Securing the Homeland Through Immigration Law Enforcement

There are three parts to any immigration enforcement system, three filters to identify unwanted people for exclusion or deportation: First, the visa process overseas; second, inspections and patrols at the border; and, finally, enforcement of immigration laws in the interior of the country.

Since the Islamist terror attacks of September 11, 2001, the first two parts of our immigration filter have seen improvements. Increased rigor in the consideration of visa applications at our consulates abroad, and progress toward implementing an effective entry/exit tracking system at the border have marked real steps forward. Although much remains to be done, the problems are being tackled.

The third filter is in much worse shape. Starting in 1993, with the Border Patrol’s Operation Hold the Line, in El Paso, and accelerated by the immigration bill passed by Congress in 1996, the focus of immigration law enforcement was the southern border. Important as this was, it was not matched by similar improvements in interior enforcement. In fact, quite the opposite. For instance, when the INS conducted raids during Georgia’s Vidalia onion harvest in 1998, thousands of illegal aliens abandoned the fields to avoid arrest. Within hours, employers and politicians registered their displeasure, and the enforcement action was discontinued.

In response, the INS developed a "kinder, gentler" means of enforcing the law, which fared no better. Rather than conduct raids on specific employers, Operation Vanguard sought to identify illegal workers at all meatpacking plants in Nebraska through audits of their personnel records. The INS found about 4,000 workers, out of about 24,000, who appeared to be illegal, and scheduled interviews to determine their status. Three thousand of these workers turned out to be illegal aliens, and never showed up for their interviews, with the remaining 1,000 able to correct errors in their records.

Local law enforcement officials were very pleased with the program: "It’s an excellent program," said Grand Island Police Chief Kyle Hetrick. "It’s a positive thing. It’s effective." Despite the initial promise of this new enforcement strategy, employers and politicians actively criticized the very idea of enforcing the law: "It was ill-advised for Operation Vanguard to start out in a state with such low employment and an already big problem with a shortage of labor," said a former Nebraska governor who had been hired to lobby for an end to immigration law enforcement. As a result, plans to expand the program to other states and other industries were scrapped and the INS official who developed the program was forced into early retirement.

Neglect of interior enforcement. The INS got the message and developed a new interior enforcement policy that gave up on reasserting control over immigration and focused almost entirely on the important, but narrow, issues of criminal aliens and smugglers. As INS policy director Robert Bach told the New York Times in a 2000 story entitled "I.N.S. Is Looking the Other Way As Illegal Immigrants Fill Jobs": "It is just the market at work, drawing people to jobs, and the INS has chosen to concentrate its actions on aliens who are a danger to the community."

This neglect of interior enforcement has helped to create a very large illegal population, now estimated by the Census Bureau at more than eight million. And, contrary to Prof. Bach’s claims, lax enforcement of immigration laws has become a "danger to the community" by increasing America’s vulnerability to terrorists from overseas.

Fortunately, today there is reason for optimism that interior enforcement will be reinvigorated. When the service and enforcement functions of the former Immigration and Naturalization Service were separated, the Bush Administration further split enforcement into two parts, border and interior enforcement (unfortunately, the first filter -- the visa process -- was allowed to remain in the State Department). Though somewhat unexpected, this was a very sensible move, given the importance of interior enforcement and the low priority it had been given in the past. And unlike the academics who had held top positions in the prior arrangement of INS, this time the immigration enforcement components of the new Homeland Security Department, including the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, are headed by people with genuine law-enforcement backgrounds.

With this new arrangement, our nation can finally work toward restoring order to our anarchic immigration system, by focusing resources and attention on all three filters in our immigration-control system.

There are a number of reasons why interior enforcement must be improved. First, in a nation built on the rule of law, allowing any set of laws, including those pertaining to immigration, to be routinely flouted undermines the very foundation of our Republic. More specifically, there are significant costs to the U.S. economy and American taxpayers from allowing millions of people to live in the United States illegally.

Finally, there is the risk from foreign-born terrorists. In a study completed last year by the Center for Immigration Studies, we found that 22 of 48 foreign-born al Qaeda-linked terrorists who were involved in terrorism in the United States between 1993 and 2001 had committed significant violations of immigration laws prior to taking part in terrorism. Thus, strictly enforcing immigration laws must be a key component of our anti-terrorism efforts.

In many cases terrorists lived, worked, opened bank accounts, and received driver’s licenses with little or no difficulty. They operated for extended periods within the United States while they were in violation of immigration laws. For example, of the 48 terrorists in the study, at least 13 had overstayed a temporary visa at some point.

