New Farm Worker Rules, Debating the Immigration Dip, and Old Healthcare Myths (Die Hard)

America's Voice Blog

Posted 02/12/10 at 06:05pm

As the week draws to a close, and Washington digs itself out of Snomageddon 2010, here are a couple of key developments on immigration.

Yesterday, U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis announced a set of new farm worker rules, including the rollback of a 2008 Bush-era reversal in labor oversight for agricultural workers in the United States. The measure was promptly heralded as a victory by many farmworker advocates, including the United Farm Workers (UFW):

The new rules would also remedy cutbacks in labor protections and restore the requirement that U.S. workers be hired before foreign laborers are imported, a protection weakened under the Bush regulations.

As reported by the New York Times:

Many of the new measures restore previous procedures for the program, known as H-2A for the type of visa that foreign workers receive, after the rules were changed in the last days of the Bush administration. Farm worker organizations strongly objected to those changes, arguing they had rapidly lowered wages for American agricultural laborers.

It's clear that these new rules are a step in the right direction toward protecting vulnerable workers. More is needed, however, which is why farm worker advocates continue to push for comprehensive immigration reform. To that effect, UFW's President, Arturo S. Rodriguez, cautions:

"We now must focus on addressing the nation's agricultural labor supply through legislation, such as the bipartisan, broadly-backed AgJOBS bill, that would let farm workers currently laboring in the United States legally stay by continuing to work in agriculture."

The Wall Street Journal quotes growers' associations that believe "the new rules didn't address the problems farmers face finding seasonal help." According to the New York Times:

While sharply divided over the new rules, growers and farm workers agreed that the Obama administration should press Congress to pass legislation overhauling the immigration system. Most versions of that legislation include a bill that creates a new guest worker program that all sides in agriculture have long supported.

"AGJobs" is a key component of comprehensive immigration reform that both farm worker advocates and growers insist cannot wait any longer.

In other news, according to a new study released by the Department of Homeland Security this week, the unauthorized immigrant population in the U.S. has dropped sharply (about 7 percent) over the past two years, for the first time in three decades. It has gone from approximately 11.6 to about 10.8 million.

The Christian Science Monitor reports:

Some immigration-control groups say the decline is happening primarily because of a buildup of border patrol and surveillance – and that the buildup should thus continue to further reduce illegal immigration. Other groups claim it is a result of the poor economy.

While the argument rages on (I'm willing to put $50 on the economy-- any takers?), Mary Giovagnoli at Immigration Impact argues that the sharp decrease in unauthorized immigration provides an opening for Washington to truly fix our dysfunctional immigration system before demand increases. Also, as Giovagnoli points out:

Immigration restrictionists who insist that the downturn is due to enhanced enforcement efforts are setting themselves up for defeat. We repeatedly heard during the 2007 debate that opponents of immigration reform didn’t actually oppose legalization, et. al.—they simply wanted to see enforcement strategies working first. So, if they want to claim that the numbers are down because of enforcement then they really have no argument left for opposing reform. In other words, you can’t have your cake and eat it, too.

Unfortunately, logic rarely plays a role when it comes to the immigration restrictionists' "solutions" to our immigration crisis. Take, for instance, the treatment of immigration in the healthcare debate, epitomized by the Joe Wilson "You Lie!" debacle.

The supposedly skyrocketing costs for immigrants' healthcare has long been a favorite talking point of those who would severely restrict or end immigration to the U.S. On that front, the New York Times reports today:

Now, a new study published online in the journal Health Affairs suggests that, contrary to popular perception, immigrants actually cost the health care system less per person than do natives of the United States. Nor do illegal immigrants make up a disproportionate share of the costs to public programs like Medicaid, researchers found.

Uh oh, what will we do with all those angry signs about immigrants bankrupting healthcare at the Tea Party rallies?

Finally, as Dara Lind points out in "Faith Leaders, Pelosi Agree: End an American Tragedy, Stop Separating Families" an Urban Institute study (PDF) released earlier this month estimated that 100,000 parents of U.S. citizen children have been deported in the last 10 years. Lind writes, "Among the families the report studied in depth, these children clearly suffered from trauma, both immediately after their parents were deported and in the long run." That trauma included changes in eating and sleeping habits, increased fearfulness and crying, anxiety, and a tendency to become "withdrawn, clingy, angry, or aggressive."

Lind quotes Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi arguing that it's time to end this American tragedy, which plays out every day for separated families. Responding to a question about immigration raids, Pelosi said, ..."We should not wait another day to end these policies."

Fortunately, comprehensive immigration reform that would end this tragedy is a solution that the majority of Americans support-- not to mention a $4 trillion opportunity for a Congress struggling to cut costs and generate revenue.