Today, Donald Trump said that “to promote integration, assimilation and national unity, future immigrants will be required to learn English and pass a civics exam prior to admission.”
Too bad we can't make those requirements for being President
11
This fake “immigration plan” is as dumb—and dangerous—as it gets. It’s a branding strategy that a real estate developer would cook up, like a gimmicky presentation to sell a bad project long enough to sneak it past approval and the public.
4
American businesses need workers (predominantly filled by immigrants) in many so-called "unskilled" jobs: anything agricultural, fish and shellfish processing, construction, factory production, housekeeping in the hotel/motel industry, and on and on. NOT just in high-tech fields. The "unskilled" label might as well be taken to mean "low wage" jobs that many Americans don't want to do. And by the way, you'd have a significant learning curve for most of those jobs if you never did them before. American businesses have come to depend on immigrants.
4
If passing a civics test seems a reasonable hurdle for someone to be let into the country, shouldn't passing a civics test also be required to become its President? Without cheating?
4
Ironically, the plan is written by a family member with no special skills.
6
“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
2
Mr. Trump's own mother arrived on these shores as a poor, uneducated teenager in 1930. She barely knew any English at all, and mainly spoke Gaelic. Historians describe her native village as "indescribably filthy" and full of "human wretchedness." After arriving, she was a "dirt poor" domestic servant. As Trump's bankruptcies and divorces piled up in the 1990s, she had the good sense to ask, "What kind of son have I created?"
Trump's clubs and properties have hired hundreds if not thousands of such poor, uneducated immigrants. Many if not most of them have been undocumented. By using undocumented workers, he saved tens of millions of dollars. Had she come in the 1990s, he would have happily hired her.
Melanie Trump's parents immigrated via the present family immigration rules. Melania has said she has a college degree. In fact, she attended college for about one year. She immigrated via the so-called "genius" exception.
Would any of these folks be allowed to come under the new rules that have been proposed by the White House? Would an uneducated economic refugee like his mother be permitted to enter at all? If she were already here, and a DACA recipient, would she now be expelled, as now proposed? Without a college degree, wouldn't Melania now be denied entry?
5
@Robert
As somebody else noted here, the White House plan itself was put together by somebody with no special skills, namely, Mr. Kushner. If Kushner were not an American citizen, he would not be permitted to immigrate according the White House plan. Unless they keep the rule that lets millionaires buy their way in.
2
Could Trump pass the civics exam? I got $100 that says he couldn't.
5
Anyone who has watched Jimmy Kimmel and others do street interviews with AMERICANS will know that few native-born Americans could not answer basic civics questions. I wonder if DJT could do so based on his own comments.
In addition, if only highly educated, English-speaking people are allowed to immigrate (and not their less-educated family members), who will take the low-paying jobs in restaurants, farms, home-care, etc.
2
The most rarely talked about the path to immigration and naturalization is the “EB-5 immigrant investors”. Worthy of discussion here.
This category includes foreign nationals who have invested or are actively in the process of investing $1 million, (or $500,000) in the US. It offers permanent residence in the United States to affluent foreigners investing money in real estate projects here.
That appears to be another real estate benefit, like all those pesky write-offs, that Trump's family has used extensively. Ironically perhaps both the Russians and the Chinese have benefited most from the Kushner and Trump family's immigration shenanigans. Some legal and some hiring of illegals.
Virtually any Mar-a-Lago member of a foreign nation can be allowed to live here. And then you get the Trump donor Cindy Yang's that sell access and immigration.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/08/us/politics/kushner-china-visa-eb-5.html
Border between the U.S. and Canada is OK. But why is the border between the U.S. and Mexico not OK?
These immigrants come to the U.S. primarily to escape problems in their native countries (Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama) which includes a stagnant economy, high levels of crime, political corruption and widespread drug use. There is a legal way to request a green card to enter the U.S., however unlawful mobs entry is not allowed. Shame and disgrace of all these central American countries and their governments who fail to feed their people, to give them medical care, good housing, and jobs. These central American countries and their governments are the ones at fault.
Sorry that your country does not love you anymore. To find true love you need to find and walk on God’s Holy road which will one day open the gate to His Kingdom in Heaven. The road you are currently walking is man made and will only bring you tears and despair, darkness and regrets.
2
So the kind of people the Republicans want - - smart and educated - - will come and leave their family behind???
Ivanka and Jared might abandon kids for $$$.
But the world does not follow their "values."
How can Republicans hold up their heads?
Jared "bought my way into Harvard" Kushner was allowed to craft this new immigration policy? Seriously? Good Lord.
2
In short, what Trump is proposing is the immigration plan that is has been in effect in Canada since 1965, where immigration is tightly controlled and visas are granted based on the Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS) point tabulation that evaluates "skills, education, language ability, and work experience."
You'd think this sort of thing would be music to the ears of progressives, to whom all things about Canada are glorious compared to the US. Except when your only goal is to oppose and defeat everything associated with Donald Trump, apparently not so.
5
With so many highly educated young Americans already looking for decent jobs that pay a decent wage, why this focus on increasing the number of immigrants with an "educated "skill set that puts them in direct competition for jobs that the educated and under/unemployed Americans we already have are struggling to find in our overly skilled set labor market.
Seems to me the scarcity is in unskilled labor; in jobs that "white folks" see as beneath them; jobs that so many immigrants would do just about anything to be permitted to full and work towards (as immigrants almost universally strive to do) the dream of American middle class status.
Bring in the would-be fruit pickers and domestics and lawn care immigrants. That's where the jobs are. We have plenty of home-grown skilled workers. Now, where are we going to find people will, able and "lucky enough" to pick our strawberries and do our laundry?
No brainier.
1
As usual this will not pass the congress, and therefore will not become law. So whats all this reaction for?
If you think about it, they are just trying to compete with Canada and many other developed nations. I don't see anything wrong with it.
Only Immigrants know how painful it is to be discriminated against for being born in a specific country.
Its not fun being stuck in a long line, just for being born where you are, even though your credentials may be great and you may be contributing handsomely to US economy.
3
@Anonymous
Actually it is quit arguably that he can and will get away with it. Like it or not. It can and will be argued that its procedural and regulatory thus within the purview of executive orders. I have a pen and phone ring any bells. Arguably DACA was an an executive order courts have turned into law (It was never passed by Congress) But courts are claiming it has the force of law an is irrevocablewhose policies you hate . Two way street if Obama can impose law by executive fiat so can Trump, You can't have it both ways either both can impose laws on immigration by fiat or neither. BUT YOU CAN'T have one set of rules for President's whose policies you like and another for those you hate. That's not law or order it's anarchy. Like it or dislike it it goes both ways. I don't like Trump I don't like his policies I didn't vote for him. But either BOTH policies carry the force of law or neither there is no in between.
1
Nearly 50% of our own college grads are either unemployed or underemployed. We need to make employers hire and train US citizens instead of continuing to import more foreign labor. And I'm saying this as someone who came in on an H1B and then got an employment based green card, then married a US citizen, became a naturalized citizen and are raising two children.
America's current immigration level is completely unsustainable. We need a drastic reduction, preferably a moratorium on immigration for the next 40 years to absorb and assimilate all those who are already here.
I have never seen a country tossing aside her own citizens in favor of foreigners the way this country does. Is America still a country, or are we just a for-maximum-profit corporation these days?
4
One of the oft repeated mantras is that immigration is good and necessary for our economy. Based on that, who will improve our economy more, someone's 80 year old grandmother or a recently graduated software engineer?
I am in complete support of this policy. If we are going to have immigration, and there is no doubt that we will, then it should give preference to those able to support themselves and who can add to our economic growth.
5
I think the civics exam is a great idea. It should be imposed on all adults who wish to vote, not only on immigrants. The franchise is exercised by native-born citizens who know nothing of American government. As a result, we have a electorate which is illiterate regarding its own obligations. How many US citizens can name the branches of government? The role of each branch? The obligation of citizens to educate themselves of their own responsibilities in a government BY the people? Our current hobbled system is the result of millions of votes cast on the basis of one or two narrow obsessions. (When is the last time the House voted a declaration of war? Yet we are in perpetual wars.) This response does not directly address who should be admitted as immigrants, but it addresses their obligations--and those of the native-born-- as citizens of an enlightened democracy, not a democracy in name only.
2
While I agree with this, this will escalate the H1-B (and similar) visa system. That's all well-and-good, but I would rather not see an escalation of that visa system and would prefer it if our economy hired Americans (= citizens + permanent resident green card holders) in this country with those needed "skills". If there's a shortage of them, maybe we ought to have a better education or incentive systems here in the USA to encourage actual Americans.
4
We should consider adding some selectivity to the immigration process. The giant influx of immigrants from the “triangle” of central America is worrisome. Their literacy and education attainments are very low. Similarly, most have limited skills. Consequently, they are obliged to compete at the bottom of any wage scale.
There is a reasonable likelihood that the bulk of these immigrants will not be self sufficient and will live in deep poverty.
They will necessarily depend upon our failing social safety net. These wages are too low to “pay taxes”. If immigration rates are not checked, they will easily exceed the capacity of our social safety net, while not contributing to its existence.
Historically, similar objections were cited about prior immigrants. These concerns were wrong. New immigrants were soon absorbed into the national economy. Their assimilation was supported by the eras of Western expansion & industrialization. There is no comparable mechanism in today’s economy.
Today’s employers seek skilled and semi-skilled workers. Lower tier jobs are disappearing. Industrial automation is continually shrinking the pool of blue collar jobs. At some point, it is reasonable to expect the low wage job market to saturate, wherein there are grossly more applicants than jobs. It will be immaterial that they are willing to work, there simply won’t be jobs. Unemployment will rise. Poverty, crime and homelessness will increase. Assimilation will stall.
5
Think it's easy to emigrate to most of the highly-industrialized countries in the world. The UK? Japan? France? Even Germany? Nope. Their formula: come as a tourist, spend lots of money and go home.
I have had personal experience with folks who worked in both Japan and the UK--rest assured that without a proper job-offer, the gates are barred to permanent residency. Even WITH a job, Japan won't grant permanent residency.
So why does the US have some special responsibility to take in just about anyone? Could there be some hard-hearted politics in this equation?
This country closed the frontier long ago, farming jobs have largely disappeared, muscle-labor is under assault by robots, trucks are about to drive themselves, and the American working-class is under assault. Signs of social breakdown are evident, if one cares to look. So adding a million or more to a stressed labor market will help anyone get a living wage?
12
Immigration is the biggest current problem, and we have to get it right. Congress has been lazy in the past, and obstructionists have been allowed to refuse any bipartisan solution. Something to remember is that when our symbol of freedom, the Statue of Liberty was donated by France our population was 50 million (1880's). We needed workers to rebuild the country. The current population is (estimated) at 325 million. It's unsustainable due to our diminishing resources and the unpredictable effects of climate change. When the floods begin and the rivers dry up, we will wish we had fewer people to feed, not more.
4
Why is nobody talking about the real reason for the middle-class anti-immigrant agnst which drives the Trump base -- automation. Immigration reform is a side-show -- a diversion from the real reason for the wage stagnation, decline in working conditions and general under-employment we're experiencing in the post-industrial age. Nobody is going to pay a reasonable living wage to a human being when a robot can do the job better and cheaper, and the least of things which a robot can't do better and cheaper than a human being is becoming frighteningly short. Until we address that issue -- well nothing else really matters.
2
Why in the world would anybody with the skills and education to qualify under the Trump legislation want to enter the United States? Those sort of people have reasonable options -- they can either remain at home or immigrate to any number of other western democracies which haven't entered their pre-collapse "Weimar" phase. The United States is the last place they would want to go.
2
As a WASP with a science degree, I had the red carpet laid out for me to come to the U.S. many years go. I stay here reluctantly, for now, for family reasons. With his new policy, Trump would still greet me with open arms, but I would not want to come, and I am fairly certain that many potential immigrants who meet Trump's stringent criteria will feel much the same as I do. He is guaranteeing the U.S. will not prosper in the long run. Few educated immigrants with any integrity will want to come here.
3
Skills? That's great. Aren't we already importing foreigners with supposedly equivalent skills who are willing (desperate) to work for much less than the prevailing professional wage scale? This is another bonanza for greedy corporations who won't even have to bother with H1-B paperwork. Think, Donald, think!
4
Many commenters are focusing on the shift to a skill-based immigration scheme when the most relevant parts of the proposal are enshrining into law the zero-tolerance policy at the border and the partial creation of a wall.
Thankfully, this Miller-spawned monstrosity is DOA.
The demand for skilled labor with advanced educations is high in the US.. and domestic supply of said labor cannot keep up in an economy that is stable and expanding. Hence... room for immigrants sponsored by employers under the H1B visa program.
When the US grants residency status to a foreign immigrant with a professional degree and the ability to contribute in a positive manner to the highly technical product and service industries that have largely replaced key segments of old school manufacturing.....
The US also has an obligation to allow said valued immigrant contributor to the nations economy to also bring family with them.
You can't have it both ways.. or you simply look like an imperialist nation only interested in colonial rule on your terms. Sorry.. but that era has passed.
I am thinking that one of the practical results of the proposal is an effective lowering of immigration. I would not be opposed. Just reading the comments here tells me how immigration now fractures us as a people and has disrupted us.
1
the new plan would provide opportunities for immigrants who have specific skills or job offers to work in the United States, provided they can demonstrate English proficiency and educational attainment, and pass a civics exam.
English proficiency? Educational attainment. A CIVICS exam?
Donald himself could not pass any of these tests. As to the chain-migration, Einstein visa for posing nude wife, Melania, well, the hypocrisy will not stop until all are pushed out of the White House and into the dustbin.
3
63% of Americans over 25 have less than an Associate’s degree. Let that sink in.
If we let the tens of thousands of college educated to PhDs get all the high tech jobs we need to stay in this country, then the 63% have jobs building office buildings, homes, running restaurants, stores, repair shops...
the past 25 years we have restricted that visa # so much that these firms have set up overseas from India and China to Cambridge in UK and helped those economies grow and thrive.
Unfortunately many of those jobs will not come back because lots have figured out how to run them efficiently but I challenge you to find high tech and others who don’t hope and pray the % do shift towards the educated worker.
Now there’s also the reality that Americans won’t work in slaughter houses, work in landscaping because it’s too hot and strenuous, clean toilets as one pointed out, etc so the need to bring in the uneducated will remain.
Bringing in your spouse and children should not be an issue but grandparents, adult brothers and sisters? I am not really sure about that. On the plus side there are family members who will care for them as they assimilate and take those jobs obese Americans cannot do and other Americans don’t want to do...
I don’t say there are no redeeming qualities to bringing in the educated. Bill Gates always said for decades, ‘put a PhD diploma in their one hand and a work visa in the other. Don’t let them go home and compete with us’!
1
Merit -Based is prejudiced against those who are "the salt of the earth."
I would rather have a" salt of the earth person" who has God-given common sense, a sense of wisdom, and a down-to-earthiness that contributes to their community.
I bet Donald Trump and his ilk could not themselves pass the civic exam for his new merit-based immigration plan.
1
Don't believe one word from this administration.
2
Ah, yes. Jared Kushner, expert at large, genius at everything. His father's protege, and his father-in-law's go-to know-it-all. Now that peace has been achieved in the Middle East, and Harvard has a fine new building, Jared is set to do .... what, exactly?
4
I am curious how this immigration policy will work with Cuban nationals and the end of the Dry Foot Wet Policy.
2
Neither Melania nor her parents had any in-demand skills but their immigration was OK?
4
An immigration test that the current occupant of the white house could not pass today. He can not demonstrate english proficiency, refuses to show any educational attainment and has no clue or interest in civics.
3
Hoorah for common sense .... this was part of the 4-part immigration plan submitted in 2017 , but lampooned by the media and killed by anti-immigrant idiots in Congress.
The 2017 proposal also included a path forward for the DACA cohort and leveled the opportunity for those who wish to immigrate from anywhere on the globe.
What a sensible starting point!
1
What is - and should be - obvious to all thinking people is that what this would do is simply to accelerate what has been happening for decades.
The unwillingness of the nation's power structure, both political and economic, to actually do what is needed to insure that our own population is provided the necessary tools, incentives and support to do the "skilled" jobs that are already being filled by immigrants IS THE PROBLEM.
Bringing in more of these workers only makes the situation worse for the future of U.S. born citizens. Already, we have very large numbers of doctors, nurses and even teachers who either are here on Green Cards or have become permanent residents or citizens.
In the case of physicians, it is much cheaper to bring over an already - hopefully - qualified individual from India or any other country than it is to train one here. For these doctors, as well as nurses and teachers, the income expectations can be much reduced from their U.S. counterparts, thereby continuing the lowering of costs to their employers, i.e. hospitals and, for teachers, city governments.
2
Did these requirements apply to Melania's parents? Just asking. For that matter, how about the Drumpf family two or three generations ago?
What about all that noble stuff on the Statue of Liberty?
We forget easily, don't we.
7
Real immigration reform won’t happen until we shift our focus from fear of people coming in to take away our jobs, to acceptance of people already here sacrificing their lives to make this country what it is.
How convenient for us to continue to ignore the 11+ million undocumented people already here playing a big role in making our society run.
Please don’t forget this during the next few days as you continue to hear talk about the new immigration plan that fails to even mention the largest and most important aspect of our immigration issues.
7
I would like Trump to take that civics exam. I want to be the proctor. It’s just one more example of his demand that others meet standards he himself can’t or won’t.
It’s interesting that the median immigrant income is about the median national income. This plan would double it. Suppose it were implemented successfully. Would resentment of immigrants rise, or fall? Somehow I doubt “immigrant gentrification” would be a popular phenomenon.
Finally, the plan mandates college education, without accounting for the quality of that education. I’ve known many immigrants with advanced degrees whose “education” was in name only. Some struggled to get a bachelors degree here after discovering their foreign degree had no value here. If college is mandatory, you can be sure the paper will exist, even if only for a fee.
4
How will this affect current green card holders? My daughter in law is from Honduras. She is married to my son, a US citizen born and raised in the USA by parents born and raised in the USA. She is also the mother of his child, a dual citizen of Honduras and the USA. It took him 14 months, plenty of fees, intervention by a congressman so the NVC would actually LOOK at his petition months after they received it, and a couple of visits to Tegucigualpa to get both mother and daughter here legally. The green card is good for 3 years.
So what happens then if her English is "not good enough" or she is deemed unworthy since her job is being a stay at home mom supported by her husband? Is that a likelihood here?
The process of legal immigration is already cumbersome, capricious, frustrating, and unpredictable, and has been for many years. Wouldn't it be better to improve services for spouses and children, instead of conflating the whole process with law enforcement and attracting "the best people" from outside the USA to work inside the USA, thus truly taking decent job opportunities from US citizens?
1
@Mac new green cards are valid for 10 years, older ones do not have an expiration date ...
While the sentiment of wanting to help all who want to come to the US is admirable, it is not practical, fair or sustainable.
As a lifelong liberal Dem, here's what I think we should do:
1. Admit individuals based on skills we actually NEED - not just accept engineers, etc... so that tech companies and other industries are able to hire cheaper, younger, immigrant substitutes instead of US citizens. (PS: why not subsidize our youth/career changers who pursue education/training in needed skill sets?)
2. Deny admittance to unskilled, non-English speaking individuals. While lack of skills, education & the ability to communicate were unimportant in the 19th/early 20th century, that is not the case in the 21st century. It is irrational to add to our already burgeoning class of the uneducated, unskilled, uninsured and their families. Admitting more only benefits those who would take advantage of cheap labor (i.e., low wage, part-time, no benefits) in the construction, hospitality, warehouse, factory & agriculture sectors. People working off-the-books and sending money back to foreign countries while simultaneously overwhelming school systems, law enforcement, health care, etc... does nothing for our cities and towns except drain our resources and eventually our good will.
3. End birthright citizenship. The 14th Amendment was enacted to guarantee citizenship to former slaves & not to be subverted by those looking for a way to game the system & gain entitlements.
13
In game the system and gain entitlements, are you including the wife and and family of our Gamer of the System In Chief? Someone has apparently revoked your “lifelong liberal Democrat “ tag just recently.
2
@RDG
My comment as to "gaming the system" applies equally to the wealthy & destitute, legal or illegal entrants. I simply believe that as a country we should decide who can claim citizenship and the associated benefits (and responsibilities).
And as for the "Gamer in Chief," I loathe him & his supporters and can't wait for his ouster
2
Asylum shopping is the practice of applying for asylum in wealthy countries rather than the first country of opportunity. U.S. asylum laws and international asylum protocols discourage asylum shopping.
The U.S. now has a safe third country agreement with Mexico as well as Canada. The U.S. can reject asylum requests presented by migrants entering the country from Mexico or Canada. It continues to accept asylum request presented at legal ports of entry on the border, but it is not required to do so.
According to the UN, “There is no obligation under international law for a person to seek international protection at the first effective opportunity. On the other hand, asylum-seekers and refugees do not have an unfettered right to choose the country that will determine their asylum claim in substance and provide asylum. States could craft bi- or multilateral arrangements, consistent with international refugee and human rights law standards, according to which asylum-seekers would be encouraged and enabled to seek international protection at the first available opportunity.”
The majority of States deny migrants access to asylum if they have already found protection in another country.” The European Union, United Kingdom and Canada are among nations that apply the “first country of asylum” principle.
https://www.refworld.org/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/rwmain/opendocpdf.pdf?reldoc=y&docid=4bab55da2
https://www.refworld.org/docid/3fe9981e4.html
4
Wait a minute. Someone, not saying who, is having thought processing issues. If skilled workers from other lands compete for jobs with U.S. workers whose migrant status was established generations back, won't those U.S. workers have a claim of discrimination? And knowing what they do about how we treat aliens in this country why would people trained, presumably in their own country to meet a need in that country, petition for employment or asylum here where we have learned somehow to hate immigrants and, thus, ourselves?
This is better than the current regime of letting in rent-a-child or rent-a-husband so-called "families" and remote "relatives" in chain relationships that may or may not actually exist.
8
Leaving one's country to live in a new country and learn a language, culture and skills takes exceptional courage, in addition to which many immigrants arrive from dangerous places where they've experienced severe trauma. Add to that the cruel treatment they receive from some Americans and the lowest level jobs they work endless hours at, and you have the very people who have the potential to go far because they have farthest to go.
I doubt donald speaks any other languages. He doesn't have the patience, focus or interest in other cultures to learn one. Were he to have to move to a country in which English isn't spoken and he had to learn new skills, he'd sink fast. Immigrants should be praised and welcomed, not rejected. Shame on our so-called president. He does not represent the majority of Americans. Sorry, world.
3
In principle, there's nothing wrong with adopting a more skills-based immigration system. Many countries, including some liberal democracies, give priority to immigrants who have desirable skills sets over those without. If you can't accept everyone, why not give preference to people who seem most likely to find employment and contribute to society over those more likely to wind up on public assistance?
The proposal can be criticized on the basis of what it leaves out--it is clearly not the comprehensive immigration reform we need. But it might be better for Democrats to seize this opportunity to negotiate: ask for protection for DACA recipients and their families in exchange support of a more merit-based system going forward.
Yes, Trump is reprehensible, and it pains me to voice even qualified support for one of this proposals. But Democrats need to show they are not the party that wants to "abolish ICE" and that they are open to reasonable restrictions on immigration. The alternative is to hand Trump an issue that he can use to win over large numbers of voters.
8
I fully agree that a shift to merit based immigration in the USA is long overdue and needed.
Objective of immigration policies allowing ones with suitable skill set and language proficiency makes eminent sense.
Hope fully this policy if enacted and implemented will go towards providing considerable relief to the hopelessly log jammed decade long wait for Green card of highly educated and skilled.
5
A physical wall may be necessary in some places. More high tech (and eco-friendly) solutions may be necessary elsewhere. It should be easy to hire people for back-breaking farm, service, or factory work, so long as minimum wage standards are met. DACA should be expanded and lead to citizenship. Beyond that I don't know, since I personally think anybody brave enough to make it here and obey the law while here should eventually be eligible for citizenship.
At least Melania’s family got in. The hypocrisy is staggering.
9
I guess he's finally had it with the in-laws.
5
Make no mistake. This is specifically intended for the tech industry. First trump and the Republicans complain that immigrants are taking away American jobs and causing wages to stagnate. Even though those would be low skilled, low wage, labor intensive jobs. The kinds that Americans are to good to do in the first place. Now they want to bring in educated and skilled immigrants in order to keep the wages in those areas low also. The problem here is that those jobs actually are the kinds of jobs that Americans want and are willing to do. Picture an immigrant here, with no access to family, tied to his/her employer with no ability to complain and you have an army of robots.
4
This will make it harder for US students with tech degrees to get a start. Great for corporations - not so much for the workers as usual. It also stinks of flagrant distain for those who need to come here most. Not surprised at all.
@Bev Wall
Should we allow in all those who “want” or “ need” to come to reside in the US?
The critical questions are whether & how the US should control its borders - who should it allow to immigrate & how many each year so as to not only sustain but strengthen the very system & the way of life which attracts the vast number of people to migrate here in the first place.
1
Melania Trump received an Einstein visa for being a model ....
of course this is a great achievement.
So if you can wear clothes and walk on a catwalk, you will receive an Einstein visa. This creates a huge loophole.
5
Surprised there is no "hotness" requirement for female applicants. Seems like we will need more handmaidens.
Be Best.
3
I loathe Trump on everything except immigration. The world is awash with unskilled, uneducated laborers (and we already have enough of those here now). A hundred years ago those were good immigrants for America, but not today.
