Bush promotes border security, guest-worker program

Posted on Tue, Oct. 18, 2005


Bush promotes border security, guest-worker program

BY FRANK DAVIES

Knight Ridder Newspapers

WASHINGTON - Using a classic carrot-and-stick approach to the contentious immigration issue, President Bush and two Cabinet members promised Tuesday to secure the nation's borders while pushing for a guest-worker program for undocumented immigrants.

"We're going to get control of our borders and make this country safer for all our citizens," said Bush as he signed a $32 billion, homeland-security bill that includes $890 million more for immigration enforcement but fewer grants for first responders.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff repeatedly linked tougher border security to thwart terrorists and criminals with a temporary-worker program in testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. He announced a goal to "return every single illegal entrant - no exceptions."

"But we're going to need more than just brute enforcement to be effective," he added. "We need a temporary-worker program to relieve some of the significant pressure on our borders, so we can concentrate on the worst of the worst."

Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao touted the administration's proposal for the estimated 10 to 12 million illegal immigrants in the United States: Come "out of the shadows," be documented, pay a "substantial fine" and be allowed to live and work for up to six years before returning home.

But members of the Senate Judiciary Committee said any comprehensive plan to revamp immigration rules will have to wait until January at the earliest and a new session of Congress. The committee is occupied with the Harriet Miers nomination to the Supreme Court, with hearings to begin in November, and other legislation.

"We're facing a daunting workload with a very heavy backlog of controversial and contested judicial nominees," said Sen. Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican and the committee chairman.

And despite a verbal boost from Bush on Tuesday, and the support of business, labor and religious groups, the administration has not pushed hard this year for immigration reform - an issue that has deeply divided Republicans.

Specter said that the administration was not ready in July, when the committee held a hearing on immigration, with a detailed legislative proposal.

Pushing the contentious issue into an election year will make it more difficult to enact legislation, several senators said.

Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., said many Republicans want to concentrate on border security and oppose a temporary-worker program: "I don't think that program in any form is going to pass anytime soon."

The administration's talk of a guest-worker program, unveiled almost two years ago, has encouraged more illegal immigration, said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.

Chertoff admitted that the practice of "catch and release" for non-Mexicans caught at the border was a serious problem. Mexicans who enter illegally and are caught are promptly returned, but last year the Border Patrol caught 160,000 non-Mexicans and only 30,000 were removed.

The rest were released and many disappeared.

"This practice acts as an enticement for additional border crossers," Chertoff told the committee. "It's unacceptable."

He said one way to speed the return of some illegal entrants is "to lean more heavily on some countries" in Central America and elsewhere to accelerate the process. The bill Bush signed Tuesday also includes $90 million to house illegal migrants.

Chertoff's pledge to return all illegal entrants "will have no bearing on Cuban migration," Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said.

Cuban migrants picked up at sea are returned while those who reach U.S. soil are allowed to stay.

Even senators who support a temporary-worker program are divided over whether - and when - illegal immigrants would have to return to their home countries at some point in the process.

Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., who is sponsoring an immigration-reform bill with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said the "enforcement-only" approach will never work, and that it would be impractical to deport 11 million illegal immigrants.

Chertoff agreed: "That would be hugely, hugely difficult, and require an enormous expenditure of resources."