Category: Joe Guzzardi

Senate Passes Ukraine Funding Bill Without Border Protection

By Joe Guzzardi

On Super Bowl Sunday, shortly before kickoff, the Senate voted 67-27 to advance a $95.3 billion funding bill, a step toward its passage. Two days later, after an all-night session, the bill passed 70-27 but without the border security measures that the House had originally demanded.

The funding package includes $60 billion for Ukraine; $14 billion in security assistance for Israel; $9 billion in humanitarian assistance for Gaza, the West Bank and Ukraine; and $4.8 billion to support allies in the Indo-Pacific.

Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) spoke passionately about the urgent need for the bill’s approval. Schumer described Eastern Europe’s war-torn regions as dire as last seen during World War II. McConnell warned that failing to support Ukraine would put America’s allies at risk by giving China a “green light” to project power in Asia and the Indo-Pacific.

Highlighting the tension among Republicans that could culminate in the Senate minority leader’s removal, fellow Kentuckian GOP Senator Rand Paul called McConnell’s support for the bill “outrageous” and accused him, Schumer and President Joe Biden of “criminal neglect” by working to “send $100 billion overseas to fix someone else’s border before addressing our [own] border.” Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) charged Schumer with dictating which amendments he would be permit—“essentially all of them are not.”

To Paul’s point, days before the Senate voted to proceed on the Ukraine-Israel funding bill, it rejected a very bad immigration bill that, instead of including HR-2’s border protections, established an emergency authority to shut down the border when a 5,000 daily average alien encounters over a consecutive seven-day period is reached or 8,500 encounters occur in a single day. By law, a single alien’s entry violates immigration statutes. Worse, the Senate’s proposed bill allows Biden to suspend this authority at his discretion, which could allow for thousands more illegal immigrants to cross.

Schumer and McConnell’s urgency to help Ukraine protect its border with Russia is reflected in its unprecedented Super Bowl Sunday vote during a period when the Senate was scheduled to be on holiday. Neither Schumer nor McConnell cares about the southwest border invasion. McConnell, worried that China might interpret nixing Ukraine funding as a “green light” for aggression, is indifferent to the thousands of Chinese nationals pouring aggressively across the Southwest border.

Among the millions of migrants flooding the southern border, Chinese illegal immigrants made up the fastest-growing faction last year. In FY 2023, CBP apprehended 24,000 Chinese nationals, about 12 times the 1,970 arrests in the previous fiscal year. Since October 1 when fiscal year 2024 began, a staggering 20,000 Chinese nationals have crossed. If the 20,000 per fiscal year quarter influx continues, a projected 80,000 Chinese nationals will enter.

The annual 2023 U.S. Threat Assessment report published by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) warned that China’s Communist Party (CCP) will continue efforts to achieve President Xi Jinping’s vision to make China East Asia’s preeminent power, a major global threat that will undercut U.S. influence, and “drive wedges between Washington and its partners.” In his Wall Street Journal op-ed, former DNI  director John Ratcliff wrote that “Beijing intends to dominate the U.S. and the rest of the planet economically, militarily and technologically.” Resisting Beijing’s attempt to reshape and dominate the world is, Ratcliff concluded, the challenge of our generation. China, national security experts agree, is the U.S.’s biggest geopolitical enemy.

Assuming Ratcliff is right, the Biden administration is failing spectacularly to meet the challenge. In December, a large group of well-dressed, military-age Chinese crossed into San Diego and surrendered to immigration agents. The El Paso sector’s Chief Patrol Agent Anthony Good told the Homeland Security Committee during a private September hearing last year that his agents suspect that the Chinese aliens are active CCP operatives, and confirmed by committee chair Mark Green (R-Tenn.)  as a “massive” concern.

Despite the potential threat that Chinese nationals represent to America, the DHS makes no attempt to detain them or no effort to locate them after border officers release them into the interior. Schumer, McConnell and Biden continue to turn a blind eye to the risks China poses, and instead are determined to pour more good money after bad into the forever Ukrainian war.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org

Senate Passes Ukraine Funding Bill Without Border Protection

US Workers Lose Ground To Foreign-Born In January

By Joe Guzzardi

The monthly Bureau of Labor Statistics report should be called the original “fake news.” Such is the case with the January 2024 report which announced that the economy added 353,000 jobs. Each month, District of Columbia’s anonymous civil servants grind out much-anticipated jobs data that Wall Street and financial journalists latch onto as the nation’s financial health indicators. Market analysts tout the monthly data to reaffirm their existing economic beliefs, be they good or bad. The first BLS Commissioner, Carroll D. Wright, described the Bureau’s mandate as “the fearless publication of the facts.” The BLS website claims that “Just the Facts” is a core value. When asked, “Is the glass half empty or half full?” BLS responds elusively that it sees an 8-ounce glass containing 4 ounces.

