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Ep 5 - Mark Krikorian, Center for Immigration Studies - Immigration Policy Under Trump
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On this week's episode of the Sphere Podcast, Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry, Publisher of Sphere Media, interviews Mark Krikorian, Executive Director of the Center for Immigration Studies, about what immigration policy might look like under a Trump Administration 2.0--and his favorite non-immigration books.
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Center for Immigration Studies: https://cis.org/
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Transcript
Podcast Introduction
00:00:01
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Good morning everyone and welcome to the very low production values ah sphere podcast. ah This is episode five. This time I get the episode number right.
00:00:14
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Because in the previous recording, I got the episode number wrong ah because that's how we do things. It's very high production values, very professional production. production
Guest Introduction: Mark Krikorian
00:00:25
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah But joking aside, my guest today is somebody who I always enjoy talking to, ah Mark Krikorian, who's the Executive Director of the Center for Immigration Studies. I hope that I got that right. If not, you will correct me.
Challenges Faced by CIS
00:00:42
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um I'm just going to preface this by saying that CIS is, as somebody whose day job is to read the output of you know most Washington think tanks every day, CIS does some of the best work just in terms of the rigor and the quality.
00:01:02
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
in this town which is all the more noteworthy because they're essentially alone in on their side of that argument because the the amount of funding and studies and so on on the pro-immigration side of the argument is enormous and the restrictionists um Not just people who think borders are good, but people who are actual restrictionists. And I think you know there should be an argument that involves all perspectives, and all perspectives should be adequately defended. ah But CIS, they fight – I don't want to say they fight a lonely fight. That sounds too depressing. but
00:01:47
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah they do They do very well with the resources they have and they do excellent work and so I'm always happy to do to talk with people who ah fit that description. so ah Do you have anything to add to that ah ah very um very laudatory introduction?
00:02:09
Mark Krikorian
It would be embarrassing if I did, I guess. so Let me only say ah that at least I'm not in my bedroom, I'm in my office. So ah this is also a low, at this end is a low production value operation as well.
00:02:24
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
How dare you, this is not a bedroom, it's a guest bedroom slash home office.
00:02:27
Mark Krikorian
Okay, there you go.
00:02:29
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
All right, this is very different. ah my and my bed and My bedroom has has a bigger bed than this, I'm not a monk.
00:02:32
Mark Krikorian
Totally different.
00:02:37
Mark Krikorian
ah Okay.
00:02:40
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um
Biden's Administration and Immigration
00:02:42
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
All right, so I've written down a list of questions there. ah So last time I interviewed you, um my first question was about the Biden border crisis. And and the in the intervening time, we've had an election.
00:02:57
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
And so the the some of the underlying topics are the same, but the current events are different, which is where we have a new administration that's about to to take office. So my first question is, what do you think of the appointments?
00:03:13
Mark Krikorian
uh... well there i mean i'm pretty pleased obviously with uh... tom homan who's going to be the orders are and in a sense i think what that means is he's going to be kind of secretary of homeland security but for immigration whereas the actual secretary of homeland security christy noem governor of south dakota i think and i have no inside knowledge on this but
00:03:29
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:03:38
Mark Krikorian
I think is going to be Secretary of Homeland Security for not immigration. In other words, for FEMA, for Secret Service, for TSA, for cybersecurity, there's plenty of stuff for her to do.
00:03:49
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
right
00:03:50
Mark Krikorian
um It would make sense to do it that way in order to divide responsibility so they're not butting heads. The It just came out recently that the president selected Rodney Scott for head of Customs and Border Protection. He was a former head of the Border Patrol, very good, excellent choice. And so he'll now be head of the agency that Border Patrol is part of, but also includes the um border and the regular inspectors at the ports of entry. So that's an outstanding choice.
00:04:21
Mark Krikorian
ah They didn't name the ICE director, he's a career ICE guy, and he comes out of the I part of ICE instead of the C part of ICE because ICE is Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
00:04:36
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:04:37
Mark Krikorian
Why they put them together, does it's a little bit of a mystery because at the border, immigration and customs should be combined obviously because you're screening people for you know various things inside the country what's happened is that uh the customs people are far more interested in chasing after people who have making you know counterfeit Gucci purses or importing you know uh whatever antiquities from the middle east illegally or something like that they don't want have anything to do with immigration the interesting thing is that the ice director that
00:04:49
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:05:15
Mark Krikorian
President
Role of a 'Czar' in Washington
00:05:16
Mark Krikorian
Trump has nominated or will be nominating, however that works, is from the immigration side. So that's actually a very good, that's a very good sign.
