Alan Simpson, IRCA Amnesty Architect, Dies

Former Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.), a legislator known for working to bridge partisan gaps, recently passed away at age 93. Simpson was a deficit hawk who often railed against those that relied on government programs. President Barack Obama tapped Simpson in 2010 to co-lead a deficit reduction commission that eventually developed a plan to save $4 trillion through a combination of tax hikes and spending cuts, although the plan never received much congressional support.

A look back at Simpson’s immigration legislation is illuminating. Simpson’s most memorable cooperative effort with congressional Democrats was his Simpson-Mazzoli Act, more commonly known as the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 that provided amnesty to approximately three million illegal aliens. Simpson, the Senate’s co-sponsor, astutely recognized that fraud was probable. Center for Immigration Studies former Senior Research Fellow Jerry Kammer wrote about the mixed feelings in Congress for the bill. “I am certain we will see a cottage industry in rent receipts and W-2 forms,” Simpson said. U.S. House Representative Romano Mazzoli (D-Ky.) worked with Simpson to get the legislation to President Ronald Reagan’s desk. Mazzoli shared Simpson’s apprehension about fraud. He acknowledged that print shops "would crop up in backyards" to produce fraudulent documents that would enable illegal aliens to gain coveted amnesty. No one knows why Simpson so passionately took up the amnesty cause. Wyoming is 1,000 miles away from El Paso, Texas and in 1986 the state had only 350,000 residents.

Simpson’s most famous tongue-in-cheek joke was, “We have two political parties in this country, the Stupid Party and the Evil Party. I belong to the Stupid Party.” He may have unwittingly been referring to his IRCA role which failed at its major objective to end illegal immigration. Unlawful entry continued, but interior enforcement that most IRCA advocates promised never materialized. Reviewing some of IRCA’s principal players and tracking their pre-IRCA final vote comments is insightful. "It is time to stop deploring the status quo," said Chuck Schumer, then in the House of Representatives. He described the bill as "a gamble" and added, “So, if it doesn't work, we'll have to go back to the drawing board." Simpson and Mazzoli both also worried about the bill’s ultimate effectiveness if it passed. Yet, they forged ahead, only to see their worries realized. Within a few years, illegal immigration soared from about three million in 1986 to 12 million. Those fearful about fraud saw plenty of it, most of it concentrated in the Special Agricultural Worker program (SAW) amnesty that provided temporary and later permanent legal status for aliens. The aliens were required to have performed seasonal agricultural work in the U.S. for at least 90 days during the 12 months ending on May 1, 1986. The U.S. Department of Labor later found that the SAW program, which Schumer championed, gave amnesty to 1.1 million illegal aliens out of 1.3 million applicants as of August 12, 1992.

Schumer, who has shown uninterrupted dedication to legalizing illegal immigrants, built a career around that single issue. In his first Senate race, 1998, Schumer beat three-time Republican incumbent Al D’Amato who favored common sense immigration legislation. His lasting contribution to the immigration debate was, despite his 1986 inability to pass amnesty, to promote and vote for multiple immigration expansion bills. Among them: Section 245(i) amnesty passed in 1994 which pardoned approximately 578,000 illegal aliens who were each fined $1,000. That amnesty was later renewed in 1997 and again in 2000; the 2000 American Competitiveness and Workforce Improvement Act that increased the H-1B cap, the Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act

(HRIFA) enacted in December 2000 which applied to certain Haitians, another amnesty; and the H-1B Visa Reform Act of 2004 that added 20,000 new H-1B slots for foreign students graduating with a master’s degree from American universities. The New York Senator also promoted President Barack Obama’s unconstitutional 2012 DACA Executive Order and his 2014 Executive Order that announced the Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents, DAPA, which deferred the deportation of illegal aliens living in the U. S. since 2010 who had American citizen or legal permanent residents’ children. His executive order simultaneously expanded DACA. Schumer invariably sided with illegal immigrants which, by definition, are lawbreakers, and to expand the domestic labor force which creates more job competition.

In 1986, during IRCA’s debates, the leading proponents insisted that the bill represented the last chance for amnesty. Simpson, “This will be the last chance.” Mazolli, “It’s now or never.” As things turned out, the opposite is true. In the 40 years since President Ronald Reagan signed IRCA, amnesty efforts are an omni-present ingredient found in most new legislation which makes clear that those who support it, from the left or the right, will fight on even though voters want less immigration.

Joe Guzzardi is an Institute for Sound Public Policy analyst. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org