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American Immigration Lawyers Association
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, June 6, 2002
CONTACT: Amanda Carufel, (202) 216-2404
acarufel@aila.org
Statement of the American Immigration Lawyers
Association
In Opposition to the Department of Justice Registration Proposal
The American Immigration Lawyers Association strongly opposes the
Department of Justice’s recently announced proposal that would
require fingerprinting, photographing, and registering of nationals of
certain countries. This measure is a false solution to a real problem.
It offers little protection against terrorism while subjecting
individuals who come to this country to a lengthy and complicated
procedure that will not make us safer. In fact, it will subject
innocent people to arrest and deportation for failure to report on
time to the authorities. It also will waste precious resources because
it would be applied to people who already have been screened and
determined to be admissible to the United States.
Without consulting Congress, the Department of Justice has moved ahead
on this ill-conceived plan that would rely on secret criteria and
racial profiling, rather than on any accurate intelligence gathered on
individuals. Reports indicate that Muslim and Arab nationals are to be
targeted, thus stigmatizing these nationalities and negatively
stereotyping these communities here and abroad.
America certainly needs to continue efforts to enhance our security.
We have come to a fork in the road; this measure leads us down the
wrong path. Immigration is not the problem, terrorism is. To defeat
terrorism we need to follow the path blazed by the recently enacted
Enhanced Border Security and Visa Reform Act which AILA helped to
develop and strongly supports, and which President Bush signed into
law less than one month ago. This new law will enhance our security
while recognizing that we are a nation of immigrants, with due process
protections and important economic considerations that mandate the
continued flow of people and goods. Without a strong economy, we will
be unable to fund our security needs.
The Enhanced Border Security and Visa Reform Act offers us the right
path to enhance our security by harnessing our technological and
intelligence capabilities. The Justice Department’s proposed rule
does not. Rather than focusing on implementing a law written for the
21st century, the Justice Department is diverting valuable resources
to resurrect a failed 1940s policy. It offers nationality profiling,
secret criteria, unfettered discretion of government officials, data
bases that will yield little useful information, an ineffective use of
resources, and possible reciprocal treatment of Americans by other
countries.
The Justice Department’s registration proposal is fundamentally
flawed. The people who mean to do us harm will not participate in it
and it will divert resources away from effective efforts to the
creation of a huge database of useless information within which
important intelligence will remain undiscovered. This measure also
will chill relationships with the very communities with whom
cooperation is being sought.
We strongly urge the Administration to abandon this regulation and
work with Congress in thoughtful ways to enhance our security.
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Founded in 1946, AILA is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that
provides its Members with continuing legal education, information, and
professional services. AILA advocates before Congress and the
Administration and provides liaison with the INS and other government
agencies in support of pro-immigration initiatives. AILA is an
Affiliated Organization of the American Bar Association.
American Immigration Lawyers Association
918 F Street NW, Washington, DC, 20009
Phone (202) 216-2400; Fax (202) 783-7853
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