A few years ago, a critic called the BLS report “the big lie” because among its other flaws the original monthly data was subject to revisions, often significant. These late changes concern Federal Reserve officials. We must make decisions in real time,” Federal Reserve Board of Governors member Christopher Waller said late last year. “Whatever data is released, that’s the data I have to use. The problem with data is it gets revised.”

Revisions, which can come more than months after initial reports are published, wouldn’t necessarily be so much of an issue if they were relatively small. However, many revisions over the past few years have been game-changers.

The January BLS report could trigger history’s biggest game-changing revision. Zero Hedge (ZH), which lists as one of its manifestos, “to skeptically examine and, where necessary, attack the flaccid institution that financial journalism has become” mocked the January release as a “clown show,” and as the election season heats up, fulfilling its mandate from the White House “to make the economy look double super good-good.” And, speaking of revisions, ZH noted that in January BLS conducted its “annual re-benchmarking and update of seasonal adjustment factors.” The bottom line—what was until December a decline in jobs, the BLS has now been miraculously transformed declines into gains. 

The glowing report ignored the following lay-offs as a total percentage of their workforce: Twitch, 35%; Hasbro, 20%; Spotify, 17%; Levi’s, 15%; Xerox, 15%; Qualtrics, 14%; Wayfair: 13%; Duolingo, 10%; Washington Post, 10%; eBay, 9%; Business Insider, 8%; PayPal, 7% Charles Schwab, 6%; UPS, 2%; Blackrock, 3%; iRobot, 31%; Citigroup: 20,000 employees and Pixar, 1,300 employees. This month, nearly all Sports Illustrated staffers received layoff notices from the Arena Group, devastating the 70-year-old magazine that once set the standard for sports journalism. Most staff received 90-day notices, but many were immediately laid off. 

More inconvenient truths ZH exposed: BLS reported that in January 2024, the U.S. had 133.1 million full-time jobs and 27.9 million part-time jobs. The totals may sound good but look back one year to find that in February 2023, the U.S. had 133.2 million full-time jobs, slightly more than the economy did one year later. Predictably, the job growth is in low-paying, part-time jobs, which have increased by 870,000 since February 2023 from 27.020 million to 27.890 million.

The mainstream media, which had 20,000 job losses in 2023 across broadcast, digital and print industries with more recent media layoffs that include CBC, Vice Media and others, mostly ignored the most important fact buried in the January BLS report. In January, the number of native-born workers tumbled again, sliding by a massive 560, 000 to just 129.8 million. Add to this the December data, and a near-record 1.9 million plunge in native-born workers has occurred in the past two months. Not only has all job creation in the past four years gone exclusively to foreign-born workers, but since July 2018 there has been zero job-creation for native-born workers. 

With the illegal alien invasion poised to continue throughout the remainder of Biden’s first term—eleven months—and legal permanent residents added at one million-plus annually, the labor market will expand by about two million foreign-born workers each year. The Biden administration has unlawfully given about one million aliens parole, an immigration status that includes work permission. 

Foreign-born workers displacing Americans is an ongoing and accelerating tragedy that President Biden willfully imposed on citizens. Biden’s malfeasance should provide talking points for the White House and congressional candidates that seek to remove office holders who support the status quo.

 Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org

US Workers Lose Ground To Foreign-Born In January

‘Bipartisan’ Senate Bill Would Keep Border Open

By Joe Guzzardi

Oklahoma Senator James Langford has not officially announced his long-term political goals. But deep-red Oklahoma’s senior senator has done a superb job of shooting himself in the foot by joining up with three open borders advocates in what they laughingly refer to as a bipartisan border agreement. Under Senate Majority leader Chuck Schumer’s watchful eyes, Langford’s negotiating colleagues are Arizona Senator Kristen Sinema, a faux Independent who caucuses with Democrats, and blue Connecticut’s Chris Murphy. Sinema and Murphy have consistently voted against border and interior enforcement while favoring amnesty enticements. Neither Sinema nor Murphy, however, have served close to Schumer’s three decades-plus in Congress during which time he has unbendingly fought for higher immigration levels and less enforcement. Up against Schumer and company, Langford is out of his element.

Even the most cursory review of the Senate’s proposed deal shows that the details would not only keep the border open but also encourage more illegal immigration. Leaked details include a disastrous provision that once border crossings reached a seven-day 5,000 rolling daily average, the Department of Homeland Security would have the authority to shut down migration. Daily encounters between 4,000 and 5,000 would allow for discretionary expulsions, and any single day where there were over 8,000 encounters, expulsions would be mandatory even if the 7-day average were lower. Those expulsions would also be exempt from judicial review. Not only would such levels be inconsistent with border security, but President Biden has complete authority to shut the border down tight without more congressional legislation. The legislation would also, say advocates close to the talks, tighten asylum standards, speed up the hearing process, double deportation flights, and expedite work permits. Only expedited work permits are likely to become a reality, a harmful feature that expands the labor force with unskilled workers and takes away jobs from U.S. workers.

