Can Comprehensive Immigration Reform Be Both Liberal and Democratic?

Abstract

The Brookings-Duke Roundtable Report obtained a difficult consensus on a wide range of mostly liberal immigration reform proposals. However, its devotion to comprehensive reform is ultimately ill-considered. Comprehensive immigration reform is not necessary except as a stratagem to make some form of substantial amnesty palatable to a majority in Congress. Such a tactic is unlikely to be successful in any case in the current political climate. Moreover, it is not desirable empirically or normatively. Empirically, any comprehensive reform that has hopes of passing will contain incoherent and contradictory components. Normatively, it is objectionable because comprehensive reform, especially of the sort endorsed by the Roundtable, will be vastly expansive. A majority of Americans are opposed to such a policy dynamic. Liberal immigration reform will be achieved at the cost of overriding public preferences. For this reason the proposed Standing Commission, a deliberate attempt to push immigration policy development out of the public arena and enhance the prospects of liberal reforms, is a bad idea.