7
Not exactly true. Look at the home healthcare industry for a start. There has been a home care worker shortage for several years, this will only get worse as the baby boomers age and require more care. This policy will negatively affect people in tech careers the most by bringing salaries down and taking jobs away from them. It’s great for corporations though and I think that is their main concern.
2
If you restrict immigration from the Philippines, Haiti, Jamaica and so many other countries there will be NO ONE to care for you in old age. Few Americans will do the cleaning, feeding, dressing that home health aide, both in the home and in institutions, do for $12 an hour (and that’s before taxes) often with no health insurance for themselves. Refer to Japan for a distinct shortage of people to care for the elderly.
1
If you happen to be from a very poor, remote and rural area in Latin America (or any other developing region) and thus you are illiterate in your own mother tongue, what are the chances you will learn a foreign language ?? so that you may contribute to society and integrate into the hosting society ??
3
Just like the Italian, Yiddish, Polish, Greek and, yes, Spanish speakers, give it a half generation or so. Come on over to the States and walk around a bit.
2
How to defeat sanctions in a connected world?
Build your own network aka the NEW Silk Road. Extend rails overland.
By accident of late invasion, American was able to build a sea-to-sea nation of one government. Because Europe was embroiled in endless wars, America was able to maintain this structure. Now, by virtue of being the non invaded survivor of WWII, we rule corporately.
The gloves-off agenda is to control all economic actions across the world. We public will merely be crushed. The VISA is the most effective way to gut the upper layers of countries governments eliminating socialism and ensuring slavery. The greatest benefit here at home is to break the spirit of the public directing them into a permanent strata of reloing travelers chasing the next factory opening.
I don't know why an educated, skilled foreigner would want to immigrate here without his/her family. Many undocumented immigrants do, and they send much of their money home to their family. But they have no other choice of working. Educated people do--there are probably lots of other jobs where they could be with their family.
4
The problem is not with immigrant families, but rather with the unskilled products of American high schools - under educated and unprepared to meet the world. Immigrants improve America, and the unskilled family members foster the next generation of impressive over achieving Americans. After the third generation, it's the usual American mediocrity. This plan will sink America.
5
One small step for trump, giant leap backwards for humankind and humanity.
The American dream replaced with trump's American nightmare - brought to you by trump, Jared and Miller and sponsored in whole by the radical Republicans determined plan to abort the dreams of millions of Americans too - giving us no choice in the matter as they steal elections with Russian help.
What we need are cheap high skilled immigrants to replace the self-entitled CEOs making more money than God and the rest of their employees combined.
Yes, lets import high skilled graduates without college debt to compete for jobs with high skilled American graduates with immense astronomical levels of debt to pay off. That is integral to decimating the American dream.
Do Republicans really want to give back territory south of the physical wall to Mexico? Give the northern banks of the Rio Grande south of the wall to Mexico too? No more access to the river from the American side unless you jump the supposedly un-jump-able wall. And they want to steal private property to accomplish this. How trumplican.
4
While it's fine to welcome highly skilled immigrants don't we need people to harvest our crops, pluck our chickens, scrub our floors and do the jobs American citizens don't want to do? These people contribute so much to our country. We should thank them every time we go to the grocery store. How many of us had ancestors who did the jobs 'real' Americans wouldn't do in the sweat shops of the Lower Eastside or the stockyards in Chicago?
While it's fine to welcome highly skilled immigrants shouldn't we also insure that our educational system affords our own young people the opportunity to become highly skilled?
4
Now all those uneducated Trump supporters will have to compete with qualified immigrants instead of for the minimum wage unskilled labor jobs they think they can't get or hold onto because of families of immigrants. What will they say to themselves now? Those Trump supporters are going to have to measure up to a higher standard, if Trump gets his way. Cool.
4
Someone unfamiliar with, well, pretty much everything would read this article and come away with the impression that this radical divide between the parties in immigration were decades old. It's not. DACA? A GOP idea. Family reunification? A GOP idea from way back.
As for "skills-based" immigration, how in the world does Trump's base support allowing in SIX TIMES more skilled workers taking away SIX TIMES more American jobs?
3
And taking away the good jobs.
2
Sounds like this policy would create more competition for the jobs of educated, middle-class Americans, rather than those of working-class Americans, as illegal immigration is doing now.
5
The baseline should be set at achieving the language level of the current POTUS.
2
Yes, endless insults, tantrums, and decrees. Such a low bar. Piece of cake to achieve such an achievable goal. In other words, Trump wants a “better class” of immigrant who will be Just Like Him.
1
My grandfather didn't speak English; he was a barber and innkeeper. His son, my father, became a lawyer. It takes a generation.
7
The article repeats the falsehood that the Trump administration had a policy of separating families at the border. The Trump administration never had such a policy. It separated children apprehended at the border from their parents only to comply wring a federal court ruling.
A federal court ruled in 1997 that unaccompanied children crossing the border illegally could not be held more than 20 days before being sent to Health and Human Service child care center. In 2015, Judge Dolly Gee of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled that accompanied children must be treated the same as unaccompanied children apprehended at the border. They cannot be held in custody with their parents, but must be released to centers operated by the Department of Health and Human Resources.
Judge Gee also ruled parents should be released along with their children, but the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned that part of her ruling. However, her ruling that accompanied children cannot be held in custody still stands.
The “child separation policy” is not a Trump administration policy; it is Judge Gee’s policy. Her ruling is the reason—the only reason—migrant children are separated from their parents.
1
@William Case
You left out the part where the Trump administration decided to incarcerate indefinitely everyone, including asylum seekers and children, who crosses the border. THAT is why the cages filled up with children separated from their parents. Your rhetorical twist on the facts is like blaming the axe for leaning against the tree, instead of the murder who uses it to dismember an innocent family.
3
So what extraordinary skills and advanced degrees did FLOTUS parents have to obtain their US citizenships?
7
The commentary is truly amusing on this one. Couple of points though. It isn't the 19th century anymore what was good then may not be good now, So citing the how wonderful the 19th century was is ...dubious, Has for the poem on the Statue of Liberty? That's a poem not a policy. And it's a policy we can no longer sustain. With record numbers homeless, food and economically insecure Native born citizens maybe we should look at taking care of our own people before foreigners? The left insistence on doing more for illegals then their fellow citizens has poisoned in ability discuss immigration in a honest for a generation or more.
Second (And this should make me popular) How much of the commentary against merit based immigration is because these immigrants would compete for those cozy jobs that have been immune to the pressure immigration has put on the lower end of the labor pool? These immigrants would compete for the the upper middle class jobs instead of the jobs of people the commentators here look upon with ,,,,,condescension? I can tthink of other words but condescension will do. I suspect the stand against merit based immigration has more to do with whose foot the shoe will pinch then the merits of the issue. Also the fact that Trump said it makes EEEEvil by definition in many eyes.
5
In other words, just as prior immigration policy has favored what is in America's interests, Trump plans to continue that policy.
2
Could this be a symptom of American education falling behind the rest of the developed world.
We don't want other countries to take "our" patents and yet we now seem to take "their" brains.
Looks a little naive.
3
Oringes. Hamberder. Covfefe. United Eshtesh.
Even Trump could not pass an English proficiency test.
As for the Civics test, he doesn’t even know the meaning of co-equal branches of government. Or the words of the Constitution.
Deport this fraud to Russia.
9
Imagine that, an immigration policy that prioritizes the interests of America. Horrifying. How dare we allow quality people in to the US at the expense of the uneducated, illiterate and sometimes violent?
7
So, uneducated, illiterate people cannot be "quality" people? Geeze! What an elitist point of view! Perhaps you think we should check their teeth before they are allowed to enter the U.S. If we allow only those who have access to quality education to come here, we are actively deepening the chasm between the haves & have nots on a global level. All [people] are created equal, remember? I guess some are just more equal than others.
3
It depends how you define America. America’s corporations will greatly benefit from this. American workers? Not so sure. In essence this will make it harder for Americans to compete for the good jobs that pay above minimum wage. And tech jobs which are where most of the skilled workers are needed will see lower salaries as a result. Just because someone isn’t educated doesn’t mean they don’t have potential. Which also brings up the point that if we educated our own citizens sufficiently we wouldn’t need to bring in highly skilled workers from other countries.
This is just a fancier way of excluding those from undeveloped countries and of brown color from getting into our country.
2
@JJGross
Money doesn’t make someone “quality”. It will by a lot of things but it cannot make people better than those who have less.
1
Does anyone wonder why concepts such as education, skills and, most astonish, language proficiency were not the most important considerations when most of the immigrants to America were European? Every action Trump takes is designed to excite his White nationalist base. What has happened to our country? How did this happen to our country? The future of America is bleak.
4
While many of Mr. Trump's ideas about immigration are reprehensible, this one is not. This proposal is more in line with the immigration system in "progressive" Canada. The Canadian immigration system tends to admit immigrants who have a certain number of "points" earned from things like education, skills, and work experience in desired fields. Of course, "entrepreneurs" (aka rich people), with a generous amount of available capital get front of the line service.
7
But that is Canada. We are not Canada, we are something very different and we welcome all. We are a safe haven and always have been. Trump knows no history, let’s not emulate the ignorant. Let’s stay true to our roots. Who walks 3,000 miles for a better life; the strong. There are always some bad apples in every immigration pool, but they are exceptions.
1
@Billy Bobby
Who is this royal 'we' you speak of ?
And I challenge you to explain to any Native American just how this country is a 'safe haven' which 'welcomes all' . . . .
1
The Evangelical Christian Conservative Republican war against non white people and the poor continues. And of course they are against keeping families together as well. Just like Jesus taught?
3
So, where are we going to get low skilled workers for the many low skilled backbreaking jobs available the rest of us don't want?
Will we use highly indebted high skilled college graduates to do those low skilled backbreaking jobs as they are replace by cheaper immigrant high skilled college graduates WITHOUT college debt?
3
Now that Melania's family have been welcomed to the US there is no need for "family ties" to matter.
6
Yeah, coming from a guy who so blatantly has zero skill, as does his wife. This country. My god.
3
Finally, I thoughtful approach to this massive problem, it's not about who's aunt lives here and who's brother lives there and who snuck in the country it's about what you can contribute to this country!
5
So much for family values.
Long overdue. Sounds pretty similar to the sort of filters other countries have. Now if we could only export the left half of the Bell-curve...
7
How in the world can someone who can not currently speak English going to be able to appear at the border with a written job offer from a company? Are US Companies going to go to the border and set up job fairs? This is idiotic not to mention unrealistic.
My Irish immigrant grandmother emptied and washed out the non-flushing toilet bowls of the rich in New York City. Immigrants take jobs that no one else wants to do. And they willingly take them and work hard to start to be able to get a foothold in the US so they can have a better life for their families.
Why can't we create an immigration policy that has some shred of humanity? Oh, that's right, Stephen-autocrat-in-the making- Miller is on the team. Enough said.
72
@EB Many first world countries, including Canada etc, have such immigration policies and priorities. You are looking at migrants as only poor and third world. This is not the only type. Many educated professionals are not going to migrate to the US right now, as it is onerous and takes too long. This is a good idea by Trump. We don't live in the 19th or 20th centuries anymore. What worked 50 or 100 years is not what might work today. How many poor needy third world people can the US absorb? Look around you, there are Americans who need help. Better to have more educated, self-supporting people.
21
@EB what's wrong with asking people to at least speak your language to a certain degree before letting them enter the country? I am all for preserving your roots and speaking your native language at home (we speak 3 languages in our house), but whenever I KNEW I'd be moving to a new country, I immediately immersed myself in learning that language. It's a given IMHO. Anyone who can read can start learning a language. You literally need no skills for that, just the desire and willingness to do so. I still cannot believe that there are people in the US who immigrated 40 years ago and still don't speak the language.
20
@EB
Employer sponsored visa programs DO NOT work the way you think they do. There is no such H1B program for people showing up at the border.
H1B visas are employer sponsored, typically for foreign nationals with advanced education and the ability to work in the high end of the US work force. They must be applied for, paid for by the employer, and approved in advance of any foreign national approaching our national border (typically through an airport port of entry).
Further... to qualify.... an employer is going to require that said H1B visa candidates have English reading, speaking, and writing skills.
There are many layers to immigration policy.. and the "shred of humanity" part you are referring to that is completely lacking under Trump is to allow refugees seeking asylum to apply for legal entry and permanent residency. This is completely different then employer sponsored immigration or family member immigration.
3
Unskilled low educated American citizens are confronting an automation-globalisation crisis that is wiping out entire communities in the Rust Belt and Appalachia.
Why in the world would we bring in MORE unskilled low educated people?
Of course we should pivot towards a merit based system.
9
Note that Trump is only doing this after Melania’s family got here. I certainly hope they keep he supermodel and Romanian waiter exemptions. Every one knows there are no pretty girls in the US or waitstaff in Palm Beach.
2
Just curious about what skill does Mr. Kushner bring to the table for immigration?
5
Any plan that does not address dreamers is a non starter. Can some ask Trump if Melania's parents will get sent back?
2
Is it too late to send Melania's family back? I doubt that they brought many skills beyond finding old rich men to marry their daughters.
4
My grandparents who left Ireland probably would have had insufficient skills to be allowed into the country. Of course, that was a different time..... we didn't have a tyrant for president.
1
I wonder if Trump knows his parents-in-law would have been banned under his plan?
1
What happened to Trump's argument that the immigrants coming from central and south America are stealing low paying (laborers, housekeepers, etc.) American jobs? So, instead we promote bringing in highly skilled immigrants who will definitely hurt the job market for American college and tech school grads. Makes so much sense, doesn't it? Duh!
2
Sounds like Trump wants an immigration policy similar to Canada's.
Works well here. I highly recommend it.
7
Because the only family that matters is Trump's.
1
This is just more of the "word games" like "war is peace" that comes from an administration that only values power and money.
We will still be short of people who will do the hard, dirty, unseen, below minimum wage, no benefits work that keeps our country functioning.
Meanwhile, trump and his type dress pretty, act pompous, ride in limousines, eat in expensive restaurants on taxpayer money.
1
Jared Kushner "spent several months working on the plan"?
Could this be why we haven't heard anything about his Mideast
plan?
4
Maybe he’s reading the unspeakable Stephen Miller’s cue cards.
1
If you believe that stopping immigration will result in America suddenly pivoting to massive and effective programs aimed at helping homeless Americans, you don’t understand reality.
We aren’t failing to take care of homeless families and homeless veterans because of the number of immigrants requiring services. We fail in that mission because homeless people are icky and dirty and mentally ill, which embarrasses the American Exceptionalism crowd, so we sweep them under the rug and ignore one more proof that this country isn’t as caring and compassionate as our myths claim it to be.
And those children sleeping on the ground didn’t choose to come here - they were brought here by adults. Those pictures are appalling to most Americans, but appealing to the segment of Americans who enjoy seeing “the other” suffer.
2
Why doesn't Kushner and Trump just summarize it and declare we will only accept immigrants from Norway, Oceania and a few other white European countries.
While good people on both sides of the debate can differ on what the policy should be avoid the extremes, ie bigots like Trump or bleeding heart liberals that want to let everybody in and put them on welfare like NYC did with PRs and other minorities in the 1970s.
1
"Most would have college or advanced degrees. Average wages to 93k from 45k" doesn't sound like a lotta competition with Trump's base. Sounds more like competition for urban Dems. I see a lot of comments about wage pressure that suffer from the lump of labor fallacy. The number of jobs is not fixed and an influx of people like this can help create entire new industries. Facebook, Google, Amazon...none existed nor could have gotten to where they are without such skilled immigrants.
2
Canada has long had just such a system in place. The current high levels of unskilled and semi-skilled workers competing for the very same bottom-end jobs as our own most vulnerable, low income worker, engenders a Social Darwinist race to the bottom in wages. This is a welcome change of approach and one that is long overdue.
5
As far as I can tell the immigrants who come aren't competing for Americans' jobs picking fruit at farms, cleaning toilets in hotels or washing dishes in restaurants. And they don't have bachelors' degrees in physics, either.
We need an immigration policy that lives up to the promise of the Statue of Liberty "give us your poor...," that makes arrangements for the 11 million undocumented who have gone on to live productive lives here, and the hundreds of thousands of DACA recipients who have gotten educated here and now occupy skilled jobs at America's corporation as well as giving asylum to those who are fleeing violence and political persecution in an increasingly chaotic world.
America must continue to be "the city on the hill-" the envy of the world; the shining example where people of every race, religion and creed can live in peace with each other.
Makes sense. For people like Trump and his voters (the wealth worshippers), having good employees is more important than family. They're all "good Christians".
3
People immigrate to help their families and their loved ones. Without your past there is no future. Hatred of immigrants, women, people of color, LGBTQ, non-English speakers, or just about anyone isn't an immigration policy. And what is considered "skilled" today may not be tomorrow. Immigrants are typically hardworking, flexible, and courageous; those are the America values that will create the future. Skills can be learned.
2
Skill-based immigration would be new to the US but is the policy in England and Australia because it makes sense.
5
The US as a country has retained its excellence and supremacy in technical innovation and leadership over a period of time, only on account of being accomodative to provide satisfactory status of citizenship to above par individuals and their families. Period. If it wants to continue and maintain its present status it has to honor such criteria or better over it.
3
Can’t wait to welcome hundreds of thousands of English speaking, skilled workers and soon to be US immigrants in a frenzy to come and share Trump’s America!!!
3
And what skills did his in laws have?
10
Or him or his wife. Scamming people, bankrupting communities, stiffing the little guy, posing nude as your greatest accomplishment.
3
Can this be retroactive? Great way to get rid of Trump, his family, Steven Miller and probably most of Congress. Most of the country, for that matter. Then whoever remains and the Native Americans can clean up the environment and have a fresh start. Whatever you do, don’t let us corrupt, two-faced white Europeans back again.
7
This policy sounds reasonable to me at least on the surface. Given the choice between a merit based immigration system and a family based one I'd choose the merit based one. That said, I don't want Trump and his team to implement it. They're too incompetent.
2
This is a just a way of making America white again. Limiting family reunification is not just to stop Latinos, but also Asians from coming to the US.
What Trump doesn’t realize is that not many Europeans are interested in coming to the US. If they decide to leave, Australia, Canada or New Zealand are the top destinations (hint: think about guns and healthcare)
11
Starting with Trump then.
2
Because the 1924 Immigration Act was so racially and ethnically loathsome that in 1965 America’s sense of fairness kicked back in.
“provided they can demonstrate English proficiency and educational attainment, and pass a civics exam” - can we apply this test on Americans too. Sadly many will fail with the simplest of tasks and yet they qualify for section 8, SNAP and Medicaid
5
Or they get elected to the presidency like Trump or get cushy jobs like drop outs Limbaugh and Hannity who now have the presidents ear. There is a reason the right loves the uneducated.
1
Before we examine this plan we need to deal with the present situation: Children separated from their families; in some cases the government does not even know where all family members are. Men and women of the immigration department at the border are overworked.
Is it too much to ask why this is not being addressed first? Or is the answer too obvious; these people don't matter.
Fear and ignorance.
The carelessness in this situation echos what happened afterTrump's hastily announced ban on muslims entering the country. Chaos in airports. Chaos in temporary border shelters. Same thing, no? That is Trump's message of dehumanization towards hispanics, muslims, eventually me or you.
Maybe it works for the angry 35%, but what about his 'christian' supporters? It's like the special $8.99 'a la carte' dinner; 1 from column A, 2 from column B, applied to morality.
Perhaps that's just politics; get as much of what you want as possible, at any cost. Then go somewhere private, and vomit.
This plan merely increases the number of H1B visas, pushing the number of foreigner working in Silicon Valley from 72% closer to 100%.
No American benefits from mass immigration. Not one. We have the recipe for spicy taco salad and Chicken Tikka Masala.
5
Australia, Canada, New Zealand has had a merit based immigration for a long time, it is time America prioritizes merit based immigration and at the same time provide temporary entry to asylum seekers being persecuted in their home countries and to those seasonal workers needed to help farmers.
All undocumented persons currently in the USA should be processed for legal status in the USA after paying a fine but in future only those entering the country through legal entry points should be allowed to reside in the USA. Enforcement of the current laws should be strict and congress should take up reforms promptly.
4
Interesting how conservatives praise Canada and Australia as models for immigration reform, but don’t mention them as models for gun control and universal health care....
14
@J G
Canada and Australia don't have the 2nd amendment...
1
Like college admissions, maybe you can bribe your way in so long as you don’t get caught. This is surely somewhere in the fine print.
Of all his fears beneath the bluster, Trump is most terrified of where he would have landed on a truly level playing field.
2
How interesting that the policy diminishes the importance of hard working individuals willing to perform menial tasks to pursue a better life. What would you expect from a couple of privileged grown up children who never had to do a hard days work in their life and could always rely on daddy;s money to outspend their history of poor judgement.
5
@gm Not Daddy's money--he didn't have any. Somebody else's money that he cheated to acquire.
This entire immigration mess cannot be fixed overnight or in 20 minutes as that person in the White House just said today. It's very sad to see children sleeping on the ground. However, those families chose to come here and we just can't provide for them. We have our own homeless families and more important homeless veterans and some of them in need of medical help.
Don't they come first. We can't save the world.
8
This proposal makes a lot of sense so of course we can count on the Democrats to hate it. There is nothing the Trump administration can do that will merit their approval.
11
Take your comment, replace “Democrats” with “Republicans” and “Trump” with “Obama,” and you’ll have a pretty accurate description of the years from 2009 to 2017.
This phenomenon is also known as karma, “chickens coming home to roost,” and “what goes around comes around.”
You can’t kick someone in the teeth and then complain when they kick you back.
Incompetency, bigotry and xenophobia do not merit approval. This administration has no principles, values or integrity. They are here for themselves and no one else. So many things, so so many should have clued his golden calf worshipping base in to this overt reality. None so much as the defrauding of those who signed up for Trump University that he had to pay off right after he won. Guess it didn't play on FOX so his worshippers didn't know about it.
My mom and grandmother immigrated from Asia in the mid-50's and the USA required they show a means of support and that they would not be a burden to the taxpayers. We brought my Aunt from Asia in the mid 80's and US Immigration in Los Angeles required we sign a binding agreement that if we sponsor her to agree to be financially responsible for her for years. She would not be eligible for social services for several years.
There is nothing wrong with "merit-based" immigration and wanting to lift up our country. At the same time we can find common ground by providing space in our country for those that are of need and less fortunate. We are a compassionate people and we are a proud nation of immigrants.
Chain migration is a hot button with this President. He could probably be persuaded to bend if stipulations were put in place on this.
I fully agree all immigrants must assimilate. I remember helping my Aunt study for her Civics test prior to her getting Natualized. And she had to have a basic understanding of the English language.
We also need to make sure DACA gets resolved and the 20mil+ issue is settled once and for all. People should not live in the shadows anymore.
Immigration reform is long overdue and now is the time to get it done. Both sides need to come out of their corners to get it done. Trump's plan is not a take it or leave it and we should expect the Republicans and Democrats to work together to get this done.
2
The second paragraph notes the proposal to significantly scale back the ability to ability of immigrants to bring along their spouses and children. It amazes me that the creators of this proposal think that the United States will still attract much needed professionals and skilled migrants if those migrants are forced to leave behind their wives, husbands and/or children. Or perhaps the hope is that only single cardiologists, mathematicians, engineers and the like will apply to live and work in the United States? Good luck with that.
6
It is only sensible to have an immigration policy that attempts to get the best and the brightest in the world. I can't think of a better barometer than their wages. Give the highest 600K earners an H1B. Test that for 3 years, at which point give them a green card. If they earn way more than the threshold, give them a green card sooner. If they earn way less, create another visa category. Construction/farm work could be examples --- but a Green Card would be unlikely. That's how most of the world operates. Long overdue and I welcome it. I really hope Congress doesn't get in the way. I am getting sick of Anti-Trumpism. Pass this bill after changes, then vote him out, then make improvements.
3
Without knowing for certain, I doubt that the Trump plan excludes wives and children in most cases. It probably does exclude parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. I would be very happy if we simply modeled American immigration policy after Canada. Our next door neighbor welcomes young educated immigrants who can contribute to the Canadian economy, and excludes immigrants who will be a burden to Canadian taxpayers.
That seems quite sensible to me, and apparently to most Canadians too.
10
I remember being required to read a book called "No Boundaries" by a percussion professor for a music ed. class.
It was all about how wonderful 'no boundaries' is or at least could be. In my book review, I felt compelled to call out the professor on his enthusiastic endorsement of this book. His
entire profession, of making the sounds we call 'percussion'
(he is quite well known and has performed in many national venues) is completely dependent on the establishment and maintenance of boundaries. No boundary (for example, a skin drumhead attached to a frame) simply means no sound.
Boundaries are vital, right down to the cellular level -- a cell 'wall' is in fact a semi-permeable boundary. We can think of nations,or regions, as cells, and their borders as the 'cell walls'. This is a necessary perspective in order to maintain the health of the greater organism in which the cells exist.
3
Just so long as there is an annual total numerical limit,
covering all types combined --
family and merit and refugees and asylum,
skilled and unskilled,
permanent and temporary.
Debate how to divvy up the annual total numerical limit.
Even adjust the annual total numerical limit,
or the allocations within the annual total numerical limit.
But enforce the limit.
And the limit is set by Congress.
And adjustments and allocations are made only by Congress.
And enforce the limit (and allocations) set by Congress.
And no amnesties for those who ignore the limits and allocations.
6
How stupid can he get? The unfilled jobs are often for unskilled jobs or jobs that can be performed with short term training.
3
One wonders what skill-set Mrs. Trump and her family came with, besides being able to put up with Mr. Trump.
12
So, a higher degree will raise immigrant salaries from $43,000 to $96,000? Wow, that's quite a good deal!
Let's find out what the average Ph.D. has to say about that!
