Antonio Garza: Stop playing defense with immigration policy

(Antonio Garza is currently counsel to the law firm of White & Case in Mexico City, and served as the U.S. ambassador to Mexico from 2002 through 2009.) The midterms are fast approaching. And as seems to be the case every other November, the spotlight is on immigration and the large number of migrant crossings at the U.S.-Mexico border. Once again, our country is playing defense trying to manage the border without a game plan for going forward. It’s time for both parties to take a different approach. It’s time to stop using immigration as a political football and posturing for ballot box wins. It’s also time to start working in a bipartisan manner on solutions. No doubt the number of migrants arriving at our border is an operational and security challenge. In the past year, irregular border crossings totaled over 2 million. These migrants left their communities for multiple reasons, including the economic crisis, fallout from natural disasters and repressive regimes in Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua. After arriving at the border, individuals fleeing political persecution can apply for asylum. But those migrants who are simply looking to fill the demands of the U.S. labor market and to support their families have no option but to try to cross the border undetected or attempt to pass as asylum-seekers.

Border and immigration issues are complex, and there are no one-pass, Hail Mary solutions. But economists are generally in agreement that the migrants arriving at the border could be exactly what the U.S. economy needs. Experts point to the lack of workers as a cause of rising food prices and inflation in the U.S. Last week, the Biden administration took several steps to create additional legal pathways. It doubled the number of H-2B visas for jobs in industries like seafood processing and hospitality to over 130,000. The administration also created a new parole program that will provide Venezuelans fleeing their country with two years of work authorization. In addition, the administration has taken some modest steps to address the nearly 2 million immigration-case backlog.However, there are limitations to policy decisions made by the White House. Executive orders issued by the last several U.S. presidents from both parties have proved to be stopgap measures, which are typically challenged in court or reversed by their successors.