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.

[ravingnutter]

Are you really that uneducated? The Posse Comitatus Act applies only within the US. Good grief...

[ckilmer]

First you stop the illegals from coming over the border.

That's what everyone agrees on.

That's what the current president is NOT doing.

The consequences of failiing to stop the invasion of illegals coming over the border are far more severe than anything coming out of the middle east.

[ravingnutter]

That's only what the MSM wants you to hear:

July 15, 2005 - The Senate backed away from its 2004 pledge to hire 2,000 more Border Patrol agents and fund 8,000 new detention beds for illegal aliens in fiscal 2006. The intelligence overhaul bill passed by Congress and signed into law in last December called for 2,000 new agents and 8,000 new detention beds each year for the next five years in order to meet the threat posed by illegal aliens. But in mid-July, the Senate voted on amendments to the Department of Homeland Security spending bill, providing funds for only 1,000 more agents and 2,240 more detention beds in fiscal 2006.

Source

Also, the agents still have to be trained and the facilities built.

[Mulch]

You used a double negative. Anyway, you obviously have a personal problem with Hayworth and its distorting your view of reality. Being from Arizona, Hayworth is close to the problem and can see first hand the the consequences that derive from it. It is entirely appropriate for him to use whatever means necessary to educate his constituents and other interested parties. Because, its clear there are people that need to be educated.

[Tammy8]

Exactly. Some of us do learn from history.

[ckilmer]

It just never ceases to amaze me though, that some people on this forum think Bush can just order the military on the border and that will solve the problem.
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Actually this has already been done quietly in New Mexico for training purposes. The results have been great. But I don't think the thing was extended. There was plenty of footage on this at Fox a couple months back. Might have been some relationship between the coverage and the brevity of the program.

As it is there are several training grounds close to the Mexican border that have trouble with illegals sometimes overruning their bases.

Current US border policy is to not offend in any way Mexican soldiers crossing into US territory to protect narco trafficers.

[Mulch]

Take a deep breath. Now release. Okay, feel better? Now go back and re-read my posts. Where did I refer in part or whole to the Posse Comitatus Act?

[savedbygrace]

Just noticed that your link was to Rep. Hsyworth's announcement, not the bill itself. So, the thread needs both our posts. Good job.

[ravingnutter]

That's what the current president is NOT doing.

Right...y'all keep on spewing the same talking points without addressing the facts. Pay no attention to the men behind the curtain, aka Congress.

Repeal of Posse Comitatus - Congress has to do that

Funding of additional guards, equipment and fences - Congress has to do that.

Passing immigration reform - they don't like Bush's plan, so again, it falls to Congress to act.

[ravingnutter]

Then Hayworth needs to contact the Governor of his state and order the NG to the border. Only the Governor can do that. My problem with Hayworth is that he is fearmongering to sell a book because he knows good and well that Bush's plan was DOA, that is a reality. Yes, it is very clear to me that people need to be educated. Apparently they are not teaching Civics anymore. However, there is no excuse for Hayworth to outright lie about this matter.

[ravingnutter]

Post #37:

Order the military to guard the US border? Why, that would be too much to ask the president to do. Oh wait. Didn't he order the military go around the world to Iraq and Afghanistan. oops.

37 posted on 02/07/2006 11:12:27 AM PST by Mulch (tm)

Posse Comitatus prevents the President from using the military to guard the border. It is Congress's responsibility to amend or repeal it. It is up to the state's individual Governors to call up the NG if they deem it necessary. Bush has no control over this.

[Mulch]

Well, you see that Bush is the problem and in fact is violating his oath to uphold the constitution. Thats the "US" constitution, for those that may not be sure anymore - not the "Mexican" constitution. As for Hayworth, I see him as simply doing his job and your label of "fear-monger" is a complete distortion more than likely due to your sympathy for illegal immigration.

