LITR 5731: Seminar in American
Multicultural Literature (Immigrant)
Research Posting 2, summer 2006
Katherine Rearick
Negotiating the US Immigration System: What Makes it so Difficult?
In my first research posting, I explored how America’s immigration system makes it so difficult to obtain citizenship. I wondered what makes the process so complicated. With effort, I unearthed a relatively simple explanation of how one becomes a U.S. citizen, but I determined that the difficulty I had finding the information was a big part of the basic problem. The bureaucracy simply does not work in favor of immigrants who seek citizenship.
In reviewing my research, Dr. White posed two interesting questions: Does the difficulty indicate a corrupt system in which predators make money off the suffering of others, or does the difficulty serve simply to limit immigration?
Additional research does not necessarily indicate a conspiracy. Rather, I now believe the difficulty of obtaining citizenship reflects a bureaucratic system that is overloaded due to outmoded, voluminous paperwork and is unable to curb exploitation that naturally rises from such an overload.
I found disturbing information in a FreeRepublic.com reposting of a Tampa Bay Online article by Keith Epstein from June 17, 2006 (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1651035/posts). Imagine this: a government warehouse in Missouri, packed with over 55 million files, one for each immigrant who is currently seeking legal status in the United States. Many of these files are hundreds of pages long. Additionally, each file must be shuttled between the warehouse and up to 89 separate government offices. In the process of making each determination, immigration officials must often sift through at least 50 different forms and enlist at least 17 different passwords in order to find necessary information.
Now, add to that backlog the passage of proposed legislation that could easily bring 12 million illegal immigrants (a conservative estimate) out of hiding—without any mention of where additional money will come from to pay for processing the influx—and one can see this an enormous problem.
This overburdened and under funded system leads to the second major obstacle to legal immigration – shameless exploitation that naturally results. In recent years, much of this exploitation has been at the hands of so-called “immigration consultants” who claim to “guide” immigrants through the system.
Most of these consultants call themselves notarios, which is intentionally misleading. In Spanish-speaking countries, a notario is a licensed legal professional. In the U.S., one needs no credentials for the title. Whenever new immigration legislation looms, notarios pop up all over the country. Many advertise the urgency with which immigrants must get paperwork ready for the new laws, even when no new laws have been passed.
The most common notario scheme is called the “asylum scam.” The notario convinces an immigrant the easiest way to gain legal status is by being granted asylum—a classification meant for immigrants who face persecution if deported. To seek asylum, the immigrant must come out of hiding, placing himself and his family on the government’s radar, usually resulting in deportation orders. The notario tells the immigrant that they will then file for a “cancellation-of-removal” order to allow the immigrant to stay legally in the U.S. The notario does not tell the immigrant that a “cancellation-of-removal” is extremely difficult to obtain. The usual result is that after the immigrant has paid the notario thousands of dollars, he is deported and cannot take legal action against the person who swindled him. For personal stories of immigrants who have been victimized, visit the two sources I used in my research:
http://www.metrotimes.com/editorial/story.asp?id=5587
and
What are the solutions to these problems?
There is no solution in sight for the paperwork overload. Any solution would be costly, and no one in Congress seems ready to address it. Steven A. Camarota, director of the Center for Immigration Studies, a nonprofit that seeks to promote moderate immigration, claims in the FreeRepublic.com article that, “Just to ask the system to do its job now would require astronomical amounts of money—at least $2 billion.” Mel Martinez, a Cuban-American and the Senate’s only immigrant, estimates an additional $750 million to $1 billion will be required to handle the new influx of immigrants if legislation is passed. There has been no discussion in Congress about a source for that money.
Some slow headway is being made against exploitation. Greg Abbott, Texas Attorney General, and Bill Lockyer, California Attorney General, are aware of the problems in their states and have successfully prosecuted a number of these cases. Abbot is especially vigilant; he has launched a campaign that discourages immigrants from employing notarios. (Read more about his campaign at http://oag.state.tx.us/oagnews/release.php?id=129). However, the resources of most state and local prosecutors’ offices are stretched too thin to allow investigation of such scams.
In May 2005, Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA) proposed legislation that contains specific provisions to alleviate notario scams in particular. Last July, Senators John Cornyn (R-TX) and Jon Kyl (R-AZ) introduced the Comprehensive Enforcement and Immigration Reform Act of 2005 (S1438), which also addresses exploitation by notarios. A detailed explanation of both of these bills is available at http://www.carnegie.org/reporter/11/newimmigrants/solutions.html. None of these proposals is moving quickly through Congress.
In the meantime, the paperwork overload grows and grows and exploiters multiply with impunity at an alarming rate. Public and political awareness of these problems is increasing, however, and this recognition may be the first step to relief.
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