President Donald Trump says it is “time for Congress to adopt a pro-American immigration reform” that ends the mass immigration of foreign relatives of newly arrived immigrants in the United States.
During a speech in Pensacola, Florida, Trump blasted the process by which foreign relatives enter the U.S. simply because their family member is an immigrant. This process is known as “chain migration.”
Trump mentioned Uzbeck national and alleged Islamist terrorist Sayfullo Saipov, who is accused of running over and killing at least eight individuals in New York City, New York in October. Saipov, who come to the United States through the Diversity Visa Lottery, had the legal right to sponsor the immigration of multiple family members once he secured he naturalized as an American citizen.
Trump said:
People come in and they’re not necessarily good. Like the man that ran over — the animal– that ran over many people in New York City the other day, you saw that two months ago. He runs over people, goes on a beautiful, I know it so well, the West-Side Highway, I know it so well, so beautiful. People running, jogging trying to get in-shape. He killed many people, ran them over. Chain migration. According to chain migration, he may have as many as 22 to 24 people that came in with him. His grandfather, his grandmother, his mother, his father, his brother, his sisters. We have to end chain migration. We have to end chain migration.
Trump demanded that the GOP-led Congress immediately adopt an immigration agenda that puts Americans first, rather than the interests of foreign nationals and foreign nations first. He said:
It’s time for Congress to adopt a pro-American immigration agenda. Every member of Congress should be asked where they stand on these issues.
Among the pro-American immigration initiatives Trump wants each member of Congress to answer on are:
- Blocking funds to sanctuary cities which give safe have to criminal illegal aliens
- Passing Kate’s Law which would put harsher sentences on repeat-criminal illegal aliens
- Increasing the number of federal immigration agents and Border Patrol officers
- Ensuring that new immigrants arriving in the U.S. are economically self-sufficient
- Ending chain migration
According to recently released data from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), about 9.3 million foreign nationals have come to the U.S. as chain migrants between 2005 and 2016. In that same time period, a total of 13.06 million foreign nationals have entered the U.S. through the legal immigration system, as every seven out of ten new arrivals come to the country for nothing other than family reunification.
This makes chain migration the largest driver of immigration to the U.S. — making up more than 70 percent — with every two new immigrants bringing seven foreign relatives with them.
Currently, only one in 15 foreign nationals admitted to the U.S. come to the country based on skills and employment purposes. Though roughly 150,000 employment-based Green Cards are allotted every year, half of those Green Cards actually go to the foreign relatives of employees.
The DHS data is the first time the agency has ever released chain migration statistics broken down into the country of origin from which foreign nationals arrive to the U.S.
In the last decade, 1.7 million chain migrants have entered the country from Mexico, with the average Mexican immigrant bringing roughly six foreign relatives with them to the U.S. Mexico sends more chain migrants to the U.S. than any other country.
Over the past ten years, these countries have sent the following number of chain migrants to the U.S.:
- 600,000 from India
- 600,000 from the Phillippines
- 500,000 from China
- 177,000 from Pakistan
- 80,252 from Iran
Chain migration could be largely increased with an amnesty for illegal aliens, which the Republican establishment and Democrats want to see before the end of the year.
A current plan that the White House has reportedly endorsed is one where 800,000 illegal aliens are given amnesty to remain in the U.S., but at the same time, chain migration is ended, reducing legal immigration levels to about 500,000 new immigrants a year, rather than the current annual flow of more than 1 million immigrants a year.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder.
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