Illegal immigration to the United States

Illegal immigration to the United States refers to the act of moving to or settling in the United States temporarily or permanently in violation of U.S. immigration and nationality law. Immigration becomes illegal when immigrants either enter the country without authorization from the US Government, or having entered the US with authorization, overstay their visa. The Immigration and Nationality Act governs immigration law.

Demography

The population of the illegal immigrant population in the United States is hard to ascertain because of difficulties in unambiguously surveying this population, although according to NPR, "Demographer Jeff Passell at the Pew Hispanic Center says illegal immigrants are surprisingly forthcoming when interviewed anonymously."[7]

Population Size

Main article: Illegal immigrant population of the United States

Estimates based on Census data, National surveys, administrative data and other sources indicate that the current [2/2007] illegal population is between 7 million and 20 million. .

Origin

Country of Origin (January 2006)
Mexico	6,840,000	57%
Latin & Central Amer.	3,000,000	25%
Asia	1,080,000	9%
Europe + Canada	720,000	6%
Rest of World	480,000	4%

According to a Pew Hispanic Center report, Mexicans make up about 57 percent of the illegal immigrants with another 24 percent coming from Central American and South American countries, approximately 9 percent from Asia, 6 percent from Europe and Canada, with the remaining 4 percent from the rest of the world .

Education

Illegal Alien Info
Education Profile	Number	Percent
Less than 12 yr.	6,700,000	67.0%
High School	3,000,000	30.0%
College Graduate	300,000	3.0%
Total Illegal Pop.	12,000,000	Jan 2006
Total Working	7,500,000

Means of violation

Border crossing

File:ElPaso-Juarez-EO.JPG

El Paso (top) and Ciudad Juárez (bottom) seen from earth orbit; the Rio Grande is the thin line separating the two cities through the middle of the photograph.

The United States Government Accountability Office estimates that “between 400,000 and 700,000 unauthorized migrants have entered the United States each year since 1992.” A substantial portion did so by crossing either the United States–Mexico border or the United States-Canada border.

According to the Pew Hispanic Center somewhat more than half of the unauthorized migrant population entered the country illegally rather than overstay their visas, where "Some evaded customs and immigration inspectors at ports of entry by hiding in vehicles such as cargo trucks. Others tracked through the Arizona desert, waded or swam across the Rio Grande or American Canal in California or otherwise eluded the U.S. Border patrol which has jurisdiction over all the land areas away from the ports of entry on the borders with Mexico and Canada."

Stricter enforcement of the border has failed to significantly curb illegal immigration, instead pushing the flow into more remote regions, slightly reducing the rate of apprehensions and increasing the cost to taxpayers of each arrest from $300 in 1992 to $1700 in 2002. Border Patrol activity is concentrated around big border cities such as San Diego and El Paso, which do have extensive border fencing, diverting illegal immigrants into rural mountainous and desert areas. The border between Arizona and Mexico has become a major entrance area for illegal immigration to the United States, due in part to the increased difficulty of crossing illegally in California. Each year there are several hundred immigrant deaths along the U.S.-Mexico border. The number of deaths has been steadily increasing since the middle 1990s with exposure (including heat stroke, dehydration, and hypothermia) a leading cause.

The tightening of border enforcement has disrupted the "traditional" circular movement of migrant workers from Mexico by increasing the costs and risks of crossing the border, thereby reducing their rate of return migration to Mexico. The difficulty of the journey has prompted many migrant workers to stay in the United States longer or indefinitely.

Overstays

A visa overstayer is someone who has entered the United States with authorization from the Government and then illegally overstayed his or her visa. Or they have entered US using a Border Crossing Card (BCC) and then violated the restrictions imposed upon card holders. Visa overstayers tend to be somewhat more educated and be better off financially than those who crossed the border illegally.

One common means of visa overstaying was coming to the U.S. on a student visa and not going to school or not leaving the country after finishing school. The number of foreign students in the United States is over 600,000. However, this practice has been curtailed with the introduction of SEVIS, whereby the universities electronically report any no-shows and irregularities to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

To help track visa overstayers the new US-VISIT program collects and retains biographic, travel, and biometric information, such as photographs and fingerprints, of foreign nationals seeking entry into the United States. It also requires electronic readable passports containing this information.

The number of overstayers varies considerably from country to country depending on the location of the country, the cultural, political, social and economic conditions in a given country in a given time. The Pew Hispanic Center calculated that 1.3% of all nonimmigrant arrivals between 1998 and 2004 resulted in overstays, with a proportion varying by country of origin. The calculated share of Mexican legal visitors who overstay is lower (1.7%) [but the number who visit is very large] than for Central American (3.2%) or South American (2.4%) nationalities, which the center explained was " because it easier for Mexicans to make illegal entries and harder for them to get visitor visas."[8] A U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) study gives estimates for all countries showing that Haiti, China, India, Korea, and the Philippines had violation rates as high as 8% or higher.[9] In general the poorer the country they came from the more likely the foreign visitor was to violate their visa.

