Man of the Year Q&A: Sensenbrenner Sees New Battles Looming on Immigration

"On December 20, Human Events Editor Terence Jeffrey interviewed 2006 Human Events Man of the Year Jim Sensenbrenner, the Wisconsin Republican who served the last six years as House Judiciary Chairman.

Sensenbrenner reviewed the battles fought in the last Congress over immigration reform and pointed to battles likely to be waged in the next. The Republican Party, he argued, needs to stick to its principles on both fiscal and social issues."........

"There is a provision in the Senate bill that I think the public might not be broadly aware of. It would provide an amnesty to employers that have been systematically hiring illegal aliens over the years. I know your bill had strong worksite enforcement provisions. Some of the reporting that I have done myself has shown that there are major employers in the United States who hire thousands of illegal aliens and then file false Social Security numbers on the W-2 forms they send on their behalf to the federal government. Isn’t that a scandal? Do you believe the government is making an adequate and conscientious effort to enforce the immigration laws at the worksite?"

The answer to that question is no. What we need to do is three things: First of all, we need more ICE agents to conduct raids at worksites. The immigration bill that I sponsored does that. There has been an increased number of ICE agents funded in the Homeland Security bill.

The second thing we need to do is increase the fines so that they actually act as a deterrent. The current fine is $250 per illegal immigrant worker per day. The House passed bill increases that to $5,000. A $250 fine is part of the cost of doing business. If somebody gets busted hiring 500 illegal immigrant workers under the House-passed bill, that’s a $25-million fine. That would make front-page news everywhere in the country, and would start acting as a deterrent. We wouldn’t get people to stop at red lights if the fine was $2 and no points.

"Do you think that one of the reasons politicians in Washington, D.C., have been unwilling to go forward with this kind of worksite enforcement—and for some to actually back the kind of amnesty Sen. McCain has proposed for employers that hire illegal aliens—is because of the lobby the corporations that are exploiting this sort of labor have in this town?"

Well, there has been an unholy alliance between the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a lot of the church groups, and some of the groups that actively lobby for amnesty for illegal immigrants. The week after my bill passed in December of last year, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce invited Mexican Foreign Minister Luis-Ernesto Derbez to a forum in Chicago, where he strongly criticized me and my bill in the most personal of terms. This ended up becoming an issue in the Mexican presidential election, which was held in July.

There is no question in my mind that the people who are benefiting from cheap labor want to have that continue, and they will stop at nothing to make sure there is not an effective law that enforces the employer sanctions that were a part of Simpson-Mazzoli and flushes the fake IDs out of the system.

I think the thing Congress has to do next is to pass the Social Security verification system that was contained in HR 4437. That would provide a secure database where someone’s Social Security number and name could be verified. That would mean that employers would be out of the business of trying to figure out if an applicant for a job was presenting a fake Social Security number or a fake ID.

"This morning President Bush said again he wants a “comprehensive” immigration-reform plan, which I take as a code word for saying he wants his illegal-alien amnesty. Are people who have your view in Congress going to be able to stop the President from forming a coalition with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in getting a bill like that through?"

What I can say is that as a result of what the House did, and the massive demonstrations of people waving Mexican flags, this is not an inside-the-Beltway issue anymore. It is a national issue, and the word “amnesty” is literally the third-rail in the debate on immigration. I think it will be much more difficult for either house of Congress to pass an amnesty bill as a result of the American public’s literally being punched in the nose by those demonstrations that were held last spring.

"And they can count on Jim Sensenbrenner’s being right in the front of the fight for them?"

Jim Sensenbrenner is not going to go away, even though we are in the minority. This is an issue where I think the American public has connected with the legislation that I introduced and the House passed. Everywhere I go in this country people come up and introduce themselves to me and say that I am right-on on the immigration issue.

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