The Aquarian Agrarian: undocumented immigrants

Showing posts with label undocumented immigrants. Show all posts

Friday, January 27, 2017

Twenty-Nine-Point Comprehensive Immigration Plan

            1. THE WALL: Do not add fencing on the U.S.-Mexico border, and do not build walls on the borders with Mexico nor Canada.

            2. CIVIL RIGHTS: Do not revoke the civil liberties nor civil rights (such as rights to equal protection of law, and due process of law) on the basis of the suspect's national origin, religion, nor enemy combatant status. All persons have these constitutionally recognized rights; not just American citizens.

            3. BANS: Enforce neither temporary nor permanent bans on immigrants and refugees coming from particular countries; especially not as a way to discriminate against refugees on the basis of the religious majority of the nations from which they come.

            4. REGISTRIES: Pass legislation specifically prohibiting the creation of federal registries, and of lists of Americans' races and religions.

            5. VETTING: If illegal immigration is really the problem, then maybe we shouldn't worry about who is trying to immigrate into the United States legally as much. Either way, relax procedures for the naturalization of legal immigrants and refugees; background checks and health examinations should take up the majority of the procedure.

            6. CRIME: As soon as possible, deport all undocumented immigrants who have been convicted of violent crimes.

            7. ARREST: Do not allow police officers, nor immigration and customs officials, to detain and deport undocumented immigrants for non-violent crimes; not for breaking petty vice laws, nor for having insufficient identification.

            8. HARBORING: Urge all governments (at all levels) to decriminalize harboring and assisting undocumented immigrants and refugees; these actions should not be felonies. State and local governments, the private sector, and charity and religious organizations, should not be punished for providing humanitarian relief (such as housing, education, health services, and food), to undocumented immigrants and refugees.

            9. AMNESTY: Grant permanent or temporary amnesty, temporary work visas, or Green cards, to all non-violent undocumented immigrants, regardless of their religion or national origin.

            10. BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP: Continue allowing all people who were born on U.S. territory to apply for U.S. citizenship when they turn 18.

            11. CHILD ARRIVALS: Ensure that undocumented immigrants who arrived in the U.S. as children – especially in the last 35 years – are not deported; and ensure that they are not separated from family members who may be undocumented immigrants, unless they have been convicted of violent crimes. Support congressional deferred action for childhood arrivals and their parents; not executive orders which bypass Congress.

            12. TRAVEL: Increase the freedom of movement of labor and capital – and refrain from inhibiting the freedom of locomotion of non-violent undocumented immigrants to other countries – by decriminalizing the act of entry into the United States without going through required naturalization procedures. Urge governments to agree to make monetary settlements with any legal immigrants who feel slighted by the relative ease with which undocumented immigrants become citizens.

            13. NATURALIZATION: Ensure that the federal government retains its authority to establish a uniform rule of naturalization. Oppose and abolish any and all support of immigration quotas as calls for unconstitutional discrimination on the basis of national origin.

            14. WORK: Do not make work a condition for citizenship. Make it easier (for undocumented and documented immigrants alike) to get green cards and temporary work visas; by increasing the number of temporary work visas for immigrants who want to come here to work (especially the number of visas for high-skilled workers). Provide easy paths to legal work, lawful permanent residency, citizenship, and full voting rights.

            15. IDENTIFICATION: Do not establish a national identification card. Do not require businesses to use e-Verify (or similar programs) to confirm citizenship as a condition of hiring. All this does is turn undocumented immigrants who want to work into unemployed second-class citizens, and turn hiring managers into immigration enforcement officials.

            16. VOTING: Allow non-violent undocumented immigrants residing in the U.S. to vote, as long as they are not eligible to vote in any other country.

            17. PURCHASES: Ensure that undocumented immigrants are not expected to show identification documents that would reveal their citizenship status, in order to purchase products that have legally mandated minimum ages of purchase (such as alcohol and tobacco).