Causes

See also causes for illegal immigration.

Illegal Mexican immigrants traditionally have been portrayed as job seekers without good paying job options in their own country. Mexican immigrants surveyed who had been in the United States for two years, only 5 percent said they were unemployed before venturing north of the border. immigration. By contrast those who had been within the US for over ten years, the figures jump to over 15%. The figures include only those who where actively seeking employment in Mexico. It excludes housewives, students, retirees, and those who for other reasons where not actively seeking employment; also the figures are not adjusted to account for those who where underemployed. Most illegal immigrants have some options in their own country but like the perceived options and opportunities better in the U.S. enough to put up with the large expense, often unpleasant journey and inconvience of illegally immigrating.

Impact

Economic

Main article: Economic impact of illegal immigrants in the United States

Professor of Law Francine Lipman writes in a 2006 paper in the peer-reviewed journal Tax Lawyer of the American Bar Association Section of Taxation that the belief that undocumented migrants are exploiting the US economy and that they cost more in services than they contribute to the economy is "undeniable false". Lipman asserts that "undocumented immigrants actually contribute more to public coffers in taxes than they cost in social services" and "contribute to the U.S. economy through their investments and consumption of goods and services; filling of millions of essential worker positions resulting in subsidiary job creation, increased productivity and lower costs of goods and services; and unrequited contributions to Social Security, Medicare and unemployment insurance programs."

The 1997 study The New Americans: Economic, Demographic, and Fiscal Effects of Immigration by the National Science Foundation found that illegal aliens, on average, cost a net loss of $4,867 per alien to the Federal government in taxes.. These costs have to be made up by all other tax payers.

One of the largest drivers of immigration both legal and illegal is economic supply and demand for labor and the natural human desire of people to participate in the economy and in so doing better their economic situation. Labor is a mobile economic factor of production. Libertarians believe that restricting free migration limits the free market for labor.[10][11]

Research by George Borjas, Robert W. Scrivner Professor of Economics and Social Policy at Harvard University, shows that illegal aliens increasing the supply of low skilled labor had a long-term reduction of wages among American poor citizens during the 1980s and 1990s by 4.8% [12] and, according to an op-ed by him in the New York Times, their wages will reduce much further if border security is reduced[13]. The supply of illegal alien labor has disproportionately affected certain groups of American citizens such as black poor (according to a study by Katherine Newman and Chauncy Lennonof Harvard and another paper by Borjas, Grogger, and Hanson[14]).

An article by medical lawer Madeleine Pelner in the conservative Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons concluded that the burden of illegal immigrants on the health care system in the US has forced many hospitals to close due to unpaid bills. Between 1993 and 2003, 60 hospitals in California alone were forced to close, and many others had to reduce staff or implement other procedures which reduced the level of service they could provide. The article attributes these closings to illegal immigration. [15]

According to Federation for American Immigration Reform, California's education system spends $7.7 billion each year caring for the children of illegal immigrants. The study did not estimate how many of the children were citizens. [16]

In 2003, the former President of Mexico, Vicente Fox stated that remittances of Mexican nationals in the United States, both legal and illegal, totaled $12 billion, and were the largest source of foreign income for Mexico. [17]. In 2005, the remittances from Mexican nationals worldwide was $18.1 billion[18].

Crime

In a study of 55,322 illegal aliens, the Government Accountability Office (while stating that the data does not include all arrests and offenses for these criminals) found that

• they were arrested at least a total of 459,614 times (averaging about 8 arrests per illegal alien)
• they were arrested for a total of about 700,000 criminal offenses averaging about 13 offenses per illegal alien (one arrest may contain multiple offenses)
• about 24% of all offenses were drug offenses
• about 21% of all offenses were for immigration offenses
• about 15% were property-related offenses such as burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, and property damage
• about 12% were for violent offenses such as murder, robbery, assault, and sex-related crimes

The balance were such as traffic violations (including driving under the influence), fraud -- including forgery and counterfeiting, weapons violations, and obstruction of justice

• 80% of all arrests occurred in three states - California, Texas, and Arizona

According to a 1997 report by the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims, "Through other violations of our immigration laws, Mexican drug cartels are able to extend their command and control into the United States. Drug smuggling fosters, subsidizes, and is dependent upon continued illegal immigration and alien smuggling." Its members have committed murder, severed limbs, assaulted, robbed, and raped [19].

