TV’s Colbert & Farmworkers Union Miss 2 Key Facts In Their Illegal Alien Stunt

By Roy Beck, posted on NumbersUSA

4% and H-2A!

These are two powerful reasons why TV comedian Stephen Colbert and the United Farm Workers of America are completely misleading the public with their “Take Our Jobs” stunt.

They claim that they are bringing a dose of reality to the national desire to move illegal aliens out of the country. They suggest that because few Americans have stepped forward to take field work at existing wages and conditions, that means we need most of the illegal aliens who are in the country.

In a nutshell, here are the two main reasons their gag is full of a baloney:

Only 4% of illegal alien workers have jobs in agriculture
To whatever extent a farmer may rely on illegal ag workers, he/she has an unlimited supply of LEGAL ag workers available through a foreign visa program called H-2A.
UNION ABANDONS WORKERS TO MAKE AMNESTY POINT

The Union’s founder, Caesar Chavez was a champion against illegal immigraiton because he knew how it depressed wages, benefits and working conditions for those who work the fields.

But now the union is much more concerned with adding millions of illegal foreign workers into the rolls of registered voters to accomplish other political goals.

Union officials said the campaign called “Take Our Jobs” is intended to highlight the role of illegal workers in feeding Americans and to goad Congress to overhaul U.S. immigration policy. . . I can’t imagine we’ll find that many Americans want to work in the fields,” said Arturo Rodriguez, president of the California-based union.

Kicking out illegal aliens would lead to crops rotting in the fields, higher food prices and a greater reliance on imports, the Associated Press says the union contends.

“If we asked all the undocumented immigrants to leave the country, the agriculture industry would die,” Mr. Rodriguez said.

Can you believe such bald-faced lying!

I hope you will challenge every reporter who ever quotes such nonsense without a response that shows what a lie it is.

The H-2A visa program allows any farmer in America to import an unlimited number of foreign workers to labor in the fields.

If the government made illegal aliens go home, there would be no reason for a single head of lettuce to rot in the fields or an apple to fall and rot on the ground.

Then why are there so many illegal aliens working the fields?

Because the farmers who hire them refuse to pay the slightly higher wages required when they use the LEGAL H-2A system and because they don’t plan ahead enough to use the system. North Carolina farmers, on the other hand, have banded together in a kind of co-op to easily use the H-2A system and beat some red tape issues.

ILLEGAL ALIENS ARE MAINLY THREAT TO NON-AG JOBS

Advocates for illegal foreign workers almost always focus on agriculture because they know — as does Stephen Colbert — that few native-born Americans are interested in working the fields at current low wages, tough working conditions and low benefits.

But hardly any illegal aliens are in the ag occupations.

The Pew Hispanic Center in April of 2009 issued a report that found:

4% of undocumented workers are in “Farming, Fishing, and Forestry.”

That is according to Pew’s Table 6, “Comparing Industries of U.S.-born and unauthorized immigrant workers, 2008″

The overwhelming majority of illegal aliens (and even higher percentage of legal foreign workers) have jobs in construction, manufacturing, service and transportation. These are jobs that a high percentage of the 25 million Americans unable to find a full-time job WOULD take.

Attrition Through Enforcement efforts that have helped cause a reduction of approximately 2 million in the illegal alien population over the last two years are designed to open up jobs that Americans DO want and to reduce burdens on taxpayers and local communities.

Using ag work as an excuse for amnesty not only is illogical, it is intentionally deceptive.

ROY BECK is Founder & CEO of NumbersUSA

NumbersUSA’s blogs are copyrighted and may be republished or reposted only if they are copied in their entirety, including this paragraph, and provide proper credit to NumbersUSA. NumbersUSA bears no responsibility for where our blogs may be republished or reposted.

HERE

NumbersUSA.com

Read It Here — Every Detail Of The Arizona Enforcement Law (originally SB 1070)

By Rosemary Jenks, Friday, May 21, 2010, posted on NumbersUSA

(EDITOR’S NOTE: Unlike federal officials who have criticized Arizona’s law, Rosemary Jenks — an attorney and NumbersUSA’s Director of Government Relations — has read it thoroughly and offers here a full description of every thing the law does.)

