Problem won't go away

By OTHER VIEWS / Washington Post
Published July 1, 2007

After Sen. Elizabeth Dole of North Carolina joined 36 of her Republican colleagues, 15 Democrats and one independent in the Senate Thursday in squashing the last, best hope for now of overhauling the nation's bankrupt and busted immigration laws, she was asked what she proposed for the 12-million undocumented immigrants in the country. "I think that is something that can be dealt with at a later time, " she replied airily.

Tell that to Ernesto, Mrs. Dole. He's a 31-year-old Salvadoran handyman in Wheaton, Md., who sneaked over the border through California four years ago after paying thousands of dollars to a migrant smuggler, to whom he remains in debt. Dole and her colleagues may imagine that Ernesto will simply evaporate now that the Senate has decided to avert its gaze, but he won't. Although he earns barely $1, 200 a month, he does better here as a painter, carpenter, landscaper and electrician than he ever could in Cabanas, his hardscrabble native region of northern El Salvador, which is rich in beans and sugar cane but bereft of jobs.

Ernesto does not intend to leave, but even if he were to be deported, there are still about 12-million people representing 5 percent of the nation's job force who cannot be ignored, hounded, harassed, wished or deported into nothingness. At some point Congress will come to its senses, steady its nerves and recognize that unimpeachable reality.

[Last modified June 30, 2007, 22:48:06]