Another large scale multi-million dollar criminal operation connected to illegal immigration is identity theft. [20]

The Center of Immigration Studies (CIS) has stated that many violent crimes in the United States are committed by illegal immigrants.[21]. Because of the immigration status of the criminals, law enforcement officials are often unable to accurately track and find many of them as they retreat back over the border where they are often untraceable and/or not extraditable.

A study by Dr. Deborah Schurman-Kauffin, director of the Violent Crimes Institute in Atlanta, Georgia, estimates that approximately one million sex crimes were committed by illegal immigrants in the period between 1999 and 2006. Of these, 70% of the victims were legal US residents. [22]

In contrast to these studies, Robert Sampson, Professor in Social Sciences at Harvard University, speculates in Harvard Magazine in 2006 that being in the country illegally gives illegal aliens an "extra incentive to keep a clean record and not commit crimes, in order to avoid deportation".

Terrorism

Mohamed Atta al-Sayed and two of his co-conspirators had expired visas when they executed the September 11, 2001 attacks. All of the attackers had U.S. government issued documents and two of them were erroneously granted visa extensions after their deaths. The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States found that the government inadequately tracked those with expired tourist or student visas.

Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies, a think-tank that promotes stricter immigration standards and enforcement, testified in a hearing before the House of Representatives that "out of the 48 al-Qaeda operatives who committed crimes here between 1993 and 2001, 12 of them were illegal aliens when they committed their crimes, 7 of them were visa overstayers, including 2 of the conspirators in the first World Trade Center attack, one of the figures from the New York subway bomb plot, and 4 of the 9/11 terrorists. In fact, even a couple other terrorists who were not illegal when they committed their crimes had been visa overstayers earlier and had either applied for asylum or finagled a fake marriage to launder their status." [23] Vice Chair Lee Hamilton and Commissioner Slade Gorton of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States has stated that of the nineteen hijackers of the September 11, 2001 attacks, "Two hijackers could have been denied admission at the port on entry based on violations of immigration rules governing terms of admission. Three hijackers violated the immigration laws after entry, one by failing to enroll in school as declared, and two by overstays of their terms of admission."[24] Six months after the attack, their flight schools received posthumous visa approval letters from the INS for two of the hijackers, which made it clear that actual approval of the visas took place before the September 11 attacks [25].

Community Health

"Legal immigrants over the age of 15 must have a chest x-ray to check for tuberculosis (drug resistant TB is incurably fatal and highly contagious)". Illegal aliens are not screened. According to Dr. Lee Reichman, "Unless Americans are willing to adopt suffocatingly draconian immigration policies, the likelihood is that with globalization TB will again become epidemic here, in the same way that HIV moved from Africa to take root throughout the world. Suffering does not localize. When we engage with the world, we engage, inescapably and absolutely, with the world's infections. And the most devastating infection in the world is not Ebola or Lyme disease, West Nile virus or even HIV, but tuberculosis." Dr. Madelein Cosman concurs, but points out that other diseases are also an issue, "many illegal aliens harbor fatal diseases that American medicine fought and vanquished long ago, such as drug-resistant tuberculosis, malaria, leprosy, plague, polio, dengue fever, and Chagas disease,"

Ecological Devastation

The net growth rate of the native population in the United States without immigration has been close to a stable plateau since 1972 [26].

According to a Time magazine report (dated Sept 12, 2004), "They turn the land to a vast latrine, leaving behind revolting mounds of personal refuse..They steal vehicles..They poison dogs to quiet them." In addition to the obvious damage done to fragile deserts by hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens tramping through them are many other significant negative environmental impacts of expanded population.[27]

Employment

To lawfully work within the US, individuals must have a valid Social Security Number and, if they are not citizens, authorization to work from the Department of Homeland Security.

Working without authorization

Undocumented workers seek and engage in work without authorization from the government. The United States has laws requiring workers to have proper documentation, often intended to prevent the employment of illegal immigrants. The penalties against employers are not always enforced consistently, which means that employers can easily use illegal labor. Undocumented workers are especially popular with employers because they can violate minimum wage laws secure in the knowledge that illegal workers dare not report their employers to the police.

Basic Pilot Program

The Department of Homeland Security maintains the Basic Pilot Program; a joint program between the DHS and the Social Security Administration that employers can use to check the work eligibility of newly hired workers. The program involves verification checks of names and social security numbers against the SSA and DHS databases. It is designed to screen for fake names and fake SS numbers, or names and numbers that do not match. It does not check as to whether legitimate names and numbers are being used by more than one person at one time, or in multiple locations. This information is known by the IRS but is not widely shared for "privacy reasons". Proposed legislation to fix these limitations have gone no where in Congress. Participation in the Basic Pilot Program is voluntary, and is free to participating employers.

