Did left of center group create Obama’s policy on illegal aliens?
Wednesday, February 22, 2012 at 10:03AM 
Customs and Border Protection point of entry in Hidalgo, Texas. (photo by Gerald L. Nino/CPB)
President Barack Obama has started to shut down the 287(g) program created in the late 1990s and fully implemented by President George W. Bush.
USA Today explained 287(g):
“Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have trained local officers around the country to act as their agencies' immigration officers. Working either in jails or in the field, the officers can check the immigration status of suspects and place immigration holds on them.”
The newspaper cited the Migration Policy Institute in a story about the program shutdown, calling MPI a ‘nonpartisan think tank.’ USA Today said MPI found that 287(g) caused immigrants to “fear and mistrust” authorities.
What the paper meant by ‘immigrants’ is not clear—the term is commonly used by media to describe anyone entering the country legally. Or not.
A close look at MPI suggests Obama formulated his immigration and illegal alien policy based on a report from that think tank. In the report ‘Executive Action on Immigration,’ MPI declared the routine ‘immigration system is broken’ thesis and goes on to provide a blueprint for what the president has done—circumvented Congress to assume control over immigration policy and procedure as well as detention or apprehension policy for those in the country illegally.
The term “prosecutorial discretion” is used throughout the document; Obama officials promote this as well.
The report is lengthy, but a close look at the MPI website suggests the organization is left of center. The report was funded by groups like the Open Society and the Ford Foundations as well as the 21st Century ILGWU (International Garment Workers Union) Heritage Fund.
Many board members of MPI are from left of center organizations—the United Nations, the Open Society Institute and even the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations.
Another left of center organization, Justice Strategies funded by the Tides Foundation, declared in a report, “The 287g program has failed.” (Feb., 2009)
Numerous organizations lobby for what amounts to open borders and they often describe the US immigration system as ‘broken.’
That is misleading. The system is glutted because the nation’s borders are not secure and left of center organizations know there is political and often corporate gold in expanding the entitlement class.
Unlike immigrants in earlier historic times, today’s immigrants and even illegal aliens who bring children to the U.S. receive various forms of federal assistance funded by the US taxpayer. Organizations like those that prepared the reports cited here also advocate for a federal version of the so-called DREAM Act to mandate in-state tuition for children brought here by their parents who entered the country illegally. States have traditionally handled the issue of college tuition.
In 1986 when the amnesty bill was largely crafted by Democrats, a promise was made to secure the border and to prevent Americans from having to deal with the issue again. The legislation was a legal, binding document. Congress and presidents have broken the tenets of that document.
The abandonment of the tenets of that legally binding document provides grounds for states or municipalities to file lawsuits against the federal government.
Ironically as states have attempted to stem the flow of entrants, in part due to exploding healthcare, educational and criminal justice costs, Obama has used his Dept. of Justice to thwart every attempt.
The Center for Immigration Studies found the illegal population has stopped declining under Obama who faces a tough re-election battle in November.
(Analysis by Kay B. Day/Feb. 22, 2012)