Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Immigration

One group of Greens has realized that the Immigration Plank of the GPCA platform is very far out of date and have taken steps to fix the problem. The current plank is old enough to call for the "repeal of Proposition 187."

The most recent campaign appeal from Peter Camejo includes the following:
Reform our immigration policies, legalize those already here and fight to set a legalized immigration level from Mexico to one person per hundred Californias every four years. End the "Exclued Mexicans" laws perprated by the Democratic and Republican parties.

This is the first time that I have seen GPCA propose a verson of a quota system on immigration. I wonder if this addresses only the symptoms, the size of the economic migration, and not the causes.

The immigration plank is under development, and it has been chaning almost daily. You can read the current proposal text in pdf format. The plank text is...

Proposed Immigration plank.

The Green Party supports policies (as advocated by Cesar Chavez) which seek to integrate, rather than alienate, immigrant labor. We should acknowledge and celebrate the influence of diverse cultures in the mosaic that is the unique California culture
  • International borders should be recognized as areas of bi-nationalinterdependence. International borders would create authentic fair-trade zoneswhere people are free to travel across borders for work, shopping or recreation.

    • Barrier walls between countries are ineffective. Thus, walls along the U.S-Mexican border should be destroyed and their construction should be halted

    • Reduce private and public militarization of U.S.-Mexican border

  • The Green Party supports the creation of a multinational labor union that establishes consistent policies in each country which ensure a living wage, health benefits and safe working conditions.

  • In order to create compliance with the principles of fair trade, the Green Party supports the renegotiation of: international trade agreements such as CAFTA and NAFTA; policies of IMF, World Bank and other international banking institutions; and of terms and conditions of contracts with multinational corporations.

  • All immigrant workers in the U.S. must be subject to U.S. wage, tax and labor laws including workplace health and safety standards as well as worker’s compensation, disability and unemployment insurance benefits.

  • Legalization programs which provide immigrants with the ability to obtain Permanent Residency status should provide reasonable time frames to complete the process and should be fair, simplified, transparent, and affordable.

  • Immigration quotas based on race, class and ideology should be abandoned for immigration policies that promote fairness, non-discrimination and family reunification. Particular attention should be given to immigrants who are political
    exiles and refugees.

The Green Party supports policies that restore and guarantee basic human rights to all persons residing in the United States
  • We oppose the continuing legislative trend of reducing and / or denying services to immigrants that are available to all other workers.
    • We advocate voting rights for permanent residents, as was the law prior to World War 1.

  • All immigrants, regardless of status, have the right to receive medical care, education, housing and access to all available public benefits and services.

  • Interpreters should be available in emergency rooms, hospitals and health care clinics.

  • All immigrants, regardless of status have the right to apply for a driver’s license without immigration status notification or restriction.

The Green Party supports policies that restore and guarantee the civil rights provided for under the Constitution of the United States which specifically states that the rights apply to all persons residing in the United States.
  • All immigrants, regardless of status, have 1st amendment rights of freedom of speech, and the freedom of assembly and association.

  • For all civil and criminal hearing, all immigrants have due process rights to beinformed of the charges brought against them, to confront their accusers, to have competent legal representation and to have a speedy trial. All immigrants have the right to free interpreter assistance for al legal proceedings. These rights mustapply to the deportation internment and hearing process.

  • The use of force or torture or other means to compel testimony against themselves or to obtain confessions must be banned.

  • All immigrants have the right to be secure in their houses, and protected against unreasonable search and seizure.

  • All immigrants must be protected against arbitrary arrest or detention based on racial or cultural profiling.

  • All immigrants have the right to be protected against intimidation by public officials or private individuals. Enforcement of immigration laws is the responsibility of the Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). Requiring local law enforcement agencies to serve as adjunct immigration agents of the Federal Immigration and Custom Enforcement agency is to be banned.

2 comments:

Orval Osborne said...

I have proposed an alternative Immigration policy, one that considers population and workers wages. I will post in 2 parts. Here is the Background and Purpose:

Except in the US, population in industrialized countries is declining. This is due to the "demographic transition", where people have their economic security needs met and children become a net economic loss, rather than the gain to security children are in an agricultural economy. However, the US is large and growing rapidly: 300 Million today, increasing by more than 3 Million every year. 400 Million are projected in 2050. Over 60% of U.S. growth since 1990 is from immigrants and their children.

Population growth is an environmental problem, expressed by Paul Ehrlich in a concise formula: I = C x P x F. The total environmental Impact is a product of the average Consumption times the total Population times an efficiency Factor. We in the U.S. must reduce our consumption levels, which are unsustainably high. But it is equally important for us to control our population. Total consumption increases when millions of people move from low consumption areas to high consumption areas like California, thus defeating environmental sustainability.