Corporate violations

Some major companies have been accused of hiring undocumented workers:

• In 2003 Tyson Foods was accused of actively importing illegal labor for its chicken packing plants; However, the jury acquitted the company after evidence was presented that Tyson went beyond mandated government requirements in demanding documentation for its employees. Tyson also used its enrollment in the Basic Pilot and EVP Programs (voluntary employment eligibility screening programs) as part of its defense.

• In 2005 Wal-Mart agreed to pay $11 million to settle a federal investigation that found hundreds of illegal immigrants were hired to clean its stores. Wal-Mart used sub-contractors and claimed that it was unaware that the sub-contactors where employing illegal immigrants as janitors.

• In December 2006, in the largest such crackdown in American history, U.S. federal immigration authorities raided Swift & Co. meat-processing plants in six U.S. states, arresting about 1,300 illegal immigrant employees. Because Swift uses a government Basic Pilot program to confirm whether Social Security numbers are valid, no charges where filed against Swift. Company officials have questioned the program's ability to detect when two people are using the same number.

Immigration enforcement

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection is responsible for apprehending individuals attempting to enter the United States illegally. The United States Border Patrol is its mobile uniformed law enforcement arm, responsible for deterrence, detection and apprehension of immigrants who enter the United States without authorization from the government and outside the designated ports of entry.

Allegations of abuse

Main article: United States Border Patrol

There are allegations of abuse by the United States Border Patrol such as the ones reported by Jesus A. Trevino, that concludes in an article published in the Houston Journal of International Law (2006) with a request to create an independent review commission to oversee the actions of the Border Patrol, and that creating such review board will make the American public aware of the "serious problem of abuse that exists at the border by making this review process public" and that "illegal immigrants deserve the same constitutionally-mandated humane treatment of citizens and legal residents".

Police involvement

The higher crime rates associated with the cross border traffic has led to extensive efforts on the part of individual sheriffs and communities trying to prevent further damage to their property and communities. [28] [29] [30] However, federal judges have ruled that control of illegal immigration is the exclusive domain of the federal government and have prohibited local communities and states from attempting to enforce ordinances intended to control illegal immigration[31].

Militarization of the border

The Posse Comitatus Act generally prohibits direct participation of Department of Defense personnel in civilian law enforcement activities, such as search, seizure, and arrests.

Major Craig T. Trebilock, a member of the Judge Advocate General's Corps in the U.S. Army Reserve stated in an article on the use of military forces in the battle against terrorism, "The Posse Comitatus Act was passed to remove the Army from civilian law enforcement and to return it to its role of defending the borders of the United States."[32] Former United States Border Patrol Supervisor David Stoddard stated "There are those who would argue that this is a violation of Posse Comitatus. That's ridiculous. Posse Comitatus prohibits the use of troops for domestic law enforcement. Border security is not domestic law enforcement. It is protecting our nation from foreign intruders. Besides, Posse Comitatus was passed in 1878, yet the U.S. Cavalry continued to patrol the U.S. Mexico Border until 1924."

In 1995 Congress considered an excemption from the Posse Comitatus Act authorizing the Secretary of Defense to detail members of the Armed Forces to enforce the immigration and customs laws in border areas.[33]

In 1997, Marines shot and killed 18 year old US citizen Esequiel Hernandez Jr[34] while on a mission to interdict smuggling and illegal immigration in the remote Southwest. The soldiers observed the goat herder from concealment for 20 minutes maintaining radio contact with their unit. But at one point, this young man (who the Pentagon says previously had fired shots in the vicinity of Border Patrol agents) raised his rifle and fired shots in the direction of the concealed soldiers. After firing two shots, this young man was, in turn, shot and killed. In reference to the incident, military lawyer Craig T. Trebilock argues that "the fact that armed military troops were placed in a position with the mere possibility that they would have to use force to subdue civilian criminal activity reflects a significant policy shift by the executive branch away from the posse comitatus doctrine."[35] The killing of Hernandez led to a congressional review[36] and an end to a 9 year old policy of the military aiding the Border Patrol[37].

In May 2006, President George W. Bush announced plans to use the National Guard to strengthen enforcement of the US-Mexico Border from illegal immigrants[38], emphasizing that Guard units "will not be involved in direct law enforcement activities."[39] Mexican Foreign Secretary Luis Ernesto Derbez said in an interview with a Mexico City radio station, "If we see the National Guard starting to directly participate in detaining people ... we would immediately start filing lawsuits through our consulates," ACLU called on the President not to deploy military troops to deter immigrants, and stated that a "deployment of National Guard troops violates the spirit of the Posse Comitatus Act"[40]. According to the State of the Union Address in January 2007[41], more than 6000 National Guard members have been sent to the US-Mexico border to supplement the Border Patrol [42], costing in excess of $750 million [43].

