END
DEPORTATION OF PERSONS LIKELY TO QUALIFY FOR
A
PATHWAY TO CITIZENSHIP UNDER IMMIGRATION REFORM
SYNOPSIS:
Immigration reform in the United States
will probably create pathways to American citizenship
for most of foreign nationals now settled in the USA.
Anticipating these changes of immigration law,
it would be possible for the U.S. government to suspend
all deportation actions for citizens of other countries
who will probably qualify for some pathway to citizenship
once new immigration laws become effective.
Perhaps 11 million of the estimated 12 million
foreign nationals now settled in the USA
will ultimately qualify for permanent resident status and later
American citizenship.
And about 1 million will be returned to their countries of citizenship.
OUTLINE:
1.
THE PRESIDENT CAN IMPLEMENT AN INTERIM POLICY
FORESHADOWING THE MOST LIKELY
RESULTS OF IMMIGRATION REFORM
2. LIKELY REQUIREMENTS FOR EARNING U.S. CITIZENSHIP.
3.
THE ONE MILLION WHO WILL BE REPATRIATED.
4.
FOREIGN NATIONALS IN U.S. PRISONS FOR ORDINARY CRIMES.
5.
FOREIGN NATIONALS COULD SERVE THEIR JAIL-TIME IN THEIR COUNTRIES OF
ORIGIN.
6. WHAT SHOULD WE DO WITH THE FAMILIES OF CONVICTED FOREIGN
CRIMINALS?
7.
EACH FAMILY-CONSTELLATION SHOULD BE CONSIDERED ON ITS OWN MERITS.
8. IMMIGRATION REFORM WILL HAVE AN IMPACT ON CRIME IN AMERICA.
9.
LAW-ABIDING FOREIGN NATIONALS
WILL HAVE THE BEST CHANCES OF EARNING AMERICAN
CITIZENSHIP.
10. DEPORTATION OF DREAMers
SUSPENDED IN JUNE 2012 .
END
DEPORTATION OF PERSONS LIKELY TO QUALIFY FOR
A PATHWAY TO CITIZENSHIP UNDER IMMIGRATION REFORM
by
James Leonard Park
Reforming the immigration laws of the United States
of America
will probably be a long and complicated political process.
It could take several years to make the major changes obviously needed.
And in the meantime, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
has the legal authority to repatriate any citizen of another country
who is found anywhere inside the USA or its possessions
if that foreign national does not have official permission to be here.
If present practice continues during the interim
period of creating new immigration law,
then some people will be sent back to their homelands
who would later be included in amnesty for law-abiding foreign nationals
who have deep roots in American society.
After American immigration laws are reformed,
justice will be extended to people born in other lands
who entered the USA without permission (or
were brought as children).
And
from the perspective of the revised laws,
some people who were sent back to their homelands
will then be perceived as potential citizens who should have been
permitted to stay.
In other words, it will be perceived that it was
unjust to deport them,
even if the law at the time of their return to their homelands
assumed that deportation was the correct response
to the discovery of any foreign nationals
living anywhere in the USA without
permission.
1. THE PRESIDENT CAN
IMPLEMENT AN INTERIM POLICY
FORESHADOWING THE MOST LIKELY RESULTS OF
IMMIGRATION REFORM.
An executive order should be sufficient to establish
a new policy
with regard to deportation of foreign nationals
whose only violation of law is being settled in the USA without
permission.
The
Morton Memo—linked at the
bottom of this file—
appeared one day
after this essay was first published on the Internet.
If executive order
does not seem to be the best way,
the Department of Homeland Security could use its discretion to
prosecute or not
as a way to defer action
for those foreign nationals
most likely to qualify for a pathway to citizenship under expected
immigration reform.
Registration
without deportation would be the first
step in such an interim policy.
The President could announce that automatic deportation would end
immediately
for all foreign nationals settled in the USA without previous
permission.
Citizens of other countries would be required to register with
the U.S. government,
but such registration would not
trigger deportation proceedings.
