At Roll Call Walter Shapiro urges the Congressional Democrats to do a deal with the Trump Administration—security for the “DREAMers” in exchange for partial funding of Trump’s wall:
Ever since the Soviets erected in 1961 a barrier separating East and West Berlin, walls have been associated with totalitarian countries rather than confident democracies. And the Trumpian vision of a beautiful solar-powered wall (presumably with Ivanka’s boutiques at the base) doesn’t make the image any prettier.
But if congressional Democrats can win lifelong legal protection for the nearly 800,000 Dreamers in exchange for, say, a $10 billion down payment on the wall, it would be a deal worth making. Sure, the $10 billion would be wasted. But that’s chump change compared to the nearly $1 trillion in giveaways already embedded in the GOP tax bill.
Yes, Trump would chortle that he won the most glorious victory since Gen. George Patton crossed the Rhine. Trump’s triumphalism would be difficult to take. Far worse, though, would be immigration roundups of the Dreamers if Trump petulantly refused to extend the executive order beyond March 5.
There’s an additional complication for Democrats: politically they’re on the wrong side of the argument. A recent poll found the following opinions on immigration:
Some 57 percent of likely midterm voters favored ending the ability of new citizens to sponsor extended family members for immigration if Congress offers a path to citizenship for young adult illegal immigrants. Some 32 percent said they support continued chain migration.
By a margin of 57 percent to 23 percent, respondents also said a bill granting legal status to young adult illegal immigrants should include a provision requiring employers to use the E-Verify system to confirm the legal status of workers.
The smart, substantive, and politically superior move would be serious workplace enforcment rather than a wall. A wall is only as good as its weakest ICE agent. Workplace enforcement would address the issue and impel businesses and government to enter into a realistic discussion of the issues.
I’m not certain how much I would trust a poll by a group devoted to reducing immigration. It seems giving Dreamers citizenship is supported by a majority of Americans, and I suspect that most of these Americans are not living in fear of the consequences of this action. I think giving citizenship to DREAMers is just another step.
I think the deal would be a good one. Give citizenship to the DREAMers. The wall is certainly stupid, but it’s not like anybody will ever build it, and as rip-offs go, it will be pretty entertaining.
The problem is that Trump is not remotely capable of doing anything; he watches Fox and talks to whomever is in the room at the time. And Republicans in Congress are terrified of alienating their base. They should try to make the deal with Trump. But how? Planting an item in Fox every day so it lodges there? Last year might have been the high point–the coherent Trump of 2017.
That’s an instance of the “genetic fallacy”, a form of the ad hominem fallacy. It’s not an isolated poll. Gallup. Pew (see Figure 4.4 and adjacent paragraphs).
The fact that most Americans support giving the DREAMers citizenship is the argument here. I read the Pew Poll as saying that 59% of Americans believe that Middle Eastern immigrants either have a positive influence or they have no impact. That’s an ambiguous number. There’s a hard-core slice of Americans who are obsessed with immigration and immigrants, and they think there are arguments where others do not.
For example, there was an incident last year where a GOP congressman from North Carolina was shocked to find out that his constituents empathized with some woman who started to attack a Somali (I think) immigrant for no reason at all.
So I think we are talking about a minority of people who really get offended by scarves and Mexicans, and the rest–a majority–thinks that immigration is a positive or a neutral fact of life. This minority is older too, and less educated, and aware that a) their views on the wane so b) they need to be told 24/7 how justified and shared all of their paranoia is. But if citizenship is given to the DREAMers they suspect that the same majority who supported that will find it inarguable that family members in Mexico should then be given citizenship.
I think that most Americans sympathize with the DREAMers but also think that we should reduce the number of immigrants coming into the country. This statement:
is untrue. It’s easily arguable. First, the difference between the DREAMers and their parents who entered the country illegally is that the DREAMers lack mens rea, intent. As to chain immigration, as noted a handy majority thinks we already accept enough immigrants. That is a political argument so not “inarguable”.
Immigration in 2018 isn’t the same as immigration in 1918, in 1958, or even in 1988. The cost of travel is much lower, ties with the country of origin are stronger, and job growth is lower. We need to rethink the policy that’s been in place for the last 50 years to adjust it to modern requirements.
How are the ties to the country of origin stronger than with the Italian immigrants who came to this country? I mean, the title of this post is a quote from a movie about Italians on a multi-generational quest to become Americans while in America. It’s a pop culture touchstone that’s about, theoretically, the American experience.
And it’s way bigger than numbers or policy. Obama deported over 2 million immigrants, and yet somehow he was considered soft. That’s not totally incorrect. Obama was soft. He wasn’t xenophobic and he wasn’t a racist. And that’s the reason why the DREAM act has not passed, because the xenophobes and racists are terrified about what happens next. People like that are always terrified, and Trump and Fox are there to feed their fears.
