CFR on Immigration, With Jeb Bush

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Independent Task Force Report No. 63

Jeb Bush and Thomas F. McLarty III, Chairs Edward Alden, Project Director

U.S.

ImmigrationPolicy


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U.S. Immigration Policy


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Independent Task Force Report No.

Jeb Bush and Thomas F. McLarty III,Chairs Edward Alden,Project Director



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The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an independent, nonpartisan membership organization, thinktank, and publisher dedicated to being a resource for its members, government ofcials, business execu-tives, journalists, educators and students, civic and religious leaders, and other interested citizens in orderto help them better understand the world and the foreign policy choices facing the United States and othercountries. Founded in , CFR carries out its mission by maintaining a diverse membership, with specialprograms to promote interest and develop expertise in the next generation of foreign policy leaders; con-vening meetings at its headquarters in New York and in Washington, DC, and other cities where seniorgovernment ofcials, members of Congress, global leaders, and prominent thinkers come together withCFR members to discuss and debate major international issues; supporting a Studies Program that fostersindependent research, enabling CFR scholars to produce articles, reports, and books and hold roundtablesthat analyze foreign policy issues and make concrete policy recommendations; publishingForeign Affairs , the preeminent journal on international affairs and U.S. foreign policy; sponsoring Independent TaskForces that produce reports with both ndings and policy prescriptions on the most important foreignpolicy topics; and providing up-to-date information and analysis about world events and American foreignpolicy on its website, www.cfr.org.

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The Council on Foreign Relations sponsors Independent Task Forces to assess issues of current and criticalimportance to U.S. foreign policy and provide policymakers with concrete judgments and recommenda-tions. Diverse in backgrounds and perspectives, Task Force members aim to reach a meaningful consensuson policy through private and nonpartisan deliberations. Once launched, Task Forces are independent ofCFR and solely responsible for the content of their reports. Task Force members are asked to join a consen-sus signifying that they endorse the general policy thrust and judgments reached by the group, though notnecessarily every nding and recommendation. Each Task Force member also has the option of puttingforward an additional or dissenting view. Members afliations are listed for identication purposes only

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Foreword ix Acknowledgments xiii Acronyms xv

Task Force Report Introduction Immigration and U.S. National Interests The Need for Comprehensive Immigration Reform Recommendations Conclusion: Maintaining the Focus

Additional or Dissenting Views Endnotes Task Force Members Task Force Observers

Contents


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ix

Few issues on the American political agenda are more complex ordivisive than immigration. There is no shortage of problems with cur-rent policies and practices, from the difculties and delays that con-front many legal immigrants to the large number of illegal immigrantsliving in the country. Moreover, few issues touch as many areas of U.S.domestic life and foreign policy. Immigration is a matter of homelandsecurity and international competitivenessas well as a deeply humanissue central to the lives of millions of individuals and families. It cuts tothe heart of questions of citizenship and American identity and plays alarge role in shaping both Americas reality and its image in the world.

Immigrations emergence as a foreign policy issue coincides withthe increasing reach of globalization. Not only must countries todaycompete to attract and retain talented people from around the world,but the view of the United States as a place of unparalleled opennessand opportunity is also crucial to the maintenance of American lead-ership. There is a consensus that current policy is not serving theUnited States well on any of these fronts. Yet agreement on reformhas proved elusive.

The goal of the Independent Task Force on U.S. Immigration Policywas to examine this complex issue and craft a nuanced strategy forreforming immigration policies and practices. The Task Force reportargues that immigration is vital to the long-term prosperity and secu-rity of the United States. In the global competition to attract highlytalented immigrants, the United States must ensure that it remains thedestination of rst choice. The report also nds that immigrants, whobring needed language and cultural skills, are an increasingly impor-tant asset for the U.S. armed forces. What is more, allowing people tocome to this country to visit, study, or work is one of the surest meansto build friendships with future generations of foreign leaders and toshow Americas best face to the world.

Foreword


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x Foreword

The Task Force nds that getting legal immigration right will alsohelp policymakers tackle the issue of illegal immigration. As the ter-rorist attacks of September demonstrated, porous borders can be aserious security vulnerability, and even as the United States welcomesimmigrants, it must be able to control who is entering the country.The Task Force nds that the widespread presence of illegal immi-grants has weakened the rule of law, created unfair competition forthe American workforce, and strained the education and health bud-gets of many states. It also nds that taking steps to resolve the fes-tering problem of illegal immigration is necessary for improving U.S.relations with Mexico.

The Task Force report recommends that Congress and the adminis-tration launch a new effort to pass comprehensive immigration reformlegislation, built around a grand bargain with three elements: improve-ments to the legal immigration system so that it functions more ef-ciently to attract and retain talented and ambitious immigrants, a robustenforcement regime that secures Americas borders and strongly dis-courages employers from hiring illegal workers, and a program of legal-ization that will allow many of those already living in the United States

illegally to earn the right to remain. The report calls for new measuresto bring in the best foreign students by removing many of the quotasand other roadblocks currently in place. It also recommends reconsid-eration of some of the post- / border measures that have discouragedtravel to the United States. Moreover, the report urges opening avenuesfor lower-skilled workers to come to the United States both temporar-ily and permanently, but with new mechanisms for adjusting the num-bers based on the needs of the American economy. Finally, it calls for

continued improvements in enforcement, including the creation of vir-tual borders to monitor entry, an electronic verication system for theworkplace, and much tougher sanctions against employers who delib-erately hire illegal immigrants.

On behalf of the Council on Foreign Relations, I thank Task Forcechairs Jeb Bush and Mack McLarty, whose experience, wisdom, andpassion for getting immigration policy right have underpinned thiseffort. CFR is also indebted to all Task Force members, a group of prom-inent individuals whose insights and expertise were indispensable. I amgrateful to Anya Schmemann, director of CFRs Task Force program,who skillfully guided this project from start to nish. Finally, I thank


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xiForeword

Edward Alden, CFRs Bernard L. Schwartz senior fellow, for ably andpatiently directing the project and writing the report. All involved haveproduced a document that offers a clear and practical way forward asthe Obama administration and Congress work to develop much neededchanges to the U.S. immigration system.

Richard N. HaassPresidentCouncil on Foreign RelationsJuly


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xiii

Some years ago, I had the pleasure of working as a newspaper editorialwriter, a job that required meeting daily with a group of strong-willed,independent journalists and trying to hash out a common stance on thebig issues of the day. Over the course of the many meetings, emails, andtelephone conversations that led to this report, I have had many occa-sions to be thankful for that experience.

The report of the Independent Task Force on U.S. Immigration Policyis the product of a great deal of dedicated work and effort by the mem-bers of the Task Force, and I am immensely grateful for the time and carethey devoted to this project. In particular, I thank our chairs, Jeb Bush

and Mack McLarty, for their leadership and acumen in building consen-sus on what has too often been an extremely divisive issue. It has been apleasure and a privilege to work with them and to learn from them.

The report beneted immensely from a series of outside meetings.Kay King and her team organized a preview event with CFR membersin Washington, led by Task Force member Andrew D. Selee, and a ses-sion with ambassadors and other senior Washington diplomats whoshared their views on how U.S. immigration policies have affected their

countries. Task Force member Eliseo Medina arranged a meeting withrepresentatives of church, labor union, and human rights groups to heartheir perspectives. Nancy D. Bodurtha and her team organized a pre-view event for CFR members in New York, led by Task Force observerShannon K. ONeil. Irina A. Faskianos and her team organized a seriesof review sessions with CFR members across the country. I especiallythank Task Force members Robert C. Bonner and Gordon H. Hansonfor hosting meetings in Los Angeles and San Diego, respectively, andformer Task Force member (now commerce secretary) Gary Locke forleading the meeting in Seattle.

Patricia Dorff and Lia C. Norton assisted in editing the report, andthen readied it for publication. CFRs Communications, Corporate,

Acknowledgments


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xiv Acknowledgments

External Affairs, and Outreach teams worked to ensure that the reportreaches the widest audience possible.