00:05:23
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right. Right.
00:05:25
Mark Krikorian
And there are some other jobs that they still have to, um you know, immigration related like in State Department and elsewhere, but so far it's looking very good.
00:05:36
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah, I mean, I i i think so too. um Everybody loves ah Stephen Miller, who was ah very effective the first time around, um or so everybody says. ah i ah This is one of my favorite Washington things I may have told you this already. I love the fact that in Washington, Czar means the opposite of what Czar means everywhere else, because the concept of Czar is an autocrat. In Washington, a Czar is a bureaucratic coordination position, meaning you have no intrinsic decision-making power. It can be very powerful position. And so far as the president,
00:06:20
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
backs you, but you have the the office itself has no power. And so Czar in Washington means the opposite of Czar. It means somebody somebody whose power depends on other people.
00:06:31
Mark Krikorian
Right, right, yeah.
00:06:32
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um but But on the issue of immigration, I don't think that's going to be a problem. It's just very funny.
00:06:41
Mark Krikorian
Yeah, in a sense, in a sense, in that respect, the president is the Czar, and the Czar is the Czaravitch or something like that, right?
00:06:41
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um
00:06:47
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right. the He's the Czar's envoy. um
00:06:51
Mark Krikorian
Anyway.
00:06:52
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
there's ah So the funny thing about customs. so There's – and I'm not sure if it's international law. This is just going to be a a ridiculous story. um the ah So in theory, in civilized countries, if you want to search someone, if you want to search their property, if you want to detain them as law enforcement, there are legal rules that specify ah you can't just do it. ah But under international law, there's an exception for customs for the obvious reason that you know if somebody
00:07:27
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
gets into the, is trying to get into the country, you have to search or you may have to search them and and it would be ah absurd if you had to like go talk to a judge every time.
00:07:37
Mark Krikorian
Right.
00:07:38
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
And so at Borders, ah customs officers have um sort of search and detention rights that are ah ah completely different from those that normal law enforcement officers have.
00:07:52
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
And at least in France, I don't know if this is international law or just French law. This is true at borders and within 20 kilometers of international waterways.
00:08:05
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah The Seine is an international waterway, so what I've just described includes the entire city of Paris.
00:08:11
Mark Krikorian
okay
00:08:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
So I have fantasies of like the the the you know the president of France using the customs as like his as police that can detain and search anyone and everything within within the city limits of Paris because it's part of the ah of the customs police jurisdiction.
00:08:33
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um Anyway, so
00:08:38
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Uh, good appointments. Okay. So next question is.
00:08:42
Mark Krikorian
Just Pascal, to sort of give you the context on ah the US version of what you described,
00:08:44
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:08:49
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:08:49
Mark Krikorian
um It doesn't apply to regular customs, but within 100 miles of the an international border, including coasts if necessary, the border of patrol has the right to stop anyone and question them and as to what they're, you know, whether they're lawfully in the United States.
00:09:00
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right. Right.
00:09:08
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:09:09
Mark Krikorian
ah You don't have to answer, so it's not quite the heavy-handed rules that French have, which is obviously the way you guys have some pretty ah pretty ah muscular police powers that the don't exist in a you know freer country like ours.
00:09:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:09:23
Mark Krikorian
but um but But they do have that authority, and they so they have checkpoints you know north of the border on certain strategic highways that smugglers would use.
00:09:30
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:09:33
Mark Krikorian
So that's the that's the only equivalent we have in the US of that.
00:09:38
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah it's just yeah i i've This is like a little thing that's always struck me as funny. um So I guess the next question is, you know Donald Trump names you, em immigration czar. ah First 100 days, what do you do?
00:09:58
Mark Krikorian
What Homan is doing, I think, which is um first thing to do is stop letting go people that you catch at the border.