The other negative impact of massive immigration is to depress workers wages and working conditions, especially in lower-skilled jobs. This is one of the three most potent tools pro-corporate politicians have used to depress workers wages. The other two are destroying the governmental protections that keep labor unions viable, and promoting trade deals like NAFTA & the WTO that export manufacturing jobs.

Discussions of immigration among politicians are currently limited to enforcement against undocumented immigrants and building a massive wall on the U.S. – Mexican border, or restarting a guest-worker program. The reactionary response to illegal immigration is to deprive them of a living wage, cut them off from medical care, education and other public services and deprive them of civil and human rights guaranteed to all persons residing in the United States. American workers wages are being squeezed, but the cause of the problem is the corporations and the politicians they finance. Building a fence won't stop illegal immigration. Instead, people will legally come in on tourist and other visas, and simply not leave when their visas expire.

The most effective tool would be a crackdown on illegal employers. Immigrants come primarily for employment. The U.S. should do what most countires do and require job seekers to have a work permit. A guest worker program, like illegal immigration, is bad because it creates a permanent class of residents who are here for their labor but who are permanently barred from becoming citizens, voting and unionizing.

We need to broaden the discussion so we include fundamental contributors to migration: trade deals like NAFTA and the WTO force millions of farmers and workers into poverty in the developing countries; multinational corporations use their market dominance to drive down commodity prices; the International Monetary Fund and World Bank loans extract huge interest payments and require poor countries to slash education and health care.

Orval Osborne said...

PROPOSAL:
A. The Green Party supports policies that seek to promote livable wages for all and that protect the environment from overpopulation:
§ 1. Employer Sanctions: top priority must be given to enforcing laws against companies that hire people without valid citizenship or work permits. Penalties on criminal employers must be substantial and strictly enforced.
§ 2. International borders: Barrier walls between countries are ineffective. Thus, walls along the U.S-Mexican border should be destroyed and their construction halted. Militarization of U.S.-Mexican border should be as minimal as the U.S.-Canadian border.
§ 3. Immigration policies: the Green Party supports the Barbara Jordan-led Commission on Immigration Reform's call for supporting family reunification with priority given to reunification of spouses and children.
§ 4. All immigrant workers in the U.S., legal or not, must be subject to U.S. wage, tax and labor laws including workplace health and safety standards as well as worker’s compensation, disability and unemployment insurance benefits.
§ 5. The Green Party supports meeting of American labor shortages preferentially by training and recruiting Americans.
§ 6. Legalization programs that provide immigrants with the ability to obtain Permanent Residency status should should be reasonably quick, fair, simple, transparent, and affordable.
§ 7. Programs involving temporary worker status must include the option of permanent residency for immigrants already in the U.S.
§ 8. Immigration quotas based on race, class and ideology should be abandoned for immigration policies that promote fairness, non-discrimination and family reunification. The law must allow immigrantion for reasons of political exile and refugee status.
§ 9. The Green Party supports the policies in each country that ensure living wages, health benefits and safe working conditions. Creation of multinational labor unions are key to realization of this goal.
§ 10. The Green Party supports the principles of "fair" trade, rather than "free" trade. Therefore, we support renegotiation of: international trade agreements such as CAFTA, NAFTA and the WTO; the policies of the IMF, World Bank and other international banking institutions; the terms and conditions of contracts with multinational corporations; and cancellation of the crushing international debt for highly indebted poor countries.
B. The Green Party supports policies that restore and guarantee the civil rights provided for under the U.S. Constitution and basic human rights to all persons residing in the United States
§ 1. We oppose the continuing legislative trend of reducing and /or denying services that are available to all other workers.All immigrants, regardless of status, have the right to receive medical care, education, housing and access to all available public benefits and services. Interpreters should be available in emergency rooms, hospitals and health care clinics.
§ 2. We advocate voting rights for permanent residents, as was the law prior to World War I.
§ 3. All immigrants, regardless of status have the right to apply for a driver’s license without immigration status notification or restriction.
§ 4. All people, immigrants included, have 1st amendment rights of freedom of speech, and the freedom of assembly and association.
§ 5. All people, immigrants included, have the right to be secure in their houses, and protected against unreasonable search and seizure.
§ 6. All immigrants must be protected against arbitrary arrest or detention based on racial or cultural profiling.
§ 7. For all civil and criminal hearings, all immigrants have due process rights to be informed of the charges brought against them, to confront their accusers, to have competent legal representation and to have a speedy trial. All immigrants have the right to free interpreter assistance for all legal proceedings. These rights must also apply to the deportation internment and hearing process.
§ 8. All immigrants have the right to be protected against intimidation by public officials or private individuals. Enforcement of immigration laws is the responsibility of the Federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). Requiring local law enforcement agencies to serve as adjunct immigration agents of the Federal Immigration and Custom Enforcement agency must be banned
§ 9. The use of force or torture or other means to compel testimony against oneself or to obtain confessions must be banned.