Immigration Reform
Wednesday, April 5, 2006
Printable FormatSenator Obama discusses the debate currently going on in the Senate over comprehensive immigration reform.
"It behooves us to remember that not every single immigrant who came into the United States through Ellis Island had proper documentation. Not every one of our grandparents or great-grandparents would have necessarily qualified for legal immigration. But they came here in search of a dream, in search of hope. Americans understand that, and they are willing to give an opportunity to those who are already here, as long as we get serious about making sure that our borders actually mean something."
Podcast Transcript:
Hello, this is Senator Barack Obama, and today is Wednesday, April 5, 2006.
Many of you, I'm sure, are following the enormous debate that is taking place here in Washington, and all across the country on the issue of immigration. I think that this is one of those issues that touches on questions of morality, questions of law, and our identity as Americans.
Like millions of Americans, the immigrant story is my story. My father came here from Kenya, that's where I got my name, and although he never became a US citizen, I understand, I think, what it means for people to come to this country in search for a better life. I represent a state where immigrant communities ranging from Mexican to Polish to Irish to Armenian, enrich our cities, make our neighborhoods. So, I understand what it means for people to come to the United States in search of a better life. I also understand that we are going to have to fix what is essentially a broken system.
When Congress first addressed this issue, comprehensively in 1986, there were about four million illegal immigrants living in the US. That number has grown substantially. Today, it is estimated that there are more than eleven million undocumented aliens living in our country. Now, the American people are a welcoming people, they are a generous people, but they have legitimate worries about a porous border in which people are living here without documentation, and not subject to the law, living in the shadows. Obviously, that circumstance is not particularly good for those undocumented workers, either. It puts them in a position where they can be exploited by employers, they don't have legal rights. If they have an accident, if their child gets sick, they may not avail themselves for government services in fear that it might lead to deportation. So, it is bad for them, and it is bad for us. We've got to fix the system.
The debate in Washington right now, essentially centers on a couple of things. Number one, everybody uniformly believes that we have to improve border security. Almost everybody believes that have to have some sort of virtual wall across our borders that will limit the enormous influx, thousands of people, who are coming through places like Arizona with impunity every day, often at great risk to themselves. So, that means we have to have more border patrols, we have to have unmanned drones that are surveying the area. We've got to have better detention centers so that you don't essentially have a situation where you are catching people, and then immediately releasing them because there's no place to hold them. Most importantly you have to have a virtual wall that's built where employers essentially have to see a tamper proof identification card in order for them to hire workers, and we've got to enforce that so that if employers are taking advantage of illegal immigrants, they pay a serious fine, and there are consequences to it. We've got employers right now who actually call into Mexico and say, "I need 500 workers, I don't want to pay the workers in the area where my plant is located the minimum wage," and essentially use illegal workers as a way of undermining health safety protection laws, minimum wage, and so forth.
So, border security is something that, uniformly, I think, people are concerned about. There are those like Representative Sensenbrenner in the House that have gone about it in the wrong way. They think that the way to deal with border security is to criminalize illegal immigrants, and criminalize those that might provide them with assistance. I think that is an impractical, dopey idea. The notion that you are going to have police officers that are snatching folks out of their homes, tearing them away from their families, instead of catching drug dealers and gang bangers is not where the American people are at.
The most serious debate that we have right now has to do with, even if we seal our borders, what do we do with the eleven to twelve million people that are already here. There are those that would argue they should all be deported. If they want to apply for citizenship, they should have to go back to their country of origin, and then they can reapply. That is not realistic. We have no way of deporting eleven to twelve million people. They will not leave voluntarily. If they came here, enduring incredible hardship, and have been living this long in this country without legal documentation. The notion that somehow by passing this law they are immediately going to report to authorities and allow themselves to be deported, just doesn't make sense, and we don't have the capacity to enforce such an approach.
What we can do, is bring them out of the shadows by putting them on a pathway to citizenship. The proposal that is on the floor right now essentially says, "Look, you broke our laws, you've got to pay a penalty for that, you've got to pay a fine, you have to go to the back of the line, you have to go through ten steps over the course of eleven years, but if you do all those things, if you show that you are committed to being a US citizen, then in fact you can stay here, work, raise your families." People call that amnesty, my attitude is, anything that requires people to jump through eleven years worth of hoops, is not amnesty. Anything that requires them to pay fines, and to learn English, and to maintain a job, and a host of other requirements, that's not amnesty; it's an earned pathway to citizenship. Whether we can get a bill like that passed, I don't know. I'm speaking to you mid-week, and there is enormous resistance on the part of some members of the Republican Party, to be honest there's some concerns within the Democratic Party about one more component of the bill which has to do with a guest worker program, essentially allowing four hundred thousand guest workers to come into the United States, even though they would never have the opportunity for citizenship, similar to the agricultural worker visas that are granted currently. There are legitimate concerns on the part of some, including myself, that this is a way for corporations to avoid a unionized workforce, or a workforce that has the ability to demand proper wages and benefits. Nevertheless, there is a feeling that if we can at least provide for some of these guest workers to come in, they may not want citizenship; they may simply want the opportunity to work here, and then go home.
These are debates that we are having. My hope is that we come up with a comprehensive bill. My bottom line is that we have to have our borders sealed, but we also have to treat humanely the people that are already here. It is important, I think, for all of us to remember that not every single immigrant who came into this country through Ellis Island had proper documentation. Not every one of our grandparents or great-grandparents would have necessarily qualified for legal immigration, but they did come here in search of a dream, in search of hope. And Americans, I think, understand that, they are willing to give an opportunity to those who are already here; as long as we get serious about making sure that our borders mean something. Today's immigrants are following the same path. We would do them and ourselves a disservice if we don't recognize the contributions of those individuals. We also fail to protect our nation if we don't regain control of our immigration system immediately. So, thank you so much for listening as always, and I look forward to talking to you next week. Bye bye.