Immigration

NPR reports that the “Trump administration is considering penalizing legal immigrants for using government benefits such as Medicaid and food stamps…” NPR’s story is very good, but it also minimizes the radical scope of the Trump “public charge” proposal,

Noah Smith of Noahpinion takes me to task (after some very nice comments) for being anti-immigration. I’m not sure I fit that description, but let me put together a few things that I have said in different places. 

First of all, there is the immediate issue of what we do with the undocumented workers who are already here. I don’t see much ambiguity on this one; they should be allowed to normalize their status and become citizens. These people are here as a matter of government policy even if they are working in violation of the law.

The government may often be less competent than we would like, but if the policy was to prevent foreigners without proper documents from working in the United States, then we would not have many millions of foreigners working without proper documents. We shouldn’t blame people who came here (like many of our parents or grandparents) to try to secure a better life for themselves and their children. If we want to punish someone for this violation of the law, we can always throw their employers behind bars.

The question is really how we structure immigration policy going forward. Noah argues the merits for having an open door for high-skilled immigrants. I am 100 percent for this policy, although I may draw the line in a somewhat different place than Noah. I absolutely want to see more foreign doctors, dentists, lawyers and other professionals in the United States.