9
Great thought.
1
US needs to stop by birth citizenship of non-citizen immigrants. The new born children of an immigrant parent should get the dependent immigration/visa status based on immigration status of the parents. If the parents get citizenship, only then those children should get by-birth citizenship. This by-birth citizenship is also massively misused and encourage anchor baby culture.
US is among only few handful of countries that still give by-birth citizenship to an immigrant child. It needs to be stopped.
29
@bonku the anchor babies problem is minuscule. And besides, what advantage would a parent have? Atm you have to wait until the child is 21 (!) until he/she can sponsor you for a green card. And even then it might take years to get it, if you get it at all...
My children were born in the US while I was there on an L1 (intracompany transfer) Visa. I am almost 60 when they're 21 and could theoretically sponsor me for a Green Card. By the time that'd be granted I am retired.
1
So, what the double-hockey-sticks are Melania, her father, her mother and her sister doing in America?
14
What was Obama’s mother-in-law doing in the White House?
helping with the grandkids. like millions of grandparents everywhere. the original poster asks a valid question.
2
Those who advocate increased unskilled, unassimilable third world immigration and porous borders have one object in mind: to reconfigure and transform the American electorate.
When China and Russia see how Congress can thwart President Trump, their respect for us diminishes and makes them think that they can establish their preeminence against only greatly weakened opposition.
Congressional Republicans need to support the president on immigration, and make the stakes clear to the American public.
15
“When China and Russia see how Congress can thwart President Trump...”
Where have you been? China and Russia watched Congress thwart President Obama for years, well before Trump came along.
Save your crocodile tears. If you really cared about this country’s reputation, you would have started this complaining a long time ago.
Also, read the US Constitution. Congress thwarting the president is a feature, not a bug, and Trump is a president, not a dictator (though he sure would love to be one).
An increasing hard sell. I’m thinking the world’s educated skill-force won’t be too impressed by the shiny new anti-abortion legislation, the lack of affordable health care, gross access to fire power, and the overt racism practiced by a large chunk of the white population...
20
Family ties based immigration was and still is grossly misused by a large number of immigrants, mainly from many developing countries, where poor quality (in terms of education, job skill set and their ability to contribute to US society and/or economy) and even criminals were allowed to enter and get citizenship in the USA. Immigration of only immediate family members (mainly spouses and children below 18 yrs) should be allowed. Whole village and full rage of friends or relatives must not be allowed on that basis.
US also needs to stop by birth citizenship. The new born children of an immigrant parent should get the dependent immigration/visa status based on immigration status of the parents. If the parents get citizenship, only then those children should get by-birth citizenship. This by-birth citizenship is also massively misused and encourage anchor baby culture.
25
So nice the Trump Administration waited until after Melania’s parents emigrated to America using the “chain migration” system they’re now trying to make illegal for everyone else. After 2 years in office, the executive branch’s only consistency is a belief that rules, ethics, and institutional norms don’t apply to “their people,” and can be bent, maligned, or tossed overboard to stroke a petty man’s narcissism and keep his political base hungry.
10
If 45th loses 2020 Election, he will end up being a room mate of his former attorney Michael Cohen. Now where his son-in-law go? Israel? Advisor for Netanyahu?
1
How did Melania’s parents get in? This Administration is bankrupt and a travesty!!!
14
This isn't going to actually happen. Trump doesn't think things out, or if someone else does, Trump puts his foot into it. But it will give Trump a talking point: "I devised the best immigration plan, the best that's ever been devised in the history of mankind..." and those who are inclined to believe him will, and let drop the fact that it never came to pass.
6
I think this is a good move , many skilled workers are left behind in lieu of people getting citizenship due to chain migration. This will give Skilled workers and highly educated more priority and add to US economy and development rather than burdening the system.
27
The 2013 "Gang of 8" legislation cited by Schumer is a nonstarter. It made zero hard choices and simply expanded immigration in virtually all categories well beyond our nation's already record, most-generous-in-the-world rates of 1.3 million legal immigrants per year. Anti-environment, it continued the policies of turbo-charged population growth via immigration to fuel continued sprawl, traffic, real estate development, abuse of ever-diminishing water resources, etc. Anti-labor, it continued the policies of in-sourcing to diminish the bargaining power and wage growth of US citizens and prior legal immigrants.
As Harvard professor George Borjas has pointed out, the very high immigration rates of the last few decades has meant winners and losers (economically, completely putting aside the environment). The winners have been the immigrants themselves, employers who pay less wages, and some consumers who pay less for some products (combined with outsourcing to countries with weak labor & environmental rules). The losers have been everyone else. Most notably anyone competing in the labor market, who see wages decrease as immigration increases.
The Democratic Party now carries water for the Koch Brothers and Chamber of Commerce on the issue of immigration.
11
Don’t you just love it how Trump rewrites our long standing rules on family immigration after Melania’s unskilled, uneducated non English speaking parents get their Green cards.
10
I see, so Trump wants foreigners coming in and taking the better jobs. I'm sure his base will love it when some Indians arrive to become their supervisors.
11
Trump's never had to deal one-on-one with those who inhabit the armpits of America & who are unable to perform even unskilled labor. What a hoot that he thinks that a sufficient number of unskilled Americans are available to perform all of the manual labor jobs out there. I've dealt with unemployable midwestern Americans for years, & some are even unable to hold down a dishwashing job. My sibs & I used to own a rental in Keokuk Iowa & lost about $14K on it in less than two years. Our tenants were often indoor-cigarette-smoking anti-education meth-head gobblers of lard-fried okra with criminal records who were scamming the system claiming to have some sort of emotional "disability" even though they could pop out kids every couple years & orchestrate serious scams to rip off their landlord while avoiding work at all costs & while leaving empty discarded sudafed push-out tablet holders & needles and syringes all over the place. I once showed up for an eviction hearing to find that the tenants had vacated the premises-- I went to the house, found the kitchen shot up with buckshot, found rabbit & dog poo everywhere, went to the police department, & couldn't get the cops to come take a statement-- the guy at the window said that if they dispatched officers to every similar complaint they would not be able to get anything else done. Trump and Co. really think that these lazy psychopathic druggies will be willing to milk cows like hard-working goal-directed Mexican immigrants?
11
How many points does one get for being a Slovenian lingerie model?
15
I wonder how many "highly skilled professionals" would be interested in immigrating to the United States, knowing that they would be forced to leave their spouses* and (unmarried) children* behind forever?
*And yes, according to current law, these are the ONLY family members that American green card holders can sponsor for immigration.
6
I dislike Much of Trump's law but Family ties is abused. It should be reserved for one wife and children. That is it. No Grandma and Grandpa Aunts, Uncles and nephews. How many go home pick up a wife and come back. I know several. This is one part of the immigration system that is abused and should be amended.
No going home for a wife. You can bring back one you were already married to and your children. If other family members want to come over they need to apply to immigrate.
8
Did you know that you can live in Canada just with an American passport, if you can keep your job working remotely for an American company? I am not sure how long it will take for Canada to close this loophole for American refugees, but for now all are welcome!
@Jane - Does the reverse scenario apply? Could I work remotely for a Canadian company while residing in the US? I had a number of years ago looked into emigrating to the US and had always looked to see if I would be eligible for the Green Card Lottery year to year. No such luck. A relative recently suggested that I go to Mexico and join the migrants crossing into the US illegally. None of my legal options would provide the option. I then suggested I cross the Canadian border into the US and claim asylum and the relative said I would be sent back, so fast, the same day. Probably true.
Zero mention of Trump's 4 immigration principles to guide Congressional legislative efforts in January and February 2018, including Trump's then-support for a path to citizenship for all 800,000 DACA recipients, as well as a million more illegal aliens who never bothered to register for DACA but might otherwise have qualified? Trump supported (1) path to citizenship for DACA + 1 million more, in combination with (2) chain migration reform; (3) elimination of the diversity visa lottery; and (4) funding for the silly "wall." These were the 4 principles to guide Congress. The Democratic Party flatly rejected this. Even though chain migration reform and elimination of the diversity visa lottery were 2 of the recommendations from President Clinton's own Bipartisan Commission on Immigration Reform, led by African-American, Democratic Congresswoman Barbara Jordan. The Democratic Party wanted solely DACA, all by itself, without any other changes to our broken immigration system.
The Democratic Party has gone so far to the right on immigration that they are now in the laps of the Koch Brothers and Chamber of Commerce. Anti-environment and anti-labor. Mr. Schumer and today's Democrats want to pretend that Barbara Jordan never existed. They have run as far away from the Jordan Commission as possible. Was it really worth it to purge all Barbara Jordan Democrats from the party? To sacrifice the Supreme Court and everything else? This was the hill they chose to die on in 2016.
5
As a legal immigrant and a naturalized citizen since the 80's, I am extremely discouraged by the way this country is being run. Do the Democrats care anymore about the country? Or do they only care about staying in power?
The United States is falling apart at the seams with out of control immigration these past 20 years. We clearly cannot take in every single person in the world who wants to come in. Yet that's the only thing the Democrats would accept, to allow in anyone and everyone who wants to come in, and immediately give them free welfare, healthcare, education, jobs, and right to vote the minute they set foot in this country.
Meanwhile, homelessness is at an all time high in all our coastal cities. Seattle is drowning in homeless, and they are drifting out to the suburbs. The majority of homeless are CITIZENS of the United States, many were veterans, who need a helping hand and are not getting it, because the Democrats would rather we spend all our resources on illegal immigrants and asylums.
It's just as well that this plan fails. It is a terrible compromise. What America really needs is a 40 year moratorium on immigration, to absorb and assimilate all those who became citizens in the last 40 years. With offshoring, outsourcing and automation, we are facing mass unemployment even in 10 years. It's time to stop this madness, end all immigration, and take care of American citizens first.
To both parties: stop playing politics and put your own countrymen FIRST.
28
Yes yes yes get behind this. We are behind the rest of the modern world. “Bring me your huddled masses” belongs back in the 19th century along with the second amendment. We need skilled immigration and a stop to illegal immigration. Most democrats want this but are too proud to side with a president they simply can’t be seen to agree with. This sits badly with me and I’ll wager the balance of our voting public.
24
Yes yes and yes POTUS. We should model our immigration more on that of Sweden, Switzerland, and New Zealand rather than purely chain migration.
12
New Zealand allows migrants to bring their families along with them, unlike the proposal outlined in the second paragraph of the article, whereby spouses and children would not qualify. Not many skilled migrants would be happy to leave behind spouses and dependent children, and too few people with needed skills are single. Oh, and immigrants are often allowed to sponsor their parents if needed to help with childcare for the grandchildren, so that their professional children can focus on their work. We are lucky in that most of our migrants bring needed skills, business acumen, and so on, but not many of them would choose to come to NZ if they couldn't bring their families. If you want the best, you have to make yourself attractive to the best. Anti-family policies won't help with that.
1
A friend of mine recently emigrated from the US to New Zealand. Amazingly enough, he was able to take his wife and children with him.
I have no quarrel with merit-based immigration, but you can’t expect it to apply to single people only.
In the context of the mass migration of "refugees" from Central and South America, Jared and Trump will have an easy job passing this thru Congress, simply because democrat politicians, in their blind hate for Trump and what he represents, can't think pragmatically to see that the majority of Americans are worried about what unregulated immigration represents to us, as a nation of laws. We can all share the anguish Trump's proposition will cause to those who wish to come to the US legally. They might not be as educated as others but probably are willing and capable of taking the less demanding jobs our society needs to function properly. In the long run Americans will realize the folly of a type of immigration that will only benefit the Trumps of the country; not everyone can or wants to be a technocrat or a executive, but still can contribute to this great country, as countless generations of immigrants have done. Unfortunately, the lack of vision and moral courage of the Democrats under the Obama's presidency created the set of circumstances that now allows Kushner and Trump to profit politically by corrupting the idea of reaching for The American Dream. In closing, let us not deceive ourselves, it is clear the current democratic leadership, regardless of what they say, are playing the politics- as- usual game. They are complicit in this latest Trump-Kushner charade.
2
The way liberals and Social Justice Warriors bash the United States these days- why would anyone want to come here?
Thankfully many of our "asylum seekers" at the border don't speak English otherwise they'd be frightened away.
6
I am putting myself out here and looking to see thoughts. I have done everything to the letter and intent of law and aspired to be a part of this country. Did everything I could got a 99% percentile in GRE, graduated with a Masters in STEM field from one of the top Universities in US. Hold a job and pay my taxes. Filed for a GC and been waiting patiently on line for 8 yrs counting now - 15 years in US Just because I am an Indian I dont see getting a GC for atleast the next decade.
Something amiss in immigration ?
25
My company will sponsor you for GC now...exactly the talent and coworker we wish to work with
4
You don’t have to wait that long for a GC because you’re Indian, but because most of the people waiting in line for a GC are from India (chain migration may be?)
I’m from Europe and got my GC in two months, as not many Europeans want to come to the US. Australia is the top destination (health care and gun laws similar to the EU)
3
Favoring those with family ties for immigration is nepotism. Single people without attachments should have equal standing with all others.
9
I assume the Knausses were the last 2 family-based admissions this admin found palatable.
8
a sensible policy
use your heads, not anecdotes and sob stories
we need a sensible immigration policy
no other nation has open borders and such chaos.
try to go to Sweden, Switzerland, Mexico, France, China with no visa and no documents and get a job. Good luck.
We need skilled workers; not randoms walking across the border
31
Except they keep coming because those jobs apparently are available for them because apparently we do need them.
4
Those jobs are available as employers know they can hire illegals or new immigrants for substandard wages and conditions.
1
Ivanka's parent's skillset?
7
This is a great start! We don't need millions more uneducated poor people who won't assimilate and don't do anything but drain our financial resources that could better go to helping Americans.
23
Melania Knauss was super intelligent, in the way that she snagged an American rich guy. So was wife number one Ivana, snagged an American rich guy, so I say let everyone in . You , too can snag a rich guy or woman. All you need to do to be in this country is be good looking. Bring on the beautiful people. Ugly people need not apply
8
I am against increasing the number of skilled, highly educated immigrants allowed into this country for one reason: we should be making the investments to create skilled, highly educated works from among Americans already here.
By welcoming skilled and educated immigrants we are merely abandoning our own citizens who are desperate for training and opportunities. Most other countries offer very cheap higher education. By allowing such immigrants to come in large numbers we are essentially free riding on those investments in education that other countries we are making while we allow our citizens to languish in unfunded schools.
28
The majority of new immigrants who come to America are family-based immigrants. About 48 percent are immediate relatives of U.S. citizens and another 20 percent are relatives in the family-based preference categories. Due rto family-based immigration, just 10 of the world’s 195 countries account for more than 57 percent of immigrants admitted to America.
Family-base immigration leaves the vast majority of people who want to immigrate to America competing for just 22 percent of immigration visas.
12
Makes sense. We need talent, not just more mouths to feed.
24
The vast majority of mouths our government is feeding do not belong to immigrants, but rather natural born citizens in red states.
6
By the same token, would Trump's father, Steve Miller father and Kushner's father qualify for the modified standards? If not some of them might have perished in the camp during WWII.
2
What can you do for our country ?
Seems like pretty smart criteria to me.
11
Dean/AG,
I thought legacy admissions were – like fur coats – something we were trying to stamp out, not step up...
If you have a big-print edition that also has shorter sentences, let me know so I can subscribe...
You know – the one where the mini-crossword is just called the crossword...
.....
Barr must really have the good on someone – have people been leaking contemporaneous notes in your direction again...
No – I don’t have the faintest idea of what it means...
At the same time, I prefer just to make things up as I go along...
#Reinholdtoo
1
Plenty of snarky comments assuming that The Donald could not pass a Civics test.
I think the same thing whenever a Democrat or so-called ‘progressive’ says we need to do away with the Electoral College.
12
Do you dream of living in an overpopulated, impoverished, poorly educated, culturally divisive, increasingly violent third world country...without having to leave home?
If so, you’re in luck. Because so long as our borders remain porous and easily exploited, that’s precisely where our country is headed. You can thank the so-called ‘progressives’ for that. Enjoy!
38
@Michal - I watched a news video today (CBC?) that featured a news crew apprehending migration families at the US border. One woman from Guatemala, a mother with two sons who were about eight or ten turned to her sons upon being intercepted and said we are in the US, we don't have to go back. I thought she is being a bit presumptive, she has simply walked into the US and there is no question in her mind that she or her kids might have to go back to their homeland. Once they are here they are in, that about sizes up the situation at the US southern border.
23
"[Insert old world relative] wouldn't have been able to immigrate into this country under this standard" isn't a persuasive argument about today's immigration policy.
I don't know why people keeping making the same argument.
11
So these skilled immigrants would then compete with skilled Americans for better paying jobs.
Only they would probably accept lower wages for the same work because they want to come to the U.S.
Not sure this plan is so great for the American worker.
23
But it’s great for American companies, and that’s what counts.
2
1) I wonder if a boring patent clerk from Switzerland would pass muster for Trump.
2) So, let's get the BEST people we need to fill our jobs (at least this year) but without their families, so they can send as many $$'s as possible back to their families, rather than establishing a community here.
3) If they kneel during the National Anthem, do they fail their civics exam? DO they have to cross themselves during the Pledge of Allegiance?
4a) If "English proficiency" includes complete sentences, and including logic and facts, Trump needs to be deported.
4b) I'd love to see Trump pass a real-world civics exam.
10
I would like to see him passing the civics test.
4
I wonder if Trump realizes that a majority of employment based visas under this proposal are likely to go to non-white people from places such as China and India or other Asian countries. This is true of other countries which have such points based immigration laws in place such as Australia and Canada. Maybe we will still have a diverse population despite Ttump!
5
Soooo...
Trump only wants to let in people smarter than the average Progressive...
Progressives only want to let in people dumber than the average Progressive...
Not the dumberest idea he's ever had...
Nor they...
6
This is just a political maneuver to come across as reasonable and level headed to the xenofobe, Trump base. While campaigning Mr. DT will say, "we tried nobody cared." His base will nod...
2
Be honest. If a Democrat was suggesting this very sensible immigration policy... akin to the immigration policies of Canada, Australia, New Zealand etc....you’d be ALL for it.
But it’s Trump’s agenda...so bring forth your whine-fest, ad nauseam.
34
Not a chance. My wife is an immigrant. She came here to marry me, so her family is still overseas. Tell me why her family shouldn't be able to join us here eventually, if they want.
6
Because we don’t need them here ?
Because we already have plenty of people here ?
Because they are older and will doubtless use scarce medical services denying those same services to Americans ?
No foreigner has a “right” to live in my country - and I have no “right” to live in theirs.
19
Setting aside how this move is a slippery slope towards limiting all legal immigration... this move will reveal how cruel right wing magical thinking is. Working adults that are immigrating to the US use any path available based on the most favorable number - that is to say skilled labor will often use family ties to immigrate as the barriers are lower. Who this will hurt are the immigrants that aren't working, but will need to maintain a status to work in the future - hint: this will hurt minors for the most part and might put them into limbo.
In 1790, Naturalization requirements included two years of residence in the country and “good moral character,” and an applicant must be a “free white person.” The Naturalization Act of 1795 extended the residency requirement to five years. In 1798, this was extended to 14 years, then back to five in 1802. in 1875, a series of restrictions on immigration were enacted. They included bans on criminals, people with contagious diseases, polygamists, anarchists, beggars and importers of prostitutes. Other restrictions targeted the rising number of Asian immigrants, first limiting migration from China and later banning immigration from most Asian countries. In 1965, the Nationality Act created a new system favoring family reunification and skilled immigrants, rather than country quotas. Thus moral and skill conditions have guided public policy since the American Revolution.
7
DJT and Jared are going to decide the ‘moral’ conditions of immigration? Priceless.
7
This is a sensible approach to immigration policy. Afterall, it works out well with Australia and Canada for decades. Don't throw out the baby with the bath water. Just because this proposal comes from Trump does not automatically mean that it's bad policy, by default. If Dems cannot see past that kind of that, and realize that most voters agree with this (much as they agree with Trump's proposal to ban Huawei from US), then Dems has lost 2020 already, without even getting past its primaries.
28
@tiddle Agree 100%. Dems are failing the Immigration debate and they do so at their own peril. Somewhere in between "kids in cages/build a wall" and "abolish ICE/open borders" is a vast territory where reasonable and rational Immigration Reform could -- and should -- take place. But on the rare occasions when Dems are even asked about this topic, they invariably pivot to "diversity is a good thing", "the Dreamers" and "we need humane policies at the border." I keep waiting in vain to hear a single Democrat put forth meaningful policies on this issue. As much as I despise Trump, some of these latest proposals make sense. Do immigrants need to arrive here knowing English? No. But they certainly need to learn English in order to stay (here in California, learning English appears to be optional, as we are quickly transitioning to a bi-lingual state). Alas, assimilation has become a dirty word. The Dems need to wake up -- and fast. Or we are doomed.
1
The "skills" he's referring to are far different from those of the majority who immigrated to the USA decades ago. The sad fact is that those skills are slowly being lost. Those skills are one that are truly important, stone work, masonry, carpentry etc. are those of artists passed down through the generations. Those skills showed meticulous attention to detail, precision and again true artistry. Today, these trades are being replaced by low & often poor quality mechanized products. Trump has long stiffed those who worked for him & had no respect for their work. Those attempting to immigrate with those skills should certainly be welcomed as should all levels of workers with all levels of education. His bought Wharton degree is a scam. This shows every day through his lack of basic English, grammar, geography, history & science knowledge (lack thereof. ) He works at a 2nd grade level.
This plan is unconstitutional & Unamerican.
12
The article repeats the falsehood that the Trump administration had a policy of separating families at the border. The Trump administration never had such a policy. It separated children apprehended at the border from their parents only to comply wring a federal court ruling.
A federal court ruled in 1997 that unaccompanied children crossing the border illegally could not be held more than 20 days before being sent to Health and Human Service child care center. In 2015, Judge Dolly Gee of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled that accompanied children must be treated the same as unaccompanied children apprehended at the border. They cannot be held in custody with their parents, but must be released to centers operated by the Department of Health and Human Resources.
Judge Gee also ruled parents should be released along with their children, but the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned that part of her ruling. However, her ruling that accompanied children cannot be held in custody still stands.
The “child separation policy” is not a Trump administration policy; it is Judge Gee’s policy. Her ruling is the reason—the only reason—migrant children are separated from their parents.
12
@William Case, it’s pointless arguing the point with its writers. Each side has dug their trenches assuming they are going to be their graves. Allow those lay dying to indulge in their final delusions.
2
@John Doe
I am not arguing with the New York Time. The Times knows that Judge Gee's order is the reason children are separated from parents detrained at the border. Labeling its a Trump policy is not n error; it is deliberate lie.
7
I wish that everyone would watch "Finding Your Roots" on PBS. There was an episode detailing the family roots of both Paul Ryan and Marco Rubio. If the immigration laws proposed by the Trump administration had been in place then, neither of them would be here in the US, much less citizens. Makes me wonder about the family roots of all of these Republican white men making immigration policy. Perhaps Henry Louis Gates, Jr can help them find their humanity.
5
An immigration plan based on merit sounds good but under Kushner/Trump it will probably mean only whites will be eligible,
2
@Elizabeth Wong ~
White males.
5
A lot of people in the comments section seem to either leave facetious comments about Trump family or seem to miss the point that immigration policy is about tradeoffs and probabilistic arguments. Nobody denies that there are unskilled people around the world who could potentially contribute to this country and whose sons and daughters might become lawyers or engineers. but the chances of that happening are vastly higher for skilled and educated immigrants. It's not sensible immigration policy to take in millions of unskilled people on the off chance that some of them may contribute Nobel Prize winning children, as opposed to taking in skilled immigrants who have a much higher probability of doing so. In addition, unlike the early 20th century when the US was primarily a farming and manufacturing economy, the country is now a knowledge economy, and what it needs to bolster its dominance in science, technology and economics is skilled, educated labor, especially so when native-born students are struggling in math and science skills. Unskilled labor will be needed to keep the lights on, but those people can be guest workers just like they are in many other countries.
23
But what about the FAMILIES of those “skilled workers”? Why do you want to tear apart families? Why do you want to prevent crucial support structures for people that, in addition to being humane, would also increase quality of living and productivity?
4
@Rev. Christopher De La Cruz We'll have to see, but it is far from clear that the proposal will forbid family members from accompanying. The question is--how many family members? It's not unreasonable to say that the current law may cover too many....
5
@Rev. Christopher De La Cruz, the chain migration reform previously recommended in the 1990's by African-American, Democratic Congresswoman Barbara Jordan was to prevent the more extended families of the initial legal immigrant, i.e., aunts, uncles, adult siblings, cousins, in-laws, siblings of in-laws, children of siblings of in-laws, adult children, etc. The Jordan Commission fully recommended support for admission of nuclear family, i.e., spouse of the initial legal immigrant and minor children. Trump has already supported this kind of chain migration reform, via his support for the Cotton-Perdue RAISE Act. Spouse and minor children deserve preferences. Merit-based immigration is the same as Austria, Australia, Canada, Denmark, Germany, etc.
Unfortunately, a month or two after Barbara Jordan tragically died at age 59, President Clinton betrayed the Jordan Commission and walked away from it as Congress was drafting the legislation that had been widely expected to pass Congress (if not with veto-proof super majority). If Clinton had simply followed through on his promises to Barbara Jordan from the prior year, the country would have had sensible immigration reform back in 1996 and Trump never would have gained traction in 2016. These changes were recognized as being necessary already at that point and are way overdue.
9
A citizen of this country must obey the laws of it, regardless of if they are good or bad. Why should a non citizen be different? One hates to be in the position of defending He Who Shall Not Be Named, but fair is fair. If we don’t like the laws, there is only one place to put the blame, on ourselves.
