News

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NAS) has published a report, The Integration of Immigrants into American Society, 50 years after the passage of the Hart-Cellar Act, which eventually resulted in an almost four-fold increase in immigration to the United States. The recent NAS report is similar to one it published in 1997 in that it trumpets the positives of immigration while ignoring the negative consequences of expansionist immigration policies. The report 18 years ago played up the fact that adding millions of immigrants “grows the economy” simply by increasing annual GDP, and it downplayed the enormous fiscal burdens and effects on American workers that result.

The new report deals with issues of assimilation, or as the NAS terms it, integration. Steven Camarota at the Center for Immigration Studies looked at the report and has written up his initial thoughts. Camarota, who is one of the nation’s foremost experts on U.S. immigration policy, was disappointed in the lack of balance in the NAS “findings.”

The Pew Research Center released a new report on Thursday that is well-timed given Martin O’Malley’s emphatic, and unfounded, claim that “net immigration from Mexico last year was zero.” We pointed out that O’Malley was conflating legal and illegal immigration, and that he either misinterpreted or misrepresented data from 2007-2014 in order to make the point that illegal immigration was a thing of the past, so therefore is is unreasonable for Americans to demand a secure border.

The Republican presidential primary debate this past Tuesday helped to better define where the various top-tier candidates stand on immigration. Jeb Bush, who is wildly unpopular with Republican voters, reiterated his support for blanket amnesty for twelve million illegal aliens. John Kasich went even further than Bush in the debate, calling illegal aliens “law abiding” and denouncing Americans who support enforcement efforts. While neither Bush nor Kasich at this point look to have a realistic shot at the nomination, in large part due to their positions on immigration, they should get credit for being honest about their intentions. Neither man pretends that he believes the interest of the American people takes precedence over the demands of illegal aliens (or probably more correctly the demands of donors who fund their campaigns.)