Andrew Arthur, a Center for Immigration Studies Resident Fellow in Law and Policy, and a former immigration judge, wrote in his New York Post op-ed that Section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act gives the president authority to “suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens.” Moreover, in 2018, the Supreme Court rejected immigration advocates’ challenges to travel restrictions that President Donald Trump implemented on certain nationals of terrorist hotspots and countries hostile to the United States and wrote that Section 212(f) “exudes deference to the President in every clause.” House Speaker Mike Johnson, reflecting most Americans’ sentiments and promising that if the Senate bill should ever reach the House it would be DOA, said that the “goal should be zero illegal crossings a day, not 5,000.” Unlike the Senate trio, Johnson knows that in the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries, immigration ranked with the economy as the two issues that most troubled voters.

Langford,  an ordained Southern Baptist minister, has pushed back against criticism and claims that election year politics and not the bill’s details hamper the Senate process. Voters are increasingly aware that Biden’s lack of political will to enforce existing laws is the main reason the border remains open. Deep skepticism with the White House’s immigration agenda has intensified, and a bad Senate bill will not soothe voters’ immigration anxiety. 

Langford got a sample of how getting cozy with Schumer could derail his career. The Oklahoma Republican Party (OKGOP) voted to censure Lankford for his close work with Democrats on border legislation. However, since not all OKGOP members were present, the censure was not official. Still, the vote could be a signal of trouble ahead for Langford. 

History’s lesson: Florida Senator Marco Rubio got a rude awakening to the long-term consequences of a Schumer connection. In 2013, only his second full year in office, Rubio was one of four GOP Senators who teamed up with four Democrats including Schumer to pass the disastrous immigration “Gang of Eight” bill, never taken up by the House. Rubio’s betrayal shocked Florida’s Republicans. In 2015, Rubio was one of 17 GOP announced presidential candidates. When the crucial Florida primary time rolled around in March 2016, Rubio needed a win over Donald Trump to remain viable. But Florida’s voters didn’t forget Rubio’s duplicity and overwhelmingly cast their ballots for Trump, 46% to 27%. Once considered a frontrunner, Rubio’s presidential aspirations ended that night.

Langford’s next re-election cycle, should he choose to run, is 2028. Myriad border outcomes could occur in the next six years. But Oklahoma Republicans are unlikely to forget, much less forgive, Langford’s eagerness to join the Democrats to keep the border open and subvert U.S. sovereignty. 

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org

‘Bipartisan’ Senate Bill Would Keep Border Open

Spineless GOP Rejects Border Bill

By Joe Guzzardi

A spineless House of Representatives just gave Americans a big, in-your-face middle finger. In the invasion’s third year, the southwest border surge continues relentlessly. Eight million illegal aliens plus one and a half million gotaways from more than 150 nations continue to lawlessly surge the border in willful defiance of United States law. The invaders have brought death and destruction with them — -death via the fentanyl they’ve trafficked in, destruction to the communities both large and small in which they’ve settled, and senseless homicides. Although the House has legislation that could end the border crisis, HR-2, the Secure Border Act of 2023 which it passed in May, and despite House Speaker Mike Johnson’s insistence that border security be included in any bill that might provide President Biden with more Ukraine funding, nothing changes.

To date, the U.S. has sent $133 billion to Ukraine for humanitarian and military aid. In December, Biden urged Congress to pass a $110 billion aid package that included $61.4 billion for Ukraine and $14 billion for Israel in its war against Hamas. Biden also seeks funding for Taiwan. Facing a government funding deadline, Johnson kicked the border security can down the road. Instead of demanding HR-2, the Speaker settled for a Continuing Resolution with a vote that included 108 weak-kneed Republicans who joined with Democrats to keep parts of the government open until March 1 and other sections until March 8. The final vote: 314–108.

Among the Republican nays were many who are, at least publicly, vocal about the dire need for border enforcement: Speaker Johnson, Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan, Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chair James Comer, Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security and Enforcement Chair Tom McClintock, Chairman, House Committee Chair on Foreign Affairs and Chairman Emeritus and House Committee on Homeland Security Michael McCaul, and Nancy Mace, National Security, the Border and Foreign Affairs Committee member. Although Johnson, Jordan, Comer, et al appear solid on security, exasperated voters wonder if they’re squishes disguised as patriots. The House’s most conservative members, thoroughly disgusted with Johnson, threaten to remove him and set off another bitter round of votes to replace him. Johnson’s unconvincing excuse that enforcement legislation which includes HR-2 would take too much time, and that the border catastrophe must be addressed correctly — -he provided no details.

With the November election only nine months away, and with polling showing that not only Republicans but Democrats and Independents all express deep dissatisfaction with Biden’s immigration agenda, Johnson should use the few weeks his enforcement cave-in bought him to get busy. Johnson must take a firm stand and make his and his fellow Americans’ positions clear that if H.R. 2 is not included in the supplemental foreign aid package, the House will not approve another CR that would fund the same disastrous, illegal border policies at the FY 2023 open border level. House Republicans, even with a slim majority, have the power of the purse, and with that leverage can end Biden’s sovereignty-busting immigration vision. Either in a comprehensive FY 2024 budget bill or included in the supplemental Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan foreign aid package that the president demands, HR-2’s border reforms must be included.