I am also thankful to the long list of people who met with me andvarious representatives of the Task Force, lending their advice andexpertise to the topic, including Doris Meissner, who briefed us on theMigration Policy Institutes ne report. I note in particular the mem-bers of my CFR Roundtable on U.S. Border, Visa, and ImmigrationPolicies, which has met regularly on these issues.

Anya Schmemann and Swetha Sridharan of the Task Force Pro-gram, and my research associate Andrew Rottas, were instrumentalto this project from beginning to end, from the selection of Task Forcemembers to the convening of meetings to the careful editing of multipledrafts. Andy also provided invaluable research assistance, unfailinglyresponding to my requests to delve into some other obscure region ofimmigration law.

I am also grateful to CFR President Richard N. Haass for giving methe opportunity to direct this important effort. We thank David M.Rubenstein for his support of the Task Force program and BernardL. Schwartz for his generous support of CFRs work on American

competitiveness.Edward AldenProject Director


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xv

AgJOBS Agricultural Job Opportunities, Benets, and SecurityCAFTA Central American Free Trade AgreementCBP Customs and Border ProtectionDHS Department of Homeland SecurityDREAM Development, Relief, and Education for Alien MinorsEU European UnionGDP gross domestic productICE Immigration and Customs Enforcement

IRCA Immigration Reform and Control ActMPI Migration Policy InstituteNAFTA North American Free Trade AgreementNEC National Economic CouncilNRC National Research CouncilNSEERS National Security Entry-Exit Registration SystemOECD Organization for Economic Cooperation and

DevelopmentSBODAC Secure Borders and Open Doors Advisory CommitteeUSCIS U.S. Citizenship and Immigration ServicesWHTI Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative

Acronyms


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Task Force Report


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Introduction

The United States, a country shaped by generations of immigrants andtheir descendants, is badly mishandling its immigration policy, withserious consequences for its standing in the world. The urgency of thisissue has led the Council on Foreign Relations to convene an Indepen-dent Task Force to deal with what is ordinarily regarded as a domesticpolicy matter. Americas openness to and respect for immigrants haslong been a foundation of its economic and military strength, and a vitaltool in its diplomatic arsenal. With trade, technology, and travel con-tinuing to shrink the world, the manner in which the United States han-dles immigration will be increasingly important to American foreign

policy in the future.The Task Force believes that the continued failure todevise and implement a sound and sustainable immigration policy threatensto weaken Americas economy, to jeopardize its diplomacy, and to imperil itsnational security.

Why is the country facing this crisis? Immigration should be seenas one of Americas great success stories. The United States has forgenerations welcomed large numbers of immigrants, found productiveemployment for them, and successfully integrated them into its popula-

tion. Unlike many other advanced countries, high levels of immigrationhave largely maintained what would otherwise be a shrinking popula-tion of working-age adults, a huge economic advantage for the UnitedStates. This country has been especially good at attracting ambitious,skilled people. For talented immigrants across the world, the UnitedStates has long been the destination of rst choice. Many innovativeand successful new American companiesGoogle, Intel, eBay, andcountless othershave been built by recent immigrants. At the sametime, the abundant opportunities for immigrants to advance and suc-ceed here have largely spared the United States from the kinds of inter-nal security threats that have faced European countries, where someimmigrants are more marginalized.


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Americas attractiveness to immigrants is essential to its prosperity,and will be especially important in helping the United States recoverand emerge stronger from the current global economic downturn. In aworld in which many of the barriers to free trade have been eliminated,and high-wage countries are in direct competition with lower-wagecountries, innovation is the essence of maintaining economic advantage.Innovation requires, more than anything else, an abundance of smartpeople with diverse knowledge and experience. No single country, how-ever impressive its educational system, contains within its borders apreponderance of the worlds most talented individuals.The Task Forcebelieves that one of the central reasons the United States achieved and has beenable to retain its position of global leadership is that it is constantly replenish-ing its pool of talent, not just with the ablest and hardest working from insideits borders, but with the best from around the world. Maintaining Americaneconomic and political leadership depends on maintaining that ow of talent.

Immigration has paid direct diplomatic benets for the UnitedStates as well. Americas openness to foreign students, investors, busi-nesspeople, and visitors is a diplomatic asset that no other country hasreplicated. The State Department keeps on its website a list of current

and former foreign leaders educated at American universities that runsinto the hundreds. These U.S.-educated foreign leaders are enormouslyhelpful for American foreign policy, providing a core of individuals inimportant positions across the world inclined to be sympathetic to theUnited States and its aims. Colin Powell, the former secretary of state,has said that foreign students return home with an increased under-standing and lasting affection for the United States. I can think of nomore valuable asset to our country than the friendship of future world

leaders who have been educated here. Robert Gates, the secretary ofdefense, has echoed that judgment: In the last half century, allowingstudents from other countries to study here has been the most posi-tive thing America has done to win friends from around the world.The current secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, said in a recent speechthat the benets of such exchanges are so great that I am committed tostreamline the visa process, particularly for science and technology stu-dents, so that even more qualied students will come to our campusesin the future. There is strong evidence that when students from non-democratic countries are educated abroad in democratic countries likethe United States, those who return home take those values with themand play an important role in trying to build democratic institutions


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Introduction

in their own countries.1 U.S. immigration policy has also been one ofthe more effective ways to encourage development in poorer countries.The United States has raised the living standards of millions of peoplearound the world simply by allowing them to move here and earn higherwages. Remittances from the United States and other advanced coun-tries to the developing world dwarf ofcial development aid as a sourceof funds for many developing countries, amounting to more than $billion in .2 Many immigrants who succeed here end up returninghome, bringing back needed skills and building economic links betweentheir countries of birth and the United States, which help generate eco-nomic development that reduces the pressure to migrate.

Despite such extraordinary benets, the continued inability of theUnited States to develop and enforce a workable system of immigrationlaws threatens to undermine these achievements.The Task Force nds thatthe inadequacies of U.S. immigration policy have deprived the United States of some of the benets that would otherwise be realized as a result of its generousimmigration regime. This is most apparent in the large population of immi-grants living illegally in this country. Although the numbers have begunto fall in the current economic downturn, illegal immigration remains a

serious problem. Nearly twelve million people are still living and workingin the United States without the authorization to do soa situation thatdiminishes respect for the law, creates potential security risks, weakenslabor rights, strains U.S. relations with its Mexican neighbor, and unfairlyburdens public education and social services in many states.

There are serious disagreements in this country over what should bedone regarding the current population of illegal migrants, differencesthat have held hostage almost every other element of the immigration

agenda. But there is no disagreement that the status quo is intolerable.The widespread presence of illegal immigrants offends fundamentalnotions of fairness, and calls into question what it means to be a sover-eign nation. At the same time, U.S. efforts to crack down on the prob-lem have at times led to harsh or arbitrary measures that are at oddswith Americas respect for the dignity and rights of individuals, most ofwhom are here in an otherwise laudable effort to better their lives andthe lives of their families. The lure of higher wages or greater politicaland cultural freedom in the United States will continue to attract manyto take the risks of migrating illegally. But, increasingly, they face a dan-gerous gauntlet of immigrant smugglers, stepped-up border enforce-ment, and the threat of criminal prosecution for the reward of what is


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often an insecure job that lacks basic workplace protections. Further,with the United States trying to tighten its legal visa and immigrationregime to help prevent terrorist attacks by extremists coming into theUnited States from overseas, illegal migration also creates an unaccept-able security risk, making it difcult for the government to know any-thing about millions of people who are crossing U.S. borders or alreadyliving in the country.

