BERKELEY -- The first two years of the next U.S. president's administration will barely see immigration reform because of the issue's complexity, experts say.
Solving undocumented immigration will be one of the challenges the next U.S. president may have to face, according to a panel of experts who met last week at the University of Berkeley.
"Before the new president approves of any immigration reform, first he will have to deal with every negative aspect that has surrounded the issue, and he will try to convince the community why legalization of the undocumented is something positive for the nation," said Frank Bean, director of Research, Population and Public Policy at the University of California at Irvine.
The immigration debate, and the anti-immigrant sentiment it has stirred up in the last few years, has led to undocumented immigrants being perceived as more of a threat, said Bean.
He says reality is exactly the opposite.
"It doesn't really matter who will be the next president; he will have to create better immigration policies because the United States needs workers for economic and demographic reasons," Bean said.
As an example he cited Iowa. That state is the second in the nation with higher rates of residents moving out, especially among youth, because of a lack of opportunities. However, Mexican immigrants have moved in to save and keep afloat the state's economy.
"Presidential candidates (John) McCain, (Hillary) Clinton and (Barak) Obama, all favor an immigration reform, which brings hope for the legalization of undocumented workers and to stimulate the nation's economy," Bean said.
Philip Martin, agriculture and economic resources professor at the University of California at Davis and president of the Integration and Immigration Program at that school, agreed with Bean.
He said it will be hard for the next president of the United States to come up with an immediate solution to the illegal immigration issue.
"I definitely don't think that we could see an immigration reform within the first 100 days or within the first year of the administration of the next president because the issue is so complex it will take years to solve it," Martin said.
The problem of illegal immigration is hardly new to the United States, Martin explained. And it has never been able to be solved because of the complexity of the matter, he added.
Neither a 1965 immigration bill nor a 1986 amnesty succeeded at deterring the influx of undocumented immigrants.
"The truth is that, since many decades ago, this nation has tried to come up with a solution for this problem but has failed to do so," Martin said. "So the next president hardly could offer an immediate solution; first, he will have to fix the situation and that will take time."
According to figures submitted by Martin, currently there are 150 million workers in the United States, 8 million of whom are undocumented. One million out of those 8 million work in the agricultural fields.
The greatest increase in undocumented immigration has taken place in the last 10 years with 300,000 to 400,000 undocumented immigrants sneaking into the country each year.
Some disagreed with both Bean and Martin and urge the next president to address the issue soon.
"Undocumented immigration is an issue that cannot wait," said Peter D. Salins, a political science professor at the University of Stony Brook at New York. "The situation is turning more critical every day, so the new president should come up with a solution to the immigration problem within his first year in office and create an immediate plan of legalization."
That legalization plan should contain all the elements to create a real solution, he said.
For Salins, the ideal plan would include four basic aspects:
First, it should control the undocumented immigration to prevent this problem. In that sense, it is necessary to create a database of personal identification, allowing the Social Security Administration to verify the Social Security numbers that it issues, increase fines to those employers who hire undocumented workers and reinforce visitor and tourist visa control.
Second, it should legalize those undocumented immigrants already living here. However, that should be a family legalization rather than an individual, and applicants must have a job, speak English and not be a convicted felon.
Third, the plan should redesign the legal immigration process.
Fourth, it should increase the fees for the process of petition of a family member on the part of an American citizen as well as other immigration services.