George W. Bush: No Amnesty for Immigrants - "There's going to be no amnesty"

CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) - President Bush on Thursday promised illegal immigrants a worker program of some type to legalize their labor here, but he ruled out any blanket amnesty.

"There's going to be no amnesty," the president said as he took time from his vacation to visit an elementary school near his ranch.

Bush is due to announce proposed immigration changes, which Mexico wants, when Mexican President Vicente Fox makes a state visit to the White House on Sept. 5.

Asked about his pending decision, Bush told reporters he was consulting with Mexican officials on a worker program ``that will legalize the hard work that's taking place now in America.''

"There will be no blanket amnesty for illegals. I've said that point blank. I will say it as many times as I need to say it."

Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., thinks illegal immigration is great for America. Philanthropist that he is, the congressman wants to give us more of a good thing. Gutierrez has filed legislation to allow virtually every illegal alien in the country (an estimated 5 million) to stay.

Those who arrived before Feb. 6, 1996, would immediately qualify for a green card. Those who came between that date and Feb. 6, 2001, could apply for legal residency after five years.

"People in this country know they are benefiting from the work of undocumented workers," Gutierrez argues. "Why not grant them the dignity and justice that comes with permanent legal residency?" Dignity and justice are euphemisms for government benefits and the ability to bring in their relatives.

A Gutierrez aide says illegals are doing "essential jobs" and God help the economy if -- spurred by our ingratitude -- they go home. And what do we do with these largely uneducated, untrained workers if the economy heads south, as indicators suggest it might?

Instead of benefits, Americans are more apt to associate illegal immigration with words like crime, disease and loss of national identity.

Contagious diseases like tuberculosis and leprosy are reappearing in this country, thanks to illegal immigration. Peter Brimlow, author of "Alien Nation," reports that several years ago, senior probation officers in Orange County, Calif., estimated that up to 80 percent of their cases involved illegals.

Amnesties tell inhabitants of the impoverished Third World that if they can sneak past the Border Patrol, Uncle Softie will eventually welcome them with open arms.

They also say to the foreigners who are patiently waiting for permission to immigrate (sometimes up to 18 years): "Suckers!"

The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 amnestied 2.8 million. According to the Immigration and Naturalization Service, there are more illegals in the country now.

Amnestied aliens can immediately sponsor their spouses and dependent children for residence. If they become citizens, they can sponsor parents and siblings.

It's difficult to get demographics on "undocumented workers." (If someone breaks into your house, is he an "uninvited guest"?) However, in 1992 the INS surveyed those amnestied in 1986. Only 15 percent spoke English, though all had been here for at least a decade; 80 percent used public health services. On average, they had a seventh-grade education.

Democrats support this dubious contribution to the general welfare, with a wink and a nod, because they directly benefit from the support of ethnic lobbies eager to increase their numbers.

Republicans lack the courage to do anything positive about the problem, though most in Congress oppose mass amnesties. They are convinced that by keeping a low profile they can do better with the Hispanic vote.

In the past campaign, President Bush refused to support initiatives to end bilingual education or recognize English as our official language. He ended up with about 35 percent of the Latino vote and congratulated himself for improving the Republican position.

However, as the National Review's John O'Sullivan notes, this still means that for every 100 illegal immigrants who come here (most from South of the border) and become citizens, the GOP will have a net loss of 30 votes.

By not defending our sovereignty, Republicans miss an opportunity to appeal to the majority of Americans who understand that illegal immigration undermines national identity. (Bush took only 54 percent of the white vote in 2000.) It's also a way to court lower-income blacks, the chief victims of cheap illegal-immigrant labor.

On Feb. 16, Bush is scheduled to meet with Mexican President Vicente Fox, who will press him to be lenient with Mexicans who've infiltrated the United States. During the election, Dubya said, "I'm not prepared to embrace amnesty because I don't think the commitment's there yet to do anything on the border." This is Bush-speak for: We have to plug our porous border before we can consider compassion for lawbreakers.

