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Immigration Reform Could Be Win-Win, Except Republicans Find Migrant Crisis too Useful [1]

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Date: 2023-10-02  

But Republicans don’t want to solve immigration. They haven’t for 30 years. They like the rolling crisis. They like being able to demonize. They salivate at the cruelty and brutality of Trump’s family separation policy, caging, sterilizing; Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s razor wire in the Rio Grande that has already resulted in deaths; Governor Ron DeSantis’ human trafficking from Texas to Rhode Island with Florida-taxpayer funded flights.

Solving immigration would not be complicated. It only takes a grasp of reality and dealing with that reality. The reality of desperate people forced to leave their ancestral home and all that they know and is familiar to risk life and all they own to come to a strange country that has proved anything but welcoming. The reality that failed governments, lawlessness, gang violence, political violence, climate disasters, poverty (sounds like the MAGA Republicans’ agenda for the USA) is what is driving millions to uproot.

And while the Republicans love to suggest (lie) that the mass migration from Latin America is due to Biden and the Democrats’ “open border” policy, what the United States is experiencing in the Western Hemisphere is comparable to what Europe is experiencing – millions of people fleeing conflict, political violence, climate disasters that have rendered their ancestral homes uninhabitable. And the only reason Latin Americans’ think our border is “open” is because it is the Republicans’ constantly tell them so, prompting the Biden Administration to mount an information campaign to warn people that they will be deported and refused entry for 5 years if they come through illegally. And they have shown the effectiveness of an online appointment system and now, opening offices in countries to interview and give authorization to people before they set out

It is important to recognize that the vast majority of these migrants are not “illegal” or even “undocumented.” The vast majority who push across the Rio Grande and present themselves (surrender) to border patrol are shepherded through a control process, given an appointment to return to immigration court. A significant percentage are immediately deported - 70 percent of asylum claims are rejected. The real problem arises because of the insufficient immigration judges and services, producing a years-long backlog.

So if the flow of people who have a legal right – by federal and international law – to seek asylum is continuing, there are solutions at hand to minimize the hardship on communities, which is what Republicans are using to gin up anti-immigrant hysteria.

The fact is, America needs to fill some 6 million jobs - the tight labor market is why the Federal Reserve is raising interest rates to “fight” the inflation triggered, it claims, by higher wages. So wouldn’t a better, fairer solution be to increase the labor supply?

That is what New York Governor Kathy Hochul has been pleading for – give these migrants who have arrived in New York at the rate of 3,000 a week (100,000 in the past year) a means of earning a living so they are not dependent on shelters and aid, but instead can be productive, tax-paying contributors to society as millions of immigrants have before them. With New York’s unemployment rate at a very low 3.9% and some 400,000 unfilled jobs statewide, businesses are clamoring to hire migrants.

"Migrants and asylum seekers came here to work -- so let's put them to work," Governor Hochul said. "Right now, we have a migrant crisis and a workforce crisis. By connecting work-eligible individuals with jobs and opportunity in New York, we can solve them both and secure a brighter future for all New Yorkers."

Why not rationalize the system as people did a century ago: let people apply for jobs even before they arrive, so that people will have a place to go when they present themselves to an immigration officer. Let those who are granted some kind of preliminary status go to communities where they may have family, friends or countrymen. Use computer technology to match people with communities where they will be welcome.

In fact, there is a model for this: Welcome.US works to resettle refugees by forging alliances between private sector and local community sponsors. It has assembled more than 240 organizations in 40 states, among them the Lions, Rotary, veterans and faith groups, refugee and Diaspora-led organizations.

Welcome US has done this to help resettle Afghan and Ukrainian refugees, and is now expanding to help resettle Haitians and Venezuelans.

There is even a rational immigration proposal from a Texas state legislator, of all places: instead of fueling a billion-dollar human trafficking industry, allow migrants to go through legal land crossings, interview them, issue an RFID “permit” which allows them to work and drive legally while enabling government to keep tabs, charge $2000 for the “permit” (instead of the $2000-$5000 they are paying smugglers) and funnel them to where they can best be integrated into the community. But that’s only a state legislative proposal. Let’s see if Governor Abbott, who enjoys seeing migrants drown in the Rio Grande, approves.

Obtaining work authorization for migrants has been a key focus for New York State Governor Kathy Hochul, who lobbied the Biden Administration to allow migrants to work. The Administration has now granted Temporary Protection Status to nearly 600,000 Venezuelans, of whom 15,000 are in NYC, allowing them to immediately obtain work permits.

Hochul has surged personnel, including 250 National Guard personnel to New York City to for case management to help migrants and asylum seekers complete the paperwork to attain legal work status, and allocated $20 million to local nonprofits serving asylum seekers and migrants, $20 million to help New York City with casework through NYC Health + Hospitals and $10 million for migrant legal services..

Most significantly, she is facilitating matching migrants with jobs with the launch of a new Department of Labor portal, after identifying 18,000 private sector job openings at 379 companies willing to hire eligible migrants and asylum seekers.

“There are individuals who have skills – technology, nursing, construction skills, doctors, and scientists. They all had to leave. And so we want to make sure we match them with their skills to the jobs that we have open.”

“We have to show our compassion to people. We're never going to compromise our values – never, ever. We're proud of the Statue of Liberty... Reflect on the fact that likely many of your family members saw that statue when they steamed into this harbor in search of the same thing that the migrants are looking for today, and that is the dignity of a job. We put them to work, we achieve that for them, we maintain our values, and we also solve a crisis here in New York. That is the opportunity that lies before us.”

Rational, humane immigration strategies are possible. Instead of building a medieval wall, they should be funding more immigration judges, more legal aid, more social workers, more computer systems (AI!) to steer people to where they are needed and will be welcomed, so no community is overwhelmed. And finally legalize the Dreamers once and for all and create a path to legalize their parents so people can be fully productive instead of living in constant fear of being swooped up and deported.

The Biden Administration and Congressional Democrats are eager to advance Comprehensive Immigration Reform. But Republicans find the border crisis just too juicy, just too satisfying, just too politically useful to solve.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/10/2/2196937/-Immigration-Reform-Could-Be-Win-Win-Except-Republicans-Find-Migrant-Crisis-too-Useful

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