7
Melania Trump’s parents became U.S. citizens because of family ties to their daughter. Evidently Trump wants to kick them out.
5
Most born and raised Americans can't pass a civics exam ... sad fact, but a fact indeed.
4
I want to watch Trump pass the civics test on national tv hosted by Alex Trebek to prove that he would meet the standard. My bet is that he wouldn't even sit for the coaching session, let alone pass the test.
4
Is Trump aware of Steve Jobs (future employer of Tim Apple) family history. How would it have been if his father ended up in France instead of the US?
Though, on second thought, when Trump's grandfather, Mr. Drumpf, came over it would have been nice to have these policies in force. I would much rather see Mr Drumpf's spawn poluting a smaller country.
4
@Aaron Of London
Are you aware that Steve Jobs father abandoned his wife and children, forcing his wife to place Steve up for adoption?
Steve was adopted and raised by the Jobs Family.
Later in life, when Steve Jobs became rich and famous, his biological father learned of their connection. He asked Steve for money, and was turned down for having abandoned him, his mother, and sister.
5
I almost hate to say it because I view Trump and his cohorts as the most partisan and manipulative group I've ever had the misfortune of observing (I'm over 70). However, I do think that the US needs to refocus and direct a higher percentage of our immigration opportunities to those who have already demonstrated a willingness to work hard and attain a high level of skill, particularly in STEM areas. That shouldn't mean that we should dilute the opportunities of those individuals who are truly in need of asylum.
2
@RWCW, to the contrary, nations like Canada with merit-based immigration systems have traditionally taken in a higher per capita proportion of legitimate refugees (from all around the world), no doubt in part because the government has the confidence of its citizens because it strictly enforces the merit system. The United States government, OTOH, has lost the confidence of its citizens because it has refused to update an immigration system designed over 50 years ago, long before weakening of labor unions during Reagan era; NAFTA; admission of China to WTO; 9/11 (several hijackers had overstayed their visas and others took flight school training not authorized under their visas); globalization; the continuing and ever expanding presence of an estimated 10 million to 28 million illegal aliens (depending on whether one uses the Pew figure or the joint Yale-MIT figure); and Trump's election itself. And still Congress refuses to do anything.
Moving to a strictly-enforced immigration system and regaining the trust of citizens could help expand confidence to expand refugee admissions, similar to Canada.
7
No one can possibly take this proposal seriously, do they?
I for one wouldn’t be an american citizen if that had been the law when my parents fled political persecution in their country in 1962.
America opened its arms to us. Both of my parents barely spoke any english when they arrived to this country, but they worked hard doing any factory work they could find. They provided a roof over our heads, food on the table and they made sure to remind us the opportunities that this great country had given us. This is the America I know and love, and I will fight to make sure I pass that forward to other immigrants that arrive on our shores, regardless of their skills or capacity to read or write.
6
@Juan
I am glad to hear what your parents accomplished, but our economy has dramatically changed since they arrived in the 1960's. Factory workers have been displaced by robots or by cheap labor in foreign countries. Instead of an endless supply of unskilled factory workers, we now need people who can design the robots or, at least, maintain them.
7
Before everyone break outs their 'Holier than thou' trumpets, ask yourself what kind of economy is the US headed to be?
Are we going to be an manufacturing/agricultural nation or are we going to be a technologically advanced, service industry/innovator nation?
Immigrants bringing in their spouses and children are a non brainer but should we encourage elderly parents and grand parents, uncles, Aunts ?
We will continue to need some roofers, maids and construction workers; but are we suffering for the lack of them?
Canada (who, we all, Liberals, seem to adore), Australia and Germany already have a merit based immigration system.
Is your welfare network (SSI/Medicare/Medicaid) strong enough to sustain the current influx of poor and indigent? (a third of all children on Medicaid are non white/Hispanic).
Hopefully the US citizens will make the right choice.
11
An educated immigrant may want to stay where there is universal healthcare services & no Russians running the government.
34
@Harold Rosenbaum
Russians only run the government in Russia.
But be sure to get back to us when Putin personally hands The Donald a check for $500K. You know, like Vlad did to Bill Clinton.
Or, when Russian interests never known for their charitable endeavors cough up north of $140 million to DJT like they did to the Clinton Slush Fund... I mean... er... Charity.
In the meantime, keep telling everyone Russia owns Trump...
11
Why won’t DJT release his tax returns and his the business records of the company he still manages? Major $investments from Russian oligarchs? Saudis and others buying over priced Trump Tower condos? Money laundering by Putin’s team so Trump could buy and renovate multiple golf courses during the depth of the Great Recession? The truth will catch up with the unAmerican Trump crime family.
4
Trump could not pass a civics test.
20
A previous letter stated we should only let in people who can sustain American values. Are they talking about making as much money as you can and having more things than your neighbors that you don't need and will never use. To look down on people who don't have your generational heritage or lighter skin. To disdain the arts and music for the wonderful world of sports. To never travel away from your home or explore other cultures. Or is it the possibility that young bright and striving people can succeed as your ancestors did . Or marry your daughter. I had thought we had grown out of this. Maybe not.
195
@Deirdre Mack "American values" ? Like the President's???
11
@Deirdre Mack
So,
Who gets to come here?
Anybody who wants to come?
As many as want to come?
The world has 7 billion people,
rapidly approaching 8 billion,
half of them quite poor,
and half of the rest not as rich as us.
Hundreds of millions, at least, would come,
possibly even a couple of billion,
if we let them.
So who gets to come?
And how many?
Maybe a lottery?
Even if a lottery,
then how many winning tickets?
And those who don't win the lottery,
they don't get to come.
and we don't let them come.
And if they try anyway,
we have them removed.
Pronto.
So,
let's get real.
Life is all about numbers,
and science, and skills.
How how to produce food to put on the table.
And how to produce it.
And how to put a roof over your head.
And how to keep warm.
Doing all that requires some know-how.
Singing in the sunshine is not going to cut it.
Not when it rains, or snows.
Not when the wind blows.
Not when it gets cold.
12
@Deirdre Mack When an issue is tearing America apart we need to understand it and deal with it. I am getting tired of being bullied by guilt. Is sackcloth and ashes the new Democratic Party uniform?
8
If successful, Democrats will encounter big trouble when they must raise the retirement age raised from 70 to 75 years old, due to the shifting of benefits to unskilled immigrants who haven't contributed much in comparison to the the highly skilled immigrants who they skewed the immigration system away from. The kids that they're bamboozling, now, will not appreciate them later.
Likely immigrants under a point system from South Korea, India and China will have college degrees and speak English (Yes, English is an Indian national language, spoken by the educated. Chinese kids who would lead in immigration points know English, a subject in the GaoKao, the tougher Chinese equivalent of the SAT and Achievement tests. I taught management in English at a Chinese university, so I can attest first hand.)
Through intent and luck, the US has been winning the race for brainpower since the rise of the Nazis in Europe. (And got the H-Bomb first for taking in practitioners of "Jewish Physics" fleeing Hitler.)
Educated immigrants, once here, punch beyond their weight class building our technical economy. Likewise, they marry, have kids, ensure the kids are educated and in this way would grow the economy faster than if the labor arriving here consisted of workers ready for the 18th Century when we have 21st century needs
Leave it to the Dems to wall out the vital flow of brainpower so that it streams, instead, to Canada, OZ, Britain and Germany.
Who says the Dems hate walls?
21
@C from Atlanta I thought Trump and his immigration blockers were Republican.
3
Paul Ryan, Republican, proposed raising the retirement age. Which Dems thought that was a good idea?
2
@Bascom Hill
To actuarily balance the program, even as it stands now, the age of retirement will increase or withholding rates will need to rise. You do the political math. The age has already been raised from the original 65 to 67 for those born after 1960.
An increased percentage of low income persons in the population will stretch the program further and the age will need to go up.
We can't continue to Willy Nilly proceed with open borders. I commend President Trump for moving forward with this process.
38
@Yangale
We don't have open borders, we haven't had open borders since the early 1800s, what in the world are you talking about?
10
@Nunyya
The borders are effectively open due to the non enforcement of current immigration law, bogus asylum claims and the sham marriages - one such ring involving 100s of people was broken up just this week in, I believe GA.
8
Non enforcement? Obama set the modern day record for sending those who crossed illegally back to their home country.
5
I love Saint Ann Coulter. (aka St. Ann of the Border)
In this case, however, I must disagree with her. I believe that an America First immigration policy should include continued immigration of about 1 million people per year. In fact, with the U.S. birthrate falling now to 1.7, we might need even more to maintain our current population in the long term.
Yes, we need border security, including a wall/fence/barrier. Without it, everything else is meaningless.
Yes, we need to screen every application and judge them based on what they bring to the United States.
Yes, we need to evaluate each applicants ability to assimilate culturally and linguistically.
Our immigration policy should be a form of neo-colonialism. Historically, colonialism was focused on the extraction of natural resources. An America First immigration policy would focus on the extraction of high value, human resources, trained at no cost to the U.S.
Unlike historical colonialism, an America First neo-colonialism would not require the blood and treasure needed to occupy a country.
And an America First, neo-colonial immigration policy would be very humane, providing talented people the opportunity to reach their full potential in a way that would be impossible in their country of origin.
I pray that St. Ann will forgive my heresy! :-)
2
@John "In fact, with the U.S. birthrate falling now to 1.7, we might need even more to maintain our current population in the long term." A key contributor to a falling birthrate is education of women. As immigrants from, say, Central America gain in education levels, their family sizes will decrease; this has occurred often enough for demographers to predict it as a given. In the US, however, a second key contributor to falling birthrates is the enormous cost of having children. More than half of the births of this country are paid for by Medicaid -- that is because, for middle-class people with high-deductible insurance, maternity costs are horrific. A Times article at one point noted that for middle-class couples between jobs, whose insurance may have lapsed but who were not eligible for Medicaid--prenatal care and delivery for one child cost $40,000. Then there's childcare. Working couples with two preschool children routinely pay upward of $30,000 per year. In expensive regions of the US--even more. The same couples may be simultaneously paying their college loans. I support immigration and believe the US has benefited greatly from it. But the idea we must import people to have babies for us (who, ideally, would be impoverished enough to have prenatal care paid for by Medicaid so they could afford to have babies) or import people, period, because we don't produce enough babies) -- this seems a roundabout way of raising the birth rate.
7
@Awestruck
You are correct. Women who immigrate to the U.S. will quickly approach the current birthrate for the reasons that you cite.
(In fact, some demographers argue that persuasively that even women who stay in their own countries will soon have much lower birthrates.)
That is why adding about one million immigrants per year is probably required for the long term.
You also identify some of the reasons why the birthrate is low among Americans, but the reality is that government efforts to raise birthrates have had limited success and been unsustainably expensive.
1
@John "(In fact, some demographers argue that persuasively that even women who stay in their own countries will soon have much lower birthrates.) " -- Yes, I was trying to say just that -- higher education levels among women lower birth rates, and not just in the US. Would government subsidies to families raise birth rates in the US? The young, exhausted & broke families of my acquaintance would say yes, but of course, that's anecdotal. I'd have liked to another child myself... but between the medical costs and childcare costs, we couldn't afford it.
3
I am curious to know if the Preident's wife or in-laws would have been able to come to the United States if these new standards had been effect at the time?
658
@rs. I read in the Times not that long ago that the Trump grandfather came to the US as an unskilled laborer. However, it is significant that the US Trump dynasty began in this country with the creation of brothels in San Francisco. I guess it's in the genes.
110
@rs
Not only would Melania Trump not have qualified, under the current administration's zero tolerance policy she would be subject to having her papers revoked for illegally working as a model before she had established resident status.
195
@rs No.
21
I literally laughed out loud when I read this headline. Trump is wanting to give immigrants a test that he could never possibly pass.
2
It’s almost universally true that those who argue the perspective of the bleeding heart or guilty conscience have never donated a dollar of their money, a minute of their time or a bed in their house to those in need. They are only charitable when it comes to other people’s money.
6
President Trump had no problem admiting his wife's parents and confirming them as US citizens. Skilled laborous; I am sure.
I think Trump likes to throw out good ideas knowing full well that those who hate him will immediately try and kill anything coming from him regardless of its merits just so they can crow about beating Trump. Alas the day it’s the golden goose.
3
So why did Melena's family get in? I thought that Trump didn't like chain migration.
1
Maybe because they had “sponsors” which I was told I had to have when I tried emigrating to the U.K., where my grandmother is from.
4
@Aaron Of London
Melania’s parents are not a public burden, and they never will be, plus they followed the law as it existed.
8
We need to stop skilled immigration and start educating/investing in the citizens already here.
7
So is Melania and being a beauty model the standard of merit for entry ?
Sounds good to me !
2
Finally, the US is starting to get a reasonable immigration preference policy.
If you think the US is out of line, you should see the New Zealand requirements for immigration.
19
A merit based visa program is nothing new. Canada has one. Trump’s initial claims make what is proposed not well thought out and arbitrary.
5
Alexander Harrison sees nothing wrong in a skills requirement for applicants for visas , green cards to enter the United States, and in fact it's an excellent idea. When Juliana and I went to the Embassy in Accra in 2004 to apply for her visa, she was asked about her "metier," or trade and she explained she was a caterer, and showed the Embassy official her diploma from the National Vocational Training Institute, National Womens TRNG. Center in Madina, a "quartier" in Accra.Embassy official was impressed, and I believe that the diploma helped her to get the visa.Juliana is an excellent "cuisiniere," so the Institute had trained her well. She told me also about a class in sex education she took at the Institute in which the teacher held up a carrot with a donut on either side to illustrate to the virtually all girls studentry the male anatomy, which I found rather droll. So its not the worst thing in the world to require that immigrants have a trade in order to enter the United States. Bravo for Messieurs Kushner and Milller. "Ils ont la tete bien serree sur les epaules,"and for their contribution to the commonweal in suggesting the skills requirement.Both of them r tea totallers like their boss,"entre parentheses!"
3
@Alexander Harrison, a bagel and a kosher hotdog probably works too.
1
It's time to stop the HB1 program. The last thing America needs is Asian foreigners and Chinese spies taking jobs away from US citizens.
7
I think this plan has a lot going for it.
9
And the first lady’s parents (newly made need citizens) will be giving up their citizenship and leaving when?
3
@Reg L
Something in the constitution about passing laws ‘ipso facto, so they ge5 to stay since they did it legally
2
"In its place, it would provide new opportunities for immigrants who have specific skills or job offers to work in the United States, provided they can demonstrate English proficiency and educational attainment, and pass a civics exam."
Well, Delusional Donnie would never get in.
That civics exam would be his Waterloo (or maybe Watergate).
English proficiency and academic attainment would also be hurdles for Donnie.
He would probably have to pay Singer a million dollars to have somebody cheat on that exam for him.
@Joe From Boston
Really, ? The president would pass a civics test and he received an Ivy League diploma, so I’m sure he could pass if he had to do so.
2
@stan
Donnie TRANSFERRED into U Penn from Fordham after his sophomore year.
No Wharton MBA. Just a U Penn BA.
He was not even an honor student. He is an IGNORAMUS.
https://www.teenvogue.com/story/trump-wharton-archive-not-top-of-class
1
It appears that most advocates of "merit-based" i.e. university educated immigration do not see the great stabilizing and enriching benefit that immigrants from Mexico and Central America have brought to many smaller towns and cities that have been abandoned by the younger generation seeking the bright lights of the coastal magnet cities. See Thomas Friedman's column on his family's home town in MN.
3
Raise your hand if you think Jared has a clue
1
Many American parents could have another child if they were not also shouldering the burden for immigrants children who qualify all entitlement programs, drain DOE budgets with ESL services, free medical care and FA for college.
26
Please provide just one shred of cited evidence to support this preposterous assertion. Seriously!
3
@Daniette
My wife and I both with professional degrees and 6 figure jobs didn’t have a third child because we are taxed at absurd levels to support non citizens .
Do you need more examples?
10
@stan
Absurd levels? Compared which countries?
5
It's odd. The people here who are claiming that it is a bad idea are harping on a great deal about Americans having to compete with higher skilled immigrants. To me, as an outsider, that smacks of a real attitude problem - it's ok if the 'dumb' ones come, because they won't take away our money. If the 'smart' ones come, they will become rich, and we won't. Racism and elitism, anyone?
In other nations, like Australia, we fill our immigration quotas in the first instance with people who can fill skill shortages, like trades. That makes much more sense as you can find people who can match the skills you need. What's the problem with that? Then you closet xenophobes don't have to worry about dirty poor brown people competing with the pretty white locals for jobs, because there are no pretty white locals to do those jobs.
I would also politely point out to those harping on the 'humanity' and 'refuge' element, legal immigration and refugee applications are (or at least should be) two different things, with different requirements. Don't conflate the two.
8
I don’t think this is a bad idea - other countries rely on skill-based policies. Had these measures been in place Melania Trump’s parents would still be in Slovenia.
1
@Maxie
Her father was a communist party functionary.
Might well have some merit in certain political circles here in the USA -- you know -- skill in "organizing" the "masses".
3
This sounds eerily similar to H1B visas to me, which will result in lower pay for current tech and white collar professionals already here, and will eventually result in their displacement.
I would be shocked if Google, Microsoft, Apple and many other Silicon Valley companies who abuse H1B's didn't have a say in this "legislation".
I'm speaking as a former tech worker with an MS in Molecular Biology and BS in Computer Science who was shown the door at a biotech company in my late 40's, only to be replaced by some 20-something recent grads from ITT in India working at 1/4 my salary. To add insult to injury, I had to train them in order to get a severance package.
So for all you current American high tech employees out there, update your CV's and start thinking about a career change because your days are numbered.
16
Your story is a nightmare...
India has untold millions of educated English speakers...That’s a lot of potential job takers...
9
@Good Morning Should UNTOLD millions...?
That allows for a really large margin of error.
1
You’re not taking this person’s story seriously...Imagine a company importing sophisticated (no doubt desperate) foreign workers to the USA from INDIA? from HALFWAY AROUND THE WORLD to take YOUR job!...It’s absolutely outrageous! A truly “dystopian” narrative...
I should hope nobody approves of importing workers to take American jobs...Why not fire the HS SCHOOL staff & save money with imports from the subcontinent? I’m sure they speak English well & can teach The Great Gatsby to your children at a quarter of the going salary...Yikes
3
Sounds like this country is becoming a cold blooded place. Btw, based on skills, kushner should surrender his us passport for someone who actually knows public policies
2
Currently our system makes it incredibly complex and tenuous for talented doctors from abroad to stay in the US. The last two years we’ve struggled to fill medical specialty training program with US medical grads, and qualified foreign applicants facing grueling and uncertain visa prospects, often leaving vacancies. This especially hurts people in rural areas. I firmly believe in codifying DACA and in creating a guest worker program with eventual possible residency attached. But I’d also quite welcome better options for highly skilled workers.
4
Trump should have to take a test on civics and Article 1 of the Constitution. If he doesn't pass he has to leave the country.
If merit means moral character, intellectual skills, and a strong work ethic, then Trump never would have made it into the country.
Won’t the “highly skilled” immigrants be competing with our own “highly skilled”? Or do we not have enough “highly skilled”? If we don’t have enough “highly skilled” in our own nation, shouldn’t we be increasing our science and technology educational fields, instead of attacking the science community?
3
@Bob
One thing for sure --
we should not be spending taxpayer money for college financial aid or subsidized in-state tuition for immigrants.
9
As long we are considering educational qualifications, how about a law precluding the US from sending its troops to a country most citizens can't find on a map
5
Only permit guest workers for any job. At some point an American will need that job.
6
A sincere request to all those who cite the Statue of Liberty and their grandparents while discussing immigration…
It’s no longer 1880.
Can we please live in the present and look to the future instead of the past?
31
Two points. One, with these new rules Melania's parents should have never been admitted. End-of-life, low skills, they will just cost us. Second, under the new rules neither Trump or his kids would be qualified to enter the USA. Let's just kick them out. And all of Trump's low-skill, low-education voters as well.
3
Melania brought her parents over. Trump's plan would prevent preference for parents and would define families as consisting solely of a spouse and offspring. I assume GOP congressmen will support Trump's plan to avoid being challenged in the primaries but the Democrats, who weren't consulted, won't vote for it. I doubt Trump cares, as he can campaign saying he offered up an immigration plan but the Democrats sabotaged it.
3
Could Trump end up in a 'not up to America's standards' list?
2
My grandparents couldn't speak English and never learned it even through the 60 years they lived here. Yet they successfully ran a vegetable farm, a barber shop, restaurant, and a pool hall concurrently. They used their earnings to buy two apartment buildings and two multi-plex homes to provide affordable housing for low income residents. They put all six children through college. Three became high level managers -- for Ross Perrot, a Los Angeles hospital, and a San Francisco bank. The other three were successful in education and dentistry. My grandparents were grateful for the opportunities their adopted homeland provided to them and their children.
They may not have had these high skills sought by the new policy, but their hard work provided needed food, housing, and other services to fellow citizens. They worked hard, were thrifty, and were law abiding, productive, contributing citizens all the years of their lives in the U.S.
High skills is not the only criteria. Farmers across America depend on low skilled labor to stay afloat. Entrepreneurs provide services to their communities, such as dry cleaning shops, restaurants, dealerships, importing of goods, and others. Immigrants come for the opportunities and for the most part they diligently embrace the chances our nation provides.
8
Our current immigration laws are an incoherent mess that are impossible to enforce and not in the best long-term interest of the U.S. I agree that skills based immigration deserves a much higher priority. We don't have to heartless, some immediate family reunification should still be possible, and we could accelerate the arrival of those that have been legally sponsored and are currently waiting their turn outside the U.S. The diversity visa lottery is something the most diverse country on earth no longer needs to hold. An improved immigration law is very possible, but both political parties must be willing to compromise, which will be difficult in this very hyper-partisan time.
9
The key is setting, and enforcing,
a total annual numerical limit on all types of legal residency
whether permanent or temporary,
whether for work or for family or whatever.
whether skilled or unskilled.
There are pros and cons for how that limit ought to be divvied up among various types. So, let's have that debate.
But, in the process of debating the division,
everybody needs to keep their eye on the ball --
a total annual numerical limit
on all types of legal residency for foreigners,
and enforcing that limit.
One million seems reasonable to me.
I would compromise with a somewhat higher limit
if a case can be made for it.
But no loopholes,
no exceptions,
no end-runs,
either in the law,
or in Presidential discretion
or de facto by way of lax enforcement.
6
And what skills did Melania Trump’s parents have to come to the US? Other than family ties? What a hypocritical President.
6
Good move. Now that his current wife’s relatives have been admitted, it’s time to change either the rules or the wife.
5
I wished this law had been in existence when Friedrich Drumpf, Maryann McCleod, Ivana Milicevic and Melanja Knavs came to this country.
How good was their English? What education and skills did they have?
Friedrich had no skills and spoke no English.
Maryann McCleod spoke English as a second language, her native tongue being Scotish Gaelic. She came her under chain migration with no distinguishing skills and worked as a domestic.
Ivana Milicevic was a Czech "model" whose great skill was what, skiing?
Melanja Knavs is Slovenian was model with success in Europe who has some language skills (hard to determine), who lied about her education and immigration status. She took advantage of chain migration to bring her parents and sister here.
Their grandson/son/husband is now closing that door for others who dearly love the same opportunity. He would also like to cause a brain drain in other countries. (If I were doing well, I would not want to come here.)
He will not allow the people who most need an opportunity for a new life to come here.
6
@cl
Trump or no Trump,
America needs to enforce its immigration laws.
Anyone who says otherwise
is begging for Trump to be re-elected in 2020.
13
@sam finn begging for Trump to be re-elected
How is that?
2
Makes sense that this was developed by Jared since he’s ascended to his current position based purely on his skills and not at all on his family connections.
9
The bar must be pretty low, then. Melania was a model, working here illegally before she even obtained a work permit, and her dad was a cobbler.
8
Would you kindly cite the source in the U.S. code that show she was here illegally?
6
It is reasonable to limit family based immigration to spouse and children only for naturalized immigrants. Siblings, parents and other relatives should not be allowed. If immigrants have such a hard time living in the US without their entire extended family going back to ten generations, they are free to return to their country of origin.
However, limiting legal immigration to highly skilled workers is short sighted. The US economy needs the flexibility to allow immigrants of varying skill levels based on the needs of the economy.
5
These changes are long overdo. This country needs our immigration policies to reflect our needs. And bringing in people based on their skills as opposed to who they are related to seems like such an obvious improvement it is hard to believe it is controversial. The fact that people running for president talk about paying everyone a UBI because they fear a future where large numbers of people won't be able to get jobs means that we no longer need unskilled immigrants.
10
And what exactly were Melania's parents' skills when they became citizens through "chain migration"?
8
The only upside to this proposal is that if it is passed, the immigrants coming into the country will be better educated and much less likely to vote for a Trump or his ilk than those Americans who did.
3
Meritocracy with common sense. What you can do is more important than who you know. Isn't it?
5
Jared Kushner never got a thing in his life based on merit - not his education, his wealth, his top security clearance, or his current ‘job’ in the White House. The sooner this crime family is out of the White House the better. Hypocrisy is not the half of it.
7
@Gwen Vilen, no, but African-American, Democratic Congresswoman and civil rights icon Barbara Jordan certainly did. Achieve things in life based on merit. And, as leader of President Clinton's Bipartisan Commission on Immigration Reform in the 1990's (aka the "Jordan Commission"), she also recommended switching to a merit-based system. Including chain migration reform and elimination of the diversity visa lottery. The Jordan Commission did a deep dive on immigration policy and literally studied this and interviewed the experts and Americans and Central Americans, etc. for almost 5 years. They came to support and recommend virtually all of the same things Trump has been supporting for the last 2 plus years.
