Immigration Reform Rally 2010 (Photo credit: Anuska Sampedro)
Apart from the fiscal mess, no legislative priority is greater than immigration reform. It should be passed this year, before the president becomes a lame duck, the 2014 midterm elections get in the way and the current bipartisan goodwill on this issue fades.
The last few years have dealt a devastating blow to the arguments used to postpone comprehensive immigration reform — especially the notion that the border needs to be “secured” first.
Immigration has already fallen dramatically. In the case of Mexicans, net immigration had dropped to zero by 2011 and is likely negative by now — meaning more Mexicans are going home than coming to the United States. The result: The number of undocumented Mexicans declined by almost 1 million between 2007 and 2011.
What is the main cause of this? While other factors may be at play, including improving conditions in Mexico, the main reason appears to be the weak economy. People aren’t coming because the U.S. economy is producing too few jobs.
Tightened border security appears to have played little role. Despite a sharp increase in border patrol activities since 2000, including passage of the Security Fence Act of 2006, prior to the 2007 economic collapse the 10 states with the most immigrants saw their undocumented populations rise by half a million. But as soon as the recession set in, the number of illegal entries dropped by two-thirds and requests for H1-B visas — temporary work permits primarily for technology workers — decreased as well. This is consistent with what happened after the bursting of the dot.com bubble in 2000.