Visa checks key to immigration solutions
The information regarding the visa process, provided by Sholeh Patrick in her column Jan. 28, was very informative.
It’s quite a process, as she details. It goes a long way to demonstrating that the system is set up to make it difficult to obtain a visa.
At a time when virtually all of us are frightened that our immigration system is not working, it is good to pause, and have someone give us the facts about the process.
Ms. Patrick gave me to pause and think about the immigration situation in a different light. It’s not that our immigration laws are bad. It’s that they are not being enforced by those who feed at the public trough!
There apparently are good checks and balances in the visa process. Those who created the system had as their best interest the desire to put in place a system that protects our nation and citizens. It was designed to weed out those who were using the promise of marriage as a way to slip into our country. The extensive list of checks and double checks in the process is not the problem, obviously. The problem is that those who are charged with enforcing the system are apparently not doing their job to the best of their ability.
Ms. Patrick’s extensive research clearly points to a system that would serve the public well, if those charged granting visas took their jobs seriously. Slipping through this maze of regulations, as is outlined in the column, would be difficult if those government employees who work in this field would diligently do their job.
I would hope that voters in the coming primaries and general election carefully listen to how the various candidates talk about immigration. Those candidates who play to our fears with words that disparage all immigrants are wrong, not because we don’t face dangers from terrorists, but because it is unjust to point the finger at a specific group and tell them they are not welcome. To tell an immigrant who is a productive member of society that he or she must “go home” is not the American way.
GOP hopeful Marco Rubio stresses that the first steps in controlling our borders is to complete the wall, begin enforcing our immigration laws, and add more border patrol guards.
Terrorists are not coming here, slipping into the country at night. They arrive with papers, giving them the right to visit or migrate. And with more border patrol staff and better border walls we would reduce the number of people seeking refuge in our country.
Thus it follows that controlling terrorists and illegal border crossing begins and ends with enforcing our immigration laws.
That means those entrusted with this process have the responsibility to keep terrorists and known criminals out. These public servants must step up and take the time and effort to thoroughly review, review again, and review for the third time each and every request for visas and immigration papers.
Earl Parker is a resident of Twin Lakes.