A reader sent the following letter to the White House (where, he says, no
doubt correctly, “it will not be read by anyone with any clout”), then
shared it with me. I thought I’d share it with you.
“I wholeheartedly disagree with the reported intent of this administration
to issue temporary work visas to workers in the United States Illegally. As
a Project Manager for an underground construction company [which he then
names], I have had an extremely difficult and frustrating time dealing with
the INS (now the Dept. of Homeland Security) regarding two Australian
citizens with highly specialized knowledge and 7 years more experience than
any comparable
American Citizens for my microtunneling operations. They have extensive
experience using a highly technical and specialized trenchless method, and
have installed 3 times the amount of footage of anyone else in the world.
“I have spent numerous dollars in attorneys’ fees, expedited processing
fees, airline tickets, hotel rooms (both in Australia and the US) attempting
to navigate the byzantine temporary worker visa program while attempting to
get a green card or H1-B for the two Aussies in question. (These two
Australians want to maintain their Australian citizenship but work in the US
and train US workers to their standards for approximately 3-5 years and then
return to their native country.) They are hard working, they pay US taxes,
and they have made every effort to stay within the letter of US immigration
laws (as has my company).
“I cannot begin to express how frustrating it is to me personally that it
has cost me approximately US$50,000 (and untold frustration to the
Australians and their families shuttling back and forth and disrupting their
children’s education and life), attempting to follow the regulations of US
immigration laws, only to find out that our President is contemplating
handing out 3 year protected working visas to any Tom, Dick, or Harry
working here illegally that managed to sneak across the border one way or
another and has made absolutely no effort to obey the immigration laws of
the United States.
“I am thoroughly displeased by this turn of events and I know that there are
millions of others in the US that are as displeased as I am.”
This letter illustrates an important truth about the immigration issue: The
people who are angriest about current policy, and about proposals like this
new Bush amnesty, are people who have some personal acquaintance with the
awful, expensive, irrational and hyper-bureaucratic business of LEGAL
immigration. People like the writer of that letter; like Michelle Malkin, who is the daughter of
immigrants; like Peter Brimelow and me, immigrants
ourselves. Most native-born Americans have no idea what you, and anyone
desiring to employ you, have to go through to accomplish a legal
immigration. When you have wrestled with that beast, the idea of handing
out Green Cards to people who sauntered across the border on spec just seems
grossly unjust.
The anger is spreading, though, and my prediction for 2004 is that illegal
immigration will be a big issue in the fall elections–to the consternation
and embarrassment of all establishment politicians, and in brazen defiance
of those politicians’ cynical attempts to cast the whole issue in terms of
“intolerance,” “discrimination,” “nativism” and “racism.”