Purpose of the Law:

To ensure “the cooperative enforcement of federal immigration laws throughout all of Arizona;”
To “make attrition through enforcement the public policy of all state and local government agencies in Arizona;” and
To “discourage and deter the unlawful entry and presence of aliens and economic activity by persons unlawfully present in the United States.”

LOTS MORE HERE Please read this. You will be in the minority, but informed!

The Dustin Inman Society
April 30, 2010

MEDIA RELEASE

April 30, 2010

DUSTIN INMAN SOCIETY URGES AMERICANS TO AVOID ANY POSSIBLY PLANNED COUNTER PROTEST OR RALLY TO OPPOSE ANTI- IMMIGRATION LAW ENFORCEMENT MARCH AT THE GEORGIA STATE CAPITOL ON May 1 2010

The Dustin Inman Society

www.TheDustinInmanSociety.org

3595 Canton Rd. A-9/337

Marietta, Ga. 30066

Contact: D.A. King

Because of recent dangerous occurrences in Arizona, in the interest of public safety and to avoid potential personal attacks or injury, the Dustin Inman Society is urging pro-immigration law enforcement Americans to avoid organized assembly or counter rallies at the announced “march” against enforcement at the Georgia Capitol on Saturday, May 1st, 2010.

By organizing, transporting and encouraging illegal aliens, subversive, anti-enforcement advocates have announced the intent to defy American immigration laws and demand an end of enforcement of those laws.

Beginning at 10:00 AM Saturday, May 1, these open borders advocates have announced plans for a five-hour march from the Georgia Capitol to advance a cause of a cessation of enforcement, open borders and to repeat the legalization legislation of 1986 for individuals who have escaped capture at American borders, reports D.A. King, president of the Dustin Inman Society.

“Most Americans understand that preserving the rule of law and defined, defended borders can be accomplished by electing responsible state and federal elected officials and that there are times when law-abiding Americans must avoid the risk of violent attacks in their own country” King said.

“According to polls, the large majority of weary Americans support the recently passed law in Arizona making the crime of illegal immigration a state crime in Arizona” observed King. “In Arizona, a fringe minority comprised largely of illegal aliens and their community organizers have made it clear that opposition to their agenda will be met with ridiculous, transparent and vacant charges of “racial profiling” and violence King said.

D.A. King urges Americans to always remember their right to peaceably assemble to make their voices heard, but to attend the anti-enforcement rally in Atlanta at their own risk. “While Capitol Police and Atlanta Police have always worked hard to provide protection to all concerned at similar past rallies, the possibility of personal injury should not be ignored” according to King. “If you go, I recommend attending with a witness and to take video and still cameras to record what is sometimes left off of media reports” was King’s experienced advice.

The Dustin Inman Society will not be sponsoring or sanctioning any counter protest to the anti-enforcement rally staged by radical anarchist elements on Saturday morning. “Expect no intervention by or protection from federal authorities” was King’s warning to possible counter protesters. “This will not be an permanent or ongoing policy of the Dustin Inman Society” says King.

Mr. King plans on video taping the event at his own risk.

Named for one of the thousands of Americans who have paid the ultimate price for America’s unsecured borders and the resulting illegal immigration crisis, the Dustin Inman Society is a Georgia-based, non-partisan, multi-ethnic coalition of Americans opposed to illegal immigration and illegal employment.

“In 1986, we proved that a path to citizenship for illegal aliens, from any region, does not result in secure borders or put an end to illegal immigration… or employment” said D.A. King, president of the Dustin Inman Society.

Advancing the cause of the American worker, the Dustin Inman Society strongly supports the as yet untried concept of securing American borders - at any price - and the vigorous enforcement of employment laws as a solution to the decades-old illegal immigration crisis (Attrition through enforcement). The Dustin Inman Society mission statement HERE.

The Dustin Inman Society supports and endorses the Arizona law mirroring long-standing federal laws.

