CNN (Opinion)
By Raul Reyes
August 31, 2015
Raul
A. Reyes is an attorney and member of the USA Today board of
contributors. Follow him on Twitter @RaulAReyes. The opinions expressed
in this commentary are solely
those of the author.
(CNN)Relax,
it's FedEx. That's a slogan associated with one of the world's largest
express transportation companies. It is also the latest policy proposal
put forth by
2016 GOP presidential hopeful Chris Christie.
"You
go on online and at any moment, FedEx can tell you where that package
is," the New Jersey governor said on Saturday. "Yet we let people come
into this country with
visas, and the minute they come in, we lose track of them."
Christie
said that he wants FedEx founder Fred Smith to come and work for the
government to show U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) how to
set up a system
for tracking people.
Christie's idea would be laughable were he not serious.
The
idea of tracking people like packages would likely be both impossible
and inhumane. Moreover, it would do nothing toward solving the problem
of what to do with the
majority of the 11 million undocumented immigrants who are already
here.
What's
sad here is that Christie seems to be succumbing to the Trump effect:
Say anything, no matter how impractical, just to garner maximum media
attention. We've seen
Jeb Bush go down this path (to disastrous effect) with his use of the
offensive term "anchor babies," and Scott Walker made a similar misstep,
with his unusual claim that we need a border wall with Canada.
The
jumping off point for Christie's bizarre proposal seems to be the fact
that roughly 40% of undocumented immigrants do not sneak across the
border. They enter the country
legally and then simply overstay their visas. Although he did not offer
details, implementing Christie's idea would presumably involve some
sort of device by which the government could monitor the movements of
all those who enter legally on visas. Possible
solutions might encompass ankle bracelets or perhaps a FedEx-like
label?
Just
imagine the response from foreign governments if we told them that
visitors to this country were to be tagged or fitted with an electronic
device.
Not
only would this generate international outrage, our tourism industry
would suffer. And there would be little to stop foreign countries from
slapping retaliatory restrictions
on Americans overseas. Monitoring the exact whereabouts of visitors
would be a violation of the due process and privacy rights of millions.
Tracking
people who have not committed any crime would be a violation of civil
liberties and human rights. It might also be unconstitutional; in March
the Supreme Court
ordered a review of North Carolina's policy of making sex offenders
wear a GPS monitoring device.
The
last time the U.S. government singled out a large group of people was
during World War II, when approximately 120,000 Japanese and
Japanese-Americans were rounded
up and sent to internment camps -- an episode that is still one of the
most shameful in our history.
On
Fox News Sunday, Christie said, "I don't mean people are packages, so
let's not be ridiculous." But he went on to call for technology "from
the folks at FedEx" to figure
out a way to monitor people. If he is suggesting that we use methods
more sophisticated than tags, labels or ankle bracelets, then his idea
becomes truly Orwellian.
Besides,
FedEx -- while setting a high bar for accuracy and timeliness -- is not
cheap. Christie did not mention any means of paying for the new
tracking technology he
has in mind. Nor did he offer a solution for dealing with the remaining
60% of our undocumented population.
His
"FedEx plan" is especially troubling coming from a governor of a
diverse state who, at times, has supported a path to citizenship for the
undocumented. Christie once
had the foresight to sign a bill allowing in-state tuition for
undocumented students in New Jersey. Now he's doubling down on the
callous soundbites and moving away from nuanced discussions of
immigration policy.
FedEx
is not going to fix our immigration system. Christie's tracking plan is
disturbing rhetoric, not a legitimate policy proposal.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
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