will be issued tamper-proof identity documents (ending the use of faked Social Security numbers).
Most controversially -- but ultimately sensibly -- the bill allows illegal immigrants already here to regularize their status, but not easily; they would have to go to the end of the line, and that only after paying a hefty fine, staying employed for a prescribed period and paying back taxes. The bills' authors argue that this is not an amnesty, because it requires a recognition of wrongdoing. They also argue that establishing the temporary visa will prevent a new pool of illegal immigrants from arriving because it will become politically realistic to fine employers who continue to employ illegals. Most of all, this provision for illegal immigrants makes sense because any legislation that does not deal with the approximately 10 million illegals will ultimately result in more lawbreaking.
(More ... Enter McCain-Kennedy) ¶ 11:09