FAIR
If Washington Won’t, Arizona Will

State Passes Tough, Sensible Illegal Immigration Laws to Protect Arizonans

April 15, 2010

(Washington, D.C.) After decades of failure by the federal government to properly secure the border, Arizona lawmakers, led by State Senator Russell Pearce, have once again responded to their constituents who want immigration enforcement. By a vote of 35-21, the State House passed Arizona SB 1070 “Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhood Act.” Already passed by the Senate, the bill is now on its way to an expected signature from Governor Jan Brewer.

“It’s no surprise that the State of Arizona, one of the hardest hit by illegal immigration, now has one of the toughest laws,” said Dan Stein, President of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). “SB 1070 is a no-nonsense, common-sense example of a state acting where the federal government is failing, a reaction to the inaction in Washington. There is a leadership vacuum on this issue. Arizonans and their lawmakers like Senator Russell Pearce are filling it.”

SB 1070 grants Arizona law enforcement the authority to inquire about immigration status, and to act on it. The new law will make it a state misdemeanor to fail to comply with federal law requiring that foreign nationals register and carry their documents with them. It also requires Arizona police officers, if they have a “reasonable suspicion” that someone is an illegal immigrant during a lawful stop, to determine that person’s immigration status and authorizes them to transfer verified illegal aliens into federal custody. SB 1070 also prohibits state and local agencies from adopting “sanctuary” polices that prohibit police from inquiring about immigration status.

“SB1070 embodies the concept of ‘attrition through enforcement,’” continued Stein, “Making it tough for illegal aliens to live and work in Arizona means that those illegal aliens already living in the state are more likely to self-deport, and it certainly reduces the incentive to come. Arizona will soon have a law that both represents the interests of legal Arizonians and serves as model legislation for other states.”

FAIR’s legal affiliate, the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI) assisted Senator Pearce in drafting the language of SB1070. IRLI, the nation’s leader in developing immigration enforcement legislation at the state level, has counseled lawmakers across the country on every innovative approach in the field of cooperative state immigration enforcement law since 2001.

About FAIR

Founded in 1979, FAIR is the country’s largest immigration reform group. With over 250,000 members nationwide, FAIR fights for immigration policies that serve national interests, not special interests. FAIR believes that immigration reform must enhance national security, improve the economy, protect jobs, preserve our environment, and establish a rule of law that is recognized and enforced.

Contact Bob Dane at 202-328-7004.

NRO The Corner

Minority Voters on Immigration [Mark Krikorian]

Ever wonder what actual Hispanic voters think about immigration, rather than the ethnic activists and campaign consultants that too many gullible Republicans rely on? Well, a new Center for Immigration Studies poll asked them, and the results are not what you’d think.

The poll of Hispanic, black, and Asian voters used neutral language (no “illegal aliens” or “amnesty” or “undocumented”) and found that the majority of each group thought overall immigration was too high and favored attrition through enforcement over amnesty. (See the full questions and results here.) It’s true, as pro-amnesty groups never tire of pointing out, that there is indeed some support for amnesty; about half of each group (as well as likely voters overall) say they favor legalization, when offered that as a stand-alone choice. But huge majorities of the very same people favor enforcement, when it was offered by itself, something the pro-amnesty polls don’t bother to do. And when asked to choose between the two, majorities of each group favored enforcement; Hispanics by 18 points, blacks by 20 points, and Asians by 28 points.

In the stand-alone question on amnesty, 44 percent of Hispanic voters opposed it, 33 percent strongly. Those are the GOP’s voters, and backing amnesty is just going to dispirit them without gaining much of anything in return.