00:10:06
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:10:07
Mark Krikorian
Because that's the whole incentive is that we let them go. Once they're let go, even if they don't have work authorization or what have you, what do they care? They're in the wind.
00:10:19
Mark Krikorian
It's not like you, if you're an illegal alien, you can't buy a bus ticket. and go get a you know sleep in your brother-in-law's couch or his guest bedroom and get a ah you know get some kind of illegal job.
00:10:23
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:10:31
Mark Krikorian
So being let go is the first attraction. And so you got to stop doing that, which means um you're going to have to detain a lot more people, which means you're probably going to have to enlist, ah use military bases near the border to actually house people.
00:10:52
Mark Krikorian
that's one of the roles the military is going to play. It's not like they're going to have the 82nd Airborne parachute into immigrant neighborhoods and knock on people's doors. It's logistical ah assistance. And you know like logistics is what successful militaries are good at. It's more important almost than anything else. And that's we can do that.
Detaining Border Crossers
00:11:13
Mark Krikorian
So first thing, you stop letting people go. um Second is you start issuing what are called detainers, in other words, notices to local police when they arrest somebody and their fingerprints pop up in DHS as for whatever reason, illegal aliens that maybe they were deported earlier, maybe they were admitted legally, but they were supposed to have left five years ago and they're still here. um Actually send out the notices saying, please hold on to these people. So when you're done with whatever your business is,
00:11:48
Mark Krikorian
prosecuting him for drunk driving, whatever it is, let us know. And sanctuary cities don't cooperate in that process, but there's lots of people who get arrested in non-sanctuary cities.
00:12:01
Mark Krikorian
And under the Biden administration, they just were issuing fewer of those detainer requests.
00:12:03
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:12:06
Mark Krikorian
So you want to pick up people who are um deportable and that the police have already gotten. And I mean, there's a million things, but the third kind of top thing I would mention,
00:12:18
Mark Krikorian
is you put on notice the countries that won't take their own people back that winter is coming.
00:12:24
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:12:28
Mark Krikorian
And ah you know the first thing we're going to do is stop issuing visas, which is in statute.
00:12:34
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:12:34
Mark Krikorian
That's allowed. But that's only the first thing. And you know you don't want to know what else we're coming up with if you unless you start taking your own people back.
00:12:41
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah. Yeah.
00:12:44
Mark Krikorian
And that'll work, because under Trump 1, they use that power more than any other administration had of the visa sanctions, and especially smaller countries immediately.
00:12:56
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
yeah
00:12:56
Mark Krikorian
um you know Oh, let me add a fourth thing that, um again, there's a million things, but a fourth thing that's important is how do you deal with sanctuary cities? And one thing I would do, there's certain funding.
00:13:07
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
That was my next question.
00:13:08
Mark Krikorian
OK, well, then I'll let you ask the question, and then I'll get to it.
00:13:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Okay, Mark Crickorian, how do you deal with sanctuary cities?
00:13:16
Mark Krikorian
um The in the first Trump administration, they withheld certain law enforcement funds, you know, funding programs.
00:13:24
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:13:25
Mark Krikorian
And the reason they can't just like stop giving any money, like no education department money or whatever, because Supreme Court has said that anything that the federal government isn't allowed to commandeer state resources.
00:13:40
Mark Krikorian
That's the word commandeering.
00:13:41
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:13:42
Mark Krikorian
for their own purposes. So that when they say, okay, no money for X, there has to be some nexus between the funding program and the policy. So if it's a highway related funding, it could be something related to automobiles or whatever it is.
00:13:57
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
right
00:13:58
Mark Krikorian
So there's a limit to what they can do. They did that during Trump won and several, a couple of jurisdictions did change their policies. The rest of them said, yeah, whatever, forget it. We'll live without the money and our you know corrupt state legislature will make up the difference or whatever it is. But this is an idea that one of our board members is retired state department and maybe back in the state department ah next next month.
00:14:22
Mark Krikorian
He said, just withhold student visas or prohibit any jurisdiction in a, any, any university.
00:14:29
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right, we wrote about that, yeah.
00:14:30
Mark Krikorian
Yeah. In a, in a sanctuary jurisdiction, just prohibit them from issuing from getting foreign students, no university, California, foreign students, no NYU, no Columbia.
