Question of the week: “Do you believe President Obama’s executive order – granting work permits to certain, young illegal immigrants – will take away jobs from American citizens or legal residents?”
- Karen Anderson: “Unlike the H1B visa holders, at least these young people, brought here through no fault of their own, were raised in America, have been educated here and/or supported America by being in the Armed Forces.”
- Dave Appling: “Broadly, no. There will be some such cases, but with minor impact, outweighed by the clear benefits to society. I strongly support the executive order. These young people did not bring themselves here. They’ve been raised as Americans, educated as Americans. They are Americans. And there’s plenty of precedent for tempering enforcement with justice.”
- Dennis Kennedy: “No! Actually it may free-up American citizens from agricultural and service jobs to do more productive work improving the overall economy.”
- Julian Mancias: “Yes. But we are talking about a very small and insignificant number of jobs.”
- Lisa Pampuch: “No. What it will do is remove the fear of deportation from people who were brought here as children. I hope it will also increase pressure on obstinate congressional Republicans to pass substantive, humane immigration reform that goes beyond the ridiculous “self-deportation” approach endorsed by Mitt Romney.”
- Jeff Smith: “Of course it will. With our unemployment rate so high, why would he do this? Is this supposed to stimulate our economy? What about the astronomically high unemployment rate among young black men? Is this “Dream Act” supposed to help them? Really? If Obama were so concerned about helping illegal aliens, why didn’t he do this three years ago? It is crystal clear that he is pandering for votes and is running scared as he sees Romney will likely win in November.”
- Steve Staloch: “Yes. With too many applicants for too few jobs and unemployment benefits ending for thousands, priority must be given to legal citizens and residents. We can’t afford to further dilute the employment pool.”
- David Cohen: No. Comparatively, this impacts a small number of people. More importantly, what the president has done is to remind us of the challenges faced by our parents or grandparents when they came to this country and positioned them for all of the opportunities it offered.
