    [House Hearing, 110 Congress]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

         U.S. ECONOMY, U.S. WORKERS, AND IMMIGRATION REFORM (CONTINUED)
    =======================================================================
                                    HEARING

                                   BEFORE THE

                          SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION,
                    CITIZENSHIP, REFUGEES, BORDER SECURITY,
                             AND INTERNATIONAL LAW

                                     OF THE

                           COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
                            HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS

                                 FIRST SESSION

                                   __________

                                  MAY 9, 2007

                                   __________

                               Serial No. 110-35

                                   __________

             Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

          Available via the World Wide Web: http://judiciary.house.gov

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                           COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

                     JOHN CONYERS, Jr., Michigan, Chairman
    HOWARD L. BERMAN, California         LAMAR SMITH, Texas
    RICK BOUCHER, Virginia               F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, Jr.,
    JERROLD NADLER, New York                 Wisconsin
    ROBERT C. SCOTT, Virginia            HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina
    MELVIN L. WATT, North Carolina       ELTON GALLEGLY, California
    ZOE LOFGREN, California              BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia
    SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas            STEVE CHABOT, Ohio
    MAXINE WATERS, California            DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California
    MARTIN T. MEEHAN, Massachusetts      CHRIS CANNON, Utah
    WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts   RIC KELLER, Florida
    ROBERT WEXLER, Florida               DARRELL ISSA, California
    LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California         MIKE PENCE, Indiana
    STEVE COHEN, Tennessee               J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia
    HANK JOHNSON, Georgia                STEVE KING, Iowa
    LUIS V. GUTIERREZ, Illinois          TOM FEENEY, Florida
    BRAD SHERMAN, California             TRENT FRANKS, Arizona
    TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin             LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas
    ANTHONY D. WEINER, New York          JIM JORDAN, Ohio
    ADAM B. SCHIFF, California
    ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama
    DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida
    KEITH ELLISON, Minnesota

                Perry Apelbaum, Staff Director and Chief Counsel
                     Joseph Gibson, Minority Chief Counsel
                                     ------

              Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees,
                     Border Security, and International Law

                      ZOE LOFGREN, California, Chairwoman

    LUIS V. GUTIERREZ, Illinois          STEVE KING, Iowa
    HOWARD L. BERMAN, California         ELTON GALLEGLY, California
    SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas            BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia
    MAXINE WATERS, California            DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California
    MARTIN T. MEEHAN, Massachusetts      J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia
    WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts   LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas
    LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California
    ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama
    KEITH ELLISON, Minnesota

                        Ur Mendoza Jaddou, Chief Counsel

                        George Fishman, Minority Counsel

                                C O N T E N T S

                                  ----------

                                  MAY 9, 2007

                                                                       Page

                               OPENING STATEMENT

    The Honorable Zoe Lofgren, a Representative in Congress from the
      State of California, and Chairwoman, Subcommittee on
      Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and
      International Law..............................................     1
    The Honorable Steve King, a Representative in Congress from the
      State of Iowa, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Immigration,
      Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and International Law..     2
    The Honorable John Conyers, Jr., a Representative in Congress
      from the State of Michigan, and Chairman, Committee on the
      Judiciary......................................................     3
    The Honorable Lamar Smith, a Representative in Congress from the
      State of Texas, and Ranking Member, Committee on the Judiciary.     5

                                   WITNESSES

    Mr. T. Willard Fair, President, Miami Urban League
      Oral Testimony.................................................     9
      Prepared Statement.............................................    11
    Mr. Roy Beck, Director, NumbersUSA
      Oral Testimony.................................................    12
      Prepared Statement.............................................    14
    Mr. Steve Camarota, Ph.D. Director of Research, Center for
      Immigration Studies
      Oral Testimony.................................................    18
      Prepared Statement.............................................    21

              LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING

    Prepared Statement of the Honorable Zoe Lofgren, a Representative
      in Congress from the State of California, and Chairwoman,
      Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border
      Security, and International Law................................     1
    Prepared Statement of the Honorable John Conyers, Jr., a
      Representative in Congress from the State of Michigan, and
      Chairman, Committee on the Judiciary...........................     4
    Prepared Statement of the Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee, a
      Representative in Congress from the State of Texas, and Member,
      Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border
      Security, and International Law................................     7
    Prepared Statement of the Honorable Elton Gallegly, a
      Representative in Congress from the State of California, and
      Member, Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees,
      Border Security, and International Law.........................     8

                                    APPENDIX
                   Material Submitted for the Hearing Record

    ``The Impact of the Mariel Boatlift on the Miami Labor Market''
      by David Card, August 1989, submitted by the Honorable Zoe
      Lofgren........................................................    53
    ``Is the New Immigration Really So Bad?'' by David Card, January
      2005, submitted by the Honorable Zoe Lofgren...................    93
    ``Dollars without Sense: Underestimating the Value of Less-
      Educated Workers'' by Walter A. Ewing, Ph.D. and Benjamin
      Johnson of the Immigration Policy Center, May 2007, submitted
      by the Honorable Zoe Lofgren...................................   136
    ``The State of Civil Rights'' by Theodore M. Shaw from The State
      of Black America 2007, published by the National Urban League,
      submitted by the Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee..................   144
    Section 703 of HR 750, ``Recruitment of American Workers in the
      Save America Comprehensive Immigration Act of 2007'' submitted
      by the Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee............................   154
    ``The Impact of New Immigrants on Young Native-Born Workers,
      2000-2005'' by Andrew Sum, Paul Harrington, and Ishwar
      Khatiwada of the Center for Immigration Studies, September
      2006, submitted by the Honorable Elton Gallegly................   157
    ``The Fiscal Costs of Low-Skill Households to the U.S. Taxpayer''
      by Robert Rector, Christine Kim, and Shanea Wilkins, Ph.D. of
      The Heritage Foundation, submitted by the Honorable Steve King.   169

         U.S. ECONOMY, U.S. WORKERS, AND IMMIGRATION REFORM (CONTINUED)

                                  ----------

                             WEDNESDAY, MAY 9, 2007

                      House of Representatives,
    Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees,
                 Border Security, and International Law
                                    Committee on the Judiciary,
                                                        Washington, DC.
        The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:10 a.m., in
    Room 2141, Rayburn House Office Building, the Honorable Zoe
    Lofgren (Chairwoman of the Subcommittee) presiding.
        Present: Representatives Lofgren, Jackson Lee, Davis,
    Ellison, Conyers, King, Gallegly, Goodlatte, Lungren, Gohmert,
    and Smith.
        Staff present: Ur Mendoza Jaddou, Chief Counsel; George
    Fishman, Minority Counsel; Andrea Loving, Minority Counsel; and
    Benjamin Staub, Professional Staff Member.
        Ms. Lofgren. This hearing of the Subcommittee on
    Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and
    International Law will come to order.
        This is the continuation of our hearing from last Thursday,
    scheduled at the request of our minority Members pursuant to
    Clause 2(j)(1) of House Rule XI to provide additional
    perspectives on the topic of the hearing. Our witnesses today
    have been chosen by the minority, and we look forward to
    hearing their testimony.
        [The opening statement of Ms. Lofgren follows:]
     Prepared Statement of the Honorable Zoe Lofgren, a Representative in
    Congress from the State of California, and Chairwoman, Subcommittee on
    Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and International
                                      Law
        Pursuant to House Rule XI clause (2)(j)(1), the minority in the
    Subcommittee is entitled to,

            [U]pon request to the chairman by a majority of them before the
            completion of the hearing, to call witnesses selected by the
            minority to testify with respect to that measure or matter
            during at least one day of hearing thereon.

        Last week, the Subcommittee held a hearing on immigrants and the
    nation's economy. At the request of the Ranking Member and a majority
    of the minority on this Subcommittee, today the Immigration
    Subcommittee is holding a minority hearing to continue the discussion
    on the effects of immigrants on the nation's economy.
        As I stated last week, some have raised concern that immigrant
    workers undermine the welfare of native-born workers by reducing wages
    and raising unemployment levels. Applying basic rules of supply and
    demand, this argument appears convincing - the more workers there are,
    the more competition there is for jobs, and hence a downward pressure
    on wages and fewer available jobs.
        However, a majority of experts on this issue, as we heard in our
    hearing last week, have explained that this basic supply and demand
    argument is too simplistic to capture reality. The majority of the
    scholarship on this topic has indicated that simple economic arguments
    of supply and demand fail to reflect the economic complexities of the
    real world of immigration. As we learned last week, immigrants don't
    just fill jobs; they also create them in various ways, thereby
    increasing demand for native-born workers and actually increasing their
    wages throughout most of the economy.
        Our witnesses last week explained that there is some downward
    effect on wages at some levels. However, the weight of the scholarship
    shows that this effect is much smaller than some have argued, even as
    small 1.1%.
        Now we turn our attention to the minority witnesses to provide
    their perspective.

