Connect

(06/26/06) - Immigration Reform -- NPG Comments: In a new report titled "Amnesty Under Hagel-Martinez, An Estimate of How Many Will Legalize If S. 2611 Becomes Law" the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), a widely respected Washington think tank, estimates that 7.4 million of the 10.2 million illegals eligible for amnesty under the Hagel-Martinez bill will receive amnesty legitimately. It further estimates that nearly 2.6 million additional illegals will legalize fraudulently, for a total of 9.9 million.

In addition to the amnesty beneficiaries, CIS believes that the bill will allow an estimated 4.5 million immediate family members currently living abroad to join their newly legalized relatives for a total of 14.4 million people who will benefit from the bill's amnesty provisions.

The report also points out that there are no numerical limits on the number of people who can benefit from the amnesty, and that because of the high rate of fraud that already exists in the immigration system the number of people who ultimately use the amnesty provisions in the Hagel-Martinez bill could turn out to be much larger than the report estimates.

Finally, the report's estimates do not include the bill's very large increases in future legal immigration, which is expected to double or triple from one million a year under current law. To see the CIS report, click here.