Securing Our Borders, Eliminate the Incentives

The United States Senate and the House of Representatives have passed two very different plans to address illegal immigration.  Congress has spent a tremendous amount of time and energy trying to find common ground that could result in a compromise bill supported by both the House and Senate.  Such a resolution is becoming more and more unlikely as the Senate continues to advocate for their “guest-worker
Authored by Congressman David Dreier (R-San Dimas) and former border patrol agent and member of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Silvestre Reyes (D-TX), H.R. 98 seeks to end the insane practice of rewarding illegal immigrants with jobs.  The bill would provide employers with the tools they need to enforce the law by creating a tamper-proof Social Security card that every new worker would need to gain employment.

Before we address the 12 million illegal immigrants who are currently living in our country, we must concentrate on eliminating the reasons why they are coming here in the first place.  We must match our tough talk on illegal immigration with action.  That begins with eliminating the incentive for illegal immigration by holding employers who hire illegal aliens accountable.

Another reality is that we are not equipped to handle the fallout produced from the Senate’s amnesty plan.  Our border resources are already stretched too thin as illegal immigrants are consistently caught and released on a daily basis.  Just imagine the influx of illegal immigrants we can expect if amnesty provisions are adopted.  The effect such a policy would have on our public safety community would be significant.

Consider that on a typical day, the men and women of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection process more than one million passengers and pedestrians and nearly 70,000 truck, rail, and sea containers.  They seize more than 5,000 pounds of narcotics, intercept 206 fraudulent documents, safeguard more than 100,000 miles of border and shoreline, and manage 317 ports of entry with only 11,300 Border Patrol agents.

Their already difficult job will not be made any easier if we reward more than 12 million illegal immigrants with citizenship.  Congress has supported a similar remedy before with disastrous results.  In 1986, the Simpson-Mazzoli Immigration Reform Control Act granted amnesty to more than 3 million illegal immigrants.  A decade later, the illegal immigration rate in the United States had tripled and has resulted in the problems we have today.

The solution to illegal immigration is not amnesty.  It is not so-called earned citizenship proposals supported by the Senate or an amnesty proposal dressed-up as a “guest-worker