Hayworth Says Only American People Can Halt Bush's Guest-Worker Plan

HumanEventsOnline.com ^ | Feb 7, 2006 | Robert B. Bluey

[boryeulb]

With the Senate about to finally address immigration reform and President Bush renewing his call for a guest-worker program in last week’s State of the Union, Rep. J.D. Hayworth (R.-Ariz.) tells HUMAN EVENTS he foresees a troubling scenario that will result in an amnesty plan being “shoved down the throats” of the American people.

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Hayworth, author of the new book Whatever It Takes: Illegal Immigration, Border Security, and the War on Terror, said Senate Republicans are poised to tinker with an already weak House immigration reform bill and bow to Bush’s demands to include a guest-worker plan.

In an exclusive interview with HUMAN EVENTS, Hayworth said, “I have every belief that the Senate will take the vehicle the House sends them, will end up passing a guest-worker/amnesty plan, and that will be sent back to the House and shoved down the throats of the American people—unless the people wake up right now and say ‘no.’”

Hayworth’s book outlines the problems facing the United States as a result of its porous border with Mexico (including the threat of another terrorist attack). He also offers solutions, some of which he discussed with HUMAN EVENTS.

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What makes immigration reform so important for you personally?

One thing we understand about the nature of this problem is that is that is transcends all others—our national security, our economic security, the future of Social Security—all of these issues—healthcare, education—all tie into this issue. The book, in a sense, holds a mirror up to America.

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What inspired you to put this on paper and to write a book about illegal immigration?

I think there are two primary reasons: First, and most importantly, to win the political argument against a guest-worker program, that I think would reward law-breaking and lead to more illegal immigration; and secondly, this book is a wake-up call. It is to sound the alarm to the American people that unless they coalesce and make their voices heard in Washington, a lot of politicians and a lot of special interests will shove a guest-worker plan right down their throats.

Make no mistake about it, this guest-worker program is driven by the most craven and cynical special interests. Big Business believes it gets an almost endless supply of cheap labor. The left believes it gets a source of cheap votes. And the American people get a huge bill to pay in terms of entitlements that people, quite frankly, are not entitled to. We’ve just got to stop this because guest worker equals amnesty equals surrender. It is a rip-off that must be prevented at all costs.

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How do things stand now in Congress on immigration reform and what do you expect the Senate to do in terms of acting on the House bill that was passed in December?

There’s no way to sugarcoat it—the House bill was just so much holiday window dressing. The fundamental problem is this: When it comes to illegal immigration, Washington views this as a political problem to be managed, instead of an invasion to be stopped. That’s the fundamental problem.

Because they look at it as a political problem to be managed instead of an invasion to be stopped, you got a bill that, essentially, was nibbling around the edges—and, yes, there was that celebrated amendment about the fence, but that was exception and not the rule. By and large, you got a lot of nibbling around the edges. And instead of enforcement first, basically the House bill is: enforcement, maybe, if we can get the Senate to go along, and perhaps we will acquiesce to the President’s priorities.

You don’t have to parse the words with this President. He’s made it very clear where he stands on this issue. He visited Tucson in the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and I’m paraphrasing him, he said to those gathered there that proponents of stronger enforcement must understand that it can only come with a guest-worker program. That type of equation is just the wrong way to go.

I have every belief that the Senate will take the vehicle the House sends them, will end up passing a guest-worker/amnesty plan, and that will be sent back to the House and shoved down the throats of the American people—unless the people wake up right now and say “no.”

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In terms of some of the ideas you outline in the book—you talk about employers and the problems that are posed there and some of the issues involved with that, and as you mentioned, you have this whole idea of the fence. What do you think are the most realistic ideas that can get through the Congress and would be acceptable to President Bush?

Again, quite candidly, I don’t know, given the current mindset of the White House and certain key members of the Senate, any notion of enforcement-first—other than poll-driven comments that appear to be verbal tranquilizers really translate into action. I just have to be candid about it.

I have a great deal of respect for our President, a great deal of admiration for him. In fact, it’s been said, on nine out of 10 issues he has no stronger ally in the Congress than J.D. Hayworth. But on this issue, there is a profound disagreement. So I don’t know if in good faith I can say to you what would be acceptable to the President. With due respect to the presidency, I think the question ought to be: What is acceptable to the American people? And operating from that template, we need to have enforcement first.

What do I mean by that? I mean literally a one-two punch: stronger border enforcement, including a military presence, on our border; and the advent and the usage of the high-tech abilities we have for continuous surveillance of our vast borders. But simultaneously, interior enforcement—holding businesses accountable and holding illegals accountable for breaking the law.

Because what is being propagated by the so-called cheap labor crowd is this notion that everyone who crosses our border is only here to look for a job. Nothing could be further from the truth. And there is an effort underfoot to excuse illegal behavior. The question is often posed to me: If these people are just here working hard, what’s wrong?

