“Distilled in their discouraging essence, Republicans’ reasons for retreating from immigration reform reflect waning confidence in American culture and in restoring the political mission only Republicans can perform—restoring U.S. economic vigor.” – George Will, The Washington Post, 2/13/14
Fact Check: In this article Will repeats the line of the U.S. political establishment that unending mass immigration (what it calls “immigration reform”) has no downsides at all—and that at a time of large-scale U.S. unemployment the flooding of our job market with foreign workers will have no negative consequences for American workers.
Will maintains that assimilation of immigrants is working just fine and that Republicans should have no concern about immigrants and their children becoming an overwhelming voting bloc for Democrats. What he is saying simply isn’t true.
Today, 20.8 percent of U.S. residents don’t speak English at home, up from 17.9 percent in 2000. Research by Harvard sociologist Robert Putnam finds that the greatest breakdowns in social ties are in areas with the greatest diversity brought about by immigration.
Hispanics, who comprise more than half of the foreign-born in the U.S., immigrants are much more likely than the general population to support Big Government, a distinction which persists through the generations. Also, Hispanics are more hostile to capitalism than most other groups in society, including liberal Democrats. See the following link below:
Politics, Values and Religion – Pew Hispanic Center
Will claims he is a conservative, but it is difficult to see how continued mass immigration from Latin America will help conservatives and Republicans. And it is difficult to see how an emerging voting bloc hostile to capitalism is going to help the economy.
With respect to immigrants taking U.S. jobs, Will repeats the establishment line that immigrants are far more likely than Americans to create businesses and jobs. He maintains that immigrants, about 14 percent of the population, represent 20 of small business owners. It’s a claim without a citation. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, natives and immigrants have about the same rate of small business ownership, about 12 percent. Immigrants, however, tend to hire their co-ethnics. See the link below:
Immigrants in the United States, 2010: A Profile of America’s Foreign-Born Population
With respect to illegal immigration, Will maintains that the border is nearly secure, neglecting to note that illegal immigration, after a lull, has started to go up again. He preposterously describes better security for our border as “East Germanization,” as if there is no difference between a dictatorship holding its people captive and a free sovereign country protecting its borders from unauthorized intruders.
Will also tries to suggest that security has improved by citing the Obama Administration’s claim that it has carried out “record deportations” of illegal aliens. Even President Obama, in a moment of candor, admitted that this was misleading.
Business and political elites aim to mislead the public on immigration. George is most willing to serve them.