This marks the third time since the current fiscal year began on October 1, 2023 that Congress has failed to pass a budget. Assuming HR-2 is included in March — -an assumption only the most optimistic can embrace — -five months will have elapsed or, expressed differently and based on Customs and Border Protection statistics, more than one million illegal aliens will have been processed and released into the interior. Americans want the border sealed shut and interior enforcement returned to protect the public from criminals that have literally walked into the nation, unvetted, and rarely pursued by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

With a terrible Senate bill in the works that could keep the alien invasion going, the nation’s message to Johnson and House Republicans is simple and direct — -no more sell outs!

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org

Spineless GOP Rejects Border Bill

Nuggets Of Good Immigration News In 2023

By Joe Guzzardi

Scouring calendar year 2023 for good immigration news is a challenge. But a nugget here and there provides a glimmer of hope, however faint, for long-elusive border enforcement to become reality. The year’s highlight came in May when the House passed, 219–213, the Secure the Border Act of 2023, HR-2. The bill’s provisions include, among several other pro-enforcement features, a mandate that employers use the legislatively elusive E-Verify that would protect American jobs, require the Department of Homeland Security to restart border wall construction, reinstate Remain in Mexico, end asylum fraud, and close the loopholes that frivolously grant parole.

Another positive in the endless battle for sensible immigration is Mike Johnson’s (R-LA) election as Speaker of the House. Since entering Congress in 2017, Johnson has earned A+ immigration grades in strengthening border and interior security as well as ending asylum and refugee fraud. Johnson and like-minded GOP reps have so far insisted that HR-2 be included in any legislation that may provide funding for Ukraine and Israel. The show-down between House enforcement advocates and a Senate dominated by open-borders backers is scheduled to begin January 8. Johnson must not yield an inch, and must absolutely reject the Senate’s demand for amnesty as a quid-pro-quo to any agreement.

Unlike finding the positive immigration news during 2023, the bad news stands out like the proverbial sore thumb. The House Homeland Security Committee released a shocking report titled “Startling Stats” that detailed the extent of President Biden and DHS Secretary Mayorkas’ illegal, unconstitutional disregard for obeying immigration law and their criminal indifference to defending national security.

In FY23, Customs and Border Protection recorded more than 2.4 million encounters at the southwest border and more than 3.2 million encounters nationwide. During the current fiscal year, 169 individuals on the terrorist watchlist were apprehended attempting to enter the country illegally, and at least 1.7 million known gotaways have evaded apprehension since FY2021. Since President Biden took office, there have been 7.5 million encounters nationwide and 6.2 million encounters at the southwest border, in addition to 1.7 million known gotaways.

Also in FY 2023, CBP arrested 35,433 aliens with criminal convictions or outstanding warrants, including 598 known gang members, 178 of those being MS-13 members. Including its Air and Marine Operations, CBP also seized enough fentanyl coming across the Southwest border to kill, the House Homeland Security Committee estimates, about 6 billion people.

The report’s findings did nothing to influence the administration to end the invasion. Not only did the illegal alien influx remain steady, it accelerated unabated. Proof that the border crisis will continue unchecked: in December, CBP processed and released a historic monthly high 302,000 aliens. Since the start of FY 2024 which began on October 1, 2023, CBP has encountered more than 785,000 aliens at the southern border alone.

With Johnson serving as speaker, and with HR-2 in place as potential leverage to use in the upcoming Ukraine-Israel funding negotiations, optimism for the first steps toward border enforcement can be harbored. But as long-time veterans of immigration enforcement versus immigration chaos conflicts can attest, there’s many a slip twixt the cup and the lip.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org

 Dems Will Dump Biden?

By Joe Guzzardi

As of today, Washington D.C.’s conventional wisdom holds that the Democrats prefer a 2024 candidate other than President Joe Biden but feel that the incumbent has earned the right to run. Nonsense! Under no circumstances will the power-hungry Democrats let Biden, unwilling to engage primary debate challengers, and refusing to campaign in the time-honored fashion, again become the party’s standard bearer. Seven months remain until Chicago hosts the Democratic National Convention, an eternity in politics, and doubly so if party leaders and donors perceive that presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump continues his upswing while Biden drops even further in national polling.

Influential Democrats and deep-pocketed party supporters could lean hard on Biden to withdraw gracefully with their promise that on his way out, they would hail him as a modern-day FDR. If Biden resists, Democrats could play hardball, a technique the party is familiar with. Since there are no secrets in Washington, everyone who’s anyone knows about Biden and his family’s nefarious dealings. Threaten to leak internal dope on the Biden family to the Republican-led Judiciary and Oversight committees and Biden might change his mind. The scenario may appear improbable but it’s not impossible.