Although the United States has been unable to control illegal immi-gration, the legal system of entry is plagued by backlogs and delays, sothat many people cannot come to this country in a timely fashion, orend up living here in a prolonged temporary status that provides littlecertainty for themselves or their families. This is the case both becauseof statutory restrictions on the number of people allowed to immi-grate by country and category each year, and because of unnecessarydelays in processing created by inefciencies in the government andthe large volume of immigration-related applications. These delays candrive some of the most talented individuals to other countries, and canforce many families into long and painful separations. There is a wide-spreadand accurateperception that the immigration system is not

working nearly as well as it should be, either for Americans or for manyof the immigrants. This country can, and must, do better.The Task Force envisions an America that, recognizing both its rich tradi-

tions as an immigrant nation and the many benets brought by immigra-tion, generously welcomes immigrants through an orderly and efcient legal system. It envisions a nation that enforces sensible and understandable visaand immigration laws that welcome those who wish to visit, study, invest, andwork here. It envisions an America that effectively controls and secures its

borders, denying entry to those who are not permitted and denying jobs tothose who are not authorized to work here.As was apparent in the heated debates that accompanied the congres-

sional effort to overhaul U.S. immigration laws in and , sucha vision will not easily be realized. There are many conicting interestsin immigration policy, and reconciling such differences is likely to be noeasier in the future than it has been to date. But the stakes are too high tofail. If the United States continues to mishandle its immigration policy,it will damage one of the vital underpinnings of American prosperityand security, and could condemn the country to a long, slow decline inits status in the world. The Task Force is encouraged by the signals fromthe Obama administration and Congress that immigration reform willbe a top priority.


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Introduction

Legislation is a critical part of improving the immigration system,and Congress has already laid some of the important groundwork. TheTask Force believes that the basic logic underlying the and effortsat comprehensive immigration reform bills remains soundthere needs tobe a grand bargain that addresses three issues. First, there should be legis-lation that reforms the legal immigration system so that it operates moreefciently, responds more accurately to labor market needs, and enhancesU.S. competitiveness. Second, the integrity of the system needs to be restoredthrough an enforcement regime that strongly discourages employers andemployees from operating outside that legal system. Finally, there mustbe a humane and orderly way to allow many of the roughly twelve millionmigrants currently living illegally in the United States to earn the right toremain here legally.

Although legislation is important, no legislative reform will succeedwithout a commitment to improve signicantly the current systemfor handling legal immigration and enforcing U.S. laws against illegalimmigration. Much as the government has recently provided desper-ately needed resources for improving security at the countrys bordersand enforcing immigration laws more effectively, the United States

must also invest in building and administering a modern, efcientsystem to handle legal immigration and temporary visa applications.No enforcement effort will succeed properly unless the legal channelsfor coming to the United States can be made to work better.The TaskForce believes that the U.S. government must invest in creating a workingimmigration system that alleviates long and counterproductive backlogs anddelays, and ensures that whatever laws are enacted by Congress are enforcedthoroughly and effectively.

The report that follows is divided into three sections. First, it dis-cusses how American national interests are at stake in its handling ofimmigration, and assesses how well current U.S. policies are servingthose interests. Second, it lays out an argument for moving forward oncomprehensive immigration reform in a way that opens doors to legalimmigrants and closes them for those who try to skirt the rules. Last, itpresents a set of recommendations both for changes to U.S. immigra-tion laws, and for ongoing, incremental improvements in the function-ing of immigration policies. While not intended as a comprehensiveblueprint, the report lays out a series of principles and concrete recom-mendations that the Task Force believes must be at the heart of the U.S.effort to develop an immigration policy that better serves Americasnational interests.


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TABLE 1. A SELECT ION OF WORLD LEADERSWI TH AMERICAN EDUCATION

Country Name Title University/CollegeColombia lvaro Uribe Velez President Harvard UniversityCzech Republic Vclav Klaus President Cornell UniversityGeorgia Mikhail Saakashvili President Columbia UniversityGhana Ko Annan Secretary-General Macalester College,

of the United MITNations (former)

Greece Kostas Karamanlis Prime Minister Tufts UniversityIndonesia Susilo Bambang President Webster University

YudhoyonoIsrael Benjamin Prime Minister MIT

NetanyahuIsrael Shimon Peres President New York University,

Harvard UniversityJapan Taro Aso Prime Minister Stanford University

Jordan Nader al-Dahabi Prime Minister Auburn UniversityMexico Felipe Caldern President Harvard UniversityPakistan Benazir Bhutto Prime Minister Harvard University

(former)Phillipines Gloria President Georgetown

Macapagal-Arroyo UniversityRepublic Ban Ki-moon Secretary-General Harvard Universityof Korea of the

United NationsSaudi Arabia Bandar bin Sultan Secretary-General Johns Hopkins

bin Abdulaziz of the National UniversitySecurity Council

Taiwan Ma Ying-jeou President New York University,Harvard University

United Kingdom David Miliband Secretary of State MITfor Foreign andCommonwealthAffairs

Sources:U.S. Department of State; original research.


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Immigration and U.S. National Interests

For any sovereign nation, deciding who will be allowed to live in thecountry is a fundamental question. The United States cannot permiteveryone in the world who would like to live here to do so. Apart fromthe nite capacity of this country and its institutions to absorb such aninux, a completely laissez-faire approach of this sort would devaluewhat it means to be a citizen. Citizenship in any country comes witha series of rights and obligations, and it is up to Americas democraticinstitutions to decide who should be invited to participate.

That premise, however reasonable and widely shared, is also thefundamental source of many of the problems that plague U.S. immi-

gration policy. Immigration laws are designed to maintain limits toentry. They are intended to enforce quotas that restrict who can comehere and to keep out those who are deemed undesirablefrom thesmall number of terrorists and criminals who pose a genuine threat,to the much larger number who try to jump the queue in an otherwiselaudable effort to improve their lives and the lives of their families.Like any rationing system, enforcing such limits is extremely difcult,particularly in the face of rapid population growth, ease of travel, and

a more closely integrated global economy. Efforts at immigrationreform must acknowledge the limits of any governments ability tocontrol such large demographic and economic forces. U.S. immigra-tion laws can be made much better, but, given the scale of the task,they will always be imperfect.

The United States, as a nation built and shaped by immigrants, hasfor much of its history had a more open door than most other advancedcountries. Yet Americans, like people everywhere, have often beenambivalent about immigration. Although the tale of the impoverishedimmigrant made good is a fundamental part of U.S. history, the UnitedStates has been no more immune than any other nation to the fears that


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come when people who speak different languages, have different cul-tures, and embrace different faiths come to live together. And thoughimmigration brings many benets, a growing population places pres-sures on public services, and results in new competition for some jobseven as it creates many others and helps the economy to grow. Concernsover the costs of immigration inevitably rise either when the growth inthe number of immigrants is large, or when the economy is experienc-ing a downturn. The United States currently faces both.

The United States has been absorbing close to one million new legalimmigrants and until recently as many as ve hundred thousand moreillegal immigrants each year. In absolute terms, those are the largestimmigrant ows in the world. Those numbers are shrinking in the cur-rent recession, which has dried up the job opportunities that are themagnet for many immigrants, especially for those not coming here torejoin their families. Preliminary evidence suggests that illegal migra-tion to the United States in particular has slowed dramatically overthe past two years.3 Less clear is whether the weakening economy andtougher enforcement measures are persuading illegal migrants alreadyliving in the United States to return home, though there is some anec-

dotal evidence that this is the case.4

But even with a decline, immigra-tion to the United States will still remain substantial compared to mostcountries in the world.

Immigration to the United States is large by any measure, but it isimportant to keep the gures in perspective. As a proportion of thepopulation, the number of immigrants in the United States is close tothat of other open, advanced countries: Australia, New Zealand, andCanada all in fact have higher percentages than the United States, and

France and Germany are about the same.5

Immigration has long been considered primarily a domestic policyissue. During periods of high immigration, like today, the country hasworried about its capacity to integrate new immigrants and to makethem part of a cohesive American society. High levels of immigrationalso put pressure on many state and local services, particularly educa-tion and hospitals; state governments are forced to pay the costs for fed-eral immigration policies over which they have no control. High levels ofimmigration also affect different parts of the country in different ways.Large, coastal cities have long been a magnet for immigrants and areaccustomed to dealing with the challenges thrown up by immigration,


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but the spread of immigrants into smaller cities and towns across thecountry has fostered new social tensions in these places.

Economically, the effects of immigration are also felt unequally.

