Leadership and Crisis (18 page)

Does this mean we should only allow immigrants who are highly skilled and educated to come to America? Absolutely not. While attracting high-skilled immigrants should be a special focus, our country can also benefit greatly from immigrants whose only credentials are a desire to work hard, assimilate, and chase the American Dream. But the American Dream is not to have the government take care of you. That is an American nightmare.

Hard-working, unskilled immigrants are in fact vital to America. I’m sure nearly every person reading this book has some personal experience with these kinds of motivated immigrants. Much like my parents, many of them have experienced third-world poverty, giving them a perspective most native-born Americans just don’t have. These people make America a better place and a stronger nation. They should be embraced, not feared. But we need a legal, orderly system for admitting them, where their number is agreed upon by our elected representatives and then rigorously enforced. Despite all the heated rhetoric about this issue, there is actually a pretty simple way to do that.

Our illegal immigration crisis is causing all kinds of serious problems, especially by straining our healthcare and education systems. Some fire-breathing politicians argue we should simply deny healthcare and education to illegals and their families. But that’s not the American way—we are far too compassionate to turn people away from emergency rooms or keep 6-year-old kids out of first grade.

My approach to stopping the massive wave of illegal immigration is straightforward: build a fence (partly high-tech, comprised of cameras and censors, and partly a traditional fence) and enforce the laws. When I was in Congress, I voted in 2006 for building a high-tech fence along the border and committing to systematically monitoring our border. Due to a lack of political will from nearly all parts of the government, however, the fence has not seen much progress; it is limited to a small part of the Arizona, California, and Texas borders. I also voted to prevent the federal government from tipping off the Mexican government about the whereabouts of Minuteman Project volunteers who monitor the border and report illegal immigration activity to the
border patrol. Unlike some of my liberal critics, I believe we should encourage the peaceful involvement of public citizens in protecting our country and upholding the law.

Many members of Congress claim it would be impossible to secure the border. That’s an amusing argument. Apparently, we can send men to the moon, we can kill terrorists with unarmed drones from half a continent away, but we can’t build a big fence. Others emotionally compare a border fence to the Berlin Wall, ignoring the inconvenient fact that the Berlin Wall was meant to keep a captive people
in
, while our border fence would keep people
out
who get here by breaking the law.

Advocates of amnesty or quasi-amnesty for illegal immigrants don’t know their history. In 1986 Congress passed an amnesty called the Immigration Reform and Control Act, legalizing about 3 million illegals and providing for employer sanctions for hiring illegal workers in the future. At the time, advocates promised the amnesty would be accompanied by strict border control to finally solve the illegal immigration problem. That should sound familiar, because it’s the same plan and the same promise we hear from amnesty advocates today.

But instead of ending the problem, the 1986 amnesty led to an explosion of illegal immigration. The promise to secure the border wasn’t kept, and the Act sent the message that if illegals can just make it across the border, they’ll eventually get amnesty. Roughly two decades later, President George W. Bush and Senator John McCain pushed for a de facto amnesty for the millions of illegals who had arrived since the 1986 amnesty. Their plan was similar to the 1986 policy, except that amnesty recipients were required to fulfill a few minor requirements, like paying a fine. I know President Bush and Senator McCain had the purest of motives, opting for the course they
believed was most compassionate. But I also believe any replay of the 1986 amnesty will fail.

We’d go a long way toward solving the illegal immigration problem if the federal government would fulfill its responsibility to enforce existing immigration laws, especially against employers of illegals. Federal courts have affirmed that local authorities also have the right and the responsibility to enforce these laws. In Arizona, for example, the state Legislature passed a law allowing state authorities to suspend or revoke the business license of a company that knowingly employs illegal workers. The U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona and the liberal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the constitutionality of this law.

More recently, Arizona enacted new policies to enforce immigration laws. These have sparked various protests by left-wingers, including an attempt to boycott the entire state of Arizona. Clearly, when the federal government does not do its job, the American people take action on their own. The ultimate solution is for the federal government to fulfill its responsibility to secure our borders.

Some immigration experts argue a moderate enforcement of immigration laws, costing less than $2 billion over five years, would cut the illegal population in half. The key is not just to round up illegals, but to punish their employers. Without available jobs, millions of illegals will have little choice but to return home voluntarily.