Should Biden exit, voluntarily or otherwise, that would solve only half of the Democrats problems. The other half would be to choose a viable replacement. Many of the names floated don’t resonate with the general public—Vice-President Kamala Harris, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, and Energy Secretary and former Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm. All have net negative polling.

Still available is California Governor Gavin Newsom, anxiously waiting in the wings, fingers crossed, ready to pounce should the opportunity present itself. But if Newsom is tapped, a vexing hurdle remains—the governor would need to script a platform that will connect nationally, a tough task given his abysmal governance record.

Typically, a stumping candidate highlights his successes. Not only does Newsom have no tangible, tout-worthy achievements, his failures and misjudgments are colossal. The elitist, multimillion net worth governor will never shake his Napa Valley French Laundry birthday party fiasco. During the COVID-19 pandemic when Newsom shutdown Orange County beaches, he dined maskless with lobbyists. The incident, which showed Newsom’s disregard for his constituents, will haunt him. The dinner is a small potatoes blotch compared to California’s exploding homelessness, wide-spread poverty, soaring housing prices, rotten public education system that ranks 44^th nationwide, rampant smash-and-grab crime, and dramatic cost of living spikes.

Although California’s bullet train fiasco has dropped from the national news, the story reflects another costly Newsom blunder. Four years ago, when Newsom unveiled his scaled-down concept for the bullet train, he proposed constructing a 171-mile starter line in the Central Valley that would begin operating in 2030 and cost $22.8 billion. Today, the projected costs are $35 billion, and exceed by $10 billion future committed funding. Adding to the bullet train’s woes: an official estimate of future ridership has dropped by 25%, and the operating schedule has been pushed further into the future. Waste, waste, and more waste on a project that Californians didn’t want, and few would benefit from.

Newsom’s gravest miscalculation is, during a sustained southern border illegal alien invasion, his immigration advocacy. California’s official government website prominently includes a section captioned “California for All” which reads as follows: “every person can achieve a better life regardless of where they start out,” an open invitation to illegal immigrants. Newsom is out of step with public opinion. At a time when the nation is coping with an estimated eight million aliens released into the interior since Biden’s inauguration and coming from more than 150 nations, Newsom as of January 1, will provide all low-income illegal aliens, regardless of age, with Medi-Cal, the state’s Medicaid program.

As many as 764,000 illegal aliens could be added to Medi-Cal, costing California taxpayers an extra $3.1 billion annually. The rub is that pursuant to the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, illegal aliens are generally barred from receiving federally funded means-tested public benefits like Medicaid. Therefore, the burdensome cost falls solely on California’s residents, a foolish, inexplicable decision since the state is sinking under a $68 billion deficit.

Deservedly, California is synonymous with failure. Residents are fleeing for more hospitable states. Newsom would have to be a magician to sell his California as a model for the other 49 states. If Democrats examine Newsom’s résumé and conclude he’s not electable, then they may be stuck, like it or not, with an equally unelectable Biden.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org

STEM Degrees Not Worth Effort, Expense

By Joe Guzzardi

Little by little, the truth about academic life on university campuses is leaking out. Although not as dramatic or headline-grabbing as the Harvard, Penn, and MIT scandals, the myth that science, technology, engineering and math degrees (STEM) will lead to a well-paid, white-collar job is gradually being debunked.

In his Los Angeles Times opinion commentary, U.C. San Diego sociology professor and author of “Wasted Education: How We Fail Our Graduates in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math”, John D. Skrentny, exposed a STEM degree’s true worth in the employment market—considerably less than advertised, and perhaps not worth the monies spent on exorbitant tuition fees.

Long-hyped as a path to a big-ticket IT job, and with employers and the federal government’s tacit endorsement that helped promote more foreign-born labor to displace U.S. workers, STEM classes’ popularity soared. Another carrot that encouraged young adults to enroll: the Bureau of Labor Statistics projected that STEM jobs would increase 8 percent by 2029 compared with 3.7 for all other occupations. From 2006 to 2015, bachelor’s degrees in the STEM fields rose from 22 percent of the baccalaureate degrees awarded to 30 percent of the total, the highest level since 1987 when detailed national record-keeping began.

But the Census Bureau’s June 2021 report refuted the popular narrative. STEM degrees don’t guarantee a coveted job in the prestigious science, technology, engineering and math fields. Among the 50 million employed college graduates ages 25 to 64 in 2019, 37 percent earned a bachelor’s degree in science or engineering but only 14 percent worked in a STEM occupation. Moreover, the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, in its 2023 analysis, found that STEM degrees held by diverse graduates hardly moved the needle. Despite corporations’ vocal commitment to DEI, black, Hispanic, American Indian, and disabled persons remain dramatically under-represented in tech.