Illegal immigration benefits Americans the way treason enhances national security.

GOP SILENT ON CLINTON-GORE AMNESTY FOR ILLEGAL ALIENS

Published: 4-21-00 Author: Samuel Francis

Posted on 04/24/2000 00:10:33 PDT by jordan8 April 21, 2000

Unknown to most Americans, but widely noticed in the Spanish-language media of immigrant communities, the Clinton administration has endorsed legislation that would grant amnesty to some 500,000 illegal aliens already in the country. The administration's endorsement, announced late last month by Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore, is transparently politically motivated -- Gore needs the vast Hispanic vote to win the election. It will be interesting to see how his Republican counterpart reacts.

On April 12, the Los Angeles Times carried the news of Gore's endorsement, on behalf of the Clinton administration, of an obscure House bill that makes illegal aliens living in the United States eligible to apply for legal residency if they are of "good moral character" and have lived continuously in this country since 1986. Apparently the fact that they entered the country and have lived in it for 14 years in blatant violation of federal law does not detract from their character.

Virtually no other major newspaper has mentioned the amnesty proposal since the Times' report. But then, why would anyone expect the media to report on a politically driven devaluation of American citizenship? Since both legal and illegal immigration is welcomed by the American governing class, the administration's decision is merely one more logical step up the ladder of abolishing citizenship -- and nationhood -- outright.

But if the media were silent about the amnesty, neither did most Republicans have much to say about it. GOP presidential candidate Gov. George W. Bush mumbled that "he did not support an expansion of the amnesty program at this time," the Times reported. Of course, like many of his statements on other issues, this one left open the possibility that he might alter his position at some other time. But since Gore's announcement was dropped at the very moment Bush was speaking to Hispanic groups in California, and since Bush also wants Hispanic votes in that state, this was probably not the time for the governor to say anything intelligent about it.

Nor have any Republican noises erupted from the House and Senate. Although the amnesty legislation is not expected to pass by itself, it might get attached as an amendment to a larger bill allowing more skilled workers to enter the country so the computer industry can fire its higher-paid American workers.

Republicans generally plan to vote for that bill, and if the amnesty is linked to it, they're unlikely to say nay to it either.

Besides, when was the last time a Republican lawmaker met an immigrant he didn't like? The Times reports that Bush seized the opportunity while in California to "distance himself" from a new version of Proposition 187, the 1994 ballot measure that denied welfare benefits to illegal aliens and which passed overwhelmingly.

Not a few Republicans -- including California Gov. Pete Wilson -- rode 187 to victory that year, when their party swept into the majority on Capitol Hill, but ever since then they've been terrified of immigration issues at all. Committed to the fiction that the party must win the Hispanic vote in order to win at all, almost all Republicans now say they're "for" legal but "against" illegal immigration.

Well, the Clinton-Gore amnesty gives the Republicans a chance to prove it. The silence with which the party is greeting the administration's endorsement suggests that they can't, that they really support immigration pure and simple, whether it's legal or not. After all, mass immigration provides cheap labor for the large agri-business interests that support the GOP and also helps drive down the cost of American labor. As the party of business, the Republicans have good reasons to keep quiet about Clinton's amnesty brainstorm.

But if the Republicans care nothing for the integrity of the law that regulates immigration or for the character of their own nation and its citizenship, they might still care something for their own political survival. The largely Hispanic immigrants who have flooded the country for the last generation or so vote overwhelmingly Democratic, and there's no reason to think that will change if the proposed amnesty goes through. Indeed, that's why the Democrats are backing it. Republicans like Bush may strut about how open they and their party are to immigrants, but the immigrants themselves know which party has pandered to them the most.

There have been four different amnesties for illegal immigrants in the last 14 years, and every time one is adopted, it helps weaken the standing laws on immigration further. If there is anyone left in either party of the American governing class who any longer takes seriously either the rule of law or the integrity of citizenship, he needs to do something to stop Clinton's latest transgression of both and wake up the Republicans to the threat it poses.

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