Increasing border security

Department of Homeland Security officials have stated that "...illegal immigration threatens our communities and our national security."[44] In fact, one of the main points of the illegal immigration controversy involves an increasing number of U.S. citizens calling for increased border security (with the main idea being to reduce illegal immigration). Some critics of border security suggest that their opponents are ignoring larger [insolvable] issues of wealth disparity, flaws in the immigration process, or other systematic issues which may have given rise to such a large influx of illegal immigrants, instead offering a band-aid solution.

The Cato Institute is among the critics who argue that increasing border security is counterproductive. The institute argues that increasing border security reduces the proportion of illegal immigrants caught at the border and increases the length of time illegal immigrants remain in the country. Cato claims that the only significant change on illegal immigrants has been in length of stay due to the cost of returning. The probability of returning within twelve months has gone from around 45% in 1980 to between 25 and 30% from 1998-2002. Also, the average trip duration has gone from 1.7 years to 3.5 years. According to the Cato Institute, the only important change in security has been one of cost. The Border Patrol's budget has gone from $151 million in 1986 to $1.6 billion in 2002. This has caused the cost of aprehending an illegal immigrant to go from around $100 per arrest before 1986 to around $1700 in 2002..

Legal issues

Birthright citizenship

Main article: Birthright citizenship in the United States of America

The Fourteenth Amendment has been interpreted by the United States Supreme Court, in precedent set by United States v. Wong Kim Ark, to grant citizenship to nearly every child born in the U.S. regardless of the citizenship of the parents, with the exception of the children of diplomats and children born to enemy forces in hostile occupation of the United States.

The Court in Wong Kim Ark did not explicitly decide whether U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants are "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States" (it was not necessary to answer this question since Wong Kim Ark's parents were legally present in the United States at the time of his birth). However, the Supreme Court's later ruling in Plyler v. Doe stated that illegal immigrants are "within the jurisdiction" of the states in which they reside, and added in a footnote that "no plausible distinction with respect to Fourteenth Amendment "jurisdiction" can be drawn between resident aliens whose entry into the United States was lawful, and resident aliens whose entry was unlawful."

Immigration Reform and Control Act

The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) made the hiring of an individual without documents an offense for the first time. The act is somewhat redundant since the forging of government documents (fake immigration documents or providing falsified social security numbers) is already a felony, and for most companies such documents must be provided to the government in its tax filings. However, the government does not notify those whose identities have been stolen for the falsified social security numbers, thus making it difficult to estimate the extent of the problem. [45]

Immigration with and without quotas

The immigration quota system was first expanded with the Emergency Quota Act of 1921 which was used to reduce the influx of East and Southern European immigrants who were coming to the country in large numbers from the turn of the century. This immigration was further reduced by the Immigration Act of 1924 which was structured to maintain the cultural and ethnic traditions of the United States.

The Franklin D. Roosevelt administration had nearly shut down immigration during the decade of the Great Depression of 1929. In 1929 there were 279,678 immigrants recorded and in 1933 there were only 23,068 [46]. By 1939 recorded immigrants had crept back up to 82,998 but then the advent of World War II drove it back down to 23,725 in 1943 increasing slowly to 38,119 by 1945 [47]. After 1946 about 600,000 of Europe's Displaced Person (DP's) refugees were admitted under special laws outside the country quotas, and in the 1960s and 1970s large numbers of Cuban and Vietnamese refugees [48] were admitted under special laws outside all quotas.

Congress passed the Immigration and Nationality Services Act of 1965 which essentially removed all nation-specific quotas, while retaining an overall quota, and included immigrants from Mexico and the Western Hemisphere for the first time with their own quotas. It also put a large part of immigration, so-called family reunification, outside the quota system. This dramatically changed the number, type and composition of the new arrivals from mostly European, to predominantly poor Latino and Asian. It also dramatically increased the number of illegal aliens as many poorer people now had family or friends in the U.S. that attracted them there. [49] In 1986, the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) was passed, creating amnesty for about 3,000,000 illegal aliens already in the United States. Critics believe IRCA just intensified the illegal immigration flow as those granted amnesty illegally brought more of their friends and family into the U.S.. [50]