        Ms. Lofgren. The Chair now recognizes the Ranking minority
    Member, Steve King, for his opening statement.
        Mr. King. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        This hearing was called because the minority was denied a
    witness at last Thursday's hearing on the U.S. Economy, U.S.
    Workers and Immigration Reform. We invited two private-sector
    witnesses, and the majority publicized the witness list naming
    those witnesses. However, 2 days before the hearing, the
    majority dictated that one minority witness must be a
    Government witness.
        The reality is that no Administration witness is going to
    testify to anything other than the Administration's view on
    immigration reform. In fact, I had a question that I was going
    to ask them, which was: Can you give us your personal opinion?
    The answer would have been no, and I decided not to embarrass
    them.
        So that leaves those who disagree with the Administration's
    position with a tremendously small or nonexistent pool of
    Government witnesses, and the 1 day we had to try to find
    another witness made finding an available, out-of-town
    Government witness even more difficult.
        So, after several attempts to resolve the situation through
    discussions with the majority, we were forced to disinvite one
    of the minority witnesses. And pursuant to House Rule XI,
    clause 2(j)(1), we requested a minority day of hearing.
        Our first thought in seeking witnesses for this minority
    day of hearing was to give Mr. T. Willard Fair the opportunity
    to respond to the attacks leveled by Mr. Wade Henderson, a
    majority witness at last Thursday's hearing. Mr. Fair will
    discuss the impact of immigration on African-American workers,
    and his views are shaped in part by his position as President
    and CEO of the Urban League of Greater Miami. So I am pleased
    that Mr. Fair is with us today.
        I am also pleased that Roy Beck, the Executive Director of
    NumbersUSA, is also here and that he is not holding against us
    the fact that we were forced to uninvite him last week.
        And finally, I am pleased that Dr. Steve Camarota, director
    of research at the Center for Immigration Studies, is here to
    give us an economist's view of the issue.
        The issue at hand is extremely important to the future of
    America. Importing millions of poorly educated foreign workers
    will not help our country. It will only hinder our growth.
        When employers hire foreign workers who will work for less
    than American workers, Americans lose jobs. Currently, there
    are 69 million Americans who are working age who are simply not
    in the workforce and 6.9 million working illegal immigrants. We
    would only have to recruit one out of 10 Americans that are not
    in the workforce in order to replace the illegal labor in
    America.
        The open-borders lobby's argument is that those people do
    not live in the place where the jobs are, but they forget that
    the illegal immigrants did not either.
        So I would point out that at last Thursday's hearing, some
    of the witnesses argued that adding more people to the
    workforce helps raise wages, but that notion is contrary to the
    law of supply and demand. The bottom line is that when more
    people are willing to work for low wages, the wages go down.
    Any employer can tell you that.
        That is why employers want amnesty for illegal aliens and a
    massive new guest worker program to import the world's poor
    because they can profit from that, and the American economy is
    like a ship with 300 million passengers and crew. The
    passengers do not contribute to the efficiency of the ship. It
    is the crew that does that. If we keep taking on more
    passengers and untrained crew, instead of putting more of our
    passengers to work, ultimately, this great ship, America, will
    sink, and it will sink into the depths of the Third World.
        I also point out that we have had testimony here from
    Robert Rector of The Heritage Foundation in a very definitive
    study that identifies a net loss to the taxpayer of $22,449 a
    year for every household on average that is headed by a high
    school dropout, and there has been no response to those
    statistics and that data. The response has been great silence.
        So I appreciate the witnesses being in here, and I
    appreciate your testimony before this Committee, and I am
    hopeful that if there is not going to be another number that is
    going to be offered so that it can be scrutinized by our side
    of this argument that the concession will be made that you
    gentlemen are right.
        I thank you, Madam Chair, and I yield back the balance of
    my time. I look forward to the testimony.
        Ms. Lofgren. We are pleased to be joined by the Chairman of
    the full Judiciary Committee today, and I would now recognize
    Chairman Conyers for any opening remarks that he may wish to
    make.
        Mr. Conyers. Thank you, Chairwoman Lofgren and Steve King
    and Mr. Gohmert and Mr. Smith and Mr. Lungren, our former
    attorney general from California.
        I consider these hearings very, very important. Why?
    Because what we are trying to do now is to correct some
    problems that have happened across the years, and, of course,
    resolving old problems are a bit of a difficulty.
        Now I come out of the civil rights movement, and Mr. Fair,
    I understand, does as well. And what we have to examine, I say
    to the witnesses, is how we deal with the problem of a fair
    amnesty reformation and at the same time deal with the reality
    of minority unemployment in this country, of which there is way
    more than is reported. It is a very highly underreported
    statistic.
        So can we do that? Can we do that without breaking up
    families? There is not a Member on the full Committee on
    Judiciary that does not want to promote family values and
    keeping families together. To do that within reason and bounds
    is a legitimate objective of the immigration reform package
    that we are at the present moment putting together.
        We do not have a bill, so everything you say here is being
    examined for whether it can be included in what our final work
    product is. So what we are trying to say is that we need a re-
    examination of full employment. We would need full employment
    if there was not an immigration crisis.
        I was one of those--and I was so proud that Coretta Scott
    King joined with me when we passed the Full Employment and
    Balance Growth Act, which was trying to deal with the reality.
        Now I would like to see a situation where there is not some
    gross surplus of low-wage workers, unskilled workers, and the
    number of jobs available. What I would like to see is a
    reasonable distribution that I have not found anywhere in my
    train of logic to want to have a pool of unskilled workers, be
    they immigrant or be they native American. I want full
    employment as a legitimate goal, and for all of those witnesses
    here today that can help me, this would be very, very
    important.
        Keep in mind African-Americans and Latinos, as minority
    groups in America, have a strong common interest in fairness
    and equal opportunity, economically and politically. And as the
    Leadership Conference on Civil Rights noted, the traditional
    civil rights movement was instrumental in eliminating
    discriminatory immigration quotas in the 1960's, and that is
    why, to me, civil rights organizations and their leaders need
    to speak out on behalf of crafting a fair bill.
        Fairness undergirds my major approach to this huge problem
    that Chairman Lofgren and her Subcommittee have adjusted their
    sights to. They are holding more hearings than anybody else in
    the Committee and for good reason. There is a lot of work to be
    done, and we have to climb over a lot of misunderstandings that
    are out there.
        Thank you, Madam Chairman.
        Ms. Lofgren. Thank you, Chairman Conyers.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Conyers follows:]
    Prepared Statement of the Honorable John Conyers, Jr., a Representative
    in Congress from the State of Michigan, and Chairman, Committee on the
                                   Judiciary
        A serious study of the immigration issue must include a thoughtful
    analysis of how foreign workers impact our native-born workers. We had
    such a hearing last week, and I am happy to hear from even more voices
    on this important issue.
        Indeed, I join Wade Henderson and the Leadership Conference for
    Civil Rights in applauding the fact that so many people and groups are
    now expressing concern for the state of Black America, and specifically
    for our unemployed and underemployed young men.
        We need to address these concerns without driving wedges among our
    communities. As Frederick Douglass stated in a prescient speech he gave
    in the wake of Emancipation, the question of immigration and race
    prerogative ``should be settled upon higher principles than those of a
    cold and selfish expediency.''
        We cannot simply condemn immigration reform as being either against
    African-Americans or a disguised form of amnesty. We cannot walk away
    from the hard work that the American people expect from us--to achieve
    comprehensive balanced immigration reform.
        We also cannot ignore the harsh realities that African-Americans
    have long faced in our Nation. We must continue to bring the Nation's
    attention to the long-lasting social and economic effects of slavery
    and segregation. These economic issues are the root cause of many
    critical issues in the African-American community today, such as
    education, healthcare and crime. We need to have a constructive
    dialogue on the role of slavery and racism in shaping present-day
    conditions in our community and American society.
        As highlighted in a prior hearing, studies show that black men born
    in the late 1960s were, by the end of the 1990s, more likely to have
    prison records than either military records or college degrees. Even
    worse, those who were high-school dropouts had a nearly 60 percent
    chance of having served time in prison.
        Nevertheless, the fact that African-Americans face challenges in
    our labor markets does not necessarily mean that immigrants are the
    cause of those problems. The scholarship on this issue is inconclusive,
    and studies that fail to take incarceration rates and education into
    account are of questionable value.
        Even assuming for the moment that immigration does hurt some poor
    American communities--especially African-American communities and
    established Latino communities--what can we do to protect them?
        Mr. Fair, in his written testimony, suggests that less immigration
    is more likely to help a young black man succeed as a carpenter or an
    ex-convict reintegrate into society. I believe, instead, these young
    men would have a better chance to succeed in an environment that
    promotes: a full employment policy; skills training; education; and
    transitional programs such as the Second Chance Act.
        Rather than simply closing the door to immigration and hoping that
    things will get better for African-Americans, we should instead be
    asking ourselves what can be done to stimulate job growth and improve
    opportunities in Black communities across the Nation.
        As one of our witnesses is from Miami, it is appropriate for us to
    note economist David Card's study on the impact of the 125,000 Cuban
    nationals who came to the United States during the Mariel boatlift.
    Although Miami's labor force increased by some 7 percent within a
    relatively short period of time, Mr. Card found that the Mariel
    immigration had virtually no impact on the wages or unemployment rates
    of less-skilled workers.
        We should also keep in mind that African Americans and Latinos, as
    minority groups in America, share a strong common interest in fairness
    and equal opportunity. As the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights has
    noted, the traditional civil rights movement was instrumental in
    eliminating discriminatory immigration quotas in the 1960s. This is why
    leading civil rights organizations have continued to speak out on
    behalf of immigrants' rights since then. Balanced immigration reform
    should be premised on protections for native-born workers such as
    unemployment thresholds which limit temporary workers. It also should
    provide protections for immigrants such as access to unions, wage
    protections, and programs that do not create a permanent underclass.
    And, as I mentioned earlier, we need a full employment policy with an
    educational base and good wages. We must move away from the rhetoric of
    ``impossibility'' or ``amnesty,'' and achieve a lasting solution to
    these problems.

        Ms. Lofgren. I now would recognize the Ranking Member of
    the full Committee, Mr. Smith, for any opening statement he
    would like to make.
        Mr. Smith. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        This is an unusual but necessary hearing, as Mr. King
    pointed out, but I certainly do want to agree with the Chairman
    of the full Committee and the comments that he just made. He
    said that a surplus of unskilled workers basically does no one
    any good, whether they be immigrants or native workers, and I
    just absolutely concur with that statement, and I share his
    concerns that a surplus might well lead to greater unemployment
    among American workers.
        Madam Chair, immigration has become the most complex and
    sensitive subject, I think, Congress faces today. It affects
    our economy, our culture, and our future. So it is critical
    that we have accurate facts if we are to properly address
    immigration reform. The late Carl Sagan said, ``Better the hard
    truth than the comforting fantasy.''
        This Subcommittee has held hearings on a number of
    subjects. Regardless of the topic, one question always comes to
    my mind: Who will stand up for the American worker? And the
    answer is: We will, and we must.
        Virtually all credible studies show that competition from
    cheap foreign labor displaces American workers, including legal
    immigrants, or depresses their wages. The Center for
    Immigration Studies found that low-skilled workers lose an
    average of $1,800 a year because of competition from illegal
    immigrants for their jobs. That is a huge economic hit.
        A study by Harvard Economist George Borjas shows that cheap
    immigrant labor has reduced the wages of American workers
    performing low-skilled jobs by over 7 percent, and it is
    instructive that the highest unemployment rates among Americans
    are in the construction and service industries to occupations
    with a high number of illegal immigrant workers.
        The nearly 70 million Americans, who are unemployed or have
    given up looking for jobs, have a right to those jobs. We must
    put the interest of American workers ahead of foreign workers.
        Today, we will hear testimony that all Americans are hurt
    by cheap foreign labor. Almost 20 percent of all Black
    Americans and 40 percent of Hispanics do not have a high school
    degree. These low-skilled legal workers are the ones who
    disproportionately must compete with foreign workers. They are
    the real victims of America's failed immigration policy. For
    proof, we have only to look at the effects of recent Federal
    immigration worksite enforcement actions.
        After last year's worksite enforcement by the Bureau of
    Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Georgia's Crider lost over
    600 illegal workers. Well, what happened? The Wall Street
    Journal reported, ``For the first time since significant
    numbers of Latinos began arriving in Stillmore, the plant's
    processing lines were made up predominantly of African-
    Americans,'' and Crider continues to fill positions with legal
    workers.
        Is that the expiration of my time, Madam Chair?
        Ms. Lofgren. I thought it was, but I think we messed up on
    the lights. So why don't you----
        Mr. Smith. Okay. I would be glad to take another 5 minutes,
    Madam Chair. [Laughter.]
        Ms. Lofgren. If you could conclude in 2 or 3, that would be
    perfect.
        Mr. Smith. Thank you.
        All right. Let me repeat that last phrase. The Wall Street
    Journal reported what happened. ``For the first time since
    significant numbers of Latinos began arriving in Stillmore in
    the late 1990's, the plant's processing lines were made up
    predominantly of African-Americans.'' Crider continues to fill
    positions with legal workers.
        Some say there are jobs Americans will not do, but that
    demeans Americans who do work in every occupation. Any honest
    job is a worthy job. If we had to pay a few cents more for a
    head of lettuce or chicken at the grocery store in order to
    protect American jobs, we should be willing to do so. The
    American worker must come first.
        Madam Chair, since I have another minute to go, let me
    mention another subject today, and I cannot avoid mentioning it
    because of what happened yesterday.
        Six individuals were arrested on their way to Fort Dix.
    They were terrorists and they intended to ``kill as many
    soldiers as possible,'' and they had the assault weapons to do
    so. As I read it, three of the six individuals were in the
    country illegally. To my knowledge, based upon news reports,
    they did not have any criminal backgrounds.
        These are the individuals who under the Administration and
    the Senate bill that are being considered would have become
    legalized. They might have become guest workers, or they might
    eventually have become citizens.
        So what happened yesterday certainly should be a wakeup
    call. It certainly should have a dramatic impact on our
    immigration debate and, I hope, will certainly slow down the
    process of any consideration of amnesty or legalization for
    people who are in the country illegally.
        Thank you, Madam Chair, and I will yield back the balance
    of my time.
        Ms. Lofgren. Thank you.
        In view of the schedule and mindful that our witnesses are
    waiting, we will ask other Members to submit their opening
    statements for the record.
        Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare a
    recess of the hearing at any time.
        Without objection, all opening statements will be placed in
    the record.
        [The prepared statement of Ms. Jackson Lee follows:]
           Prepared Statement of the Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee, a
        Representative in Congress from the State of Texas, and Member,
     Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security,
                             and International Law
        Today marks the eighth hearing in a series of hearings dealing with
    comprehensive immigration reform. This subcommittee previously dealt
    with the shortfalls of the 1986 and 1996 immigration reforms, the
    difficulties employers face with employment verification and ways to
    improve the employment verification system. On Tuesday May 1, 2007 we
    explored the point system that the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia,
    and New Zealand utilize, and on May 3, 2007 the focus of the discussion
    was on the U.S. economy, U.S. workers and immigration reform. Yesterday
    May 8, 2007 we took a look at another controversial aspect of the
    immigration debate, family based immigration. Today's hearing is a
    continuation of the hearing we held on May 3, 2007.
        At that hearing this past Thursday, May 3, 2007 the tone of the
    conversation turned ``ugly'' for lack of a better word. I remind my
    colleagues that these series of hearings that began at Ellis Island and
    will conclude at the end of this session are about finding the truth,
    dispelling the myths, and arriving at a consensus that is in the
    interest of first the American worker, the border, and our economy.
        Working under the assumption that immigrants are a detriment and a
    strain on our economy, and further a detriment to the economic
    opportunities of young low-skilled blacks we invited a panel of experts
    to discuss this very issue.
        Dr. Orzsag mentioned that more low skill workers mean more high
    skilled workers and low skill labor creates the need for more jobs in
    general. For example an attorney or a doctor may not have the time to
    mow his lawn, do his own dry cleaning, or make his own lunch. On the
    other hand a low skilled worker laboring on a farm means that there
    will be an urgent need to hire a driver to deliver the produce to the
    grocery store, and another individual who stocks the product in the
    grocery store. Likewise common sense dictates that the same groups of
    workers make obvious contributions to our economy when they buy
    groceries, clothes, gas, and other living essentials.
        With regards to this ``perception'' that illegal immigration is
    having a particularly adverse effect on the job opportunities of young
    black men allow me to reiterate the following. That argument is in part
    a disingenuous argument. It does not take into account the fact that
    since the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 our nation has seen a
    growing black middle class. Quite frankly, I agree with Wade Henderson.
    I will not allow ignorance and divisiveness into this discussion about
    immigration.
        However, I understand the concerns of gentleman like T. Willard
    Fair, and I address these issues in my immigration legislation the SAVE
    America Comprehensive Immigration Act of 2007.
        Let me take a brief moment to describe how my legislation, the SAVE
    America Comprehensive Immigration Act of 2007 addresses this shortage
    of workers. Section 703 of the SAVE Act, entitled ``Recruitment of
    American Workers,'' mandates the following.
        First of all any employer that files a petition on behalf of a
    foreign born employee will have to file an affidavit that illustrates
    their efforts to recruit a lawful permanent resident (LPR) or a United
    States Citizen (USC), and an emphasis will be placed on attempts to
    recruit employees from minority communities. Recruitment efforts in
    minority communities can include advertisements in local newspapers in
    the labor market where these workers patronize for at least 5 days,
    advertisements in public transportation systems, and recruitment
    activities in secondary schools, recreation centers, community centers,
    and other places throughout the communities within 50 miles of the job
    site that serve minorities.
        The SAVE Act also mandates a 10% surcharge on all fees collected
    for petitions to accord employment based status. These funds would then
    be used to create an employment training program with the purpose of
    increasing the number of available LPR's and USC's in the occupations
    that are the subjects of these petitions. Likewise, 50% of the funds
    will be used to train workers in rural and inner city areas.
        Finally a portion of the proceeds will also be used to establish an
    ``Office to Preserve American Jobs'' at the Department of Labor. The
    purpose of this office is to establish policies that encourage American
    employers to hire American workers before resorting to foreign workers.
        In conclusion I say to this distinguished panel that those of us in
    the majority put the American people first, and we will continue to do
    so. The notion that we would do otherwise is simply not true.

