The Immigration Score Sheet -- Four Years of What?
By Alan Lee, Esq.†‡
As we look back on four years of the Bush Administration, Americans
who have family members, employees or friends in the immigration
process or are otherwise concerned about the drifting path of immigration
policy towards conservatism, must decide the importance of the immigration
issue to them and, if important, determine whether this Administration
and its friends in Congress deserve four more years. To this writer,
the Bush Administration, unfortunately, has been one of the worst
for the rights of immigrants in the past 50 years. A small list
of its "prized" accomplishments follows:
1. President Bush announcing his proposal in January 2004 to give
temporary legal status to a large number of illegal aliens, but
then not even pushing for any legislation to give flesh to his proposal.
The President later further mentioned the proposal mainly in places
where the words would be popular, giving credence to many earlier
fears that the January announcement engineered by his chief political
adviser, Karl Rove, was only done to curry favor from Hispanic-Americans
for the November elections. He was, however, caught with the immigration
question during his third debate with Senator John Kerry on October
13, 2004, at which time he defended his proposal as giving a "temporary
worker card," emphasizing that it was not an amnesty as he
stated was earlier proposed by Senator Kerry. Senator Kerry responded
that the President's guest worker program by itself would not solve
the immigration problem and that the country needed an earned legalization
in which workers who have been here for a long time and paid their
taxes among other factors could begin to move "towards full
citizenship out of the shadows.”
2. The Administration's stripping five judges from the Board of
Immigration Appeals in March, 2003, in a blatant attempt to toss
off judges who were sympathetic to immigrant rights. At the same
time, the Administration encouraged the Board judges to use affirmances
without opinion (AWO) - one line decisions without reasoning. In
speaking of the reasonableness of this process, the First Circuit
Court of Appeals in Albathani v. INS noted that the Board member
who denied Albathani's administrative appeal was recorded as having
decided over 50 cases on a single day, a rate of one every 10 minutes
over the course of a nine hour day. The Court further observed that
the Circuit Court itself had taken considerably longer than one
day to review Albathani's case, and that the record of the hearing
itself could not be reviewed in 10 minutes. The National Association
of Immigration Judges was so incensed by Attorney General John Ashcroft's
continued interference in Board affairs that it published a position
paper in early 2002 urging that the immigration court be removed
from the Department of Justice.
3. The Administration's calling on all local law enforcement agencies
to take part in enforcing the immigration laws, thereby undercutting
efforts of police departments throughout the country to gain cooperation
from immigrant communities in criminal cases. Many local law enforcement
officials have complained to no avail. The Republican Congress continues
its efforts to pass the CLEAR Act (H.R. 2671) and its counterpart
in the Senate (S. 1906) which would force all state and local police
officers to become federal immigration agents by denying them access
to federal funds they are already receiving if they refuse the enforcement
duties.
4. The Administration's failure to push Congress to pass two popular
pieces of legislation, the DREAM Act and AgJOBS, which are largely
noncontroversial and backed by many legislators in both parties.
The DREAM Act would give conditional permanent residence status
to children who arrived in the U.S. before the age of 16, have lived
in the country for five years, graduated from high school or obtained
a U.S. GED certificate and are of good moral character. It has 47
co-sponsors in the Senate and 134 co-sponsors in the House. AgJOBS
would legalize the status of approximately 500,000 needed farmworkers
and has been supported by 63 co-sponsors in the Senate and 104 co-sponsors
in the House. In point of fact, the Administration reportedly told
the Senate majority leader (reported in the 7/14/04 Wall Street
Journal) not to let AgJOBS come up - not that the Administration
was for it or against it - just not to let it come up for a vote!
5. The Administration's panicking and splitting the INS into three
separate agencies, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (U.S.C.I.S.),
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (U.S.I.C.E.), and Customs
and Border Protection (C.B.P.) in March 2003, based on the flimsy
excuse that a flight school received confirmation copies of two
of the 9/11 hijackers' approvals six months after their changes
of status to F-1 student were actually approved. The confirmation
copies were sent out by contractors and not INS personnel in a job
that was largely ministerial. The upheaval, meanwhile, has caused
much confusion to personnel and the public, contributed to massive
backlogs of the agency, and not perceptibly improved efficiency
and service. As of September 30, 2003, the number of pending cases
at the U.S.C.I.S. stood at a record 6 million plus, and in the latest
debacle of the Department of Homeland Security, entry was denied
on terror related grounds to Yusuf Islam, formerly known as the
famous 1970's folk-rock singer Cat Stevens, (best known for his
song "Peace Train") and Tariq Ramadan of Switzerland,
a moderate Muslim scholar offered a teaching post by Notre Dame
University, while entry was reportedly allowed to 3 convicted and
controversially pardoned individuals who attempted to assassinate
Fidel Castro, Cuba's leader, with 33 lbs. of explosives at the Ibero-American
Conference in Panama in November 2000. ("Narrow Borders,"
am New York, pg. 9, 10/1-3/04).