U.S. companies benet from a larger, diverse workforce. Immigrantsare concentrated at the lower- and higher-skill ends of the labor force,which tends to complement a U.S. labor force that is more concen-trated in the middle. About percent of native-born Americans havea high school diploma or some postsecondary education, whereasimmigrants are clustered at the extremes, with many having eitherless than a high school education or a college degree or higher.6 Highlevels of immigration put some downward pressure on wages, par-ticularly those of lower-skilled Americans who have also seen theirjob opportunities and wages under pressure from liberalized globaltrading rules, though there is disagreement among economists on the

FIGURE 1. H ISTORICAL LEGAL IMMIGRATIONTO THE UNI TED STATES, 18202007

1 8 2 0

1 8 3 0

1 8 4 0

1 8 5 0

1 8 6 0

1 8 7 0

1 8 8 0

1 8 9 0

1 9 0 0

1 9 1 0

1 9 2 0

1 9 3 0

1 9 4 0

1 9 5 0

1 9 6 0

1 9 7 0

1 9 8 0

1 9 9 0

2 0 0 0

2 0 0 7

M i l l i o n s

2.01.8

1.6

1.4

1.2

1.0

0.8

0.6

0.4

0.2

0

Source:Migration Policy Institute, .


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size of these effects.7 Such domestic social and economic factors are

obviously important in shaping U.S. immigration policies and inu-encing decisions about the mix of immigrants the United States wantsto admit.

But there is another dimension that is equally important. Immigra-tion has become increasingly central to American foreign policy, andcrafting a more workable immigration policy is vital to U.S. foreign aswell as domestic interests. The Task Force considers the six issues thatfollowthe economy, national security, Americas image in the world,its core values, development policy, and the vital relationship withMexicoto be the central foreign policy dimensions at stake in howthe United States deals with immigration.

TABLE 2. TOP NATIONS BY NUMBER AND PERCENTAGEOF IMMIGRANTS

World Rank Percentage Immigrants Immigrants Number of of Worlds as Percentage as Percentage

Country Immigrants Immigrants of Population of Population

United States 38,355,000 20.56 42 12.81Russia 12,080,000 6.47 57 8.48Germany 10,144,000 5.44 43 12.31Ukraine 6,833,000 3.66 36 14.70

France 6,471,000 3.47 50 10.18Saudi Arabia 6,361,000 3.41 19 25.25Canada 6,106,000 3.27 25 18.76India 5,700,000 3.06 167 .52United Kingdom 5,408,000 2.90 55 8.98Spain 4,790,000 2.57 46 10.79Australia 4,097,000 2.20 23 19.93Peoples Republic 3,852,000 2.06 187 .29of China

Source:UNWorld Population Policies report.


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THE ECONOMY

Immigration has helped make the U.S. economy, despite its recent dif-culties, into the worlds strongest and most dynamic; maintaining thateconomic advantage is the foundation of Americas inuence and powerin the world. If the United States loses its economic edge, its power willdiminish. Getting immigration policy right is therefore critical to U.S.economic and political leadership.

More than half the recent growth in the U.S. labor force has comefrom immigration, and nearly all the future growth will come eitherfrom immigrants or from current workers delaying retirement.8 Unlike Japan and most of Europe, which face a steady decline in theirworking-age populations, Americas high immigration rates, and rela-tively high birth rates among more recent immigrants, have mitigatedmuch of that decline.9 Even countries seen as new economic rivals tothe United States, such as China and Korea, face signicant declinesin their working-age populations and are becoming more interestedin attracting immigrants themselves.The Task Force nds that, thoughimmigration will not substantially arrest the aging of the American popula-

tion, openness to immigration means that the United States will face fewerof the economic and social pressures that will mount as a growing numberof Americans retire and are supported by a smaller working-age popula-tion. When the United Nations examined global demographic trendsin , it found that the United States was one of the few countriesadmitting enough migrants to expand its working-age population,though even the United States (and every other advanced country)is far short of admitting enough immigrants to maintain its ratio of

working people to the retired elderly.10

The United States, along with other advanced countries, is produc-ing many jobs in the service, retail, and leisure sectors that are notparticularly attractive for native-born workers, but are a rst step onthe economic ladder for an unskilled immigrant. Immigrants are par-ticularly overrepresented in sectors such as agriculture, construction,janitorial and maintenance work, and food preparation. The Bureauof Labor Statistics predicts that the majority of the fastest-growingjobs over the next decade will be ones that demand little or no highereducation, including health, leisure, and hospitality services (thoughother low-skilled occupations such as stock clerks and cashiers will


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the United States has enjoyed an enormous brain gain from immigration.In , roughly . million legal immigrants in the United States hadmore than a high school education, and accounted for half of all the edu-cated immigrants living in the Organization for Economic Cooperationand Development (OECD) countries. The second highest, Canada, hadjust over percent.15 More than one-quarter of U.S. immigrants have abachelors degree or higher. The United States has also done better thanmost European countries in attracting educated immigrants, thoughthat advantage has been shrinking in recent years.

Other countries are recognizing the benets that have accrued tothe United States from being a magnet for foreign talent. The Euro-pean Union (EU) is creating, though not without some controversy, ablue card that will provide easier entry into the EU for highly skilledworkers and will allow them to work anywhere in Europe.16 Canada hasimplemented a points system intended to identify immigrants whoseskills are needed in the country and to make it easier for them to immi-grate. Similar systems have been launched recently in Australia, NewZealand, and the United Kingdom, and are being considered in severalother European countries.17 In most cases, those systems do not include

hard caps on the number of skilled immigrants who can be admittedeach year. In contrast, the primary U.S. vehicle for attracting skilledimmigrants, the H- B visa program, is currently capped at , peryear, with another , visas reserved for those who earned advanceddegrees from American universities. In and , despite someexibility in the quota, it met less than half the demand for these work-ers from U.S. companies and was lled quickly after it opened each year.This year, with the severe recession sharply reducing job openings, the

quota is likely to be large enough to meet most of the demand for skilledforeign workers.18 Some countries have also quite consciously tried to take advantage

of American missteps, for instance, by aggressively recruiting foreignstudents who could not get visas to attend American universities after/ , or by offering permanent status to would-be immigrants to theUnited States caught in the lengthy backlogs for green cards.19 Canadahas increased the poststudy work period to three years and promisedto facilitate permanent residence for foreign student graduates. Brit-ain, which is second only to the United States in attracting foreignstudents, has invested aggressively to increase those numbers, aimingto add , foreign students between and . The British


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government recently offered a new incentive by doubling to two yearsthe time that foreign students can remain to work in the country afterthey graduate. As former prime minister Tony Blair put it, It is aboutgetting the skilled people we need into our economy, and building linksaround the world that could last a lifetime. However, the United King-dom has also recently introduced far more stringent entry requirementsfor international students, leading to concerns in the higher-educationsector that the new restrictions might negatively affect internationalstudent ows into the country.

There are new competitors as well. Japan, which has long resistedimmigration, announced plans last summer to more than double itsnumber of foreign students to , by . It aims to simplifyimmigration procedures, to hire more English-speaking professors, andto assist students in nding jobs after they graduate. Some in the coun-try are proposing a target of one million foreign students.20 Singaporehas set a goal of attracting , foreign students by ; Malaysiais aiming for , . 21 Both Japan and Singapore subsidize tuition forforeign as well as for domestic students. India is making greater effortsto keep its advanced students at home. Even China is planning to offer

scholarships for , foreign students and hopes to attract ,by . The United States is now facing a global competition for talent,and though it holds many advantages, it is no longer the only choice forthe most talented immigrants seeking advancement.