In addition to overstaying visas, we found that terrorists have violated immigration laws in a number of other ways. Some terrorists have engaged in fraudulent marriages to American citizens, such as Fadil Abdelgani, who took part in the plot to bomb New York City landmarks in 1993, and Khalid Abu al Dahab, who raised money and helped recruit new members for al Qaeda from within the United States. Terrorists also violated immigration laws by providing false information on their applications for permanent residence, such as Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, who inspired several terrorist plots. Still other terrorists have violated the law by working illegally in the United States; at least eight terrorists held jobs for extended periods while living in the country illegally before taking part in terrorism, including those involved in the 1993 World Trade Center attack, the plot to bomb New York landmarks, and the Millennium plot. Because such a large percentage of foreign-born terrorists violated immigration law, enforcing the law would be extremely helpful in disrupting and preventing terrorist attacks.

Tolerating illegal immigration facilitates terrorism. Of course, vast majority of aliens who violate immigration laws are not terrorists. However, allowing a large illegal population to reside in the United States facilitates terrorism for two reasons. First, it has created a large underground industry that furnishes illegals with fraudulent identities and documents that terrorists can (and have) tapped into. Several of the 9/11 terrorists were assisted in getting their Virginia driver's licenses from someone who specialized in helping run-of-the-mill illegal aliens obtain them.

Second, the existence of a huge illegal population creates a general contempt or disregard for immigration law. Although the general public may still want the law enforced, the scale of illegal immigration creates a tacit acceptance by law enforcement, policymakers, and even immigration-enforcement personnel themselves. With millions of illegal immigrants already in the country, and with immigration laws widely flouted, it is perhaps easy to understand why the immigration inspector at Miami’s airport allowed Mohammed Atta back into the country in January 2001 even though he had overstayed his visa on his last visit and had abandoned his application to change status to vocational student by leaving the country.

The release from INS detention of 1993 World Trade Center Bomber Ahmad Ajaj or Brooklyn subway bomber Gazi Ibrahim Abu Mezer (or, more recently, sniper John Lee Malvo) also does not seem so outrageous when one considers that immigration law is routinely violated and millions of people are allowed to live in the country illegally. Tolerating mass illegal immigration is by no means the only factor increasing the chance that terrorists will successfully enter and remain in the country, but by not enforcing immigration law we have made life easier for the large number of terrorists who have broken immigration laws.

Other reasons for interior enforcement. Of course, combating terror is not the only reason to enforce immigration law. We know from a variety of sources that illegal aliens are overwhelmingly unskilled, with more than three-fourths lacking even a high school education. Each year several hundred thousand illegal aliens without a high school education settle in the United States. Allowing in so many unskilled workers creates very significant economic problems. The economic goal of a modern society such as ours is to create a large middle class through high-wage, capital-intensive jobs exhibiting growing labor productivity and aiming toward a flatter distribution of income. Mass unskilled immigration, a very large share of which is illegal, subverts these goals. In its 1997 report, the National Research Council concluded that by increasing the supply of unskilled workers, immigration was responsible for close to half the decline in relative wages for high school dropouts from 1980 to 1994, translating into lost wages for those dropouts amounting to about 5 percent of their incomes.

From the point of view of employers, this seems like a desirable state of affairs, since lower labor costs mean higher profits, and for consumers it should mean lower prices as well. Of course, for the 10 percent of our workers who lack a high school education and who are already the lowest-paid workers, this reduction is quite harmful. But, putting aside the impact on the working poor, the long-term consequences of illegal immigration for the economy are also harmful.

There is strong evidence that in industries as diverse as construction, garment manufacturing, and agriculture an increasing reliance on unskilled illegal-alien labor is slowing productivity gains and causing the United States to fall behind its international competitors. At least 80 percent of illegal aliens lack a high-school education and this unskilled immigration acts as a subsidy by artificially holding down labor costs by increasing the supply of labor. Businesses tend to want subsidies and often grow dependent on them. But like any subsidy, illegal immigration prevents innovation and causes the industry in question to lose its competitive edge in the long term. Reducing illegal immigration and allowing wages to rise naturally would not only be good for the working poor, it would make for a more productive economy. Employers, in response to upward pressure on wages, would adopt more productive methods, such as dried-on-the-vine raisin production or greater use of pre-fabricated material in construction. We can reduce illegal immigration secure in the knowledge that it will not spark inflation because unskilled workers account for such a tiny fraction of total economic output. High school dropouts account for less than 4 percent of total output in the United States, so even if wages rose substantially for these workers, the effect on prices would be very small.

