Posted on 01/12/2004 7:33:52 PM PST by Happy2BMe
Mass Immigration Said 'Swamping' U.S. Cities The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), a Washington, D.C.-based group advocating tighter immigration restrictions, says 1.1 million immigrants will enter the U.S. this year alone. In its new report, FAIR says the immigrant population nearly doubled from 19.8 million in 1990 to 31.1 million a decade later. "America's immigration policies have launched us into a risky experiment never tried by a modern day country," said Dan Stein, FAIR's executive director, in reference to the new numbers. "This demographic change is unlike anything this country has ever experienced, and is unprecedented in modern times." FAIR says six large U.S. cities over 100,000 – Hialeah and Miami, Fla., along with Glendale, Santa Ana, Daly City and El Monte, Calif. – had foreign-born populations of more than 50 percent. The immigrant population constituted 41-50 percent of the total in four others: Los Angeles, East Los Angeles, and Garden Grove, Calif., along with Elizabeth, New Jersey. Mexico accounted for about 9.2 million immigrants, or 30 percent of the total foreign-born population in the U.S., according to the Census Bureau's 2000 report, making it the leading country of birth. Next were China and the Philippines, with 1.5 million and 1.4 million respectively. They are followed by India, Vietnam, Cuba, South Korea, Canada, El Salvador and Germany. In 2000, more than half the foreign born population lived in three states: California, New York and Texas, the Census Bureau found. The FAIR report said immigration was the greatest in the South, which saw its foreign born population grow by 90 percent, followed by 65 percent in the Midwest. FAIR says the foreign-born population in the U.S. will swell to 45 million by 2010 if current immigration levels continue, "making this decade's wave of immigration the largest in U.S. history," the report said, adding California's foreign-born population alone is expected to swell to 12 million by decade's end. Currently, the U.S. population is estimated at 291 million people, according to Census Bureau figures. Though not all immigration is unhealthy for the country, FAIR says many regions of the U.S. are already struggling economically to provide basic services for people. Adding more numbers will simply make it more difficult – and expensive – to offer them, and that could lead to other troubles, the group claimed. "What remains to be seen is if this country has the capacity to accommodate, and assimilate, an unending wave of mass immigration ¯ because failure to do so will result in a balkanized, fragmented, strife-torn and dysfunctional America," Stein said. New Immigrant Initiatives A number of surveys have shown a majority of Americans at odds with lawmakers who support high levels of immigration. Still, there are new immigrant-friendly initiatives being introduced and considered by Congress and the Bush administration. For the first time since before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, the administration has hinted it is considering a new work-related legalization program for millions of aliens currently residing in the U.S. A week ago in Miami, Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge told an audience the U.S. will have to "come to grips" with such an initiative, if for nothing else because of the sheer number of illegal aliens who here now or planning to come in the future. "The bottom line is, as a country we have to come to grips with the presence of 8 to 12 million illegals, afford them some kind of legal status some way, but also as a country decide what our immigration policy is and then enforce it," Ridge said. Legislatively, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 16-3 in October to approve the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act of 2003, which would provide college opportunities for U.S.-born children of illegal aliens residing in the country – a vote hailed by immigrant and Latino support groups. "The future of thousands of Hispanic children depends on the passage of this bill," said a statement by the National Council of La Raza, the nation's largest Hispanic civil rights group. In clarifying Ridge's statement to reporters a few days later, President Bush said he has opposed, and continues to oppose, any "blanket amnesty" for illegal aliens. But, he echoed the Homeland Security chief's support for a work-related legalization plan. "We need to have an immigration policy that helps match any willing employer with any willing employee," Bush told reporters Dec. 15. "It makes sense that that policy go forward. And we're in the process of working that through now so I can make a recommendation to the Congress." Bush will travel to the Summit of the Americas in Monterrey, Mexico, next month, where he will likely discuss the issue with other regional leaders. Some lawmakers, however, call such work-related plans little more than an amnesty program, and are opposed them on those grounds. Instead, they are pushing for stricter overall enforcement of existing immigration laws as well as a different approach to creating the so-called "guest worker" programs. Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., head of the House Immigration Reform Caucus, says border legislation he introduced earlier this year aims to plug "gaping holes in both America’s porous borders and its dysfunctional guest worker programs." Reform groups like FAIR maintain the first issue Washington should address is continued record-high immigration. "Mass immigration has nothing whatsoever to do with the economic and social well-being of the United States or the American people," Stein said. "Immigration is entirely about the interests of the immigrants themselves, special interest ethnic groups, and business interests that want unlimited numbers of low-wage workers." Jon E. Dougherty
Mass immigration, most of it coming from south of the border, is "swamping" the United States, with six large U.S. cities now consisting mostly of foreign-born inhabitants, a new report warns.
Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2004
"Blackbird" is a beautiful song.
We really need to take the broken wings around here and learn to fly.
You are correct, and if you have followed the free trade debate you will have noticed that one of the major objection to free trade is that it depresses American wages.
Do you ever miss Calcutta?
We used to be a slavery nation, too.
But times change.
We should pursue a freedom agenda, first.
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