Here’s the problem: Chances are they have used false documents. We know that fraudulent use of a Social Security number is a felony. And we have to get tough on illegals and those who knowingly hire illegals. And we have to put in place mechanisms, as I outlined in my enforcement-first bill, that ends the bureaucratic stove piping, that ends the absurdity of the Social Security Administration writing employers to say these numbers don’t match up, but don’t you take any action, you could open yourself up to an immigration lawsuit.

Instead of the Social Security Administration playing a store-front lawyer, the Social Security Administration should do the job it is supposed to do. The fraudulent numbers, and those utilizing them, that information should be shared with the Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Homeland Security. But instead of utilizing information literally at Uncle Sam’s fingertips, Uncle Sam has had his hands tied and that information stove piped and taken away.

We need to end the gaming of the system. We need to return to the original intent of the 14th Amendment, what Sen. Howard advanced when he spoke about that amendment when he proposed it on the floor of the Senate, that sadly has been changed drastically through court interpretations in the 20th century. And we have to understand that by turning off the magnet and by putting stricter controls on benefits, we will offer a powerful disincentive to those who come here illegally.

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You outline all of this in detail in the book, and you go through point-by-point information that people probably wouldn’t necessarily know about or have at their fingertips. You say the American people need to wake up. Is your book the vehicle that you think will be able to do that?

I think this book serves as the wake-up call. I think it could be a rallying point. When readers pick this book up, and after they read Sean Hannity’s introduction, they read chapter one, “Overrun,” and in one place there is a litany of real-time experiences with the abuses of our system by illegals; with the abuses of our system by business interests; with the abuses of our system by left-wing grievance-mongers, all too eager to pander in the name of political correctness.

I believe it outlines the problem and the dimensions of the problem. But we don’t leave it there. We offer tangible solutions that were in my enforcement-first bill that sadly were watered down into an enforcement-maybe bill in the House of Representatives—a bill I, in good conscience, could not case a vote in favor of.

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You come from a border state and your two senators, John McCain and Jon Kyl, are on different sides of the debate, at least it seems. Each has a separate bill in the Senate. Give me a rundown of both of those, and if those aren’t good enough, what the problem is with each.

With both of those bills, and rather than go through a litany of my criticisms of the bills, let me step back and say it this way. Unless and until you enforce existing laws, there is no incentive for any new approach to work. Because if people do not obey existing laws, and if the government refuses to enforce existing laws, what makes us think any new laws are going to be either enforced or obeyed?

I have a great deal of respect for my colleagues in the Senate, but in the final analysis, that fundamental question fails to be addressed. That is the first and primary fault line. Now I could go through a litany, and goodness knows if either of those plans advances in the Senate I’ll be happy to do that, but in the final analysis, the first question remains the last question remains the constant question: If people are not obeying existing laws, if the government fails to enforce existing laws, what on earth makes us think any new laws would either be enforced or observed?

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Do you think since 9/11 the situation has improved or worsened? Obviously, in that time we’ve seen a lot more attention paid to the issue, but has any impact really been made?

The most disappointing, and in a sense the most troubling aspect of this entire question, is the pronouncement by the secretary of Homeland Security that we could have operational control of the borders within five years.

Now, just stop and think about that for a second. He made that announcement in late 2005 that it was his goal and his belief that the American nation could have operational control of its borders within five years. That means 2011—10 years after the brutal attack on our homeland in 2001.

And I think each American, as we pause for reflection on that, I don’t believe anyone in their wildest nightmare, could believe that the bureaucrat-laden language of long-term goals would include security our border 10 years after we were attacked. That is inexcusable, it is unconscionable, and it is the wrong approach for the wrong reasons at the wrong time in our history.

It brings me pleasure to say that, but one of my jobs is not simply rally around the administration, but as a member of the United States Congress, regardless of partisan label, if something’s wrong—if we’re mired in what political scientists call bureaucratic inertia, what we just have to call inaction—it is highly inappropriate and it is very dangerous.

Accordingly, I don’t believe the progress has been made that should have been made—both reflective of a nation on a war footing and realistically addressing the nature of the threats we confront here in the United States.

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How much of an impact does Big Business have on the Bush Administration and have on this debate because of their desire to have cheap labor?

I think you see interests that I would consider traditional allies. The United States Chamber of Commerce, the agri-jobs group, the service industries are just bound and determined that they want to have what is in effect corporate welfare—a permanent subsidy to absorb their costs of doing business by bringing people in and creating a new status of worker that essentially would be paid for by the taxpayers of the United States to facilitate a new American caste system or a permanent underclass.

That is what I believe, quite frankly, is a major part of the problem in Washington and why so many of my congressional colleagues view this as a political problem to be managed or finessed rather than a threat to be confronted or an invasion to be stopped. And there’s been no secret about this. The White House went to work, it was first reported in the Los Angeles Times, that a coalition of border security and economic security hired Dick Armey, the former Republican leader, and Cal Dooley, a former Democrat member of Congress from the agricultural areas of central California, and they’re out pushing the notion of a guest worker.

The battle has been joined, and the President, to his credit, does not engage in parsing of words, but he has decided that a guest-worker program is the prescription he wants to follow. And I politely but profoundly disagree.