Those foreign nationals who know they have the best
chance
of being offered pathways to American citizenship
will be the first to register themselves and their whole families.
And the public fact that
they were not deported
should encourage other foreign nationals voluntarily to register
themselves.
Registration with the United State Department of
Homeland Security
would not guarantee a
pathway to American citizenship.
A certain percentage of foreign nationals who voluntarily register
will ultimately be required to return to their homelands.
But those who register voluntarily will have a better chance at
citizenship
than those foreign nationals who decide to remain in the shadows.
Along with the opening of registration,
the President could announce the most likely criteria
to be used for offering citizenship to
foreign nationals.
Here is another cyber-sermon laying out some likely criteria:
IDEAL
IMMIGRANTS:
New Criteria for Selecting New Americans
http://www.tc.umn.edu/%7Eparkx032/CY-IDEAL.html
2. LIKELY REQUIREMENTS FOR EARNING U.S. CITIZENSHIP.
Eventually new criteria will be defined by the
Congress and signed by the President
for
earning citizenship in the United States of America.
Here are twelve standards likely to be applied:
A.
LEARN ENGLISH.
B. EARN A COLLEGE DEGREE.
C. BE EMPLOYED IN A LEGITIMATE OCCUPATION.
D. PAY ALL TAXES.
E. REGISTER WITH THE SELECTIVE SERVICE.
F. SERVE IN THE U.S. MILITARY.
G. REGISTER WITH THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY.
H. LIST ALL RELATIVES WHO ARE U.S. CITIZENS.
I. DOCUMENT HOW LONG YOU HAVE LIVED IN THE USA.
J. APPLY FOR NATURALIZATION AS EARLY AS PERMITTED.
K. GET A DRIVER'S LICENSE.
L. FOLLOW ALL LAWS.
These are explored in another on-line essay:
"Earning American Citizenship: Be Above Average":
http://www.tc.umn.edu/~parkx032/CY-EARN.html.
3. THE ONE MILLION WHO WILL BE REPATRIATED.
Immigration reform is not likely to be blanket
amnesty for all foreign nationals.
First, any such amnesty would be resisted by conservatives in Congress.
And second, it would not be good for America
to tolerate certain people in our population.
(Here is the basic
reason we should not declare blanket amnesty:
Allowing all citizens of other countries settled in the USA to remain
would strongly encourage more millions
to enter with United States without permission.)
Having acknowledged that the vast majority of
foreign nationals
already settled in the USA without permission
will probably be allowed to stay and to earn U.S. citizenship,
we will nevertheless be forced to deal with a minority of foreign
nationals
who must be returned to their countries of citizenship.
Once voluntary
registration without deportation is
announced,
those foreign nationals who will not be offered pathways to
U.S. citizenship
will not voluntarily
register themselves.
They will do their best not
to be noticed by any government
agencies.
The announced likely criteria for earning American
citizenship
will include factors that exclude
certain foreign nationals.
The most likely of these excluding
factors will be criminal
behavior.
(Here we mean all crimes other than violating immigration laws.)
Citizens as well as non-citizens are regularly arrested, tried,
convicted, & imprisoned
of violating local, state, & federal laws.
When such violations are serious
enough to warrant prison time,
then they will probably be serious enough crimes
to exclude the
convicted criminals from U.S. citizenship.
Or this criterion could be set at convictions that resulted in more
than one year in prison.
4. FOREIGN NATIONALS IN U.S.
PRISONS FOR ORDINARY CRIMES.
One of the first things that happens after any
arrest
is taking a photograph
of the person arrested.
This is one step in fully
identifying the alleged criminal.
Complete identification should always include country of citizenship.
Eventually the USA will probably have a complete list of
all residents.
Thus, the identity of arrested persons should be kept in a format
that will later be compatible with this future national facebook.
Whatever databases have already been created for
arrested persons
should be consulted to see if this person has been arrested before.
Trials and convictions will also be included in the same databases.
Whenever convicted criminals are identified as
foreign nationals,
great care should be observed to make certain that these persons
are also registered with the United States Department of Homeland
Security.