        [The prepared statement of Mr. Gallegly follows:]
    Prepared Statement of the Honorable Elton Gallegly, a Representative in
      Congress from the State of California, and Member, Subcommittee on
    Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and International
                                      Law
        Mr. King, thank you for holding this hearing. It is important that
    we have a serious discussion about how illegal immigration has affected
    American workers.
        It defies common sense to argue that the presence of at least 12
    million illegal workers has not negatively affected the unemployment
    rate, wages, and working conditions for legal American workers.
        A study by the Center for Immigration Studies found that between
    2000 and 2005, the number of new male immigrant workers increased by
    1.9 million. At the same time, the number of employed unskilled
    American workers declined by 1.7 million.
        The conclusion is inescapable.
        The problem will be even worse if we grant amnesty to illegal
    workers. If every one of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants
    sponsors two (2) additional immigrants each, which is a very
    conservative number--the U.S. will have at least 24 million new
    immigrants coming to this country under amnesty over the next 10 years.
    That number will not include those who will continue to violate the law
    and cross our borders, figuring that eventually Congress will grant
    them yet another amnesty.
        The new immigrants will not just be competing for jobs, but for
    housing, health care, education, and other services. It defies belief
    that an additional 24 million people--again, in addition to the 12
    million already here--many of whom will not speak English and will have
    few jobs skills, will not have a serious, negative impact on our
    economy, our workforce, our schools, our hospitals, and our
    communities.
        In addition, there is no doubt that adding a minimum of 24 million
    people to our population will have negative consequences for our
    environment, our traffic problems, and our overall quality of life.
        Mr. King, I would like to place a copy of the Center for
    Immigration Studies report I mentioned, The Impact of New Immigrants on
    Young Native-Born Workers, 2000-2005, into the record.
        Thank you again for holding this hearing. I look forward to hearing
    from our witnesses.
        I yield back the balance of my time.

        Ms. Lofgren. We have three witnesses before us today.
        First, we have Roy Beck, the founder and Executive Director
    of NumbersUSA Education and Research Foundation. Mr. Beck is
    author of the book, The Case Against Immigration. He is a
    graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism.
        Next, we have Steven A. Camarota, Director of Research at
    the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington, D.C. He holds
    a Ph.D. from the University of Virginia in public policy
    analysis and a master's degree in political science from the
    University of Pennsylvania.
        Finally, we will hear from Mr. T. Willard Fair, President
    and Chief Executive Officer of the Urban League of Greater
    Miami. Mr. Fair has served as an adjunct professor at the
    Atlanta University School of Social Work, Bethune-Cookman
    College, Florida International University and the National
    Urban League's Whitney M. Young, Jr. Center for Urban
    Leadership. He earned his B.A. in sociology from Johnson C.
    Smith University and an M.S.W from the Atlanta University
    School of Social Work.
        Your written testimonies will be made part of the record in
    their entirety.
        I think you saw the little light system we have here. Each
    of you will be asked to summarize your written testimony in
    about 5 minutes. When the yellow light goes on, it means you
    have a minute left, and it is always surprising when you are a
    witness because the time really does fly.
        When the red light goes on, it means your time is up, as
    surprising as that may be, and we would ask you to try and
    conclude. We do not have a heavy gavel, but we would ask if you
    would conclude so we can get to the next witness and then to
    the questions.
        So, if we can begin, if we could start, Mr. Fair.

               TESTIMONY OF T. WILLARD FAIR, PRESIDENT,
                           MIAMI URBAN LEAGUE

        Mr. Fair. Thank you, and good morning. To members of the
    panel, it is a pleasure for me to have the opportunity to speak
    to you this morning on an issue that is important not only to
    me, but to my constituency group in Miami.
        For the last 40-plus years, I have been attempting to make
    sure that young Black men in Liberty City have the tools that
    they need in order to be productive citizens in Miami-Dade
    County. We have worked at that, and I suggest to you that the
    status of young Black males around this country is of such a
    significant nature of deterioration that all of us should be
    concerned.
        We know, based on everything that we have read by all of
    the experts, that the issues that face them, that keep them
    from becoming productive citizens are many and complex, from
    family composition to incarceration to attitudes to beliefs to
    the last vestiges of racism being practiced. Those things
    surround them on a day-to-day basis.
        I would not suggest to you that those things are the only
    things, nor would I suggest to you that illegal immigration or
    legal immigration is a primary reason for the creation of those
    things, but when we have the discussion about the variables
    that make them unable to achieve their highest aspirations, we
    never talk about the impact of mass immigration on that, and I
    suggest to you that Miami is the best laboratory for you to
    look at as we talk about the impact of legal versus illegal
    immigration on the ability of Black Americans to ascend to the
    heights of their aspirations.
        When I came to Miami 40-plus years ago, there were certain
    things in place that gave you some understanding about the
    importance of Black Americans to the economy, to the vitality
    of that city. One of my favorite observations is where did they
    go because when I came to Miami, all of the hotel, motel,
    restaurant jobs in Miami were occupied by African-Americans.
    Today, that is flipped. That is neither good nor bad nor is
    that condemning anybody who has the jobs, but the issue becomes
    what happened to all of those people who had those jobs?
        When I came to Miami 40 years ago, the construction
    industry primarily was made up of laborers who came from
    Liberty City. It is not by accident, but should have been
    predicted that the first persons that fell off the high
    scaffolds in Miami involved in construction were not people
    from Liberty City, but were Haitians, because, once again,
    those jobs that used to be held by African-Americans are now
    held by others, legal or illegal. The numbers have impacted
    adversely on the ability of Blacks in Miami to get jobs.
        This does not mean that one wants to blame immigration, but
    one certainly has to understand the effect of mass immigration
    on those set of circumstances. When one digs down deep into
    that whole process, one then begins to understand that if you
    talk about a form of amnesty that is going to put an additional
    12-million-plus people into that system, I mean, you create
    other sets of problems that are already in place.
        So, when we begin to talk about the issue and its impact on
    Black America, academicians, researchers all have demonstrated
    very clearly by their research that it does occur. What
    disturbs me, for example, is we talk to economists, we talk
    about supply and demand, and we know that it is going to impact
    on us adversely, and finally, we may admit that it does, but
    when we talk about that it does, we talk about it impacts
    modestly. Well modestly may mean one thing to you as an
    academician, but if it is you in reality, then it is
    significant. It is no longer modest.
        So all of the experts agree that illegal versus legal,
    legal versus illegal has an impact on the ability of African-
    Americans to get jobs. But we began to switch it off and say
    that it does not.
        We also have this whole notion that we can allow certain
    people to come in to the system, create jobs, and as they take
    over certain jobs, they will then, by virtue of their numbers,
    create other jobs in the industry. Well, that does not work in
    Miami because what happens is that if you take over all of the
    jobs picking lettuce, the notion is that you are able to pick
    lettuce cheaper and, therefore, you can get it to the market
    faster. You get it to the market faster. Therefore, you can get
    more people to buy it. Then what happens is that----
        Ms. Lofgren. Mr. Fair, your red light is on. If you----
        Mr. Fair. My red light?
        Ms. Lofgren. Yes. If you could just, you know, wrap up, I
    do not want to cut you off in the middle of your sentence.
        Mr. Fair. What happens then is that if those who are in
    place to get the new jobs are not people that look like me,
    then it works. But the lettuce pickers then become the
    cashiers, then become the foremen, then become the truck
    drivers, and once again, we are locked out of an industry.
        Thank you, Madam Chair.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Fair follows:]
                     Prepared Statement of T. Willard Fair
        Good morning and thank you for the opportunity to address this
    panel.
        I have devoted much of my adult life to one of the most important
    challenges facing our country: How to help young black men build
    constructive lives as fathers and breadwinners. The size of the problem
    was outlined in a recent book published by the National Urban League
    entitled The State of Black America 2007: Portrait of the Black Male--
    black men are much more likely to be unemployed than white men, more
    likely to be dropouts, in prison, in poverty, or dead.
        There are many reasons for grim statistics like this, including the
    continuing effects of slavery and Jim Crow; the shift in the economy
    away from manufacturing; broken schools in our big cities; the
    glorification of self-destructive behavior by popular culture.
        But one factor is too often ignored--mass immigration.
        There was little immigration when the struggle for civil rights
    began to achieve success in the 1950s and '60s. In fact, the 1965
    immigration law that started today's mass immigration was itself seen
    as a civil rights measure, intended to clean out rules that favored
    immigrants from some countries over others. Sen. Edward Kennedy, then,
    as now, chairman of the Senate immigration subcommittee, said ``The
    bill will not flood our cities with immigrants. . . . It will not cause
    American workers to lose their jobs.''
        So much for predictions.
        Since 1965, nearly 30 million legal immigrants have come here, plus
    millions of illegal aliens. The results have been devastating for those
    Americans--black or white--who compete for jobs with this immigrant
    tide. George Borjas of Harvard has shown that immigration has cut the
    wages of American men without a high school degree by $1,800 a year.
    Economists at Northeastern University have found that businesses are
    substituting immigrants for young American workers, especially for
    young black men. In fact, scholars estimate that immigration is the
    reason for one-third of the drop in employment among black men, and
    even some of the increase in incarceration.
        Of course, none of that means that individual immigrants--or
    particular immigrant groups--can be blamed for the difficulties facing
    black men. Being pro-Me should never make me anti-You. Nor can we use
    immigration as a crutch, blaming it for all our problems. The reality
    is that less-educated black men in America today have a variety of
    problems--high rates of crime and drug use, for example, and poor
    performance at work and school--that are caused by factors unrelated to
    level of immigration.
        But if cutting immigration and enforcing the law wouldn't be a
    cure-all, it sure would make my job easier. Take employment--
    immigration isn't the whole reason for the drop in employment of black
    men; it's not even half the reason. But it is the largest single
    reason, and it's something we can fix relatively easily.
        Think about it this way: If there's a young black man in Liberty
    City, where I live, who's good with his hands and wants to become a
    carpenter, which is more likely to help him achieve that goal--amnesty
    and more immigration, or enforcement and less immigration?
        Which is more likely to help an ex-convict or recovering addict get
    hired at an entry-level job and start the climb back to a decent life--
    amnesty and more immigration, or enforcement and less immigration?
        Which is more likely to persuade a teenager in the inner city to
    reject the lure of gang life and instead stick with honest employment--
    amnesty and more immigration, or enforcement and less immigration?
        And it's not just a matter of jobs. Whatever your views on
    government social programs, everyone can agree that resources are not
    infinite--there's only so much social spending to go around. And since
    immigrants have relatively low skills and low incomes, they use a lot
    of social services and pay little in taxes, cutting into the spending
    on America's own poor. The Center for Immigration Studies estimates
    that illegal aliens alone cost federal taxpayers $10 billion more a
    year in services than they pay in taxes--that's $10 billion that's not
    being spent on disadvantaged Americans, not counting the much larger
    deficits at the state and local level, where most social services are
    provided.
        Likewise with the schools. This is an issue close to my heart,
    since I co-founded Florida's first charter school and was recently
    confirmed as chairman of the statewide Board of Education. We must
    offer the best education possible to all our children, for their own
    good and for the good of our country. But as budgets have tightened,
    school enrollment has surged, and all of the growth in the nation's
    school-age population--100 percent--comes from immigrant families. This
    surge in enrolment has led to school overcrowding and has diverted
    resources that would otherwise have been devoted to at-risk students.
        Solutions to the challenges facing black Americans have to come
    from both private efforts and government initiative--but regardless of
    the specific approach, flooding the job market and overwhelming the
    public schools and other government services undermines all our
    efforts. The interests of black Americans are clear: No amnesty, no
    guestworkers, enforce the immigration law.

        Ms. Lofgren. Thank you.
        Mr. Beck, your 5 minutes are beginning.