The United States has tried in some ways to respond to this com-petition. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), for instance,recently increased a postgraduation work program known as OptionalPractical Training from twelve months to twenty-nine months for for-

eign students graduating with degrees in science, technology, engineer-ing, or mathematics, a move that will increase the chances of foreignstudents in those elds nding permanent work in the United States.The State Department has made timely processing of student visasone of its top priorities, and the improvements have been signicant.But U.S. laws and procedures, including the range of security and otherbackground checks and the strict quotas on many categories of immi-grant and nonimmigrant visas, still make it challenging for some for-eign students and scholars to come to the United States to study and, ifthey wish, to remain here to work after they graduate.22

The Task Force believes that the costs of losing preeminence in attract-ing talented immigrants would be very high. The United States has hit a


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plateau in the numbers of American students graduating with advanceddegrees, particularly in scientic and technical elds. Indeed, thenumber of science and engineering PhDs earned by U.S. citizens hasfallen by more than percent in the past decade.23 The United Stateswill face an accelerating shortage of highly skilled workers as the bulkof the baby boom generation starts heading into retirement. In ,there were more holders of masters, professional, and doctoral degreesamong the age fty-ve to fty-nine cohort, which is nearing retire-ment, than among the thirty to thirty-four cohort. More worrisome,this stagnation in the educational achievement levels of Americans hascome at a time when many other countriesSouth Korea, Canada,Japan, France, Spain, and othershave continued to expand the shareof their populations receiving higher education.24

In most developed countries that attract foreign students, higher edu-cation is an important path to permanent residence for highly skilledimmigrants. Although the United States continues to host by far the larg-est proportion of globally mobile foreign students, its share has declinedand other countries have gained ground. Enrollment, which had beengrowing rapidly in the s, fell slightly for several years after / . It be-

gan to recover in and to exceed pre- / levels, rising to a record, international students in the school year. 25 Overall,the number of foreign students attending American universities wouldhave been about percent higher if the pre- / growth rates had contin-ued.26 Further, the sharpest drops were seen in rst-time enrollment byforeign graduate students in science and engineering, which dropped bynearly percent between and before beginning to recover in

and . They have yet to bounce back to pre- / levels.27

Over that same period, foreign student enrollment surged in othercountries: the United Kingdom gained , foreign students from to , France and Australia each added , , and Japan and

Germany , each.28 China, India, and some other countries havealso done more to increase higher-education opportunities for their cit-izens at home. Overall, the number of students studying outside theirhome countries grew by percent to nearly three million people from

to , the biggest increase ever. Yet the United States attractedonly a small fraction of those new international students. Althoughit still hosts about percent of the worlds international students,roughly double its closest competitors (the United Kingdom, France,Australia, and Germany), other countries have been gaining ground.29


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The United States retains enormous advantages in attracting theworlds best students. On any list of top universities in the world, Amer-

ican institutions predominate. Smaller countries like Australia havelimited capacity to absorb new foreign students. In the United States,international students make up only percent of total enrollment, sug-gesting that there is tremendous room for growth. But the competitionhas become much tougher than ever before.

The Task Force believes that immigration can never, nor should, makeup for the decits in the American educational system. It is critical that theUnited States reverse the trend that has seen fewer Americans pursuinghigher education in the sciences and engineering. But education reformis a slow process that takes many years to show benets, and even heremany U.S. school districts are nding they must look abroad to ndqualied teachers to ll positions in science, mathematics, and foreignlanguages. Immigration is necessary to ll those skills gaps.

FIGURE 2. RECEN T CHANGES IN INTER NATIONAL STUDENTENROLLMENT IN THE UNI TED STATES, 19992008

800,000750,000

700,000

650,000

600,000

550,000

500,000 1999/ 2000/ 2001/ 2002/ 2003/ 2004/ 2005/ 2006/ 2007/2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

I n t e r n a t i o n a l S t u d e n t E n r o l l m e n t

Projected enrollment (had growth rate remained unchanged; estimated average . percent)*

Actual international student enrollment

*Projected enrollment calculated by applying the average growth rate of . percent compounded annu-ally from academic year through academic year . The growth rate of . percent isbased on the average rate of growth from academic year to academic year .This information represents international student enrollment data as reported by the Institute of Interna-tional Education,Open Doors .

Source:NAFSA: Association of International Educators, .


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Immigrants are especially important in science, technology, andengineering, which are so critical to U.S. economic competitiveness.Foreign students and immigrants make up more than half the scien-tic researchers in the United States; in , they received percentof science and engineering PhDs and percent of computer sciencedoctorates. Among postdoctoral students doing research at the highestlevels, percent are foreign born. This is not a recent development;even in the s, some percent of engineering and computer sci-ence students in the United States came from abroad.

On one signicant measure of innovation, the number of pat-ents issued each year, the United States far surpasses any country inthe world; immigrants produce nearly percent of those patents, orroughly twice their share of the U.S. population.30 Other studies haveshown that an increase in the number of foreign graduate students inthe United States results in signicant increases in the number of patentapplications.31 Overall, the share of all patents awarded to U.S. scientistsof Chinese and Indian origin grew from just percent in the late sto percent in the early part of this decade; at Intel, the worlds largestsemiconductor maker, percent of the patents are for work done by

Chinese or Indian immigrants. Just as important, this increased inno-vation by recent immigrants actually coincided with an increase in thenumber of patents awarded to native-born scientists as well, indicatingthat American-born and immigrant scientists are feeding off each otherto enhance the countrys overall innovative capacity.32

One in four engineering and technology companies established inthe United States between and had an immigrant founder.33 The four countries that create the greatest number of new companies

per capitathe United States, Canada, Australia, and Israelall havelarge immigrant populations.34 It is not an overstatement to say that theUnited States would not enjoy anything close to its current technologi-cal and entrepreneurial leadership if it had maintained a closed immi-gration policy.

Amy Chua, the Yale historian and legal scholar, argues in her recentbook,Day of Empire: How Hyperpowers Rise to Global DominanceandWhy They Fall , that the successful great powers in history have beenthose able to attract and make use of the most talented people the worldhas to offer. At any given historical moment, she writes, the mostvaluable human capital the world has to offerwhether in the form ofintelligence, physical strength, skill, knowledge, creativity, networks,commercial innovation, or technological inventionis never to be


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found in any one locale or with any one ethnic or religious group. Topull away from its rivals on a global scale, a society must pull into itselfand motivate the worlds best and brightest, regardless of ethnicity, reli-gion or background. America, she argues, has been more successfulthan any other country in the world in recent history in attracting andmobilizing such talents.

The Task Force believes that maintaining robust levels of immigra-tion, allowing for uctuations based on the state of the economy, is rmlyin Americas national interests. In particular, continuing to attract highly skilled immigrants is critical to the competitiveness of the U.S. economy, andto Americas ability to remain the worlds leader in innovation. The UnitedStates must open its doors more widely to such people.

NAT IONAL SECUR I T Y

Since the terrorist attacks of September , , the United States hashad to confront a difcult paradox: a generous immigration and visasystem is potentially a threat to U.S. national security, yet is also criti-

cal to maintaining security. The nineteen hijackers who carried out theattacks were able to exploit weaknesses in the U.S. visa and border secu-rity regime to enter the United States and remain here unnoticed whilethey plotted and prepared for the attack. The ease with which theyentered the country led to a series of measures aimed at making U.S.borders less vulnerable to inltration by terrorists. Overall, as a resultof such measures, the country is more secure from another terroristattack than it was before / . Yet some of those measures, by making it

inordinately difcult for others to come to the United States, have thepotential to weaken Americas security rather than improve it.Border and immigration policies can help keep terrorists or danger-

ous criminals out of the country. The United States can, for example,demand detailed background information, including ngerprints orother identiers, from anyone who wishes to enter the country. Inspec-tors are free to search those arriving at the border, without any needto show reasonable suspicion or probable cause, as would be the caseinside the country. On numerous occasions since / , U.S. ofcials havealso used minor immigration violations to deport people they believedwere involved in terrorist-related activities, adding to the arsenal of lawenforcement tools.35


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The link between immigration policy and national security wasinstitutionalized with the creation of the U.S. Department of Home-land Security in .36 DHSs primary mission is to protect the UnitedStates from another terrorist attack, yet the bulk of its personnel andresources are dedicated to the traditional tasks of immigration, tradefacilitation, and border control. The post- / debate about immigra-tion has often been conducted in terms of a trade-off between securityand openness, with advocates of tougher security willing to sacriceopenness, and proponents of openness prepared to run higher securityrisks. But that is only part of the dilemma. Indeed, the trade-off is alsoone between short-term security and longer-term security.The TaskForce nds that border and immigration measures, used in a targeted and focused way, can help make the United States less vulnerable to another ter-rorist attack. However, if those same measures keep out talented immigrantsor signicantly disrupt legitimate cross-border travel or commerce, the long-term foundations of Americas economy and military strength, and conse-quently its security, will be weakened. The challenge is to nd approachesthat ensure that these two goals need not be mutually exclusive.

