Quotes from Organizations
0-9
9/11 Commission
See FAIR’s issue brief Immigration-Related Findings of the 9/11 Commission.
A
African American Leadership Council — S.744 comprehensive immigration bill
(Frank Morris, Council leader)
“The Senate Gang of Eight’s immigration bill is not only impractical, but immoral. Increasing immigration levels through amnesty and new visa programs, particularly at the low-skilled level, will flood the labor market with millions more people, leading to higher unemployment, more poverty, and a lower standard of living for many in the black community.”
(Council press release April 23, 2013)
C
Citizenship and Immigration Services Council of the American Federation of Government Employees
“As S.744 is currently structured, it provides for a massive increase in the flow of CIS [Citizenship and Immigration Services] casework while making no reforms to our broken adjudications process. The result is predictable: if passed, S.744 would lead to the rubber-stamping of millions of applications for both amnesty and future admissions, putting the public safety and the taxpayer at risk. …I would urge you to remove all of the provisions in S. 744 that make it even more difficult for adjudicators to deny applications and to initiate removal proceedings and to replace them with provisions that enhance our ability to investigate fraud and criminal activity, which is now widely overlooked.
(Council president, Kenneth Palinkas, open letter to Gang of 8 Senators, June 5, 2013)
Christian Coalition
(Heidi H. Stirrup, Director of Government Relations)
“We agree that a tightly controlled, well-regulated system of legal immigration, like the one we have now, is essential to the security of this country. But scaling back the ability of Americans to reunite with their families will not improve national security, and could severely damage the American family.”
(Letter to Members of Congress, March 20, 1996)
Council on Sustainable Development, Population and Consumption Task Force
(An advisory body established by President Clinton)
“This is a sensitive issue, but reducing immigration levels is a necessary part of population stabilization and the drive toward sustainability….
POPULATION POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS: …
Develop immigration and foreign policies that reduce illegal immigration, while researching the links between demographic change and sustainable development.” (Population and Consumption Task Force Report, 1966)
Council of Economic Advisers
“Several factors have contributed to widening [income] inequality. One major factor is increasing returns to education and experience…In addition to rapidly increasing demand for educated labor, two institutional factors seem to have contributed to rising wage inequality: the decline of unions and the erosion of the minimum wage by inflation…. Immigration has increased the relative supply of less educated labor and appears to have contributed to the increasing inequality of income, but the effect has been small. A study of the effects of immigration between 1980 and 1988 found that it explains less than 1 percent of the change in the college-high school wage differential. Although immigration flows were considerably larger in the late 1980s than the early 1980s, this study makes it seem unlikely that immigration could explain more than a few percent of the total change in this differential.” (pp. 117-121)
(1993 Annual Report to the President, Feb. 4, 1994 ISBN 0-16-043028-3, GPO, Washington, DC
G
Global 2000 Report to the President
Hudson Institute
“Increased demand for highly skilled workers, combined with an aging labor force, has already created shortages of skilled workers, shortages that are likely to grow for many years. At the same time, many low skilled workers are having increasing difficulty finding employment.” (p.1)
(“Workforce 2000: Work and Workers for the Twenty-first Century,” U.S. Dept. Labor, date ?)
I
INS statements
“At the national level, INS will continue to meet with and solicit input from organizations and individuals that represent community-focussed interests, including (but not limited to) groups such as … the Federation for American Immigration Reform…”
[Other named organizations were: “…Amnesty International, the National Council of La Raza, the National Asian and Pacific Legal Consortium, the American Friends Service Committee, Human Rights Watch,… Consular and Immigration Officials from Mexico, Canada, and other countries; other federal agencies, and officials of state and local governments.”]
(INS — “FY 2000 Annual Performance Plan,” July 1988)
“[There is a tendency to focus on border enforcement because of a] unique coalition of special interest groups that join together and influence both political parties against effective interior enforcement — and specifically work site enforcement and employer sanctions.” (“INS Senior Official,” Migration News, Jan. 1999)
Izzak Walton League
“…we must be forthright in identifying immigration reforms as part of our goal to stabilize global and national populations. An increasing population, regardless of the reason for the increase, uses more resources and produces more pollution. Those interested in the conservation of natural resources and the protection of ecological systems for all people must be free to discuss immigration issues from this perspective, without the fear of being labeled racist or bigoted.”
