Brilliant political tactics in support of immigration reform
So, immigration reform failed this year in the Congress on the fears of nativists who don't want all those brown people around who (mostly) don't speak English. A lot of them have been saying for years, "enforce the laws on the books!"
So, that's what the Bush administration has been doing, in spades:
Raids shake local McDonald's restaurants
Fear of raids and arrests caused McDonald's restaurants around Carson City to close or cut back operations Thursday and Friday following the arrests of 54 accused illegal immigrants at 11 fast-food restaurants and a franchise headquarters in Reno and Fernley, according to the popular fast food chain and critics of the raids.
Immigration raid causes uproar
The ICE raid on the Wood River Valley occurred on Saturday, Sept. 15, when 11 officers from an ICE Fugitive Operations Team out of Boise descended on the valley in search of alleged fugitive illegal immigrants. Arrests were made in Ketchum, Hailey and Bellevue.
Immigration raid linked to ID theft, Chertoff says
More than 1,200 people were arrested for alleged immigration violations in Tuesday's six-state raid on meat processing plants and about 65 of them face criminal charges, including identity theft, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said today.
Federal officials said Operation Wagon Train netted 1,282 individuals, the largest such crackdown on illegal immigration at a single worksite.
The strategy seems to be to enforce the law as written properly (no more wink-and-nod; real resources are being devoted to this), which is going to put the squeeze on a number of industries, and put The Fear into illegal immigrants. This will make some goods and services more expensive (agricultural products, construction, fast food, meat (from packing operations), etc), and will make "El Norte" less attractive to workers from south of our border.
If this goes on long enough (and enough economic pain is thus inflicted), it will likely spur some renewed effort at immigration reform in the Congress (it would be useful if an investigative journalist would check to see if a majority of ICE-raided businesses are located in the congressional districts of those representatives who opposed reform in the last go-'round); you can bet that the lobbies of those businesses that are most affected are already screaming.
However, there's another effect that I don't think the majority of people will like: we're going to become yet more of a police state. "Your papers, please." We already see this at airports with the TSA; now it's going to be ICE at your workplace.