Republican Sens. David Perdue (Ga.) and Tom Cotton (Ark.) plan to introduce legislation at the White House Wednesday calling for a new skills-based immigration system, the Washington Examiner reportedTuesday.
According to the report, the plan would reduce the overall level of legal immigration into the country.
“Our current immigration system is outdated and doesn’t meet the diverse needs of our economy,” Cotton aide Caroline Rabbitt told The Weekly Standard. “Senator Cotton and Senator Perdue will join President Trump to unveil legislation aimed at creating a skills-based immigration system that will make America more competitive, raise wages for American workers, and create jobs.”
The White House late Tuesday released President Trump’s Wednesday schedule, which included an 11:30 a.m. announcement alongside Cotton and Purdue in the Roosevelt Room. The schedule did not say the topic of the announcement.
Both of the senators have called for immigration reform, often criticizing the current system.
Earlier this year Cotton and Perdue introduced legislation that they said would effectively halve the number of green cards issued each year from 1 million to roughly 500,000.
“Over the last 40 years we’ve seen a huge increase in immigration,” Cotton said at the time, arguing that the current amount is out of line with “historical” levels.
The legislation would have nixed immigration preferences for nonimmediate family members, adult children or adult parents of current legal permanent U.S. residents. It ultimately stalled in the Senate.
White House policy director Stephen Miller and Senate Republicans have reportedly been meeting to discuss immigration reform that would ultimately lower the amount of legal immigration.
The proposal comes as the Trump administration continues to look for solutions and reform on immigration, an issue Trump took a hard-line stance on during his campaign. During that time he pledged to deport more than 10 million undocumented immigrants.
During the first six months of his administration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Department of Homeland Security have cracked down on undocumented immigrants. Trump has also doubled down that he intends to build a wall with Mexico.
Cotton and Perdue did not immediately respond to The Hill’s request for comment.
Do we really need Skilled based immigration? It’s bad enough to take in new welfare recipients. We should import people to take away any decent paying jobs we may have left? With so many Americans being unemployed? I don’t think so.
What happened to Job,Jobs,Jobs?
Australia has been using this method for decades…with millions of boat people coming from the Philippines they tried sending out the Navy to blockade them receiving international scorn for actually shooting across the bows to turn them away. So, the ones that actually make it to Aussie shores are scrutinized according to skills. Engineers, doctors and scientists get to stay, dishwashers and lawn mowers are sent back.
I have always thought this was a good way to handle it…improving the population as a whole by introducing “smart” people into the herd. But, as Bob points out above, there’s plenty of unemployed smart Americans to fill the positions.
Sadly, many Mexicans came to the US and went to school on your dime, returned to Mexico to live and can do American work from there!! Think about this: engineering drawings. An architect draws a hotel or hospital plan, sends it to an engineering firm. They email it to a Mexican engineering firm to get the plans done for a fifth of the cost and the completed plans are emailed back. The money just left our boarders and the engineers and Autocad drafting people are hung out to dry with nothing but student debt. Things just keep getting better, don’t they?
Bud, good thinking. That also pertains to anything that can be emailed. CNC programing i’m sure is on the list. One of my sons went to MasterCam programming school. I suspect that he will feel the pinch soon. Owners of American companies need to do their part, but corporations it seems will do anything for the bottom line, including destroying middle class America. I’ve seen it myself in many places. As the old owners died off, their progeny didn’t have the same patriotism and let it all slide. They took the money and ran.
They want to pay less for skilled labor obviously, its more BS everyday now. These people think we’re a bunch of idiots.