Not only does the Wall Street Journal endorse a bill that would harm American citizens, they also mislead about the bill (WSJ assertions in Italics, refutations are not):
Restrictionists dismiss the Dream Act as an amnesty that rewards people who entered the country illegally. But the bill targets individuals brought here by their parents as children. What is to be gained by holding otherwise law-abiding young people, who had no say in coming to this country, responsible for the illegal actions of others? The Dream Act also makes legal status contingent on school achievement and military service, the type of behavior that ought to be encouraged and rewarded.1. Those covered have to be “younger than 16 years of age on the date the alien initially entered the United States”, but there’s nothing in the bill requiring them to prove that they were brought here by their parents; older children do occasionally cross the border alone.
2. The DREAM Act grants “conditional permanent resident status” – lasting six years – and the minimum requirements are to have “earned a high school diploma or obtained a general education development certificate in the United States”. Not to diminish those who have GEDs, but is that what most people have in mind when they hear the phrase “school achievement”?
3. Many things would be gained from not passing the DREAM Act. If we could encourage those illegal aliens to return home they could help their own countries. The alternative the WSJ wants would continue braindraining Mexico and other sending countries. We’d also free up education slots and possibly discounts for American citizens, something that’s vitally important due to cutbacks in community college budgets that cause many Americans not to be able to obtain retraining.
We’d prefer that border reform start by expanding legal channels of entry for people who come here to work. There would be little need for a Dream Act if more U.S. work visas had been available for the parents of these children. The U.S. focus on border security has, along with the economic downturn, had some effect on reducing illegal entries. But walls, fences and employer crackdowns mainly produce thriving markets in human smuggling and document fraud and make a mockery of the rule of law, especially in some border areas.1. If all the work visas in the world were available and everything else were the same, we’d still have a large illegal alien population, and it would probably be higher due to the network effect.
2. Those making “a mockery of the rule of law” include the WSJ and all the other sources that oppose immigration enforcement.
Supporting the Dream Act also makes political sense for Republicans, who will have a tough time winning national elections without more Hispanic support. Polls show that Hispanic-American priorities tend to match those of other voters—the economy, jobs, education and so forth. Nevertheless, immigration has symbolic importance among Hispanics as a sign of political recognition and respect.The DREAM Act is an openly anti-American bill that would help foreign citizens who are here illegally at the same time as it hurt some American citizens who won’t be able to go to college. Most GOP leaders are certainly corrupt enough to put their political interests well ahead of the interests of the U.S. To some extent many Hispanics are willing to put their ethnic solidarity interests ahead of the interests of the U.S. as a whole; if most GOP leaders weren’t corrupt they’d realize how serious a problem that is and take pro-American steps to counter it.
There is nothing to gain by passing this DREAM act except more debt and less respect for law. The WSJ is thinking purely in terms of cheap labor and political expediency. Shame on them for this.
