Enforcement Only

All that's left of immigration reform

SITUATIONS SOMETIMES need to get worse before they get better. That's the best that can be said about the Bush administration's crackdown on illegal immigration, announced Friday.

To its credit, the administration has long pushed for comprehensive immigration reform that would tighten border security, discourage businesses from hiring illegal workers, create a pathway to citizenship for many of the nation's 12 million illegal aliens and open the way to more legal immigration. Congress scuttled such reform this summer, amid outcries from conservatives that it amounted to amnesty for those here illegally and from liberals that it was too timid. In response, President Bush has decided to launch an enforcement-heavy initiative that will probably be as ineffectual as it is painful.

The most disruptive of 26 provisions is likely to be the one that puts teeth into "no match" violations. "No match" occurs when the Social Security number provided by a worker fails to match a number in the Social Security Administration database. Until now, employers were alerted when an employee triggered a "no match," but there were no consequences. A new regulation gives employers about three months to either dismiss the worker or verify his legal status. No one should be surprised when this approach yields thousands, if not millions, of "no matches" that force employers to cycle furiously through workers, at a cost of time and money.

The administration is right to try to streamline the visa program for seasonal agricultural workers to help provide growers with a reliable stream of legal workers; the changes would also increase protections for laborers. The Department of Homeland Security is right to extend to three years the terms of visas for professional workers from Canada and Mexico, who currently have to renew those visas annually. The administration's plan also includes common-sense measures such as requiring government contractors to submit information about their employees to a federal electronic verification database to ensure the legality of their workforce.

No administration can be faulted for seeking to enforce the law, but the nation is saddled with a law that cannot work. The economy, as long as it continues to grow, will continue to attract immigrants, and they will come illegally if there is no other way. The administration acknowledges that an enforcement-only approach cannot possibly address the most significant immigration problems facing the country and is likely to exacerbate the problems already experienced by businesses and workers alike. It's a sad commentary on politics in Washington that, by increasing the pressure for change, such problems may be reform's best hope.