Although warnings about pro-STEM fallacies have been reported for at least a decade, they’ve fallen on deaf ears. Forbes journalist and Duke University School of Law J.D. George Leef wrote in 2014:

“Interest groups that want more STEM education, research funding and workers know how to capitalize on that belief to get politicians to enact the policies they want. Even through there is nothing approaching a [labor shortage] crisis, they keep lobbying as if we have a dire one…Strong business and educational groups lobby for nice-sounding policies that benefit themselves, frequently employing dubious arguments and misleading claims. The costs of the resulting pro-STEM policies are dispersed among the public, and fall particularly hard on the unfortunate individuals who invest a lot of money and years of their lives in pursuit of credentials that are apt to become almost worthless.”  (“True Or False: America Desperately Needs More STEM Workers,” by George Leef, Forbes, June 10, 2014)

The year after Forbes published Leef’s critique, Jesse Jackson traveled to Silicon Valley where he found that its overall workforce was only 30 percent female, 3 percent Hispanic, and 2 percent black. Countless studies from respected academics and prominent think tanks came to the same conclusion—U.S. tech workers are effectively shut out. But only a smattering of the published research, including Skrentny’s op-ed, address the most obvious reason that American minorities are consistently kept out of white-collar jobs. Employers prefer to hire younger, less qualified, cheaper foreign nationals, mostly from Pakistan and China, that work on H-1B visas, the so-called guest workers who rarely go home. In the 10 years since Leef, Jackson, and countless other scholars have sounded alarm bells, hundreds of thousands of H-1B visa workers have entered the domestic labor market to take jobs that would otherwise go to U.S. STEM grads.

Year-after-fiscal year, and regardless of economic conditions, the federal government approves 85,000 H-1B visass. In late 2022 and throughout 2023, Google, Amazon, Meta, and other tech giants laid off thousands of workers. And 2024 is off to a similar start as Duolingo, Twitch, and Discord made deep cut while Amazon and Google continued their 2023  significant firings. Despite the layoffs, H-1B approvals continued.

As long as H-1B visa workers are readily available to employers, and as Artificial Intelligence makes a greater, ever-growing societal impact, STEM degrees will become increasingly less valuable on job-seekers’ resumes.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org

STEM Degrees Not Worth Effort, Expense

Ted Williams Rescues Bush 41 Campaign

By Joe Guzzardi

Baseball fans recognize Ted Williams as one of the sport’s all-time Cooperstown Hall of Fame legends, a fearless pilot who served in the United States Navy and the United States Marine Corps during World War II and in Korea. Less well-known is that Ted is also a Fly Fisherman Hall of Fame inductee.  Williams caught black marlin in New Zealand and tiger fish in the Zambezi River in Mozambique. In Ted’s opinion, only three fish were worthy of true sportsmen— tarpon, bonefish, and Atlantic salmon. Considered by Williams the triple crown of fishing, he had caught and released over 1,000 of each by 1982.

“The Kid’s” inner circle—his family and close friends—knew that Williams had another passion. Williams was a political junkie.  Born in 1918 in San Diego, Williams grew up in conservative California. Beginning in 1890, and lasting for about a 100-year period, Republicans consistently occupied Sacramento’s Governor’s Mansion, and the state’s voters consistently sent Republicans to the U.S. Congress. Williams most admired President Calvin Coolidge, the former Massachusetts governor who favored tax cuts and limited government spending.

No surprise then that when Vice President George H.W. Bush called on Williams to campaign on his behalf in the 1988 New Hampshire primary, Ted accepted, and thereby changed America’s presidential history. Setting the scene, President Ronald Reagan’s two-terms were up, and Bush was part of a crowded GOP primary card. The Iowa caucus’ outcome had been a shock to the Bush campaign. The Vice President finished a distant third to Kansas Senator Bob Dole and televangelist Reverend Pat Robinson, the newly formed Christian Coalition’s favorite. With only a week between Iowa and New Hampshire, Bush was floundering. The Manchester-Union Leader, a powerful conservative New Hampshire voice, labeled Bush “a wimp,” and endorsed Delaware governor Pierre S. du Pont.  Jack Kemp, the Buffalo Bills’ former quarterback, was also vying for the GOP nomination.

Although Bush had done his legwork and visited the Granite State frequently during 1988, when primary week began, he polled five points behind Dole. Another failure would have put Bush permanently out of the running. John Sununu, former New Hampshire governor and Bush’s campaign reached out to Williams. Neither Bush nor Sununu personally knew Williams, but they had heard of his strong political opinions. A liberal on social policy, Williams was a conservative on fiscal and foreign policy. Although he distrusted all politicians, he particularly hated the Kennedys and consistently voted the GOP ticket.

Sununu phoned Williams and persuaded him to fly to New Hampshire from Florida where he had been fishing. Williams’ presence with Bush, who played second fiddle to “The Kid,” changed the game, and helped put Bush in the White House. Voters turned out in droves to get a glance at their beloved Boston Red Sox hero. One gifted Williams an antique bamboo fishing rod. Ted signed autographs, and introduced his new friend, Bush, as “the next president of the U.S.”