The creation of the Department of Homeland Security accentu-

ated an unfortunate tendency to dene U.S. security in terms of who iskept out of the country rather than who is let in. The department reg-ularly showcases statistics that highlight its success at barring peoplefrom entry: the number of criminal suspects or immigration violatorsturned away at the borders, illegal migrants apprehended or deported,and miles of fencing constructed. But those are incomplete measures ofsecurity. Although securing borders makes the United States safer fromcertain kinds of threats, especially terrorism and drug-related crime,

the United States became a military superpower largely because of itseconomic strength and its technological capabilities, which have givenits armed forces the most advanced and lethal weaponry in the world.Maintaining that status requires maintaining Americas lead in inno-vation, and innovation thrives in an open environment. Gordon Eng-land, the former deputy defense secretary, put it strongly: The greatestlong-term threat to U.S. national security is not terrorists wielding anuclear or biological weapon, but the erosion of Americas place as aworld leader in science and technology.37

As a recent National Research Council (NRC) committee reportargued, many of the technologies that are vital for continued U.S.military superiority depend on scientic and engineering research


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occurring around the world, not just in the United States. U.S. nationalsecurity and economic prosperity both require full engagement withscientic advances in other countries, and rely on attracting many ofthe best scientists and engineers to work in this country. A leadingAmerican scientist in a cutting-edge eld wants the very best scienticcolleagues working with him or her regardless of nationality. An out-standing pool of talent working on a problem is the most likely path tosignicant scientic advancement, the NRC report says.38 Rather thanjust measuring those kept out, the Department of Homeland Security,the State Department, and other agencies should also be keeping closetrack of the numbers of skilled foreigners being attracted to this coun-try, and how the United States compares to other countries that aretrying to draw from the same talent pool.

There would be serious negative national security consequences ifthe United States were to lose its technological edge. The technolo-gies developed in the civilian economy of the United States are alsovital for its military, and vice versa. Interaction with foreign compa-nies and foreign scientists is inescapable and invaluable. U.S. techno-logical leadership has by many measures already diminished; from

to , for instance, U.S. production of scientic articles inleading physics journals fell from to percent. Centers of scien-tic research excellence have sprung up around the world, and Japan,Korea, and several European countries have acquired leading posi-tions in certain cutting-edge technologies.

Americas national security depends on technological break-throughs that keep U.S. military capabilities well ahead of those ofrival nations. Yet a number of studies dating back a decade or more,

which have looked not only at restrictions on the ow of scientists, butalso at related restrictions on the export of technologies and scienticknowledge that might have military relevance, have found those effortslargely self-defeating.39 There is a consensus in both the scientic andnational security communities that measures aimed at limiting accessto research and knowledge that could be used for harmful ends mustbe as narrow and targeted as possible to avoid hurting scientic enter-prise. Yet that has not always been the practice.

In the aftermath of / , for instance, the U.S. government expandedthe so-called Visas Mantis program, which requires a special securityclearance for students, researchers, and other temporary visitors tothe United States who are knowledgeable in elds that could have


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training and certain specialized language skills.43 The Task Force believesthat a more expansive program would pay substantial dividends .

PUBLIC DIPLOMACY

Americas image in the world has taken a beating in the past decade. ThePew Global Attitudes Project, the most comprehensive survey of itstype, showed a precipitous drop in favorable opinions toward the UnitedStates from across the world between and , with only a handfulof exceptions.44 The reasons for this decline are many, but the evidenceis strong that immigration and cross-border exchanges of all types areamong the best tools the U.S. government has for trying to reverse thisdecline. Certainly, mistreatment at the hands of U.S. border and immi-gration ofcials is one of the surest ways to denigrate Americas standingin the eyes of many in the world.

Allowing people to come to the United States helps Americas imageby exposing foreigners directly or indirectly to the realities of life in thiscountry. Polls of foreign attitudes toward the United States indicate

strongly that those who have spent time here, or have friends or fami-lies who have spent time here, have more positive views of the UnitedStates than those who have not. In its polling of Arab countries, forinstance, Zogby International found that Arabs who knew even a singleAmerican were roughly percent more favorable in their opinion ofthe United States than those who did not. Among those who had trav-eled to the United States, wanted to travel here, or had a relative livinghere, the favorability was to percentage points higher.45

The Task Force nds that one of the most successful forms of public diplo-macy has been to allow non-Americans to see what the United States hasachieved at home. Encouraging travel to the United States has more posi-tive inuence than the best efforts that the government can muster to use themedia and other channels to present a positive image abroad.

Yet, since / , the United States has made it inordinately difcult formany people to travel here to see the country for themselves. This isespecially true for those from Muslim and Arab countries where theneed to improve understanding of the United States, and vice versa, ismost urgent.46 Visa restrictions put in place after the terrorist attacks,and special procedures such as the National Security Entry-Exit Regis-tration System (NSEERS) that imposed extra screening on most male


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travelers from some two dozen Muslim countries, led to a signicantdrop in travel to the United States from all countries where visas arerequired. In the past few years, however, overseas travel recovered frommost countries in the world to near pre- / levels, but not from muchof the Muslim and Arab world. In , the number of visas issued tonationals of Egypt, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Jordan, Indonesia, and SaudiArabia remained well below their pre- / levels, in some cases half orless.47 Although the United States must be vigilant in using its bordersto keep out those who would do this country harm, there is signicantscope for encouraging greater travel to this country without leaving itmore vulnerable to acts of terrorism.

Apart from the aggregate numbers, the bad experiences that indi-viduals may have while attempting to travel to the United States rever-berate among their friends and families, damaging the perception ofthe United States as a country that welcomes foreigners. Steven Kull ofthe Program on International Policy Attitudes said that in focus groupswith Arabs and Muslims people very spontaneously brought up theserestrictions on immigration and visas as evidence of . . . hostility towardIslam. Almost everybody in the focus groups knew somebody who had

some problem when they came to visit the United States, or came towork here or to study here.48 According to a survey of two thousand international travelers from

around the world commissioned by the U.S. travel industry in late ,the U.S. entry process was considered the worlds worst by a two-to-one margin, with the Middle East a distant second. More than half thetravelers said they found U.S. border ofcials rude and unpleasant.49 Those ofcials represent the face of the U.S. government to much of

the world, and it is critical that the face be a less hostile one. As formersecretary of homeland security Tom Ridge put it, after / , the worldwas kind of surprised we pulled in the welcome mat so quickly. TheTask Force believes the United States needs to put it out again.

Even before the current global economic downturn, overseas travelto the United States had yet to recover to pre- / levels despite a surgein travel to other countries around the world. The economic costs, aswell as the diplomatic costs, have been substantial.50 A number of recentdevelopments have been encouraging, however. The State Departmentand the Department of Homeland Security have worked hard to makethe visa and entry process less onerous and more efcient. Both agen-cies have made progress in eliminating lengthy backlogs for security


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checks that delayed many students and other visitors for months in

the aftermath of / , although consular stafng shortages have occa-sionally caused the problems to recur. Over the past several years, forexample, waiting times for visas at most U.S. embassies abroad havesteadily declined; on the other hand, the delays for security reviews andbackground checks that especially affect foreign scientists and engi-neers have unfortunately increased again, so that many visa holdersare facing waits of several months to return to the United States. U.S.Customs and Border Protection has issued and prominently displays aPledge to Travelers and is training all frontline border ofcers to treatreturning travelers with courtesy, dignity, and a welcoming attitude.Congress has also doubled funding over the past ve years for educa-tional exchanges such as the Fulbright program, which has historically

1,200

1,000

800

600

400

200

0 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

I n d e x : 2 0 0 1 = 1 , 0 0 0

NSEERS Europe Asia World

FIGURE 3. INDICES OF NONIMMIGRAN T VISASFROM NSEERS COUNTRIES, EUROPE, ASIA, AND THE WORLD

Source:U.S. Department of State, .


