Work amnesty: Bush turns back on law-abiding citizens with immigration plan

Are you a commuter snagged in burgeoning traffic? Are you a member of a young family desperately seeking affordable urban housing? Or are you, perchance, a low-skilled, low-wage worker wishing your job would pay a living wage? If the answer is yes, welcome to the club: You've just been had by President Bush.

This isn't a partisan jab. Democrats are equally culpable. Neither party represents or fights for the rights of the common man (or woman) on immigration policy. U.S. immigration policy is a scandalous mess as a result.

President Bush proposes to grant a form of "work amnesty" (although the White House avoids use of the term, "amnesty," as if it were a contagious form of late-term cancer) to foreign citizens living and working here illegally. He would have them apply for three-year work visas, renewable up to six years, with the possibility of applying for permanent residency status. Foreigners living abroad could also apply for visas to fill hard-to-fill jobs in the United States that would be posted on a government-run database.

Bush's plan funnels a deluge of unskilled, desperately poor (and therefore underpaid) workers into the U.S. economy. Politicians brag "guest" workers contribute dramatically to our Gross Domestic Product (GDP). They ignore their attendant costs: higher taxes to pay for these workers' (and their families') health and education services; greater competition for scarce and pricey housing; a greater drain on state and county infrastructure (more traffic and use of roads, etc.) and the driving down of wages at the lowest end of the pay scale.

Dan Stein, executive director of Federation of Americans for Immigration Reform, says, "Employers will never again have to compete for workers by offering better pay or benefits. They will simply have to look across the border or across the ocean to find an unlimited supply of workers willing to accept whatever they are willing to pay."

Then there's the never-discussed trade deficit issue. Conservative Los Angeles community activist Fernando Oaxaca writes that illegal workers make obvious contributions to the GDP, but, "........in their totality, the illegal work force members and their children probably cost local and federal taxpayers untold billions of dollars annually......there is the leakage from the GDP of many billions of dollars which the illegal workers earn but don't spend in the U.S. Instead, they send these dollars to their home country as remittances ($14 billion to Mexico in 2003). This share of their "production" must then be subtracted from their contribution to the American economy." And when you do the math, poof, the contribution is overwhelmed by costs.

The United States should be a haven for those from abroad who are politically persecuted by despotic regimes. We should selectively allow in highly educated immigrants with important and rare skills (i.e., scientists, doctors and the like). We should work with poverty-stricken countries and teach them to educate and employ their own underclasses. But we should not serve as some sort of overrun spigot to absorb and care for the overpopulation other countries produce but cannot support. We're destroying our own environment and quality of life in the process.

The best thing that can be said about the president's proposal is it will probably die in Congress this year. Let's hope he takes the concerns of average Americans into account in any future proposals.

" You know what it is ~ a petty bias of mine ~ really ~ got it back in the Infantry where there were a whole host of Hispanic guys doing service on behalf of floating scum in New England. What can I say?!"

From USA Today:

"Patrick O'Day was born in Scotland. Francisco Martinez Flores was born in Mexico. Neither were U.S. citizens, but they died together in Iraq as U.S. Marines.

At least seven U.S. servicemen killed in the Iraq war weren't citizens, the Defense Department says. They're among approximately 31,000 "green-card" soldiers, Marines, sailors and airmen in the U.S. military. They're permanent legal residents but not U.S. citizens. Yet they chose to defend the country where they live.

Active duty

There are approximately 31,000 active-duty military personnel who are legal residents but not U.S. citizens. Branch of service:

Non-U.S. citizens Percent of total
Navy 15,880 4.2%
Marine Corps 6,440 3.8%
Army 5,596 1.2%
Air Force 3,056 0.8%

Source: Defense Department

The large number of non-citizens serving in the military may surprise many Americans. But non-citizen legal residents have long been able to serve in the military. They make up about 2% of the 1.4 million active-duty servicemembers. About a third come from Mexico and other Spanish-speaking countries. The rest are from China, Vietnam, Canada, Korea, India and other countries.

"My son is dead, and I'm broken inside," says Jorge Rincon of Conyers, Ga. His son, Army Pfc. Diego Rincon, came to the USA from Colombia as a youngster. He was killed March 29 in a suicide bombing attack. His funeral is Thursday.

"The only thing that keeps me going now is to make sure that he's buried as an American," says Rincon. "That will be my dream come true."

Other families feel the same and are taking advantage of a presidential order last year that allows relatives of slain troops to apply for posthumous citizenship. The gesture carries no additional financial benefits for surviving relatives.

The family of Marine Lance Cpl. Jesus Suarez Del Solar, 20, who was born in Mexico and moved with his family to Escondido, Calif., seven years ago, is expected to apply for posthumous citizenship.

On Sunday, the Marine Corps presented Martinez Flores' family with his citizenship papers at their home in Duarte, Calif.

"If my brother hadn't gone over there, he would have been a citizen by now," says Nayeli Martinez, 19. "He and my mom and I all applied at the same time. Ours got processed faster than his. He had taken his citizenship test, and the only thing left was to take the oath in a formal ceremony. Before he could do that, he shipped out."

But the process for granting citizenship posthumously can take several weeks, and families are concerned that the status will not be granted before their sons and brothers are buried. Georgia Sens. Zell Miller and Saxby Chambliss are introducing legislation that automatically would grant posthumous citizenship.

He sent the letter a day after he officiated at a funeral Mass for Marine Lance Cpl. Jose Gutierrez, 22, a Guatemalan immigrant and one of the first combat casualties.

Gutierrez was granted posthumous citizenship. So was Marine Cpl. Jose Angel Garibay, 21, of Costa Mesa, Calif.

It's common for legal immigrants to "have pride and patriotism and serve in the military," says Peter Nunez of the Center for Immigration Studies, which lobbies for lower immigration quotas. "They continue the long tradition of immigrants who come to this country being patriotic."

Shauna O'Day, whose husband, Patrick, 21, was from Scotland, says she's proud of her husband. O'Day and Martinez Flores were among four Marines who died March 25 when their tank plunged into the Euphrates River.

"When I first heard he was dead, it just made me so angry that he was over there fighting. And he wasn't even a citizen," O'Day says. "But then I realized that it just shows what a great place this is to live."

O'Day's husband came to the USA with his parents as a youngster. He could have applied for citizenship but didn't. And she doesn't plan to change that.

"He loved this country. And knowing that my husband was willing to die fighting for America, and he wasn't even a citizen, makes me even prouder to be an American," she says.

Patriotism is sustaining Jorge Rincon.

"When my son went to the recruiter to join the Army, I went with him. I wanted to join, too, but they told me I was too old," he says. "We came here for the American dream, and we found it."

Rincon learned Tuesday that his son was granted U.S. citizenship: "I'm proud for Diego and proud to be in this country and proud that my son was in the United States Army."

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.