By Erica Werner
March 14, 2013
Senators
writing a comprehensive immigration bill may dramatically limit green cards for extended families of U.S. citizens, reserving them for
immediate family members instead, a key lawmaker said Thursday.
It
would be a significant change to U.S. immigration policy that's long
favored family ties over economic or job criteria. And it's already
sparking opposition from groups trying to protect family-based
immigration.
Sen.
Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who is part of a bipartisan Senate group
negotiating the bill, said the aim is to remake the immigration system
so it has a much clearer economic focus.
"Green cards should be reserved for the nuclear family. Green cards are
economic engines for the country," Graham said. "This is not a family
court we're dealing with here. We're dealing about an economic need."
Unlike
most other industrialized nations, the U.S. awards a much larger
proportion of green cards to family members of U.S. citizens and
permanent residents than to foreigners with job prospects here. Green cards are permanent resident visas and allow holders to eventually
become citizens.
About
two-thirds of permanent legal immigration to the U.S. is family-based,
compared with about 15 percent that is employment-based, according to
the Migration Policy Institute. The remainder is largely humanitarian.
Current
law gives preference to spouses and minor and unmarried children of
U.S. citizens. Permanent residents can petition for immediate family,
and citizens can petition to bring in their married children and
siblings, but they're on a lower priority. Graham indicated that he
would prefer to eliminate the married children and sibling categories
altogether.
"We're going to change fundamentally the immigration system," said Graham.
Kevin Appleby, director of migration policy at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, criticized the proposed changes.
"What
the senator's not taking into account is the social costs for not
preserving families in the immigration system, which is not as tangible
or measurable as an economic benefit, maybe, but immigrant families do
strengthen our social fabric," Appleby said.
Appleby
said that instead of reducing green cards for family members and
increasing them for employment ties, senators should simply make more green cards available over all. Lawmakers in the past, Republicans in
particular, have opposed that approach. Meanwhile they've been hearing
pleas from the technology industry for more high-tech workers and from
industries like hospitality and agriculture that use lower-skilled
workers.
Advocates
agree that changes are needed to the family immigration system. Right
now there are more than 4 million people waiting in backlogs, with
Filipinos in the sibling category facing waits topping two decades. The
Senate group has committed to reducing that backlog.
The
tension between family- and employment-based immigration has not gotten
as much attention in a debate that's often focused on border security
and the fate of the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants already
here, who would be given a path to legalize their status in the Senate
bill. But the issue could become contentious as senators work to
finalize their legislation by next month.
In
the last round of immigration negotiations in 2007, the Catholic Church
ended up opposing action on the bill in part because of discomfort with
a proposal that replaced the family-based system with one that awarded
points based on job skills, English ability, education and family ties
in handing out visas.
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