Since persons who have violated local, state, or
federal laws
(and who as a result have been sentenced to serve some time in jail or
prison)
are not likely to become eligible for any pathways to American
citizenship,
the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
should be kept fully informed about each convicted foreign criminal.
While any convicted criminals are serving their
sentences
as imposed by the regular criminal justice systems in the USA,
their citizenship should be carefully investigated and documented.
There are about 100,000 inmates in state and federal
prisons
who are foreign nationals living in the USA without permission.
This is about 5% of all prisoners in the USA.
And it is less than 1% of all foreign nationals settled in America
without permission.
And instead of releasing foreign criminals back into
the general population
after they have served their time in prison,
they should be handed over to ICE for possible deportation.
If it seems likely that they will never become U.S.
citizens,
no matter how liberal our immigration reforms,
then repatriation should be planned to follow any term of imprisonment
in the USA.
The federal prison system could require that all
inmates in federal prisons
be handed over the ICE for possible return to their countries of origin
when their sentences are completed.
Many local and state prison systems will voluntarily
cooperate
in collecting and verifying citizenship information for each inmate.
And federal law might be changed to require such cooperation
from all prisons that receive any form of federal assistance.
Also ICE might pay a per
capita fee for each foreign inmate turned
over.
This should cover additional costs to investigate and document
the citizenship-status
of all inmates.
Since these foreign prisoners are already in
custody,
why not turn them over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement
immediately?
Then, if possible, they might serve their prison time in their
homelands.
In any case, they should never be released into the
general population
without a ruling by an immigration judge permitting them to stay in the
USA.
Deportation proceedings should begin while the
foreign prisoners are still in prison.
This will save all of the costs normally associated with
identifying and locating citizens of other countries
who are settled in the USA without permission.
Because they are already in safe custody,
there is no danger of them disappearing once again
as a response to opening the proceedings needed to deport them.
And if their jail-time expires before their
citizenship-status has been confirmed,
they should be kept in some sort of custody until their final
destination has been decided.
If we agree that foreign nationals who were
convicted of crimes while living in the USA
have no chance of
being offered any pathways to American citizenship,
then they should be deported
(along with others in their families who have no right to live in the
USA)
as soon as their jail-time is completed.
5. FOREIGN NATIONALS COULD SERVE THEIR JAIL-TIME IN THEIR
COUNTRIES OF ORIGIN.
If immigration reform in the United States
makes it clear that convicted criminals will never qualify for American
citizenship,
then it might be possible to deport foreign nationals
who have been convinced of crimes of the USA
to serve their sentences in the countries where they are
citizens.
Before any such deportation of convicted criminals
takes place,
we must be certain that the receiving country will actually put the
criminal in prison
to serve a sentence of the same duration as would be imposed in the
USA.
When we do not have
such assurances from the country of origin,
then the foreign criminal will have to serve the prison time in the
USA.
Individuals convicted of any crime in the USA
will have their identities carefully recorded by the criminal justice
system.
And if they are foreign nationals to be returned to their countries of
citizenship,
their pictures and other identifying details will also be preserved
by the United States Department of Homeland Security,
just in case they attempt to re-enter the USA
after they are released from prison in their counties of citizenship.
6. WHAT SHOULD WE DO WITH
THE FAMILIES OF CONVICTED FOREIGN CRIMINALS?
Whenever criminals are removed from the general
population,
this has an impact on whatever families they have.
This applies both to families who are citizens of the USA
and to families that include some non-citizens.
Almost always the closest family members knew about
the criminal activity.
And they might have tried to protect themselves
by distancing themselves from the criminal.
In some cases, family members were instrumental in having the criminals
arrested.
All such factors should be taken into account
in deciding what to do with the other family members
of foreign criminals who must now go to jail.
If it has been determined by ICE that the foreign
criminal
will be repatriated after the term in prison has been completed,
then careful planning can be made for other family members.
Family unity should be honored above citizenship.
