John Block Reports from Washington

Hello everybody out there in farm country. This radio commentary is brought to you by the Renewable Fuels Association, Wal-Mart Stores, Monsanto, and John Deere. They are all friends, supporters, and allies of a healthy farm economy and prosperous rural America. Thank you.

And now for today’s commentary—

What about immigration? Is the Congress going to try to address this difficult and polarizing issue this year?

William Siegel, a Trustee of the Hudson Institute, has put forth a suggestion that I think is worth consideration.

Here is the situation that exists today. We have anywhere between 12M and 20M illegals in this country now. They sneaked in across the border or came in on a temporary visa but never went back. They broke the law. They don’t deserve healthcare, school lunch, food stamps, all of the entitlements that our legal citizens receive. Send them back!

That’s just not going to happen. 12M or 20M is too many. Some have been here for years, raising their children. Most of them are working – doing work that we can’t get our legal citizens to do. Who is going to milk the cows, slaughter the hogs, roof the houses, pick the strawberries, do the lawn work? They are doing the dirty work, the dangerous work. We need them.

So, here is the middle ground suggestion. Give all the illegals 6 months to register. This does not give them citizenship or necessarily the many benefits that our legal citizens are entitled to receive.

However, the federal government and states may in the future give them some of these benefits. You ask – why would they register if they don’t necessarily get the benefits? Because we would agree to let them stay here, in the USA, no risk of deportation. Stay and work. Raise your family.

However, if they don’t register, they would be subject to deportation – no excuses.

I know that this does not deal with all the details. Will there be a path to citizenship? What kind of benefits can they expect, etc.? But they would have the peace of mind to know that the next time their workplace is checked by immigration officials, they would not be deported.

The plan herein outlined is not perfect, but it could be a compromise worth consideration. If we insist on the all or nothing approach, we will get nothing.

In closing, I would encourage you to access my website which archives my radio commentaries dating back 10 years and will go back 20 years when complete. Check on what I said back then. Go to www.johnblockreports.com.

Until next week, I am John Block in Washington.