The huge gaping hole in Bush's immigration proposal:Bush
says:
Third, we need to hold employers to account for the workers they hire. It is against the law to hire someone who is in this country illegally. Yet businesses often cannot verify the legal status of their employees, because of the widespread problem of document fraud. Therefore, comprehensive immigration reform must include a better system for verifying documents and work eligibility. A key part of that system should be a new identification card for every legal foreign worker. This card should use biometric technology, such as digital fingerprints, to make it tamper-proof. A tamper-proof card would help us enforce the law Â? and leave employers with no excuse for violating it. And by making it harder for illegal immigrants to find work in our country, we would discourage people from crossing the border illegally in the first place.
Here is the breakdown of worker types:
| type | claim | "proof" |
| U.S. citizen | U.S. citizen | birth record |
| immigrant | U.S. citizen | forged birth record |
| immigrant | legal foreign worker | green card |
| immigrant | legal foreign worker | forged green card |
Bush is only proposing a secure Green card (or equivalent). He is not proposing anything that would make it harder for immigrants to falsely claim to be U.S. citizens. That would require either a national ID card or an enhanced identity verification process. So Bush is letting businesses off the hook by retaining a lax system that allows for a certain type of false identity (of citizenship). That's to be expected. One of the biggest backers of illegal immigrant labor is business.
Whatever your position on immigration, what Bush is proposing is not an honest solution. If you want immigrants here and working, then be frank about it and fashion policy to match. Same for those opposing immigration. But let's not have this half-assed "we're making sure that
those who claim to be legal foreign workers are
legal" while ignoring others who are pursuing a different tactic to obtain employment
posted by Quiddity at 5/15/2006 05:39:00 PM
I still don't understand... what exactly is the problem they are trying to solve here?
The problem is correctly framing the pre-election debate in the run-up to November mid-terms. With Iraq going badly and bin Laden still sending video tapes, Republicans need a divisive issue to rally the base. Going after immigrants is a tried and true off-the-shelf crisis. It's not going so well for a couple of reasons - firstly it's seen as a racist pandering by hispanic Americans (there are not many hispanics in the "Minutemen" border vigilantes). And secondly and the far right Bush base think the President is offering an amnesty and should deport all the illegals.
Ironically, Quiddity's post here much along the lines of what you'll find on Powerline and other right-wing blogs who think that Bush is too soft.