HERE to read the full post on NRO with informative links

NumbersUSA

Postville Plant to Hire 150 More Workers
Monday, February 1, 2010
- posted on NumbersUSA

Postville Plant

The poultry plant in Postville, Iowa which was home to one of the nation’s largest immigration worksite enforcement actions in history is preparing to hire 150 new workers. In May of 2008, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials arrested close to 400 illegal workers. Read Full Story

The Week Magazine

The case for inaction on immigration

On Tuesday, 80 House members unveiled a new immigration amnesty proposal. The bill, written by Illinois congressman Luis Gutierrez, would put illegals on the road to citizenship. — The Gutierrez bill is too permissive to get very far: It grants amnesty to any employed illegal alien provided the alien has not been convicted of a crime and pays a $500 fine…

‘Hate Groups, Nativists, and Vigilantes’: Lou Dobbs and the pro-amnesty crowd’s campaign of vilificationBy Mark Krikorian

November 2009

Op-eds and Magazine Articles

National Review Online, November 13, 2009

It’s not clear why Lou Dobbs resigned from CNN Wednesday. Fox said he’s not headed there, and from his comments it sounds to me like he’s going to run for office in New Jersey (though Bob Menendez’s seat, the next Senate opening, isn’t up until 2012).

Be that as it may, it’s likely that part of the reason was the vilification campaign against Dobbs by pro-amnesty groups, part of a broader jihad against any public expression of skepticism about amnesty and open borders.

After the June 2007 collapse of the Bush-McCain-Kennedy amnesty push in the Senate, a demoralized Frank Sharry, one of the top left-wing amnesty advocates, summed up the lesson he’d learned: “We thought we were in a policy debate . . . And in fact we were in a cultural war.”

Later that year, the open-borders crowd decided to change tactics based on this insight. The public, in their estimation, was open to legalizing the illegal population and further increasing immigration, in exchange for promises of future enforcement, but was being duped by evil-mongers stirring up atavistic fears. So, presaging Obama’s jihads against Limbaugh and Fox News, they shifted from arguing how wonderful amnesty would be to viciously attacking the malefactors who were publicly arguing for attrition of the illegal population through enforcement.

In December 2007, as part of that strategy, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) was assigned to designate the oldest restrictionist organization, the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), a “hate group.” The National Council of La Raza’s contribution was to start a campaign entitled We Can Stop the Hate, decrying the mainstream opposition to amnesty as a “surge of hate and violence” caused by “code words of hate” peddled by “hate groups, nativists, and vigilantes.” And a new hard-left group, America’s Voice, was founded as a war room for the pro-amnesty faction; among other things, they hosted an online election for the “Top Anti-Immigrant Wolf” (and included me among the nominees, though I haven’t been informed if I’ve won).

But the Emmanuel Goldstein of this drive to demonize amnesty opponents is Lou Dobbs. The Drop Dobbs campaign is sponsored by La Raza, the SPLC, Media Matters, LULAC (the League of United Latin American Citizens), et al. In October they arranged a series of protests by open-borders groups in cities around the country demanding Dobbs’s head. At the New York protest, a pastor from Spanish Harlem told the left-wing New America Media, “Lou Dobbs is a terrorist. He is encouraging the American people to hate Latinos. It is not only a human-rights abuse, but it is a form of terrorism against us.”

The day after the protests, frequent Dobbs critic Geraldo Rivera (who, unlike Dobbs, is not married to a Hispanic woman) said in a speech that the opponents of amnesty have been “reckless beyond imagining” and that Dobbs in particular “is almost singlehandedly responsible for creating, for being the architect of the young-Latino-as-scapegoat for everything that ails this country.”

Along these same lines is Basta Dobbs, whose founder describes its target as “The Most Dangerous Man for Latinos in America.” So We Might See, a “national interfaith coalition for media justice,” joined with the National Hispanic Media Coalition to fight Dobbs’s “anti-immigrant hate speech,” not because it’s factually incorrect but because it’s a form of “media violence.” And the SPLC’s Mark Potok and others claim (here, for instance) that Dobbs is directly responsible for an increase in “hate crimes” against Hispanics (the rate of such crimes actually went down, as FAIR points out in its debunking of the SPLC’s smears — but facts aren’t the point here).

It’s important to note that this campaign goes beyond mere name-calling. This isn’t Obama as the Joker or Dick Cheney as the Prince of Darkness, Van Jones calling Republicans a**holes or Rep. Joe Wilson’s “You lie!” Those are all simply part of a boisterous, if indecorous, politics.

The pro-amnesty crowd’s demonization efforts, on the other hand, are clear incitements to violence. They can’t claim that Lou Dobbs is a “terrorist” and that FAIR is responsible for people being killed in “hate crimes” and then be surprised when one of their followers acts in perceived self-defense.

