Opinion: Immigration déjà vu
This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.
The Washington Post’s Spencer Hsu reports on a relatively new border enforcement strategy — smacking every would-be crosser with a criminal record, instead of just fingerprinting immigrants and turning them around:
First piloted in December 2005 near Del Rio, Tex., Operation Streamline requires that virtually everyone caught illegally crossing segments of the border be charged with at least a misdemeanor immigration count and jailed until they are brought to court and, if convicted, eventually deported. A conviction jeopardizes any future legal entry to the United States. Federal officials credit the program and other measures for contributing to a 20 percent drop in apprehensions of illegal immigrants on the U.S.-Mexico border in 2007, to 859,000. That figure is on track to drop an additional 15 percent this year.
The article notes that apprehension statistics aren’t always reliable, particularly when a slow economy is already deterring migrants. And some say the program is straining jail facilities and law enforcement resources. Still, the tactic will likely have an effect much like other border security measures: decreasing illegal immigration in the short run (but making it into a more dangerous gambit for those who decide to cross through more dangerous terrain), while quite likely negatively impacting the economy in the longer run.
If that point were ever contained in a nutshell, it’s in this story. Or this one.