THE YEAR OF THE IMMIGRANT AS SCAPEGOAT
In an anti-immigration frenzy not seen since the 1920’s, lawmakers in Washington are sweeping up legal immigrants in the same net of legislation that seeks to expel and keep out the undocumented.
By Linda Ocasio
The United States has always had an uneasy relationship with its immigrant population. But even accounting for this historical ambivalence, the current immigration backlash in Washington is stunning. Lawmakers are sweeping up legal immigrants in the same net of legislation that seeks to expel and keep out the undocumented. The anti-immigrant mood is shaping national policy on other fronts as well. It has reinvigorated efforts to make English the official language of the United States and added fuel to the drive to eliminate affirmative-action programs.
“As a veteran of the Chicago City Council. I came to Washington believing I was pretty accustomed to belligerent arguments, screaming debates, and divisive legislation,” Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Illinois) wrote in an article this summer. “I didn’t take into account that I was entering Congress during the year of the immigrant as scapegoat.”[1] “It seems,” says Newark Archbishop Theodore McCarrick, chair of the migration committee of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, “the debate on immigration in this country has been reduced to a series of generalizations about a nameless, faceless “they.”[2]
Nativists have long tried to limit or cut off the flow of humanity seeking better lives in the United States. They are still having their say, with spokespeople like Republican presidential candidate Patrick Buchanan calling for a moratorium on legal immigration. But the architects of the current legislative effort to limit the number of immigrants who legally enter the country do not come from the far right. Instead, they are members of a bipartisan Congressional commission, led by former Rep. Barbara Jordan (D-Texas), a liberal Democrat who was appointed by President Clinton. The U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform, in interim reports, has called for the reduction of legal immigration from the current level of 800,000 to 550,000 annually–the first time legal immigration would be reduced since 1924. Cognizant of the 1.1 million spouses and minor children awaiting visas, the Jordan panel recommends that 700,000 immigrants be permitted entry each year until the backlog is eliminated. The panel also proposes eliminating low-skilled immigration, and requiring companies who hire skilled foreign workers to pay fees up to $10,000. To pay for beefed-up enforcement of the nation’s borders, it suggests instituting a border crossing fee. President Clinton has called the panel’s recommendations consistent with his own “pro-family, pro-work, pro-naturalization” views.
The “Immigration in the National Interest Act of 1995,” introduced in August by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), chairman of the House Subcommittee on Immigration, is leading the pack of legislation before Congress that would dramatically curb legal and illegal immigration alike. “This is the main vehicle for immigration reform,” says Smith aide Allen Kay. “In less than two months, this bill has gotten 109 co-sponsors in the House, including many Democrats.”[3]
While echoing the Jordan commission in many areas, the Smith bill calls for even stricter controls. For instance, U.S. immigration policy has been traditionally centered on family reunification, permitting automatic entry to the parents, children and siblings of legal residents. The Smith bill, however, would end this so-called “chain migration” by eliminating visa preferences for children over 21 and siblings of legal residents. The Smith bill would also impose greater restrictions on U.S. companies in hiring foreign workers. For example, it would require Labor Department certification for outstanding researchers and professors who are now exempt and eliminate the 10,000 visas allotted annually for unskilled workers. The number of refugees allowed entry would be cut in half, from 112,000 to 50,000 a year. Smith’s bill would also boost the budget of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) to improve border security. To this end, it calls for 1,000 additional border-patrol agents, 14 miles of triple fences on the border, and higher penalties for smuggling in the undocumented.
If the Smith bill becomes law, the total number of immigrants permitted entry into the United States would be reduced from 800,000 to 515,000. The existing backlog of spouses and children of permanent resident aliens would be reduced each year by either one-fifth of its current level, or 50,000–whichever is greater–over a five-year period. At that rate, the American Immigration Lawyers Association predicts, 300,000 people would remain in the backlog at the end of the five-year period.
The bill also calls for the immediate deportation of anyone who resides illegally in the United States for 12 months. The Smith guidelines demand that sponsors must have an income 200% over the poverty line. Legal non-citizens who receive any kind of federal support for any cumulative 12-month period within seven years of arriving in the country would be considered a public charge and subject to deportation as well. Those deported would have to remain outside the United States for 10 years before becoming eligible to receive any immigration benefit.
