There have been reports of voting in U.S. elections by aliens in recent years. The lead article in this issue, by veteran immigration analyst David Simcox (see page 231), sheds additional light on this issue. Verification of voter registration applicants remains a serious problem. In a number of states, applicants are asked to check a box on a form asking if they are U.S. citizens. Applicants can check “Yes,” but there is no follow- up to verify the authenticity of that answer. Mail-in registration allows even greater chance for error and deliberate fraud. The Government Accountability Office (www.gao.gov) notes that it is presently difficult for states to identify duplicate registrations in other states. And databases for felony convictions or immigration status are rarely matched against voter registration lists. Non-citizens can dilute citizens’ votes. When persons prohibited from voting by law, such as illegal aliens or felons, are allowed to vote anyway, their votes cancel out those of American citizens. Legal and illegal aliens can easily register to vote in local and national elections, and, in close elections, make a very big difference.

Immigration and the Labor Market

The U.S. economy has officially lost hundreds of thousands of jobs this year, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that unemployment has hit a four-year high of 5.7 percent. But President Bush, Congress, and the major presidential candidates are still calling for “comprehensive immigration reform,” which is new-speak for some form of massive amnesty for the tens of millions of illegal aliens residing in the U.S. Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, in an interview in the Wall Street Journal (August 14, 2008, p. A10) offered this proposal to stabilize the housing market: “The most effective initiative would be a major expansion in quotas for skilled immigrants….A doubling or tripling of (skilled immigrants) would markedly accelerate the absorption of unsold housing inventory to sale—and hence help stabilize prices.” As we have noted before, what Wall Street really wants is cheap labor. American workers should be made to compete with the rest of the world’s populations, according to Greenspan and his confederates. Until mass immigration is brought to a halt, there remains little hope for the future of the American worker.