[Zerano]

I agree with you wholeheartedly--JD Hayworth is one of the (few) good guys. He isn't as strong of a defender of the Constitution that Rep. RON PAUL is, but still, I admire him a great deal & wish him all the best.

I find it sad that we can't find more people like JD Hayworth, Tom Coburn, RON PAUL, & Tom Tancredo & elect them into Congress...I'm sure there's plenty of them out there.

[Tammy8]

Questions/Comments

#1 Who will keep out those not eligible? Who will keep track of the ones who do qualify while they are here? Who will make them leave when it is time for them to leave? We already have many who came here legally on the pretense of visiting, going to school, etc., and simply stayed when their time was up. Immigration has admitted they cannot keep track of those who came here legally and did not leave when they are supposed to now. Those millions who are here illegally now were not concerned with breaking a law to get here; why would we think they would worry about breaking another to stay here?

I like #2 and #3.

If you think #4 is the answer to #1 you are kidding yourself. We don't have enough facilities to detain the illegals, we can't keep out those deported now, without a fence the border is an open revolving door. We have done nothing but pour money at the border and yet we have a mass invasion of illegals. The first step in any plan is to build a real fence, no other plan will work without a major barrier. A major barrier must be in place before enforcement will be possible.

This plan is nothing more than a way to make the illegals legal. It in no way will solve the problems of illegal immigration. Illegal immigration will continue even if we had this plan, many (I would bet most) will not want to take the time and trouble to qualify legally, and will just continue to illegally cross the border.

If we build a real fence, and if we strictly enforce the laws as they are now, if we implement #2 and #3 of this plan and if there is proven to be a real need for labor then and only then should we discuss a "guest worker plan" remember previous plans to stop illegal immigration failed due to lack of enforcement and any effective enforcement is just not possible without a fence.

[ravingnutter]

You are so freaking off base it is not even funny. I live in South Texas, neither you nor Hayworth have to tell me about the problem. Good grief...trying to explain facts to you is like talking to a Democrat, you can't deviate from your talking points or hold a thought long enough to learn the facts. Do yourself a favor, take a civics class for cripe's sake. I've got better things to do than to talk to brick walls.

[Wonder Warthog]

"If you think #4 is the answer to #1 you are kidding yourself. We don't have enough facilities to detain the illegals, we can't keep out those deported now, without a fence the border is an open revolving door."

Sorry, but you are wrong. Increased enforcement and rapid deportation, along with a complete shut-down on the ability of illegals to work here (by passing strong legislation penalizing businesses for hiring them) is the ONLY long-term answer. The "fence" is a pipe dream. Even if the "fence" is built, do you honestly think the flow will stop?? It might slow down some, but in the main it will simply move "offshore" to our thousands and thousands of miles of coastline, and to our northern "friend" Canada--whose border is so long that it is impossible to "fence".

[SC33]

Along with everything you said, of which I agree, I think that there are areas of the border where a partial fence may be in order. A more cost effective method may just be building more vehicle barriers to help curtail smuggling.

[Cboldt]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1525534/replies?c=656

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

Posse Comitatus prevents the President from using the military to guard the border.

http://www.dojgov.net/posse_comitatus_act.htm

You are being disingenious. Nowhere in the Posse Comitatus Act is the word borders mentioned. I asked you twice and I'll ask you again:

Are the borders considered international territory or not?

Your love of President Bush is seriously eroding your judgement.

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

Repeal of Posse Comitatus - Congress has to do that

The Act doesn't pertain to the borders, I've told you that a million times.

Funding of additional guards, equipment and fences - Congress has to do that.

The money is already there, it is being misdirected in other Dept of Homeland Security pork-barrel adventures.

Passing immigration reform - they don't like Bush's plan, so again, it falls to Congress to act.

Bush isn't using the Executive Powers granted to him to enforce existing immigration laws. This is why Tancredo, Hayworth and others are "whining" for Bush to do something. Why would they waste their time trying to pass immigration bills when it's going to get watered down or stripped by arm-twisting from the Bush administration themselves?