Professors discuss U.S. immigration policy

By Ettie Berneking

Published Dec. 4, 2007

Three UM system professors took on immigration policy in the U.S. at the Chancellor's Global Issues Forum.

Chancellor Brady Deaton moderated the debate on Monday.

In the debate, the panelists debated for an hour and a half over a topic Deaton considered "one of great interest."

The debate was co-sponsored by MU Difficult Dialogues, a program spearheaded by a group of students and faculty working to stimulate intellectual inquiry on campus.

"This is a topic of ongoing importance," Deaton said.

The panelists were MU law professor Rigel Oliveri, MU history professor Abdullahi Ibrahim and UM-Kansas City law professor Kris Kobach.

Deaton began the discussion by asking the panelists about complexities in the immigration debate.

Oliveri said there are thousands of complexities to immigration.

"There are more and more complexities each year," she said.

Oliveri talked about the growing role that state and local governments are playing in the battle of illegal immigration enforcement.

"There's been a shift away from a national policy to individuals and local force," she said.

Kobach responded by saying that local authorities are the eyes and ears of enforcement.

Kobach told a story about one of the Sept. 11 hijackers who was pulled over on Sept. 9, 2001, for speeding.

He said that if the police officer had just taken the time to ask a few more questions, history might have played out differently.

Each of the panelists took a turn to comment on the complexity of immigration issues.

Ibrahim focused on the perceived link between immigration and terrorism and the distinction between labor and capital.

Kobach said the topic is a historical one.

"This is a timeless debate in American history," Kobach said.

He said the U.S. is a nation of immigrants and that the issue of immigration is still in the spotlight of public opinion.

According to Kobach, 60 to 70 percent of U.S. citizens say the number of legal immigrants is too high.

Audience questions focused on the economic costs and gains of illegal immigration. The audience remained involved in the discussion for the rest of the evening.

Kobach said more than 65,000 illegal immigrants live in Missouri, and more than 1.2 million entered the United States last year.

Ron Harstad, MU economics professor and audience member, challenged Kobach's statistics.

He said that according to the statistics he had read, the monetary drain of illegal immigration in Missouri was not as high as Kobach had said.

Mary Jo Bryan, another member of the audience and a member of the League of Women Voters, spoke about visas.

Kobach said they take so long to get approved in part because of the 5 million new applications annually and the lack of resources to process them.

By the end of the discussion, the panelists were wrestling with the question of who is to blame for the issue of illegal immigration and how it would be resolved.

"The end question is, how do we treat people once they get here?" Oliveri said.

"How welcoming are we to immigrants, legal and illegally? It's a very complicated issue, and it doesn't look very welcoming."

Kobach said there is no "silver bullet" to solve immigration issues.

He said illegal immigration can be solved through "small solutions," and all options are in need of more research.

As the audience filed out after the debate had ended, Deaton, the panelists and Noor Azizan-Gardner, diversity programming and professional development director, gathered at the front of the auditorium and discussed the forum's success.

"This is an issue that people really want to talk about, but we only have an hour a half," Azizan-Gardner said.

Gardner and Deaton both said they were pleased with how knowledgeable the panel was and with the audience's involvement.