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This article is against amnesty. It depicts homeland security as something that is suppose to be doing its job and prevent illegal immigration, but the protection is not really there; it is a false warning. Illegal immigrants are not being treated as if they are breaking the law, which they are.

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This article is against amnesty. It states that granting amnesty will make citizens question if the law is really being enforced and why lawbreakers are being rewarded. The new law is under the assumption that a choice other than amnesty will be much more difficult or almost impossible, but they could just cut off work places from hiring illegals. These illegals will slowly go away on their own since the job market will be slim to none for them. This amnesty law is also not thinking of the opinion of the actual citizens.

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Mr. East. Mr. President, for almost a decade illegal immigration to our country has been out of control. Reliable estimates now place the annual influx of illegal aliens at over 1 million. Sadly, Congress has failed to act to defend our national sovereignty and the future of our citizens.

At a time when we should be acting decisively to stop illegal immigration, there is talk of granting amnesty to illegal aliens. I suspect that 8 million unemployed Americans would question the wisdom of an amnesty policy which rewards lawbreakers.

Our distinguished former colleague, Secretary of Health and Human Services Richard S. Schweiker, set forth a compelling case against amnesty four years ago. Secretary Schweiker also made a persuasive case for enacting sanctions against employers who knowingly hire illegal aliens. Mr. President, I ask that Mr. Schweiker's article from the October 1977 Congressional Digest be printed in the Record. The article follows:

Statement by Richard S. Schweiker

From a statement issued on August 29, 1977, and from remarks delivered on the floor of the U.S. Senate on May 25, 1977, on the occasion of his introduction of S. 1601, a bill designed to protect American workers from the adverse impact of illegal alien employment.

I oppose President Carter's plan to grant amnesty to illegal aliens. I believe this proposal is ill-conceived, based on erroneous assumptions, and mischievous in impact.

In his recent message to Congress, the president accurately stated the problem: "In the last several years, millions of undocumented aliens have illegally immigrated to the United States. They have breached our nation's immigration laws, displaced many Americans from jobs, and placed an increased financial burden on many states and local governments." The Immigration and Naturalization Service estimates that one million jobs are now held by illegal aliens. And yet, the essence of the President's plan is to reward this illegal conduct with special benefits for which aliens who have obeyed the law will be ineligible.

Although there are precedents in our history for granting an amnesty or pardon to lawbreakers to remove the adverse consequences of law enforcement, the illegal alien amnesty plan goes much further. It puts the government squarely behind the lawbreaker, and, in effect, says. "Congratulations, you have successfully violated our laws and avoided detection - here is your reward."

Millions of people throughout the world, including legal aliens temporarily in the United States and relatives of American citizens, have tried to work patiently within the confines of the immigration laws to obtain permanent status and eventually American citizenship. If the Administration's proposal is adopted, the government will be saying to them, "Sorry, we have nothing for those who obey the law." We are fond of saying America is a nation of laws. By accepting the President's plan, we would be setting a nasty precedent of putting the government on the side of the lawbreaker by rewarding his illegal conduct and undermining the efficacy of our laws.

The amnesty proposal is not only misguided in approach, but also based on erroneous assumptions. Administration spokesmen have conjured up images of massive dragnets of federal officials having to comb communities throughout the nation for illegal aliens unless amnesty is granted. Obviously, this could not and would not happen. Enforcement of the immigration laws against illegal aliens has been a very difficult task. But one of the primary reasons is that employers at present can lawfully hire illegal aliens. Easy employment in the United States is the primary attraction for illegal aliens. We need effectively to cut off this source of jobs which rightfully belong to Americans and legal immigrants. When this is accomplished, I suspect many illegals would return to their homes, and others who are deported would have no incentive to return to the United States. The assumption that the only alternative to a massive round-up and deportation of millions of illegal aliens is to grant a general amnesty is simply erroneous.

