End the dying
season
Immigrants
in the 18th and 19th centuries bet their lives
they could get to America. Nothing has changed in the 21st.
In Texas,
Arizona and southern California, summer is called the dying season.
It’s
the season when blast-furnace temperatures kill migrants from Mexico who
fail to complete treacherous desert crossings on foot.
It’s
the season when swift currents in a canal near El Centro, Calif., drown
migrants too weak to conquer them.
It’s
the season when no one in the U.S. seems shocked to learn that two
migrants died recently while being transported in a truck box that
became an oven in the Dallas sun. Two truckers were charged with murder.
In June
alone, 67 migrants died trying to cross the border between the U.S. and
Mexico, according to The New York Times. This doesn’t include
22 who died in Mexico. Only Mexico records those deaths and then only
those who are Mexican citizens.
Each
summer, the deaths are a mere blip on the nation’s geo-political
radar. They’re reported one minute, out-of-mind the next, and register
only briefly with a nation that has more pressing matters on its mind
this year.
However,
border deaths aren’t new. Their numbers, estimated at about 2,000
annually by the Mexican government, actually have declined a little
along with the American economy.
Laying
blame for migrant deaths is an exercise in futility, but there has to be
a better way. Using what everyone knows would be a good place to start.
Poor
migrants know they have a good chance of finding a job in the United
States. Employers know they need migrant laborers to fill jobs Americans
apparently don’t want.
An
efficient program that matches foreign workers with jobs in the United
States would go far to end illegal immigration, protect workers from
exploitation, and provide the work force America apparently needs.
A
well-run program—along with swift and sure action against violators—should
convince both potential employers and workers that working outside it is
a waste of time and money. Only a well-run program will convince
migrants that it’s not worth risking life or limb to get here.
Getting a
good program may require a total overhaul of the U.S. Immigration and
Naturalization Service, an agency so seriously mismanaged that many
experts say reform is impossible and replacement is necessary. A good
program will also require the United States to put pressure on the
Mexican government to get its economic, political and educational house
in order.
It’s
time to end the dying season.