Democrats, Business Sacrifice ‘Dreamers’ to Preserve Chain Migration
Democrats pose as ardent champions of the 3 million ‘dreamer’ illegals — but they are deliberately sacrificing the illegals’ interest in a quick and narrow amnesty to instead protect the continued chain-migration inflow of Democratic-leaning voters.
The Party’s chain-before-dreamer choice was made when Democrats rejected President Donald Trump’s four-part Framework offer to amnesty 1.8 million illegals in exchange for a gradual wind-down of the chain migration program which annually brings roughly 350,000 migrants into the United States.
Trump’s requirement for ending chain migration is the major obstacle to a deal. Democrats have largely accepted Trump’s demand for a wall and many also support a partial end to the visa lottery, although many still oppose the border-wall legal reforms sought by Trump.
“Democrats are in a bit of a box because they’ve gotta say ‘No’ to a pathway to citizenship to 1.8 million because they’re upset about chain migration and the diversity lottery,” pro-amnesty Sen. Lindsey Graham said frankly on February 8.
The second-ranking Democrat in the Senate, Sen. Dick Durbin, made the same chain-migration-first statement on February 7, while redefining chain-migration of an immigrant’s siblings, parents, and adult-children as a family “reuniting”:
On the backs of Dreamers, the White House is attempting to radically slash legal immigration by prohibiting American citizens from reuniting with their parents, siblings, and children. This isn’t what America should stand for.
— Senator Dick Durbin (@SenatorDurbin) February 7, 2018
Democrats are being asked to blindly accept the Administration’s proposal to eliminate the diversity visa lottery and drastically limit legal immigration, in order to protect Dreamers. This goes against our nation’s values.
— Dick Durbin (@DickDurbin) February 8, 2018
The Washington Examiner reported February 7 that Sen. Brian Schatz also put chain migration above a dreamer amnesty:
We’re not going to allow draconian permanent changes to the immigration law in exchange for something that they claim to already want...They clearly want to cut the number of legal immigrants in half. That was never contemplated until about three weeks ago, other than by people like [Rep.] Steve King, and we are not seriously contemplating any such compromise.
The cold calculation to favor chain migration over a quick amnesty is shared by House Minority Leader Rep. Nancy Pelosi. She delivered an emotional, eight-hour speech favoring illegals over Americans just as Capitol Hill leaders announced a cross-party budget deal which gave up the Democrats’ political leverage in amnesty politics.
The Democrats’ choice to put chain-immigration above an amnesty shows that the ‘dreamers’ are merely theatrical props for the Democrats’ self-serving immigration strategy, said Jessica Vaughan, policy director at the Center for Immigration Studies.
If the young illegals were organized to serve their interests, they could endorse an amnesty-for-reform deal with Trump and the GOP, she said. But they cannot make that deal because “they’ve lashed themselves to the progressives and they cannot untie the knot,” she said. Without the ability to make a deal for themselves, “they’re nothing but props for the Democrats.”
Chain migration is prioritized by Democrats because it brings in several hundred thousand Democratic-dependent voters each year, allowing them to slowly turn red states into blue strongholds, such as California. That motivation was recently acknowledged by the influential progressive writer, John Judis:
There is … [a] political dimension to the argument about immigration that is voiced by leading Democrats and Republicans. It is that continuing large-scale immigration of unskilled workers will help the Democrats politically and hurt the Republicans. That calculation lies at the bottom of Democratic hopes and Republican fears of immigration. It encourages Democrats to ignore the downside of mass and illegal immigration.
The Democratic legislators’ preference for a continued future inflow of Democratic-leaning voters is mirrored by progressive advocates, including Indivisible, the National Immigration Law Center and United We Dream, which jointly declared January 8 their support for the failed, 17-years-old, no-strings Dream Act amnesty instead of Trump’s amnesty offer:
We urgently need a narrowly-tailored solution that addresses the crisis Trump created, without putting families at risk or reducing people’s lives to a bargaining chip. We need the bipartisan Dream Act now.
Immigrant advocate Rep. Luis Gutierrez declared January 31 that “The White House agenda is to gut legal immigration in exchange for allowing some of the Dreamers to live here. For those of us who support legal immigration, and that’s most Democrats, it won’t fly.”
Business groups are also subordinating ‘dreamers’ interest to their business goal of importing more blue-collar workers and white-collar professionals.
I'd put it differently: the White House pushing for huge cuts to legal immigration is what stands in the way of the President getting both a bipartisan deal to protect Dreamers and (much of) the funding he wants for the border. https://t.co/O472toj0mc
— Todd Schulte (@TheToddSchulte) January 31, 2018
America doesn’t have the world’s strongest economy in spite of immigration — it’s because of immigration. And we can’t afford to change that. https://t.co/hYgv11f6B0
— Ali Noorani (@anoorani) January 31, 2018
CNBC reported on February 9 an interview with Dunkin’ Donuts CEO Nigel Travis about the company’s three-year plan:
Skilled labor remains a challenge for Dunkin’s franchisees, and Travis emphasized the need for immigration reform. “We need more people. Talking to Democrats and Republicans, there seems to be a fair amount of agreement that it needs to be split between the amount of security and letting all people come into the country and becoming citizens — all we’re asking is to increase the labor pool.”
Business advocates use economic “growth” as their euphemism for mass immigration, including chain migration. The phrase is used because business growth is aided by the annual inflow of 1 million of new immigrants, who double as cheap workers and taxpayer-aided consumers.
The semi-hidden sacrifice of the ‘dreamers’ by Democratic and business elites has been noticed by some of the 3.25 million young illegals, most of who work in low-status, low-wage blue-collar jobs — but who have no political group to champion their own interests. The San Francisco Chronicle reported January 26:
Marissa Montes, co-director of the Loyola Immigrant Justice Clinic in Los Angeles … has noticed in recent weeks that [DACA] recipients have sounded more and more likely to back a wall — and even, at times, cuts to family-based migration that Trump and other conservatives favor — in exchange for citizenship …
The Chronicle quoted one example:
Ana Rodriguez, a 26-year old who lives in Union City and works at a day care center … With time running short, Rodriguez said, “I’m sure a lot of us will say go ahead and build the wall if that’s what’s gonna let us continue living our lives.”
She added, “We just want to live in peace like everyone else.”
The young illegals have minimal political influence. ‘DACA’ approved illegals graduate college at one-quarter the rate of Americans, most work in blue-collar jobs, roughly one-quarter of ‘dreamer’ illegals are unable to speak English, and young ‘dreamer’-age illegals are arrested for crimes at twice the rate of Americans. Their economic clout is minimal — DACA illegals collectively pay only $2 billion in Social Security taxes — and they are most valued by business for their ability to depress blue-collar wages. This weak foundation leaves the illegals without any political group solely working to win a quick amnesty.
Read the rest here.
