9/11 Immigration Effects

7954 Words32 Pages
[Working Paper] ------------------------------------------------- US Immigration Since 9/11 ------------------------------------------------- Consequences and Implications of 9/11 on US Immigration Policy Jaisang Sun I. Introduction Since the advent of the 9/11 terrorist attacks that brought down the symbolic Twin Towers in Manhattan, and a part of the Pentagon, immigration has upped its status as the most critical political issue in the US. As it seems, surveillance seems to have increased to the point where individual citizens are feeling the pressure on their skin. It is true that the surveillance on the movement of people have taken a new form since 9/11; however, a lingering question still remains. The most important question…show more content…
As a result, immigration policy has lost its independent polity agenda. [Therefore,] virtually no new immigration policies have been created separated from terrorism policies since 2001.” Particularly, illegal immigration has overlapped with growing concerns about national security. The first official immigration initiative by the US government since 9/11 was the enactment of the Real ID Act in 2005. This new legislation required that drivers’ licenses issued by states had to conform to national standards, thereby making it difficult for illegal immigrant s from obtaining the licenses without having to prove their legal status and residency in the US. This legislation, however, proved to have many loopholes around it for illegal immigrants to obtain drivers’ licenses regardless of their illegal status because the states were not obliged to conform to the standards. Therefore, states like Washington and Oregon that did not conform to the national standards until later in 2008 when the federal government made it that non-conforming licenses were no longer accepted in any federal agency, became a sort of a safe haven for a lot of illegal immigrants from various states to obtain drivers’
Open Document