Jay Mcfarland's Immigration Plan as Published 16 Months ago

An Immigration Plan that Just Might Have a Chance

Once again the United States Congress has set about righting all wrongs when it comes to the issue of Illegal Immigration. Yet somehow I’m quite confident that this attempt will yield the same result as all of the previous attempts. Immigrants will continue to flood our borders, if not to a greater extent, and the people of the United States will continue to complain about the ever growing problem. The unfortunate reality is that our current representatives love band aids and truly seem to have little understanding regarding the overall scope of the problem. Either that or they just don’t care about the will of the people. Many of these representatives support some type of amnesty with little increase in security on the border, while others believe that all offenders should be rounded up and shipped out regardless of employment status or length of residency within our borders. Neither of these solutions will work. Instead, we need to implement a comprehensive strategy that requires reform and action on the part of multiple organizations. All of which have the greatest impact upon the influx of illegal labor to this nation. These groups are: A) The Immigrants that are currently in the United States; B) Those companies and individuals that employ illegal labor; C) The United States Government; D) Local Governments; E) Mexico. Any immigration reform must require action on the part of each of these groups or the plan will fail. The following is a brief summary of the role that each organization must play in order to achieve true results.

A. The Immigrants Currently in the United States

Trying to decide how to deal with those immigrants that currently reside in this nation is perhaps the most difficult part of the equation. I believe that if they are currently employed, have current residency, and are free of any criminal activity that they should be allowed to stay provided that they remain employed, file yearly tax returns, follow all laws and regulations, and that they pay a punitive fee for the laws that they have broken. This fee would not be small and it would be deducted from their paychecks each pay period and the funds generated would be used to offset the costs that illegal immigration has thrust upon our society. Any criminal activity will result in the prescribed jail time followed by deportation.

I also believe that these immigrants should be given the opportunity to become citizens of this country over time which will be the best incentive to stay on track. We do not need a group of permanent 2nd class citizens who have little hope in participating in the American dream.

B. The Employers

Currently our government provides a loophole for every employer in America. When hiring a new employee companies are only required to see employment documentation such as social security cards and then photocopy them. There is no requirement to verify if these documents are false or not. This loophole in itself has given rise to a black market of falsified documents that are available to every illegal immigrant. Once they have purchased these documents immigrants are free to work for any company that is willing to hire them and these companies cannot be held liable for hiring illegal labor.

The solution to this problem is actually quite simple and in fact there is already a pilot program in many states to test it out. Employers would simply log into a National Government Database and verify an applicant’s work status and whether or not these documents are authentic. Once a search has been completed the government would issue a confirmation number which would have to be submitted at the end of each year with the tax information that a company currently has to file annually. For any employee that does not have a confirmation number the company would face a hefty fine. Random audits would be done to keep employers honest.

If this system were implemented today millions of employees would immediately be identified as having used fake documentation which is a crime. These employees would be given the opportunity to apply for the worker status as described above under their true identity. Those unwilling to do so would be deported without question. After the initial search for any current employees an applicant that tries to apply for work using falsified documents in the future would be placed under arrest and then face the consequences of committing this type of crime.

C. The United States Government

Obviously, the first thing that the government needs to do is implement an aggressive and comprehensive immigration reform bill such as the one described here. Beyond that the U.S. must do a better job of controlling the borders. Any type of amnesty or worker program that is implemented without securing the borders will result in floods of additional immigrants seeking these programs. Again, to provide a guest worker program without securing the borders is an open invitation to “come on over and enjoy the good life” in the United States. Not to mention the obvious dangers that unsecured borders present when it comes to homeland security and the war on terror.

Secondly, the U.S. must make the country of Mexico stand up and pay attention to this problem. This can be done by taxing all monies transferred from the United States to Mexico from Immigrants until Mexico secures its side of the border in a satisfactory manner. These monies can be used to pay for increased security and to offset the cost of immigration on our society.

Since the number one source of revenue in Mexico is monies sent from immigrants back to family members in Mexico I’m quite confident that a tax on these funds would get the immediate attention of Vicente Fox.

D. Local Governments

Local governments must be empowered to act when they encounter an illegal immigrant by taking them into custody and handing them over to the proper authorities. Unless this happens illegal immigrants will have little fear about living their daily lives in public because they will know that even if they are detained they will not be deported.

E. Mexico

Mexico simply must be required to enforce its side of the border. As I stated earlier this can be done by taxing any funds transferred into Mexico from the U.S. as well as through sanctions or trade embargos. Hitting them in their wallets will be by far the quickest and easiest solution. Mexico simply cannot be allowed to continue with the status quo.

Conclusion

The bottom line is that implementing any one of these programs alone, without all of the others will result in failure. We simply cannot allow our representatives to place a band aid on the problem one more time and hope that a future generation solves the problem. Whether or not we hold our representatives accountable to our will is a subject for another show.

As always, I would love to hear your ideas and solutions that perhaps can add to this plan. Please send your thoughts to jmmcfarland@cbs.com.

Jay Mcfarland