Without quotas on large segments of the immigration flow, legal immigration to the U.S. surged and soon became largely family based "Chain immigration" where families brought in a chain of off quota new immigrant family members. The number of legal immigrants rose from about 2.5 million in the 1950s to 4.5 million in the 1970s to 7.3 million in the 1980s to about 10 million in the 1990s. In 2006 legal immigrants to the United States now number approximately 1,000,000 legal immigrants per year of which about 600,000 are Change of Status immigrants who already are in the U.S. (Pew Hispanic Data Estimates[51], [52]) (Pew Hispanic Data Estimates[53], [54])

Matrícula Consular

A controversial alternative to fake IDs and other illegal practices is the Matricula Consular ID being used in the U.S., which is issued by Mexican consulates. This document is accepted at financial institutions in many states of the union and, with an IRS Taxpayer Identification Number, allows illegal immigrants to open checking and saving accounts. This has benefited American companies and banks who profit from remmittances of migrants towards their place of origin, while allowing immigrants to save money and identify themselves.[55] The passage of the REAL ID Act of 2005 (a part of Public Law P.L. 109-13) prohibits States from issuing identification or driver's permit cards to anyone who cannot demonstrate that they are legally in the USA, taking full effect in 2008. Citizenship and/or immigration status is to be clearly denoted on these ID cards and they automatically expire on the expiration date of non-citizens' visas or other authorizing documentation. These IDs will be tied to online databases which will allow instant verification of the validity of these documents at low cost or no cost to the person seeking verification. As of 2006, the anticipated effect of this legislation is to make it increasingly difficult for illegal immigrants to use counterfeit documents to or to live and work illegally in the USA. However, at the same time, the REAL ID Act of 2005 effectively imposes a mandatory national ID for all US Citizens as well.[56]

Historical context

Every wave of immigration into the United States has faced fear and hostility, especially during times of economic hardship, political turmoil, or war: in 1882, Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act, one of the nation's first immigration laws, to keep out all people of Chinese origin; during the "Red Scare" of the 1920s, thousands of foreign-born people suspected of political radicalism were arrested and brutalized; many were deported without a hearing; and in 1942, 120,000 Americans of Japanese descent were interned in camps until the end of World War II.

Chinese experience

Main article: Chinese Exclusion Act (United States)

In 1882, Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act, which was passed due to the belief that Chinese laborers were unfair competition and lowered wages of native born Americans. Anti-Chinese sentiment was also present for fear that Chinese immigrants were unable to assimilate. In 1882 the Chinese Exclusion Act had cut off nearly all Chinese immigration. The first laws creating a quota for immigrants were passed in the 1920s, in response to a sense that the country could no longer absorb large numbers of unskilled workers, despite pleas by big business that it wanted the new workers. Ngai (2003) shows that the new laws were the beginning of mass illegal immigration, because they created a new class of persons — illegal aliens — whose inclusion in the nation was at once a social reality and a legal impossibility. This contradiction challenged received notions of sovereignty and democracy in several ways. First, the increase in the number of illegal entries created a new emphasis on control of the nation's borders — especially the long Canadian border. Second, the application of the deportation laws gave rise to an oppositional political and legal discourse, which imagined "deserving" and "undeserving" illegal aliens and, therefore, just and unjust deportations. These categories were constructed out of modern ideas about crime, sexual morality, the family, and race. In the 1930s federal deportation policy became the object of legal reform to allow for administrative discretion in deportation cases. Just as restriction and deportation "made" illegal aliens, administrative discretion "unmade" illegal aliens. Administrative law reform became an unlikely site where problems of national belonging and inclusion played out.

History of border security

For a period of time in the 1990s U.S. Army personnel were stationed along the U.S.-Mexico border to help stem the flow of illegal aliens and drug smugglers. These military units brought their specialized equipment such as FLIR infrared devices, and helicopters. In conjunction with the U.S. Border Patrol, they would deploy along the border and, for a brief time, there would be no traffic across that border which was actively watched by "coyotes" paid to assist border crossers. The smugglers and the alien traffickers ceased operations over the one hundred mile sections of the border sealed at a time. Sher Zieve claims this was very effective but temporary as the illegal traffic resumed as soon as the military withdrew.[57]. After the September 11, 2001 attacks the United States looked at the feasibility of placing soldiers along the U.S.-Mexico border as a security measure. [58](link broken), [59], [60]

According to many US Border Patrol agents, they were instructed by their leadership during 2005 to "keep new arrests to an "absolute minimum" to offset the effect of the Minuteman vigil, adding that patrols along the border have been severely limited" as one US Border Patrol agent put it [61].

