Immigration union chief blasts WH amnesty plan

Susan Ferrechio
October 27, 2014
Washington Examiner

The union president representing 12,000 immigration service agents said Monday he is staunchly opposed to President Obama using executive action to allow millions more illegal immigrants to obtain green cards and work permits.

Kenneth Palinkas, president of the National Citizenship and Immigration Service adjudicators and personnel, called reports about planned executive action “dangerous” and said it would increase “exponentially” the health risks, threats to national security and expense to taxpayers that he said are on the rise because of lax enforcement of immigration laws.

Palinkas made the statement after the Homeland Security Department announced it is seeking the materials to produce up to 34 million green cards and work visas in the coming years.

“If you care about your immigration security and your neighborhood security, you must act now to ensure that Congress stops this unilateral amnesty,” Palinkas said in what he described as a public statement.

The NCIS has long been opposed to efforts to increase immigration through a Senate bipartisan reform measure. That bill would have coupled additional border security with an increase in visas, a guest worker program and a pathway to citizenship for those here illegally. But it was never considered in the Republican-led House and is all but doomed to die when Congress adjourns in December.

President Obama has promised executive action in response to the congressional stalemate, but he has not announced his plan.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest last week declined to say the card order by DHS had anything to do with Obama’s planned executive action and called the suggestion “crazy.”

Palinkas has long complained his agency is ill-equipped to deal with the current influx of immigrants.

“We are still the world’s rubber-stamp for entry into the United States, regardless of the ramifications of the constant violations to the Immigration and Nationality Act,” Palinkas said in the statement. “Whether it’s the failure to uphold the public charge laws, the abuse of our asylum procedures, the admission of Islamist radicals, or visas for health risks, the taxpayers are being fleeced and public safety is being endangered on a daily basis.”