Lou Dobbs last month described a shooting at his home, which came after weeks of threatening phone calls. He prematurely suggested (and I prematurely echoed his suggestion) that this was a result of the hate campaign directed against him. That may well turn out to be the case, but police said it could have been a stray hunter’s bullet (though at the time it wasn’t rifle season for deer, only squirrels and other small game). Nonetheless, given what happened to Pim Fortuyn after a similar vilification campaign, Dobbs is wise to have a bodyguard.

Of course, there are voices inciting violence on the pro-enforcement side too. But they’re kooks on the fringe, and going after them is pointless precisely because they’re so irrelevant. The mainstream figures, the targets of the amnesty crowd’s vilification, have always gone out of their way to avoid this sort of thing. Dobbs’s wife is Mexican-American, and he’s not even a restrictionist, just an “illegal/bad, legal/good” kind of guy. For over a quarter-century FAIR has been leery of organizing local chapters because of the stray hater who might be attracted along with the normal concerned citizens. For more than a decade Numbers USA, a restrictionist group, has had a button on its home page titled “‘No’ to Immigrant Bashing.” And the whole thesis of my book is that the difference in immigration today is not that today’s immigrants are somehow inferior to those of a century ago, but that we have changed and outgrown immigration.

But if I might put myself in their heads for a moment, this kind of caution is irrelevant to the organizers of the hate campaign against amnesty opponents. And it’s not because La Raza and the rest are cynically trying to taint pro-enforcement voices. On the contrary, they sincerely believe that support for any kind of immigration enforcement or limit on immigration is, by definition, hateful and an incitement to violence. Despite occasional pious acknowledgments that a nation has a right to control its borders, open-borders groups (on both the left and right) oppose all existing immigration-control measures and any prospective ones. This is because they reject the moral legitimacy of immigration controls, borders, sovereignty, and nationhood itself. Thus, unyielding opposition to amnesty and illegal immigration — however measured the tone, however sober the argument — is necessarily the equivalent of an act of violence in their eyes. And so they perceive their vilification campaign simply as a matter of self-defense, a response to our provocation.

When, despite Dobbs’s departure from CNN, the push for amnesty fails next year, as it inevitably will, it will be interesting to see how they deal with yet another defeat. They can hardly escalate their rhetoric further. HERE

Athens Banner Herald
July 10, 2009
Opinion page

Letters

The illegal immigration crisis, now being all but ignored by the media in hopeful preparation for the Obama amnesty scheme, took more than 30 years to develop. It cannot and will not be solved overnight or with the stroke of a pen.

The amnesty-again crowd urges that it would be difficult to deport approximately 20 million illegal aliens in a short period; therefore, its only solution is legalization and citizenship.

We tried legalization in 1986. Amnesty was granted to approximately 3 million illegal aliens. Today, we have approximately 20 million. Amnesty does not stop illegal immigration.

Rewarding criminals with exactly what they broke the law to obtain is not a workable or sensible method of stopping the crime of illegal immigration.

The reasonable choice is to work toward the gradual but steady attrition of the illegal population through enforcement of the laws already in place. It is enforcement of our laws that stops and deters crime, including illegal immigration. Having tried rewarding illegals with a path to citizenship in 1986, it is past time to try strict and fair enforcement of existing laws.

By objecting to any and all enforcement of the law, the open-borders lobby shows us what works at stopping illegal immigration. Enforcement works.

In a 2007 Associated Press report on a then-new Arizona law aimed at employers who hire illegal immigrants, one illegal alien said, “I don’t want to live here because of the new law and the oppressive environment, I’ll be better in my country.”

Local law enforcement’s use of tools such as the federal program that locates illegal aliens who’ve landed in Georgia jails for crimes in addition to illegal immigration works.

Another legalization and a path-to-citizenship program would be sending a message all over the world that to become an American citizen, all one needs to do is break into the United States and wait for the next amnesty.

