Date: 2006-05-09
Speaker: DANIEL E. LUNGREN (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Cali

fornia. Madam Speaker. in assessing the effectiveness of immigration policy. it is helpful to look at both the push factors and the pull factors which contribute to the phenomenon of illegal immigration. In assessing the push factors. we must not overlook the role of the government of Mexico. On a human level. it is a sad fact that people are motivated to make what is often a dangerous trek north to the United States because of the absence of economic opportunity in Mexico itself. Yet this flow of illegal immigration into the United States acts as a pressure relief valve by allowing the Mexican government to escape political accountability to those it has failed. Ironically. the Mexican governments laissez fare attitude towards immigration out of Mexico is not reflected in its policy concerning its own southern border. When you hear the President of Mexico or other Mexican politicians rail against the Housepassed border control bill. please keep in mind that when it comes to their own border policies. all of the rhetoric concerning the right to migration is suddenly nowhere to be found. In the end. the Mexican governments policy will prove to be shortsighted and will ultimately cause serious damage to their own country. Imagine the longterm effects of a nation losing millions of its hardest working younger people. The future of Mexico is sending its government a clear and unmistakable message of adios as they vote with their feet. Furthermore. when one factors Mexicos demographic future into the equation. a dire picture emerges. According to an article by Philip Longman in the May/June issue of Foreign Affairs. "Mexican fertility rates have dropped so dramatically. the country is now aging five times faster than is the United States. It took 50 years for the American median age to rise just five years. from 30 to 35. By contrast. between 2000 and 2050. Mexicos median age. according to U.N. projections. will increase by 20 years. leaving half the population over 42.. Meanwhile. the median American age in the year 2050 is expected to be 39.7." Thus. ultimately illegal immigration from Mexico into the U.S. is not good for either Mexico or the United States. According to the Associated Press. President Fox has tharacterized the House immigration bill as. quote. stupid. To his credit. the same AP story quoted President Fox as acknowledging that his government must "generate opportunities here in Mexico." However. it is the responsibility of the United States Government to control our own borders and to take action to reduce the pull factors which draw people to the United States. We must demagnetize the attraction of illegal employment in the U.S. Unfortunately. our track record here reflects a failure of government policy on our side of the border. The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. IRCA. or SimpsonMazzoli. for the first time imposed sanctions on employers for the hiring of those ineligible to work in the United States. Yet since the passage of that bill. administrations of both political parties have failed to enforce the law. The fact that there were only three cases last year. three. of a notice to file a prosecution for the unlawful hiring of illegal aliens is utterly indefensible. There must be a will to enforce the law. I wish to recount what in retrospect was the death knell to an effective regime of employer sanctions. An amendment to SimpsonMazzoli was accepted which completely undermined the employment verification system. In its place. a series of documents required to be submitted with the 19 employment eligibility verification form was substituted. The end result was the creation of a new cottage industry for the production of false documentation. I would like to emphasize once again that it was the negation of an effective employer verification system. which in combination with the lack of enforcement. undermined the usefulness of employer sanctions as an immigration enforcement tool. -It was for this reason that the basic pilot project was created in 1996 by this Congress. The system allows employers to voluntarily check the names and Social Security numbers of its employees against the records maintained by the Social Security Administration and the Department of Homeland Security. Building on this project. H.R. 4437. the Housepassed bill. would create a nationwide mandatory program. Unlike the watereddown language in the 1986 bill. the employment verification provisions in the Housepassed bill offers a genuine prospect for effective employer sanctions necessary to demagnetize the attraction of unlawful employment in the U.S. An effective employer sanctions regime. coupled with the need to fully fund the additional 2.000 Border Patrol positions authorized this year and in the out years. is essential if we are going to control illegal immigration. At the same time if we are to maximize the cooperation of employers with the implementation of an effective system of employer sanctions. it is necessary to ensure that in those cases where U.S. workers are unavailable. employers have the option of employing temporary foreign workers. Let me suggest that regulating the stream of workers which have crossed back and forth our southern border since the 1870s will facilitate the job of a larger Border Patrol and the implementation of an effective system of employer sanctions. By definition however. in a temporary worker program. the workers should be temporary. Along the lines of an amendment I offered unsuccessfully in 1986. workers could work in the United States for up to 10 months of the year. During that time a portion of their wages could be withheld. The money would be placed in an escrow account and would only be returned to the workers upon their return to their home =ountryih most casesMexico. The proposal has a built in incentive for the temporary workers to return home to work their own small farms and to reunite with their families. In fact. Mexico and Canada have entered into a temporary agricultural worker program along these lines. which by all accounts has operated quite successfully. Finally. we cannot avoid the issue of what we will do with those who have entered our country illegally and have settled in our communities. I certainly do not favor an amnesty. But the use of the word "amnesty" does not excuse anyone on this side of the argument from explaining exactly what they propose to do with as many as 11 million people. By the same token. those who have violated our laws should not be allowed i{ cut in line in front of those who have obeyed them. A middle ground solution would allow those undocumented persons with sufficient equities in our society to remain. They could continue to work and travel back and forth between the United States and their home country. They would be legal residents. "blue card" holders if you will. However. they would not be afforded the legal equivalent of a diamond lane to citizenship. If they wish to become citizens. they would be required to return home. file an application and get in line like everyone else. Such requirements are necessary to reassure Americans who have been turned off by the ideologically driven multicultural agenda of those.groups promoting identification with the Mexican flag. an alternative national anthem. and celebration of May Day in solidarity with leftist Mexican trade unions. It is hard for me to conceive of anything which could do more damage to the case one might make on behalf of those who demand acceptance by us to be equal partners in our society. For the common element of all immigrants who have come to this land has been a deep and buming desire to become Americans. The welcome mat extended to previous generations of immigrants was predicated upon a commitment to a common patrimony. Nothing less should be expected of those who currently seek to become a part of the tapestry of a larger tradition and history of American immigration. ENERGY