OTOH, they could lead with moral clarity and character. And they not only did not demonize immigrants, they acknowledged the historical role and value of immigrants throughout US history.
Now that said, it is important to consider the policy itself. And not just the character of the proponent of the policy. The policy itself should not necessarily be dismissed just because one does not like the proponent of the policy.
2
It does not appear to be a well thought out plan . . . Are there many highly skilled immigrants who would be willing to come to the United States and leave their family members behind? And, is this the character of person we desire in our country? Someone who would come to our country and desert their loved ones? This plan is also not in keeping with our character . . . until now.
2
Umm. Do you not understand the thousands of foreign students who come to the U.S., earn advanced degrees, would love to stay here and must return home. That is the true crime and the type of “Ellis Island” immigrants that the country needs. Not the Central America mom who is 20 with three kids and can’t read or write even in Spanish. A close friend and her husband are Indian, he’s an electrical engineer and she has a Ph.D. They are back in India. Can I choose who I would rather be here? I guess I can in 2020.
10
@MM Yes, I am aware of foreign students studying in the US and that some portion wish to stay. I think you misunderstand that many who come to, and attempt to stay in our country, whether educated or uneducated, exert great effort to bring family members. Do you understand wanting to live your life with family? Not everyone who wishes for a better life is willing to leave family behind . . . do you understand that?
4
Most other countries use a point based system including education, knowledge of the culture and language. Why are there so many comments here that claim that these criteria are somehow anti-American or contrary. We have limited resources, and preaching unlimited growth, without attention to those resources seems stupid. I don't care about Donald Trump's inlaws or wives, yes these are egregious examples of cheaters, but that is not the point, we don't level the playing field to make cheaters valid, we level the playing field so the best possible people can join the pool of citizens. Almost every other country does this too.
12
It’s ironic that so-called ‘progressives’ habitually reference the policies of yesteryear to make their argument, as if importing the world’s overpopulated “tired, poor huddled masses” would be an appropriate immigration policy in today’s economic and social climate.
Me thinks they are retrograde rather than progressive.
18
@Michal It's ironic that today's conservatives are so "fiscal" about what they choose to conserve.
3
@Michal, or as if going back to a bunch of other policies from the 1890's or 1910's makes sense. The reality is today's immigration system is seriously outdated and was recognized as such even in the early 1990s. When African-American, Democratic Congresswoman and civil rights icon Barbara Jordan, as leader of President Clinton's Bipartisan Commission on Immigration Reform, also recommended chain migration reform; elimination of the diversity visa lottery and stronger enforcement vs illegal immigration, including mandatory E-Verify, among other changes.
3
What exactly were Melania’s parent’s qualifications? Or Melania’s for that matter.
4
I would be curious about what tax payer benefits they have used.
2
Oh, the irony.
Trump wants a `merit-based' system with high-skilled workers.
Apply that standard to the White House and the building is empty.
3
And how many in the current administration do we think could pass the civics exam?
4
Once again, the antithesis of decency.
2
This is the same administration that for the past two years has been putting up blockade after hurdle after complication to people coming in on H-1B visas...the skilled worker visas. So excuse me if I express some extraordinary doubt about their intentions.
"Rates of RFEs and H-1B visa denials soared shortly after Trump took office, according to a National Foundation for American Policy analysis of USCIS data. Between the third and fourth quarters of the fiscal year 2017, USCIS began denying 41% more H-1B visas and issuing 67% more RFEs."
From: https://www.businessinsider.com/h1b-visa-foreign-worker-says-trump-immigration-crackdown-doomed-american-dream-2019-3
4
@Nunyya
There is no merit in allowing either the would-be employers or the would-be employees to tell us how to measure "merit".
Their claims need to be examined closely.
3
Jared Kushner, one of themost entitled individual in the world, is the least qualified person to apply “merit” to any system.
16
Respecting compared to whom? Perhaps Chelsea Clinton?
2
@MM
Ms. Clinton wasn't qualified to make policy and so she never did.
6
Chelsea lived in the WH. She wasn’t responsible for peace in the Middle East and all the other stuff Jared pretends to do while he’s running his real estate business.
5
Today's world is very different from that of 100 years ago. Droves of unskilled workers who were able to assimilate via manual labor jobs are not what's needed to keep the US competitive for the future. High skills are unfortunately a necessity and plenty of our allies have policies to the same tune. Until China, Japan, Korea etc. begin accepting millions of unskilled persons who's cultural backgrounds differ from the host, this policy makes sense.
183
So sensible. We simply cannot practically assimilate an infinite number of low skilled people. We have far too many of our own already. Great way to destabilize a country, however.
24
It was really nasty of these Spanish speaking immigrants to come to our country and steal those farm jobs and meat packing jobs away from our own citizens. Farm work builds muscles and character while living in the great outdoors with lots of sunshine. Packing house line work develops mental toughness and the ability to withstand silly romance about animal sensibilities. Our citizens would benefit from these stolen jobs!
Not to forget women who come here to learn child care and modern domestic skills, again robbing our women of these abilities and attitudes.
34
Don’t forget the nursing homes. Those low-skilled people from Central America are taking all those rewarding jobs bathing and feeding the elderly, hoisting them out of bed and wheeling them to the sunroom for minimum wage.
31
Any fan of the Hb1 visa program out there? Trump is about to make it or immigration policy.
Guess what Trump supporters:
Now, instead of immigrants taking jobs picking vegetables and washing dishes, they will take the high skill, high paying tech jobs (at half the pay your son or daughter who just learned programming was going to get paid).
Trump is a scam. Bernie wants to send your kids to school, paid for by the billionaires who got rich from your work, but Trump wants to replace you with immigrants, while he yells about a wall that makes no sense.
Trump used illegal immigrants to Saudi Arabia there. He used illegal immigrants in NYC and Atlantic City. He uses illegal immigrants in his resorts, and now he will give the coastal tech billionaires exactly what they want. Legal, high skill immigrants that take Hough paying jobs from America citizens.
So much winning.
10
Tell us again what skills Melania's parents brought to America?
Will they lead the way for this new policy by going back to Slovenia?
8
"It was America that taught us a nation should not open its doors equally to all nations."
Less than a century ago, a European leader made this statement to the NYT, shortly before becoming the Chancellor of Germany. How little America has learned in that time.
2
@Randall
Really? It was Angela Merkel?
3
@John Murray huh?
2
Demonstrate English proficiency? Provide proof of Educational attainment? Pass a civics test? Trump fails on all three counts. Deport him immediately.
9
I would be very curious to know what Melania Trump's parents skills are that gave them citizenship.
7
This sounds much like the H1B visa program, used to break the backs of STEM workers in the US. The irony is this visa targets the very jobs the politicians say college students should be preparing for (ie., engineering, comp sci, math, etc.)
This is also the very same program President Trump, while campaigning and earlier in this term, criticized as being rife with corruption, abuse and of much detriment to US citizens.
It has been a hot button for years, with some saying there is a shortage of technical professionals, others stating the obvious, the Gates, the Zuckerbergs and the Blankfeins don't want to be paying top dollar for technical professionals.
The proof of the damage rought by this type of visa? Scan the job boards for technical positions in major cities. I have and what I find is not pretty. Many of the positions actually pay less than comparable positions back in 2001. If there was truly a shortage of qualified technical labor, compensation would be rising, not decreasing or stagnating.
Bottom line: Trump does it again! What was his GPA at Penn again?
15
Oh, so like Canada? This is the most sensible thing I've seen come out of any administration on immigration in the last 30 years.
23
As much as I dislike 45 he's right on this. It's worked here in Canada. bring in people who will make your economy grow.
5
Yes. And Australia. And any other sensible nation.
5
"it (Trump's plan) would provide new opportunities for immigrants who have specific skills or job offers to work in the United States, provided that they can demonstrate English proficiency, educational attainment and pass a civics exam."
As most Americans cannot "demonstrate English proficiency, educational attainment and pass a civics exam" such a plan, if enacted, would certainly raise the bar for ALL job seekers, not just immigrants.
This could be HUGE...
2
@HapinOregon, pass a civics exam? What a joke. Most of us born here had to learn that stuff in school early on only to grow up in a world that looked good on paper but often functioned totally the opposite in practice. Maybe we need more unbrainwashed immigrants to help us restore civility here.
1
@HapinOregon
You say,
"....most Americans cannot "demonstrate English proficiency....""
"Most Americans"?
Really?
Which ones?
Oh -- you must mean certain "demographics" in the Dem base.
1
The logical extension of Trump's incredibly ridiculous and cruel proposed immigration policy as developed by "senior advisor"(based on what training and experience is totally unknown and groundless!) Jared Kushner, is to deport every American not of Native American birth/ancestry! Anything else is compromise.
I wonder if Trump could pass a civics exam or citizenship test.
4
The last thing this country needs is more impoverished, unskilled foreign nationals. Merit-based immigration is in the best interest of the American citizenry. Good move. Bravo!
11
@Michal No, the last thing this country needs is closed-minded citizens closing the borders to new talents and new hopes.
2
Trump buildings (4) in sunny isles is where Russians vist to have anchor babies. He doesn't seem to be bothered by immigrants that buy his condos to gain access to America.
4
@Mitchell Adler or by immigrants who would marry him or by immigrant businessmen who would contribute to his campaign coffers. now skin color...that's another story.
2
A lot of the comments here speak of people who immigrated 50 or more years earlier. Times have changed. Skilled immigrants provide the growth engine that this country needs.
23
@Partha and every July 4 we speak of people who immigrated even before that. why not?
1
And where would Trump be if skills were emphasized over family ties?
3
Faking experience to get into USC is apparently easy, so faking experience to get past Dumb Donald should be a snap.
2
I wholeheartedly agree with this plan with ONE tiny addition:
We deport ALL young Americans who willingly ( that would be ALL) take drugs, drop out of school, and otherwise squander thier futures while blaming "the other" ....to the country that sends use thier educated masses.
You know.....the American citizens who blame immigrants for their woes while they light another bowl or inject another load of dope. Waaaaahhhhhhh they cry.....the immigrant is taking my job!!!! They live in the greatest country in the world (in spite of Trump) and who are learning every day from Trump how to blame others when the SHF.
I would even subject our citizens to a civics test and English proficiency exam.
2
@Ignatz
You say,
"I wholeheartedly agree with this plan with ONE tiny addition:
"We deport ALL young Americans who willingly ( that would be ALL) take drugs, drop out of school, and otherwise squander thier [sic] futures ...."
Gee,
I wonder which "demographic" would get hit the hardest by your proposal.
Hint. It would not be the Trumpsters.
Yes, it might hit some of the Trumpster "demographic".
But it would not hit them as hard as certain other "demographics" -- i.e. "demographics" in the Dem base.
3
Jared, your grandparents came here as holocaust survivors. What skills did they bring?
They worked hard and your felon father and you are the beneficiaries of their hard work.
Tell that to Stephen Miller!
All of you are a disgrace!
9
So will he be sending Melania and her parents back to Slovenia?
5
There’s Jared. What were his immigrant family skills?
6
So, America, who now will pick your vegetables and fruits? Who will do the horribly difficult work in the slaughterhouses that process your meat? All those new immigrant PhDs?
6
@American Mom
Some farming jobs are already be done by robots and others will be soon. The few jobs that cannot be done be mechanized could be done by workers on temporary visas who would return to their families, in their own countries, at the end of each agricultural season.
Many small independent slaughterhouses hired Americans, kept working conditions safe, and paid middle class wages. Then a few companies bought the small independents, and moved production to areas where it was hard to find work. Working conditions became worse and wages did not keep up with inflation. Workers do not have other jobs nearby so few complain, especially those who are undocumented. It has been suggested that the poor working conditions (such as greasy floors, dull knives, and fast conveyor belts) have led to accidents that the companies are not reporting.
The slaughterhouses could automate some of the work, and improve the safety and pay of the others. Americans would be happy to again take safe jobs that pay a fair wage.
5
Can't we have both?
10
That's the way liberal darlings like Canada do it. You literally get points for having a skill or speaking the language. My dad is in immigrant (although he's since moved back) but he did have a skill when he moves here from Latin America. Makes sense to me.
9
How is this not a good idea? I’ve been out of the country long enough not to be in full Trumpium hysterics, so I can recognize a decent idea of his despite my general distaste for him. Stop the black and white thinking.
21
Judging the merit-based system by comparing grandparents who arrived without skills is disingenuous. When industrial and farm labor jobs were plentiful and required to specific education or experience, then people of that generation and before could easily be accommodated.
23
Having a merit-based class of applicants is fine so long as there are also family and humanitarian classes of immigrants and overall immigration levels increase. (This is in fact the Canadian system.)
4
Let's see, English proficiency, educational attainment and a civics exam. Maybe we should apply these standards to presidential candidates. Two out of three isn't bad.
3
"...provided that they can demonstrate English proficiency, educational attainment and pass a civics exam."
Trump would fail miserably.
5
@Somewhere Not so. He can read bank statements, knows arithmetic, and . . . . well, gee, 2 out of 3 ain't bad.
Based on Trump's past words and actions, and the sentiments expressed by his base supporters, I'm pretty sure Trump's concept of "merit" is a fig leaf for "whiter."
4
According to Wikipedia Donald Trump’s grandfather Frederick Trump emigrated to the US at age 16 he had little education so he became a barber to make ends meet.
I wonder if Donald Trump thinks about how his grandfather would not have been allowed in the US had his new regulation been in place at the time.
5
hmm... What about runway models? Is that a skill set we need?? Guess who?
7
Only the desperate want to come to the United States anymore. People with real skills aren't really in that category. The current resident is the biggest immigration deterrent we've ever had. He's his own wall.
2
What qualifications does Jared Kushner bring to the table other than he is the President's son in law. Isn't it true is wife's mother was an immigrant, not a skilled migrant?
3
@Joseph B Actually, the Donald's own mother was an immigrant.
2
It is so ironic that two men — Jared and Donald — who owe their families for everything are proposing a skill-based criteria. Next, ivanka will come out against nepotism and Melania against bullying...oh, wait.
5
Should guess workers pay social security taxes ?? If they are not given the possibility to contribute for at least 10 years, they will never be able to receive a social security old age pension...…...As an H1B from 1994 to 1999 I know what I am talking about.
Look into Germany's scheme where the guess worker is given a refund if he or she goes back home before AS LONG as they never received any benefits while in Germany...……….
4
@Jorge
Of course, GUESTS, not GUESS……...I guess...….
1
How about the scores of undocumented immigrants Trump employs at his luxury resorts and golf courses?
I wish the Times would bring this fact back into the limelight. Trump is only using the issue of immigration to gin up his base.
6
Thank god, Melania got in on an Einstein visa and her family was able to make it in before trumps about face in immigration policy.
5
Like a broken clock Trump sometimes has a half reasonable idea - borne of ignorance and malice no doubt - but half reasonable or as reasonable as any other idea on how to not let every Tom, Dick and Harry into the country and onto its dole.
6
@AL Meanwhile, go get that "broken clock" fixed and tell me the guy who was able to help you wasn't from an immigrant family.
Too bad this policy didn't exist when Friedrich Trump, nee Drumpf, immigrated to the US.
After his also German born wife got homesick than they moved back to Germany, he was deported had deported for not having served the mandatory time in the military. Avoiding the draft runs in the family.
Luckily for Melania and her parents the 'new' immigration law was not in force yet. Great job when you can get it.....
4
I immigrated to the US 39 years ago and have been a naturalized citizen for the last 34 years. I am grateful for the opportunities this country afforded me. I personally know several immigrants who have brought in to the country a large number of people using the family reunification clause. This is typically a chain reaction, with each person after being granted legal status sponsoring others under the same reunification provision. Many of these reunification folks know little English, have scant knowledge of American history or cultural, and posses few marketable skills. After the initial qualifying period a good number of them apply for social benefits as independent adults. With independent income below the poverty line they qualify for several social benefits though they have never contributed in to the system through any taxes. There is abuse & misuse in the system. This has to stop.
It is a sane policy to give preference to those with education and skills that are needed or in short supply. Many countries that are attractive to immigrants are adopting this strategy with success. This is far better than allowing anyone wishing to immigrate to this country regardless, simply on the basis of family reunification or lottery.
36
@SLP You're not alone. Many immigrants feel that way once THEY've been able to get in.
5
@kenneth
I was granted visa based on my specific skills, not through family reunion or lottery provision. And, that seems to be the determining change the current proposal is attempting.
3
I am liberal but The TDS is real. Because Trump proposes merit-based immigration, you're going to oppose it because he suggested it? This is what Canada does -- you know that country we're always pointing to as the land of universal health care?
Also, the brain drain from other countries to America has been going on for as long as I can remember. Why do you think we were the leaders in so many industries including more recently, tech? These are the immigrants we want because they can contribute right away and also help create more jobs and keep us competitive in an increasingly global world. Seriously, I hate the GOP but both sides have lost it. Critical thinking is gone from the American electorate in general.
23
@Ana TDS Tennessee Department of Safety ?
The irony, if not apparent, is that the new, improved immigrants will have all the qualifications to take American jobs, plus the willingness to do them at lower wages. After busting unions to lower wages, then exporting the remaining jobs that were still too costly to enable ever-higher executive bonuses, what remains to be stripped to rock-bottom are the highly skilled jobs. This, however, will not solve the country’s hunger for the lowest cost labor that Americans refuse to do. The shortage of “unskilled” immigrants may drive bottom wages higher, and when Americans still refuse to do those jobs, the welcome signs will return. Furthermore, the “skilled” immigrants will need “unskilled” people to build their houses, tend their gardens, raise their children, clean their houses, and do their nails. Because wages of the “skilled” immigrants will be lower than those of the Americans they replace, the wages of the new “unskilled” will have to be even lower than they are now, restoring the trend desired and required by big money and their fully-paid, fully-owned politician.
6
If Trump had not married Melania, would she have qualified for citizenship?
Probably not.
She was approved for an “Einstein” visa, though her qualifications seemed dubious.
We don’t know if that application included a claim she graduated from college, which we she falsely claimed on her website that has since been taken down.
Trump promised during the presidential campaign that Melania had plenty of documentation and he would show it.
But we have seen nothing.
Under Trump’s new plan, would Melania qualify?
And Melania would have been forbidden to bring her parents to the US?
Let’s see the documentation on Melania and see if she would measure up to Trump’s new plan and if Trump’s plan needs revision.
4
That's what Canada does. Another area it is ahead of the US
7
I think we should require the same of Trumpists, including making them take a civics exam. I wonder how many would pass it?
3
"In its place, it would provide new opportunities for immigrants who have specific skills or job offers to work in the United States, provided that they can demonstrate English proficiency, educational attainment and pass a civics exam."
Trump himself would be unable to pass an English proficiency exam. Does that mean if this passes we can deport him to Russia?
4
Despise Trump as much as any civilized person, but these proposals are not different from Canada immigration system which stresses skills, demand in key areas and age. Family immigration is really difficult in Canada.
16
I don't get this merit based immigrantion based on skills and education. Without weighing on what America has meant to those needing welcome and opportunity, this administration jaws on constantly about protecting U.S. jobs. Isn't the merit based admission idea based on educated skilled workers from overseas 'taking away' the most desirable jobs from those already here? This gang of propagandists and tactical publicity seekers that constitute this adminstration can't seem to get their story straight or make a cogent argument. It is hard to believe they actually mean skills and education rather than being opposed to non-white candidates from places they disdain.
5
First, I’m not a fan of The Donald.
Now that’s out of the way...
I’m surprised he’ll let anyone in.
Seems if he wanted to be consistent, not his best skill, with his base he’d stop all immigration, immediately. He’d then train Americans for American jobs to MAGA.
I despise Trump, but am sorry to say that merit-based immigration is the only kind we should have, if any.
I learned about it when trying to illegally live in Canada and New Zealand.
In both cases, when they caught me, they explained that they have a lengthy evaluation process and points system to determine if you will be an asset to their country.
They don't want the tired, poor, pregnant, uneducated masses.
They want the healthy, educated, successful, statured people who have specific skill sets that their country needs, and who will not take jobs away from their citizens.
They also recognize the lifeboat analogy. Too many people sinks the lifeboat.
Let's not oppose Trump on the rare occasion when he has a good idea!
27
Any immigration reform that has a guest worker program without amending the current part of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution that allows birth right citizenship for visitors is useless. That is the big draw for illegal immigration; citizenship for anchor babies.
7
The birth rate in the US has dropped to the point of not replacing ourselves. This has devastating implications in terms of maintaining generational social obligations - let alone the growth of a country with an enormous amount of space and opportunity.
We need immigrants of all stripes. We need fresh blood. We need diversity. We need to help those in need - escaping horrible lives. That is what America was founded on. That is why Donald Trump is here. That is why I am here.
The solution is simple. Open the gates to anyone who wishes to arrive here ready to work and pay taxes. They must pass security muster, etc.
But it is our obligation - to ourselves and to humanity. Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed and all those other mythical dudes would agree. Just do the right thing. Open ourselves to those who want to live better, safer lives. They have a record of low crime and high contribution.
3
@Bob Bruce Anderson We need LESS people, not MORE. The earth can only sustain so many and we've overshot that figure long ago. #TeamThanos!
@Hat Trick
No disagreement on over population. We should have slowed our reproductive rate billions ago.
But here we are. Do we abandon compassion and decency just because we abandoned science?
We can't control the planet but we could lead with intelligence and thoughtfulness.
I am a secular humanist, but I suggest the core thinking of most religions encourages us, no, implores us to embrace the "other".
This is a good idea. Works in Australia.
11
I welcome this initiative from President Trump.
America is no longer the frontier land that needs people to establish homestead and fight Indians. The immigrants do not necessarily come here fleeing hunger and persecution or for joining family in a faraway land.
The 21st century was ushered in with a bang by 19 pious young men who joined 72 virgins in the nether land by deploying fully fueled aircrafts as lethal weapons. They came to the US thoroughly programmed to carry out their mission of harming us. Their programmed kinfolk have been waiting impatiently to get a chance to do it all over again.
It is also time to realize that America, the lifeboat, is full. It cannot afford to take many more on board, especially those who jump in to scuttle it completely.
11
So we will prioritize immigrants who come to the US with degrees that put them in direct competition with US citizens who have spent tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars to get degrees here. College graduates are not facing tremendous job prospects .. let alone the growing number of older employees who just happen to be laid off and find very little appreciation in the job market.
And with a large pool of employees, who will really pay well ? White collar workers support a lot of blue collar jobs too.
6
So much for the "family values" party. Wait, wasn't there some other party in history that hated immigrants?
2
As long as this policy doesn't affect all those H2 visas Trump gets for hires for his properties; can't imagine those individuals are highly skilled but they will take lower wages and such...
2
I sure hope our immigration officials consider, Bricklayers, Rough Carpenters and Framers, Sod and Irrigation specialists, Concrete Workers, Drywallers, Painters, Roofers, Landscapers, Detasselers and other Farm and Field Workers, Meat Cutters, Butchers and other Food Processors as people with special and necessary skills! Otherwise, without these folks who will do the work we can't seem to find anyone else to do?
5
It is long since passed time to rewrite the constitution and eliminate excessive powers for the President. No single person should be able to bring such destruction to America, never mind one who LOST the vote of the majority of Americans. Decimate the Electoral College! The American People deserve a truly representative government.
2
@Dan If we're going to amend the Constitution, let's get rid of birthright citizenship, please! At least one parent needs to be a legal U.S. citizen. That would put the kibosh on anchor babies, yay!
Like it or not, this is one thing that at least by reason, makes sense. Canada and Australia both have similar systems in place. You can joke all about Melania or her parents, it is irrelevant to this policy change.
7
Stephen Miller is a hypocrite and he is the architect of this policy.
His Great Grandfather, like my Grandfather came to this country with nothing. They didn't speak the language and many of them were nothing more than migrant farmers.
As a Jew who was lucky enough to be born here because my grandparents had the courage to cross the ocean to escape the Pogroms in Europe I totally reject the idea that people who are willing to move themselves and there families across Oceans or large land masses offer this country less than someone with an engineering degree in computer science coming for professional reasons.
I grew up in NY, among second and third generation Irish, Italian, Greek, Jamaican, etc., etc., etc. The one thing we all had in common was we had a parent who decided to change the fate of themselves and multi-generations of American citizens for a better life.
They universally loved this country, many of them and their children fought in wars for this country. If we decide to base immigration on merit, or money or degree aren't we saying the American dream is only for the rich and talented?
Don't we have enough income inequality to stop beating on hard working people who want a better future for their children. The people who see America as a special place to cherish. Those are the kind of people I want my kids to grow up with.
This policy has nothing to do with illegal immigration. It's a complete sellout of the values this country was built on.
6
We’ve had skills based immigration in Canada for years - there were adjustment pains (and you can still find under-employed immigrants everywhere) and now there is an emphasis on immigrants applying during graduate and post-graduate schooling who are training in Canada - with Canadians and doing research/internships with Canadian companies. Many families do indeed come - but in Canada we take it as a defining aspect of the 21st century that both halves of a couple (regardless of gender) will have similar levels of education and thus both be eligible. We have grandparent/caregiver long term visas so families can be together... just not all beneficiaries of government programs. However, we also pay living wages to more of our population which will never be accepted south of the border... house keepers/cleaners make from 25-45$ an hour depending on where you live (even under the table).
