Clash on Immigration Is Avoidable
The United States in the 1980s has made important breakthroughs in admitting new groups of immigrants. We have successfully pressured the Soviet Union to permit the exit of large numbers of Jews and other nationalities and must now plan their immigration and integration into this country. Two years ago, we began legalizing the status of more than 1.5 million undocumented aliens living in the United States, allowing them to emerge from a clandestine existence to contribute as full citizens to this society.
These triumphs of American foreign and domestic policy now threaten to unravel unless several groups develop a common strategy and make strenuous efforts to avoid conflict.
Because Soviet Jews are leaving their country at about twice the rate that had been anticipated last year, the United States must adjust its immigration policy to admit them. If we were to turn our backs on them, we would be in the position of having pressured the Soviet Union to release them while we would not accept them. This makes poor policy and little moral sense.
Moreover, no one knows how long the current open atmosphere in the Soviet Union will last. If it passes, the freer emigration policy could collapse. Before that happens, we need to rescue as many people as possible.
Refugees to the United States receive a small federal grant to aid their initial resettlement. In the case of Soviet Jews, this money is more than matched by community funds, providing a public-private partnership for resettlement. Both sources of funds are necessary.
But if Soviet Jews are entering in larger than anticipated numbers, where will this new federal funding come from?
One possibility is a new appropriation. Another proposal calls for using part of the $930 million that Congress authorized for 1988 for State Legalization Impact Assistance Grants, which are designed to help states and local communities offset the costs of services to newly legalized aliens. Because of federal and state bureaucratic delays, the Bush Administration has mistakenly assumed that the funds are not being spent and has proposed that $300 million be cut from this year’s budget. Legislation also has been introduced in Congress to divert $100 million of assistance grant funds to Soviet refugees.
These proposals have alarmed the Latino community. The grants were designed to help Latinos and others who gained legal status to acquire educational, language, health-care and other services so that they could better assume their new status as permanent residents and, ultimately, citizens of the United States.
In fact, without access to the educational services funded by the grants, many newly legalized persons--who must demonstrate competence in English and civics before gaining full legal status--will lose their chance to become permanent residents and revert to undocumented status. In some areas, such classes are running on 24-hour schedules with long waiting lists. These programs are having trouble getting access to badly needed grant funds.
Diverting these funds for any reason escalates the danger that the newly legalized will not become permanent residents. Even more galling would be a transfer of this funding for Soviet Jews. Is there a message here that one group is more worthy of public support than another?
A clash of interests on this issue would harm the Jewish and Latino communities, which have for several years cooperated closely on such issues as immigration, language and social policy. But it would be even more damaging to the country as a whole, which would be left with unnecessary communal strife and incompatible refugee and foreign policies. It would also undermine the legalization program, thus expanding the exploitable subclass of undocumented persons.
Interests need not clash on this issue. Soviet Jewish and Latino goals can be reconciled with an enlightened legislative strategy.
This year’s money for Soviet Jewish resettlement need not be irrevocably removed from the grant fund. Instead, $100 million for can be borrowed from the fund, with this amount to be paid back in 1991 when assistance for legalizing aliens will still be needed. Or, new money can be allocated for Soviet Jews without coming at another community’s expense.
However this funding issue is resolved, we should support and strengthen the assistance grant. The funds should be responsibly and fully expended by state and local entities for their original purpose, particularly to support education programs. Moreover, the funds should be made available for legalization outreach, job training, education and enforcement to combat discrimination under employer sanctions.
This is a policy that Jews, Latinos and all Americans can come together to endorse. A bill embodying these principles has recently been introduced by Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Panorama City). Anyone interested in avoiding ethnic strife and preserving the country’s traditions of welcome and pluralism should support it.
