Imperfect ‘Gang of Eight’ legislation best option
The Senate鈥檚 current 鈥淕ang of Eight,鈥� a bipartisan group of eight senators focused on immigration, has released its first draft of a comprehensive immigration reform bill. The proposed legislation deals with a path to citizenship, border security and visa reform. While the bill is unfortunately weighed down by impractical proposals, it still represents America鈥檚 best chance at fixing immigration and should be passed.
The bill鈥檚 first goal is to resolve the status of America鈥檚 11 million undocumented immigrants. Those who entered before 2012 will be allowed to apply, and pay a fine, for legal residency if they have a clean criminal record and a job. After doing this for 10 years 鈥� and showing English and civics knowledge 鈥� they can apply for permanent residency and then citizenship three years after that. Throughout this 13-year process, they will periodically be checked to ensure they are still working and law-abiding, they will not be allowed to access public benefits and they will owe about $2,000 and any back taxes.
There will be far-right critics who oppose any normalization of undocumented residents鈥� status, but the mass deportations they dream of are impractical and morally questionable. America cannot tolerate such a large portion of its population being treated as an underclass. This bill strikes the right balance between ameliorating the situation and not giving illegal residents an unfair advantage over legal immigrants.
The bill also recognizes that undocumented residency cannot be solved without greatly reducing illegal entries. Luckily, it allocates $4.5 billion to border security, allows National Guard deployment to the border and hires 3,300 new customs agents. Undocumented immigrants will not be allowed to apply for full citizenship until border security benchmarks have been met. The bill will also require all businesses to verify their employees鈥� legal residences, and aims to crack down on foreigners who overstay their visas. These provisions should appease representatives who are understandably concerned about security.
The bill鈥檚 main shortcomings are revealed in the way it deals with visas. While it dramatically increases the number of high-skill workers allowed in the U.S., it penalizes companies that hire mostly foreign workers. The bill also creates a new guest-worker program for low-skilled immigrants but sets caps every year based on industry demand and regional economic factors. These arbitrary regulations based on fears of immigrants 鈥渟tealing our jobs鈥� are one reason the immigration system is such a mess today.
While the bill has shortcomings, it is by far the best piece of legislation on immigration in years. Hopefully, reasonable legislators will be able to overcome inevitable right- and left-wing ideological opposition and finally make progress on this issue.