Inger Eberhart - Acworth

• Inger Eberhart is a member of the board of advisors of the Dustin Inman Society, which advocates for secure borders and the enforcement of American immigration laws.

Originally published in the Athens Banner-Herald on Friday, July 10, 2009

Center for Immigration Studies

Attrition Through Enforcement

A Cost-Effective Strategy to Shrink the Illegal Population

April 2006

By Jessica M. Vaughan

——————————————————————————–

Proponents of mass legalization of the illegal alien population, whether through amnesty or expanded guestworker programs, often justify this radical step by suggesting that the only alternative – a broad campaign to remove illegal aliens by force – is unworkable. One study put the cost of such a deportation strategy at $206 billion over the next five years. But mass forced removal is not the only alternative to mass legalization. This analysis shows that a strategy of attrition through enforcement, in combination with a stronger border security effort such as the administration’s Secure Border Initiative (SBI), will significantly reduce the size of the illegal alien population at a reasonable cost. Reducing the size of the illegal population in turn will reduce the fiscal and social burdens that illegal immigration imposes on communities. In contrast, a policy of mass legalization is likely to increase these costs and prompt more illegal immigration.

Studies of the size and growth of the illegal population show that a borders-oriented strategy like SBI, which aims to improve border security and focuses mainly on removing criminal aliens, will achieve only limited results. If supplemented by attrition through enforcement, which encourages voluntary compliance with immigration laws rather than relying on forced removal, the illegal population could be nearly halved in five years. According to the government’s own cost estimates, such a strategy requires an additional investment of less than $2 billion, or $400 million per year – an increase of less than 1 percent of the President’s 2007 budget request for the Department of Homeland Security ($42.7 billion).

Elements of the attrition through enforcement strategy include: mandatory workplace verification of immigration status; measures to curb misuse of Social Security and IRS identification numbers; partnerships with state and local law enforcement officials; expanded entry-exit recording under US-VISIT; increased non-criminal removals; and state and local laws to discourage illegal settlement.

The purpose of this analysis is to identify both the likely cost to the federal government and the expected effect in terms reducing the size of the illegal alien population, of re-orienting the nation’s immigration law enforcement strategy from one that relies primarily on border control and removing criminal aliens to one that also aims to increase the probability that illegal aliens will return home of their own accord. Among the findings:

A strategy of attrition through enforcement could reduce the illegal population by as many as 1.5 million illegal aliens each year. Currently, only about 183,000 illegal aliens per year depart without the intervention of immigration officials, according to DHS statistics.

Voluntary compliance works faster and is cheaper than a borders-only approach to immigration law enforcement. For example, under the controversial NSEERS program launched after 9/11, DHS removed roughly 1,500 illegally-resident Pakistanis; over the same time period, in response to the registration requirements, about 15,000 illegal Pakistani immigrants left the country on their own.

Requiring employers to verify the status of workers could deny jobs to about three million illegal workers in three years, affecting at least one-third of the illegal population. This measure is a central feature of H.R. 4437, the enforcement measure passed by the House of Representatives in December, and is estimated to cost just over $400 million over five years.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) knows the name, address, and place of employment of millions of illegal aliens, and issues hundreds of millions of dollars in tax refunds and tax credits to illegal aliens. Changing the laws to provide for information-sharing would help boost immigration law enforcement at minimal cost.

US-VISIT is a critical tool in curbing illegal immigration. Screening must be expanded to include Mexicans and Canadians, and DHS must move forward to deploy an exit-recording system. These steps should be a pre-requisite to adding or expanding any visa program.

Less than 10 percent of ICE investigative resources are devoted to fraud, workplace violations, and overstayers. DHS could double non-criminal removals at a cost of roughly $120 million per year, balancing a “broken windows” approach with its current triage approach to interior enforcement.

Laws enacted by the state governments of Florida and New York to prevent illegal immigrants from obtaining driver’s licenses have induced more illegal aliens to leave than have federal enforcement efforts against certain illegal populations in those states, and have come at virtually no cost to the federal government.