Although the Administration emphasizes difficulties in enforcing the immigration laws against illegal aliens, there appears to be no adequate appreciation of the problems involved in enforcing the proposed amnesty plan. Under the President's proposal, aliens without legal status who have been in the United States since before January 1, 1977, but not as early as January 1, 1970, will be placed in a new category called "temporary resident alien." Almost certainly, the Administration contemplates that these people will in several years be granted resident status, the last step before American citizenship. Apparently, all that will be necessary to establish residency since prior to January 1, 1970, is to show rent receipts, wage records, or the like. It is unclear how the Immigration and Naturalization Service will be expected to detect fraudulent records.

The possible ease [with] which even newly arriving aliens will be able to take advantage of the amnesty [reveals] the mischief of the proposal. Recent reports from immigration officials at our southern border show a significant increase in illegal alien traffic since talk of amnesty began. Although the proposal on its face may appear not to benefit new arrivals, the lack of understanding of the limits of the plan and the difficulties in enforcing it actually aggravate this very burdensome problem.

For these reasons, I oppose the Administration's amnesty plan. But I support the President's recent call for sanctions against employers who knowingly hire illegal aliens. Some months ago I introduced legislation (S. 1601) to make it unlawful to knowingly employ an illegal alien and to provide stiff fines for those who choose to violate the law. Although my bill prescribes a stronger arsenal of penalties to deter violations than the Administration proposal, I welcome this part of the President's program. Drying up employment opportunities, not rewarding illegality, should be the cornerstone of our nation's policy toward illegal aliens. We should open up the jobs illegal aliens now hold to unemployed Americans and legal immigrants, not make permanent the unfair labor competition. I believe strong employer sanctions can go far toward accomplishing this goal. I feel employer sanctions are a workable program to deal with the problem of illegal aliens without rewarding illegality.

I stated the case for such a policy as follows when I introduced S. 1601 on May 25 of this year:

Unemployment in the United States today is our most urgent domestic problem. The administration, Congress, the governments of our States, and the American people have properly focused great attention on efforts to put the economy back on track and alleviate the personal hardships of unemployment. One step we can take in the right direction is to protect American workers from the unfair competition of illegal aliens who take jobs which should be held by American citizens and those lawfully in the United States and depress prevailing wage rates and working conditions we in Congress have worked so hard to guarantee.

Action in this area will certainly not solve all of our economic problems, but I have concluded it is a necessary step. Although we do not have reliable statistics on how many illegal aliens there now are in the United States, estimates range from four to eight million. The Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service estimates that as many as one million jobs are improperly being held by aliens not authorized to work. The adverse impact of these figures is obvious. Moreover, the magnitude of the problem illustrates a great distortion to our immigration policy, probably the most compassionate in the world. In fiscal year 1975, immigration authorities caught about twice as many illegal aliens as the number lawfully admitted that year for permanent residence.

The primary drawing card for aliens seeking to illegally enter the United States is the greater economic opportunity here than in the nations from which the come. These illegal alien workers can successfully compete with American workers as they will often work for lower wages and under unfavorable working conditions. There is simply no way immigration officials can adequately deal with this problem as long as the enticement of employment in the United States remains. We must, therefore, close off these attractive opportunities by first, making it unlawful for an employer to knowingly hire an illegal alien, and second, by providing effective sanctions against employers who choose to violate the law.

I would like to mention several aspects of my proposal. First, a ban on knowingly employing illegal aliens will be less than fully effective without strong and efficient sanctions for violations. Although I share the fear of some that a flat rate civil penalty will not effectively deter some employers, I do not advocate criminal penalties, primarily due to several problems of practical application. I propose that the legislation provide an arsenal of civil penalties, increasing in severity with each additional violation.

A second aspect of this bill I wish to highlight deals with the issue of whether we wish to allow states to also legislate in this field. I believe Congress should not preempt the field, and should say so in the act. Although the adverse impact of illegal alien employment is national in scope, it certainly is more serious in some areas of the country than in others, and is manifested in different job markets in varying geographical areas. Not only can state legislatures better deal with the nuances of the problem within their state, the states can also provide needed enforcement personnel resources to deal with the overall problem. Of course, no state legislation may conflict or be inconsistent with the congressional enactment.