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been one of the most successful U.S. public diplomacy initiatives.Although exchange programs of this sort are expensive, the payoffs aresubstantial in terms of building goodwill around the world and theyshould continue to be expanded.

In , concerned about the slow recovery in overseas travel to theUnited States, the State Department and the Department of Home-land Security established the Secure Borders and Open Doors Advi-sory Committee (SBODAC) to make recommendations on how theUnited States could better attract and treat visitors without weakeningefforts to protect the countrys borders.51 The report argued that theUnited States will become less secure if it implements measures thatdiscourage people from coming to this country.

The Task Force endorses the core argument of the SBODAC report:Our long-term success requires not only that we deter and detectdetermined adversaries, but also that we persuade millions of peoplearound the globe of our idealsdemocratic freedom, private enter-prise, human rights, intellectual pursuit, and technological achieve-ment. That persuasion requires human interaction, and each visitor tothe United States represents such an opportunity. As the co-chairs of

the committee wrote, We cannot win the long struggle against extrem-ist ideology by closing our doors to the people of the world [who] wantto visit, learn and work here.

AMER ICAN VALUES

Americas immigration policy is an important part of its core values

as a nation. The American dream remains a compelling ideal. Manypeople around the world believe fervently in the United States as acountry where anyone, no matter how humble his or her origins, canstart anew and succeed in building a better life. As pollster John Zogbyhas summarized the ndings of his many international opinion sur-veys, America still represents a beacon of hope.52 Is it any wonder thatthe United States attracts not only many of the brightest, most capablemigrants, but also many of the ambitious poor who see no opportu-nity for advancement in their own countries? For many in poorer coun-tries, those who have braved the journey to reach the United States inan effort to better themselves and support their families at home areconsidered heroes. That many Americans see some of those same


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individuals as criminals is bafing to them. At the same time, however,many Americans worry that the failure to enforce immigration laws hasbetrayed an equally important part of the American value systemthecommitment to the rule of law. They do not wish to reward those whoare seen as having violated the law in order to come to the United Statesor remain here, and are skeptical of the governments commitment toenforcing immigration laws.

The Task Force believes that how the United States handles its immigra-tion policy speaks to Americas core values. Americans have a right to deter-mine who will come to live in this country, and to enforce those rules, but theyalso have a responsibility to treat those who may have violated those ruleswith respect and fairness.

Enforcing U.S. immigration laws in their current state is an extraor-dinary challenge. An estimated twelve million people live in the UnitedStates illegally, but beyond their unauthorized status, they have littlein common. Some were brought here as children and have lived inthe United States for decades, retaining no signicant ties to theirbirth countries; some have been here only a few months. Some haveno family ties; many have U.S. citizen relatives, including spouses and

children.53

The vast majority are hardworking and, apart from theirundocumented status, law abiding, but some are serious criminals tiedto transnational gangs and other criminal organizations. Many haveno plausible legal claim for remaining in the United States, but manyothers do. Somewhere between one million and one and a half millionpersons of the total illegal immigrant population in the United Statesare estimated to have a claim to legal status, but are stuck waiting fortheir cases to be considered because of the backlogs or administrative

processing delays.54

Yet the systems for enforcing immigration laws dolittle to allow for distinctions among these very different cases.To take one example, the United States has greatly expanded the

number of noncitizens who are detained for extended periods. Inthe scal year, nearly , such people were jailed, triple thenumber of a decade ago.55 The policy has been driven by the necessarygoal of trying to ensure that those who are ordered removed do notsimply disappear and remain in the United States unlawfully, which hasbeen a long-standing problem, or that those seeking asylum do not posea security threat. As recently as , some percent of those arrestedfor violating immigration laws, and then subsequently released andordered to appear in court, failed to show for their removal hearings;


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held under the aggravated felony provisions are automatically jaileduntil they are deported, and once deported are permanently barred fromreturning to the United States. There are no good data on the numberof individuals deported under the aggravated felony provisions; the bestestimate is just over , cases over the past decade.61 The Task Forcebelieves that serious criminalsthose who commit felony offensescan and should be deported, even if they are in the country legally. The United Statesneeds, however, a more discriminating system that separates serious offenses from minor ones, and allows for greater exibility in dealing with extenuat-ing circumstances.

Further, the complexity of U.S. immigration rules is such that harshtreatment can be inadvertently visited upon innocent individuals. Theworkplace raids carried out by Immigration and Customs Enforce-ment (ICE) ofcials, though a legitimate component of immigrationenforcement, have sometimes resulted in U.S. citizens being mistak-enly detained and even removed from the United States. Recent inves-tigations by the Associated Press and theLos Angeles Times uncovereddozens of such cases.62 And some of those clogging up immigrationcourt proceedings are people who have tried to comply with U.S. immi-

gration rules but have fallen through one of the many cracks that makeit easy to inadvertently forfeit legal immigration status. These includeindividuals whose cases have been in limbo because of excessive visaapplication processing delays.

Other measures enacted with the reasonable goal of ensuring toughenforcement of immigration laws have nevertheless made U.S. treat-ment of some immigration violators, as well as some legal immigrants,unnecessarily inexible. Congress in , for example, passed a law

that prevents immigration violators from returning to the UnitedStates for up to ten years, and sometimes permanently, even for whatare occasionally minor or technical immigration law violations. Thesepenalties can make it impossible for individuals who might otherwisebe entitled to remain in the United States to nd any legal way to do so.Some U.S. citizens now nd that their parents, spouses, and childrenare barred from the United States for a decade, or even permanently, asa result of these laws.

The treatment of refugees and asylum seekers is another dimensionof immigration policy that reects important American values. U.S.refugee policy has been among the areas of immigration policy mostclosely tied to foreign policy priorities. Throughout the Cold War, for


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instance, the United States had an open door for those eeing Commu-nist countries or other U.S. adversaries, but cast a far more skeptical eyeon those facing persecution in countries allied with the United States.While refugee policy has historically been used to serve other foreignpolicy interests, it has largely been driven by the ethical conviction thatthose eeing political, religious, or other forms of persecution shouldbe offered safe haven. That commitment is enshrined in internationaltreaties and domestic U.S. laws that set the standard for the rest of theworld; when American standards erode, refugees face greater riskseverywhere. U.S. refugee and asylum policies have also opened thiscountry to an array of impressive scientists and others eeing persecu-tion in their home countries, a tradition that continues with contempo-rary efforts to rescue scholars facing oppression abroad.63

Historically, asylum claims had been particularly susceptible tofraud, in part because for those without family ties or employmentskills, such claims represent one of the only remaining legal channelsfor migrating to the United States. For many years, those who arrivedin the United States and claimed asylum were routinely allowed into thecountry and issued a permit that would allow them to obtain a Social

Security card and to work pending a hearing on their claims. Substan-tial backlogs meant it would be many years before an invalid asylumclaim would be detected.64 Not surprisingly, a signicant number failedto show at their hearings and simply remained in the country illegally.65 Moreover, well before / , there were fears that asylum claims could beabused by terrorists attempting to enter the United States, as they hadbeen in the past. Ramzi Yousef, the chief architect of the bomb-ing of the World Trade Center towers by Islamic radicals, entered the

United States on a false Iraqi passport, claimed political asylum, andwas released into the country pending a hearing. The asylum systemwas reformed in the mid- s in order to better protect against fraud-ulent claims. The long delays that had allowed individuals to stay inthe United States for years while awaiting an asylum interview wereeliminated. Instead, those who request asylum quickly nd themselvesin deportation proceedings if their request is not granted by an asylumofcer after an interview, a procedure known as expedited removal. Inaddition, those who request asylum are no longer given automatic workauthorization, eliminating an incentive that had encouraged some tole baseless asylum claims. Congress also passed broad legislation thatmade it more difcult for genuine refugees to access the U.S. asylum


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system, and mandated initial detention for those who arrive in theUnited States without valid travel documents.

