Media
Small Town & Small Business Leaders Agree: The Economy Needs Comprehensive Immigration Reform
July 27, 2011
Washington D.C. - The National Immigration Forum hosted a national telephonic press conference with a Republican elected official and business leaders to highlight the economic benefits of federal immigration reform and the harmful impact of deportation-only immigration measures at state and federal levels.
Some elected leaders have pushed a variety of harsh deportation-only measures that are both bad policy and bad politics. In this Congress alone, House Judiciary Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX) has sponsored or co-sponsored at least seven anti-immigrant measure that undermine American competitiveness and enterprise, including a national mandatory E-verify program that unfairly burdens small business and forces them to perform federal immigration duties. Meanwhile several states moved ahead with harsh immigration enforcement legislation like Georgia and Arizona’s.
The press conference comes the day after a Senate Judiciary Immigration Subcommittee hearing called “The Economic Imperative of Immigration Reform” that featured prominent business leaders and elected officials, including Republican Mayor Paul Bridges of Uvalda, Georgia. Mayor Bridges is a plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit against Georgia’s new immigration enforcement law and a vocal advocate for immigration reform, and a vehement opponent of Georgia’s harsh new anti-immigrant law.
“State based immigration laws undermine state economies, period. There are fields of food in Georgia that can’t be harvested because these foolish immigration laws ruined the labor force. The Georgia law will destroy the economic livelihood of countless Georgians and deny those living here of their right to drive with their friends, host members of their family or engage in other daily activities without government intrusion,” said Mayor Paul Bridges. “Any American who values liberty, privacy and prosperity should fight this unnecessary, unconstitutional and extremist law. At the same time, the federal government must do its job and reform our broken immigration system so that we don’t see more bad laws like the ones in Georgia and Arizona. We don’t need more federal gimmicks that undermine our economic prosperity and don’t solve our broken immigration system. Plain and simple; harsh, enforcement only immigration laws ruin the economy.”
At the federal level, some Congressional leaders have proposed onerous new mandatory E-Verify legislation. Small business leaders in particular would suffer, forced to absorb the costs of a cumbersome, inaccurate system which would prevent them from maintaining a stable workforce.
"This burdensome regulation not only will cost my business and businesses like mine millions every year but will cost local governments lost tax revenue through forcing workers into the underground economy,” said Jim Houser of Hawthorne Auto Clinic in Portland, Oregon. “They call it E-verify but I'd like to call it E-terrify, it's a terrifying prospect for business and our economy."
E-Verify would also unfairly force small business owners to play a federal immigration role. “In New York, immigrants from across the world bring the entrepreneurial drive that makes the city and country thrive,” said Edgar Andrade, a small business owner from New York and member of Small Business United. “Mandatory E-Verify would not only be costly and time consuming to implement, it would also foster distrust between employers and workers – a key component of a successful small business. Making business owners fulfill federal immigration responsibilities is unfair, costly, and undermines their competitiveness at precisely the time American needs small businesses to create jobs. Our businesses would shed jobs, our stores would be forced to close and our fragile economy threatened. As a nation of immigrants and small businesses, we must oppose foolish immigration enforcement measures.”
The business and elected leaders speaking today agreed that the U.S. needs a bold, federal solution. Rather than creating a new, ineffective, and expensive government bureaucracies and laws, our country should require illegal immigrants to register, pay a fine, learn English, and become full Americans they said. It would ensure that everyone – workers and employers - are paying their fair share of taxes, while at the same time making sure the American economy isn’t hindered or burdened by foolish new measures that won’t solve the problem.
“There is a broad political consensus to reform the broken immigration system,” said Ali Noorani, Executive Director of the National Immigration Forum. “Republicans, Democrats, Independents all agree this problem must be fixed with a comprehensive federal solution. The American people want compromises that lead to long-term solutions, but much like the debate in Congress over the debt ceiling, Congress is doing just the opposite. Instead of compromises that will boost our economy, some leaders have offered us makeshift Band-Aid fixes. There is a better way forward that will ensure greater economic prosperity for all. ”
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