[Wonder Warthog]

"1-3 million illegals will not circumvent our southern border by sailing their schooners up our coasts of first going to canada and sneaking in that way. To say that the same or even close to the same amount would get here disregards logic and logistics for that matter."

Unless we increase enforcement and deportation, a fence will accomplish exactly nothing--they'll still be coming in and their number will continue increasing. The only thing is that the rate of increase will drop a little. You underevaluate the force of human ingenuity.

OTOH, with sufficient increase in enforcement and penalties against employment, we probably won't NEED the fence in the first place.

[gubamyster]

ping

[Ben Ficklin]

I hate to keep throwing water on you, but.........

It is real easy to get rid of the illegals.

As you may, or may not, know, employers file quarterly reports which include names, addresses, and SS numbers.

The Feds get a list every 90 days of every bogus SS number being used.

With this fact, the feds can do any number of things such as go out and arrest/deport the illegal or simply write a letter to the employer telling him to fire the illegal.

The feds don't need the employer, they can do it theselves. And they could have been doing it for the last 20 years.

But they don't.

[savedbygrace]

You are missing the point. It appears to be intentional.

You are no longer worth the effort of a reasonable discussion.

Buh bye.

[Ben Ficklin]

The truth hurts?

[Sterco]

Mr. Presedente Bush is about to run into his first brick wall. The nation knows that this will not work. The illegal immigrants have hit Washington's own territory. Hey Mr. Bush how do you like "MS 13" in Washington? Get ready for much worse!!! Your stance in this nation is fading and fading fast. Get a grip Mr. President!!! We are going to have to deal with the invasion you leave us with. Nice to be a lame duck!!!

[Tammy8]

It's not that the laws that are flawed, they are not enforced; since the laws in place are not being enforced, why would you think for a moment that new ones would be?

Explain how passing new laws would allow you to apprehend and deport 3 million illegals per year, while they are still streaming in, because there is no fence. Don't forget there are already millions here now to deport.

[Sterco]

Ben has a lot of "Oral Traction" he supports illegal immigration and always has.

You are no longer worth the effort of a reasonable discussion.

Buh bye.

[Sterco]

I was talking to Ben so there is no confusion.

[Sterco]

The truth hurts?

The point that hurts is "Illegal Mexicans Suck the Big One" we just don't want them here anymore. They cost us lots of money. Education, incareration, food stamps, and just generally being a illegal Mexican pain in the American ass. How about they all just go the "fornification" home and we enjoy our country and the illegal Mexicans enjoy theirs. It is going to happen Ben. My Senator just informed me that the are over whelmed with English speaking people telling them that "enough is enough". Ben that does not bode well for illegal immigrants. Sorry dude but the damn damn is going to come down!!!

[axes_of_weezles]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1573931/posts

[Wonder Warthog]

"It's not that the laws that are flawed, they are not enforced; since the laws in place are not being enforced, why would you think for a moment that new ones would be?"

Maybe because a sufficiently large number of people got enough pissed off about the subject to force Congress to act. That "is" basically what is happening. Congress really has no interest in restricitng illegal immigration, but they are catching enough flak from their constitutents that they are being forced into it.

"Explain how passing new laws would allow you to apprehend and deport 3 million illegals per year, while they are still streaming in, because there is no fence. Don't forget there are already millions here now to deport. "

Maybe because those laws would drastically increase the number of immigration enforcement officers, and streamline and simplify the rules so deportation is faster and easier.

If these things are done, the fence won't be needed. If they are NOT done, the fence will do no good.

[Ben Ficklin]

Do you think that your senator is telling you what you want to hear?

[Sterco]

The "Wall" is enough of a symbol that the majority of the Mexican "Peons" will pay heed and stay home. Mezico has a lot of "house cleaning" to do. We here in America can no longer take on Mexico's responsiblities. If anyone left in Mexico has any "cajones" they will take care of the problem themselves. Quit expecting America to take your problems. Hey you Mexican macho pukes get after the problem head on!!! Don't try to dump it on the USA. You bunch of weinies!!!

[Sterco]

Do you think that your senator is telling you what you want to hear?

My Senator might be telling me what you don't "Want to hear". Haul back to Mexico dude. I am tired of your rhetoric. Times are changing. You are losing. How does it feel? Get ready for the worst. America just woke up!!!

[Ben Ficklin]

Times aren't changing, you just think they are.

The bottom line always prevails.

[Sterco]

Hide and Watch!!!

[Sterco]

My Denver friends tell me if you walk into a Norte Denver bar and say "Migra" Mezicans go runnin like the devil is after em. That tells me you are losing dude. Get used to it!!!

[Ben Ficklin]

Have you been to the border lately? They are all headed north, none south.

Catch and release will still be in effect for another year.

Did anybody tell you that the employee verification will take 5 years to implement?

[Sterco]

Did anybody tell you that the employee verification will take 5 years to implement?

Did anyone tell you how miserable we are going to make the lives of these illegal trespassers? And we will make them miserable in Colorado. I hope the rest of you here are paying attention to this.