Post-9/11 Changes in Immigration Laws, Policies, and Enforcement, Essay Example

Introduction

Even before the tragic events of September 11, 2001, a domestic distrust of alien residents was pervasive in American culture. As early as 1996, Congress passed tough legislation, the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) (Hines, 2006), making all immigrants, legal and illegal, more susceptible to deportation. This was especially true for those who had arrest records and felony convictions. In the ensuing years, the number of immigrants deported for crimes is nearing 1 million (Associated Press, 2007). Therefore, it is wrong to assume that the heinous acts of terrorism that exploded on U.S. soil in 2001 are responsible for many Americans’ anti-immigration stance, since that position predated the infamous attacks. Because of these facts, De Genova (2007) has observed that the United States is embroiled in the interlocking crises of “demands of citizenship, erosion of civil liberties, imperial ambition, nativist parochialism, extravagant domestic law enforcement, and global lawlessness” (p. 421).

Immigration Laws Defined

There have been periods of tightening and loosening of immigration laws and policies. Political and social trends have guided immigration laws in the United States (Hines, 2006) when viewed historically. In the waning years of the Bush administration, federal thinking on immigration called for comprehensive reform measures that would continue the trend toward rigid standards. On May 15, 2006, in an address to the nation, President George W. Bush summed up his administration’s thinking on this matter:

We must begin by recognizing the problems with our immigration system. For decades, the United States has not been in complete control of its borders…We’re a nation of laws, and we must enforce our laws. We are also a nation of immigrants, and we must uphold that tradition, which has strengthened our country in so many ways. These are not contradictory goals. America can be a lawful society and a welcoming society at the same time. We will fix the problems created by illegal immigration, and we will deliver a system that is secure, orderly, and fair. So I support comprehensive reform that will accomplish [this]. (Walker, 2007, p. 135).

The very title of IIRARA provides evidence as to the political climate that produced it. The words illegal, reform, and responsibility hint that the word immigrant is a problem. Hines (2006) offers an excellent summation: “Get tough on immigrants, stop illegal immigration, and blame immigrants for criminal and welfare problems” (p. 11).

Changing Domestic Immigration Laws

Comprehensive reform is being discussed at local, state, and national levels. National security is tied to this. “America’s porous, 2000-mile Mexican border –and its growing population of 11 million undocumented migrants” (Walker, 2007. p. 173). Our national debate on the topic of immigration is intense. We must finds ways, according to Bhargava (2009), to resolve issues that affect countless immigrant families and to soothe tensions regarding immigration as a wedge in social justice.

Changing International Immigration Laws

Our connections are worldwide, forming a nexus that is economic in nature. What happens in one country has far-reaching consequences half way around the planet. Following our 9/11 crisis, we were not the only country that sought to revamp its immigration laws. Just as the United States accelerated its pre 9/11 concerns over immigration, other countries, particularly ones from the European Union, were doing the same thing (Karyotis, 2007).

The differences in the ways in which people groups are treated have changed since September of 2001 are surprising. Rottman, Fariss, & Poe (2009), who have studied human rights issues that have surfaced since the attack on the World Trade Center, show, as a salient feature of their work, that it is no easier to pass through political asylum officers and immigration judges in the United States if you are a seeker of refuge from another English-speaking country. In fact, those from Spanish speaking countries, and, surprisingly, those from Arabic-speaking countries have stronger probabilities of acceptance through the legal system than do native English speakers.

Immigration Enforcement of Immigrants

Times have changed.  Many Americans want toughness in fighting the problems associated with illegal immigrants. People with these views love to see actions like the ones that are reported from Arizona. Effron and Wilkinson (2010) report that “America’s toughest sheriff,” Joe Arpaio of  Maricopa County, leads the way in arresting illegal immigrants. His deputies have arrested more than 30,000 of them since he took office. He has been re-elected four times now, winning by wide margins in the Phoenix area. Even after the Department of Homeland Security forbade him to conduct massive sweeps of arrests in Hispanic neighborhoods, Arpaio continues to make such arrests amidst claims of racial profiling.

Multiple surveys have shown that a majority of citizens feel that the government is not doing enough to control our borders and that immigration levels should be reduced, making it more difficult to enter the United States. It is obvious that “terrorist attacks negatively affected public opinion about immigrants” (Hines, 2002, p. 45). Safety and border control is of paramount importance to a majority of Americans.

The courts have had to deal with the issue of U.S. birth to foreign nationals. The case of Hamdi v Rumsfeld  has brought about much debate. Hamdi, who was born in Louisiana to foreign parents, eventually wound up being a member of the Taliban (Eastman, 2007). The problem is over the interpretation of the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.  The Supreme Court overturned a lower court opinion when it aid that Hamdi could not be detained indefinitely as a combatant of the United States, but that he should be granted the same rights as any U.S. citizen, even though his experience with this country had only been through birth.

