U.S. Immigration Reform Likely In 2007

Oxford Analytica


U.S. Immigration Reform Likely In 2007

Oxford Analytica 10.18.06, 6:00 AM ET


Immigration reform legislation has failed to pass this year. Yet the need for comprehensive reform remains acute.

There is no definitive data on how many undocumented immigrants are present in the U.S. The most reliable estimates assume that there are between 8 million and 12 million families. The scale of these numbers is striking when related to the U.S. labor force. From 1999 to 2005, 4.1 million workers are estimated to have arrived from abroad, or approximately 86% of the net increase in the total number of employed persons over the same period.

This onward march of immigration poses policy challenges that lawmakers have repeatedly failed to address:

1. Economic challenges. Employers, native-born workers and immigrant workers have different interests:

-- Business leaders have cautioned against excessive restrictions on immigrants. Employers seem to be eschewing native-born workers in favor of new immigrant workers.

-- Labor unions have dropped their historical opposition to immigration, but still fear that cheap immigrant workers displace U.S.-born workers.

-- President George Bush has sought to address continued high employer demand for immigrant labor, backing a "guest worker" program for temporary migrants.

2. Political challenges. Immigrants form an increasingly significant interest group in U.S. politics, but the political debate has become increasingly polarized:

-- Hundreds of thousands of mostly Hispanic immigrants staged demonstrations this spring to protest against new immigration enforcement measures being considered in Congress.

-- Some House Republicans have called for strict policies to deport new "illegal aliens" and oppose any sort of amnesty for longtime undocumented residents.

-- Bush, many Democrats and some business-oriented Republicans favor a system of managed migration.

3. Security challenges. The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks have transformed immigration into a security issue, with significant policy ramifications:

-- Security concerns have fueled calls to strengthen the physical barriers against immigrants along the Mexican border, and to impose new registration requirements on immigrants along both the northern and southern frontiers.

-- Immigration is now a responsibility of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, headed by the assistant secretary who directs the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency. The agency has introduced a voluntary Basic Pilot Employment Verification Program, a federal database through which companies can determine the validity of employees' identification documents.

-- Employers face increasing scrutiny about their employees' legal status.

-- The White House has faced intense pressure from some Republicans to toughen immigration laws and deport migrants on the grounds that they constitute a security threat.

One factor that complicates the immigration debate is that the interests and cleavages associated with the issue do not follow strict partisan lines. Both major parties have significant, historically entrenched, internal divisions over immigration policy:

1. Republican disunity. The interests and aims of populist Republicans are at odds with employers who depend on low-wage immigrant employees.

2. Democratic infighting. Historically, trade unions have been hostile to mass immigration. This resistance has declined in the last decade, but union Democrats favor only modest immigration numbers. More liberal and civil-rights-minded Democrats have promoted an open and reform-oriented approach to immigration.

The failed reform effort this year was designed to overcome the deep divisions on immigration within and between the two parties.

However, the reform effort stalled for two reasons:

-- Ideological chasm. The division between lawmakers who opposed any sort of amnesty and those who wished to promote some mechanism for transforming illegal immigrants into legal residents was too great to overcome.

-- Institutional barriers. Institutionally, the structure of the U.S. legislative process favors inertia over reform. The political system, in effect, gives a veto to sufficiently determined interests.

Reform has become more difficult, because the Bush presidency has presided over a deeply polarized political system. However, comprehensive immigration reform will re-emerge as a major issue in 2007, due to:

-- the sheer numbers of illegal immigrants and the cost of maintaining a border security policy to exclude them;

-- the overwhelming desire, on the part of the business community, for legal clarity and an adequate supply of personnel; and

-- the political prize of winning the rapidly expanding Hispanic population's electoral support.

While entrenched interests have blocked progress on immigration, a desire to clarify the legal status of millions of U.S. residents, and the demands of the business community, will give the issue legislative impetus. The next Congress is likely to enact comprehensive immigration reform.