              TESTIMONY OF ROY BECK, DIRECTOR, NumbersUSA

        Mr. Beck. Madam Chairwoman and Mr. Chairman, Ranking
    Members King and Smith, and others Members of the Subcommittee,
    thank you for this opportunity to talk about this subject,
    which was the chief topic, I believe, of the bipartisan U.S.
    Commission on Immigration Reform in the 1990's chaired by the
    late Barbara Jordan.
        I was pleased that Chairman Conyers brought up this key
    principle of immigration policy that has fairness to it, and I
    believe that that was one of the chief principles of the
    bipartisan commission. In fact, a quote from the Commission's
    study said that immigration policy is needed so that ``it helps
    mitigate potential negative impacts, particularly on
    disadvantaged U.S. workers.''
        I am pleased to talk about this because I helped found
    NumbersUSA in 1997, I should say, to educate about and to
    advocate for the recommendations of the Jordan Commission. The
    Jordan Commission could find no rational justification to meet
    emerging labor needs by importing large quantities of foreign
    workers. Now this is after several years of study.
        Regrettably, Congress only dealt with a few recommendations
    about illegal immigration, but put off almost all the
    recommendations that the Jordan Commission had about protecting
    the American worker, and that is what they did. They put it
    off. Many of you were here. You know Congress put it off and it
    has not taken it back out.
        The principle of the Commission was that immigration policy
    should never be allowed to reduce the wages, working conditions
    or the opportunities of American workers, and those
    recommendations of about a decade ago were that this country
    should dramatically reduce legal immigration, that is bring in
    fewer of these legal foreign workers that are impacting the
    people that Mr. Fair is talking about trying to help, the
    American workers, said that illegal immigration should be
    substantially reduced by eliminating the jobs magnet, illegal
    foreign workers in this country should be removed from the
    labor markets and caused to return to their home countries, and
    that large-scale foreign worker programs should be avoided.
        It seems to me the major question before this Subcommittee,
    before this Congress, is: Why not go ahead and pass the rest of
    the Jordan recommendations on immigration to protect the
    American worker? Have the conditions of our vulnerable American
    workers improved so dramatically since then that that is no
    longer valid? And I think the answer is, no, they have actually
    decreased.
        I want to use the remainder of my oral comments to touch on
    one aspect of the Jordan Commission recommendations which was
    about reinvigorating domestic recruitment channels. Now we can
    take an example right here in the Chesapeake region, especially
    over on the Atlantic Coast.
        Every year, you have all of these tourism industry
    businesses up and down the coast saying down in Congress, ``We
    have to have more visas for foreign workers,'' and yet in just
    Virginia, Maryland, D.C. alone, there are 2 million working-age
    native-born citizens who are not working right now.
        Many of these businesses have better procurement channels,
    labor recruitment channels with Poland than they do with the
    Potomac, even though the Potomac has tens of thousands of older
    teens and young adults who are wasting away early years of
    their lives in nonemployment, instead of getting the experience
    and the dignity of having the entry-level, the stepping-stone
    jobs that would lead them to lives of middle-class financial
    security later on.
        The Jordan Commission spoke to this problem. They said the
    availability of foreign workers may create a dependency on
    them. We see that everywhere. It has been well-documented that
    reliance on foreign workers in low-wage, low-skill occupations
    creates disincentives for employers to improve pay and working
    conditions for American workers.
        When employers fail to recruit domestically or pay wages
    that meet industrywide standards, the resulting dependence,
    even on professionals, may adversely affect both U.S. workers
    in that occupation and U.S. companies that adhere to
    appropriate labor standards.
        We have 23 million native-born Americans, 18 to 64, who are
    less educated, no more than a high school degree, who do not
    have jobs right now--23 million. With this kind of situation,
    with the kind of poverty you read in the Post yesterday, the
    story about Mr. Edwards and his concern about the 37 million
    people in poverty, you think what would it be like if the
    American business community created domestic recruitment
    channels into these big pockets of poverty? How would that
    change the suffering that we have at the lower levels of this
    country?
        I would say that it is time to look at those Jordan
    Commission recommendations, maybe go further. I would say why
    recruit through immigration any low-skilled workers to deal
    with those, and my final sentence, Madam Chairwoman, is that
    the evidence shows that we do not have a shortage of workers.
    We have a shortage of domestic recruitment channels.
        Thank you.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Beck follows:]
                         Prepared Statement of Roy Beck
        Madame Chairwoman, Ranking Member King, Members of the
    Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today
    to talk about immigration policy and its effect on American workers,
    one of the two subjects that has dominated my attention as an author
    and journalist for the past two decades.
        The topic of this hearing was addressed through years of
    exploration by the bi-partisan U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform,
    chaired by the late Barbara Jordan, and including other luminaries such
    as Michael Teitelbaum and the late Richard Estrada. As it happened, I
    was commissioned by W.W. Norton & Co. during precisely that mid-1990s
    period to research and write a book on this same topic. The Jordan
    Commission began issuing its reports just as I had sent my final
    manuscripts to New York. I was surprised and pleased to see the
    Commission making many of the major recommendations that I had included
    in my own book's conclusions, and for largely the same reasons,
    including the Commission's principle that immigration policy needed to:

            ``. . . help mitigate potential negative impacts, particularly
            on disadvantaged U.S. workers.''

        For the last decade, I have had the privilege of educating about
    those recommendations that came from the final act of public service of
    Barbara Jordan's long and illustrious career. Since 1997, I have been
    the executive director of NumbersUSA. It is a non-profit, non-partisan
    organization founded to educate about and carry out both the
    immigration recommendations of President Clinton's Council on
    Sustainable Development and the Jordan Commission recommendations that
    were designed to serve this country's national interests, and
    especially the interests of American workers and the households they
    support.
        Let's apply that standard to the question of what to do with
    illegal aliens who already are in our country. Is the approach that
    works best for the American worker also good for the economy? Or are
    the two goals in conflict?
              would we collapse if illegal workers self-deported?
        What if the officially estimated 7 million illegal foreign workers
    \1\ were caused to self-deport over the next decade primarily through
    the enactment and implementation of laws that denied them U.S. jobs?
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \1\ ``Size and Characteristics of the Unauthorized Migrant
    Population in the U.S.,'' Jeffrey S. Passel, Pew Hispanic Center.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        This is not an idle scenario. Most of the major corporate lobbies
    believe an aggressive enforcement of immigration laws, added to
    mandatory workplace verification of new hires, would lead to a
    substantial loss of workforce among businesses that have illegally
    hired a lot of foreign workers.
        That is why they insist on a legalization of the current illegal
    workforce--and adoption of a large new guest worker program--before
    they would consent to full enforcement of immigration laws.
        In the assessment of the corporate lobbies, an Attrition Through
    Enforcement policy depriving businesses of their illegal workers would
    threaten to collapse the economy, harming all workers and the national
    interest.
        But in the school of thought represented by the bi-partisan U.S.
    Commission on Immigration Reform, the removal of millions of illegal
    foreign workers would open up jobs and raise the wages for American
    workers while strengthening the economy and serving the national
    interest.
                     a giant pool of non-employed americans
        Would our economy suffer under an Attrition Through Enforcement &
    Self-Deportation scenario? Would American workers gain? Is it
    economically necessary to legalize the illegal workers to keep their
    employers in business?
        Let's look at some big numbers.
        About 142 million people in America (including 7 million illegal
    aliens) hold paying jobs. They are the producers, and they support 160
    million people in America who do not hold a paying job (including 5
    million illegal aliens).\2\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \2\ March 2006 Current Population Survey
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        That's 142 million supporting 160 million others.
        But among the 160 million ``non-producing'' dependents are 70
    million ``non-institutionalized'' people who have no job but who are of
    the same age as the Americans who are holding full-time and part-time
    jobs.
        Nearly 70 million people in the broad working age of 16-74 are
    either looking for a job and are considered unemployed, or have dropped
    out of the labor force altogether.\3\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \3\ ``2006 annual Average Data, Employment status of the civilian
    noninstitutional population by age, sex and race,'' Bureau of Labor
    Statistics
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        That would be 70 million Americans without a job from which to find
    only 7 million to replace the illegal foreign workers--that is 10
    available legal U.S. residents without a job for every one illegal
    foreign worker with a job.
        The ratio is still overwhelmingly in favor of finding American
    worker replacements even if you limit the pool to:

              Native-born Americans

              Aged 18-64

        Some 42 million Americans without a job meet those criteria.
        And of those, 23 million are ``less-educated'' Americans with no
    education beyond high school and, thus, the people who would be more
    likely to compete for most of those jobs. That would be three less-
    educated Americans without a job for every illegal alien with a job.
        Sadly, this category of less-educated Americans has seen labor
    participation rates fall still lower in recent years, as foreign labor
    participation has risen.\4\ Opening up construction, food production,
    hospitality and other service jobs would provide immediate
    opportunities to reverse the native workforce dropout damage of recent
    years.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \4\ ``Dropping Out: Immigrant Entry and Native Exit From the Labor
    market, 2000-2005,'' Steven A. Camarota, Center for Immigration Studies
    Backgrounder, March 2006
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
               illegal aliens do jobs americans won't wait to do
        Skeptics always raise the question about whether Americans would do
    the jobs that illegal aliens are doing. My response long has been that
    without the availability of foreign labor, employers eliminate jobs
    that aren't very productive and improve the conditions on the others
    until Americans take them.
        But many recent cases of workplace raids in meatpacking plants and
    factories in all regions of the country during the last few months have
    suggested that there are a lot of Americans who will take so-called
    foreigner work as is. In nearly every case, federal enforcement
    arrested or drove out large numbers of illegal foreign workers who were
    entirely replaced by American workers within a few weeks. In some
    cases, the employers offered somewhat better wages, benefits and
    working conditions to attract jobless Americans back into the labor
    market. But in other cases, Americans were willing to take the jobs
    under the exact circumstances the illegal worker held them.
        We may understand why when we look at the labor statistics a little
    closer. There may be 23 million less-educated Americans without a job
    as the potential pool for replacing the illegal aliens and many of whom
    will need some serious recruiting to get back into the job market. But
    there are around 7 million unemployed Americans who are looking for a
    job right now.
               society as a whole and all workers tend to benefit
        Why would we not seek to meet our labor needs out of this pool of
    non-employed Americans?
        From the standpoint of the non-employed Americans, why should they
    be denied the opportunity to be recruited to jobs that will provide
    them the satisfaction and dignity of being productive members of our
    society? The Americans who would benefit tend to be among the most
    vulnerable members of our national community, with the fewest
    resources.
        From the standpoint of taxpayers, why should working-age Americans
    dependent on taxpayer support not be encouraged to step up to the plate
    to take available jobs?
        The 142 million productive working people of this country already
    are supporting the physical and social infrastructure for those 70
    million non-employed working-age Americans. As any of those 70 million
    enter the labor force, there would be no need for more infrastructure
    to handle the housing, education, transportation, recreation, health
    care, etc. of they and their families (because they already are here).
    Furthermore, as they enter the workforce they would begin paying more
    taxes to take some of the tax burden off the 142 million.
        If all 12 million of the officially estimated illegal aliens were
    to leave the United States, and if 7 million Americans replaced the 7
    million illegal workers in their jobs, the ratio of ``producers'' to
    ``non-producers'' would change from a 142 to 160 ratio to a 142 to 148
    ratio, with significant implications for tax/expense ratios of local
    and state governments.
        According to recent Heritage Foundation research, most households
    headed by illegal aliens are net tax drains of around $18,000 a year.
    When they leave the country, governments not only save the $18,000 per
    household, but they save on the formerly non-employed legal resident
    who has taken the illegal worker's job and is now paying more taxes. A
    less-educated legal resident worker will be a net tax drain, too, but
    since he/she already was a tax drain as a non-employed person, he/she
    should be less of a drain with a job.
            `attrition'--not `mass deportation'--provides transition
        I am not aware of any study or even claim that the Attrition
    Through Enforcement & Self-Deportation option could result in mass
    departures of millions a year. And no political leader is proposing
    mass deportations.
        Thus, the process of recruiting and training Americans to replace 7
    million illegal foreign workers as discussed above would take place
    over several years.
        The bad news for many of America's most vulnerable citizens is that
    it will be years before many of those jobs will be opened up by illegal
    aliens leaving the country. But the slow, steady process of emptying
    out the illegal population will provide employers plenty of time to
    adjust to a new era of the rule of law and establishing new channels of
    recruiting.
             'attrition' sets need for domestic recruiting patterns
        Many public and business leaders in local areas seem to sincerely
    believe that their region not only needs the illegal workers but must
    import new platoons of legal foreign workers each year.
        I recently spoke to a group of government and business leaders from
    western Colorado. One man said that many tourism and minerals
    businesses there depend on illegal labor now, have depended on it for a
    long time and would collapse if new flows of foreign labor were cut
    off. Through a combination of legal and illegal channels, according to
    this man, many businesses had become addicted to foreign labor.
        The Jordan Commission spoke to this problem:

            ``The availability of foreign workers may create a dependency
            on them. It has been well-documented that reliance on foreign
            workers in low-wage, low-skill occupations, such as farm work,
            creates disincentives for employers to improve pay and working
            conditions for American workers. When employers fail to recruit
            domestically or to pay wages that meet industry-wide standards,
            the resulting dependence--even on professionals--may adversely
            affect both U.S. workers in that occupation and U.S. companies
            that adhere to appropriate labor standards.\5\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \5\ 1997 Report To Congress, ``Becoming An American: Immigration
    and Immigrant Policy,'' p. 79

        Here again are conclusions that foreign-worker patterns that are
    harmful to vulnerable Americans are also harmful to the economy as a
    whole. But just like individuals who are addicted to harmful drugs,
    businesses and local economies can wean themselves and change to
    healthier patterns of behavior.
        Does anybody really believe that the Colorado ski industry and
    mineral industry would shut down if the federal government shut off its
    supply of foreign workers?
        Instead of shutting down, one can be sure that these industries
    would aggressively create new channels of recruitment, perhaps into the
    relatively nearby population centers of Kansas City, Dallas, St. Louis
    and Chicago. Yes, at first, they might find it difficult to persuade
    non-employed people in those cities to pick up roots and move with
    their families to Colorado. But once the first individuals and families
    settle and like their conditions, they will send back word to old
    neighbors, friends and family--just like the foreign workers have been
    doing the last 30 years. Soon, domestic networking patterns will create
    flows of labor just like the international ones do today that result in
    entire villages in foreign countries emptying out to settle in one
    small area of the United States.
        There are currently around 750,000 non-employed native adults (age
    18-64) in Wisconsin, 900,000 in Missouri, 1.7 million in Illinois and
    3.1 million in Texas.\6\ While Attrition Through Enforcement is
    gradually weeding out illegal workers from the Colorado labor force,
    employers have huge pools of potential workers to be persuaded to try
    living in the beautiful Rocky Mountain state. And if those states don't
    prove responsive enough, there are always the 4 million non-employed
    native adults in California.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \6\ March 2006 Current Population Survey
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Because international recruiting services and networks are so
    readily available and because the federal government provides and
    allows such large flows of foreign workers, many Colorado businesses
    are far more likely today to seek workers from Central America than
    from the Central Time Zone of the U.S.
        The Jordan Commission thought the federal government should
    encourage employers to re-discover domestic recruiting, calling on it
    to provide:

            ``. . . incentives or penalties to help ensure that employers
            in the U.S. engage in serious recruitment of American workers
            (for example, national rather than local recruitment where
            appropriate) and contribute significantly to the training of
            the domestic U.S. workforce.'' \7\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \7\ 1997 Report To Congress, Becoming an American: Immigration and
    Immigrant Policy, U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform

        The same phenomenon can be seen so readily in the Chesapeake Bay
    region and especially along the Atlantic seashore where the tourism
    industry clamors for access to more and more foreign workers even
    though around 2 million American natives in Maryland, Virginia and
    Washington DC do not have a job. Included in that are more than a
    million in the area who are less-educated. To again go alliterative,
    some of the businesses demanding more work visas each year are far more
    focused on recruiting from Poland than from the Potomac where tens of
    thousands of older teens and young adults waste away years in non-
    employment with little experience in entry-level and stepping-stone
    jobs that could form a pattern for later middle-class financial
    success.
        The gradual loss of illegal labor and a gradual reduction in new
    legal foreign labor would begin to create the virtuous economic circles
    of the World War One and World War Two eras in which industries had to
    recruit heavily from among poor, underemployed White and Blacks in the
    South and in the hill countries of our nation. When the wars shut off
    immigration, corporate America finally valued the least valued members
    of our national community and created great migrations of American
    natives across regions, leading toward the Great Economic Compression
    that turned the country into a dominantly middle class society.\8\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \8\ The Case Against Immigration, Roy Beck (W.W. Norton)
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
            dead-end jobs become prized jobs with lower immigration
        The Great Economic Compression between 1929 and the early 1950s
    provides us a model for how reducing overall immigration numbers not
    only can stop the damage of immigration policy but greatly improve the
    lives of people in lower-skill jobs without them even having to change
    jobs.
        It was a time when the lower classes gained considerably on the
    middle classes and the middle classes gained on the upper classes. This
    emerging egalitarianism happened despite the coincidence with a Great
    Depression and a World War. Economic historians have attributed as much
    as one-third of this advancement of the working classes to the fact
    that immigration levels were low (well below 200,000 a year) and
    fertility had been low, producing an ever-tighter labor market.\9\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \9\ American Inequality: A Macroeconomic History, Jeffrey
    Williamson and Peter H. Lindert (Academic Press)
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        I stood face-to-face with this history during my research in Iowa
    meatpacking towns. I talked to old meatcutters who had begun their
    careers in the 1920s in disgusting, dangerous conditions at very low
    pay. For four decades, industry had used the easy supply of foreign
    labor to bust unions and keep meatcutting as one of the worst jobs in
    America.
        But after Congress put strict numerical caps on immigration in
    1924, the immigrants in the packing houses found that their labor was
    more and more valued in the tighter labor markets. Their unions grew
    stronger, pay rose and meatpacking became one of the safer jobs in
    America.
        I talked to numerous men who in the 1970s made enough money to
    support large families on one income and took nice vacations every
    year.
        But all of them had lost their jobs in the early to mid-1980s after
    Congress allowed the flow of foreign labor to rise from a quarter
    million a year in the 1960s to a half million a year in the 1980s (and
    then a million a year after 1990). One meatpacking company used the
    excess labor to bust the unions and slash wages and working conditions.
    Every other company then had to do the same or be run out of business
    (and several were). Now, meatcutting is back to being one of the worst
    jobs in America, populated mainly by immigrants and illegal aliens who
    will put up with the conditions just as long as it takes to find
    another job.
        I have no doubt that if Congress would enact the Jordan Commission
    recommendations, we would again see a beleaguered immigrant workforce
    in the meatpacking industry see their jobs turn into some of the best
    lower-skilled jobs in the country.
        But until then, we seem destined to continue a sad chain of
    occupations collapsing across the country. American drywallers are
    among the workers most under attack right now. But you can see it with
    all kinds of trades and services as the federal government's
    recklessness about immigration numbers ruins formerly middle-class
    occupations.
                jordan commission recommended less foreign labor
        The Jordon Commission in the 1990s could find no rational
    justification to meet emerging labor needs by importing large
    quantities of new foreign workers.
        Regrettably, Congress dealt with only some of the illegal
    immigration issues in 1996 and decided to set aside all of the Jordan
    Commission recommendations on legal immigration for consideration in a
    future year. That year has yet to arrive.
        I hope this hearing is a sign that the time has finally come when
    Congress and the President will effect policies that place the same
    kind of priority as did the bi-partisan Commission on ensuring that
    immigration never be allowed to reduce the wages, working conditions or
    opportunities of American workers.
        Based on that principle and research of the economy and labor
    markets in the 1990s, the Jordan Commission concluded that:

              Annual legal immigration numbers should be
            dramatically reduced;

              Illegal immigration should be substantially curbed by
            eliminating the jobs magnet;

              Illegal foreign workers already in the U.S. should be
            removed from our labor markets and caused to return to their
            home countries;

              Large-scale foreign guest worker programs should be
            avoided;

              Legal immigration should be limited to spouses, minor
            children, refugees and workers of very high skills not
            possessed by American workers.

        It seems to me that the major question before this subcommittee is
    why it should not go ahead and approve the rest of the Commission's
    recommendations and also exercise its oversight and purse functions to
    force this Administration to implement the immigration laws already
    passed by Congress.
        Congress needs to consider if the conditions of the American worker
    and the economy have changed substantially since 1996 to suggest that a
    different direction from the Jordan Commission is in order.
        With the abysmal statistics on widening gaps in income distribution
    and the plight of both our native and our foreign-born workers at the
    lower rungs of the labor market, it appears that the recommendations of
    the Jordan Commission are even more in order today than when they were
    made a decade ago.

        Ms. Lofgren. Thank you.
        Dr. Camarota, your 5 minutes.

    TESTIMONY OF STEVE CAMAROTA, Ph.D. DIRECTOR OF RESEARCH, CENTER
                        FOR IMMIGRATION STUDIES

        Mr. Camarota. Madam Chairwoman and Mr. King and Members of
    the Committee, I would like to thank you for inviting me here
    to speak.
        I would like to begin my comments perhaps in a way by
    building just on what Mr. Beck said, by looking at it with
    data. There is no evidence of a labor shortage in this country,
    especially at the bottom, the labor market where immigrants are
    most concentrated. If there was, wages, benefits and employment
    should all be increasing fast. Actually, that is the opposite,
    the exact opposite, of what has been happening.
        The national unemployment rate of 4 or 5 percent is not
    even relevant to this debate for two reasons. First,
    immigration's effect on the labor market, especially illegal
    immigration, is mainly on less-educated, young Americans,
    wherein unemployment is much higher than 4 or 5 percent.
    Second, unemployment figures do not include those who have left
    the workforce entirely and given up looking for work.
        The share of adults without a high school education in the
    labor market--that is have a job or are looking for a job--fell
    from 59 to 56 percent between 2000 and 2006, and for those with
    only a high school degree--and these are adults again--it fell
    from 78 to 75 percent. Thus, these individuals, however, who
    are not in the labor market do not even show up in unemployment
    statistics.
        There is a huge supply of potential, less-educated natives
    in this country. There are 23 million adult natives, 18 to 64,
    with no education beyond high school who are either unemployed
    or not in the labor market. There are another 10 million
    teenagers, 15 to 17, who are unemployed or not in the labor
    market. There are 4 million college students unemployed or not
    in the labor market. And in each of these cases, the share of
    those individuals working has been declining, even after the
    economy turned up in 2003.
        Wages and benefits have generally stagnated or declined for
    the less-educated. Hourly wages for men with less than a high
    school education grew just 1 percent between 2000 and 2005.
    Hourly wages for men with only a high school degree grew by .5
    percent for that whole 5-year period. If there really was a
    labor shortage, wages and benefits and labor force
    participation should all be going up. It is not.
        Now there is a good deal of research showing that
    immigration has contributed to this problem. In a study
    published in 2003 by The Quarterly Journal of Economics, which
    is like the top journal in the field, the authors concluded
    that immigration reduced the average annual earnings of native-
    born men without a high school degree by over 7 percent.
        In another recent paper published by the National Bureau of
    Economic Research, the authors concluded that immigration was
    responsible for 40 percent of the decline in Black employment--
    among men--between 1980 and 2000. Their findings are supported
    by other research done by Andrew Sum and Paul Harrington at
    Northeastern University looking at the post-2000 period.
        Now it is true that some researchers have found no
    significant negative effect from immigration, but they have
    mostly done that by comparing differences across local labor
    markets. Economists now think that the effect of immigration is
    national in scope, and the effect is mostly on young and less-
    educated workers, particularly minorities.
        When we focus on such workers and treat the economy as one
    big integrated whole, the economists do find significant
    negative effects from immigration. Now, of course, other
    factors adversely impact wages and employment for such workers,
    such as technology and globalization, but labor-saving devices
    and access to imports makes allowing in less-educated workers
    all the more unnecessary from an economic point of view. And
    immigration levels, unlike globalization or the pace of
    technological innovation, is something we can change.
        Now it is also important to understand that all research
    indicates that less-educated immigrants who create the job
    competition for less-educated natives consume much more in
    public services than they pay in taxes. The National Research
    Council found this. Often, the greatest strain is on services
    used by America's poor.
        Now some still argue for immigration on the grounds that it
    will stop the aging of America as a society. We are short of
    workers, and the idea is we are just growing old so fast. But
    no serious demographer actually makes this argument. Census
    Bureau projections indicate that if immigration were 200,000 a
    year, the working-age share of the population, 15 to 64 years
    of age, would be 59 percent in 2060. If it was a million a
    year, 5 times higher, the working-age percentage would be 60
    percent.
        So you could have a huge difference in immigration with a
    tiny difference in the working-age share. It does make,
    however, the population a lot larger. Those who wish to keep
    immigration levels at their current level or perhaps increase
    them further must at least understand that the policies that
    they favor come at the expense of the poorest and least
    educated Americans.
        Thank you.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Camarota follows:]
                    Prepared Statement of Steven A. Camarota

