Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Answering Kaus   [Ramesh Ponnuru]

Mickey Kaus asks whether NR’s editors are advocating passage of the Isakson immigration plan—which would require border and workplace enforcement of immigration laws to take effect before an amnesty or guest-worker program could—or just urging Senator McCain to embrace it. He also raises two objections to the plan. First, he worries that an administration soft on illegal immigration could claim that border control had taken effect when it really hadn’t. Second, he worries that announcing that an amnesty is likely to take effect in the near future would cause a stampede of illegal crossings.

 

Let me take these points in reverse order. I’ll speak for myself, but I think my position is consistent with the editorial. The worry about creating an expectation of an amnesty is a real one, although that expectation may already exist in muted form given that amnesty has been debated for three years. Sen. Isakson believes, however, that the legislation should only legalize workers who can prove that they were here at the time of passage. If they come between passage and the triggering of the amnesty, they would be deportable.

 

As for the who-would-certify question, the answer is to put hard-to-fudge conditions in the law. Isakson has made a good start, but his bill could be improved by, for instance, requiring that the government certify a 75 percent reduction in illegal border crossings before a guest-worker program or amnesty took effect.

 

Finally, I didn’t take the editorial to be saying that Sen. Isakson’s idea is the best possible immigration reform or even that it is better than not passing any bill. I’d like to see the bill improved, by toughening the trigger requirements and by requiring Congress to take a second vote before any guest-worker provisions took effect. But details aside, the framework for a compromise could be here. And the McCain-Hagel-Kennedy-Martinez-whoever bill would be better with Isakson’s amendment than without it, which is why I would like McCain to embrace it.

03/28 04:04 PMShare