We don’t need the new immigration bill. We need to enforce the one already in place and was meant to protect fair immigration, our nation’s sovereignty, secure our border while demonstrating compassion. This is current law and reason enough to not trust the government to ‘solve the problem’ by passing another piece of paper. Have the guts to enforce what you already agreed upon to solve the problem. Read on…
Q. Mr. President, we in Florida are having a tremendous problem with the influx of illegal immigrants. Do you see any way that the White House or the Congress, the administration, can spread the influx throughout the rest of the 50 States, rather than this — [inaudible]?
The President. So that we can spread the immigrants, do you mean, throughout the States?
Well, I think that our immigration policy is perhaps going to give us a better handle on that and put us back in a position of being able to control our own borders. You know that we’ve issued orders with regard to the interception of some who are not truly refugees, in the sense that we take those people who are fearing persecution and death in their own lands. We have been trying to diversify and spread the people that do come in, and that we take in to other areas of the country. But I believe that basically, the problem — that we’ll get a handle on it with the new immigration program if the Congress will support us on that.
Here is Reagan’s first two paragraphs on his statement.
Statement on Signing the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986
November 6, 1986
The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 is the most comprehensive reform of our immigration laws since 1952. In the past 35 years our nation has been increasingly affected by illegal immigration. This legislation takes a major step toward meeting this challenge to our sovereignty. At the same time, it preserves and enhances the Nation’s heritage of legal immigration. I am pleased to sign the bill into law.
In 1981 this administration asked the Congress to pass a comprehensive legislative package, including employer sanctions, other measures to increase enforcement of the immigration laws, and legalization. The act provides these three essential components. The employer sanctions program is the keystone and major element. It will remove the incentive for illegal immigration by eliminating the job opportunities which draw illegal aliens here. We have consistently supported a legalization program which is both generous to the alien and fair to the countless thousands of people throughout the world who seek legally to come to America. The legalization provisions in this act will go far to improve the lives of a class of individuals who now must hide in the shadows, without access to many of the benefits of a free and open society. Very soon many of these men and women will be able to step into the sunlight and, ultimately, if they choose, they may become Americans.
If Congress, the President would begin to enforce the current laws and act on current law we would do well. We don’t act on what is law now.. what promise can we believe that will cause us to trust that the new law will be any more than trouble for our nation?