Illegal immigration is also a problem for public coffers. In addition to reducing wages for the working poor and hindering productivity gains, there is another problem with illegal immigration -- it imposes significant fiscal costs, an extremely important concern at a time of huge budget shortfalls in almost every state. As a practical matter, the middle and upper classes in the United States pay almost all of the taxes. The poor -- immigrant or native -- generally consume significantly more in public services than they pay in taxes. Because illegal aliens are overwhelming unskilled, this results in their having much lower incomes and tax payments. Moreover, while illegal aliens are not supposed to use most welfare programs, in fact they often make use of them anyway. Even if the immigrant himself is not eligible because of legal status, immigrant families can still receive benefits on behalf of their U.S.-born children, whose welfare eligibility is the same as any other native-born American.

In research done by the Center for Immigration Studies, we estimated that of households headed by illegal aliens from Mexico (the largest component of the illegal population), 31 percent used at least one major welfare program. This is lower than the 37 percent estimated for households headed by legal Mexican immigrants. But it is much higher than the 15 percent estimated for natives. Significant use of public services coupled with much lower tax payments means that illegal immigrants almost certainly create a net fiscal drain.

In 1997 the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) estimated that immigrant households consume between $11 billion and $20 billion more in public services than they pay in taxes each year. This net fiscal drain (taxes paid minus services used) is almost entirely the result of unskilled immigrants. The NAS estimated that an immigrant with less than a high school education imposes a net fiscal drain of $89,000 on public coffers during his lifetime. This burden on taxpayers would, of course, become even worse if these immigrants were legalized, because they would remain largely poor, given their limited education levels, but they would become directly eligible for welfare programs. From the point of view of taxpayers, reducing illegal immigration by enforcing the law would almost certainly be desirable.

What steps are necessary to enable the new Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement to play its vital part in immigration control?

Tracking System for Temporary Visa Holders. There is a longstanding problem that the federal government often has no idea whether foreign visitors have left when their temporary visas expire. In addition, it often has no idea where foreign citizens live while their visas are still valid. A number of terrorists have been tourists and business travelers, and it would be very difficult to track such individuals within the United States. Even in the current environment, it is unrealistic to expect all foreign visitors to submit their passports every time they check into a hotel and to expect hotels to report that information. Currently, foreign travelers are required to write down their destination upon entering the United States, but no effort is made to verify the information; in fact, two of the 9/11 jihadists listed "Marriott Hotel, New York" as their destination.

The Special Registration system in place for visitors from selected, mostly Middle Eastern, countries is a valuable first step toward a comprehensive entry/exit tracking system, but it would probably not be feasible to apply it in its current form to the millions of alien visitors from all countries. But it would be possible to keep such close tabs on all foreign citizens residing here for extended periods of time who are affiliated with an American institution responsible for their whereabouts. Such a system makes sense because many of these long-term visitors (here from one to six years, or more) reside here for a long time in a legal status, whereas short-term visitors are less likely to have the time to hatch sophisticated plots before their visas expire. Although short-term tourists and business travelers, who are not attached to any American institution, make up the majority of non-immigrants, the number of long-term visa holders requiring oversight is still quite large. In 2001, there were more than 1 million foreign students and exchange visitors admitted (including their spouses and young children), as well as almost 1.4 million long-term foreign workers (including family), each more than double the number admitted just five years previously. Tracking these individuals through their American institutions is both desirable and possible. If they leave their schools, jobs, or otherwise violate the terms of their admission, we would know immediately, and then we could send out an investigator while the trail was still warm.

Tracking foreign students -- and others. One of the largest single categories of long-term temporary visitors is foreign students (admitted on F1 and M1 visas). A number of terrorists originally entered on student visas, including Eyad Ismoil, a conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and 9/11 hijacker Hani Hanjour, and both were in the country illegally when they committed their crimes. Ismoil dropped out after three semesters and remained in the United States illegally, while Hanjour never even attended class. Both Khalid Abu al Dahab and Wadih el Hage originally came to the United States on student visas, later married Americans, and became naturalized citizens.

The 1996 immigration law mandated that the INS develop a computerized tracking system for foreign students to replace the failed paper-based system. Unfortunately, that system did not moved beyond the pilot stage because of scorched-earth opposition from universities and colleges. Institutions opposed it, and continue to oppose the current Student Exchange and Visitor Information System (SEVIS), fearing the extra administrative burden, but mainly because they do not like the idea of treating foreign students differently from their American counterparts. But given the very real threats we face, tracking students makes perfect sense. Ideally such a system would provide the INS with real-time information verifying a student’s enrollment and immediately notify the INS if the student drops out or otherwise is not honoring the terms of his visa. The border security bill signed by the president last May has accelerated the development of a workable student-tracking system, but as this subcommittee heard last week, there is still a long way to go.

