#ncpol: The cold hard reality on the immigration issue

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96498US senator Jeff Sessions (R-Alabama), one of the few gutsy, real men left in Capitol Hill’s Republican ranks, has laid out a powerful prosecution of the federal government’s negligence in protecting our borders and enforcing immigration laws.  Sessions, chairman of the subcommittee on immigration and the national interest, has published a Chart Book laying out the facts of current immigration policy in easy-to-understand detail:

[…]  The overwhelming majority of immigration to the United States is the result of our visa policies. Each year, millions of visas are issued to temporary workers, foreign students, refugees, asylees, and permanent immigrants for admission into the United States. The lion’s share of these visas are for lesser-skilled and lower-paid workers and their dependents who, because they are here on workauthorized visas, are added directly to the same labor pool occupied by current unemployed jobseekers. Expressly because they are admitted into the U.S. on legal immigrant visas, most will be able to draw a wide range of taxpayer-funded benefits, and corporations will be allowed to directly substitute these workers for Americans.

Improved border security would have no effect on the continued arrival of these new foreign workers, refugees, and permanent immigrants—because they are all invited here by the federal government. The most significant of all immigration documents issued by the U.S. is, by far, the “green card.” When a foreign citizen is issued a green card it guarantees them the following benefits inside the United States: lifetime work authorization, access to federal welfare, access to Social Security and Medicare, the ability to obtain citizenship and voting privileges, and the immigration of their family members and elderly relatives.

Under current federal policy, the U.S. issues green cards to approximately 1 million new Lawful Permanent Residents (LPRs) every single year. For instance, Department of Homeland Security statistics show that the U.S. issued 5.25 million green cards in the last five years, for an average of 1.05 million new legal permanent immigrant annually. These ongoing visa issuances are the result of federal law, and their number can be adjusted at any time with a new federal law.burrt

However, unlike other autopilot policies—such as tax rates or spending programs—there is virtually no national discussion or media coverage over how many visas we issue, to whom we issue them and on what basis, or how the issuance of these visas to individuals living in foreign countries impacts the interests of people already living in this country.[…] 

Here are some of the highlights of his report:

  • The US will issue more green cards over the next ten years than the combined current populations of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina COMBINED. 
  • Over the next 50 years, the birth rate of new immigrants will exceed that of current Americans by 7-to-1.
  • Immigration adds ONE Los Angeles — increases the US population by an amount roughly equivalent to the population of that California city — every three years.
  • Flow of immigrants to grow 700 percent above 1970s levels by 2060.
  • US issued 680,000 green cards to immigrants from Muslim nations over the last five years.
  • Regarding migrants from the Middle East:  91.4 % on food stamps, 68.3% on cash welfare.
  • America has ten million more foreign-born residents than the entire European Union.  (Watching the news lately?:  See how “well” things are working over there?) 
  • The US has six times more migrants than ALL of Latin America combined.
  • US to legally admit more new immigrants over the next decade  than the combined populations of: Atlanta, Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, Denver, St. Louis and Dallas.

And here’s a wee bit more food for thought:

[…] The predominant supply of low-wage immigration into the United States occurs legally, and the total amount of immigration to the wallUnited States has risen dramatically over the last four decades. Under current federal policy, the U.S. issues “green cards” to about one million new Legal Permanent Residents (LPRs) every single year. For instance, according to the Department of Homeland Security, the U.S. issued 5.25 million green cards in the last five years, for an average of 1.05 million new permanent immigrants annually. New lifetime immigrants admitted with green cards gain guaranteed legal access to federal benefits, as well as guaranteed work authorization. LPRs can also petition to bring their relatives to the United States, and both the petitioner and the relatives can become naturalized citizens.

[…] In the post-World War II boom decades of the 1950s and 1960s, annual legal admissions were roughly two-thirds lower, averaging together less than 3 million grants of permanent residency per decade—or about 285,000 annually. Moreover, due to a variety of factors, including lower stay rates and stay incentives, the total foreign-born population in the United States actually declined from about 10.3 million in 1950 to 9.7 million in 1960 and 9.6 million in 1970. During this economic period, compensation for American workers nearly doubled.

These lower midcentury immigration levels were the product of a federal policy change—after the last period of large-scale immigration that had begun in roughly 1880, President Coolidge argued that a slowing of immigration would benefit both U.S.-born and immigrant-workers: “We want to keep wages and living conditions good for everyone who is now here or who may come here. As a nation, our first duty must be to those who are already our inhabitants, whether native or immigrants. To them we owe an especial and a weighty obligation.”

[…]train

Yet the immigration “reform” considered by Congress most recently—the 2013 Senate “Gang of Eight” immigration bill— would have tripled the number of green cards issued over the next 10 years. Instead of issuing 10 million grants of legal permanent residency, the Gang of Eight proposal would have issued at least 30 million grants of legal permanent residency during the next decade (or more than 3 times the entire population of the state of North Carolina). Finally, it is worth observing that the 10 million grants of new permanent residency under current law is not an estimate of total immigration. In fact, increased flows of legal immigration actually tend to correlate with increased flows of illegal immigration: the former helps provide networks and pull factors for the latter. Most of the top-sending countries for legal immigration are also the top-sending countries for illegal immigration.

Additionally, the U.S. legally issues each year a substantial number of temporary visas which provided opportunities for visa overstays, a major source of illegal immigration. The Census Bureau therefore projects that absent a change in federal policy, net immigration (the difference between the number coming and the number going) will total 14 million by 2025.Not only is the population of foreign-born at a record level, but Census projects that, in just eight years, the percentage of the country that is foreignborn will reach the highest level ever recorded in U.S. history, with more than 1 in 7 residents being foreign-born and, unlike the prior wave, surge towards 1 in 6 and continually upward, setting new records each and every year. […]

mouthPretty much the entire North Carolina delegation to Congress has been bad on the immigration issue.  Walter Jones and Mark Meadows are the two exceptions — having been the most consistent on border security and opposing amnesty.  Renee Ellmers and Robert Pittenger have been praised by pro-amnesty groups for their dedication to the cause.  Everybody who has voted FOR  these CRomnibus spending bills has voted FOR the funding of amnesty and sanctuary cities.  In the Senate, Thom Tillis voted to keep funding amnesty and sanctuary cities.  (At least he’s a man of his word.  He told us what he was going to do in the Senate race.)  Burr voted for cloture on the CRomnibus, but voted against the bill — a move that makes him just as complicit in the matter as Tillis. 

Out of control immigration is breaking our country with the strain it’s putting on the social welfare net.  It’s killing job opportunities for Americans, and driving down wages for everyone.  Don’t let these politicians fool you.  Immigration is a huge problem — a huge issue — facing our country.