The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee criticized the new guidance released today by the Department of Homeland Security on processing illegal-immigrant students as giving them an unfair advantage over legal immigrants.
The rules clarify how applications for deferred immigration status will be processed when the application period opens Aug. 15. Individuals will be able to request deferred action consideration by submitting a request to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) along with the standard $380 fee to process an employment authorization application and the $85 fee that is charged to all immigrants to cover the cost of the biometric check.
Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas) said that the new process, which doesn’t charge any additional fees for DREAM applicants, will result in a backlog of applications for immigrants applying through legal channels while letting the young illegal immigrants come to the front of the line.
“The lack of specific standards for employees processing the applications is an open invitation to fraud, especially because the Administration is allowing illegal immigrants to submit third party affidavits as proof of at least one of the DREAM Act requirements,” Smith said. “Potentially millions of illegal immigrants will apply for the administration’s amnesty and the American taxpayers are the ones who will be forced to foot the bill.”
The chairman also noted the timing of the issuance of the rule as the unemployment rate rose to 8.3 percent.
“The administration’s guidelines don’t just encourage illegal immigrants to work in the U.S.– they actually require them to apply to do so,” Smith said. “This is a slap in the face to the 23 million unemployed or underemployed Americans. American workers should not have to compete with illegal immigrants for scarce jobs and American taxpayers should not have to pay for President Obama’s amnesty agenda.”
Once the illegal immigrant students are granted deferred status they can apply for a work permit.
Smith added that he’s still awaiting a response from President Obama that he sent following the announcement of the new policy, in which he asked that Obama provide the Judiciary Committee with any legal opinions from the Justice Department regarding the constitutionality of the enforcement change.
Illegal? To Obama there is no such thing as an illegal immigrant. We’re all just one big happy global family sitting at the knee of Papa Soros.
Illegal Immigrant? NAH! Illegal Aliens, see, they crossed the borders WITHOUT ever filing any petitions for Legal Immigration. Their nationality is NOT USA, but their country of origin.
That’s why, “Executive Order Obama” signed a losely worded statement for Dream Act No. 3 applicants to present some form of “documents.” Enter a massive underground industry of falsifiers, corrupt leeches of society and other ne’er-do-wells scalping these “Dreamers” of their life savings for some phoney-baloney documentation.
And BCIS “will NOT perform any background checks” of the “Dreamers.” So, 40 year olds will now have become 30-somethings and 12 or 13 year olds will now become 16 year olds…see what happens when “Rule-of-Law” is replaced with “Rule-a-Day?” Law of “Unintended Consequences” reigns supreme.
I would bet that if legal immigration numbers were reduced one-for-one whenever an illegal immigrant applied, those standing in line to legally immigrate would raise a bit of a ruckus. This would increase local pressure on the illegals’ government to police illegal immigration. Those who abide by the rules should have enough clout to force action. They do not have any ‘skin in the game’ now, so why should they care? They don’t. Get their toes pinched a bit, make their wait time increase for every illegal immigrant accepted and made legal, and they’d get involved. Same thing for ‘anchor’ families. Relatives must wait longer for each illegal immigrant allowed to stay legally. There’d be some reaction here in the USA for those involved. Right now, they don’t care.
tom