Despite the current difficulties faced by SEVIS, this strategy should not be limited only to foreign students. There are an additional million temporary workers, trainees, and intra-company transferees who can and should be included in such a system. Expanding the new tracking system to cover all long-term non-immigrants is necessary to ensure that the system is as comprehensive as possible. INS enforcement could then follow up with the sponsoring employer or other institution as soon as it learns that the alien violated the terms of the visa.

Names of visa violators should be in the national crime database. In January of 2002, the INS announced that it was going to add to the FBI’s National Crime Information Center (NCIC) database the names of more than 300,000 illegal aliens who have been ordered deported, but whose departure the INS cannot verify. This is certainly a good start, but once a well-functioning entry/exit system is in place, the names, photos, and fingerprints of all those who overstay or otherwise violate the terms of their admission to the U.S. should be added to the criminal database. In that way, if they are ever arrested for a crime or even pulled over in a traffic stop they can be held by local police and then turned over to the BICE agents. This could become a key component of interior enforcement. With 3 to 4 million visa overstayers living in the United States, there is no question that tens of thousands of them have some encounter with the authorities each year. Traffic stops and arrests are a significant opportunity to apprehend those in the country illegally, and we should take full advantage of them.

While adding visa violators to the criminal database would help reduce illegal immigration, one may still wonder if it would ever be useful against terrorists. In fact, two of the 9/11 hijackers were pulled over in traffic stops in months preceding the attacks. In the spring of 2001, the plot’s ringleader, Mohammed Atta, received a traffic ticket in Broward County, Florida, for driving without a license. He had, by this time, overstayed his visa on his previous visit to the United States between June of 2000 and January of 2001, though the INS at Miami International Airport allowed him back into the country. Had a system of carefully tracking overstays and placing their names in the criminal database been in place, then we might have been able to apprehend Atta and perhaps avert the 9/11 attacks. Although he had not overstayed his visa, Ziad Samir Jarrah, who was on board United Airlines Flight 93 that crashed in Pennsylvania on 9/11, was issued a speeding ticket on September 9 in Maryland for driving 95 miles an hour in a 60-mile-per-hour zone. Thus, even the most sophisticated terrorists in American history seem to have run afoul of the law prior to carrying out their plans.

For BICE to quickly take custody of visa violators detained by police, it would need many more agents assigned to interior enforcement and much more detention space. By adding the names of visa overstays to the criminal database, the INS would in effect enlist the help of thousands of local law enforcement officers.

Enforcing the ban on hiring illegal aliens. The centerpiece of any new interior enforcement strategy has to be a resumption in enforcement of the ban on hiring illegal aliens. While worksite enforcement, as it is commonly called, may not seem to be important to national security at first glance, it is, in fact, vital to reducing the terrorist threat. Gaining control of the border between crossing points (now the job of the Homeland Security Department’s Bureau of Customs and Border Protection) is only possible if BICE is able to dramatically reduce the number of illegal job seekers trying to sneak into the United States by making it extremely difficult for them to find work.

As already indicated, the estimated 8 million illegals now living in the country have also created a vast market and infrastructure for fraudulent documents. The existence of widespread fraud can only make it easier for terrorists to operate in the United States. In addition, it would be much harder for terrorists who overstay their visas to blend into normal life if finding a job is made more difficult. At least eight of the terrorists in our study worked in the United States illegally before being arrested. Of course, terrorists could still come with large sums of cash and try to live undetected, but doing so would be much harder if getting a job is much more difficult.

Worksite enforcement must be made effective. There are two steps that are needed to make worksite enforcement effective. First, a national computerized system that allows employers to verify the work-eligibility of new hires needs to be implemented. Employers would submit the name, date of birth, Social Security number (SSN), or alien registration number to the INS for each new hire. This information is already collected for I-9 forms, but is not used for enforcement. After an instant check of its database, the employers would then receive an authorization number indicating that the person is allowed to work in the United States. The authorization number would provide the employer an ironclad defense against the charge that they knowingly hired an illegal alien. Tests of such systems have generally been well received by employers.

Document fraud, of course, is widespread, but a computerized system would be a key tool in uncovering it. For example, a valid SSN that is linked to a different name and submitted to immigration authorities, or a SSN and name that show up among numerous employers across the country, would both be indications that a worker is trying to skirt the law. BICE could develop procedures to identify potential problems of this kind. When a potential problem is identified, special agents would then go out to the employer and examine all the paperwork for the employee, perhaps conducting an interview with the worker and determine the source of the problem.