A third aspect of this bill I wish to highlight is one which creates a private course of action for enjoining violations of the ban, in addition to power [for] the government to seek injunction. In view of the enormity of the effort required by the government to deal with the problem which exists, I feel the government should welcome the cooperation of the private sector. Such plaintiffs could include competing businesses, labor unions, private individuals, and others adversely affected by illegal alien employment.

A fourth point I wish to note is a proposal aimed at easing the direct expense to the taxpayer for enforcement of these and other provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act. It has been estimated that any effective attack on illegal alien employment will cost an additional $12 million each year. As a means of attempting to partially hold down the appropriations for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, I suggest that all administrative and civil penalties, such as those assessed for knowingly employing illegal aliens, paid into the Treasury under the act be counted as a credit under the Service's appropriation for that year.

I hope my colleagues will seriously consider this and other proposals which have been made to make available to American workers jobs which have been illegally taken by violators of our immigration laws. ■

Congressional Record - Senate

July 18, 1981

S 7543,7544

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the social contract press quarterly journal public issues policy environment human population immigration international migration language culture assimilation

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The Case Against Amnesty for Illegal Aliens

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Mr. East. Mr. President, for almost a decade illegal immigration to our country has been out of control. Reliable estimates now place the annual influx of illegal aliens at over 1 million. Sadly, Congress has failed to act to defend our national sovereignty and the future of our citizens.

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This article is against amnesty. It describes how even if amnesty is allowed and certain laws are placed on it, people will still find a way around these laws. Amnesty will encourage even more illegal immigrants to come into the USA and we will have way to many to handle; we will be letting almost anyone become a citizen.

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This cartoon is against amnesty. It shows how foolish this new bill looks and it makes it way too easy to get into the US that it is bringing in even more illegals.

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This article argues against amnesty. The amount of all these illegal immigrants will put a huge financial burden on the US and their tax payers.

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Jim DeMint is president and Robert Rector is a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation.

The economist Milton Friedman warned that the United States cannot have open borders and an extensive welfare state. He was right, and his reasoning extends to amnesty for the more than 11 million unlawful immigrants in this country. In addition to being unfair to those who follow the law and encouraging more unlawful immigration in the future, amnesty has a substantial price tag.

An exhaustive study by the Heritage Foundation has found that after amnesty, current unlawful immigrants would receive $9.4 trillion in government benefits and services and pay more than $3 trillion in taxes over their lifetimes. That leaves a net fiscal deficit (benefits minus taxes) of $6.3 trillion. That deficit would have to be financed by increasing the government debt or raising taxes on U.S. citizens.

For centuries immigration has been vital to our nation's health, and it will be essential to our future success. Yet immigrants should come to our nation lawfully and should not impose additional fiscal costs on our overburdened taxpayers. An efficient and merit-based system would help our economy and lessen the burden on taxpayers, strengthening our nation.

A properly structured lawful immigration system holds the potential to drive positive economic growth and job creation. But amnesty for those here unlawfully is not necessary to capture those benefits.

We estimate that when those who broke our laws to come here start having access to the same benefits as citizens do - as is called for by the Senate "Gang of Eight" immigration bill - the average unlawful immigrant household will receive nearly $3 in benefits for every dollar in taxes paid. The net annual cost is $28,000 per unlawful immigrant household.

Given the U.S. debt of $17 trillion, the fiscal effects detailed in our study should be at the forefront of legislators' minds as they consider immigration reform.

Already, illegal immigrants impose costs on police, hospitals, schools and other services. Putting them on a path to citizenship means that within a few years, they will qualify for the full panoply of government programs: more than 80 means-tested welfare programs, as well as Social Security, Medicare and Obamacare. The lifetime fiscal cost (benefits received minus taxes paid) for the average unlawful immigrant after amnesty would be around $590,000. Who is going to pay that tab?