This will apply to families that have both citizens of the USA and
non-citizens.
It might be best for the
whole nuclear family to be returned
to the country where most adults in the family are citizens
after the term of imprisonment of one family member.
All minor children who are U.S. citizens
would have an automatic
right to return to the USA
after they are old enough to live on their own.
When it is known that the whole family will be
affected
by any arrest, trial, & conviction for any violation of law,
then other family members
will exert pressure
on the person who is committing crimes.
Because the whole family might be deported
as a result of a criminal conviction of one member,
the law-abiding members of the family will help to control the criminal
behavior.
7. EACH FAMILY-CONSTELLATION
SHOULD BE CONSIDERED ON ITS OWN MERITS.
Each and every family member has a different
history.
And decisions about one family member will necessarily affect the
others.
Past immigration enforcement has sometimes been rigid in enforcing the
law
—not
taking the whole family into account.
Just as most
foreign nationals will probably be
granted the right to remain in the USA,
thus many members of families of convicted criminals
will offered pathways to citizenship
even if some family members are repatriated
because they could not fulfill the minimum requirements for U.S.
citizenship.
Sometimes people who would normally have qualified
for U.S. citizenship
will be kept together with other family members who are returned to
their countries of citizenship.
Later they can apply to be admitted to the USA
under whatever new immigration policies are then in effect.
Above all, decisions should be made by immigration
judges
that will do the most good
and the least harm to
all family members.
Prison sentences must be served either in the USA or in some other
country.
What would be best for all family members
both during and after the term in prison
for the convicted
criminal?
8. IMMIGRATION REFORM
WILL HAVE AN IMPACT ON CRIME IN AMERICA.
Immigration reform in the United States of America
will probably offer pathways for earning American citizenship
for the vast majority of
foreign nationals now settled in the USA.
The minority
of foreign nationals who have been convinced of ordinary crimes
will probably not be
offered U.S. citizenship.
Immigration reform might also create other criteria
which will exclude
would-be Americans from citizenship.
But criminal behavior (either in the home country of while living in
the USA)
is the most likely factor that will exclude someone from American
citizenship.
The first impact of any such new immigration policy
will be on the criminal behavior of foreign nationals already settled
in the USA.
Since it will be clear that any crimes serious enough to earn time in
prison
will not only put the foreign criminal into jail to serve that
sentence.
But violating any local, state, or federal law (except immigration laws)
will probably exclude that person from any future hope of becoming a
U.S.
citizen.
Exceptions will always be possible for special
circumstances.
But criminal behavior is likely to be the most serious reason
for denying any
foreign national the privilege
of becoming a U.S.
citizen.
Once such immigration reform comes into operation,
all foreign nationals already settled in the USA
who hope to qualify for American citizenship at some later time
will be strongly motivated
to avoid criminal behavior.
They will know that crime will not only put them into prison,
but it will result in deportation either during the prison-sentence
or after the prison-sentence has been served in an American jail.
In other words, the potential criminal who is also a
foreign national
will know in advance the implications of any criminal behavior today:
Law enforcement will catch the criminal.
A fair trial will be conducted (or the prisoner can plead guilty).
If the arrested foreign national is convicted,
a prison-term will be served in the USA.
And in addition, that criminal conviction will probably lead to
deportation.
The foreign national will already be in custody for
the violation of criminal law.
And he or she will not
be released into the general population
after the imposed sentence has been served.
Rather, the foreign criminal will be processed by ICE
for possible deportation after the sentence has
been served.
And careful records of the identity of each such
deported criminal
will be maintained by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security
and by all the most relevant law-enforcement agencies.
This will prevent them from ever attempting to re-enter the USA.
And if they are ever discovered in the United States,
they will be immediately deported once again.
When there are minor children involved,
they will also be re-settled in the country where the parents will be
re-located.
Care and compassion should govern the methods for
repatriating
all who must be returned to their countries of citizenship
under new immigration laws in the USA.
The impact of this additional 'punishment' of
deportation for convicted foreign criminals
will probably make the underground population of hidden foreign
nationals
even more law-abiding than the average American citizen.
