Legal Commentary

U.S. Expands Expands Iraqi Visa Program Tenfold

By Jeralyn

We have 12 million people living in this country without proper documentation, many of whom work, have families and pay taxes.

While Congress stalls year after year on providing a path to citizenship for them, and the radical right says there is no room for them, the Bush Administration has no problem playing favorites:

The American Embassy in Baghdad announced Thursday that it had expanded tenfold its program to help Iraqi employees of the American government here, who faced threats for their work, to obtain visas and ultimately citizenship in the United States.

Why should the Iraqis get special treatment? Because they provided aid to the U.S. in its unneccessary preemptive war that we entered under false pretenses?[More...]

The program will allow 5,000 Iraqis to go to the United States for each of the next five years. Each person can take immediate family members, who include spouses and children. More distant relatives, including siblings, parents and grandchildren, can apply under another program. So the actual numbers emigrating will probably be considerably higher. The average Iraqi household is estimated to have about six people, according to officials from the International Organization for Migration.

What about the Haitians? They face horrible fates when sent back home from the U.S. What about those from Mexico, many of whom work at jobs Americans don't want? When Congress does act on their behalf, will they have to go to the back of the line, learn English, pay fines and taxes -- all behind the Iraqis?

The answer seems to be yes, even as to those who are here seeking asylum:

....immigration experts warn that because there is a global cap on the number of refugees that the United States accepts and the slots are allocated by region — with some flexibility — it is possible that either Iraqi refugees will squeeze out others who are equally deserving or that not all Iraqi refugees who are eligible will be granted a space.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on July 25, 2008 (boomark / email).