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George Fishman

Series

Parsing Immigration Policy8 episodes

Recent Episodes

Parsing Immigration Policy
Parsing Immigration Policy

The Coming End of Title 42

Summary There’s an immigration crisis at the U.S. southern border, but that border could be all but erased if Title 42 were to end without the administration implementing equally effective enforcement policies. Title 42 is the public-health order that directs the Border Patrol to expel border-jumpers without a hearing. Whether the U.S. can continue to rely on this public-health order to deal with the immigration crisis remains a question for the courts. In response to an application filed by a coalition of states, the Supreme Court has ordered that Title 42 stay in place until the Court considers whether those states should be allowed to appeal an order terminating Title 42. On this week’s episode of Parsing Immigration Policy, Andrew Arthur, the Center’s Fellow in Law and Policy, and Senior Legal Fellow George Fishman provide an overview and a comprehensive timeline of Title 42’s circuitous legal route, with predictions on the future of those public health orders and the corresponding effect they have had on the border.
Host:
Mark Krikorian
Organization
Center for Immigration Studies

December 2022

Parsing Immigration Policy
Parsing Immigration Policy

Immigration in the Lame Duck: Per-Country Cap, Dreamers and Farmworkers

Summary Before the 118th Congress is sworn in on January 3, the current Congress will likely consider several immigration measures in the “lame duck” session with the backdrop of a historic meltdown at the border. In this week’s episode of Parsing Immigration Policy, experts at the Center join Mark Krikorian, the Center’s executive director and host of the podcast, discuss the issues to watch for in the closing weeks of the 117th Congress. George Fishman, a senior legal fellow, and Jessica Vaughan, the Center’s director of policy, focus on three specific measures. First, the "Equal Access to Green cards for Legal Employment" (Eagle) Act, supported by Big Tech, which would dispense with per-country caps for employment-based green cards and offer permanent work permits to many ostensibly temporary workers on green-card waiting lists. Second, there is a bipartisan effort to provide green cards to so-called Dreamers, adult illegal immigrants who came as minors, many of whom have work permits through the legally dubious DACA program.
Host:
Mark Krikorian
Organization
Center for Immigration Studies

October 2022

Parsing Immigration Policy
Parsing Immigration Policy

What to Expect on Immigration from the Next Congress

Summary The midterm congressional elections that will determine control of the House and the Senate are less than a month away. Once again, immigration is a key issue for voters and many of the candidates have made promises about their immigration agendas. What can we expect from Congress during the last half of a President Biden administration? This week’s episode of Parsing Immigration Policy is a conversation from a recent panel discussion between several seasoned immigration experts with extensive experience on Capitol Hill: George Fishman, the Center’s Senior Legal Fellow; Rosemary Jenks, Director of Government Relations at NumbersUSA; and RJ Hauman, Director of Government Relations and Communications at the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). Fishman covers the history of immigration legislation from when the Republicans controlled the House. Jenks describes the potential election outcomes in November and the implications for immigration legislation, while Hauman outlines immigration priorities for Republicans in the next Congress.
Host:
Mark Krikorian
Organization
Center for Immigration Studies

August 2022

Parsing Immigration Policy
Parsing Immigration Policy

STEM: Science, Technology, Espionage, and Math

Summary Does the large scale admission of foreign students from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) PRC, especially those in STEM fields, pose an economic or security threat to the United States? More than 317,000 Chinese students are present in the country today, representing over one-third of all foreign students. The PRC government considers every one of these students an intelligence asset, and pressures them all to gather whatever intelligence they can during their time in this country. George Fishman, the Center for Immigration Studies’ senior legal fellow, has been following this issue since 2005, and joins this week’s episode of Parsing Immigration Policy to discuss his recent report on the escalation of students from the PRC studying in the United States, the intelligence collection threat they present, and several steps the United States – and even states – can take to limit the espionage taking place at universities.
Host:
Mark Krikorian
Organization
Center for Immigration Studies

July 2022

Parsing Immigration Policy
Parsing Immigration Policy

Biden v. Texas: Remain in Mexico and the Bigger Questions

View Podcast Archive Summary The Supreme Court finished its 2021-2022 term with the release of Biden v. Texas, a case brought against the administration by the states of Texas and Missouri. Most of the media attention has focused on the Court’s finding that the Biden administration may rescind the Trump-era Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) – often referred to as the “Remain in Mexico” – policy. But receiving little attention is that the key issues in the matter were remanded to the lower courts. These are the issues that will have lasting impact on immigration policy and how it is enforced. Today’s episode of Parsing Immigration Policy highlights the issues that are left to be resolved, which will likely be making their way to the Supreme Court: Does the immigration law require the Department of Homeland Security to detain illegal migrants? Can the executive release on parole hundreds of thousands of illegal migrants? These questions go to the ability of the executive to simply refuse to enforce immigration laws.
Host:
Mark Krikorian
Organization
Center for Immigration Studies

April 2022

Parsing Immigration Policy
Parsing Immigration Policy

Buying a Green Card Just Got More Expensive

Summary Congress created an investment visa program, the EB-5 Program, in 1990 to stimulate the U.S. economy, specifically rural and depressed areas, through job creation and capital investment by foreign investors. The loopholes in the program, which sells a pathway to U.S. citizenship to wealthy foreigners and their families who invest in job-creation projects, quickly allowed the program to become riddled with fraud and to stray from what Congress envisioned. After an eight-month lapse, Congress has brought the program back to life through a provision in a funding bill – but it returns with many reforms. George Fishman, the Center’s senior legal fellow and former DHS Deputy General Counsel, who was closely involved in EB-5 reform efforts, said, “These reforms bring to a close a seven-plus-year bi-partisan reform effort led by both the Democrat and Republican chairmen and ranking members of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees.
Host:
Mark Krikorian
Organization
Center for Immigration Studies

March 2022

Parsing Immigration Policy
Parsing Immigration Policy

Who Makes U.S. Immigration Policy?

Summary Congressionally established immigration policy has certain narrow carve outs providing discretion to presidents. One of these carve-outs, "immigration parole", has been abused by presidents of both parties to admit hundreds of thousands of ineligible people from abroad, ignoring the intent of Congress and undermining the Constitution’s separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches. The Biden administration seems to want to parole in millions. Can presidents simply ignore laws passed by Congress and let into the United States anyone they want? In this week’s episode of Parsing Immigration Policy, George Fishman, the Center’s senior legal fellow with more than 25 years' experience in government, provides recommendations for how the courts or Congress can address the executive branch’s abuse of parole. Jessica M. Vaughan, the Center’s director of policy studies, discusses the impact of allowing the mass entry of broad categories of beneficiaries.
Host:
Mark Krikorian
Organization
Center for Immigration Studies

August 2021

Parsing Immigration Policy
Parsing Immigration Policy

Reflections of a Veteran of Past Immigration Battles

Summary Today’s immigration policy debate focuses on many of the same issues as it did decades ago, including numbers, amnesties, labor impact, fiscal costs, and legislative strategy. In this week’s episode of Parsing Immigration Policy, George Fishman, former Department of Homeland Security Deputy General Counsel and Republican Counsel on the House Immigration Subcommittee for over two decades, shares his institutional knowledge on immigration and legislative strategy and its application to today’s debates. Fishman became part of the immigration policy debate in the mid-1990s at the time of the bipartisan U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform, the “Barbara Jordan Commission.” He discusses his participation in the three important immigration legislative battles that followed – in 1995-96, 2005-07, and 2013-14 – and what that experience can teach us today.
Host:
Mark Krikorian
Organization
Center for Immigration Studies