Not only will foreign nationals settled in the USA
without permission
seek never to be discovered by any agency of government,
but they will try even harder to avoid any behavior
that could result in a criminal conviction.
9. LAW-ABIDING FOREIGN
NATIONALS
WILL HAVE THE BEST CHANCES OF
EARNING AMERICAN CITIZENSHIP.
Of the millions of citizens of other countries
already settled in the USA,
the vast majority are already following most laws.
They will not be arrested for any criminal behavior.
They will not go to jail for any violation of ordinary local, state, or
federal laws.
And if they fulfill the other criteria for
citizenship
set forth in new immigration laws,
they will have good chances of becoming American citizens.
Ending automatic deportation of foreign national
will be the first step toward a new United States of
America.
10. DEPORTATION OF DREAMers
SUSPENDED IN JUNE 2012
On June 15, 2012, the U.S. Department of Homeland
Security
announced "deferred action" for all foreign nationals who would qualify
for the DREAM act.
By administrative decision (in contrast to new legislation),
foreign nationals who were children when they were brought into the USA
(age 15 or below) will no longer be subject to immediate deportation
if they were less than 31 years old on June 15, 2012.
They will not be prosecuted for the immigration violations of their
parents.
And, unless they have been convicted of serious crimes,
they will be given temporary authorization to work in the USA.
Such two-year authorizations might be renewed on a case-by-case basis.
This "deferred action for childhood arrivals" DACA
does not grant amnesty.
And it will not automatically open a pathway to American citizenship.
Also, after the foreign nationals register with the U.S. government,
the months under this new status will not count as months 'out of
status'.
All further questions of legal residence and possible citizenship
will have to be established by immigration reform at some later time.
Deciding not to prosecute DREAMers already settled
in the USA
will not encourage additional unauthorized immigration,
because DACA requires at least 5 years
of continuous presence in the USA up to and including June 15, 2012.
About one million young, law-abiding foreign
nationals
who were brought into America by
their parents without
permission
will probably register under this decision not to deport them.
If the program works well,
perhaps 2 million young foreign nationals will be registered.
Created
June 16, 2011; Revised 6-17-2011; 6-23-2011; 9-22-2011; 9-23-2011;
9-28-2011; 10-13-2011; 3-24-2012; 6-19-2012; 1-24-2013
FURTHER
READING
The United States Immigration and Customs
Enforcement (ICE)
is now operating under an interim set of guidelines
for deciding when to prosecute foreign nationals who have violated US
immigration laws.
Twenty factors are worth considering:
MORTON MEMO
EXPLAINED:
Guidelines for and against Deportation.
http://www.tc.umn.edu/~parkx032/MORTON.html
AUTHOR:
James Park is himself a grateful immigrant to the
USA.
He was admitted as a child with his whole family in 1949.
And he was naturalized in 1955.
The United States has been enriched by each member of his family.
Immigration reform will allow millions more people born in other
countries
to become open, meaningful members of the American family.
Much more about James Park will be found on
his website,
an Existential
Philosopher's Museum,
which now has more than 1,000 rooms.
Some of these rooms contain other essays about
immigration:
Registration
without Deportation:
Bringing
Millions of Foreign Nationals out of the Shadows .
Twelve Million
Foreign Nationals in the USA:
How Many Will Stay?
Earning
American Citizenship:
Be Above Average
IDEAL
IMMIGRANTS:
New Criteria for Selecting New Americans .
IMMIGRATION
REFORM:
Selecting New Americans .
I am an
Immigrant
.
IMMIGRATION
REFORM:
Problems and Solutions:
Keeping the UU Debate Constructive .
IMMIGRATION
REFORM:
A Range of Options .
If They Cannot
Work, They Will Not Come:
And Many Will Return to their Homelands .
Born in the USA:
The Easy Way to Become a U.S. Citizen
.
Comprehensive
Repatriation of Citizens of other Countries and their Families
.
National
Identity File .