The main platform for immigration reform in the Senate is the “Immigrant Control and Financial Responsibility Act of 1995,” submitted by Senator Alan Simpson (R-Wyoming), chair of the Senate Subcommittee on Immigration. The Simpson bill would increase law enforcement at the border, crack down on the sale of phony social security numbers and passports, levy stiffer penalties for smuggling in the undocumented, and also–like the Smith bill in the House of Representatives–limit refugee admissions to 50,000 a year. Simpson’s proposals for legal immigration, yet to be introduced in Congress, are expected to be in line with the Jordan recommendations and the Smith bill.
Senator Simpson believes that public opinion on tho issue is a juggernaut that will not slow down. “The American people are fed up,” Simpson says. “When they want the law enforced, they are called racist and xenophobic.” He adds that “the American people believe immigration has become more of a burden than a blessing.” Reflecting just how much the political winds have shifted, nobody is talking about an amnesty such as that implemented as part of the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. “We did one amnesty, and it’ll never happen again.” says Simpson. He predicted that as the immigration bill wends its way through the legislative process, it will become even more restrictive.[4]
The Congressional Task Force on Immigration Reform, appointed by House Speaker Newt Gingrich, is also making proposals that it hopes to see incorporated into the final legislation. The task force has drafted Proposition 187-inspired bills that would require hospitals to report undocumented immigrants in order to receive federal reimbursement for their medical treatment, and force schools to turn away children who are in the country illegally. It also recommends amending the U.S. Constitution so that children born in the United States to undocumented parents would no longer autornatically become citizens. Another bill, introduced by Rep. Bob Stump (R-Arizona), would halt all legal immigration for five years. Although that bill has 70 sponsors, it has little chance of passage as long as the Smith bill is in the pipeline.
Legal immigrants are being targeted in other policy areas as well. For instance, the centrist Democratic Leadership Council has criticized Republicans for using welfare reform as a vehicle for immigration reform. The House welfare-reform bill, which passed in March, would bar legal non-citizens from welfare benefits, Medicaid, and food stamps. The Senate version of the bill, introduced by Senator Bob Dole (R-Kansas) and recently ousted Senator Bob Packwood (R-Oregon), would bar legal immigrants from receiving federal benefits for the first five years of residence in the United States; after that states would still have the option of cutting off those benefits. Both the House and Senate proposals would prevent most elderly immigrants from receiving aid under the Supplemental Security Income program, which assists the disabled and elderly poor. Prema Vora, Lin advocate for South Asian women, says the bill would trap women who are legal permanent residents in abusive relationships with no recourse to shelters that receive any federal funding.[5]
Republican presidential candidates, sensing the zeitgeist, are exploiting anti-iminigrant sentiments on the campaign trail. Patrick Buchanan supports Rep. Bob Stump’s proposed five-year moratorium on legal immigration, the only candidate so far to do so. California Governor Pete Wilson–who rode Proposition 187 to fame and reelection–launched his short-lived presidential campaign in lower Manhattan, with the Statue of Liberty visible behind him. Wilson unashamedly attempted to co-opt the national icon on his so-called Liberty Tour by making a distinction between the generations of legal immigrants who arrived at Ellis Island in the past and the undocumented who cross the borders today. Senator Bob Dole joined the small but shrill chorus calling for a law that would make English the official U.S. language; Buchanan and Wilson both support the move. And everyone, including President Clinton, is willing to discuss how to cut back affirmative-action programs.
Despite all the bluster and the prodigious number of charts and graphs produced by the anti-immigration forces, no one has yet provided a sound economic argument for limiting legal immigration. Jeff Passel and Michael Fix, immigration specialists at the Urban Institute, consider the arguments for curbing immigration to be without foundation. While those who advocate greater restrictions on immigration contend that immigrants are a burden on the U.S. economy and taxpayers, the Institute’s research reveals that immigrants pay more in taxes than they receive in public services, generate more jobs than they take, and are less likely to be on welfare than U.S.-born residents. In addition, Passel and Fix found that the majority of undocumented immigrants are those who overstayed their visas, making increased border enforcement a misguided strategy in any event.[6]
The proposals before Congress would have profound consequences for legal and undocumented immigrants alike. The American Immigration Lawyers Association argues that the anti-immigration bills before Congress would drive the undocumented further underground and into even more extreme exploitation. The Mexican American Legal Defense Fund (MALDEF), concerned about the curbs on family-sponsored legal immigration, say these bills will force separation between U.S. citizens and their parents, and make a mockery of the concept of family.