            18. DRIVING: Make it easier for immigrants and refugees – and ordinary citizens as well - to obtain drivers' licenses. First, by urging more states to allow undocumented immigrants to obtain drivers' licenses for non-citizens; second, by urging courts to find that charging fees to license drivers amounts to charging people to leave their state, which interferes with the freedom of locomotion. As long as driver's licenses are considered constitutional, and as long as people are expected to carry identification, all levels of government should be urged to issue driver's licenses and identification documents at no charge to the recipient.

            19. WELFARE: Ensure that state and federal welfare agency employees do not violate immigrants' Fifth Amendment freedom from self-incrimination, by using undocumented immigrants' state of need as an excuse to make them state their citizenship status, in order to have them detained and deported (without any evidence of commission of a real crime against person or property having appeared).

            20. SOCIAL DIVIDENDS: Ensure that governments cannot discriminate against undocumented immigrants seeking welfare support in the form of cash payouts from social dividends; if the opportunity arises to choose between a residents' dividend and a citizens' dividend, a proposal of a residents' dividend should be drafted and passed rather than a citizens' dividend.

            21. SAFETY NET: Stay open to the possibility of revoking federal social safety net benefits for undocumented immigrants; but only consider doing so after all structures supporting the corporate welfare system are abolished, and during the same time period that the federal social safety net is being phased out for all residents.

            22. SOCIAL SECURITY: The right to receive social welfare supports (including the entitlements, the S.N.A.P. / Food Stamps program, and others) should not be contingent upon paying taxes and paying into Social Security. There is no enumerated constitutional authority for federal involvement in retirement savings nor welfare; federal involvement in retirement should end; authority for any continued federal involvement in welfare should be passed constitutionally; and all government revenue should derive from fines that penalize waste rather than taxes that penalize productivity. Such a policy on welfare and taxation will provide additional tax relief to low-income undocumented immigrants and refugees; easing the transition to work, without overwhelming the worker with tax forms. Allow immigrant and native-born workers alike to opt-out of the Social Security system.

            23. SANCTUARY: End the federal government's monetary support of so-called “Sanctuary Cities” for undocumented immigrants; but only do so as part of a broader effort to stop these unconstitutional payments from the federal government to community governments.

            24. STATE WELFARE: Allow state and local governments to decide whether to grant undocumented immigrants' requests for social welfare benefits such as housing, education, health, and food assistance.

            25. PRIVATIZATION: Save money, shrink the welfare state, and make ordinary consumer goods more affordable (for immigrants and the native-born alike), by making health, education, and housing easier to purchase on the open market. Phase-out federal involvement in those sectors, and urge state and local governments to decrease regulations and taxes on them. Make purchasing goods like health insurance, medications, and education – and buying or renting housing – as easy and affordable as buying foods and drinks.

            26. EDUCATION: Require all publicly funded universities to offer in-state tuition rates to undocumented immigrants who reside in the state. Do not inhibit private colleges from offering scholarships and grants to undocumented immigrants.

            27. MILITARY: Ensure that acts of Congress concerning immigration allow non-violent undocumented immigrants to serve in the military (and become citizens); rather than giving undocumented immigrants a choice between serving in the military for two years or attending college. Do not make undocumented immigrants, nor anyone else, subject to selective service registration, military drafts, nor civil emergency preparedness service; not as a condition of citizenship, nor for any other reason.

            28. LANGUAGE: Do not interfere with the First Amendment freedom of speech of undocumented immigrants and refugees who speak languages other than English. Do not make English the official language of the United States of America; and pass a constitutional amendment formally prohibiting any state or local government from doing so. Do not require immigrants nor refugees to learn English as a condition of citizenship.

29. CULTURE: Do not interfere with the freedom of cultural expression. Do not expect, nor require, immigrants and refugees to "assimilate" to American culture; which includes liberal and conservative political cultures, neither of which fully embraces all of the freedoms that make people want to come here. Achieve civic pluralism by respecting ethnic and religious cultures' self-determination rights; while protecting the rights of ethnic, religious, and political minorities, with full civil liberties, and equal protection of law with due process.

