Founder’s Corner

Dear All:

Earlier this week the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced a new mission statement that more accurately reflects the values the Biden administration and the Personnel within it place on their responsibility to manage immigration in U.S. citizens’ best interests.

“USCIS upholds America’s promise as a nation of welcome and possibility with fairness, integrity, and respect for all we serve.”

According to USCIS Director, Ur M. Jaddou, “This new mission statement reflects the inclusive character of both our country and this agency. The United States is and will remain a welcoming nation that embraces people from across the world who seek family reunification, employment or professional opportunities, and humanitarian protection.”

The statement would be fine if the U.S. government and USCIS, were nothing more than a welcoming station on the pathway to citizenship, but they’re not. For edification, I urge you to read USCIS’ prior mission statement:

“U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services administers the nation’s lawful immigration system, safeguarding its integrity and promise by efficiently and fairly adjudicating requests for immigration benefits while protecting Americans, securing the homeland, and honoring our values.”

Absent from the new statement, is the basic tenet that U.S. government agencies exist to protect the interests of U.S. citizens – not those of foreigners and not those of corporations. As a former employee of USCIS reminded me, there is no affirmative right to immigrate here. “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. . .” is poetry, not policy!

The U.S. government is under no obligation to grant benefits to aliens who are unqualified or ineligible to receive them. Historically speaking and consistent with today, poorly regulating and ineffectively restricting immigration is bad policy, and it’s harmful to the citizenry.

To date, the Biden administration’s ability to weed out the unqualified has been a dismal failure. In addition, their eagerness to pursue policies that have displaced hundreds of thousands of U.S. workers at all skill levels further demonstrates their disregard for Americans.

It’s been just over a year since they took office, and in that time, we’ve witnessed the utter abdication of their responsibility to manage immigration in U.S. citizens’ best interests.

For instance, look at the steep decline in Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) removals in 2021, compared to prior years. And this during a huge surge of migrants crossing the southern border.

Fiscal Year	ICE Removals
2017	226,199
2018	256,086
2019	267,258
2020	185,884
2021	55,590

CNN’s February 4th article “These workers are the only ones really seeing higher wages” reported, “Workers in the lowest quartile of earnings have been the only ones to see an increase in wages over the past two years, after accounting for inflation. But the gains have been pretty meager.”

As meager as these gains were, they weren’t meager enough to satisfy corporate interests and the minions in the government’s bureaucracy. Last year prior to the Senate leaving for holiday recess, Department of Homeland Security Secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas, announced that in 2022, he would award an additional 20,000 temporary seasonal employment-based H-2B visas.

According to Joe Guzzardi, “jobs in these categories include landscaper, lifeguard, forestry worker, housekeeper, waiter, cook, amusement park worker, among jobs in other employment sectors where Americans have traditionally worked.”

It’s all about supply and demand. Covid-19 and the Trump administration’s restrictive immigration policies lowered the supply of available workers. This pushed employers to raise wages and increase benefits. Journalist and pundit Mickey Kaus said it best when he tweeted, “Can’t have that! Need more low-skilled migrants. Mayorkas has gotten the memo. . .” Well, it was good while it lasted.

On the legislative front, stalled in their previous attempt to attach a host of immigration provisions to the now defunct Build Back Better Act, House Democrats have turned their attention to the America COMPETES Act of 2022’ (H.R. 4521) and are trying to inject immigration provisions that represent massive giveaways to Big Tech and universities.

The Senate version of the bill, the ‘U.S. Innovation and Competition Act (USICA),’ was passed last June and both the Senate and House versions seek to spend $250 billion on domestic research and manufacturing to make the U.S. more competitive against China.

However, unable to resist the opportunity to turn a constructive piece of legislation into a complete nightmare, House Democrats inserted the following immigration provisions:

Create a W nonimmigrant visa program for foreign investors of start-ups and entrepreneurs, their families, and so-called but undefined essential foreign workers who work for them, also allowing their family members to receive work permits.
Create a one-year path to an unlimited number of Green Cards for any W visa holder who meets certain investment and ownership stake requirements.
Create an unlimited number of Green Cards for foreign citizens who hold a doctoral degree from a U.S. institution of higher learning or an equivalent degree from a foreign university.
Create a five-year program that creates 5,000 Special Immigrant Visas (SIV) yearly for Hong Kong residents, amounting to an additional 25,000 Green Cards over the five-year period.
Authorize an unlimited refugee/asylee program for certain Hong Kong residents.
Change existing law to treat Hong Kong as a separate state from China in determining per-country limits for existing Green Card categories.
Grant Temporary Protected Status with work permission for Hong Kong residents currently in the U.S., regardless of their existing immigration status which may include unlawfully present status.

USCIS’ new mission statement and this brash attempt to insert immigration provisions into a bill meant to boost America’s competitiveness illustrates the dystopian society we’re currently living in.

Make no mistake, the harm done by the Biden administration in the form of bureaucratic rule changes, neglect in enforcing immigration laws currently on the books, and relentless attempts to pass open borders legislation, are cumulative. Those actions will harm us, and future generations of Americans.

In closing, Director Jaddou stated the revised mission statement was influenced by USCIS workers responses to an internal survey. If that’s the case, it calls into question their loyalty to the U.S. and their understanding of their job responsibilities.

In solidarity.