(Newsletter of the League’s Carrying Capacity Project — “Environments for Life,” Winter 1994)
N
National ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) Council — on amnesty legislation and immigration benefit fraud
“Enforcement is not a dirty word. Enforcement saves lives.”
(Chris Crane, Border Patrol Council head at House Judiciary Cte. Hearing, May 22, 2013)
“Law making in our nation has indeed taken a strange twist as Senators invite illegal aliens to testify before Congress and groups representing illegal aliens are brought into the development of our nation’s laws, but American citizens working as law enforcement officers within our nation’s broken immigration system are purposely excluded from the process and prohibited from providing input. Never before have I seen such contempt for law enforcement officers as what I’ve seen from the Gang of 8.”
(Chris Crane, Council president, Townhall.com, April 22, 2013)
“Every American should brace themselves for a piece of legislation from the Gang of 8 that, despite a lot of window dressing, will fail to do anything other than provide for amnesty and doom the US to a constant flow of illegal immigration. My promise to America is if we don’t have enforcement first — including both a secure border and robust interior enforcement — enforcement will never happen at all. We will be back here in ten years discussing the next amnesty.”
(Chris Crane, President, press release, April 12, 2013)
“Our politically appointed leaders, DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano and ICE Director John Morton, do not speak for us when it comes to enforcing the law. Secretary Napolitano and Director Morton have repeatedly undermined the ability of our officers to enforce and protect the public safety. We believe the first priority of Congress ought to be ensuring that the immigration laws it has already passed are enforced. A mass legalization, or amnesty, of millions of illegal aliens, combined with an increase in future immigration, will have profound consequences for every law enforcement officer in the country and especially those who enforce our nation’s immigration laws.”
(Council president Chris Crane, Press Release, March 22, 2013)
“Our politically appointed leaders, DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano and ICE Director John Morton, do not speak for us when it comes to enforcing the law. Secretary Napolitano and Director Morton have repeatedly undermined the ability of our officers to enforce and protect the public safety. We believe the first priority of Congress ought to be ensuring that the immigration laws it has already passed are enforced. A mass legalization, or amnesty, of millions of illegal aliens, combined with an increase in future immigration, will have profound consequences for every law enforcement officer in the country and especially those who enforce our nation’s immigration laws.”
(ICE Agents Union Press Release, March 22, 2013)
“…I spoke with ICE attorneys, citizenship and immigration service employees and supervisors, and ICE employees and supervisors. All voiced strong concerns that immigration fraud is widespread and ignored by the federal agencies tasked with enforcing United States immigration laws. As a rule, when fraud is suspected or confirmed, no action is taken against the alien involved or their attorney. “
(Testimony to House Immigration Subcommittee, July 24, 2012)
New York Times — immigration limits and enforcement
“As a general proposition, the Simpson-Mazzoli bill is at once tough, fair and humane… The United States cannot conceivably let in all the worldwide millions who want in. That means controlling our own borders and that in turn, means something called employer sanctions. Federal law must forbid hiring illegal immigrants and also provide employers with a way to identify who they are. The Simpson-Mazzoli bill would do both. Without being specific, it calls for the gradual development of a limited, reasonable process of identification.”
(NYT editorial “Not Nativist, Not Racist, Not Mean,” Mar. 18, 1982)
Nobel Laureates — The environment
(Signed statement by over 1500 scientists including 99 Nobel Prize laureates)
[Issuing a call, inter alia … for a stabilized population through voluntary family planning.
In presenting the report one signatory said that the consequences of ignoring the major environmental and poverty issues would create a flood of “environmental refugees” into wealthier northern countries which, in turn, would become poorer as a result.
