Open Season on Immigrants, Legal and Not

As one prominent advocate for immigrants said to me recently, one can only only echo what was once said about Joseph McCarthy, “Have you no shame, sir?”  Now that immigration reform has failed in Congress, it appears to be open season on immigrants, legal and not.

Consider a few examples.

The House Judiciary Committee pulled from its agenda HR 1071, to allow immigrants who lost a spouse or a parent in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to become legal permanent residents. The legislation sparked stiff opposition from lawmakers who want to limit immigration, and panel members agreed to allow the issue to become part of the broader debate.

Over the past few weeks, anti-immigrant legislators in the U.S. Congress are misrepresenting the issues, and attempting to undercut legal immigrants’ access to programs that address health, education, housing, and even hunger. Instead of fixing the broken immigration system when they had the chance, these legislators are pursuing a path that would harm immigrant families – taking health care away from children.   During the debate on the immigration bill, these legislators were claiming that their concern was with undocumented immigrants, not those here legally. But now they seek to prohibit legal immigrants families from accessing critical programs in times of need.

And the claim that is “open season” on immigrants is not just figurative.  According to a Hill.com news story, “[Rep.] Tancredo introduced [an] amendment to the appropriations bill for the Departments of Commerce and Justice to force the release of [two former Border Patrol agents] Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean.”  As Immigration Daily (www.ilw.com) states,

The issue is one of principle – if people get convicted and then are commuted by a pardon, how is justice served? If former BP agents Ramos and Compean are freed, the message to all Border Patrol agents is that the rule of the law does not apply to the border. The fault in the result of this particular case lies with our penal system. It is too harsh with extremely high sentences being handed down, often disproportionate to the crimes being committed. Congress should change sentencing guidelines for all convictions and reduce the punitive consequences for crimes so that punishment is fairly meted out to all and that true justice is served. However, the President should not pardon the convicted former agents because (1) to do so would be to make an exception in one isolated case and (2) the folks pushing hardest for relief are no friends of the President.

KJ