Reply #19: Ok, shoot me down in flames for this one....

[mwooldri]

... I have a few radical steps that would help (but not cure) illegal immigration.

1) Change citizenship so that being born on US soil alone doesn't give you US citizenship, you have to have at least one parent who is a citizen, either by birth (again because one of their parents was a citizen) or by naturalization.

2) Expand the scope and the definition of the H-1B visa program. Use that program as the basis for the guest worker program instead, and allow the visas to be renewed indefinitely.

3) Make it easy and empower appropriately a government department to check employers for hiring legal employees, and if they are hiring illegals then the companies get fined to the point that it becomes uneconomical for them to hire the illegal. e.g. a fine of $10,000 per illegally hired employee, and $25 an hour fine for every extra hour the employee works after the initial citation. It shouldn't be up to one government department to report to what was the INS and leave it to them to eject the illegal immigrant out of the country. That same department that does the reporting should have the power to levy fines on the spot to the employers that are breaking the law.

4) The illegal workers that are already here working for an employer should be able to get a visa through the expanded H-1B program to cover themselves and their family. However for those people who are applying retroactively there should be an endorsement placed on their visa that effectively puts them at the back of the queue for getting a regular immigrant visa or even citizenship (say 10 years for a 'green card', 15 years for 'citizenship'). But if they work with the same employer for 10 years, or a variety of H-1B endorsing employers for 10 years then they can get their 'green card'.

5a) I bet some illegal immigrants even come into the country and make it on their own without an employer - become self employed. Some kind of amnesty should be made for them, hey they've done more than a lot of Americans have done and got some part of the American Dream. Work with them, maybe make them an employer! Sorry I can't think specifically as to what to do.

5) Expand resources to combat people trafficking - so that youung children don't get caught up in the sex-slave trade (tempted with a good job in the USA but found out that they're effectively imprisoned and forced to have sex repeatedly).

6) I hate to say this, but after all of these easings have been made place - for those who have entered the country illegally and have not claimed asylum - yes there should be toughening up. I don't necessarily state that it should be made a felon but if you have entered the country without a welcome - not even with a tourist visa - then you should be put into jail for a week or two and then some kind of arrangements should be made to repatriate you to your country of origin.

7) Having a fence up between the USA and Mexico isn't necessarily a 'bad thing' IMO but to make it the same way like the Iron Curtain is.

Hopefully a few mix of 'carrot' and 'stick' approaches would work to ease the illegal immigrant problem.

Regards, Mark - a legal immigrant btw, and somewhat against the new immigration bill because if I leave my Green Card at home and I get stopped by a police officer, technically I could be arrested with a felony - and any felony revokes my Green Card status... and I get to go home to England. Admittedly I have an advantage - English accent, blonde hair, blue eyes, very fair skin... so I might be able to wangle my way out of it... but technically I'd be committing a felony every time I stepped out of the house without my Green Card. Right now if I don't have it it's a misdemeanour.

Mark.