You may have noticed Ethiopians collecting tolls in Dallas, or Somalis working for the Texas prison system doing contract work. Not African-Americans, mind you—we’re talking Africans. Apparently state agencies hire people on visas and not necessarily the thousands of qualified American citizens who are out of a job in need of work. Preferring aliens over U.S. citizens, particularly in times of economic downturn, is a despicable policy even for Obama’s “Amerika.” The liberal mantra is that one truly can’t find an American to do “that kind” of work in America, no matter what kind of work that is. At the heart of the matter are preference categories, affirmative action for so-called disadvantaged minorities and women, or special categories like handicapped. Employers have to verify that an individual whom they plan to employ or continue to employ in the U.S. is authorized to accept employment, not whether he/she is a citizen—about that, employers frankly don’t care.
It is true that no alien may accept employment in the U.S. unless he/she has been authorized by the Government, but you see aliens are more equal than the majority of U.S. citizens and that’s the rub. Aliens, such as those who were admitted as permanent residents, granted asylum or refugee status, or admitted in work-related nonimmigrant classifications have employment authorization as a direct result of their immigrations status. Moreover, other aliens may apply individually for employment authorization. In general, temporary non-immigrant workers will fall into the work category of seasonal agriculture, or else specialty areas like defense, nursing, fashion, athletics and entertainment. Permanent workers fall into one of several categories that represent extraordinary ability, advanced degree, a certain profession, business or skill. There are in fact many ways in which a person may be able to work in the U.S. Approximately 140,000 immigrant visas are available every year for alien permanent worker categories, and there are millions of permanent resident aliens already living and working legally now in the United States.
You’ll also be happy to know that Congress mandates a Diversity Immigrant Visa Program too, which is administered annually by the Department of State. Section 203(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act makes 55,000 Diversity Visas (DV) available each year to persons from countries with low rates of immigration. The Department of State conducts a lottery to hand these out, and international registration for one of these babies opens up on October 5th and closes the day after Election Day, November 2nd. These lucky “Lotto” Winners will have preference for hiring when they arrive in the U.S. All of which doesn’t sound that terrible, until one considers something else alongside of it. American citizenship places one at a positive disadvantage for employment opportunity, especially if one is white and it involves applying for a government job or government contract. U.S. citizens are actually disadvantaged when it comes to getting a job with the U.S. or State Government in these United States of America!
Whereas a government job now and again may require a security clearance, which could possibly advantage citizenship, most government jobs do not require one. Some preference categories such as for veterans in the State of Texas might also give a citizen the edge. Federal preference categories, however, direct preference in hiring based on minority race/ethnicity, female gender, or disabled status. State agencies across the state follow Federal Guidelines and Federal “Law” with respect to the eligibility to work in the U.S. based solely on the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) policy directives. The USCIS standard is that, as long as an individual completes an I-9 and the agency can verify an individual is legally able to work in the U.S., that state agency (or any private employer) is able to hire them. U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) guidelines with respect to non-discrimination practices further and expressly do not have “preference” criteria to hire American citizens over someone else, say, who is legally able to work by virtue of permanent legal residency or the VISA that authorizes work in the U.S.!
Virtually every Human Relations (HR) Department in government and quite a few larger businesses parrot the politically correct policy position that, why yes, we certainly do not preference a mere citizen but will gladly hire someone with a VISA if that person is the “most qualified candidate” and most especially if that person happens to fall into a minority category. As the U.S. Department of Labor proclaims, “Affirmative action must be taken by covered employers to recruit and advance qualified minorities.” Translation: a person who is African and black has a better chance to get jobs under the law and EEOC guidelines than a person who is a U.S. Citizen and happens to be white—for Federal jobs and contracts to be sure, and also for the states and employers who follow the same idiotic rules.
The majority of unemployed and underemployed people fall into that unfortunate category of being both white and citizen, but then a policy of not hiring them first over immigrant aliens is only idiotic if the Government chiefly serves them. Silly Rabbit, you just answered your own stupid question. Consider the full extent of the mess we’re in. As stated, employers must verify that an individual whom they plan to employ or continue to employ in the U.S. is authorized to accept employment in the U.S. That’s truly amazing, even if it no longer sounds strange, because it wasn’t always so. You see, once upon a time Americans enjoyed an existential right to work and a corresponding right to hire virtually unimpeded by government “oversight.” The presumption of freedom changed only with the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) of 1986, which provided terms of the last amnesty for illegal immigrants. In other words, we started enforcing dictatorial terms of hiring, in order to advantage certain legalized and formerly illegal immigrants over newly arriving illegal ones. Of course there shouldn’t have been too many of those, since the implicit precondition for amnesty was that we would secure our U.S. borders.
In periods of economic downturn and high unemployment, citizens compete more directly with alien residents and temporary workers for scarce job openings. Some of them will no doubt experience disappointment and anxiety if/when they do not “win” the competition for jobs. Today there are more than four job-seekers for every opening. For any given job, there probably are dozens of applications. Historically periods of economic downturn correlate strongly to increased political nativism and to anti-immigrant sentiment among the native population (majority ethnicity and citizens). Prior to 1965 the political establishment showed a pattern of responding to this, through steps to alleviate the overall numbers of legal immigrants being admitted to the U.S. National origins percentages were applied to aid in the process of assimilation. In many ways, the period we witness today is atypical, because there are many favored categories for hiring that did not exist before the Civil Rights Era. Moreover, we have a much larger problem today with illegal immigration, as well as with illegal hiring and employment.
Under such a circumstance, it would appear prudent to introduce legislation and administrative policy preferences that address the obvious and valid concern, and which recognizes the fact that U.S. Citizens do indeed have greatest stock in our society. The edifice of government is chiefly maintained by the citizen-voter and citizen-taxpayer. The government’s obligation to its American citizens and the rights that inhere in them under the Constitution exceed that for resident aliens or nonimmigrant workers, foreigners and visitors of every stripe. Preference in hiring should be afforded to the native born and naturalized citizen worker in these United States. Government agencies do not currently discriminate on the basis of citizenship versus non-citizenship, so long as the person is authorized to work in the U.S., but it is time that they should.
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