(“World Scientists’ Warning to Humanity,” November 1992)
O
Open Border groups
“Without Mexican farmworkers, legal or not, the rest of us wouldn’t eat. Failure to legislate and enforce fair standards for farmworkers is a conscious policy that takes advantage of problems in other countries. We need to address the pay and conditions faced by farmworkers instead of criminalizing those who put the food on our tables… Why should corporations be allowed to move from place to place, seeking lower wages, while working people are prevented from moving to seek higher wages?… Since the passage of NAFTA, the economy of Mexico has collapsed, with untold thousands driven off their land and thousands of small businesses driven into bankruptcy. Is it any wonder that the desperation resulting from these policies has caused so many people to cross the border into this country, seeking employment?… Immigration policy has not stopped the entry of undocumented workers. It raises their vulnerability, in order to keep them from standing up for their rights.”
(Statement of Alex Pulaski, Northwest Treeplanters and Farmworkers United (NFTW) union [a.k.a., Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste (PCUN) — a union begun in 1985 claiming 4,000 members, half of whom reside year round in Oregon. PCUN is a member organization of CAUSA ‘98.)
(Oregonian, Oct. 30, 1998, “Farm union decries guest-worker hires”)
P
President’s Council on Sustainable Development
“The United States should: Develop a U.S. national population policy that includes attention to issues such as population stabilization … and just, consistent and workable immigration laws.”
(Report commissioned by Pres. Carter in 1977, directed by Gerald O. Barney, published 1980)
R
Real Estate interests
“We expected the new housing market to be considerably smaller because of the baby-bust generation. Luckily, we’re finding that more immigrants are filling the hole. It’s really critical.”
Stanley Duobinis, dir. of forecasting Nat. Assn. Home Builders
(Wall Street Journal, Oct. 10, 1996)
Rockefeller Commission
See U.S. Population Commission
Roman Catholic Church
“The two basic principles of Catholic social teaching are these: 1) all people have the right to emigrate in order to avoid persecution, war and economic deprivation; 2) all people have a corresponding right to immigrate (that is, to be received in a host country), for the same reasons. …The Church’s approach has frequently put it at odds with the prevailing attitudes among nation states which generally conceive of the rights of nations above those of immigrants. That is precisely what Catholic social teaching denies. For it conceives the right to migrate as a prior right rooted in the very nature of persons….”
(Migration World, Vol. 22 #4, 1994, “New Directions in the Catholic Understanding of Immigration Rights” p.30 — Allan Figueroa Deck, S.J. (Assoc. Prof. Th., Loyola Marymount U. L.A., CA)
“We must raise our collective voice to protest this mentality [to restrict access to social services for illegal aliens] and call for a change of heart and a renewed commitment as a nation to solidarity with immigrants and refugees. …For so many decades, the United States welcomed the stranger. …While it is true that no one country can respond totally or take in all those seeking freedom in a new life, the world of nations simply cannot shut its eyes or doors. The most vulnerable in the world — those with nowhere to lay their heads because of persecution or injustice — should not be denied justice, safehaven or a new life.”
(Miami Herald, part 7, “Reform” Nov. ?, 1993)
“The march of Latin Americans to the United States shouldn’t be understood as a wave of anger or revolutionary passion, but more as a peaceful conquest.”
National Catholic Register, Nov. 16, 1986 [citing comment of Father Florencio M. Rigoni, assistant secretary for migration for the Mexican bishops’ conference, in La Jornada, Mexico City]
“…America is a dying nation. I tell the Mexicans when I am down in Mexico to keep on having children, and then to take back what we took from them: California, Texas, Arizona, and then to take the rest of the country as well.” (The Wanderer, St. Paul MN May 6, 1987 [Citing Father Paul Marx, in homily for the International Mother’s Day Walk for Life in Niagara Falls, at St. John the Baptist parish in the suburb of Kenmore.]
S
Select Commission on Immigration and Refugee Policy
“As important as immigration has been and remains to our country, it is no longer possible to say as George Washington did that we welcome all of the oppressed of the world, or as did the poet, Emma Lazarus, that we would take all of the huddled masses yearning to be free… if U.S. immigration policy is to serve this nation’s interests, it must be enforced effectively. This nation has a responsibility to its people — citizens and resident aliens — and failure to enforce immigration law means not living up to that responsibility.”