Our government is now in the business of redistribution. As Nicholas Eberstadt, an economist at the American Enterprise Institute, has pointed out, federal transfer payments, or taking from one American to give to another, grew from 3 percent of spending in 1935 to about two-thirds of all spending in 2010. Adding millions of unlawful immigrants to U.S. programs will have a massive negative fiscal effect.

Our findings are based on empirical research and reflect common sense. Unlawful immigrants have relatively low earning potential because, on average, they have 10th-grade educations and low skills. Heads of households like that, whether from the Midwest or Central America, will receive, on average, about four times as much in government services and benefits as they pay in taxes. Adding millions more to bloated welfare and overburdened entitlement programs would deepen the fiscal hole our country is in.

In addition to costing taxpayers, amnesty is unfair to those who came to this country lawfully. More than 4 million people are waiting to come to the United States lawfully, but our dysfunctional bureaucracy makes it easier to break the law than to follow it.

Our cost estimates are in some ways very conservative: The $6.3 trillion figure does not factor in the waves of unlawful immigrants who could pour into this country hoping for another future amnesty. As scholars at the Heritage Foundation and elsewhere have explained, the comprehensive immigration bill being considered in the Senate differs little from previous empty promises to secure our borders and enforce immigration laws on the books. When amnesty was granted under a similar plan in 1986, there were about 3 million unlawful immigrants; now we have more than 11 million.

Instead of forcing through a complicated, lengthy bill, Congress ought to advance piece-by-piece immigration solutions that enjoy broad support and build trust with the American people. We should move to streamline our legal immigration system, encourage patriotic assimilation to unite new immigrants with America's vibrant civil society, fulfill promises to secure our borders and strengthen workplace enforcement.

We are proudly a nation of immigrants. People the world over are attracted to the United States because we are a nation of laws. Granting amnesty to those who broke the law and putting them on a path to citizenship would be unfair, would encourage more bad behavior and would impose significant costs on American families.

Read more from PostOpinions:

Charles Krauthammer: In immigration deal, a trigger and a poison pill

Jennifer Rubin: Conservative groups slam new immigration study

Greg Sargent: The right's last stand against immigration reform?

Editorial: Conservative backlash threatens immigration reform

Michael Chertoff: Obama's immigration agenda

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Amnesty for illegal immigrants will cost America

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Jim DeMint is president and Robert Rector is a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation. The economist Milton Friedman warned that the United States cannot have open borders and an extensive welfare state. He was right, and his reasoning extends to amnesty for the more than 11 million unlawful immigrants in this country.

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This article states reasons against amnesty that you can use. It also states that democrats just want this bill to pass because it will increase their popularity and create friction between the Republicans. this article gives reasons like the USA has less jobs as it is, this kind of plan failed before, and we do not have enough money to support them.

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As you may have heard, after more than a year of giving little more than lip service to illegal immigration, the Democrats have suddenly become extremely interested in pushing comprehensive immigration reform. This is quite curious in that the bill almost assuredly cannot pass.

A year ago, when I interviewed Roy Beck, head of Numbers USA, he didn't think that they had the votes:

Just look at the Senate. It looks like there's going to be a good chance that the Senate is going to have 59 Democrats. ...There were about 15 Democrats who voted against the amnesty in 2007. I think we ought to get about half of those and maybe more. If you got 8 Democrats to vote against it, that means you'd need 9 Republicans. I don't see it. At most, I see 6 and they might not get but 2 or 3 -- especially if they offend McCain.

...I don't think Pelosi thinks she has the votes. ...She goes out and makes statements that get all of us all upset and gets her applause from the Hispanic caucus. But ...there were right around 50 Democrats who co-sponsored the SAVE ACT last year, which was a very, very strong enforcement bill. This amnesty will not have nearly the strength of that. I think one of the reasons that those Democrats signed that bill is that they're from districts whose constituents are pushing them hard on this. So, I think we'd have a good chance to get 60-70 Democrats in the House to vote against that and I don't think we ought to lose more than a half dozen Republicans. If we did that well, then we'd beat it in the House.

