American Immigration Ambitions

The bill launched on Tuesday, April 16 in Congress seeks to remedy a problem of one of the historic motors of dynamism in the United States. With 11 million undocumented foreigners on its soil, the country must urgently adapt its laws to reality. The 4.7 million legal immigration applicants, some of which have been waiting for 10 years, confirm the blockage in the system.

On one hand, the bill must make a path toward citizenship for undocumented immigrants. On the other hand, it must guide the flow of newcomers into qualified jobs rather than into family reunification. Barack Obama cleverly fanned the flames in an area on which his Republican adversaries must compromise. They lost the last presidential election largely due to Latino voters’ hostility toward their oppressive stances on immigration. By increasingly appealing to Hispanic people during the campaign, the president managed to make them forget the record number of deportations recorded during his first term in office.

The compromise reached is a subtle one: Citizenship applicants will have to wait until the Mexican border is more “secure,” and they will only be able to obtain American nationality within 13 years. Cutting-edge, as well as agricultural and service, businesses will see a rise in their immigrant quotas, but unions have managed to exclude certain professions hit by unemployment and regulate the new system according to their employment situation. Both the Latinos and the churches applaud the faster five-year pathway to achieving the American nationality promised to “dreamers” — young undocumented immigrants that arrive in the U.S. during their childhood.

If the bill is voted in, it will be the first major reform of immigration law since the country was under Ronald Reagan’s presidency over 26 years ago when he achieved citizenship for 3 million undocumented immigrants and triggered a new wave of arrivals. Since then, the landscape has changed: Jobs are rarer in the United States, even though there are signs of recovery; demographics have fallen in Mexico and emigration has emptied a number of villages; the U.S. border is a lot less permeable and as for South America, it has become considerably more attractive.

Even in a country shaped by immigration, the issue stirs strong emotions. The parliamentary discussion is scheduled for May or June. It will be tough. But the Republican and Democrat senators’ initiative shows that immigration can be something other than a battleground for demagogic confrontation. Food for thought for France.