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        Ms. Lofgren. Thank you, Dr. Camarota.
        Because this is the minority's day of hearings, I will call
    first on the Ranking Member, Mr. King, for his 5 minutes of
    questions.
        Mr. King. Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and I
    appreciate that.
        I think with all the testimony that is here--and I
    appreciate it all--the part that is the least discussed is the
    recruitment channels for employees.
        And I think about how things work when I went down to go to
    work on a pipeline when I was 19 years old. People showed up,
    and some slept in campers. If you stayed there long enough,
    pretty soon, they would become trailer houses. Then they would
    begin to put foundations in and build homes, and towns start.
        The recruitment lines went back by familial lines. Anyway
    that the communications could go, from Haiti, from Iowa to
    Kansas, wherever it might be, that network has been how we
    recruited a group of employees.
        And, Mr. Beck, you spoke on that, and I would ask if you
    would expand on that thought for this Committee, please.
        Mr. Beck. Interesting you would bring up, you know, local
    personal experience. I grew up in the Missouri Ozarks in the
    1960's, and many of my friends--I was busy working in a steel
    plant there--were recruited to dig for pipelines through
    Nebraska and Kansas. This was grueling work, 60-hour-a-week
    work, but they offered good pay, and they had to do it because,
    at that point, they did not have these foreign labor channels
    to do it.
        I was watching a PBS special on the building of the Alaska
    pipeline, and I do not know if you have seen this recently, but
    it is amazing, you know, how incredibly awful the working
    conditions were, and yet they had people standing in line. They
    did not have enough jobs--they were terrible jobs--because they
    paid enough money.
        I have no doubt that the Colorado Tourism Ministry that I
    spoke to recently and said, you know, we would go out of
    business without foreign laborers, they used to have
    recruitment channels into places like St. Louis and Chicago and
    Dallas and Kansas City. They do not have those anymore.
        So, I mean, I think all of us can who are of a certain age
    can remember when those recruitment channels existed. One of
    the things that happens among young people is that if they do
    not see people their age or just above their age doing a job,
    they cannot necessarily imagine doing that job. So it is not
    going to be particularly easy.
        It is going to take a little bit of time for businesses to
    have to actually motivate. Recruitment means not just offering
    a job. It means motivating people to take this job. It means,
    in some cases, getting whole pure networks to come at the same
    time. But I do not think we are talking about people moving
    across the entire country either. In most places, you have
    plenty of labor within 100, 200 miles.
        Mr. King. Could I summarize that by suggesting that
    employers will do what is necessary and most efficient in order
    to recruit the labor that they need to do the job?
        Mr. Beck. They are not going to go out of business just
    because the Congress does not provide them easy foreign labor.
        Mr. King. And like electricity, follow the path of least
    resistance.
        I go to Dr. Camarota. You made the statement that the
    unemployment rates are not even relevant in this discussion,
    and it is interesting. I have not heard that statement made
    before this panel at any time. I am in my fifth year here. I
    might have missed it. But I would ask you to expand upon that a
    little bit.
        I went back to the U.S. Department of Labor, and I thought,
    well, if you are a company and you wanted to evaluate if you
    are going to establish, you know, in a locale, you would go in
    and do a survey and find out what is the available labor
    supply. The U.S. Department of Labor will get you those numbers
    if you break those statistics down. You have done that, and if
    you could speak to that issue, I would appreciate it.
        Mr. Camarota. Sure. Look, I mean, the national unemployment
    rate includes everyone, and it includes only those who say they
    are actively looking for a job at the time the Government asks.
        If we break that down and look at, say, workers with less
    than a high school education, their unemployment rate is
    usually two and often three times the national average. If we
    look at young workers who have only a high school degree but
    are under the age of 30, their unemployment rate is typically
    double the national average.
        Then there is the issue of all the people who are not even
    in the labor market, some 20 million people who have no
    education beyond high school, they are not in school, and they
    are not in the labor market right now. Now, obviously, not
    every one of those individuals wants to work.
        But to put some of this in perspective, if there are 23
    million less-educated natives, either unemployed or not in the
    labor market, 10 million teens, 4 million college students in
    the same situation, there are about 7 million illegal aliens.
    If you are asking me, ``Does it seem that we have easily the
    potential pool of workers to replace the 7 million illegal
    aliens?'' provided we pay well enough, yes.
        Mr. King. All right. Thank you, Dr. Camarota.
        Mr. Fair, Dr. Camarota made the statement that 40 percent
    of the decline in Black employment over the years 1980 to 2000
    was indexed to an increase in immigration--illegal immigration
    would be part of that--would you speak to that issue, please?
        Mr. Fair. Well, absolutely. There is no doubt about, as we
    look, for example, in Miami, that as the numbers rise in terms
    of legal and illegal immigration, then prosperity drops in our
    community. As we look at how they are recruited--you alluded to
    that earlier--it becomes quite clear that there is a system of
    informality that allows those, because of their numbers, to
    impact adversely on my community.
        If we go to Fort Lauderdale International Airport, nine out
    of 10 of the workers there happen to be Haitian, and you would,
    therefore, conclude that Black people who live in Liberty City
    do not want to work at the airport. That is not true. There is
    no official advertisement of the jobs into my community that
    Black folks are aware of. As a result of that, then it impacts
    adversely on our numbers because the jobs are there, folks take
    the jobs, and therefore the 40 percent keeps getting larger and
    larger.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman's time has expired.
        Mr. King. That is the recruitment channel that Mr. Beck
    addressed.
        I yield back.
        Ms. Lofgren. The Chair now recognizes Mr. Ellison for 5
    minutes.
        Mr. Ellison. Thank you, gentlemen, for your presentations.
    I appreciate it.
        I also thank the Chair and the Ranking Member for the
    hearing. It is a very important subject.
        I wonder, Mr. Fair, if you could talk about some of the
    efforts that have taken place from a governmental standpoint or
    it may be even a business-community standpoint in Liberty City
    or even Florida to do active recruitment efforts, training
    efforts, educational efforts to get the young Black men that
    you and I care so much about in a position to take the jobs
    that you are mentioning.
        So could you talk about what is going on without regard to
    immigration, but just things that we are doing to train and
    recruit and educate young African-American men to be ready for
    the job market? What is going on now?
        Mr. Fair. Through our South Florida workforce program,
    which is the primary Government-funded program whose purpose is
    to address that issue, there is a lot going on. The issue is
    not what is going on, but the issue is the magnitude of that
    which is going on.
        If you have a federally designed program to train and
    prepare 300 persons who are unemployed to participate in the
    job market, but the real population of need is 3,000 people,
    then you make no significant impact on the pattern then. So
    what is needed is a reallocation of significant resources to
    resolve the problem today, not tomorrow.
        Mr. Ellison. You know, Mr. Fair, I will agree with you
    wholeheartedly. I think you are dead on the mark.
        The thing that concerns me about the whole discussion we
    are having today is that, you know, for years and years--and,
    you know, I am a 43-year-old African-American man--I well
    remember looking for a job, having trouble getting one. In the
    programs available, the things to help me get employed were not
    easy to find, and yet in 2007, we are being told that it is the
    immigrants' fault. And I just do not buy that.
        I think that there has been a consistent neglect of young
    African-American men participating in the labor force for quite
    a long time, and now, all of a sudden, for political reasons,
    some people say, ``Oh, it is the immigrants,'' and I just have
    problems believing that.
        If I could ask you a question, Mr. Camarota, I thought your
    presentation was very interesting, and I think that you have an
    excellent command of the statistics in your presentation and I
    just want to ask you this question. You have made a good case,
    I think, that America does not have a labor shortage. There are
    more than enough native American workers to fill the
    particularly low-wage jobs out there.
        But that does not necessarily lead me to the conclusion
    that it is somehow foreign workers that are doing the
    displacing. I mean, that might be a reasonable conclusion to
    draw, but I wonder if you could help me draw the line a little
    bit tighter for me. For example, if you say there is a worker
    surplus for low-wage sector employment, can we then necessarily
    draw the conclusion that it is somehow the agency of low-wage
    foreign workers or their acts that are causing the displacement
    of the native workers?
        It seems to me that there is a real good chance that is the
    native corporate structure that is trying to get low-wage
    workers that are easy to manipulate, not likely to form a
    union, and are subject to being intimidated through Government
    acts and through ICI that sort of makes them really want to
    seek out these foreign workers, which is really the real
    causative factor.
        I wonder if you would comment, if you understand what I am
    saying.
        Mr. Camarota. Well, let me answer it this way. Maybe this
    is helpful. If the question is, is immigration the only problem
    that less-educated workers face or African-American men face,
    clearly, it is not. You have other structural problems in the
    U.S. economy.
        But take that NBER paper for example. It did say that 40
    percent of the problem seems to be related to immigration, and
    it is a 40 percent we could change. We could set a different
    immigration level and dramatically reduce it. It is very hard
    to instruct the Japanese to stop setting up factories in
    Malaysia or to slow the pace of technological innovation which
    generally disadvantages less-educated people. So this is
    something we have control over, we can actually do something
    about.
        And another issue is that there also is a kind of a
    crowding out for public services as well. So you do not just
    have labor market impact. You can also have impact, say, on
    health care and education for low-income populations. But
    immigration is not the only problem. Absolutely.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman's time has expired.
        The Ranking Member, Mr. Smith, is recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Smith. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        Mr. Fair, let me address my first question to you, but
    preface it by saying that, 2 weeks ago, I attended church in
    the Black community of San Antonio, and after church was over,
    I had breakfast with about 12 new friends in a room next to the
    church itself.
        The number-one issue they were concerned about was illegal
    immigration. That was from their heart. They have seen the
    evidence of it in their community, and they knew what they were
    talking about.
        It seems to me that unless we think we can somehow repeal
    the law of supply and demand when, as you said, when you get
    into the magnitude of the number of people coming in, the mass
    illegal immigration or mass legalization of illegal immigrants,
    that is inevitably going to have an adverse impact on lots of
    communities, but probably disproportionately the Black
    community.
        Why do you think that there are organizations, particularly
    even civil rights organizations, that deny that immigration has
    an impact? As Mr. Camarota just said, we know there are lots of
    reasons, but it would be dangerous denial to say that
    immigration is not one of the substantive reasons. Do you have
    any thoughts on that?
        Mr. Fair. I most certainly do, and it takes more than 5
    minutes, but it is called the complicity of race. And that
    means that for so long, we have been denied the right to be
    right about things that are important to us, that when we
    publicly are right, we get condemned. So the most important
    thing is for us to be liked by those even though they do not
    like us.
        It is amazing that if you look at the history of Black
    leadership on this issue, from A. Philip Randolph to Frederick
    Douglass, W.B. DuBois, they all were against immigration, but a
    strange thing happened on the way to the press conference.
    Their supporters initially were people who were immigrants and,
    therefore, suggested to them that you cannot be against us if
    you are not for us, and they had to withdraw their positions
    publicly. The only one that kept his position was A. Philip
    Randolph. He started out as a restrictionist. He ended up being
    a restrictionist.
        The leadership today is the same. They want to make sure
    that they are liked, but they cannot deny the reality, and if
    you talk to people, as you talked to those persons at the
    church, you will find that what they are saying nationally is
    not what we are feeling on the street.
        Mr. Smith. That is a profound statement. I thank you for
    that.
        Mr. Beck and Mr. Camarota, let me ask a question of you
    all.
        First of all, Mr. Beck, congratulations on the recent 10th
    anniversary of NumbersUSA and for all the good work that you
    have been doing.
        You mentioned Barbara Jordan. I served with Barbara. Or did
    I serve with Barbara Jordan? She was certainly a personal
    friend of mine, and I know we had to testify before the
    Immigration Subcommittee that I chaired years ago. I admire her
    work, and it is interesting that we are now disregarding her
    work.
        She, of course, is a former Congresswoman from Texas,
    African-American herself, and she saw clearly the dangers of
    illegal immigration to the American labor market, and since
    both of you all have testified about the labor market, that is
    really my question. Both of you have said that there is no
    labor shortage, that, in one case, wages are less than
    inflation for the low-skilled for the last several years.
    Clearly, immigration has an impact on that, although a lot of
    people tend to gloss over that.
        Do you all have any statistics to give us today as to how
    many legal immigrants there are in the so-called categories of
    jobs where illegal immigrants supposedly predominate? My
    figures are along the lines of, for instance, even in the
    service sector, even in the food industry, even in the
    construction industry, the vast majority of individuals are
    actually legal workers, and yet that is where the highest
    unemployment is among American workers because of the
    oftentimes low-skilled foreign workers who are coming in and
    displacing American workers.
        Mr. Beck and Mr. Camarota?
        Mr. Camarota. Yes. I mean, roughly speaking, in occupations
    like construction, building, cleaning and maintenance, or food
    preparation and service, about half of the immigrants in those
    occupations are illegal, about half are legal, but in most
    cases, about 70 to 80 percent of the people in those
    occupations are U.S. born. So illegals generally make up
    anywhere from 10 to 20 percent of the workers in those
    occupational categories.
        If I had time, I could go through and give you some more
    precise estimates, but roughly speaking, in most of those
    occupations, 80 percent of the people are legal and, in most
    cases, it is more than 80 percent. In fact, if you looked at
    all 370-plus occupations as defined by the Department of
    Commerce, you can basically not find any that are majority
    foreign born, let alone majority illegal.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman's time has expired.
        We will now recognize Mr. Davis for his 5 minutes.
        Mr. Davis. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
        Let me welcome the panel.
        Mr. Fair, let me begin with a statement. I recognize I am
    not a witness today, but given my friend from Texas's comments
    and given your comments, I do want to put one thing in
    perspective. I do not know that generalizations help us a whole
    lot today.
        Mr. Fair, I noticed the title of your opening statement is
    a provocative one. It is ``Mass Immigration Versus Black
    America,'' which implies that there is a monolith of effect and
    a monolith of opinion within the Black community.
        You and I do not think alike on this issue. You and Mr.
    Ellison do not think alike on it. There is no monolith of
    opinion in the Black community. Some Black people would be
    supportive of one approach on immigration. Some, such as you,
    would take another. But I assume and hope you would agree with
    me there is no Black position on this.
        Let me move from that to another set of observations. I
    want to pick up on Mr. Ellison's points. Mr. Ellison was--and
    this is how I took Mr. Ellison's questions. I think trying to
    get you to focus on cause-effect. You lay out in your opening
    statement, your testimony today, a lot of effects.
        You worry, for example, about the fact that illegal aliens
    could be costing taxpayers $10 billion more in services than
    they pay in taxes, and then you make the statement that is $10
    billion that is not being spent on disadvantaged Americans. You
    mention social services.
        If I understand your testimony, your argument, the context,
    you have said that the money that we are spending on illegal
    aliens, in your opinion, takes dollars away from the safety net
    in this country. Is that a fair characterization?
        Mr. Fair. Yes, sir.
        Mr. Davis. Let's focus on $10 billion. Do you happen to
    support the Warner Act?
        Mr. Fair. Yes, sir.
        Mr. Davis. You do. Do you happen to know how much it has
    cost?
        Mr. Fair. No, I do not.
        Mr. Davis. Do you have any idea?
        Mr. Fair. No.
        Mr. Davis. Do you think it is in excess of $10 billion?
        Mr. Fair. Should be.
        Mr. Davis. It is actually, as I understand it, $8.4 billion
    a month. That is money that could be spent on social services,
    too, isn't it?
        Mr. Fair. Yes.
        Mr. Davis. Are you testifying before any Committee about
    the war on Iraq draining resources from social services?
        Mr. Fair. I have not been invited.
        Mr. Davis. Would you agree to testify to any Committee that
    the war on Iraq is costing too much money in social services?
    Is that a cause you have taken up, sir?
        Mr. Fair. No, I have not.
        Mr. Davis. You mention, for example, and you talk in your
    next paragraph about the fact that you think the presence of
    immigrants--legal and illegal, I am assuming--results in school
    overcrowding. Is that also an assertion of yours, that it has
    created overcrowded schools?
        Mr. Fair. Yes.
        Mr. Davis. You say it has diverted resources that could
    have been devoted to at-risk students. You are familiar with No
    Child Left Behind, are you not?
        Mr. Fair. Got my pin on.
        Mr. Davis. Are you aware that over the last 4 years that
    there has been a $17 billion gap between the authorizing levels
    of No Child Left Behind and the amount of money that Congress
    has put on the table?
        Mr. Fair. Yes, sir.
        Mr. Davis. Does that concern you?
        Mr. Fair. Yes, it does.
        Mr. Davis. Are you taking any newspaper ads out complaining
    about No Child Left Behind being underfunded?
        Mr. Fair. Not at this point, but if I get the opportunity--
    --
        Mr. Davis. Well, it is your money and your opportunity.
    Have you purchased any newspaper ads regarding No Child Left
    Behind being underfunded?
        Mr. Fair. No, I have not.
        Mr. Davis. You ask in your opening statement, ``What is
    more likely to persuade a teenager in the inner city to reject
    the lure of gang life and instead stick with honest
    employment?'' And then you ask, ``Amnesty and more immigration
    or enforcement and less immigration?''
        I absolutely agree with you that gang life is a problem in
    many communities, including yours in Miami. I assume that part
    of the problem that there is a gang life is that there is a
    strong drug culture. Is that correct?
        Mr. Fair. Okay.
        Mr. Davis. I assume that part of the problem is gang life,
    is there is an absence of opportunities for young people when
    they leave school at 3. Do you agree with that?
        Mr. Fair. Yes, sir.
        Mr. Davis. Have you taken out any ads complaining about an
    absence of dollars for after-school programs, Mr. Fair?
        Mr. Fair. No, I have not.
        Mr. Davis. The point that I am making to you--and my time
    is limited, but I think you get and everyone in this room gets
    the point that I am making--there are a lot of things
    contributing to the absence of social services. There are a lot
    of things contributing to the desperate plight of young Black
    men. There are a lot of things contributing to the desperate
    plight of urban communities. And you have chosen to pick the
    one for your focus that is the most divisive, that is, frankly,
    the most corrosive.
        If you, frankly, would spend the same kind of energy
    criticizing budget priorities that shortchange those
    communities, if you spent the same kind of energy criticizing
    social neglect of those communities, you would be quite an
    eloquent voice in the debate. I have no doubt of that.
        But my disappointment is with the effort to generalize and
    to suggest that all Black folks think the same about this, and
    to suggest that this issue has the causal effect it does, I
    disagree with you about that.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman's time has expired.
        The gentleman----
        Mr. King. Madam Chair, I ask unanimous consent the
    gentleman be allowed to respond to the 5 minutes of
    allegations.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman from Alabama is recognized for
    an additional 1 minute.
        Mr. Davis. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
        I am happy to let you respond. Those were not allegations,
    Mr. Fair. I am simply stating my assertions. You are free to
    state yours.
        But I will end with this point. Yes, we need to do
    something about the illegal immigration that we have in this
    country. We all agree on that. We need to secure our border
    because things more dangerous than people can come over our
    border.
        I absolutely agree with you that if employers go out and
    hire illegals, they ought to be punished. I was a prosecutor. I
    sent people to jail for hiring illegals.
        But my concern is when you plunge in this issue and you get
    into this us-against-them rhetoric. I would submit--my final
    point, Madam Chairwoman--us-against-them politics, Mr. Fair, is
    not in the interest of racial minorities.
        Thank you, Madam.
        Ms. Lofgren. Mr. Fair?
        Mr. Fair. Thank you very much.
        First of all, let me congratulate you for reading my
    testimony.
        Secondly, let me also say that if you would state what you
    read correctly, I did acknowledge that all of those other
    circumstances exist that impact adversely on my community.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman's time has expired.
        Mr. King. Madam Chair, I would ask unanimous consent that
    the witness be allowed an additional minute to be able to
    respond to the question.
        Ms. Lofgren. I object because we have already been here an
    hour, and I am sure that Mr. Gallegly will invite the witness
    to respond further.
        Mr. Gallegly is recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Gohmert. Parliamentary inquiry. Did the Chairwoman
    indicate that she was giving the gentleman from Alabama an
    additional minute to allow the witness to respond?
        Ms. Lofgren. There was a unanimous consent request. Time is
    not granted to witnesses. Time is granted Members of the
    Committee to yield, and the gentleman----
        Mr. Gohmert. Well, the record should note that he took all
    the time.
        Ms. Lofgren. Well, not all of the time, but I am sure Mr.
    Gallegly will correct that.
        Mr. Gallegly is recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Gallegly. Not only are you a good Chairwoman, you are a
    very astute Chairwoman, and with that, I thank the gentlelady
    for the time.
        And I would very much like to have the opportunity to hear
    Mr. Fair respond to Mr. Davis's statement.
        Mr. Fair. Thank you very much, sir.
        As I pointed out, if you read my testimony, I did
    acknowledge and give credit to all of the other conditions that
    creates the problems that we are concerned about as it relates
    to the predicament of Black America.
        I also said in that statement that mass immigration is part
    of those issues that create the problem that we do not talk
    about, and since this was about immigration, it was appropriate
    for me, I thought, to point out my concerns about the impact of
    mass immigration, not the impact of drug culture, not the
    impact of ``dysfunctioning'' families, not the impact of
    anything called poverty or racism. But this was the context
    about the impact of mass immigration.
        I tried to do that, and I think I did that correctly, and I
    am in agreement with your observations that I should be equally
    as concerned about those other issues, and I think that my
    record speaks to the fact that I am more than equally concerned
    about those other issues.
        Mr. Gallegly. Mr. Fair, as the chairman of Florida's Board
    of Education, can you describe in your words the impact that
    the high number of children that speak no English or limited
    English? Has it or has it not or to what degree has it strained
    the schools in your State, especially those that have the
    greatest needs in the economically challenged areas?
        Mr. Fair. The impact, once again, is about resources and
    resource allocation. Clearly, we understand that in many