Business groups who oppose the bills, such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the American Manufacturers Association, say there aren’t enough skilled American workers to fill slots in fields such as information technology, medical services, and academic research. They also recognize that current immigration policy serves their interests by providing a steady supply of unskilled workers willing to do tedious jobs for low wages.
Some on the U.S. right who favor increased immigration restrictions have made Machiavellian use of the oft-heard argument that immigration hurts African Americans the most because they lose low-skilled bs to immigrants. “Why have liberals been silent about the economic effects of immigration on their natural constituency–the working poor and black workers in particular?” New Republic senior editor Michael Lind wrote in a New York Times op-ed piece in Septernber.[7]
Both political parties are far from united on the issue of immigration. Some of the loudest rumblings of dissent have, in fact, come from the Republican camp. The Wall Street Journal has called it a debate between libertarians, who argue that labor markets should be permitted to function without restrictions, and re-constructionists, who want to use government to clamp down on immigration in order to construct a society that conforms to their vision.
Jack Kemp and William Bennett are among the most prominent Republican Party spokespeople for the pro-immigration position. In general, politicians from Texas and New York are more likely than their California counterparts to favor immigration. For instance, House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas) has balked at putting a cap on legal immigration, saying it would deprive the U.S. economy of a source of strength, not weakness. Texas Governor George W. Bush, a Republican, has cautioned against alienating Mexico, and said only a strong Mexican economy and middle class will reduce illegal immigration.
Rudolph Giuliani, the Republican mayor of New York City, has also come out strongly against anti-immigration measures. He said the Gingrich proposals to deny social services to undocumented immigrants and prohibit their children from getting an education would be morally and fiscally devastating to cities. Rep. Elton Gralleghy, a California Republican who chairs the taskforce, rebuked the mayor: “Unlike Mayor Giuliani, I make no apologies for putting Americans first.”[8]
It is clear that the immigration debate is not just about numbers. It is also a veiled discussion about the future ethnic make-up of the United States. According to the latest findings of the U.S. Census Bureau, the percentage of the nation’s foreign born now stands at 8.7%, or 22.6 million people, the highest level since 1940. California has the highest proportion of foreign-born residents, almost 25% of its popuIation; New York has the second highest, with 16%. These changing demographics have incited a xenophobic reaction.
“When you enter the INS waiting roorns, you find yourself in an underworld that is not just teeming but is also almost entirely colored,” Peter Brimelow wrote in Alien Nation, a racist tract calling for drastic cutbacks in immigration and for the preservation of a white United States. Many of Brimelow’s ideas have permeated the current debate. In a June address in New York, Senator Simpson lifted an idea from Brimelow when he wondered if immigration was eroding the historical memory that he believes Americans should and must share to thrive as a nation. Simpson even quoted Abraham Lincoln, who referred to those ties as “the mystic chords of memory,” just as Brimelow had in his book.
Inevitably, the next question becomes: who is an American? For many people, the question has faint echoes of another time when American-ness was the focus of Congressional hearings: Are you now or have you ever been… a citizen of another country’?
While nativist sentiments clearly have the upper hand at the moment, Roger Smith, author of Civic Ideals: Conflicting Concepts of Citizenship in American Law and a political-science professor at Yale University, points out that “powerful moral traditions that go back to the Declaration of Independence” call for a compassionate U.S. immigration policy. Moreover, he observes, “We remain an extremely privileged and affluent country in a world of suffering.”[9] As long as that remains true, the highest walls and the most punitive measure will not stanch the flow northward.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Linda Ocasio is a freelance writer and a former member of the New York Newsday editorial board.
NOTES
1 . Luis Gutiérrez, “The New Assault on Immigrants,” Social Policy (Summer 1995).
2. “Newark Archbishop Says Immigration Bill Flawed,” Associated Press, September 12, 1995.
3. Allen Kay, aide to Rep. Lamar Smith, personal interview, August 21, 1995.
4. Alan Simpson in a speech at the International Center for Migration, Ethnicity and Citizenship at the New School for Social Research in New York City, June 5, 1995.
5. Prema Vora “The Means of Survival,” City Limits Magazine (June/July, 1995).
6. “Immigration and Immigrants Setting the Record Straight,” Michael Fix and Jeffrey S. Passel, The Urban Institute, May, 1994.
7. “Liberals Duck Immigration Debate,” Michael Lind, OpEd, New York Times, September 7, 1995.
8. “Giuliani Criticizes a U.S. Crackdown on Illegal Aliens,” New York Times, August 22, 1995.
9. Roger Smith, personal interview, July, 1995.
