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With the failure of Congress to pass comprehensive immigration reform legislation in 2007, the politics and the policy issues of immigration remain difficult, complex, and contentious leading up to the 2008 election.
 It is more important than ever that policymakers and the American public have solid information, fact-based analysis, and sound policy ideas on which to base their discussions, and, ultimately, their decisions. MPI is uniquely to contribute this knowledge because of the work that went into the report of its Independent Task Force on Immigration and America’s Future.
The Task Force was convened by MPI and co-chaired by former Senator Spencer Abraham (R-MI) and former Congressman Lee Hamilton (D-IN). MPI Senior Fellow Doris Meissner directed the panel’s work. Members of the bipartisan group included leaders of key immigration stakeholder groups, experienced senior public policy actors, elected officials, and immigration experts, with ex-officio participation from Mexico, Canada, the European Commission, and executive branch agencies. The Division of United States Studies and the Mexico Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, as well as Manhattan Institute, collaborated with MPI on this project.
The Task Force undertook a careful analysis of the economic, social, and demographic factors driving today’s large-scale immigration. Concluding that immigration is essential to US national interests and will become even more so in the years ahead, the Task Force recommended that the United States fundamentally rethink its policies and overhaul an outdated system to better reflect current realities.
Its final report, Immigration and America’s Future: A New Chapter, details recommendations for policies that are needed both to harness the advantages of immigration in a new era and to minimize its inherent tensions.
Specific Task Force recommendations include:
- Simplify and redesign the immigration system by drastically reducing the number of visa classifications and by establishing a new provisional visa category providing legal employment for workers at all skill levels. Provisional visas would bridge the false divide between temporary and permanent immigration and eliminate the need for a large guestworker program.
- Introduce a new type of immigration visa called a strategic growth visa to help the United States compete more effectively for international talent.
- Create a small, independent federal agency — the Standing Commission on Immigration and Labor Markets — to systematically monitor and analyze workforce, economic, and demographic trends, and make regular recommendations
to the Congress for adjusting temporary,
provisional, and permanent immigrant admissions levels.
- Place mandatory employer verification and workplace enforcement at the center of immigration enforcement reforms and replace existing Social Security cards with secure, biometric cards so that they — along with existing, already secure “green” cards and immigrant work authorization documents — would be the only ones that could verify work eligibility.
- Accelerate implementation of “smart border” measures and strengthen immigration enforcement at legal ports of entry (air, land, and sea) and as part of overseas visa issuance.
- Work collaboratively with Canadian and Mexican partners on improving security, curtailing unauthorized migration, and facilitating legal movement and trade.
- Create a National Office on Immigrant Integration to provide leadership, visibility, and a focal point at the federal level for integration policy.
The Task Force recommendations articulate a vision that promotes US global competitiveness in the context of post-9/11 security imperatives, while tackling many of the technical details that have made immigration such an intractable public policy problem. This report serves as a durable foundation upon which to build the discourse and policies that can meet the challenges and opportunities that immigration poses for the 21st century.
Executive Summary | Order Online (US) | Order Online (International)
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Adult English Language Instruction in the United States: Determining Need and Investing Wisely
By Margie McHugh, Julia Gelatt, and Michael Fix
Report, July 2007
This report offers first-time estimates of the numbers and costs to provide English language instruction to legal and unauthorized immigrant adults. The authors estimate that in to get to a level of proficiency necessary for civic integration or to begin post-secondary education, approximately 5.8 million adult lawful permanent residents (LPRs) currently in the United States will need about 277 million hours of English language instruction a year for six years. The cost of meeting these needs would be $200 million a year for six years over and above current expenditures. In order to remain in the United States under the terms of the failed Senate immigration bill or to fully participate in US civic life, approximately 6.4 million unauthorized immigrants will need about 319 million hours of English instruction a year for six years, with a projected cost of an additional $2.9 billion a year for six years.
Document Security Provisions: What's in the Cards?
By Dawn Konet
Fact Sheet No. 17, June 2007
This Fact Sheet provides a chart of the security features -- from photos and fingerprints to holograms and lamination -- of documents issued by government agencies and used by US residents to work, travel and verify their identities. While some of the other commonly used documents have had their security features steadily improved, there have been no significant changes to the Social Security card, one of the most commonly used to show work eligibility.
How Changes to Family Immigration Could Affect Source Countries' Sending Patterns
By Julia Gelatt
Fact Sheet No. 18, June 2007
The proposed Senate bill would substantially revise the family-based permanent immigration system. The current system allocates about two-thirds of permanent visas to family members while the Senate bill, which includes changes to family categories and a new points-based system, would likely result in less than half of all visas going to family members. At the same time, using the points system, the share of visas going to employment-based immigrants would increase from less than one-fifth currently to about two-fifths.
Annual Immigration to the United States:
The Real Numbers
By Julia Gelatt
Fact Sheet No. 16, May 2007
While official figures show annual permanent immigration to the United States averaging about 1 million people a year, actual annual immigration to the United States is about 1.8 million people. True numbers of people who enter the United States each year and ultimately remain permanently include not only those coming through official permanent immigration channels, but also those entering through certain temporary immigration streams, and those entering or remaining in the United States without authorization.
MPI Publications on US Immigration Policy | All Publications |
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Immigration Reform: Prospects and Possibilities
Congressmen Jeff Flake (R-AZ) and Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), the authors of the STRIVE Act (Security Through Regularized Immigration and a Vibrant Economy) will keynote this event.
Co-sponsored by MPI and The Brookings Institution at Brookings
Thursday, April 26, 2007
8:30 to 10:00 a.m.
The Brookings Institution, Falk Auditorium
Introduction
Remarks by Congressman Jeff Flake (R-AZ)
Remarks by Congressman Luis V. Gutierrez (D-IL)
Transcript
The Fourth Annual Immigration Law and Policy Conference
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Keynote by Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), Chair of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and International Law, US House of Representatives
Co-sponsored by MPI, Georgetown University Law Center, and Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc. (CLINIC)
Georgetown University Law Center
In-State College Tuition for Unauthorized Immigrants?: Leading Law Professors Debate at MPI
Debate between Kris W. Kobach, University of Missouri-Kansas City and Michael A. Olivas, University of Houston Law Center
April 6, 2007
Responding to New Immigrants: What Structures are State and Local Governments Creating?
Briefing with Chung-Wha Hong, New York Immigration Coalition; Nick Johnson, Commission for Racial Equality; Charles Kamasaki, National Council of La Raza; and Demetrios Papademetriou, MPI.
March 30, 2007
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