    instances when we have rules that allow both legal and illegal
    immigrants to come into our community, the burden of preparing
    those persons or taking care of those persons has always stayed
    with the local and State government. In two instances do we get
    enough money from the Federal Government in order to do those
    things that are related to the newfound citizens of the
    community.
        So part of what has been the challenge for the State of
    Florida, once again, is to always figure out how can it come up
    with additional resources that are necessary to meet those
    needs without any real resources coming from the Federal
    Government. It is a strain. It is a budgetary one.
        Mr. Gallegly. Mr. Fair, would you say it is a reasonable
    assessment to say that illegal immigration affects those most
    that can least afford to be, that have the greatest needs?
        Mr. Fair. Everything that I have been able to read and
    understand, whether it is a CIS report or a NumbersUSA report
    or a FAIR report or a scholarly report from Harvard or from
    Northeastern University, all support the fact that in spite of
    what we think, the reality is that it does impact adversely on
    those who can least afford it.
        Mr. Gallegly. Thank you, Mr. Fair.
        Mr. Camarota, you know, we have heard lots of numbers, and,
    unfortunately, there is no real way to clearly define what the
    real accurate number is. We hear 12 million. We hear 20
    million. But by the most conservative estimates today, we very
    seldom hear less than 12 million. So let's say that we are
    going to accept the most conservative number being 12 million.
        We have also heard that most experts agree that a single
    immigrant may be responsible for at least 10 that they would
    subsequently sponsor once they got amnesty or some form of
    status. Let's say that we take only a percentage of that, two,
    which would be a conservative number. That would translate into
    an additional 24 million that would be entering the country
    over the next 10 years.
        Could you just give me a brief response whether you would
    agree with those numbers as being conservative, and what kind
    of an impact would that have, particularly on low-skilled
    native workers?
        Mr. Camarota. Okay. Very briefly, if we legalize those
    here, obviously, it could stimulate a lot more legal
    immigration. The last amnesty most certainly did. Legal
    immigration is double what it was prior to the amnesty. So,
    yes, certainly, if we legalize 10 million or 12 million people,
    we could stimulate a lot, and, again, because the people
    legalized have very little education----
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman's time has expired.
        Mr. Camarota [continuing]. It would tend to stimulate legal
    immigration of people with very little education as well.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman's time has expired.
        The gentlelady form Texas is recognized for 5 minutes.
        Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you very much, Madam Chairwoman.
        And thank you to all the witnesses.
        Mr. Fair, welcome.
        Mr. Fair. Thank you.
        Ms. Jackson Lee. I have had the opportunity to question the
    organizations represented by Mr. Beck and Dr. Camarota. In
    fact, I think, Dr. Camarota--hello--you have seen me in years
    past--and so forgive me if I focus on Mr. Fair.
        Let me make a personal statement and thank Chairwoman
    Lofgren. It should be very clear how unique, how different, how
    far reaching the approach on this comprehensive immigration
    reform has now taken under her chairwomanship. I served for 6
    years as the Ranking Member in hearings that then the minority
    desired to have could never be heard. We could never be heard.
    And so I think it is a tribute to the new attitude of this
    Congress to want to make sure that all voices are taken into
    consideration as we move toward this very, very important step.
        I say that to Mr. Beck and Dr. Camarota because your
    information is important. We will be utilizing that data. It is
    important.
        Mr. Fair, it is important to note, as I acknowledge the
    importance of statistics, that the overall perspective, I might
    disagree with you on--and let me just be very clear--but I
    welcome the discussion. Why? I am a former board member of the
    Houston Area Urban League. I champion the leadership over the
    years that the Urban League has fostered on issues of
    economics, job training.
        I know you know from whence you speak, and I appreciate
    that you have given us the opportunity to carry this discussion
    even if in the backdrop of a position that I question, but I
    certainly welcome because I believe if we are going to get
    comprehensive immigration reform, your interests, your needs
    have to be considered.
        So let me welcome you and pose a number of questions for
    you in light of that.
        First of all, I think it is important to note that there
    are many different constituencies that will be addressing this
    question. I have lived with the comprehensive question, and so
    I find it crucial, wearing several hats, that whether it is
    humane, whether it is through homeland security, whether it is
    because we are a mosaic nation, that we find a road map to
    document those who are undocumented. I think we need to find a
    way to address the question of the need of temporary workers. I
    also believe that we have to find a way to ensure that
    populations that you speak about are stakeholders in the
    process.
        Now I heard someone on the radio say, ``I am so mad
    because'' my son or daughter ``cannot get a job at Burger
    King.'' I do not want to denigrate Burger King. Of course, this
    was an African-American person. I do not want to denigrate
    Burger King, but I want their son or daughter to maybe pass by
    Burger King and work at Microsoft or be a refined educator or
    whatever as we move up the economic ladder. I do not want to
    fight over Burger King, and I am not denigrating it.
        But I will say to you there is a vast need of diverse
    workforce. Some of those happen to be people who are now
    undocumented. But how do we get to where you want to go? Here
    is what I want to ask.
        I also want to make note so that the record can be clear.
    The Congressional Black Caucus and the Asian Pacific Caucus,
    the Hispanic Caucus are working together. No voice is going to
    be left out, and we are hearing your voice. That is what I
    think is important. I do not want you to think that you are up
    here with the lights out and the shades down. The Chairwoman
    has been very, very open to hearing different viewpoints.
        But the question has to be: How do we get to where you want
    to be? Race matters, does it not, Mr. Fair?
        Mr. Fair. Yes, it does.
        Ms. Jackson Lee. It is still a question.
        And I notice in this book, we have a number of issues, the
    state of civil rights, the unequalness as it relates, but my
    question is if we can get an immigration bill that partnerships
    job training, job retention, I do not want to say
    protectiveness, but hire American first, alongside of
    recognizing that we have to secure America, can you work along
    those lines where language would be to tie the growth of
    immigration to retaining jobs, training, going in to
    underserved areas and providing real training dollars, not the
    kind that you cannot find?
        I yield to the gentleman.
        Mr. Fair. Thank you very much, and I think you are
    absolutely correct. The issue becomes, as we pursue a
    comprehensive reform, that we also take into consideration the
    impact that that reform is going to have on American citizens.
    We also understand that it is much more palatable when we begin
    to look for solutions, when we articulate to the masses that we
    also are concerned about your current condition.
        It is not about making excuses. It is about understanding
    that no matter what you do, you have to make sure that what you
    do impacts on everybody. Part of that solution, for example, is
    going back to Whitney M. Young's Marshall Plan.
        Ms. Jackson Lee. Yes.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentlelady's time has expired.
        Ms. Jackson Lee. Well, my sentence, as it expires, is I
    recocommend that you read the Save America Comprehensive
    Immigration Reform, the parts of that that talk about job
    training and tying it to comprehensive immigration reform.
        I thank the gentleman, and I yield back.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentlelady's time has expired.
        The gentleman from California, Mr. Lungren, is recognized
    for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Lungren. Thank you very much, Madam Chairwoman.
        I would just have to take issue with one of the statements
    made that somehow allowing minority day and minority views is a
    new day in this Committee.
        I chaired a hearing on behalf of Mr. Coble last year
    dealing, I believe, with one of the issues surrounding the
    Patriot Act and Habeus Corpus and so forth. We held that. We
    were not the only Subcommittee that did it. I chaired it. I
    allowed two rounds. I allowed extra time for everybody. And to
    suggest that somehow we did not allow minority----
        Ms. Jackson Lee. Would the gentleman yield?
        Mr. Lungren. No. I do not have the time to yield because we
    are being kept to a very----
        Ms. Jackson Lee. Well, I hope I will be able to explain it
    on my time. Thank you.
        Mr. Lungren. We are being kept to a very short 5 minutes
    here, and I just want to say that fairness is fairness, and I
    appreciate the fact that----
        Ms. Jackson Lee. Not immigration. It was not fair.
        Mr. Lungren. Could we have order, please?
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman controls the time.
        Mr. Lungren. Well, it is tough to control the time.
        Ms. Lofgren. I am trying.
        Mr. Lungren. I come here from a different perspective, I
    think, than some people on this panel. I was here not when
    Barbara Jordan was here with her commission, but I go back to
    the commission that was co-chaired by Father Hesburgh who made
    the statement that we must close the back door of illegal
    immigration so that we can keep the front door, legal
    immigration, open.
        So I am not one of those who believe that we ought not to
    have immigration. I believe that we ought to have a controlled
    immigration system, and that requires us to stop illegal
    immigration.
        But I also must say that when we were dealing with the
    issue in the late 1970's that our unemployment rate was over 6
    percent, sometimes 7.5 percent or higher than that. Most
    economists believed that full employment would always leave you
    with at least 6 percent unemployment. We are now running at
    about 4.4, 4.5 percent. We have to understand that we have
    different economic circumstances now that are actually better.
        However, the real problem remains that we have large
    pockets of unemployment, particularly among minority
    communities, and that is something that all of us, I think, on
    a bipartisan basis, ought to be concerned about.
        I do not have a study, but anecdotally--I used to work in
    construction--frankly, the face of construction has changed in
    the last 20 years, and in some cases, unless you know Spanish,
    you cannot get a job in construction, and I see a paucity of
    African-American young men working in construction.
        Now I wish the gentleman that made assertions--I think that
    was the word--was still here because I think that we have to
    deal with that. And so, that is my perspective.
        And here is what I would like to ask Mr. Beck and Dr.
    Camarota. I happen to be one of those who do not believe that
    we can take 12 million people out and somehow round them up and
    send them home. I think we have to do something. It cannot be
    amnesty from my standpoint as I define it.
        But my question is this: If we were to have a program, such
    as has been talked about being negotiated or at least talked
    about in the Senate, of a legal status for those who have been
    here illegally, have not broken the law, speak English, can
    take care of themselves and so forth, they would have to do it
    every 3 years, they have to pay a penalty, they do not have the
    right to bring in other family members, that time is not a new
    time to count toward citizenship--so they are here, but they
    are here under legal circumstances--wouldn't that be
    preferable?
        And then we would have real enforcement--real enforcement--
    I mean employer sanctions and some real means of
    identification, a tamper-proof Social Security card and a
    worker card, whatever you want to call it, wouldn't that be a
    better situation than what we have today?
        Mr. Beck. It would be marginally better, yes, but the key
    factor with illegal immigrants--the Jordan Commission found
    this--was not that they are illegal, but that they are here,
    and that is the reason why the level of legal immigration is
    too high as well. That is----
        Mr. Lungren. Well, do you want to cut off all immigration?
        Mr. Beck. No, but immigration should be reduced back, as
    the Jordan Commission said, to a level that actually serves the
    national interests. We have all of these----
        Mr. Lungren. So you are talking about immigration--it does
    not matter, legal or illegal?
        Mr. Beck. The Jordan Commission recommended deep cuts in
    our legal----
        Mr. Lungren. I understand that.
        Mr. Camarota. Well, I mean, the research does not suggest
    that illegals work for dramatically less, though clearly that
    happens. Rather, it is just their presence here. If you are
    concerned about low-skilled workers, then do not import so many
    and try to make as many of them go home. Legalizing does not
    solve that problem.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman's time has expired.
        The gentleman from Texas is recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Gohmert. Thank, Madam Chairman.
        I would like to come back to Mr. Fair, and I really
    appreciated your responses to the assertions from the gentleman
    from Alabama. I wish he had been here to hear all of your
    response to his assertions. You made some good points.
        All of you have made some good points. I know it takes time
    out of your schedule, and you do not get paid for being a
    witness here, so we greatly appreciate all three of your input
    into the process. I think it is better when you do not get
    lectured the whole time when you come here to testify.
        But, Mr. Fair, you brought up Miami as a good example, and
    you basically raised a question about what happened to the
    African-American workers that you had seen in the hotels and
    other places working that you say now are being held by
    immigrants, regardless legal or illegal.
        It raises a question--and I am curious--do you know what
    has happened to those African-American workers that you used to
    see? Are there any surveys or studies that have shown? Are
    these part of the ones that have just become disenfranchised
    and not even seeking work? Do you know where they are now?
        Mr. Fair. I think it is probably a combination of all of
    the above. One of the things that we cannot get in Miami is a
    discussion around this issue. If you have a discussion around
    this issue, then someone assumes that you are having a
    discussion because you are anti-someone being present.
    Therefore, we can never have the discussion. I am hoping that
    Steve and CIS, for example, would do a study. It would be
    interesting to know where Black America in Miami would be
    today, for example, had not the Cubans come.
        Mr. Gohmert. Well, I am curious where they are today.
        Mr. Fair. Well, some of us say that they are dead, they are
    incarcerated, they are part of that 80 percent between 18 and
    40 that are unemployed. They are part of the new illegal
    culture in the community. I do not know, but some of these
    academicians, like Steve and CIS and Roy Beck from NumbersUSA,
    ought to really document that so you and I would have that
    answer.
        Mr. Gohmert. Okay. But you do not know of a current study
    that gives us that information?
        Mr. Fair. No.
        Mr. Gohmert. But you are right. It would be very helpful.
        Do you other two know of any studies of that nature?
        Mr. Camarota. Well, basically, there is a very long
    literature showing that less-educated Black men have left the
    labor force in large numbers in cities like Miami.
        In answer to the question, clearly, Blacks have upscaled,
    so there would be less working in those jobs, and there was
    some attrition out, and so, basically, some got better
    employment, some retained the job and a whole lot seems to have
    just left the labor market entirely and do not even show up in
    unemployment statistics, and a lot of others are now
    intermittently employed, so they are unemployed, employed,
    unemployed. So that is sort of the answer.
        It is a mixed bag. Some were crowded out and went elsewhere
    and did okay, and some seem to have done quite poorly.
        Mr. Beck. I would just like to comment about the history,
    and I happen to be the author of a couple of books, lots of
    research particularly focused on the relationship between mass
    immigration and Black Americans beginning in the 1820's.
        What history shows is that every time we have spikes of
    mass immigration, Black Americans' employment opportunities go
    down. Wage depression hits all American workers, but especially
    Black Americans, and that is a function of race and culture.
        Right now, Mr. Fair, listening to his testimony, I am
    hearing sometimes it is not race, it is culture. There is a
    preference of Haitian workers over the descendants of American
    slaves, and I think that is tied very much into culture of
    guilt and almost like White majority society's guilt about
    slavery and, therefore, they take it out on the people that
    just their presence make them feel guilty.
        But the literature is very clear that throughout American
    history, high immigration means a step backwards for Black
    progress. It has happened over and over again. It is happening
    right now.
        Mr. Gohmert. Well, as my time is getting closer to
    expiring, maybe a study like that would be helpful.
        I would like to comment. Yes, I would like for all
    Americans to be able at some point to drive past Burger King
    and have other employment, but I think the far greater tragedy
    is those who have come disenfranchised and are not even trying.
    There is the real tragedy because some of us started out having
    some of the worst jobs--cleaning toilets, for example, that
    nearly made me throw up--but that gave me opportunities to keep
    moving on, and crawling under houses for a job that you had to
    dig your way in and dig your out, hauling hay 18 hours a day.
    Those jobs may be menial and some think less respectable, but I
    would submit they give you a chance to move on to better
    education.
        Thank you all very much.
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman's time has expired.
        The Chair recognizes herself for 5 minutes. I just wanted
    to make a couple of comments.
        First, in our hearing last week, we had very interesting
    testimony, and one of the pieces of testimony was about a study
    done by Professor David Card of Princeton University. Rather
    than do the analysis that economists do, they took an actual
    event and studied it, and what they did was they studied the
    Mariel boat lift into Cuba to see what happened when 125,000
    individuals, primarily low-skilled, all of a sudden in a very
    short period of time jumped into Miami.
        It increased the population of Miami, according to the
    study, by 7 percent, and what they found was, surprisingly or
    not, there was no adverse impact on the employment at any
    level, not among Cubans, a very tiny, slight effect on Cubans,
    no adverse impact on African-American workers. They did
    controlled studies in Atlanta, Houston and Los Angeles, and
    without objection, I am going to make the underlying economic
    report a part of the record--and I will also provide it to you,
    Mr. Fair--along with the updated study from 2005 which I will
    also make part of the record, without objection.
        Also, the Ranking Member mentioned that there are these
    studies, and they are absolutely correct because they have not
    been countered, and I think certainly they have been countered
    by witness after witness. I just want to mention a critique,
    which, without objection, I will make part of the record, of
    The Heritage Foundation which is often cited.
        This report from the Immigration Policy Center describes
    The Heritage Foundation as ``deeply flawed'' and that it relies
    on ``inflated statistics and dubious assumptions to arrive at
    its flawed conclusions.'' It goes on to say that the report
    contributes to ``low-income households the cost of political
    decisions over which they have no control. For instance, the
    Heritage report's accounting low-income households are
    responsible for a share of the billions of dollars being spent
    in Iraq.''
        And they also allocate to immigrants ``the payment on the
    national debt stemming from the enactment of tax cuts'' that
    have created a huge hole in the budget, and they also go on to
    say that the report does not accurately gauge the impact of any
    group on the U.S. economy as a whole.
        I would like to just read a section on page 6 of the
    report. ``To the extent that the Heritage report mentions
    immigration at all, it is to raise the specter of immigration
    reform unleashing a flood of low-wage immigrants into the U.S.
    labor market and dramatically increasing the fiscal burden on
    U.S. taxpayers. The authors support this grim scenario by
    citing another Heritage report from May of 2006 which presented
    inflated estimates of the increase in legal immigration that
    allegedly would result'' from the bill in the Senate last year.
        ``The 2006 report claimed that the bill would allow
    anywhere from 66 million to 217 million new immigrants into the
    United States over the next 20 years. The outlandishness of
    these projections is evident in the fact that the estimate of
    217 million is 70 million more than the combined populations of
    Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua,
    Costa Rica and Panama. The 2006 report arrived at these
    estimates largely through statistical slight of hand in which
    many categories of immigrants were double counted.''
        And, without objection, this report is a part of our
    record.
        [The information referred to is inserted in the Appendix.]
        Ms. Lofgren. I just think it is important that we have the
    facts before us. We are all entitled to our opinions, but we
    are not entitled to our own facts.
        At this point, I would like to recognize the gentlelady
    from Texas for a unanimous consent request. Ms. Jackson Lee,
    did you have a unanimous consent request?
        Ms. Jackson Lee. I certainly did. Let me thank the
    Chairwoman. I would like to put into the record the chapter
    from ``The State of Black America 2007,'' the section, Mr.
    Fair, on status of civil rights by Ted Shaw. And I would like
    to ask unanimous consent to submit that into the record.
        Ms. Lofgren. Without objection.
        [The information referred to is inserted in the Appendix.]
        Mr. King. Madam Chair? Madam Chair, I have a unanimous
    consent request.
        Ms. Lofgren. I am sorry?
        Ms. Jackson Lee. I am sorry. I did not----
        Ms. Lofgren. All right. Without objection, Mr. King, you
    have a unanimous----
        Ms. Jackson Lee. I did not finish mine.
        Ms. Lofgren. Oh, I am sorry. I did not mean to cut you off
    of your unanimous consent request.
        Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you.
        And I would like to also put into the record section 703 of
    H.R. 750, the ``Save America Comprehensive Immigration Act of
    2007,'' Mr. Fair, that talks about the issue of recruitment of
    American workers.
        [The information referred to is inserted in the Appendix.]
        Ms. Jackson Lee. I would clarify the fact that, as the
    Ranking Member on this Committee on Immigration, we never were
    able to hear the then-minority view, which was the view of
    Democrats at that time. And I thank the gentlelady.
        Ms. Lofgren. My time has expired.
        I recognize the Ranking Member for a unanimous consent
    request.
        Mr. King. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        I ask unanimous consent that the Rector study be introduced
    into the record.
        Ms. Lofgren. Without objection.
        [The information referred to is inserted in the Appendix.]
        Mr. King. And I might also, if the Chair would submit, do a
    very short colloquy.
        Ms. Lofgren. We have been here for an hour and 35 minutes.
    So the Member is recognized for 1 minute.
        Mr. King. Okay. And I would ask the Chair if she would
    consider holding a hearing and allow the author of the study
    from the Immigration Policy Center to testify before this
    Committee alongside the author of the Rector study so we would
    have an opportunity to evaluate the perspectives of those two
    experts.
        Ms. Lofgren. We will certainly consider any requests by the
    minority. We are mindful that we have a very aggressive
    schedule of hearings and very few days to do it. And so, if the
    request would be proposed to us in writing, we will consider
    it, understanding that we are in conflict with other
    Subcommittees, and finding dates when we can actually meet has
    proven to be quite a challenge. But we will do our very best.
        Mr. King. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        Ms. Lofgren. At this point----
        Mr. Gohmert. Parliamentary inquiry.
        Ms. Lofgren. Yes?
        Mr. Gohmert. A comment was made that the minority position
    was never allowed to be heard in the last term. Was there ever
    a minority request made in the last----
        Ms. Lofgren. The gentleman has not stated a parliamentary
    inquiry.
        Without objection, Members will have 5 legislative days to
    submit any additional written questions to you witnesses, which
    we will forward and ask that you answer as promptly as you can,
    to be made part of the record.
        Without objection, the record will remain open for 5
    legislative days----
        Mr. Gohmert. Parliamentary inquiry.
        Ms. Lofgren [continuing]. For the submission of any other
    additional materials.
        I would like to extend an invitation to everyone here to
    attend our next two hearings on comprehensive immigration
    reform. On Tuesday, May 15, at 9:30 a.m., we explore issues
    relating to how immigrants assimilate into American
    communities.
        And, with that, this hearing is adjourned.
        [Whereupon, at 11:33 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
                                A P P E N D I X

