Automatic Citizenship

So far this year, 14,442 compatriots have been deported and have returned from the United States. Of this total, 88 percent are male and 12 percent are female. Most of the population that migrate and are sent back are active and young, in other words, those of working age. With high rates of unemployment here, due to the poor economic situation, the migration pressure is greater. However, so is the number of fellow countrymen returning — whether because the persecution methods of illegal immigrants have intensified, or because the economic situation in the U.S. has deteriorated, making it harder to find work.

The House of Representatives, with bipartisan support, has just allocated $600 million to pay for about 1,500 additional agents and unmanned aircraft for surveillance of the border of Mexico and the U.S. The legislation includes $176 million to hire 1,000 new border patrol agents to be stationed in regions where the flow of illegal immigrants is greater, and $89 million for 500 additional immigration and customs agents. Another $196 million will go to the Department of Justice to increase its staff of federal marshals, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Firearms, Alcohol, Tobacco and Explosives.

While the measures to secure the border intensify, immigration reform, aimed at repairing the broken immigration system and legalizing the status of the hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants, is not moving along or succeeding. Hispanics hoped that the immigration issue would be addressed through comprehensive reform, encompassing the various facets of the problem. However, it seems that the promises and proposals made to them have political overtones and are aimed more at winning the Hispanic vote in the upcoming elections than at solving the problem.

In addition, several Republican lawmakers have asked Congress to hold hearings on a possible change to the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution that, since 1868, provides automatic citizenship to anyone born on U.S. soil. This is seen as a way of denying automatic citizenship to children of illegal immigrants born in the U.S. The number of children born in the U.S. to illegal immigrants has increased from about 1.3 million in 2003 to four million in 2008. The groups opposed to immigration reform insist that illegal immigrants have children in the U.S. not to raise a family, but instead to “live off the government,” assure their children American citizenship and later provide a way to attain their own citizenship. In other words — ironically enough — illegal immigrants act out of self-interest, and are not simply human beings fighting for their right to work, improve, live in dignity, and strengthen their families.