In December, 2005, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to build a separation barrier along parts of the border not already protected by a separation barriers. A later vote in the United States Senate on May 17, 2006, included a plan to blockade 860 miles of the border with vehicle barriers and triple-layer fencing along with granting an "earned path to citizenship" to the 12 million undocumented workers in the U.S. and roughly doubling legal immigration (from their 1970's levels). In 2006 the Senate approved 370 miles of new double- and triple-layered fencing and 500 miles of vehicle barriers and then refused to fund them. In December, the House voted for 700 miles of new barriers. Neither was able to reach a compromise bill. There is no assurance that if built, these new layers of protection will reduce the flow of illegal migrants from Mexico.

Controversy and viewpoints

According to a Time magazine poll taken nationally in the United States

• 82% say that the United States is not doing enough to keep illegal immigrants from entering the country
• 71% support major penalties for employers who hire illegal immigrants
• 69% believe illegal immigrants should have greater restrictions to government services, such as driver's license, health care/food stamps, and attending public schools
• 68% say that illegal immigration is an extremely/very serious problem in the United States
• 62% favor taking whatever steps are necessary at the borders, including the use of the military, to cut the flow of illegal immigrants into the country
• 56% favor building a security fence along the U.S.-Mexican border
• 51% think the US would be "better off" by deporting all illegal immigrants, while 38% believe the U.S. would be "worse off"

Bay Buchanan, head of Team America, an immigration reduction political action committee, claimed that the 1990s-era border security program Operation Gatekeeper cut down unauthorized immigration by 90%. The actual numbers are not quite that high with 565,581 apprehensions in San Diego district in fiscal year 1992 before Operation Gatekeeper and its enhanced border fencing and policing to a low of 100,681 apprehensions in 2002 — an 82% reduction. Apprehensions in 2006 are at 138,608 or a 75% reduction. [62] However, the number of apprehensions may not correlate with a reduction in unauthorized immigration [63]. Apprehensions have gone up in other areas as border security was enhanced in San Diego and El Paso which saw a similar drop in apprehensions.

According to a 2002 Zogby International poll, "58 percent of Mexicans agree with the statement, "The territory of the United States' southwest rightfully belongs to Mexico." Zogby said 28 percent disagreed, while another 14 percent said they weren't sure. Meanwhile, a similar number – 57 percent – agreed that "Mexicans should have the right to enter the U.S. without U.S. permission," while 35 percent disagreed and 7 percent were unsure. " [64] In the 2001–2006 National Development Plan the Mexican Government says they want to support the 18 million Mexicans who live outside Mexico. There is no information on this report on the source of the data or on the number of those illegal aliens who live in the United States.

Hardvard Professor George Borjas asserts, "The critical issue is how much we care about the well-being of immigrants compared with that of the Americans who win and the Americans who lose." [65] Philip Martin, of the University of California, Davis concurs, "Perhaps this is why immigration is such a political hot potato; it's mostly a distribution issue and, for governments that are in the business of redistributing income via taxes and subsidies, regulating immigration is another redistribution tool." [66]

2004 illegal immigration debate

Main article: United States immigration debate

In 2004, United States President George W. Bush proposed a guest worker program to absorb migrant laborers who would otherwise come to the U.S. as illegal aliens. However, the details were left to legislators. In 2005, the Congress began creating legislation to change the current illegal immigration policies. The legislation approved by the U.S. House of Representatives led to massive protests.

See also 2006 United States immigration reform protests.

Professor Wayne A. Cornelius, (U.C. Davis) summed up his opinion of the problems of illegal US immigration as follows: “Consequences predicted by advocates of the concentrated border enforcement strategy have not yet materialized: there is no evidence that unauthorized migration is being deterred at the point of origin; that would-be illegal entrants are being discouraged at the border after multiple apprehensions by the Border Patrol and returning home; that their employment prospects in the US have been curtailed; or that the resident population of undocumented immigrants is shrinking.” [67]

Terminology

The Immigration and Nationality Act is the primary body of federal immigration law in the United States. It defines the term "alien" as “any person not a citizen or national of the United States.” It defines the term “immigrant” to mean every alien not falling within a set of “classes of nonimmigrant aliens” spelled out in detail by the act, for example: diplomatic personal, students residing within the US to attend school, athletes attending athletic events, ship and aircraft crew members; and others residing or staying within the United Sates on a temporary basis. The act classifies aliens remaining within the US on a permanent basis as immigrants without regards to an individual’s legal status.

There are a variety of terms which can be found in government agency news releases, photo captions, and reports. These terms include undocumented immigrant, unauthorized immigrant, illegal immigrant, undocumented migrant, unauthorized migrant, migrant, unauthorized immigrant worker, illegal migrant, illegal alien, undocumented alien, unauthorized worker and unauthorized resident.