Anyway, they should try to make some sort of deal on this with Trump as the deadline approaches. I just don’t see it working. DACA and the opiate crisis were two things he could have had bipartisan support on, or at least offered what the Democrats would consider reasonable. On opiates, instead of trying to boost treatment with people who actually know something about addiction, they’ve got Sessions worried that weed is a gateway drug. Nobody tell these idiots about the semi-legal delivery services bringing edibles, indica, and sativa to your door in less than an hour in New York and every other major city in this country.
I know many present-day immigrants who Skype home every day and travel back to the old country multiple times per year. That’s a pretty big difference from the situation at the turn of the 20th century when immigration was a much more greater commitment. I don’t believe the Italian immigrants maintained those sorts of ties with Italy.
I only know of one family who’s maintained its contacts with its country of origin over a protracted period (in the case of this particular family 150 years). I think that’s like to become the norm. Travel and communications have changed.
Its hard to take Shapiro seriously after his first paragraph. The Berlin wall kept people in, not out.
In all the debate no one seems to want to deal with the issue that immigration is a privilege, not a right, and countries have the right to set the terms of immigration, including the responsibilities to come with the privilege. How about this. Screw the wall. Let the kids stay. But no more immigration, period, until we digest what we have. No immigration lawyer arguments. No excuses or rationalizing. If they come illegally put them in jail; don’t deport them. And don’t, as was the case under Obama, put them on buses to place them wherever possible. You want to help the kids? Fine. That’s the deal. Take it or leave it.
Something else that’s rarely mentioned is that immigration has a value and entails costs. Importing workers gives that value to the imported workers. The costs are borne mostly by the jurisdiction. Merely tallying up the taxes paid by or on behalf of those imported workers doesn’t really account for the net profit or loss associated with the workers—employers are receiving benefits while the cost is being transferred from employers to jurisdictions.
There are lots of ways of dealing with that but we aren’t doing any of them.
I don’t have a problem with importing workers but I do have a problem with subsidizing it.
Italian immigrants are fairly notorious for high levels of reverse immigration. There were improvements in shipping in the 1880s that made it cheaper/easier to migrate, but it also began an era of reverse migration, which the U.S. did not really have before. I think at least 50% of the Italian immigrants during the 1890 to WWI period returned home, and when they resettled in Italy they were known as the ritornati.
I think the background story is that unification of Italy left the country unstable and weakened some localized protections, and the U.S. had wage labor opportunities available. But Italy’s economy was expanding, so a straddling approach could be used in which Italians could move to America and work for several years, save their money, and return home where he could buy goods cheaper or invest in a promising business.
The cost of transportation has gotten cheaper, but I think the lesson still remains is that this is not the type of immigration that is good for America. America wasn’t improved by Italians buying Italian goods and starting businesses in Italians. I’m not sure anyone who has advocated a Keynesian stimulas policy could not appreciate the implications of money going to people who don’t plan to spend it. Also, that 1890-1914 wave of immigration destroyed what had been a rising commitment to social welfare programs. People don’t want to strengthen a community of sojourners.
On costs, I read this piece today that tries to explain the reasons for the teaching shortage:
“2. A good chunk of that student growth is in immigrants and non-English speakers. We public schools are required to take all kids of school age the minute they set foot on our soil, regardless of their previous education or English ability. An explosion in immigration keeps the need for ESL teachers growing, and those classes are very small. Our school keeps the equivalent of one full-time hire for about 16 kids.”
https://educationrealist.wordpress.com/2017/12/24/wherefore-and-whither-the-teacher-shortage/amp/?__twitter_impression=true
To put some real numbers behind that in Chicago that would be about $110,000 per year for each 16 immigrant kids. There are about 50,000 immigrant kids in the Chicago Public Schools in need of remedial English (according to the CPS). 50,000/16 X $110,000 = $343,750,000 per year
In practice it’s probably actually more than but you get the idea.
Somewhat off-thread, but many of the problems identified by the education blogger have to do with teachers being called to do more: the law requires more exacting credentials; more service to immigrant and non-English speaking students; more individualized service to special education students; and more educational options such as charter schools.
Some of the discussion started to sound like a point that @steve sometimes makes, which is that a lot of the relatively high costs associated with American healthcare is that Americans are the patients. Sure enough, in part three the point is made:
“[T]he aspects of health that require patient cooperation–obesity, smoking, addiction–have extremely low success rates. Doctors have offloaded these responsibilities onto therapists, who aren’t expected to have a fabulous success rates.
“But when the country began actively forbidding both students from quitting and teachers from limiting their student population, teachers weren’t allowed to offload their responsibilities onto some lower career ladder occupation, or even lower expectations for success. In fact, governments became ever more quantitative in its demands for educational outcomes.
“Don’t bleed too hard for teachers. We mostly ignore the outcome expectations. And it’s pretty good pay for most of us, as well as a great working schedule. But for any number of reasons, the public debate and the absurd expectations is a huge part of the job in my region of Teacher World, and not even a tiny blip on the horizon of Dale’s.(*)”
(*) Dale changed teaching jobs to be closer to his wife’s job and found himself in a wealthy suburb teaching students who are well-prepared for each lesson, and he asks whether what he is now doing is actually teaching.