EDITORIAL: Immigration protests
Staff Editorial
Daily Targum (Rutgers)
03/22/2006

(U-WIRE) NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. — At the Statehouse in Trenton on Tuesday, over 1,500 Hispanic immigrant workers rallied for a bill before the U.S. Senate that may give illegal workers legal status. The bill, supported by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., would also increase security around the Mexican border and punish companies employing illegal workers, according to The New York Times. Without legal status, companies have the opportunity to exploit their labor, by paying lower wages. The workers are not able to demand more money since another illegal replacement can easily be found. Some illegal workers are unable to go to the police or find legal protection, since to seek this help could mean deportation.

As disgraceful as it is for companies to use illegal immigrants for their own advantage, punishing the owners will not help the situation. Illegal immigrants come to the United States to find work, which in their own country is hard to find. To punish owners would mean these immigrants would have absolutely no shot to find the money that they seek. Owners would avoid hiring the workers at all, leaving those who come to the country without any means to find a better life. Although the workers should not get a clean slate for entering illegally or protection under the law when they are not citizens, they cannot be completely left out of finding a way to temporarily bring money to their household before deportation.

The workers also protested another law that would make illegal immigration a criminal act, ending with jail time instead of simply deportation. This opposite extreme of McCain's plan may serve as a deterrent, but would only drain money from an already strapped prison system.

Neither of these bills can be supported because both would cut any aid for workers, as well as financially damage the United States.

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