Months of political jockeying, grandstanding and public protests – along with considerable jawboning by the president – provoked the U.S. Senate yesterday to pass a sensible and comprehensive immigration reform package.
It’s a productive start to what will surely be a heated debate this summer as the House and Senate try to narrow the massive differences in their two bills. We believe the Senate plan provides a road map to resolve what’s now an unchecked illegal immigration system that taxes everything from our health-care systems to public schools.
To appease House Republicans, the Senate bill includes security provisions that position 6,000 National Guard troops on the border to support Border Patrol agents. It also calls for aerial surveillance and a 370-mile fence along the Mexican border.
The sticking point will be the bill’s three-tiered system for dealing with the up to 12 million illegals already here. The House doesn’t want any program with even a whiff of amnesty. Congressman Tom Tancredo is calling the bill “the largest illegal alien amnesty in American history.”
Since rounding up and deporting 12 million people is completely impractical, the Senate has proposed that those who have lived in the United States five years or longer would be allowed to stay and apply for citizenship, provided they pay back taxes, learn English and have no serious criminal records. Those are key requirements that allow supporters of the Senate bill to say they’re not promoting a blanket amnesty program. But it doesn’t go down with Tancredo and many of his House colleagues. “It is bad for our national security, it is bad for American workers, and it sends a very bad message to those waiting legally for their chance at the American dream,” he said.
Under the Senate plan, undocumented workers who have been here two to five years – about 2.8 million people – would have to return to a point of entry in Mexico or Canada and apply for a green card. Their return could be immediate, which places them at the proverbial “head of the line,” as other immigrants wait across the globe to be admitted legally. And the roughly 2 million who have been here less than two years would have to return to their countries. That’s no small change.
We urge Sen. Ken Salazar and other members of the conference committee to find an approach that’s tough on employers who look the other way as they hire illegals and clarifies worker rights and responsibilities.
We hope the political stars are properly aligned this year so Congress can pass meaningful reform. Border security is an acute problem, and a solution is long overdue.