The Associated Press Stylebook, the primary style and usage guide for most newspapers and newsmagazines in the United States, recommends using "illegal immigrant" rather than "illegal alien" or "undocumented worker"[68]. According to Voice of America's Wordmaster, a weekly analysis of American English from the official international radio and television broadcasting service of the United States federal government, "The most common term by far, though, at least as reflected in the news media, is illegal immigrants" in reference to people who are in the United States without following immigration laws.

Significant agents involved in the debate

Grassroots political groups

Many organized political groups have begun to speak out on the issue of illegal immigration (and also legal immigration) resulting in a wide range of policy options under active consideration.

The immigration reduction movement seeks to reduce the levels of illegal immigration into the U.S. The Minuteman Project has been lobbying Congress for stronger enforcement of the border laws and is reported to be organizing private property owners along the U.S.-Mexican border for the purpose of building a fence to discourage illegal border crossings.

Other groups are organizing protests against the federal classification of illegal immigrant status as felons. These groups also demand various rights be established in law for undocumented workers to become permanent legal residents (with permission to work) or (eventually) a path for full U.S. citizenship. These groups have also organized large protests and rallies in many major urban centers in the U.S., including New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, and Dallas. However, some have reported that the movement may have generated a significant backlash among those opposed to illegal immigration, which, according to a number of political polls, includes the majority of Americans. A recent Zogby poll found that 61% of Americans were less sympathetic to undocumented workers as a result of the protests. [69]

Failed Attempts at City sanctions

Several cities have passed an Illegal Immigration Relief Act designed to penalize landlords who provide illegal immigrants with housing and businesses who provide illegal immigrants with employment. These cities include:

• San Bernardino, California
• Avon Park, Florida
• Hazleton, Pennsylvania
• Farmers Branch, Texas

See also

• Immigration reduction
• United States immigration debate
• Free immigration
• Immigration to the United States
• Immigrant deaths along the U.S.-Mexico border
• Melting Pot
• Migra
• Nativism (politics)
• Operation Jump Start

Notes and References

• Immigration and Nationality Act, Title 8 Code of Federal Regulations [70]

Further reading

• Barkan, Elliott R. "Return of the Nativists? California Public Opinion and Immigration in the 1980s and 1990s." Social Science History 2003 27(2): 229-283. in Project Muse
• Brimelow, Peter; Alien Nation (1996)
• Cull, Nicholas J. and Carrasco, Davíd, ed. Alambrista and the US-Mexico Border: Film, Music, and Stories of Undocumented Immigrants U. of New Mexico Press, 2004. 225 pp.
• Thomas J. Espenshade; "Unauthorized Immigration to the United States" Annual Review of Sociology. Volume: 21. 1995. pp 195+.
• Flores, William V. "New Citizens, New Rights: Undocumented Immigrants and Latino Cultural Citizenship" Latin American Perspectives 2003 30(2): 87-100
• Hanson, Victor David Mexifornia: A State of Becoming (2003)
• Lisa Magaña, Straddling the Border: Immigration Policy and the INS (2003
• Mohl, Raymond A. "Latinization in the Heart of Dixie: Hispanics in Late-twentieth-century Alabama" Alabama Review 2002 55(4): 243-274. ISSN 0002-4341
• Ngai, Mae M. Impossible Subjects: Illegal Aliens and the Making of Modern America (2004),
• Ngai, Mae M. "The Strange Career of the Illegal Alien: Immigration Restriction and Deportation Policy in the United States, 1921-1965" Law and History Review 2003 21(1): 69-107. ISSN 0738-2480 Fulltext in History Cooperative

External links

News Coverage

• The History of Immigration, by Jorge Majfud
• Orange County Register: “ 'Visa overstayers' fuel illegal population” - April 5, 2006 [71]
• USA Today: Text of President Bush's Immigration Law Reform Speech on May 16, 2006 [72]
• CNN: Reaction to Bush immigration speech - May 15, 2006 [73]
• Washington Post: “One Sheriff sees immigration answer as simple – May 20, 2006 [74]
• Associated Press: “Ariz. Posse to Arrest Illegal Immigrants” –May 4, 2006 [75]
• NY Times “Arizona County Uses New Law to Look for Illegal Immigrants” –May 9, 2006 [76]
• City Journal “How Unskilled Immigrants Hurt Our Economy” –no date [77] A publication of Manhattan Institute
• KTRH News Radio “Video Sheds Light on Mexican Pledge Controversy” October 18, 2006 [78]

Other Links

• Border Security: Fences Along the U.S. International Border[79] a report of the Congressional Research Service (January 13, 2005) provided by the Federation of American Scientists.
• Immigration by the Numbers (Google Video) Roy Beck's celebrated demonstration of the population consequences of current U.S. immigration policies.