The draft bill that the White house has been drafting which was recently “leaked” to the media has the President stating that the illegal immigrants will have to go to the “BACK OF THE LINE.” But there are many lines in Immigration. My question is Which line?
The ways to get Residency for legal people is through employment, family, Asylum or by lottery (Diversity). Visas have per country restrictions. The same number is given to every country, irrespective of the size of the country. Thus for skilled professionals from India and China, there is a long lineup for educated legal people. People born in India for instance, with a Master’s Degree (and this applies to people with Master’s Degree from an American University) has been waiting in line since 2004 just to get their Permanent Residency. Thats 9 years. How does this jive with a “Path to Citizenship within 8 years ” that the administration has been promising? Lets face it, most illegal immigrants have at best a high school degree. Should they be allowed to jump over the legal non immigrants from India with a Master’s Degree?
In the family category, brothers and sisters of United States Citizens from Philippines have been waiting since 1989. They are patiently waiting in Philippines and did not enter illegally as did the people who crossed borders. Should they now just enter this country illegally?
There is No line up for Asylum and Diversity visas.
The second question is how will we grant this “path to citizenship” to the 11 million illegal residents. Most of them are uneducated and don’t have steady permanent employers. Their relatives are most often illegal. Its not like Mexico will persecute them if they went back to Mexico, so no need to give them Asylum. (note: Asylum has no lines, and if amnesty is asylum then there would be no “back of the line.” ) And if Mexicans needed to enhance “diversity” , we would not even be having this conversation. It’s only their voting power that is motivating this whole legislation. So will we create a new category?
Will we clear ALL backlog by artificially increasing the numbers this one time? If so, what about that very bright Master’s Degree holder who just happened to be born in India and just happened to have not applied before the passing of this legislation? Would the next Sergey Brin have to stand behind these 11 million people? Will they then not simply leave and go to EU?
Also Mr. President, any legislation that is passed WITHOUT the input of 2 parties is not the way our system is supposed to work. We stand for the checks and balances. Did you not teach Constitutional Law?
However that is not to say that the the Republican plan is all good either. Granting non immigrant visas to some of these 11 million people is like telling them to self deport. They wont leave when their visas expire.
But my last plea is to the Democrats. Why do you hate Computer Professionals on H-1B? Because unless you hate them, why do you still have the completely absurd, unconstitutional “Control” memo from 2010? And why are you selectively enforcing it to the computer consulting industry ONLY? Where is the rule of law that we all fought to reinstate from the Presidency of W Bush?
Contact Houston Immigration Lawyer, or Houston Immigration Attorney Annie Banerjee, for more information