23
This is not a bad policy to put in place. The current model is not a balanced approach. I was part of the highly skilled labor pool who waited for an exceedingly long time to gain my citizenship to this country due to the prioritization of quota allocated to those belonging to the “family reunification” category. And this is not dissimilar to policies in place for countries like Canada and the UK. We will benefit from having both highly skilled individuals and those of lesser skills. If quota remains a factor, I’d like to see over the long-run we allocate equally to both skill and family-based applications, with asylum seekers as an important and separate category.
8
There are very few things I agree with Trump about, but preference for skilled workers over extended family is one of them. I have seen HUGE extended families brought here under the current system.
Of course spouses, children, and parents should be let in, and maybe a few other categories.
Also, there should be a path to citizenship for most immigrants currently here, and asylum should be granted to many or most seeking it.
11
@dr. c.c.
If we offer to legalize those who are living her illegally, then more will be encouraged to illegally move here on the expectation that they, too, will eventually be granted legal status.
3
But no mention again of the Dreamers?
One would have hoped that immigration "reform" would have given some consideration to the many whose lives are still in limbo.
3
Trump offered a path to citizenship for the dreamers. It also called for increased border security. Democrats turned down his offer. It didn’t provide what they wanted, open borders.
6
@Roland Williams
I am breaking my own rule here - I try not to respond to people whose hearts are full of hatred and their minds full of Fox News nonsense.
In your case, I am going to make an exception.
Democrats do NOT want open borders. Produce the evidence for your false claim.
Trump NEVER offered a path to the dreamers. He might have alluded to one at some point - it's so hard to keep up with his lies - but to the best of my recollection, it was connected to building THE WALL.
Republicans lionize Ronald Reagan. His most immortal words were, "Tear down this wall, Mister Gorbachev!"
Trump is no Republican. I'm not even sure he's a human being.
Maybe his wife should leave ... what are her skills exactly?
9
Exactly what I was thinking, along with her parents.
Better idea, let Melania stay and deport Donald!
One reason why immigrants with degrees get jobs is because they have made efforts to get the relevant skills.
If Americans were to make similar efforts to educate themselves the need and angst about immigrants would diminish. We have the worlds best teaching universities yet we don’t have enough students studying the subject matters required for today and tomorrow.
Schools have been blamed, the educational mandates have been targeted and myriads of other reasons thrown in to excuse the fact that we don’t produce enough talent within the US.
Frankly it is easy to blame outsiders , externalize and rationalize the reasons why - but the reality is that we are blaming others and making excuses for our own inability to study hard and work hard to educate ourselves
The onus is on us to take responsibility and educate ourselves for the jobs of today and tomorrow. For too long have we blamed everyone and everything for our inability to produce the talent required for these jobs.
We should stop making excuses and focus on accepting our abilities and efforts to address our inadequacies.
3
@Rh
The fact that a TeeVee reality star who cowardly avoided military service and who lies every time he opens his mouth is President says it all about education level in this country.
But at least a lot of people know who won on "the Voice" last night.
2
Sooooooooooo isn't he all about how immigrants are taking our AMERICAN jobs?? Now we can ONLY accept the ones who will take our jobs?? Does not compute.
4
Seriously, a civics exam?? How many of us could pass a civics exam or a citizenship test? I doubt I could (maybe right out of HS). I doubt the Donald could.
3
Trump loves the poorly educated, as long as they're Americans.
8
I cried when I read this article. To imagine that the country that welcomed my grandparents would no longer welcome people like them is unthinkable to me.
9
@Gormalm
America - and the entire world - was a vastly different place when our grandparents came to the US. The skills they had upon arrival were sufficient to get them jobs and become truly self supporting. At this time, even with a four year college degree it is difficult to land a job that pays enough to eat and pay rent. With the introduction and continuing development of robotics, it will become even more difficult in the future. America is no longer the “land of opportunity” for as many as it was in the past.
7
None of my grandparents would be acceptable, either — not able to speak English, unable to pass US civics exam, and very low-skilled.
Too bad, too. Their children (my parents, aunts, and uncles) completed at least some high school; went on to either fight for various US military branches during WWII or to support the war effort at home; returned home from war to build a Super Power, strong working and middle classes; and raised families.
Their grandchildren (me, sibling, and first cousins) grew up to all complete high school, with many earning college and graduate degrees to become business owners, social workers, pharmacists, lawyers, nurses, teachers and professors.
Their great grandchildren (my generation’s children) have all completed at least a bachelors degree, with most completing graduate degrees — and their children are completing their education and building careers, families, and raising the next generation.
This all happened to generations of my family because the USA held open the Golden Door to a land of opportunities.
167
@Donna Nieckula
So what?
No Americans ever worked harder and longer for less return than enslaved and separate and unequal black Africans in America.
No Americans ever had more of their lives, lands and natural resources stolen from them than brown Native American pioneers.
5
this plan is dead on arrival. As with everything else, trump is just trying to change the subject and waste our time. There is no seriousness to anything he does that requires cooperation.
3
My family are naturalized citizens because my dad came as a physician (of Pakistani ethnicity). I'm not sure the proposed legislation exactly.. but there's little chance my dad would come without his family. I'm now a physicist + SW engineer and my brothers work at Goldman Sachs and the US Air Force. We were young and assimilated well. (We speak native English and mostly grew up in this melting pot.) Doesn't it benefit the US to accept the bright and willing from other countries, families included?
6
Since third-world countries have relatively few highly skilled workers, apparently under this policy, the US will no longer be accepting third-world immigrants. Gosh, I'll bet that had little to do with Trump adopting the policy.
5
Explain how this works.
If I gave a job offer to someone overseas, they accepted, that person could come into the USA to work, but couldn't bring spouse and children?
Or am I misreading this?
3
When the Statue of Liberty was erected we had a different welfare system. There wasn't any. Immigrants didn't get free medical care,schools with special education, supplemental food for children etc. They cost us nothing.
You can't compare the era when Trumps parents came here to today's reality. Most of the uneducated illegal workers will probably loose their jobs with the increasing automation. We could get stuck with paying for their welfare,medical etc for a very long time.
Let's keep them out and let's educate our own underclass. They deserve better
23
Sure, now that he used “chain migration” to get his skill-less in-laws in, the door can get slammed on everyone else. Absolutely as hypocritical as one would expect.
7
From the far left...Bravo on Trump's plan
21
It's interesting to read the comments here which display no understanding of the current immigration system, especially from people who have probably never been affected by it ever in their life. The current immigration system is completely broken and hands out greencards to people through family ties to those who have never set foot in USA their entire lives and quite many of them use the greencard for freebies especially healthcare benefits without ever paying taxes or paying minimal taxes. At the same time people who come here and work hard, pay taxes and are law abiding residents have to wait for years. If you are from India or China you can essentially forget about ever getting a greencard with the current system. People who like to give opinions on immigration system must make it a point to understand the current laws in totality. It's nice to be idealistic but turning a blind eye to the ground situation simply to oppose anything proposed by Trump is not stupid. Being naive yet opiniated is not harmless.
17
Do when will Melanie's parents and family be repatriated to their home country?
2
That is, AFTER Melania did this exact same thing with her own family.
5
You want to remember, these are the same people who think an “Einstein visa” for Melania was perfectly appropriate.
(This would be a major scandal for any other administration, but it’s hardly noticed amid Trump’s moral and ethical wasteland.)
6
What skills do Donald Trump and Jared Kushner possess? Would they be able to come into our country under these rules?
What about Melania's parents? Why were they recently granted citizenship? What are their skills?
I'm so tired of the hypocrisy.
8
Clearly he doesn't care about the pains of family separation. As a young chd, I waited more than five years to be reunited with my mother.
1
@tim Why would your mother abandon her child?
Love the part about passing a civics exam.
Wonder if citizens would be able to pass it?
2
The skills requirement sounds great until you look at the reality of the job market. As the Trumps know because they use the special work permits, the U.S. needs unskilled and semi-skilled workers for the hotel and hospitality industry, the home building industry (i.e. sheet-rocketing, landscaping) and food processing. Just who do you think is deboning all of those chickens you eat, guys with Ph D's? One of the quickest ways to deal with the problem of illegal immigration is to arrest the CEOs, CFOs, etc. of every company that ICE raids.
3
There is a double standard for the rich in all areas of American life. Poor immigrant? You are the devil trying to steal from us and turn us into a third world country. Rich immigrant? Come on in, please!
3
@ Benjo I’m confused. Do you think poor immigrants are better for this country than affluent immigrants? If so, then in what way are they better? Or do you think our immigrant policy is just a charity enterprise?
10
@KitKat Poor immigrants work.
1
This proposal is worthless. In fact, every proposed law and regulation is worthless at this point.
As long as anyone can simply walk across an open, undefended border, make a bogus asylum claim, and get a free, subsidized stay of three or more years, all regulations are meaningless. If someone lacks the necessary qualifications to immigrate, they will simply buy a $100 bus ticket from Honduras to the U.S. border and walk in uninvited.
Any proposal must first begin with border security, including:
1. An expanded physical border barrier as requested by the Customs and Border Patrol.
2. Changes to the asylum law and the addition of more judges to allow the rapid adjudication of cases and repatriation of those who are rejected.
3. Expanded holding facilities at the border and an end to catch and release
4. A formal Safe Third Party agreement with Mexico.
Once we can enforce the laws, we can make laws. In the meantime, we are simply a nation of suggestions.
12
Sure, permanent legal status/possible asylum claim. Exactly the same in your mind?
I’m sure Melania’s folks had sweet skills...
2
Question of the day:
Who is more filled with pathological hatred?
(1) Anti-immigrant zealots.
(2) Anti-abortion zealots.
2
@camorrista Answer of the day: Yes.
I venture to say two thirds of Congress, and the entire administration, couldn't pass a civics test.
8
This a Silicon Valley sponsored bill to displace American workers from US universities and STEM careers. It’s a Trojan horse. Slap tariffs on Chinese trinkets, but let Chinese nationals displace American students and STEM professionals by millions. Great idea, genius.
12
@True Norwegian ....sponsored bill to displace American workers from US universities and STEM careers.
Leaving those jobs unfilled or just filled by more qualified people ?
I'm sure this has already been stated by someone....but Melania's parents and sister came in through chain migration. There was no 'merit' there.
And, of course, Third Wife came in on a tourist visa and then worked, which is against the law.
Don't forget! Be Best! Oh, and if her husband starts a war with Iran, will Barron go when he's eighteen? Don't forget! Be Best!
4
Would Melania and her parents qualify? If not, they should consider leaving as a show of good faith.
3
I recall Melania got a genius visa, or was that a fraud.
1
Amber Moore,
I'm sure Melania would be more than happy to get away from Trump.
Maybe she's hoping that she'll be deported.
1
Remind me; Melania's merits and skills?
1
Her modelling skills must have been exceptional. She got the genius visa.
1
@Kalkat
She speaks 6 languages .... that's a pretty marketable skill.
5
@Catherine. That's what they claim, anyway. But English is one of those six languages and I'm not impressed.
2
Donald and Jared got their "merit" because of their affluent families. Not truly merit base. Immigrants especially the poor and unskilled are the genetic pool of talents. Darwin recognized it. Jared should know better.
1
so his in laws would have been banned?
deport all trump supporters. give them all 100k and ship them out.
1
A little late now that Trump's in-laws are here freeloading.
2
How exactly are those people aligned with American values? Like who would be more aligned with American values (whatever that means) than the family of Americans that want to join them here. Those are the people that will immediately find a community here in the US and would be provided with a previous introduction to what it means to live here. Someone that comes here simply because there is better pay will not contribute much more than helping our GDP. A person that does integrate would contribute a lot more
3
My partner, a Chinese, a dual master's degree holder from USC and London School of Economics, was rejected H1B last year (a visa for foreign workers with specialty occupations) because her six-figure-salary job does not meet the standard of "specialty occupation" even though she submited 400 pages of materials to prove the complexity of her position.
Numerous cases like this have happened or are happening since October 2016 around me. So, sorry to be biased as a foreign worker, I don't trust a single word in this article.
8
Why don't we educated our own kids, all of them. Our educational system is broken and broke. Richest nation in the world cannot afford to pay teaches a good wage or educate our kids decently.
6
Try and get an immigration visa somewhere decent other than the US, even with needed skills. It is not easy. This still sounds better than what most countries offer.
11
Helping those who need it most is what America is about.
Trump is governing the USA like he runs a business, only focusing on the bottom line. And we all know what happens to trump’s business ventures - belly up, bankrupt, kaput, defunct, corruption, fraud, etc.
Treating the people seeking help like assets and liabilities is the trump way, the inhumane way, the immoral way, the WRONG way.
Trump’s continued refusal to address effective solutions to the migrant movements and immigration processes is what labels him as an unfit leader in American government. He only offers ways to ban them, deport them, jail them, and worse - separate the parents from their kids.
These people coming to America are not our enemies. Yet our xenophobic president shoves them all into the same category - criminals. Yes, of course there are bad apples, just like any other group ... like in government for instance, where there are definitely bad apples.
A truly decent leader would make the changes necessary to help these people, isolate the bad apples, process the rest. Instead of just knee jerk deportation back into danger, find other places to help them.
We have to wait until 2021 for a truly decent leader, one that represents ALL Americans.
2
There is nothing unusual about this. Canada has two channels for immigration. The first one is less skilled people and that is not a path to citizenship. The other channel is for people that is based on skills that are needed and that one has a path to citizenship. Canada also is quick to deport illegal aliens. This has resulted in Canada taking in a higher per capita amount of immigrants. Sounds like a very good system to me.
21
Mr. Trump is fairly ignorant and it is no surprise that his attempts at policy are failures. He is short sighted, and currently focuses on people who can invest in his real estate projects and who can undermine professional staff that were educated in the US.
He cannot see one or two generations into the future, nor does he understand our country's history. We were not made great by importing wealthy landlords, we were made great because we accepted the daring underclass that yearned for a better life. Having family members here to help with the transition makes a lot of sense. Mr. Trump makes no sense.
fairly ignorant?
wow. that's all. wow.
The administration would "significantly increase the educational and skills requirements for people who are allowed to migrate to the United States, "
Such as Melania who was granted an Einstein Visa in 2001 (Nicknamed the "Einstein Visa", the EB-1 is in theory reserved for people who are highly acclaimed in their field - the government cites Pulitzer, Oscar, and Olympic winners as examples - as well as respected academic researchers and multinational executives.)
And becoming a citizen in 2006 gave her the right to sponsor her parents, Viktor and Amalija Knavs, who are now in the US and in the process of applying for citizenship. An example of "chain migraton" which Mr. Trump despises.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43256318
1
My grandmother is a first gen legal immigrant. she barely had any education, but her Father was a doctor. She works at a hospital in the house keeping department and is the hardest worker I've ever known, and she just turned 70. to get the job, she wrote that she graduated High School and there's really no way to background check people with these kind of skills from their native country, what if someone lied about graduating college? Also, wasn't the point to hire people to do jobs that us entitled Americans aren't willing to do? This is just a racist policy being Implemented by that racist Stephen Miller and other people who think like him, " if you can speak English, get out!" yeah, those kind of people.
@Jay Americans don't want to do those jobs at those wages. It's not a hundred years ago when all you needed was a strong back. Times change. So should our immigration laws.
5
At the next press gaggle, please, reporters, ask Trump questions from the current Citizenship Exam.
Perhaps Trump is not as bad as he is painted to be. At least not all his ideas. Just for a comparison: A few days ago, the NYT was touting the compassion and approach to immigrants by NZ prime minister, Jacinda Ardern. Just so you know, my liberal co-readers, your NZ hero, Ardern, strongly supports skill-based immigration system already in place in NZ, and this system is much stricter than what Trump proposes. In fact, her government has been scaling down immigration and a particular push has been toward making sure that people with low level skills and education are not allowed to migrate. English tests are mandatory. Family-based immigration is possible here only within reasonable boundaries. For example, a NZ citizen can bring a spouse, but can make only two applications like this in a lifetime. Even if you adopt a child overseas, if the Immigration NZ finds out that this child has a health problem (e.g., diabetes), you won't be allowed to bring this child over. So what Trump proposes is not different from what leftists promote globally. Perhaps this is the reason why he was able to get so much support from Obama and Sanders voters. This left-wing anti-immigration ideology is part of the classical DEM agenda from earlier decades that Trump successfully employed to siphon out votes from the Democratic party. If DEM politicians showed interest in Trump's immigration reforms, they'd see the voters who 'betrayed' them in the last presidential election be 'blue' again.
16
Unfortunately many of the comments here are facetious. A shift to merit based immigration in the USA is long overdue and needed. I've applied for positions in other developed countries, and you need to be able to "check the boxes" to get in. USA should do the same. There is simply no need to import unskilled citizens.
Comments about existing US citizens not being willing to do agricultural or physical labor are not relevant to citizenship-granting immigration programs. A robust GUEST worker program is needed for this. All those shiny buildings in Dubai and Doha were not built by those countries' citizens. They were built by hundreds of thousands of guest laborers from poorer countries who were not granted citizenship there.
339
But guest workers do end up staying. Look at Germany.
11
As a Canadian I can confirm this message. Indeed many immigrants coming to Canada without skills and/or English/French language skills end up feeling marginalized, can draw upon Canada’s Resources, not ever really get to contribute to Canada, and it ends up being a lose-lose situation. Much as I dislike many things about this Administration, this seems reasonable.
73
@Chris Canuck
But many of the posts say that Canada has a "skill based" approach (whatever that means exactly) and for that reason we should adopt Trump's proposal. It would be helpful to have some specific about what people mean by "skill based" approaches in Canada, Australia and elsewhere, since a lot of commenters are relied on these general comparisons.
12
This is truly a pro-immigration, progressive proposal.
Progress means to move forward. Our current family-based immigration policy is regressive, designed for an 1880’s manufacturing economy.
This plan is designed for the next 100 years, not the last 100 years. It will enable us to skim the best and brightest people from around the world. It will strengthen the U.S. position in today’s global information economy.
This is something that Democrats and Republican should both embrace.
27
The plan is unconstitutional. English is not the official language of the United States, and thus can make a prejudicial and hence arbitrary determination based on language. So this is just pure politics.
2
@Not Pierre Oh, jeez, not that old rant. Fine, let's make English the official language of the United States, as it should be!
1
I hate to point this out, as my father is a naturalized citizen who came as a highly-skilled immigrant, but doesn’t this mean there will be fewer high-skill jobs for American-born citizens—who are generally less-qualified than highly-skilled immigrants? Will American-born citizens really be ok doing menial labor?
98
@Brooklyneer Whether or not they are more qualified than American-born citizens, importing more high-skilled workers will exert downward pressure on high-skilled jobs. There is already a huge waiting list for H1B jobs. What do you think will happen when the new batch of immigrants consists of low-cost software engineers, nurses, and other white-collar professionals?
20
@Brooklyneer
There isn't going to be that much of an increase in high skill immigration overall and those are the people that can best handle competition vs non college graduates.
1
@Marcus Aurelius
This isn't about lazy people collecting "government handouts.". It's about pay being driven downward in skilled occupations.
9
“...new opportunities for immigrants who have specific skills or job offers to work in the United States, provided that they can demonstrate English proficiency, educational attainment and pass a civics exam.”
I’m not an expert in these things, but one might suspect that a nation is unlikely to receive many [willing] immigrants who happen to possess the very skills that it has demonstrated itself to be baffling hostility towards.
We’re either a land of immigrants, or a land of fairly unrepentant mass murderers. The shades of gray are remarkably limited.
Let's put our prejudices against Mr. Trump aside, and recognize that a skills- and needs-based immigration policy is long overdue.
43
I thought Melania’s pop was a communist onion farmer from Slovenia. We have a shortage of that???
What did the mom bring to the table? Our First Lady got in on a genius visa.
Something stinks and it ain’t the onions.
9
This proposed policy is far above the immoral and unfair policy we have now. It's immoral because it breaks the law and theoretically the law should be modified or obeyed. Its unfair because it favors illegals above and beyond the individuals who follow legal immigration rules and policy.
Plus Trumps plan to fly illegals to San Francisco is brilliant!
11
He got his in-laws in on family migration, so he doesn't need it anymore.
5
Funny how all those "progressives" wailing about how they want us to be like European nations, are so quick to reject the immigration system those countries have had in place for decades.
Our current system of immigration may have served us well when our country was a vast untamed wilderness and the economy was largely driven by unskilled labor. However in this era of technology with overcrowded cities and a crisis of affordable, housing, education and healthcare, the perpetual mass importation of uneducated, unskilled foreigners does us no favors.
53
I detest this administration and recognize that our broken electoral system has given us a minority government twice in less than 20 years but I agree with most of this policy. Immigration should be a mix of skills-based and humanitarian based. Most nations are like that. There also should be a guest worker visa program because many low skilled jobs go unfilled. However there should be safeguards to prevent abuse by employers who would hire immigrants to pay them less than US citizens. Before hiring for a high paying job with a visa they need to prove there are no citizens or legal residents available for such job.
4
Sounds like a scheme to get cheap labor for otherwise well-paying US jobs.
This is worse than the family-based immigration. At least those immigrants don’t take jobs that Americans pay thousands of dollars for college to get.
2
About time. Get rid of birthright citizenship and over haul our antiquated asylum laws and we may finally be making some progress. The democrats oppose this common sense approach at their peril.
36
Skill-based is a nice way of saying that more US jobs will be given over to lower-wage immigrants. We don't need large scale immigration to the US.
5
For all his bluster and tantrums, pointing fingers at Democrats, and scare tactics, Trump cannot produce a comprehensive immigration plan.
2
A skills based immigration system would be an important achievement and to the great benefit of this country. “What benefits America” is the immigration question that should always be asked in the ordinary course. For too long, too many immigrants from around the world have been denied entry because of a system that is overloaded with illegal immigration coming through our Southern border.
I’ve been surprised that more non-Hispanic ethnic groups haven’t spoken up about the disadvantages in gaining entry they have as a result of a illegal Latino immigration. A move toward meritocracy is something Asians and Europeans immigrants should rally around.
23
White collar 'in-sourcing', coming soon to a city near you.
We can all become self-employed temps. and adjuncts.
Brought to you by those for the neo-colonization of the the US.
3
Trump’s supporters should have to prove their education and skills to be allowed to vote.
6
When and where will this end? Everyday, a major US institution is slotted for drastic change seemingly decided upon by the GOP (Greedy Old Party) in the WH. Trump and Kushner (who only knows how to cheat his tenants) seem to glory in creating inhumane and devastating conditions for large swaths of the US population. What a mockery they have made of the country.
5
Tell that to my grandfather, who immigrated to Boston in the 1890s from Galway in Ireland. He had no skills and no h.s. diploma. Yet he worked hard (grave-digger, brick-layer, factory hand), bought a house, sent his two daughters to college, and loved America. Without people like him, this country is finished.
219
@Christopher B. Daly
I bet he had absolutely no expectations of free housing, free food and free healthcare.
Am I right?
40
@Christopher B. Daly Trump wants a White America from 1860; where women and people of color had zero power. Trump is chipping away at Democracy. You better speak up; or; be forever silent. Ray Sipe
16
@Christopher B. Daly. The era of an empty continent in need of unskilled labor ended a century plus ago. The planet and this country are now awash in people and unskilled labor and there is no end of that in sight.
69
It's discriminatory and racist. It's xenophobic. It's un-American.
How many of our forebears would have been kept out? I wouldn't be here today if these proposed requirements were in force when my great-grandfathers emigrated here from Italy and northern England. My English ancestor was a skilled carpenter; would that have been enough?
Do we only let in white people with privilege? What's coming demographically can't be stopped at the border with legislation. In a matter of decades, whites will not be the majority any more; a plurality only.
1
@Mark You're also referring to people who came here legally, like my mother's grandfather did.
If enacted, this policy might more closely represent that of Canada, which has four categories - family class, economic immigrants (skilled workers and business people), refugees, and a category called humanitarian.
It's hard to say whether this proposal, if enacted, will be a benefit or a deficit to the nation, but it would be nice to have something - finally - clear and defined.
7
This sums up Canadas immigration process minus the liberal rhetoric. Canada admits Immigrants by a point system based on skills, resources and language ability. why was that left out of the article. Immigration is supposed to benefit the country who is receiving these individuals. Why is that so controversial?
47
Moving more toward skilled based immigration is a very good way to update our immigration laws. There is nothing wrong with it, provided we still have fairness and accept people who genuinely seek asylum along with a measured number of economic refugees. But the situation we have now is not working. Nobody should ignore the laws of a country and think it's preferable to pay smugglers $10,000 to sneak in and work off the books. That has kept a lot of businesses from increasing their wages and job conditions, when they can get illegals to work for them. I also read comments about people coming in having gratitude. I see instead more sense of entitlement and using ways to abuse our laws such as bringing children to use as passports. Yes, I think it's a good idea to reform our immigration laws provided it be fair, wise and not discriminatory which is why it must be a bi-partisan thing, and the Democrats should NOT reject this talking point out of hand. We should also be wise with border security and maintain our resolve when it comes to those who violate our immigration laws. My grandparents learned English, in fact they were so pleased to be in the new country, even in the midst of the Great Depression, and half of my uncles served in WW2. I see nothing wrong or mean about immigrants having to learn English.
26
They DO learn English! Just like they did 119 years ago. The process is the same. The parents learn what they can do they can work. It’s not standard English because they’re learning on the go and from the media (unavailable in 1900). It’s their kids and grandkids who become successfully bilingual, get their educations and become Americans; just like Those People did from Woodrow Wilson’s less desirable places in Europe.
1
@RDG No they don't. They rely on their anchor babies to translate. There is an illegal guy from Mexico in Seattle who took refuge in a church here who was to be deported (there is also another illegal guy from Mexico there who's been there for months.) This latest guy had a painting company for over 25 years here and STILL needed a translator for his sob story on the news!