(“U.S. Immigration Policy and the National Interest,” March 1, 1981, GPO, Washington DC)
T
The Urban Institute
“…despite having one of the most inclusionary immigration policies in the Western world, U.S. immigrant policies — initiatives that are intended to encourage or discourage the integration of newcomers into the society — have been, for the most part, sketchy and laissez faire. As a result, there are few areas of U.S. public policy that evidence so stark a mismatch as our immigration and immigrant policies.
The disjuncture between these policies occurs at a time when immigrants constitute a steadily growing share of the nation’s work force; when many enter the U.S. with low education and job skills and limited ability to speak English; when the number of rewarding low-skilled jobs is rapidly shrinking; and when the effectiveness of our public institutions — most notably the public schools, which have historically integrated newcomer populations — is in decline.”
(Policy and Research Report, Winter/Spring 1993)
Trilateral Commission
“Comprehensive policies…will require a fundamental shift …anchored in a new international imperative, the right of individuals to stay where they are.”
“A broad consensus is developing…that receiving countries must be attentive to pre-refugee, pre-migration circumstances in sending countries…Thus, migration prevention must become a legitimate objective of international diplomacy and national policy.”
(Draft Trilateral Commission Report on Immigration, 1993 [authored by Doris Meissner])
U
U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform — Jordan Commission on unskilled immigration
Commission on Immigration Reform chaired by Hon. Barbara Jordan
“We see little justification for admitting unskilled foreign workers into an economy that must find job opportunities for millions of unskilled U.S. workers.”
“The Commission recommends the elimination of the admission of unskilled workers. Unless there is another compelling interest, such as in the entry of nuclear families and refugees, it is not in the national interest to admit unskilled workers. This is especially true when the U.S. economy is showing difficulty in absorbing disadvantaged workers and when efforts towards welfare reform indicate that many unskilled Americans will be entering the labor force.”
(“Legal Immigration: Setting Priorities,” U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform, 1995.)
U.S. Population Commission
“There is hardly any social problem confronting this Nation whose solution would be easier if our population were larger.”
(Commission Report, Mar. 27, 1972)
“After two years of concentrated effort, we have concluded that, in the long run, no substantial benefits will result from the further growth of the Nation’s population, rather that the gradual stabilization of our population would contribute significantly to the Nation’s ability to solve its problems.”
(Commission Report, Mar. 27, 1972)
United Nations Population Fund
“Nations should also consider the concept of providing temporary sanctuary for refugees while withholding the right to permanent residence, in combination with efforts at successful repatriation.”
“The major source of migrants in Latin America, by far, is Mexico. Estimates based on the 1980 census suggest that of 2.2 million Mexicans enumerated abroad, 99 percent were in the United States. World Bank labour-force estimates suggest that this amounted to 10 per cent of Mexico’s domestic labour force.”
(“The State of World Population — 1993”, News Feature A Special Category: Refugees an Asylum-Seekers)
“In Africa, water scarcity is a major contributor to environmental stress. Population growth plus increased per capita water use have strained national capacity.”
(Resources Environment and Development Review, vol.16 (1990)”Rapid Population Growth and Water Scarcity: The Predicament of Tomorrow’s Africa”, by [Malin] Falkenmark)
[The author calculates that as much as two-thirds of the African population [about 450 million] may be living in ‘water-stressed countries’ by the end of the century. This will severely limit the population carrying capacity of the countries concerned. Without substantial progress to alleviate poverty and reduce rates of population increase, high levels of out-migration seem inevitable.”]
W
Washington Post
Washington Post,(editorial)
“Illegal hiring undermines the vast and expensive government effort to control the borders. Billions have been spent hiring guards, erecting fences and thwarting smugglers. A continuing supply of jobs on the illegal market will keep the undocumented coming. And the competition certainly hurts American workers and those legally in this country not only by closing off entry-level jobs but by holding down wage increases that legal workers might bargain for. Continued defiance of the law merits prosecution. Legal immigration will suffer if the lawbreaking goes unchecked.”
(“Labor, the Law and Chickens,” Washington Post, September 2, 1996)