                                  ----------

                   Material Submitted for the Hearing Record

      ``The Impact of the Mariel Boatlift on the Miami Labor Market'' by
        David Card, August 1989, submitted by the Honorable Zoe Lofgren

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

    ``Is the New Immigration Really So Bad?'' by David Card, January 2005,
                     submitted by the Honorable Zoe Lofgren

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

      ``Dollars without Sense: Underestimating the Value of Less-Educated
        Workers'' by Walter A. Ewing, Ph.D. and Benjamin Johnson of the
      Immigration Policy Center, May 2007, submitted by the Honorable Zoe
                                    Lofgren
    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

      ``The State of Civil Rights'' by Theodore M. Shaw from The State of
     Black America 2007, published by the National Urban League, submitted
                      by the Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee
    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

     Section 703 of HR 750, ``Recruitment of American Workers in the Save
       America Comprehensive Immigration Act of 2007'' submitted by the
                          Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee
    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

       ``The Impact of New Immigrants on Young Native-Born Workers, 2000-
      2005'' by Andrew Sum, Paul Harrington, and Ishwar Khatiwada of the
       Center for Immigration Studies, September 2006, submitted by the
                            Honorable Elton Gallegly

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

     ``The Fiscal Costs of Low-Skill Households to the U.S. Taxpayer'' by
    Robert Rector, Christine Kim, and Shanea Wilkins, Ph.D. of The Heritage
               Foundation, submitted by the Honorable Steve King

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]