1
Will President Trump go forward with trying to legislate his son-in-law's immigration bill, which he'll unroll tomorrow in a Rose Garden address? If so, that bill will fail, as Trump's bill to repeal President Obama's Affordable Care Act failed.
Mr. Kushner, Trump's White House Senior Advisor, has created a plan that doesn't address most of the pressing immigration concerns in America today. Kushner's plan features merit-based, educational and skills-based requirements for all people who will be allowed to apply to immigrate to the U.S. These immigrants must demonstrate proficiency in English, American civics, educational attainment.
And not a single provision in the Kushner/Trump bill for DACA, the "Dreamers" who were born before their undocumented parents came here and who were brought up from early childhood here in the U.S. Chain-migrations will be curtailed, though Mr. Trump's wife's family became U,S. citizens through her chain-migration from Slovenia.
Construction of Trump's border wall is the sine qua non of the new immigration plan. Separation of families at the border will still occur. Migrants lacking education, skills, and English, and from certain countries and faiths won't be allowed to apply for admission to the United States. So much for liberty and justice for all.
Chances are slim to none that Mr. Trump's and Mr. Kushner's unacceptable plan will make it to legislation anytime soon.
1
I really don't understand this policy. First, educated and skilled workers would be less inclined to come if they have to leave their families behind. Second, wouldn't this just increase remittances? Instead of these immigrants trying to integrate into American society, they'd work until their visa ran out and return home, meaning they wouldn't be inclined to invest in and strengthen their community. Then again, I realize this administration is incapable of drafting coherent, well thought out policies.
128
@Bob
Canada has a skills based system and has an excess of applicants.
11
@kwb Actually, Canada has moved away from the skills based system to an employer sponsorship system (they're not the same), but both are worth learning from to improve our wacky system.
14
@Bob, I am a skilled immigrant (PhD in Engg) and received my citizenship after a long multi-year process. I know many others like me who would have liked to stay here but returned home because the path to a green card was so long (decades long). If Trump's proposal addresses the long wait times for skilled immigrants then many more people would choose to stay...whether that's what Americans want that's another discussion. A skills based immigration system is long overdue. Based on this article, Trump seems to have a very fair proposal.
17
What skills did the immigrant Trump family bring to the U.S.? If none, could we to send all their descendants back under the proposed changes in the law?
Total annual "green cards" -- keep at one million -- Good.
Change the "mix"? Let everybody duke it out in Congress.
Increase the total annual "green cards"? - No.
Bundle the "package" with amnesty? No.
Not for Dreamers.
Not for anyone else.
No deal is better than a bad deal.
No deal "fallout"?
Take it to the voters in November 2020.
3
Times you should also mention in the immigration debate the race hatred killings and violence increase by predominate white Christians. Or at least mention the race violence increase since the president signaled his support. We have militias kidnapping people at gun point and rally’s where Trump nudges his audience for a comment such as shooting immigrants at the border.
1
And this comes from the party that is all about "family values" –hypocrites.
4
@dmm I think you meant to say "American family values".
Hilarious. Meanwhile, my company still can't hire foreign PhDs who were trained on the US tax payer dime (~$500K) thanks to the oh so brilliant H1B cap restrictions. But let's limit immigration to the highly skilled? Paradox anyone?
I know that literally no one in this administration thinks through anything. I'm sure it's even commonplace to see these clowns ordering hot soup with a side ice cream for lunch at the Rayburn cafeteria. But everything they come up with just seems like they're throwing darts at a cork board with random words pinned to it.
5
Let's hope the requirements aren't retroactive.
Melania would have to go back to school.
4
I wonder if Trump could pass a civics exam.
4
Oh leave it to those self righteous pills, Jared and Stephen Miller, the grandsons of Holocaust survivors to completely forget their own family history in getting here.
The sainted Rae Kushner must be cursing Jared for his betrayal. Last I checked, neither of his paternal grandparents would have been admitted to the US under the proposed standards. The upside is, we wouldn’t have the felon Charlie and Jared here either.
3
Doesn't this go against jobs for Americans when your qualifications for entry is your skill to fill a job?
1
Melania Trump dropped out of a foreign university after a year.....does that count for citizenship? Never mind “skill” in any other area.
5
So, the author of Trump's final solution and his sidekick Prince Jared, with all of the wisdom they have gained at their young ages, have concocted one of the most repressive and racist programs I have not seen since the days of George Wallace.
3
Admitting highly skilled workers is a fine idea, but who's going to mow the lawns and wait tables at Mar-a-Lago? And pick fruits and vegetables in California? And do a million other jobs that "unskilled" laborers do because American citizens won't do those jobs themselves?
7
Good luck recruiting highly skilled professionals if they can't bring their families.
7
Should this selective merit -associated policy be preceded or followed by merit-based election /selection of ALL policymakers? Everywhere!
1
Isn’t this the same approach to immigration policy that every other developed country has?
I looked into fleeing this country when Al Gore decided not to even try to fight for the climate and on our behalf for the WH and again when Trump was elected. Am I remembering incorrectly that other countries demand fluency in their language, the equivalent of hundreds of thousands in savings, plus a job offer in hand?
7
@Lilly you are remembering incorrectly - Canada Australia New Zealand all take in people using a points based system. Points are allocated based on education, fluency in English/French, and having family including extended family in the country. Points are also given to people with needed skill sets such as hair dressers or bus drivers or whatever they are in need of. So these developed countries have holistic policies!
2
Currently 65% of all immigrants in the US have come from family based (chain) migration. We have 45 million immigrants in the US - 4 times more than the next closest country which is Saudi Arabia at just over 12 million. Under the current system we allow immigrants to sponsor grown sons and daughters (and their children), siblings (and their children), parents (and their relatives), and new spouses (and their relatives). Half of all our immigrants are limited English proficient. Seems perfectly reasonable to me that we start to reduce the amount of family based immigrants and replace them with skills based immigrants.
12
It would be wonderful if this administration solved the problems as they are instead of pivoting away and solving a problem that is less urgent. We live in a world where humanitarian crises have become the norm. Does our president try to work on that? No. He encourages the type of autocratic leaders from which refugees flee. The problem at the border was a backlog of court cases, so what does this administration do? Tries to reduce the number of judges to hear their cases and build grotesque prisons/kennels to hold people until their cases can be heard while separating children from their families. That's not solving a problem, that's compounding it.
This new set of quotas is another round of historical laws meant to keep people out, not because we don't have room (I live in a very rural area that could use some immigrants!), but because some people don't like the people coming in. That's not policy, it's bigotry.
its a proposal. I can tell everyone for certain its not going any where. McConnell doesn't want to even bring up immigration or health care in the senate, he knows that getting members of his own party to agree on much of anything is a problem in it self. The House will laugh at it. So its another DOA for both houses of Congress.
1
Apparently for Melinoma at least knowing a few phrases in a language equals being fluent in them. Her parents were card carrying members of the communist party, I guess that’s a asset too.
4
Finally an immigration plan, which will bring in immigrants willing and capable to work in high skill areas.
As an legal highly skilled immigrant I had to navigate a whole decade of my life to finally get my green card.
It is high time American immigration system shortens the number of years a skilled immigrant spends in immigration limbo.
I for one applaud the Trump White House for a long awaited immigration over haul which will surely push America towards further prosperity.
73
But if members of their family (like kids and spouses) aren't deemed as skilled enough, they'd have to just deal with that? Seems fair
1
@Eric
Kids and spouses are included in this plan, just extended family isn’t. Learn a bit more before commenting.
9
Jagoff: As I understand it, it’s limited to the immediate nuclear family. That excludes the grandparents. More than a little hypocritical (see Melania’s parents, the grandparents of Barron Trump).
If the admin wants to focus on skills, let's focus on some of the job categories that have been most difficult to fill. Farm-based skills would be one. Restaurant-based skills would be another (especially in the San Francisco Bay Area, where restaurants close because they can't find workers).
4
@Wayne Cunningham Would you consider a guest worker program if it was fairly and equitably run? (That's a tall order, I know). As it is, those who are willing to take lower-skilled jobs, particularly if they're undocumented, often lack labor protections that used to be taken for granted. I say "used to be," because decades and decades of progress (in unions, in OSHA rules, etc) seem to vanish when a source of cheap and easily exploited labor appears -- so we have young men who wield pesticides for realtors with no masks or gloves; twelve-hour dishwashing shifts, men who lift back-breaking loads on construction sites, etc. A few years ago, NPR reported on one of the "Day without Immigrants" protests. They interviewed a business owner who explained how reliable his workers were and how he depended on; it then transpired that he paid them under minimum wage. I don't think that's okay, and I'm sure most Times readers and commenters don't think so either -- but while many commenters point out the need for people to fill such jobs, they don't often address the exploitation that takes place.
2
@Wayne Cunningham
Restaurants in San Francisco close because their food is horrible and/or they can't afford the high overhead such as rent and utilities and the $15/hour minimum wage.
BTW- Some of the most expensive restaurants in the world are located in San Francisco and they are doing just fine!
3
They cannot find 1.00/hr employment shared tips, you mean.
3
I wonder if Jared Kushner's or Steven Miller's ancestors who immigrated here from Europe to escape persecution and the Holocaust had great language skills or extensive education??? My guess is NO- and guess what? a couple of generations later Jared and Steven attended the elite schools of Harvard and Duke....imagine that...and imagine that is indeed possible for the children or grandchildren of current immigrants that might only speak Spanish or Chinese or Vietnamese and who have limited education BUT are here (or want to come here) so their kids can achieve like Miller and Kushner. That is the American Dream....and those two self important yutz's are lacking with empathy or self awareness to make sure that they "pay it forward" to those that want the same thing for their family. What a disgrace. America is already great because of our history. Trump et al are destroying that.
54
Lo, it's the 21st Century!
4
@R - I see your point....However, our country is starting to lose out from a technology standpoint...Many countries: Canada, Japan, Germany and so many others base their immigration on skills not family and they absolutely do not suffer from the added cost of welfare, crime and related issues. I don't want my country to lose out...Let the countries of origin deal with families - I want the best...
5
@R They came here legally and did not cross the borders illegally or overstay their visas. Do you not know the difference between doing it legally and illegally?
5
Skills? Gee guess Melania’s parents would not have gotten in.
12
The educated and skilled of the world are already showing less interest in coming to America because of the backward policies of this Administration.
442
@BlueHaven Where did you pull this "fact" from? Please provide a non partisan source confirming your "fact".
21
@BlueHaventhere is absolutely no evidence of that. The u.s. Remains the number one destination of everybody on earth. That's why our laws have to be overhauled..
11
@Bill - Why would the Admin's 'preferred' people from Western and Northern Europe come to the US? To leave behind a functioning society with a functioning safety net for the dysfunction that the GOTP is causing?
20
The best immigration proposal* I have seen has little of what Trump seems to be recommending and has new ideas that never see the light of day in most immigration discussions.
* Found in "How Many is Too Many? The Progressive Argument fro reducing Immigration into the US" by Philip Cafaro.
In this case, he should give back the children he stole and sold to Betsy De Vos. Too bad so many of them are dead now, and of course there are the kids who have been psychologically maimed for life by routine sexual abuse while in prison. But hey hey - there was money to be made.
Notice the bombardment of “decisions” spewing from DJT.
These are distractions.
This is political and policy thrashing.
He has no plan.
He has no core objectives and goals.
DJT is filling the DC pipeline and media channels with nonsense to keep people occupied- distracted.
How about those tax returns?
They are on the way... and DJT knows it!
Don’t be distracted!
16
Melania’s parents recently became citizens based on family unity - just in time
11
People who emigrated to the US with 0 "skills":
:Sergey Brin
:Andy Grove
:Jan Koum
:Andrew Ly
:Elon Musk
:Jerry Yang
:Joseph Pulitzer
:Levi Strauss
:Madeleine Albright
:Steve Chen & Jawad Karim
:Elie Wiesel
:John Muir
:Irving Berlin
:Rita Moreno
:Eddie Van Halen
:Joni Mitchell
And too many others to mention.
27
@Nunyya....yes quite right....but have you seen the list of criminals who enter our country with zero skills....I believe it's 10 times longer...
9
@Nunyya I agree and they came here legally. There is a difference between legal and illegal or don't you know.
7
@DP Debunked a thousand times over. But keep beating that drum there guy.
9
Melania Trump obtained US citizenship on a visa reserved for immigrants with "extraordinary ability" and "sustained national and international acclaim" ; the "Einstein Visa". She was approved in 2001, one of five people from Slovenia to win the visa that year. Becoming a citizen in 2006 gave her the right to sponsor her parents. They became citizens in 2018, under the family-based immigration program the president has dubbed "chain migration." It seems that none of this would be possible under Kushner’s proposal.
15
This is good news for those who want to get a green card purely on education and professional skills , who have been waiting for 15 years for a green card while paying taxes and being in status in this country. While the family based people cant even speak a word of english. So family and professional paths for green card should be treated separately. Let the family based green cards go to another pool of priority dates.
12
I highly doubt that Trump could pass a civics exam, given how he is trampling all over the Constitution.
9
Anyone can take the test to become a citizen as an exercise. Maybe you could send one down to DC addressed to the grate man himself.
1
Climate change is real and it is going to hurt every person on this planet. We do not need more people in this country- no matter how skilled they are.
I beg my fellow citizens: stop this madness. We take in a million legal immigrants every year and take two to three million illegal immigrants. Every single year.
It has got to stop. The United States should not be the dumping ground of the world's excess population. We face a bleak future- every additional immigrant is another nail in our collective coffin.
In the coming century it will be countries will fewer people that will be the most prosperous.
21
Your second to last paragraph could have been written by Woodrow Wilson 120 years ago and by all the nativists who followed until they passed the bigoted 1924 Immigration Act. A classic case of Talleyrand’s subjects “remembering everything and learning nothing.” There’s “room”. Not for ALL the millions who want in. But there’s work to be done and we could some of Those People willing to work hard and morph their families into Americans.
2
Trump is already quietly doing this with the form DS-5535 he introduced in 2017 as part of "extreme vetting." Since 2017 there has been a 34% increase in immigrant visa denials under section 221G. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/24/opinion/schulman-immigration-extreme-vetting-ds5535.html
@MS AWESOME ! Finally somebody is attempting to do something about this...I wish they could stop the anchor baby issue as well.
4
Hopefully, as proposed, said policy will have a retroactive component to it. Then we can start the process of deporting the FLOTUS and her parents!
6
When the first immigrants came to the USA they came for a better life. Our immigration policy benefited people.
Now we are changing our immigration policy to benefit only corporations by allowing only people with certain skills.
Corporations that cannot hire people with certain skills should either re-train their existing employees or pay better wages so that it will be worth while for US citizens to train for that job.
Don't complain when you employer tells you need to train your replacement from China, India, Vietnam, etc...
7
Trump is going to win 2020 because of this issue. Even though he doesn't have a good answer either. And in spite of the fact that he is out of his mind and everyone knows it.
6
This new proposal is smart, warranted, and should be supported by all who wish to see the country flourish in the 21st century. People criticizing it based on the idea that Melania or Trump's ancestors wouldn't qualify under the new conditions aren't addressing the fact that the country's needs have changed dramatically in the last century and our immigration policies should reflect those changes. There was not a generous safety net system in the past - if you didn't work, you didn't eat. The concept of "unemployment" doesn't apply to the kind of agrarian society many of our ancestors lived in when they immigrated to the US.
Today's economy is different, and we need people with skills who can help us compete against countries like China. Unchecked low-skilled immigration tears at the social fabric, places burdens on taxpayers and school systems, and (most importantly) forces working class citizens to compete against the poor of the world.
40
"Currently, about 12 percent of immigrants qualify based on their skills, while more than half are given permission to enter the United States because of a family connection. Under Mr. Trump’s proposal, those numbers would be reversed, with nearly 60 percent of all visas going to immigrants with particular skills or offers of employment."
So what's the problem? I think this is a great idea and I am as liberal as they get! Just so you know- I am ashamed Trump is our President and I disagree with him on everything except immigration. I'll vote for him in 2020 just because he is finally willing to do something other than "amnesty" .. If amnesty is such a great idea then why don't Democrats run on it? In fact- They never even mention it!
34
@Aaron: You would vote for Trump in 2020 no matter what.
3
@Aaron, Oh they LOVE their DACA, DACA, DACAs, yes they do. But it basically just gets people upset to mention it anymore. Trump bait or endorsement.
BTW, just whereabouts are those millions of DACAs AND their parents hanging these days?
2
Today IT is about immigrants.
Yesterday it was about trade.
And the “pros” and “cons” continue.
More or less; daily.
Talking AT,m; rarely if ever WITH.
When will “personal accountability’s” time come?
When will being personally responsibility, for voiced and written harmful words, and
done-deeds be on the agenda of
elected and selected policymakers?
At all levels. Everywhere.
When will toxic complacency about..., as
well as active complicity in...,
BE no more than descriptive words in a welcoming-menschlich-world?
I don't know if Justice Ginsburg's grandparents got in based on skill when they immigrated from Austria Hungary in 1907. It's not about immigrants skills, but their children and grandchildren are often high achievers. This policy is short sighted. You never know which immigrant family will have kids and grandkids who end up as top scientists, judges, engineers and inventors.
183
@Letitia Jeavons
You never know which ones will join organized crime or drug gangs, either.
19
@Letitia Jeavons--- well be that as it may ...I am counting (hoping) that skilled/intelligent immigrants will likely have children that contribute quickly without being on the public dole. (again, I hope)....
6
@Letitia Jeavons
Aren't all of Kushner's policies short sighted?
7
"..provided that they can demonstrate English proficiency, educational attainment and pass a civics exam."
Is this a new requirement for a high-school diploma?
4
@Thomas Payne
It certainly should be for the Los Angeles Unified School District! 65% of whom are illegal or the children of illegal parents.
2
@Thomas Payne, I'd like to see presidential candidates be required to prove their literacy and their ability to compose a coherent paragraph, and to demonstrate knowledge of the Constitution of the United States.
1
And what educational skills exactly, would Trump bring if he came in this way?
2
@jb Caddying, shoe shiners and beverage cart and greens services.
2
It is about time. Flooding the schools in NY, TX, and CA with non-English speaking kids from uneducated backgrounds has been devastating to education. Bringing in low-skilled people to bolster an aging population is a giant Ponzi scheme. What happens when they get old? Wages of low-skilled jobs have gone down proportionally and a 40 hour week can’t even start to support a family. And as a physician I see the astronomical health care costs that are carried by everyone else. It usually takes a few generations to get up to speed on educational attainment.
70
So no more “chain migration,” like that which brought the former-communist-bureaucrat father of Trump’s current wife? And no more guys from small German villages whose only “skill” is setting up brothels in Alaska (like Fred T’s Father)?
And Trump’s “biggest loser” financial record would hardly qualify him for entry....
15
I hope this passes.
15
And Melania's parents skills?
9
Send America you best educated to compete with our heavily indebted students. Yeah! that sounds like MAGA.
8
Merit based immigration will drive down wages for white collar jobs
Corporate America wants us all to be Uber drivers, no benefits, stagnant wages and no stability
An influx of educated, skilled foreigners willing to work for less will displace our own college grads and make it more difficult for American students to place into US schools
226
@Deirdre Are you fine with the current system which forces America's working class to compete with world's poor? Right now, people with college degrees are effectively insulated from the type of competition our construction workers, landscapers, and dishwashers face from low skill immigration. Liberals dismiss the concerns of those voters by saying their anxiety is rooted in racism and xenophobia.
41
@Kirby-Completely untrue. People coming out of college today are up there eyeballs in debt and wages are being driven down by HB1 Visas.
We have a massive shortage in people with trade skills in construction.
21
You don’t see the race tensions and violence? You act like they are a burden when they are not. You assist in rounding people up who have lived here for decades and paid on with nothing back for them. You amount crossing the border to a major crime like murder when it’s more like a speeding ticket in a system that makes up rules and blocks all roads when it suits their politics.
I’m sorry but race bigotry is what is driving this. And if you support Trump who is a racist you are one as well. That’s the reality.
9
Haven’t seen any better solutions from Democrats or Liberals. Feel free to try.
20
Time to remove that plaque with the Emma Lazarus poem from the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. In fact, maybe France should take it back.
2
@jagoff
Maybe the house should legislate it since they represent the majority of Americans and not the minority.
Its a shame Trump has sincere (though soulless) people that think they are actually doing something important and valuable when their capricious boss can flip on a gnat's whisper and send them scurrying back into their hiding places.
1
I think this may be a step in the right direction, but we need to evaluate and re-balance per-country caps to ensure diversity. When we see some visas - such as the H1b being flooded with workers from only a few countries a change to the criteria can reduce diversity.
13
@Margo Hmmm... lets talk country caps, since you opened the discussion and seem to be claiming knowledge of this factor in the US immigration system.
There are only 65,000 H1Bs issued every year... with others leaving and renewing, the estimated number of people on H1Bs is less than 0.5% of the US population. Country caps don't apply to H1Bs, but they DO apply to permanent residency (green-cards). Each country has the exact same cap--so India and China get the same cap as Ireland and Norway. This leads to people from larger population countries, regardless of how qualified and assimilated they are to have long wait times--I believe those with Masters degrees from India who have Already Been Approved for permanent residency have an over 50 year wait to actually *get* it, while a HS grad from Norway can get their greencard within a year, if they qualify and have someone to sponsor them (through employment or US family connections). Also, countries that are "oversubscribed" (i.e. with "too many" qualified candidates with approvals seeing their american dreams wither away while they wait in line) also don't get to apply for the diversity lottery.
So my question to you is... what exactly do you mean by diversity? As in, to reflect the white-dominant demographics of colonial Europe and America, or the color-dominated demographics of the world?
why not assure FAIR economic policies around the globe?
- if the outrageously deep & wide divide between rich & poor
were narrowed significantly,
- if the insatiable "global north" moderated its hunger & thirst
for resources extricable - even via wars - in the global "south",
- if food speculation, land grabbing, monocultures, biopiracy,
and modern slavery were ended,
- if corruption were eradicated, debt relief granted,
- if CON_descension made way for eye-level respect among
the peoples [and for the natural habitats] of this earth ... *)
people would stay in their home countries and migrate,
i.e. TRAVEL [with visas where needed] out of pure curiosity.
not out of utter misery and despair.
_____________
*) not to forget climate change and disaster displacement.
1
From my POV the guy that does my landscaping is way more important than the guy who comes up with a way to track me on my phone or figures out how to drop a bomb from a drone on a house from 10,000 miles away.
18
@HL
Perhaps the time is over for helping wealthy people pay less for landscapers.
8
@Jagoff- I'm okay with that. I have no problem doing my landscaping, plumbing and painting. I'm not okay on who decides what's an essential skill.
The question is do we want immigrants or not and how many. Not who's job is outsourced to immigrants based on skills that are picked based on politics.
If a guy wants to come her from Guatemala and work hard, assimilate and become a citizen why should he or she be knocked out for someone Google may want to hire to come up with advanced ways to spam me?
4
@HL As long as they are legal !
2
Isn’t it ironic that quite possibly the biggest beneficiaries of nepotism and least qualified public servants in modern history (Trump and Kushner) are imposing a skills and qualification requirement for immigration, and eliminating family connection, chain migration? It’s malevolent incompetence and bad faith policy at its very worst.
24
Trump is an American Hero. Finally, we have a President who gets it. The United States was not founded to be the dumping ground for the world’s undesirables. While this truth may be offensive to some people, it is still the truth.
If the objective of an immigration policy is to bring the United States down to the level of every 3rd world country, then Trump is wrong. But if the objective is to keep America a world leader, we should have an immigration policy that welcomes only those people who can sustain American values. Otherwise, it’s a race to the bottom.
9
@Samara Who are you kidding? Trump policies, generally, are degrading US society, education, science, environment, etc. -- in short, he is responsible for putting the US on a trajectory to become a 3rd World country!
2
American values? What exactly does that mean? These people work hard so we don’t want them now? Why can’t Americans work hard and do that work? Saying it doesn’t pay enough sounds like they are lazy.
1
@Mathias
If the shoe fits, wear it.
Wow, reading the remarks supporting skills based immigration was an eye opener for me. My question is how do we exclude people from countries that don’t allow access to education or education isn’t available? If only our politicians could just produce a bipartisan, fair immigration policy, for once. If they can’t come up with a process, then they shouldn’t get paid. I support results based terms for our politicians, if they won’t work together then there will only be one term allowed.
4
I don't like educational requirements - so many have come to our country with little education or money - because of the hidebound social systems in their native countries, they were shut out of opportunity. They came here, worked hard, sent their kids to school - and many of their descendants have made contributions to the US and the world far beyond what they ever would have had they not been allowed the opportunity the US offers.
267
@Wesley
You would prefer the “I have a 2nd cousin there” system over personal achievement. Got it.
15
@Jagoff Second cousins cannot be sponsored for immigration. So not much of a put down.
7
@Wesley Agree. It's a significant "brain drain" or loss of resources that the home country has invested in its people to stay and contribute to their societies.
It's hard for me to believe it comes from the Trump Administration, but this is the kind of sensible immigration policy we need.
Democrats oppose skill-based immigration at their political peril. Anchor baby sympathy plays well on Democratic twitter but not with most real voters.
13
It is curious that the US would demand the passing of a civics test when the vast majority of Americans have absolutely no idea how their government function, the services is provides and how it is funded.
Low-skilled jobs are still jobs that need to be filled which Americans are too proud or lazy to do.
14
@Bullmoose Donald demonstrates daily that he could not pass a civics test.
1
Too late to apply to all the Central Americans who are now stealing across our southern border because we don't have a wall to keep them out. And because our border agents are simply overwhelmed by their numbers. But then again, I think about Kushner's forebears in Europe who did not meet with such restrictions when they wanted to come to our shores before and after WWII.
