Today is the 40th anniversary of President Ronald Reagan’s signing of the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) of 1986, the big amnesty-for-enforcement deal that was supposed to fix illegal immigration for the future.
How’d that work out?
With the incoming 120th Congress far more radical on immigration policy than any predecessor — ever — that question is of more than theoretical interest.
The promise of IRCA was betrayed, and that betrayal has poisoned the immigration debate to this day. The betrayal was not the amnesty itself — giving scofflaws a pass is never appealing, but it is sometimes expedient.
The betrayal stems from the fact that those pushing for the amnesty did not — and never intended to — honor the “grand bargain” that the law represented. The enforcement that was the price for amnesty — specifically the first-ever enactment of “employer sanctions” sanctions, the prohibition on the employment of illegal immigrants — was never meant to be carried out.
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