Citizens of most countries define their identity by ethnic descent. But Americans are different. We’re bonded together by ideals and values that form a common national creed. That’s why all immigrants should learn English; in order to communicate these values with each
other, we need a common language. Moreover, learning English is crucial for immigrants’ chances of success in America. Today, an immigrant who doesn’t speak English will probably experience a low standard of living and even government dependence.

Through most of our history, the need for immigrants to learn English was so widely recognized that it wasn’t a topic of serious political debate. Congress even traditionally refused to admit new states if they lacked an English-speaking majority.

But in recent decades, the incentive to learn English has eroded. For example, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 required the provision of bilingual voting ballots. California and some other states also allow voting by mail in state elections using non-English language ballots. But bilingual ballots should not be needed, because immigrants since the Nationality Act of 1906 (later reaffirmed in the Nationality Act of 1940) have had to demonstrate literacy in English in order to gain U.S. citizenship.
⁹
Since only citizens can vote, why would anyone need a foreign language ballot?

Furthermore, just before he left office President Clinton signed Executive Order 13166, which required federal agencies to ensure people could receive communications and services from the government in foreign languages. Although well-intentioned, the policy further reduces the motivation for immigrants to learn English.

I co-sponsored a bill in Congress to declare English the official language of the United States and to establish a uniform English language rule for naturalization, to reaffirm the previous law. Understanding how vital English is to success in America, many immigrants enthusiastically supported the bill. In fact, much of the opposition to it didn’t come from immigrants, but from guilt-ridden liberal elites who believe
that encouraging English unjustly imposes American values on immigrants.

According to this philosophy of multiculturalism, we should not try to spread our values because our culture is no better than anyone else’s—and in many ways, it’s supposedly much worse. This view is popular among liberal academics at elite universities and professional “civil rights activists.” But in my experience as both the son of immigrants and as a governor, the vast majority of immigrants reject this nonsense. They know life in America is better—that’s why they came here in the first place.

I have no problem imposing American values on people who want to become Americans. Freedom, hard work, self-reliance, and rugged individualism are values all Americans should embrace. If immigrants reject these values, well, it’s a big world out there.

The reasons we must secure our borders are really beyond dispute.

First—the safety of our citizens. Our porous borders tempt terrorists to sneak into America. Additionally, many border communities are imperiled by the violence, drug smuggling, and other crimes committed by vicious Mexican drug cartels that now threaten to spill over the border.

Second—the cost to our citizens. As I noted before, America is the most generous nation on earth. We care for our poor and needy, and we do the same across the world through government foreign aid as well as private charity and humanitarian assistance. But we cannot allow millions of illegal immigrants to sneak into our country and eventually end up on government assistance.

Third—the cost to our culture. Robust immigration is a great benefit to America, but immigrants have to come here legally and they have to be not just immigrants, but converts. When we accept immigrants who see America as a mere resource to exploit for their personal gain, we spread a debilitating welfare mentality that chips away at the traditional can-do attitude that has made America great.

The truth is, with the exception of Native Americans, we are all immigrants to this country. Some came hundreds of years ago, some hundreds of hours ago. My mom and dad came to America to work hard and chase the American Dream. And in the end they caught it. Becoming converts to the idea of America, they are now middle-class Americans. Make no mistake, many Americans helped them along the way, by hiring them to work, loaning them a car, and teaching them the ways of America. But they never accepted welfare, nor did the idea ever cross their minds.

Determined, highly motivated immigrants helped make this country great. And they will continue doing so—if we reform immigration.

CHAPTER 9

THE MOST BORING GOVERNOR IN LOUISIANA’S HISTORY

You could hear the snickers in the crowd. “Did he just say he’s going to clean up corruption in Louisiana? Sure he is, and I bet he thinks the Saints will win the Super Bowl, too! The poor young fella.”

During my runs for governor in both 2003 and 2007, many Louisianians thought it was quaint, perhaps even charming, that I pledged to crack down on the corruption that has made our state famous for over a century. It’s not that folks didn’t want clean government; they just thought it was terribly naïve to think we could ever achieve it.

You could see it in their faces. Some of the older ladies on the campaign trail looked like they had to restrain themselves from patting me on the head. I think a few of them wanted to adopt me. The state’s grizzled political veterans were less charitable, taking me for a dreamer, a fool, or both.

A former Louisiana congressman has often remarked that at any given time half the state of Louisiana is under water and the other half is under indictment. Indeed, you could fill a small library with books
about, shall we say, the “colorful” history of political corruption in my state. Although our poor reputation on this issue is long-standing, once in a while we manage to outdo ourselves.