I live in Arizona and this state just passed a very tough immigration bill. Even though the issue is one that the Federal government should be dealing with, there is so much frustration in a state like Arizona, the local state government took it up.

So, according to the new bill:

The new bill, passed by the Arizona house of representatives last night, greatly expands the powers of the police in dealing with illegal immigration, including for the first time giving them the right to stop anyone on “reasonable suspicion” they may be an illegal immigrant and arrest them if they are not carrying identity papers.
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This will be accompanied by a crackdown on employers who take on day labourers, who often stand at specific street corners in the hope of being offered work. The new legislation makes it a crime to pick up someone if the driver “knows or recklessly disregards the fact that the alien is here illegally”.

The main problem will all this is its not reasonable and not fair to put the onus on illegal immigrants. The onus needs to be on businesses that hire them. Every business loves cheap labor and they’ll hire them because there is no adequate enforcement of existing laws. No wonder workers keep coming. If there is no work here I am sure the flow will stop. It’s that simple. They left because there is no job. So,if you can’t get a job here then what makes it worthwhile for them? Nothing.

I’m a legal immigrant. If I could have received a world class education in Nepal, believe me I would not have come to the USA. If an employer had not offered to sponsor me for a H1B visa and provided me with a job, I would not have stayed after college.

The fact of the matter is employers in the United States are much too happy to receive this kind of labor. I’ve never been to a car wash in the Phoenix area where all the employees are not illegals. Same goes when I peak into the back of a restaurant, the cleaning crew in the office etc.

If these employers were to be held up to the same standard that this bill is holding illegal immigrants to then the problem would be solved. You simply can not blame the immigrants. After all, America makes an explicit promise when it says:

“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

And you can’t revise history and say that only applies to Irish and German immigrants.

Also, you need to consider that when you set yourself up on a pedestal by declaring yourself  “the last best hope of man on earth” as President Ronald Reagan did then of course people are going to want to come. You simply can not stop someone from wanting to come to the United States. America is too well advertised. What I’m tying to say is you can’t punish people for wanting to come here.

However, if you don’t want them here then don’t make it easy for them to work here. Close the employment opportunities and I promise you people will not come. And in many ways the economic downturn has already demonstrated this to us. Consider this:

The analysis of census data from the U.S. and Mexican governments, being released today by the Pew Hispanic Center, highlights the impact of the economic downturn on Mexican immigrants, many of whom enter the United States illegally.

The study found that immigrants arriving from Mexico fell by 249,000 from March 2008 to March 2009, down nearly 60 percent from the previous year. As a result, the annual inflow of immigrants is now 175,000, having steadily decreased from a peak of 653,000 in 2005, before the bursting of the housing bubble dried up construction and other low-wage jobs.

I’ve wondered why such a simple issue gets blown out of proportion so much. I get the sense that it is because the same party that is so anti-illegal immigration is also the party of small business owners. So, while they want to kick these people out, they sure as heck enjoy the lower labor costs and increased profits!

In other words you can do the dirty messy work for dirt cheap but just don’t use my hospitals, my roads, my schools, my social services and while you’re at it learn some English will ya’.

You can’t have it both ways!

photo credit: Phil Guest

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