Keep in mind that since then, in large part because of health care and deficit spending, the political environment has become absolutely poisonous for Democrats. There are plenty of predictions that the Democrats will lose the House, only Democrats in bluest districts can feel completely safe, and make no mistake about it: comprehensive immigration reform would be about as popular as Barack Obama at a Tea Party.

So, why would the Democrats consider pushing the bill at all if it won't pass? There are probably two reasons for it.

One, they're hoping that it'll fire up the Democrats' Hispanic base, which is an iffy proposition to begin with. Although Hispanic Americans do tend to be pro-illegal immigration, polls show that for the most part, it's not one of their biggest issues. Still, the Democrats have made a lot of promises and some Hispanic liberals are starting to get antsy. For example, Rep. Luis Gutierrez (Ill.) has been threatening to encourage Hispanic Americans to "stay home" on election day to punish Democrats for not pushing amnesty.

Plus, as an extra added bonus, Republicans fought each other like rabid wolverines over the issue last time and the Democrats will be hoping for a repeat while they scream "racist," "nativist," and "bigot" from the sidelines. In other words, this probably has a lot more to do with politics than policy.
So, since that's the case, how do we fight this bill? We fight it by playing it smart, not tearing each other to shreds, and by sticking with the arguments that will have the most resonance in the 2010 election.
#1) We need "security first." Even John McCain, the man who led the fight for comprehensive immigration reform last time around, has since admitted that the American people don't believe we'll secure the border.

Incidentally, there's good reason for that. For example, the Obama Administration has announced that the border fence which was begun by the Bush Administration won't be "finished until at least 2016." So, if we're lucky, in 2016, 15 years after 9/11, we may for the first time have a secure border that terrorists can't just walk over with a nuclear bomb. That'll be great, won't it?

Tell you what: let's stop putting the cart before the horse. Let's finish the fence, adequately staff the border patrol, get a proven system in place to prevent illegal aliens from being able to get jobs with fake Social Security numbers and then and only then, we can come back and discuss the whole "path to citizenship" issue. If that's too long to wait for the illegal immigrants, then they can always just go home.

#2) Jobs, jobs, jobs. Amnesty for illegals: It's for those times when you have a 9.7% unemployment rate & want to take even more jobs from Americans. When so many people are out of work and having trouble taking care of their families, why in the world would anyone want to give away American jobs and drive down American wages? How out of touch with what's going on in this country do you have to be to want to hand American jobs to foreigners via amnesty when so many people are hurting?

#3) We're too broke for an amnesty. As is, 47 percent of Americans are paying no income taxes. Do we really need to add to their ranks -- and let's not kid ourselves because that's what we're talking about.

Point being, if 47 percent of Americans aren't paying income taxes, how many illegals, most of whom have low paying jobs, would be paying income taxes if they became citizens? 10%? 20%? In other words, when the country is broke, why do we want to bring in millions more people to collect food stamps, welfare, and earned income tax credits even though they don't pay income tax? Are we so short of Americans who do that sort of thing that we actually need to bring in poor people from other parts of the globe to take advantage of our social safety net?

#4) Amnesty is unfair to immigrants. Nobody has been treated worse in the whole amnesty debate than legal immigrants. They love and respect this country enough to obey the rules -- and what do they get in return? Oftentimes, they have to wait in their home country. They fill out reams of paperwork. They pay thousands of dollars in legal fees.
Then what happens? They're spoken of in the same breath as some guy who snuck into our country in the middle of the night and stole somebody's Social Security number. Furthermore, despite all the rhetoric to the contrary, illegals are going to be rewarded for breaking American laws while legal immigrants have to put up with the same old hassles. What's the message to legal immigrants? The message is, "You're stupid for loving and respecting this country enough to obey our laws." Legal immigrants to this country deserve to be treated better than that.

#5) We've already tried this once before. It didn't work then and it won't work now. As former Reagan Attorney General Ed Meese has noted, we've already tried this once during the Reagan Administration.