After / , in an effort to keep out those who might have ties to ter-rorist groups, Congress and the administration established extremelybroad denitions of material support for terrorist groups that hadthe unintended effect of barring individuals who in the past wouldcertainly have gained admission. Some prodemocracy opponents ofauthoritarian regimes in places like Burma, Cuba, and Iraq, for exam-ple, were excluded on material support grounds; in one well-publicizedcase, an Iraqi who was teaching Arabic to U.S. Marines was labeled asa supporter of terrorism because he had worked to overthrow SaddamHussein. In other cases, the material support provisions had the effectof barring asylum seekers who were forced to assist terrorist organi-zations under the threat of death or severe injury. After much delay,the Bush administration made some progress by issuing waivers in themost egregious cases, but serious problems remain.66

Partly as a consequence of the new restrictions, there was a sharpfalloff in asylum admissions after , which prevented many of thosewho may have had legitimate claims from seeking refuge in the United

States. In , the number fell to less than half of the previous year,and only in recovered to pre- / levels. Most of those who arrivein the United States seeking asylum for political or religious persecu-tion are now routinely detained while their claims are being heard, atraumatic experience for individuals who so often are eeing violenceor abuse. In many cases asylum seekers are forced to wear prison uni-forms, held in jails and jail-like facilities, and sometimes comingledwith criminal inmates.67 This detention policy has included families

with small children.68

The prisons are frequently in remote locationsthat make it difcult to gain access to legal counsel, which is often thedifference between asylum claims being accepted or rejected.69 Asylumseekers can be detained for months, and sometimes even years.70

Since changes to the law in , asylum seekers also face the pos-sibility of expedited removal, in which they can be immediately turnedaway if they fail to make a clear request for asylum or if they cannotpersuade an asylum ofcer that they have a credible fear of persecu-tion and do not request a judicial review. The expedited removal pro-cess applies to claimants who do not have travel documents or whohave fraudulent ones. Although it is appropriate for immigration of-cers to have such authority, expedited removal needs to be exercised


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with caution to ensure that those who may face persecution if they arereturned home are given an adequate hearing. A two-year study by theUnited States Commission on International Religious Freedom foundthat while proper procedures had been put in place at ports of entry,implementation varied considerably, and in a signicant minority ofcases individuals claiming fear of persecution had nonetheless immedi-ately been removed to their home countries.71

Issues regarding the treatment of illegal immigrants and those seek-ing refuge in the United States are among the hardest faced by the of-cials responsible for making these decisions. Deportation is a harshpenalty that profoundly affects the lives of those removed, and manyillegal immigrants have a strong incentive to avoid removal by whatevermeans possible. Genuine asylum seekers may face imprisonment orviolence at home if they are denied entry by the United States. Findingthe proper balance between upholding the law and ensuring due pro-cess is extremely important.

The Task Force believes that the United States needs to uphold the highest standards for due process and fair treatment of refugees, asylum seekers, andthose facing deportation because they are living in the country illegally.

DEV ELOPMENT

The United States has rarely thought about how its policies to encour-age economic development in poorer countries might affect immigra-tion; similarly, it has rarely thought about how its immigration policiesmight affect development. For a variety of historical and institutional

reasons, the United States has generally separated economic develop-ment policy from immigration policy. This contrasts with Europe,where full membership in the European Unionwhich includes theright for citizens of one EU country to work in any otherhas beenconditional on reaching certain economic benchmarks. The EU strat-egy for admitting poorer member countries such as Greece, Spain,Portugal, and Poland was to invest large sums to bring living standardsin those countries closer to the standards of the more advanced EUmembers. This was fairly successful with earlier entrants like Spain andPortugal, though less so in the case of newer members like Poland andthe Baltic states, where the income discrepancies with western Europewere considerably larger.


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Washington has encouraged developing countries that send largenumbers of migrants to the United Statesparticularly Mexico andCentral Americato pursue economic development through opennessto trade and foreign investment, and has not offered much direct devel-opment aid. Trade agreements such as the North American Free TradeAgreement (NAFTA) and the Central American Free Trade Agreement(CAFTA) excluded most issues related to labor mobility, though somesmall categories of visa preferences were created for citizens of Canadaand Mexico, as well as for Chile and Singapore, which have signed freetrade agreements with the United States. Both the United States andMexico have long been wary of the sacrices to sovereignty involvedin the European model of integration, and there is little likelihood ofthat changing in the near future. But there are nonetheless numerouspossibilities for closer cooperation that might address some of the rootcauses of high levels of migration.

The Task Force believes that economic development inside the sendingcountries is the best way to discourage mass emigration. The difculty ofthis task cannot be overestimated, however. The reality is that the sort ofstrong, steady growth necessary to reduce migratory pressures remains

elusive in many countries. Although the European model has been suc-cessful in some respects, the disparities between the newer EU mem-bers and older ones were not nearly as large as the disparity betweenthe United States and most of the countries that send large numbers ofimmigrants here.

A Council on Foreign Relations study that looked at the pros-pects for slowing northward migration from Latin America concludedthat development is not only uncertain; it is also a gradual process, with

effects measured over . . . decades rather than [in] months and years.Thus even a successful development effort cannot be expected to havean impact on migration trends in the near future.72 Further, most ofwhat determines the success of development efforts in sending coun-tries is not in the hands of the U.S. government. It depends largely onthe internal governance in these countries, their educational systems,their resource bases, their tax and investment policies, and their attrac-tiveness to international capital. The United States can have some inu-ence on the policies pursued by these governments, but it is extremelylimited. There is scope for more targeted U.S. efforts to encourage eco-nomic development, especially in Mexico. But the impact on emigra-tion, particularly in the short term, is likely to be minimal.


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A more promising prospect is for the United States to take a closerlook at how its immigration policies can be used to encourage develop-ment in the sending countries. At its heart, development is about thereduction of poverty, and immigration can be an important compo-nent. AsThe Economist recently put it, Migration has turned out to bea very successful strategy for the worlds poor to make their lives a littlebit better. The same economic opportunities that propelled so manyEuropean immigrants to cross the Atlantic Ocean in the nineteenth andearly twentieth centuries are leading some in the worlds developingnations to seek a new life in wealthier countriesfrom the Middle Eastto Europe to the United States.

The history of the last great migration showed that emigration wasnot antithetical to development in Europe. Indeed, it would be moreaccurate to say that emigration helped reduce economic pressures inEurope at a time of political and economic stress. Further, a surprisinglyhigh percentage of those who emigrated from Europe to the New World(about one-third) eventually returned home. Today, this sort of circularmigration is occurring on an unprecedented scale. Increasingly, someimmigrants are splitting their time between their countries of birth and

their adopted countries, rendering obsolete old notions that the emigra-tion of highly skilled individuals necessarily results in a brain drain fordeveloping countries. The development of Indias vibrant informationtechnology industry, for example, has been driven in large measure byIndian immigrants to the United States who have returned home to buildbusinesses that take advantage of their knowledge of the U.S. market.

The most obvious measure of the economic benets of migration tosending countries is remittances from those working in advanced coun-

tries, which have more than doubled over the past ve years to morethan $ billion in , though even this likely understates the sizeof total remittances. Latin Americans alone remitted about $ billionin . In certain countries, the contribution of remittances is enor-mous; they account for percent of gross domestic product (GDP) inHonduras, for instance, and percent in Jamaica. But there are moresubtle benets that are likely more important and lasting. Unlike theimmigrants of a century ago, modern migrants can move more quicklyand easily between their home and adopted countries, and can keep inclose touch through modern communications.73

A major study carried out for the Public Policy Institute of Californiain , for instance, found t

CFR on Immigration, With Jeb Bush

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