Written on January 26^th, 27^th, and 30th, 2017

Edited on February 18th, 2017

Thursday, May 8, 2014

Taxpayer-Funded Benefits for Undocumented Immigrants

The following was written in April 2014, as part of a response to the Campaign for Liberty's 2012 survey questionnaire for candidates running for federal office.

17. Will you vote to oppose all taxpayer-funded benefits for illegal immigrants?

Yes, I will vote to oppose all taxpayer-funded federal benefits for undocumented immigrants.

Although race discrimination in employment practices and the eVerify program are, undeniably, obstacles to undocumented immigrants obtaining the means of survival and a decent standard of living, there are additional obstacles; namely, the increasing monopolization of the public sector over the distribution of welfare services.

Government departments and bureaus which prohibit the private sector and the non-profit voluntary sector from competing to provide welfare services deny people who entered this country through illegal methods the ability to obtain their needs through earning money and paying for those goods and services with cash or credit, and through receiving voluntary mutual aid given interpersonally and via charitable organizations.

Such individuals have already been denied the legal right to work, and so – with no remaining legal alternatives - they often find themselves in need of goods and services which the government has limited the ability of non-governmental actors to provide. They cannot attempt to make use of many of such services, because they would risk revealing their immigration status to the government in order to do so, thereby risking deportation.

When undocumented immigrants cannot either work to obtain, or receive for free, services which are typically provided by government, government overreach is to blame. If ever a government requires its citizens to present sufficient documentation of their identity whenever they needed food or water, then we would be asking whether undocumented immigrants even have the right to eat and drink - hence survive – and survival will be considered a right granted by government, to an even greater degree than it is already. But when welfare provision is not exclusively done by government, it cannot be cut by legislators who cut services in order to satisfy taxpayers.

If the public sector continues to monopolize the provision of welfare, then when State-run markets collapse - and/or when governments become unable to sufficiently provide welfare - people's basic needs will not be met. That is, unless a thriving underground market featuring gift-giving, bartering, sharing, and trade between voluntarily cooperating individuals is permitted to function; absent price controls, purchase mandates, citizenship requirements, and barriers to participation and competition in markets.

The federal government should neither require states to provide taxpayer-funded benefits to undocumented immigrants, nor prohibit them from doing so. I will urge states to allow such individuals to freely access and/or purchase any and all ordinary consumer goods and services – whether health services, education, or items which require minimum age for purchase – without presenting documentation or registering with a government administration.

Additionally, I will vote to repeal the D.R.E.A.M. (Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors) Act because of the manner in which it was implemented; President Obama implemented it via an executive order after the bill had been rejected by Congress. But I also support repealing the Act because of the choices it offered undocumented immigrants as a condition of staying; to study in college or serve in the military. Most of such individuals come to the United States to work, not to study or to fight the federal government's enemies; without the option of apprenticeship in one's field as an alternative, such legislation amounts to little more than a threat to temporarily derail the kind of life desired by the immigrant.

I will urge states to implement generous guest worker programs for undocumented immigrants, allow people to work while on welfare and transition from one to the other with a smooth transition by enacting negative income taxes, pass state-level D.R.E.A.M.-Act-type legislation that includes apprenticeship as a condition for citizenship, and consider having separate licenses for driving and car insurance versus for travel and security purposes.

For more entries on borders, immigration, and territorial integrity, please visit:

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2010/11/jurisdictional-aterritorialism-bastiat.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2011/01/immigration-and-minimum-wage.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2012/04/immigration-and-borders-policy.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2013/10/map-of-contiguous-united-states-in.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/02/cascadia-proposal.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/04/the-piscean-ethic-in-government-ecology.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/04/thoughts-on-illegal-immigration.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/04/on-immigration.html

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/04/social-policies-for-2012-us-house.html

For more entries on social services, public planning, and welfare, please visit:

http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2010/10/loss-of-public-planning-department.html