In the end, Bush ended up with 59,290 votes; Dole, 44,797; and Kemp, 20,144.  Campaign donations returned, and Bush was on his way to the White House. Bush, a World War II pilot and Yale University baseball standout, and Williams became friendly. Bush kept his old first baseman’s glove at the ready in his desk drawer, a quirk that endeared him to Williams.

Now Bush’s chief of staff, Sununu organized two major events that included Williams. First, a 1991 Rose Garden lunch on the All-Star game’s afternoon with Joe DiMaggio to celebrate the 50^th anniversary of Joe’s 56-game hitting streak and Ted’s .406 average. After lunch, they flew Air Force One to Toronto to watch the game, a 4-2 win for the American League. Second, also in 1991, Bush presented Williams with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, one of the rare times Ted agreed to wear a tie.

Historians acknowledge that Williams was the key factor in putting Bush on the presidency’s path. On November 8, 1988, Bush won a landslide against the Democrat candidate, Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis, 426 electoral votes to 111, an impossible outcome without Teddy Ball Game’s intervention.

Joe Guzzardi is a Society for American Baseball Research and Internet Baseball Writers Association member. Contact him at guzzjoe@yahoo.com

Ted Williams Rescues Bush 41 Campaign

Mayorkas Bobs and Weaves Around the Truth

By Joe Guzzardi

In September 2022, weeks before the mid-term election, then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy announced the GOP’s “Commitment to America,” a promise that a newly elected GOP majority would create an “economy that’s strong,” “a nation that’s safe,” “a future that’s built on freedom” and “a government that’s accountable.” Expanding the safe-nation vow, Republicans pledged to “secure the southern border,” “reduce crime and stop Fentanyl” and “defend our national security.”

The GOP squeezed out a narrow House majority, and could do no better than a 50-50 Senate tie leaving deciding votes to Vice-President Kamala Harris. During the ensuing 15 months, month-over-month border conditions consistently worsened. When McCarthy made his announcement, just before fiscal year 2022 ended, 2.8 illegal aliens had crossed the border, a then-record. The following year, a House Committee on Homeland Security released its report titled “Startling Stats” which found that in FY 2023, CBP arrested 35,433 aliens with criminal convictions or outstanding warrants, including 598 known gang members, 178 of those being MS-13 members. CBP, including its Air and Marine Operations, seized 27,293 pounds of fentanyl coming across the Southwest border, an 88% increase over FY 2022, and  enough to kill, the committee estimated, about 6 billion people. So much for the “Commitment to America” and its promise to secure the southern border, stop Fentanyl, and defend national security.

For months, congressional Republicans have made rumblings about impeaching Mayorkas, but their words were empty. The low point came when, in November 2022, California’s Tom McLintock, the House Judiciary’s Chairman of the Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement, joined with Democrats and seven other Republicans to vote against a resolution to impeach Mayorkas. When, two years into the invasion, a leading Republican who oversees “immigration integrity” teamed up with committed open borders Democrats like House Speaker Joaquim Jeffries and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, enforcement is a pipe dream.

From the instant Biden signed his Day One Executive Orders that undid  former President Donald Trump’s actions to restore prudent immigration, migrant caravans moved north. Interviewed along the way, the illegal aliens, also encouraged by Biden’s campaign promise to welcome asylum seekers and to end deportations, expressed confidence that work authorization and employment awaited them. Within a few weeks, the migrants’ predictions came true. At that relatively early juncture in what was Mayorkas’ clearly brazen and treasonous disregard for federal immigration law, the House should have impeached the DHS Secretary. In the end, the motion would have failed. But an early House effort might have moved the border chaos higher up on the public’s radar. Instead, unchecked, Mayorkas’ unconstitutional dismantling of established immigration law at the border and the interior accelerated.

After months of back and forth, the House appears ready to begin the impeachment process against Mayorkas. On their trip to Eagle Pass, the 600+ House delegation that included House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green, R-Tenn., said that his panel will officially begin an effort this month to impeach Mayorkas, an indefatigable witness. In his multiple appearances before the House and national television audiences, Mayorkas has proven adept at giving vague answers to specific questions or avoiding any response.

Most recent example: During a January 4 nationally televised interview, Mayorkas refused to state exactly how many illegal aliens immigration officials apprehended crossing the US-Mexico border between ports of entry have been released into the interior under the Biden administration. Although Mayorkas admitted he knew the answer, he refused to share the data. Little wonder that Mayorkas was tight-lipped. The House Judiciary Committee knows the answer that Mayorkas dutifully concealed. Since Biden took office Jan. 20, 2021, at least 3.8 million illegal aliens either have been released into the nation’s interior or successfully evaded Customs and Border Protection agents to enter the country, a population that exceeds that of 22 states and the District of Columbia.