False Choice

In November 2005 Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff presented the Bush Administration plan to address the nation’s immigration crisis. Known as the Secure Border Initiative (SBI), the plan is billed as a comprehensive solution that will “secure America’s borders and reduce illegal migration” within five years.1 The cost of SBI was projected to be $2.5 billion.2

While SBI addresses a number of grave border security weaknesses, such as Border Patrol staffing levels, detention capacity, and physical infrastructure, and is certain to reduce the number of new illegal arrivals, it will have no noticeable effect for communities across the country that already are hosting illegal populations. The SBI makes almost no effort to reduce the size of the existing illegal alien population; nor does it address the problem of visa overstayers, who make up perhaps as much as 40 percent of the illegal immigrant flow.

Ongoing research by leading immigration scholars strongly suggests that when border control is the sole focus of immigration enforcement policy, illegal immigrants tend to stay put, rather than risk re-entry. According to Princeton researcher Douglas S. Massey, “Enforcement has driven up the cost of crossing the border illegally, but that has had the unintended consequence of encouraging illegal immigrants to stay longer in the United States to recoup the cost of entry. The result is that illegal immigrants are less likely to return to their home country, causing an increase in the number of illegal immigrants remaining in the United States.”3 If the goal of immigration policy is to relieve the fiscal and social burden of illegal immigration and enhance homeland security without spurring more illegal immigration, then some effort must be made to reduce the existing population of illegal immigrants as well as to slow the flow of new illegal arrivals.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has said it is simply “not practical” to try to forcibly remove the illegal population: “The cost of identifying all of those people and sending them back would be stupendous. It would be billions and billions of dollars.”4 The administration, along with some supporters in Congress, maintains that the only alternative is to legalize the resident illegal alien population through a massive new guestworker plan.

Cost would certainly be a factor in any new guestworker or amnesty program, as well. According to a 2004 report by Center for Immigration Studies Director of Research Steven Camarota, the illegally-resident population produces a net fiscal drain of about $10 billion (fiscal costs minus taxes paid). After an amnesty, that cost rises to nearly $29 billion, as the amnesty beneficiaries become eligible for more services.5 In addition, based on past experience, any new amnesty is likely to result in large numbers of ineligible individuals receiving status, including terrorists, and will spawn new illegal immigration.6

Policies for Attrition

The purpose of attrition through enforcement is to increase the probability that illegal aliens will return home without the intervention of immigration enforcement agencies. In other words, it encourages voluntary compliance with immigration laws through more robust interior law enforcement. When combined with a strategy to improve border security, this approach will bring about a significant reduction in the size of the illegal alien population and help deter future illegal immigration. This strategy requires a modest investment in additional resources for certain federal enforcement programs totaling less than $2 billion over five years above and beyond what has already been appropriated by Congress or requested by the White House for immigration law enforcement. The key elements of this strategy are:

1) eliminating access to jobs through mandatory employer verification of Social Security numbers and immigration status;

2) ending misuse of Social Security and IRS identification numbers, which illegal immigrants use to secure jobs, bank accounts, drivers licenses, and other privileges, and improved information-sharing among key federal agencies;

3) increasing apprehensions and detention of illegal immigrants through partnerships between federal immigration authorities and state and local law enforcement agencies;

4) reducing visa overstays;

5) doubling the number of non-criminal, non-expedited removals;

6) passing state and local laws to discourage the settlement of illegal aliens and to make it more difficult for illegal aliens to conceal their status.

Some of these measures are included in H.R. 4437, the Border Protection, Antiterrorism, and Illegal Immigration Control Act of 2005, passed by the House of Representatives in December 2005. Additional legislative action is still needed to end Social Security and tax identification number misuse and additional funds need to be appropriated for expanded removal programs, support of state and local partnerships, and the enhancement of the US-VISIT program.

Enforcement: Faster and Cheaper

Table 1 illustrates the significantly better results that can be achieved by pursuing attrition in addition to a border control strategy such as SBI. With an attrition strategy, the United States could reduce the illegal population from its current 11.5 million to 5.6 million over a period of five years, a 51 percent reduction. SBI alone will produce only modest results – reducing the illegal population to only 10.3 million illegal aliens after five years, a 10 percent reduction.

READ IT HERE