Mass Immigration Is a Tea Party Issue
The “Tea Party” movement still appears to be going strong. Groups of Tea Party activists are now planning an April 15th rally in Washington. That day, the deadline for filing income taxes, is symbolic of the movement’s opposition to the federal government’s reckless policies of tax and spend.
Immigration has not been a prominent issue among Tea Party activists, but it should be. Immigrants, legal and illegal, are net loss to native-born taxpayers. A significant reason is that we have an immigration policy which is, in the words of researcher Robert Rector at the Heritage Foundation, “importing poverty.” As a recent study by the Center for Immigration Studies found, “In 2008, 58 percent of all households headed by an immigrant [legal or illegal] with one or more children under age 18 used at least one welfare program, compared [with] 36 percent for native households with children.”
Our legal immigration system places most of its emphasis on admitting people with family connections to previous immigrants, rather than emphasizing skills. The consequence is a flow of immigrants who are, on average, less educated and less skilled than the native-born, and are thus more likely than the native-born to receive public assistance. Our system is supposed to prevent immigrants from becoming public charges, by requiring their sponsors to be responsible for them, but this provision is seldom if ever enforced.
And the little screening we do for self-supporting legal immigrants of course doesn’t apply to illegal immigrants. They come solely on the basis of their needs, not ours.
The most extensive research, to date, on the financial costs and benefits of immigration (legal and illegal) was the 1997 study conducted by the National Research Council. While it found that low-wage immigration was beneficial to some economic interests, it was a net loss of between $15 and $20 billion a year to taxpayers. With the foreign-born population now much higher then it was thirteen years ago, the loss is probably much greater.
Thus it would seem that immigration is a natural issue for Tea Party people to raise. Unfortunately, there are some people who don’t want them to make this connection. One is former Republican Congressman Dick Armey who has stepped forward as a spokesman of the Tea Party Movement. While in Congress, Armey proved himself a loyal ally of the cheap-labor open-borders interests.
Recently, Armey attacked former Congressman Tom Tancredo who has stepped forward as a Tea Party advocate. Tancredo advocates less immigration and strict enforcement of immigration laws. For this reason, Armey has tried to push Tancredo out of the movement by labeling his views as “uncharitable and mean-spirited.” Given Armey’s proven charity toward open-border profiteers, one hopes that Tea Party supporters will see the proper side to support.
AIC supporters, consider getting involved in the Tea Party movement. Make your voice heard, and place your concerns on the agenda. Our dysfunctional immigration policies are a big part of what is wrong with America today.