An Appeal for Wise Leadership at ICE
By Jerry Kammer, February 27, 2017
One of the reasons I came to work for the Center for Immigration Studies was that I wanted to make the case for humane but firm enforcement of the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA). That legislation presented to the American people a compromise between two values that had come into conflict. IRCA provided the compassion of legalization for illegal immigrants with a pledge that the federal government would check future illegal immigration by cutting off the jobs magnet with penalties for employers who knowingly hire unauthorized workers.
As everyone now knows, IRCA's amnesty was carried out, benefitting nearly three million people. But over the years its enforcement dwindled under pressure from economic and ethnic interests that benefitted from illegal immigration.
Public frustration at this failure of governance mounted steadily through the years. It was a major factor in the election of Donald Trump, who launched his presidential campaign with an intemperate appeal to those grievances. Mexican immigrants, he infamously said, were "rapists", though some were presumably good people.
Now the Trump administration, following through on Trump's campaign promises, is ramping up deportations. While the administration's new policy emphasizes the removal of those who committed felonies, it is also giving ICE agents a green light to initiate deportation proceedings against those whose principal offense was to cross the border illegally or overstay their visa.
http://cis.org/kammer/appeal-wise-leadership-ice
