Nothing drives a career politician crazier than a newcomer to politics who wants to solve the nation’s problems, not just kick them down the road. Unsolved problems keep the coffers of professional politicians full. They hate a pragmatist like Donald Trump, who sees through their charade and seeks to solve problems that have been roaming the political scene election after election. Immigration is one of those issues.
The last meaningful immigration law occurred in the ‘Immigration and Nationality Act Amendments of 1965 (the Hart–Celler Act)’, which abolished the system of national-origin quotas and replaced it with family reunification as the major preference group. Since then, minor changes have been made in immigration law, with a politically unfeasible hot-potato concept, Comprehensive Immigration Reform, stymying any significant changes to which immigrant categories are to be given preference.
The Progressive segment of the Democratic Party believed that by flooding the country with poor immigrants and their extended families, they could create a permanent poor underclass, voting Democratic, that would make them a majority U.S. party far into the future. Originally called ‘multiculturalism’, this group would replace the prior American ‘melting pot’ immigration concept, which created a unified society. Under this original American immigration concept, the first generation would be ‘immigrants’, but the second generation would be transformed into “Americans.
But a funny thing happened on the way to fundamentally changing American immigration politics. The second generation of largely Spanish-speaking immigrants became entrepreneurial and relatively affluent. When Trump came on the political scene, many of them voted Republican. When Joe Biden took office in 2021, he opened the southern border to anyone, flooding the nation with over ten million diverse immigrants of unknown character or skills to offset this betrayal of their presumed Democrat Party loyalty.
Biden disclaimed any responsibility for slowing the deluge, claiming that Congressional action was required, which he knew from experience would not happen. His perfidy was exposed by President Trump, who closed the border under existing law almost immediately after taking office in 2025 for a second split term.
The Trump Administration will soon face the fact that it cannot kick the immigration can down the road by just trying to deport millions of illegal immigrants. That task is too broad and will soon become greatly unpopular and a political liability for the midterm election in 2026 and for his presidential successor in 2028. Furthermore, the country needs additional workers to help fuel the growth Trump has stimulated. Lastly, the nation’s birth rates are declining, which, without additional citizens, will compromise America’s strength and world leadership.
The European Union is just beginning to understand that its culture and future identity have been compromised by allowing into the EU millions of child-bearing Muslim families. Instead of integrating and becoming EU citizens with their second and third generations, ardent followers of Islam create religious communities that soon become political blocs against the prior native cultures. Biden/Harris found in the 2024 election that they had to trade out their longtime Jewish voters to accommodate the much more aggressive Muslim faction populating their dominant, anti-Semitic Progressive wing of the Party.
The Trump Administration should consider the following to stabilize the chaotic situation created by the Biden immigration deluge:
- Continue ICE’s aggressive efforts to deport criminal illegals.
- Incentivize that segment of the Biden-era immigrants who meet defined requirements, to register in return for future permanent residency status.
- Protect immigrants from deportation who came here before the Biden open border policy, if they have a clean legal history, have employment, file income tax reports, and are not on welfare.
- English language proficiency should be required of all second-generation immigrants given residency status.
- Eliminate all but family siblings from the preferred status in prior family reunification preferences.
- Create preference for new permanent and temporary categories that meet the needs of the American economy and are not contrary to American culture and assimilation.
- Approve the ‘Dream Act’ for undocumented immigrant youths who were brought to the U.S. as minors.
- Reinstate and enforce ‘E-Verify’, making employers responsible for verifying the immigration status of their employees.
It is long past time for our federal legislators to accept responsibility for America’s future and cease kicking this vital policy down the road, while making it a perennial political issue that lines their campaign bank accounts as they seek to extend their undeserved prestige positions.
TW3
September 30, 2025
John Whitmore Jenkins
