Bush's Immigration Enforcement: Epic Failure

Posted by Paco Fabian, AlterNet at 12:18 PM on April 1, 2009.

Editor's note: this is cross-posted from the America's Voice blog ...

Today we're releasing a new report that outlines in stark detail why the Bush Administration had it backwards when it came to immigration enforcement. 

The report finds that in three key areas- immigration law enforcement, labor law enforcement, and support for state and local police- the Bush Administration focused its resources on undocumented workers rather than high value targets like unscrupulous employers and dangerous criminals. 

Two years ago, then-Secretary of DHS, Michael Chertoff, promised to crack down on unscrupulous employers, saying:

"[The] days of treating employers who violate these laws by giving them the equivalent of a corporate parking ticket -- those days are gone. It's now felonies, jail time, fines and forfeitures." 

Well, the new report shows that in 2007, the same year Chertoff made his claim, 98% of all workplace immigration arrests and 89% of all workplace criminal arrests were of undocumented workers, rather than their employers.  The following year, 2008, was more of the same - 98% of all workplace immigration arrests and 87% of workplace criminal arrests that year were of the worker, not the employer. 

In case we've forgotten, these aren't just abstract statistics. 

Remember the raid in Postville, Iowa and the human toll borne by hundreds of families, entire communities torn apart? That was the consequence and cost of the Bush recipe for enforcement without first fixing the immigration mess.

The report also shows how the Bush Administration slashed funding for programs to assist state and local police in fighting crime, like COPS, and instead directed money toward expanding state and local role in civil immigration enforcement.  Not only did this empower the Sherriff Joe Arpaios of the world to engage in racial profiling, but it hurt general crime-fighting efforts in these communities.  As Montgomery County, MD Police Chief J. Thomas Manger recently stated in testimony before the House Homeland Security Committee:

Immigration enforcement by local police would likely negatively affect and undermine the level of trust and cooperation between local police and immigrant communities.

Thankfully, the Obama Administration and Secretary Napolitano of DHS have a chance to fix these misplaced priorities and to direct enforcement efforts at the right targets - the truly bad actors. 

If recent news reports are any indication, the Obama Administration may learn from its predecessor's mistakes.  The Los Angeles Times reported that the Administration will focus ICE enforcement efforts against bad actor employers, quoting a DHS official saying they will focus "on using our limited resources to the greatest effect, targeting criminal aliens and employers that flout our laws and deliberately cultivate an illegal workforce."

Spencer Hsu of the Washington Post also highlighted the possible new focus reports:

Napolitano has sought to chart a middle course by ordering a review of which immigrants are targeted for arrest. While a policy is still under development, Napolitano has said she intends to focus more on prosecuting criminal cases of wrongdoing by companies. Analysts say they also think ICE may conduct fewer raids, focusing routine enforcement on civil infractions of worker eligibility verification rules.

Part of a comprehensive fix to our broken immigration system certainly involves enforcement, that is not the issue.  The issue, as the report lays out, is that real crime and real criminals should be in the cross-hairs, not the undocumented workers seeking a better life. 

The Obama Administration needs to make good on their promise to reform our broken immigration laws and to adopt smart enforcement strategies that target the truly bad actors.  

To not do so would be to repeat the Bush administration's epic fail when it comes to immigration, and we all know how well that turned out.

Tagged as: bush, immigration, ice, enforcement