Dramatically increase the number of investigators. Investigators from BICE are charged with such tasks as worksite enforcement, anti-smuggling efforts, and combating document fraud. Before the reorganization, there were only about 2,000 agents assigned to interior enforcement for the entire country. This number must be increased dramatically. Also, there were only the full-time equivalent of 300 INS inspectors devoted to worksite enforcement year-round, whose job it is to enforce the ban on hiring the five or six million illegal immigrants in the workforce. If the number of investigators was increased to the levels necessary, they could begin to visit employers identified by the verification system as having a potential problem, and additionally could randomly visit worksites to see that employers were filing the paperwork for each worker as required by law. Those employers found to be knowingly hiring illegals would be made to pay stiff fines.

It is not just in the area of worksite enforcement that additional investigators could be put to work. The system of tracking students and perhaps other visitors requires that there be enough agents to locate those identified by the tracking system as having violated their visas. If we create a tracking system, for example, but there are no agents to investigate those who stop working or attending class, then a tracking system is almost meaningless. Failure to develop such a system means that millions of illegal immigrants will continue to work and live in the United States facing little or no penalty. Not only does this make a mockery of the rule of law, harm the working poor, and impose significant costs on taxpayers, it also exposes the country to significant security risks.

Employment verification as a proxy for comprehensive registration. Most of the recommendations outlined above have dealt with temporary visa holders or efforts to reduce illegal immigration. More effective monitoring is also needed of permanent residents. A number of militant Islamic terrorists have been legal immigrants, including Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, Siddig Ibrahim Siddig Ali (ringleader of a plot to bomb New York landmarks) and Mahmud Abouhalima, a leader of the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center.

Until the early 1980s all non-citizens living in the United States were required to register annually their whereabouts with the INS. This practice should probably not be revived in that form. Potential terrorists cannot be expected to dutifully send in post cards with their addresses. However, the employment verification system outlined above could be a very effective tool in locating non-citizen legal immigrants. This is especially important when a person is placed on the watch list after he has entered the country. At present, there is often no

Yeah, blah blah blah another paper, another presentation, another Congressional committee -- then they all do lunch and ignore it.

I personally think that nothing will happen until some wackos string claymores at random along the smuggler trails. Some illegals get blown to jam, immigration activists would scream, the press would get all over it, and the government would have to put people on the border -- to find and deactivate the claymores, of course. But at least while that all was going on the traffic would drop.

Some illegals get blown to jam, immigration activists would scream, the press would get all over it...

The germ of an idea is forming. We know two things for certain.

1) Illegals are crossing Ft. Huachuca now, and
2) Unexploded Ordnance remains on several training ranges.

So, not only is the above scenario plausible, it is also possible. Now, I'm not going to advocate violence. But I will say that this may be what it takes to open some eyes in Washington and in the BP's Tucson Sector. Either this scenario, or an over-zealous Military Policeman unloads on illegals.

Why, HJ, the solution is obvious! The Mexican Foreign Minister, the Never Reformed Marxist America Hater Santiago Creel (raised in San Diego, renounced his U.S. citizenship) has demanded that we reopen immigration talks now that he has shown the Mexican Army's effectiveness in protecting the American border during the recent unpleasantness in Iraq. The solution? Well:

Give Ft. Huachuca to Mexico, and make Southern Arizona a Mexican protectorate, kind of like the way the U.S. runs Iraq now! After all, Mr. Bush has never found it in his heart to put the U.S. Army on the border, but he did ask Tom Ridge to call "his counterpart" (his words) in Mexico and put the Mexican Army on the U.S. border...soooo, problem solved! Just install the Mexican Army on all U.S. bases near the border and then the "illegals" walking across will no longer be illegals! After all, if they're "undocumented", the Mexican Army can just set up a card table at the southern edge of the fort and issue them "documents"! And send them on their way.

I'm sure Mr. Bush, Mr. Ridge, and especially Sr. Creel will appreciate the brilliance of my solution.

I guess you know that Mexico go the "whole enchilada" yesterday.

Go to www.mysanantonio.com/news and scroll on the left-hand column until you get to Mexico. Then click.

In this article Mexico told Tom Ridge that they would help with border security if their migrants were allowed to cross with no problems. You know "open borders"and guaranteed jobs.

I just heard on ABC news that Tom Ridge said today that there would be no retributions to Mexico for their not backing the US. Different strokes for different folks.

This along with the gun bill will do George Bush in.