When pressed to provide a solution, Mayorkas invariably points to Congress to fix the nation’s “broken immigration system,” three words that translate to amnesty. But if existing immigration laws had been enforced for the last five decades rather than disregarded in varying degrees by eight consecutive Republican and Democratic administrations—Carter, Reagan, Bush 41, Clinton, Bush 43, Obama, Trump, and most catastrophically, Biden—sovereign America wouldn’t be in its current dire straits. Secure borders aren’t a Republican or Democratic issue, but a national U.S. priority.

Cato the Elder, a Roman Senator at the time of the Punic Wars between Rome and Carthage is said to have used the phrase, “Ceterum (autem) censeo Carthaginem esse delendam” (“Furthermore, I consider that Carthage must be destroyed”) as the conclusion to all his speeches, to push for the war with their long time enemy and rival.

It would be great if every congressman would in a similar vein state, “Mayorkas impediendus est!” or Mayorkas must be impeached!

Joe Guzzardi is an Institute for Sound Public Policy analyst who has been writing about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org.

Mayorkas Bobs and Weaves Around The Truth

Mayorkas Bobs and Weaves Around The Truth

Border Crisis To Accelerate or Come Under Control?

By Joe Guzzardi

Around financial markets, the conventional wisdom is to “let the trend be your friend.” What happens in the market on one day will also likely occur on the following. Investors, the theory goes, should ride the “trend” until it “bends,” then bail out.

The phrase sums up the southwest border crisis. The invasion continues seamlessly one day after another, and during 2023 has steadily ramped up to a record number of migrant crossings with a December seven-day average of more than 9,600, a Homeland Security official told CNN. The record-smashing figure represents the average across the nation’s entire southern border. In November, total encounters stood at 6,800, meaning that the southern border has seen a month-over-month influx of 3,000 more daily arrivals as migrants continue to pour through the border.

In FY23, Customs and Border Protection recorded more than 2.4 million encounters at the southwest border and more than 3.2 million encounters nationwide. During the current fiscal year, 169 individuals on the terrorist watchlist were apprehended attempting to enter the country illegally, and at least 1.7 million known gotaways have evaded apprehension since FY2021. Since President Biden took office, there have been 7.5 million encounters nationwide and 6.2 million encounters at the southwest border, in addition to 1.7 million known gotaways. 

Also in FY 2023, CBP arrested 35,433 aliens with criminal convictions or outstanding warrants, including 598 known gang members, 178 of those being MS-13 members, and CBP, including its Air and Marine Operations, seized enough fentanyl coming across the Southwest border to kill, the House Homeland Security Committee estimates, about 6 billion people.

The data are included in the committee’s fiscal year-end report titled “Startling Stats,” but it’s findings did nothing to influence the administration to end the invasion. Not only did the illegal alien influx remain steady, it accelerated unabated. If the House’s year-end summary had no effect on the Biden administration’s mismanagement of the border disaster, nothing will. Proof that the border crisis will continue unchecked: in December, CBP processed and released 302,000 aliens. Since the start of FY 2024 which began on October 1, 20023, CBP has encountered more than 785,000 aliens at the southern border alone.

As alarming as the raw CBP statistics that related to the multimillions of border encounters are, they understate the invasion’s inevitable consequences. Factor in chain migration and the certainty that arriving aliens will either start new families or grow their existing ones, and population growth will continue upward. Citizens who live in high density cities should brace for more overcrowding driven by Biden and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ criminal disregard of federal immigration laws. 

A Center for Immigration Studies analysis detailed that the Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey (CPS) showed that the total foreign-born or immigrant population, both legal and illegal, was 49.5 million in October 2023 — a 4.5 million increase since Biden’s inauguration and a new record high. At 15 percent, the foreign-born share of the U.S. population is the highest percentage recorded in U.S. history. Since Biden took office, the foreign-born population has grown on average by 137,000 a month, compared to 42,000 a month during Trump’s presidency, and 68,000 a month during President Obama’s two terms. These unsustainable population increases generate urban sprawl and drain already diminishing natural resources like water and farm acreage.

Creating an equitable immigration system under Biden that benefits citizens and migrants alike is a long shot, but still possible. Congress returns from its winter recess on January 8, and will resume discussions over numerous thorny issues. At the top of the House GOP’s to-do list is, before authorizing funding for Ukraine and Israel wars, to demand that the immigration provisions encompassed in HR-2, which it passed in May, must be included. Key among those provisions is mandatory E-Verify which would end the jobs magnet that lures thousands of foreign nationals to the U.S. with employment expectations and to curb the administration’s parole abuse. Parole is intended for extraordinary circumstances, usually granted to one individual, and not intended to be given out en masse. 

HR-2 represents the best chance that legislators have to restore operational control of the border. Otherwise, the invasion will continue until at least January 2025. Based on the latest CBP monthly statistics, without HR-2 another 3 million illegal aliens will cross during the 2025 calendar year.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org

Border Crisis To Accelerate or Come Under Control?