They allowed roughly 2.7 million illegal aliens to become citizens and in exchange, we were supposed to implement security measures to fix the system. Guess what? We never fixed the security problem and today, we're talking about giving citizenship to roughly 4 times as many illegals.

So, why would anyone who actually wants to solve the problem suggest implementing a government policy that's already a proven failure? Of course, that's just it: What politicians want is more illegal workers to pad the bottom lines of businesses that give them campaign contributions and more potential voters for the Democratic Party. What they don't want is to fix the problem because they're worried about what's good for them personally, not what's good for the country.

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Five Arguments Republicans Should Use Against Obama's Immigration Bill

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As you may have heard, after more than a year of giving little more than lip service to illegal immigration, the Democrats have suddenly become extremely interested in pushing comprehensive immigration reform . This is quite curious in that the bill almost assuredly cannot pass.

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This article shows a negative view on amnesty. They argue that illegal is illegal; these people know what they're doing and chose to disobey the law still. Also, this article states that the founding fathers of the USA fought for their rights, and maybe these people should have done that in their own home country.

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An argument against amnesty

Shaaya Ellis | Tuesday, February 5, 2013

Last week a bipartisan group of United States senators unveiled an outline suggesting ways to fix our countries illegal immigration problem.
Sen. Chuck Schumer, who leads this crusade, said: "This plan introduces a tough but fair path to citizenship for illegal immigrants currently living in the United States that is contingent upon securing our borders, reforms our current immigration system that will better recognize the importance of characteristics that will help build the American economy and strengthen American families, establishes an effective employment verification system that will prevent identity theft and end the hiring of future unauthorized workers and lastly establishes an approved process of admitting future worker to serve of nations workforce needs while simultaneously protecting all workers."

While these suggestions for immigration reform are cogent and reasonable, it is a clear contradiction to this nation's values to grant amnesty to those who willfully and knowingly broke the law.

Firstly, all illegal immigrants are criminals in that none of them are innocent of breaking the law. All who come here illegally consciously and intentionally break the law. For our public servants to grant them citizenship undermines the oath of office they took to protect and defend our fair country from enemies foreign and domestic.

Secondly, if you are here illegally, first and foremost you are breaking the law. This means all those here illegally are entitled to nothing: No vote, no say, no services, no opinion, no status, no right to work etc. There are provisions to seek and gain citizenship, legally. Maybe if illegals had remained in their own country and fought for change and worked towards improving their own countries, maybe their native countries would be better. Our founding fathers put their very lives on the line as do our service men and women throughout history to attain and keep the freedoms we have earned. Our taxes help to support this country, and it's services should only go to the citizens of this country. Granting amnesty to those who continue to usurp the rule of law is not fair to the citizens who work and pay their taxes.

Thirdly, it is unfair to allow those who have willfully and intentionally broken our nation's immigration laws to, in essence, cut in front of those across the world who have been patiently and legally waiting their turn to become U.S. citizens. To let those who came here illegally continue to reside in our nation undermines the integrity of our country and does a disservice to those who abide by the law.

Finally, if we are serious about achieving solving our illegal immigration problem, then we must imprison and apprehend the lawbreakers who come to this country illegally. This would send a concise and direct message to those who come here illegally.

Likewise, those here illegally can deport themselves if they find that coming to America illegally is a serious crime and that the taxpayers will no longer foot the bill for their medical care, education and other welfare amenities.

Furthermore, if we are deeply committed to achieving real immigration reform, the border is going to need much more stringent security. Failing to secure our border costs the taxpayers in many ways. Schools become overcrowded, medical resources are stretched too thin, other government services are overtaxed and taxes increase further. Granting amnesty to those who deliberately break the law not only is economically burdensome, but it is also an injustice.

Shaaya Ellis is a sophomore political science major with a classics minor. He can be contacted at [email protected]

The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.

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An argument against amnesty // The Observer

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Last week a bipartisan group of United States senators unveiled an outline suggesting ways to fix our countries illegal immigration problem. Sen.