Immigration Enforcement of Non-Immigrants

One of the first things that happened in the waked of the events of September 11 was the passage of the USA Patriot Act. The tragedy virtually ended any progress made in the area of positive immigration reform. The Patriot Act, passed into law a mere six weeks following the disaster, concerned itself with the legal issues of terrorism, wiretapping, banking, and shared foreign and domestic intelligence. On the topic of immigration, the Act “expanded the government’s ability to detain and deport suspected terrorists” and “greatly increased the budget for immigration enforcement, and tripled the number of U. S. Border Patrol on the northern border” (Hines, 2006, p. 12).

Regarding non-immigrant enforcement, we need to confess three things: 1. that terrorism is present in almost all governmental discussions in the land. Each legislative proposal links its value with the specter of terrorism; 2. that U. S. laws limit protections under the Constitution for immigrants and certain non immigrants; and, 3. U.S. courts have been loathe to apply international law to domestic cases (Hines, 2006).

Immigration Enforcement of Illegal Aliens

Any person who is unable or unwilling to return home after entering into the United States through legal channels, has the right to make application for political asylum here. The legal system for political asylum, as we know it today, began when Congress passed the Refugee Act of 1980 (Gee, 2004). This law brought the United States into line with a United Nations protocol that had been in place since the late 1960s. Under the 1980 statute, any alien residing in the United States.

Our fears are not soothed when we realize that the terrorists from the September 11 raids entered the United States through approved channels of immigration. Because of this, more surveillance of immigrant groups occurs than ever before, and the possibility of people groups who are perceived to be illegal or undocumented in origin now brings heightened concern and scrutiny (Rodriguez, 2008). Such exacerbated situations have produced new forms of racial tensions as the intentions of those who appear to be of foreign ethnicity bring suspicion. Post 9/11 laws allow local authorities to play a more central role in illegal immigration enforcement than ever before.

Conclusion

The United States has some good things going for it when it comes to its immigration policy. For one thing, it has the weight of law on its side. All of the activities of immigration officials are backed by statutes that are aimed specifically at the issue. It is largely uncontroversial for a country to detain those who pose threats to national security (McLoughlin, Noone, & Noone, 2009).

There are also bad things going for current immigration policy. Some believe that the guides that are in place stretch laws to their limit, harming basic human rights and placing stress on U.S. relations with other countries along the way. We make the acknowledgment that ours is a global economy, and migratory stresses placed from one country on another affect business interests, jobs, and other exchanges or services.

Newscasts and print editorials are full of critical commentary on recent methods of detention and interrogation. Some researchers reason that the U. S. Congress should “explore a new system of security detention for terrorism suspects” (McLoughlin, Noone, & Noone, 2009, p. 504). Whatever is to be with U.S. immigration laws, policies, and enforcement, we can rest assured, based on the weight of history, that they will evolve using most people’s distrust of foreigners as the fundamental position from which they make their claims.

References

Effron, E. & Wilkinson, F., Executive Editors (2010). America’s toughest sheriff. The Week, 05 Mar 2010.

Associated Press. (2007). Group reports 196 immigration law separated 1.6 million from families. 18 Jul 2007. Retrieved March 2, 2010 from http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,289734,00.html

Bhargava, D. (2009). Transformative policy change in the United States. Social Policy, 39(1), 4-5.

De Genova, N. (2007). The production of culprits: From deportabilty to detainability in the aftermath of “homeland security.” Citizenship Studies, 11(5), 421-448.

Eastman, J. (2007). Born in the U.S.A.? Rethinking birthright citizenship in the wake of 9/11. Texas Review of Law & Politics, 12(1), 167-179.

Gee, H. (2004). The refugee burden: A closer look at the refugee act of 1980. Social Science Electronic Publishing. Retrieved March 2, 2010 from http://www.worldlii.org/int/journals/lsn/abstracts/276988.html

Hines, B. (2006). An overview of U.S. immigration law and policy since 9/11. Hispanic Journal of Law & Policy, 12(1), 9-28.

Hines, B. (2002). So near and yet so far away: The effects of September 11^th on Mexican immigrants in the United States. Texas Hispanic Journal of Law & Policy, 8(1), 37-47.

Karyotis, G. (2007). European migration policy in the aftermath of September 11. The European Journal of Social Sciences, 20(1), 1-17.

McLoughlin, J., Noone, G., & Noone, D. (2009). Security, detention, terrorisim, and the prevention imperative. Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law, 40(3), 463-505.

Rodriguez, R. (2008). (Dis)unity and diversity in post 9/11 America. Sociological Journal, 23(2), 379-389.

Rottman, A., Fariss, C., & Poe, S. (2009). The path to asylum in the U.S. and the determinants for who gets in and why. International Migration Review, 43(1), 3-34.

Walker, C. (2007). Border vigilantism and comprehensive immigration reform. Harvard Latino Law Review, 10, 135-174. By: Motomura, Hiroshi. Albany Law Review, 2003