6. The Administration's alienation of Muslim communities in the
United States by instituting the National Security Entry/Exit Registration
System (NSEERS) special call-in registration program in September
2002, under which most males 16 and over from 25 countries were
ordered to register at local immigration offices ostensibly to improve
homeland security by interviewing them to determine whether they
or any of their family members or acquaintances were threats. That,
however, was not what finally transpired as hundreds were detained,
thousands humiliated, and the fruits of the efforts from September
2002 to September 2003 after 290,526 registrations (83,519 call-ins
and 207,007 port of entries) was a government statement that 11
had links to terrorism - even though none were charged with terror
related grounds of inadmissibility or removability. The Administration
proudly stated at the end of the program that it had placed 13,799
registrants into removal proceedings. This fact, however, should
not be held up as a badge of honor, but as a mark of shame. It should
be noted that DHS officers for the most part ignored the fact that
the individuals were not threats and that many had applications
for immigration relief pending with the U.S.C.I.S.. The ostensible
goal of security gave way to detentions for illegals, deportations,
and fleeing of many Muslims to the Canadian border. The end result
has been deep distrust of the government by Muslims here and further
reason for hatred from abroad.
7. The Administration's scaring away many tourists and students
from coming to this country, a blow to the national economy. With
its current ingrained culture of "no", this Administration
has sacrificed part of the economic well-being of the country by
putting up a series of barriers to make visitors and students feel
less welcome while other countries are rolling out the welcome mat.
Encouraging consular and immigration officers to say "no"
to visa applicants and entrants at ports of entry respectively,
and lengthening the visa process to unreasonable time limits because
of many times ineptly handled security clearances has made the United
States a less attractive place to visit and study in. The Social
Security Administration in a recent foreign student regulation basically
told students that it could care less whether they could drive a
car, lease an apartment, or obtain many of the goods and services
needed to live independently during the time of schooling. The U.S.C.I.S.
with its new non-refundable SEVIS student fee of $100 to even obtain
an I-20 student form will further discourage the entry of foreign
students, as the student visa is not guaranteed and $100 is much
money in most of the world. In the meanwhile, the CBP through its
multiple confusing deadlines for machine readable passports, participation
in U.S. VISIT, and biometric passports (in which our current biometric
requirements do not match international standards) has many times
discouraged and frustrated potential visitors to the States. The
U.S. Department of Commerce has estimated that visitor spending
dropped from $82.4 billion in 2000 to $65.1 billion in 2003 and
the number of foreign students dropped by 8.5% between 2001 and
2003.
8. The Administration's seeming fixation with detaining and deporting
those entering the country through means other than legal inspection
without right to a hearing before an immigration judge or federal
court (summary removal proceedings) while at the same time not adequately
funding port inspections, a huge hole in our national security in
which terrorists could bring in a suitcase nuclear device. Currently
less than 5% of containers are inspected. The Administration in
April 2003 announced that persons coming in by sea would be detained
during the entire period of their proceedings; and further announced
in August 2004 that illegal aliens caught within 100 miles of the
Mexican border would be placed in summary removal proceedings unless
they could prove that they were present in the U.S. for at least
14 days. Now it is attempting to pass legislation to extend the
reach of summary removal proceedings to persons sneaking into the
U.S. unless they can prove that they have been here for at least
five years. In the meantime, the Administration has announced plans
to go forward with development of a battlefield nuclear weapon which
will penetrate deep bunkers in the earth despite cries of many that
the money would be better spent to improve port security.
9. This Administration's unwillingness during its four years to
ask Congress to roll back any of the harsh measures of the Illegal
Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (IIRIRA)
including amending the definition of "aggravated felony"
to include only serious offenses (currently the term can be applied
to shoplifting offenses or other seemingly small crimes and trips
up many returning lawful permanent residents at U.S. ports of entry
who committed the offenses in the distant past when they were not
considered aggravated felonies), repealing the 3 and 10 year bars
against entry for most individuals who have been illegal in the
U.S. for 180 days or one year respectively after April 1, 1997,
and repealing the bar against judicial review of many immigration
decisions ( INS was widely recognized as the worst agency in the
federal government, and its successor should not enjoy immunity
from a federal court's review of the reasonableness of its decisions).
10. The Administration's inability to deal effectively with its
right wing House congressional elements as illustrated by October
2004's controversial H.R.10, the 9/11 Recommendations Implementation
Act, to the effect that, even when the Administration voices support
for removing anti-immigration provisions from such important legislation
as asked for by the 9/11 Commission itself, the House Republicans
have as of the date of this writing refused to compromise. They
turned their 667 page bill into an omnibus wish list fulfillment
package for the U.S.C.I.S. and U.S.I.C.E. incorporating many anti-immigrant
provisions removing immigrant rights such as raising the bar to
gain political asylum, making it easier to deport persons in the
U.S. here for a long period of time, and even specifically targeting
our successful Second Circuit decision of Firstland International
in which the Second Circuit Court of Appeals held that there was
no statutory authority for the government to revoke our client's
immigrant visa petition once he had embarked on his journey to the
United States unless a prior notice of revocation was given.
This is but a short list (which could undoubtedly go on ad
infinitum) of the various ways that this Administration and
its friends in Congress have hurt immigrant rights. In the House,
the most virulently anti-immigration spokesmen up for reelection
are Representatives Hastert (R-Illinois), DeLay (R-Texas), Tom Davis
(R-Virginia), Sensenbrenner (R-Wisconsin), Hostettler (R-Indiana),
and Hyde (R-Illinois). On the Senate side, the chief anti-immigration
spokesmen up for re-election are Senators Grassley (R-Iowa), Frist
(R-Tennessee), Kyl (R-Arizona), and Sessions (R-Alabama). When you
Americans who are concerned with the country's immigration issues
line up before the ballot box on November 2nd, you should consider
whether you would like to have four more years of this Administration's
policies.
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