10
@Jack Kushner's family were Holocaust survivors (at least, some were). They were not admitted to the US before WW2. The US did not open its arms to Jewish refugees prior to and during the war; it did not expand the quota systems then in effect. FDR made this decision deliberately. As one example of US policy, you might look up the story of the MS St. Louis -- a boat filled with refugees who were refused entry to Cuba and the US. The boat went back to Europe; a quarter of those on board died in death camps.
5
Brush up on your history. If Kushner’s forebears tried to enter the country after 1924’s shameful Immigration Act, they met with a phalanx of restrictions. Many died in the 1930s and 1940s desperate to get in even with the unfilled, ethnically based “quotas”. Trump’s new wrinkle is his usual “only the Right People may enter” (we’re way past his appointing “only the best people “). No, everyone can’t come in but there are plenty of working type folks this country needs who are willing to put in the hard work and time to become Americans along with their kids. Bringing in only foreign elites and more SS St. Louis episodes is what we don’t need.
1
It isn't skilled/educated/professional immigrants we really need now. We need people willing to take the jobs U.S. citizens reject so that their children can become skilled/educated/professional.
Yes, do let in skilled/educated/professionals, but seek out a labor force willing to work at what we won't,
7
@Elaine Frankowski
" but seek out a labor force willing to work at what we won't"...at the slave ages being offered.
People always forget to finish that sentence. Must be a typo or something. Want to see those jobs filled really quick? Pay more.
11
@Elaine Frankowski
So we need more work competition for the poorest among us... so you skilled workers can pay less for your landscapers..., how thoughtful
2
Melania Trump was associated with Irene Marie Models and Trump Model Management.
Once she married Donald, she obtained US citizenship for apparently NOT working as a model anymore.
But a veteran named Miguel Perez who served two tours in Afghanistan, fighting for this country, was recently deported to Mexico.
He had
He was born in Mexico and legally came to this country at age 8. He had lived here since the age of 8 and fought for this country. But he had a drug conviction on his record for doing drugs after he came back from Afghanistan.
So under Trump's policies, he was escorted out of a sanctuary church he was living in by ICE officials and thrown out of the country.
His Senator, Tammy Duckworth stated: "At the very least, Miguel should have been able to exhaust all of his legal options before being rushed out of the country under a shroud of secrecy."
,
By the way, what qualifications did Trump award Melania's parents? Didn't they recently decide they wanted to live in this country?
10
Nothing from this administration is a sincere proposal. Obviously, Trump, Miller and company want Northern Hemisphere European's over Southern Hemisphere immigrants. Who will determine the skill-set that matches our country's future? I would say a caregiver for and aging population is needed. A farmer in California may need help at harvest. Trump is thinking different. Have we forgot the inscription on the base of the Statue of Liberty?
8
@Barton - sorry, but our country cannot determine a major aspect of domestic policy based on a sentimental poem that wasn't even there when the statue was erected. The country has long had various methods of deciding which immigrants to accept, and that's fine.
8
@DRS
You skipped the part about the various methods of deciding which immigrants to accept was driven by bigotry, racism, and ignorance. The Know Nothing Party kicked it off before the Civil War. Sadly, the Know Nothings are back in power today.
3
@DRS
If you can be honest and see the massive amount of racial bigotry supporting the immigration debate maybe we might have a conversation. But I agree with the statue of liberties values that I grew up with. Just because you disagree doesn’t invalidate those values you have thrown away.
1
This proposal makes sense. To ask whether it would have kept out this or that person in the past is beside the point. How many others were kept out that would have been let in and contributed? Besides, the nations needs today are what they were in 1910. As far the so-called "dreamers", deport them and let in an equal number or law abiding immigrants. We can reward the beneficiaries of a crime, which is what they are.
19
@DRS
What laws have the Dreamers broken?
4
@DRS
that's why T. was able to bring two wives, who then also brought their parents. hypocrisy!
6
@tim They are illegal. Sins of the fathers, right?
The emphasis on current skills is bogus. First of all, the ability to verify foreign qualifications is very limited, and fakery is very easy. Second, immigrants often do very well in American education, because they know its value. Human capital is in what it can do, not in what it shows right now. Andrew Carnegie was a starving scotch kid when he got here.
192
@Tim
Andrew Carnegie didn’t have food stamps or housing vouchers waiting for him either.
8
@Tim
A quibble: The Scots do not accept "scotch" as a descriptor, never have. Scotch is booze, not people.
17
@Tim
Andrew Carnegie wasn’t handed a form explaining where to get food stamps and housing vouchers when he arrived either.
9
At a time when the U.S. fertility rate stands at 1.7 babies per woman, well below the 2.1 needed to simply replace our population, restricting immigration invites economic stagnation. Not only are immigrants desperately needed to fill job openings in a tight labor market, they are also important demographically. Immigrants tend to be much younger on average than U.S., so their presence helps offset the aging of our population.
Our GDP's largest component is consumer spending. Low fertility rates that are not offset by increased immigration will result in fewer consumers and fewer workers, a sure formula for economic stagnation. Japan provides a very sobering lesson that we need to heed.
11
@Leo Brideau We need less people on this earth, not more fertile uneducated and impoverished people.
1
I'll agree to that if Trump takes the tests that will be imposing. That is, if he can even comprehend the questions.
Now, seriously, the question is:
Are American workers willing to stand in the hot sun in an agricultural field (full of pesticides) and work 12 hours a day - backbreaking work ?? It seems they are not, they are too "delicate" for that.
"Skilled" workers are needed, yes, but NOT ONLY!!!
So many of the Mexicans (etc) that I hire - first, second generation legal workers - are willing to do so much more, and are so grateful for the job!! They make our economy work. It will be a disaster, if they become scarce. It's already happening, in many agricultural and construction areas.
Get a grip, people, look around America and you will see how much unskilled immigrants contribute - it is astounding to me that this issue is so controversial. And sad to realize how much Americans are still such racists. Not all of course, but so many of us!!
29
@Me. What exactly do they contribute?
2
@Jackson
Without hardworking, underpaid fieldworkers, you'll have a hard time getting fresh fruit and vegetables.
And undocumented immigrants pay close to $12 billion in state and local taxes annually. Scroll over your state to see how much money undocumented immigrants contribute where you live:
https://itep.org/immigration/
7
@Jackson Besides doing a lot of jobs that would otherwise not be filled (such as manual labor, work in processing plants, work in nursing homes or as home health aides), they (a) live in the area and pay rent; (b) they shop local stores and help local economies in their areas; (c) they introduce new restaurants, cultural exchanges, music to a community; (d) they generally behave in a law-abiding manner and (b) they pay taxes and other fees which are also paid by citizens, which support local governments.
7
I’m sure they’re lovely people, but what are the First Lady’s parent’s special skills?
9
@itsmildeyes. Obviously you are clueless about chain migrations. It does not apply to parents or grandparents. But it does apply to aunts, uncles, cousins, second cousins, third cousins, etc.
1
So, what skills did the First Lady's parents bring to the US? They got citizenship based on Melania being here. Hypocrites, every single one of them.
35
Worse than hypocrites, they’re un- American.
1
We need workers for agriculture and hospitality. My son, with a mechanical engineering degree, is having trouble finding a job. We don't need to give priority to these skilled workers. We have plenty of our citizens trying to find work.
9
I'm pleasantly surprised he has elected to not cut overall immigration to the US - I would have favored increasing it, and, given his rhetoric, I anticipated a steep reduction.
I'm glad that my university classmates who have been encouraged to leave the country or take more prestigious but less socially beneficial jobs (e.g. serving as quants rather than teachers) to guarantee visa status now have other options.
I do hope that spouses will receive some form of work permit so that gender norms won't be reinforced, but I'm pleased with this plan. Who knew Trump would do something I would agree with, though I'm sure we're doing it for different reasons!
3
@Informer
What are you talking about? Trump's plan does "cut overall immigration." Are you and your "classmates" here on a visa with "a university education"? And what's a "quant"? Your point escapes me.
3
Under such rules, neither Trump's wife or her parents would have been allowed to immigrate, let alone become US citizens. What a hypocrite!
We need real immigration reform, not rules based on a dilettante's ideas of who should come to America, which simply put, are white and middle-class.
96
How is this not real reform? Do you prefer family members over high skilled individuals who can contribute to this country?
4
@Barbara Wait, people with skills are white and middle class? Your first observation is kind of racist and your second is a truism. Are you also saying that we should not alter the rules under which Trump's wife and her parents were admitted? Because....? Do you even read what you write?
1
@JerseyGirl @Jose
I'm saying that Trump only wants whites who are middle class or higher income. Most people with skills are better educated and many if not most of them are white. Yes, I do think that families should stay together. American values are based on family togetherness. We need a cross-section of people.
Wasn't it the so-called Cowardly Lion who said, If I only had a brain? The administration will never come up with a decent plan.
7
@Ruth Z Deming
Scarecrow said that. The lion lacked courage. Trump lacks all three (Tin Man needed a heart).
5
@Ruth Z Deming That's the scarecrow.
1
I assume the Trump family immigrants will relinquish their visas? Melania's parents appear to be here on a family basis, neither Melania nor Ivanka were citizens until after marrying Trump. There is no arguing the facts nor morality of these short-sighted moves. What hypocrisy.
41
There are lots of people who benefitted from earlier a d existing immigration policies. Some of them did more than others. Look at the Tsarnaevs.
4
@Shutupdonny
This proposal would not ban marriage visas. Maybe learn a little more about how different visas work.
1
We have an aging population with more and more baby boomers retiring every year. If you are concerned about your retirement benefits or health insurance, remember that we need more working age people and our immigration laws have kept us in better shape to deal with these issues than most advanced European countries who try to limit immigration, and in better shape than China which is still reeling from the effects of the one child policy.
Immigrants come to America to work. They are far less likely to file for unemployment or other government benefits than those of us born here. Sure we need skilled labor for the jobs of tomorrow but we also need people to pick our vegetables and clean our homes. We must not turn our back on immigration which has been one of the major reasons for America's remarkable financial success.
15
@Bill
Most of those crossing the border are mothers with arms full of children. They don't speak English, have no skills, and have minimal education. They will be a drain on our economy and contribute nothing.
11
I guess that must be because we are not educating our own people?
7
Why not educate/train US citizens for higher-paying jobs, and have a preference for lower skilled immigrants?
30
@Heidi Fanslow
I think every single H1B should cost 50,000 and the money should go to Scholarships for Americans.
4
@Dee Might want to take a look at this paper from the CATO institute which says otherwise: https://object.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/workingpaper-13_1.pdf
The number you mention comes from the Center from Immigration studies which in its own report summary shows that the number is inflated due to the Earned Income Tax Credit.
As an aside, the Center for Immigration studies is purportedly pro-immigrant while simultaneously promoting anti-immigrant perspectives.
P.S.: The CATO institute is funded by the Koch Foundation (i.e., Koch brothers aka conservatives)
2
@Dee No, they aren't.
1
Yes, this immigrant would like to see more people come to this great country. Of course, we should prefer intelligent and hardworking ones. Even if it is not easy to select people for quality, we should make an attempt. We already have an over-supply of deadheads.
38
@boroka
not lost on me
1
@boroka
Many of the deadheads are US citizens--or even recent immigrants--who think it should be up to them to decide who else gets to come into a country once known for being welcoming to all. Pulling the ladder up after you've already climbed it isn't cool.
5
isn't this plan at the center rather than on left or right. I came to the United States in 2013 for Graduate School. I have been working in the high tech industry for the last 4 years. My application for Green Card has been approved by USCIS but I can't get it because I am from India and I don't have any family ties here. Indians with advanced degrees merely get 2800 Green Cards out if 1 million every year. Isn't it unfair to us that we might not get our Green Card in our lifetime? And not having Permanent Status is a big obstacle in taking risks such as stating my own startup here.
46
@Aditya Why not help your own country and help build India's software and engineering industry. India does have a high tech industry. It has a rather robust one. America needs to train its own doctors, scientist and engineers instead of relying on a serious brain drain from developing countries.
8
@Aditya how is a greencard approved but you do not have one yet???
2
@Arnold
Because it’s a long line if you’re from India or China. That’s the system. Look it up.
1
Skills based criteria is a great update to immigration policy. Makes total sense in today’s day and age when illegal migrants can be allowed to enter and stay in the US but highly educated legal residents would have their visa not renewed after they built a life in the US.
Skills based immigration should be applied to all skill areas and not just limited to science and technology, such criteria may be revised every year based on projected skills requirements in the country.
153
@Observer and what of the natural born citizens that are unable to read or write with ease? Should we put them in rowboats and cast them toward some other country?
What test would you use to identify those that qualify? We can't even get a Census form updated properly, and you want to have a moving target of the skill-set needed for the day?
As another reader commented here, the people that want to come into our country, when given the opportunity to learn - do so with eagerness, as they "value the education".
8
@Denise Good point! We shouldn't be wasting our time and resources on uneducated and poor illegals when we have, unfortunately, many Americans that need our time and help instead.
1
What skill did his two European wives and his father have that were so crucial to our nation? What we’re short of right now is basic semi or unskilled labor willing to work for low wages...as in typical immigrants being scapegoated. Ask anyone looking for a reasonably priced laborer, handyman or gardener. Can’t imagine what farmers are doing for help.
61
@Keep Note that Donald demonstrates daily that he could not pass a 'civics exam'; also, Melania's parents would not have been permitted entry under these reg's & Donald's golf courses, hotels, & rental properties need lower-skilled workers. Kushner's family would not have been admitted either. This proposal doesn't improve the Southern Border disarray because those folks are petitioning RE asylum due to violence in Central America, a lawful & ethical basis for entry. This is nothing more than more shameful pandering to his base.
3
@Keep
So we’re short of people “willing to work for low wages”.... Yeah I wonder why!
@Fredrick Orkin
Actually it helps migrants by having them apply for asylum in their home countries without making a dangerous trek... what could be wrong with that?
2
Isn't it strange how many off the wall balloons Trump is trying to float at one time: Immigration limitations, trade war with China, sabre-rattling with Iran (but nothing about that wall, though)? His legal problems keep growing, but he keeps deflecting, stone-walling, obstructing Congress' oversight role. And then, he backs off, as he did with the automobile tariff … anything to keep the people from following the money and the corruption behind it. The law may grind slowly, but it grinds exceedingly fine.
19
@The Lone Protester, apparently he's forgotten about the wall. He isn't very bright. He'll remember to mention it at his next 'lil rally, though.
Once again, what used to be called 'family reunification' will be rebranded negatively as 'chain migration' and will appeal to the xenophobic base. Wealthy immigrants will be able to get around the restrictions and can afford the lawyers fees to do so.
Keeping families apart for no good reason is cruel. The restrictions had already become tighter allowing only the closest family members. The next step will be to force them to go home if they don't fit prescribed categories even if they are being provided for by their citizens relatives and strengthening the family social structures which is the greatest value to society as a whole.
Like many proposals, it will not get far but it will enhance the appeal of DJT to the base. The question is how many independent voters will it attract?
4
This raises the question as to what is more important to this country - immigration to strengthen family, or immigration to strengthen a skilled work force? Realistically speaking, one cannot exist without the other. How can a skilled immigrant thrive, contribute to the economy and live the American dream without the ties of family? A more fruitful legislation would be to remove annual. per-country limits on skill-based immigration (yes, it exists) and instead base it on education/skill level etc.
2
The only real solution to the immigration crisis is to reduce the violence in Central America that drives people from their homes. This can only be done by removing drug trafficking from criminals and legalizing all drugs, as Portugal has done.
11
Yep but that requires Americans to look in the mirror.
2
". . . the proposal would vastly scale back the system of family-based immigration that has for decades allowed immigrants to bring their spouses and children to live with them. . . and increase the educational and skills requirements for people who are allowed to migrate to the United States."
This proposal has Trump written all over it - care more about making money than one's family.
What Trump apparently doesn't seem to understand is that families need and depend on each other in order to survive and be successful. They get their strength and hope from each other.
". . . increase[ing] the educational and skills requirements" may look great on paper, but at what cost to one's family?
This is just another mean, cruel and hateful act by Trump.
4
Although we definitely need a reboot to immigration policy, this is not it. I have yet to see the details but I recall an earlier one which wanted potential immigrants to have won a Nobel Prize or an Olympic Medal (an individual one, not a team effort.) If their prior efforts didn't underscore their racist and classist attitudes, I'd be more optimistic. A country is strongest when it's people are of many varieties and this includes skills, intellect, etc.
4
@Geneva9 I think we should develops and encourage home grown talent before stealing other countries best educated. We encumber our students with debt and then let in people whose education was cheap or state sponsored jump in front.
We owe our own student at least a fair chance. We need to stop importing other countries talent, especially when they come from countries where talent is in short supply.
Frankly I prefer the less educated who come here for the American Dream and work hard for it, not those who drift in for a 100,000+ job at Microsoft.
2
Are you proposing socialism be implemented by republicans?
1
Skills based immigration is what most Western developed countries use, including Canada and Australia.
49
@Robert kennedy
It used to be called Brain Drain.
1
It's interesting that Trump didn't push this until after Melania Trump's parents got their American citizenship. What are they contributing to the United States other than their presence? I'm so sick of one set of standards for the wealthy and unethical, and a different set for everyone else. When Trump's mother came here from Scotland, I think her papers listed her as a "domestic." Good thing for him that maids and cleaning ladies were good enough to get in here then.
103
Well, the change would be in granting a "green card" for permanent residence, not citizenship.
This does not appear to be contrived quite the way you suggest
1
@Linda
I’ll bet you melania’s parents are not living on the taxpayer dime. That’s enough contribution for me.
2
@Margo
I am almost certain that Melania Trump's parents are now naturalized citizens, and they were admitted here as family members of a citizen (Melania). The naturalization ceremony was kept rather quiet. My point is that they were admitted as family members, which the Trump administration wants to curtail (eliminate?).
3
Did Melania's parents meet the new criteria?
13
@Gerri Perreault
No.
3
Excellent news.
5
. How so? What the country needs workers and not the college educated necessarily. The hard worker who is not too proud to do all the jobs “skilled Americans” eschew. Careful what you ask for
2
Did I miss the part on the Statue of Liberty after tired and poor that said English speaking PhD??
31
@Judy It's a beautiful poem. Doesn't mean it should be law.
And even in those days, immigrants were sent back who were deemed diseased or mentally unfit.
11
@Judy,
Its a poem. Not a law now. Not a law ever.
We are a Representative-democracy not a poemocracy.
10
Thank God that Melania's parents were able to migrate to the United States from Slovenia after she married Trump. Today not so good.
7
@Richard
And do trumps base know that his mother and father in law are also communists?
2
Immigration needs reform, but not from a hypocrite like Trump who scourges immigrants on the stump and then employs undocumented labour at his resorts. And not from this administration, either. BOTH Dem and Repub politicians block mandatory E-verify and criminal punishment for those who hire undocumented labor, BOTH of which, of enforced, would end this problem without having to buy a single brick.
Until America faces what it has to change about who, and how, we punish for employing undocumented persons, we will never change this dismal status quo that only helps fearmongers and exploiters.
37
Once we get over complete dissatisfaction with the current government and status quo, exactly how could this get changed instead? Wait until they all get replaced?
The godKing has spoken. But his cult is not sure what he said. They decline to explain or answer inquiries. Nothing to see here ...move along.
9
Merit-based immigration? Trump needs a field trip to the Statue of Liberty. It is an inspiring sight, in large part because of the Emma Lazarus poem on the base. The poem contains the words: "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, your wretched refuse yearning to breathe free..."
Lazarus understood what America should be all about.
94
our neighbors to the north use this sort of system and it isn't as bad as you make it out to sound.
30
And how ironic it is, considering Trump has absolutely zero merit of any value himself.
7
@D._.-> yet we also bring in refugees without those credentials, those seeking asylum, and don’t ban people from majority Muslim countries.
So far, so good.
4
Another immigration reform plan that will die before it gets off the ground. This is confirmation that our elected representatives are more interested in winning reelection than solving problems?
4
@Ron. This then also confirms that a large part of the American population, being complacent as well as complicit, religiously practice:
Willful blindness.
Willful deafness.
Willful ignorance.
Silence when outrage is needed!
They are doing what I helped send them there for.
Banning or reducing family-based immigration is shameful and Trump and any legislators who do so should not be re-elected.
Jared Kushner, especially, should be deeply ashamed of himself since he is Jewish and without the protections offered by US immigration policy, his family and he himself might be rotting in a European shtetl. If there is such a thing as Karma, he better hope that his children don’t need to flee America due to antisemitic violence because they might not find a safe haven, which is what his plan denies many immigrants who seek better lives in the US.
Let’s be sensible and strengthen borders and procedures to make immigration safer. Let’s not destroy people who are coming here to improve themselves and our culture.
12
How ironic the inverse juxtaposition of skills and family ties, in this propsal crafted by the young Mr Kushner!
6
At face value, this proposal seems to be right in the center, doesn't it?
As I see it there are two extremes in this debate: one proposing immigration cuts coupled with a border wall, and another with amnesty / "abolish ICE."
Wall funding is unpopular, but even the NYT has highlighted how the border is in crisis. At the same time, this bill incorporates points-based consideration, which is unambiguously an improvement of the existing system.
The devil is in the details, but on face value this seems to be a "good deal."
21
Right. Let’s see the details.
For some reason when the President stands by KKK murderers and race baiting bigotry to drum up his base I doubt it will be anything I could support.
Even as the plan is DOA, the nation would be better served by ensuring that all Americans..
".... have specific skills or job offers to work in the (economy of the 21st century) United States, ....can demonstrate English proficiency, educational attainment and pass a civics exam."
Also, it's likely that immigrants preparing for their citizenship exams are better able to pass a civics exam than many natural-born citizens. They certainly will know about the Constitution and rule of law.
26
Sounds like socialism. I don’t believe republicans support such assistance to average people. That socialism stuff is for protecting the wealthy, patent rights, banks etc. After all how does Trump make all his money but by taking on massive debt?
If you make immgration based on family, it will become a matter of community and identity.
If you make immigration about refuge and humanity, it will become a matter of gratitude.
If you, instead, make immigration about (arbitrary) value added, it becomes a transaction.
People will be patriotic for their family, patriotic for their saviours, but could they ever be patriotic for those who only care what immigrants can do for them?
277
Nailed it, Ethan. I would only add that when we talk about “family connections”, generally this is referring to family connections to a U.S. citizen. Limiting family-based immigration infringes on what are currently the rights of all U.S. citizens. We tend to think of immigration benefits going only to non-citizens.
17
@Ethan Arnold bravo, well said!
9
@Ethan Arnold-Beautiful post. If you really wanted a transaction based immigration policy come up with the number of slots and start the bidding.
6
Sounds like a fantastic idea! One of the best Trump has ever had. A policy that many other nations follow. Good job, Mr. President.
24
Look forward to all the Trump acolytes signing up for grounds keeping jobs, harvesting crops, washing dishes, caring for the elderly, cooking food, driving cabs, etc since these hard working people are not likely the “skills” he speaks of. Shame on him!
5
It’s about time. We need skilled people, and there should be no exception to this ever. People needing help need to go to their closest country, not get in a plane that flies over dozens of other countries to get to the US.
And FTR, Mexico is fully capable of belong its own.
11
@Simon
Are you willing to stand in the hot sun in an agricultural field (full of pesticides) and work 12 hours a day - backbreaking work ?? It seems our american workers are not, they are too "delicate" for that. I wonder about you?
23
@Simon we don't need skilled people! US colleges and universities are pumping out skilled people. PhDs cannot find academic jobs. Unless you want those skilled people to pick the crops that are rotting in California?
10
And US engineers can't find work
8
What about Viktor and Amalija Knavs?
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@Patricia Bryanmy guess is that they waited until the Knavs got their citizenship before moving forward with this
6
@Patricia Bryan. ...and don't forget the sister too.
4
@Lynn I wondered about that too.
2
Australia has higher immigration levels per capita than the US and it is skills based.
76
True. Also true is that the United States is currently home to 45 million immigrants while Australia is home to 7 million.
3
Currently 1 in 7 residents in the US is an immigrant while 3 in 10 are immigrants in Australia. We granted over 1 million new green cards and over 2 million temporary visas in 2017. You can look at per capita numbers, but it doesn’t reflect the true picture of how immigrant friendly the US is (and has been).
8
Trump's skill based immigration plan is same as the sharia law of Saudi Arabia. The only difference is that his base somehow doesn't want to acknowledge that they are same.
13
Would this plan have precluded Ms. Trump's, Donald's in laws, from immigrating, you know, the family connection thing, otherwise known as chain migration?
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@Dan
Yes.
6
Makes complete sense, we need skilled workers.
7
@TJ McGlyn
So, will you then be willing to stand in the hot sun in an agricultural field (full of pesticides) and work 12 hours a day - backbreaking work ?? It seems our american workers are not, they are too "delicate" for that. I wonder about you?
2
What skills do you mean? Look at the volumes of work immigrants do now! Devil is in the details!
2
Good idea. This may bring in skilled people to replace unskilled Trump voters now attempting to do work above their skill level.
It should help our GNP.
44
@Hamboy
Unfortunately it will block the most uneducated migrants from coming in to vote Democrat
4
"..provided that they can demonstrate English proficiency, educational attainment and pass a civics exam."
If that's the standard, then Trump wouldn't be allowed in.
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@Pat B
or Mrs. Trump
13
@Pia
Melania Trump is a U.S. citizen so she already passed a civics exam. She did not complete college but she speaks 6 languages - including English.
5
@Pat B
Too late DT was born here! There are not many native born Americans - including college grads - who could pass the civics exam, either!