The Democrats’ shutdown showboating showed that blanket resistance is fruitless. Time to compromise.
REALITY TV has, if anything, given Donald Trump a penchant for unexpected moves. After the president torpedoed a bipartisan immigration agreement with his infamous “shithole” remark, he reversed course on Thursday by offering Democratic leaders an outline for an immigration deal.
The deal demands hefty concessions from Democrats on deterring illegal immigration. It would alter certain immigration laws, making it harder for asylum-seekers who entered the U.S. illegally to get a lawyer and speeding up deportations of unaccompanied children not from Mexico or Canada. It would allow immigrants whose visas have expired to be deported without a trial. It would create a $25 billion trust fund to be spent on Mr. Trump’s southern border wall—an admission that American taxpayers, not Mexico, will pay for his boneheaded wall.
Most controversially, the deal would also morph the legal immigration system. It would severely restrict “chain migration” (i.e., family-based immigration) by preventing American citizens from sponsoring visas for their parents, siblings, and adult children. Spouses and minor children could still have their visas sponsored. The 50,000 spots allocated to underrepresented nations—through the so-called “diversity visa lottery system”—would be changed to a “merit-based system,” though precisely what that means is unclear.
In return, the deal would create a decade-long path to citizenship for some 1.8 million “DREAMers,” unauthorized immigrants brought to America as children. This is more than double the 700,000 recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (D.A.C.A.) program, which grants two-year renewable work permits to eligible DREAMers. Mr. Trump, of course, ignited all this immigration talk by rescinding D.A.C.A. in September, though the rescission doesn’t take effect until March.
The Trump immigration deal is not at all “extremely generous,” as the White House characterized it. The deal doubtless makes large concessions to those who believe, misguidedly, that immigration ought to be restricted. But elections have consequences, and the restrictionists are in power.
What’s more, the restrictionists are themselves making concessions, too. The “Goodlatte bill” currently moving through the House represents what the anti-immigration crowd imagines for a D.A.C.A. compromise. It demands all of the same concessions as the Trump immigration deal. On top of that, the Goodlatte bill cuts overall legal immigration by 25% and blocks money to “sanctuary cities” that don’t work with federal immigration agents. In exchange, the bill would grant D.A.C.A. recipients three-year work permits. Millions of DREAMers wouldn’t qualify for the work permits. Nobody would be legalized.
The Trump deal, therefore, exemplifies the best and worst aspects of a compromise. Both sides get something they want, and both get something they don’t. In the national immigration debate, Mr. Trump has introduced the prospect of legalizing all 1.8 million D.A.C.A.-eligible DREAMers, not just the 700,000 D.A.C.A. recipients, something Democrats and pro-immigration Republicans should cheer. Across the aisle, restrictionist Republicans are finally getting long-sought-after changes to the immigration system, both legal and illegal.
If the Democrats reject this deal, what then? The fate of the DREAMers was ostensibly important enough for Democratic leadership to stage a government shutdown. But top Republicans have repeatedly said that they won’t bring anything up for a vote that Mr. Trump won’t sign. So the prospects of a more moderate immigration deal, like the one Mr. Trump shot down two weeks ago, appear dim.
Legalizing the DREAMers is popular, and it is deeply cynical for the Republicans to use their fate as a bargaining chip. But decrying Republican hypocrisy is a Sisyphean task. The Democrats must remember that they are the minority party. They attempted to extract concessions from Republicans over a government shutdown and failed. Now that America’s Republican president is voluntarily proffering immigration concessions, the Democrats must rediscover how to compromise.
1/29/2018 Correction: A previous iteration of this editorial stated that Donald Trump’s immigration deal would offer a path to citizenship for “all 1.8 million DREAMers,” implying there are only 1.8 million DREAMers. There are, in fact, roughly 3.6 million DREAMers. The Trump immigration deal would offer a path to citizenship for 1.8 million D.A.C.A.-eligible unauthorized immigrants who do not receive D.A.C.A. protections. The editorial’s misleading phrasing has been amended. Apologies.