00:14:41
Mark Krikorian
um I don't know if it'll work or not, but this administration has has it out for the universities anyway. I mean, the vice president has said when he was still in the Senate, well, he's still in the Senate, technically, um we should seize the endowments of the universities, kind of like King Henry VIII, you know what I mean?
00:14:49
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:15:00
Mark Krikorian
Seizing the monasteries. um This would be a much milder version of that. In other words, if you're going to choose between those things, but the point is that is going to make them squeal and maybe they'll put some pressure.
00:15:13
Mark Krikorian
We'll see. um There's no perfect single silver bullet to end sanctuary cities, but there's some things you can do. And I expect this administration is going to do a lot.
00:15:24
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:15:25
Mark Krikorian
Yeah.
00:15:26
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
So yeah, I mean, the point about the universities is very true. I think most people have no idea how much, especially big public universities like the University of California system are totally dependent on foreign students because they're the ones who pay full freight.
00:15:43
Mark Krikorian
Yep.
00:15:43
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um And so they're extremely profitable. um And, you know, they're there to get their degree, they cheat. ah It's a sort of open secret in many of these places.
00:15:55
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
This is not me saying, you know, people are eating dogs and cats in Ohio.
00:16:00
Mark Krikorian
right
00:16:00
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah This is, this is very well known. um So yeah, it's, a but let's, you know, kind of want to pursue this. So let's,
00:16:16
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
what's to stop?
00:16:20
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
the White House, the the DOJ from saying, look, illegal immigration is illegal, abetting illegal immigration is a crime. So, you know, if you're abetting illegal immigration, I'm not going to, you know, play around with budget threats and so on. I'm going to arrest you.
00:16:37
Mark Krikorian
Right.
00:16:38
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah
00:16:39
Mark Krikorian
but That's definitely possible. homan Tom Homan has actually alluded to that.
00:16:45
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:16:45
Mark Krikorian
and so the and you know But again, because that's something that's never been done before, I can see them doing it. But it's the kind of thing where you have to pick a really good target, somebody who is so loathsome and so publicly unappealing and has been responsible
00:17:05
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
can Can we find somebody like that in the leadership of big blue cities? No, I don't think they're they're all they're all upstanding citizens.
00:17:10
Mark Krikorian
yeah Yeah, they can.
00:17:13
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
They're all you know well within the mainstream of American society and politics.
00:17:18
Mark Krikorian
And they'd have to find somebody like that after link them to some outrage, so outrageous, you know, raping a four year old girl or something and they protected this guy.
00:17:26
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:17:31
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:17:31
Mark Krikorian
That's the kind of thing. and then
00:17:32
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:17:33
Mark Krikorian
that And so in other words, the point is you need to, it's like a lot of these litigators trying to get a case to the Supreme Court. They're looking for the you know most sympathetic plaintiff.
00:17:41
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right, right, right, right.
00:17:44
Mark Krikorian
In this case, you'd have to find the most unsympathetic defendant and pursue that. And if they did that, that would get people's attention in sanctuary cities ah real quick.
00:17:57
Mark Krikorian
And so
00:17:57
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
Media Strategy for Immigration
00:17:58
Mark Krikorian
I'm, look, I'm not saying this because I have inside knowledge of what they're planning, but I expect that ah that is in fact what they're doing.
00:18:10
Mark Krikorian
um And you'd have to find in a jurisdiction where The U.S. Attorney, the federal prosecutor, could try them in a place where you would get a good jury, too. In other words, there's a lot involved, but if they found the right case, that would be like a lever.
00:18:19
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
right
00:18:26
Mark Krikorian
You know, what did Archimedes say? Give me a lever long enough and I'll move the world. Well, give me a sanctuary city politician loathsome enough and they can move the world.
00:18:29
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
yeah
00:18:38
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah Yeah, that's that that's a good observation. So beyond sanctuary cities, um again, in this scenario… um where Mark Rickorian is czar, actual czar of immigration, not fake DC czar.
00:18:56
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
you start If you start doing anything, there is this entire nexus of or you know organizations, institutions, sanctuary cities are one, but you know NGOs are very well funded by both blue state governments and evil billionaires, media organizations that are going to run all of the sub stories and not run all of the stories having to do with crime and everything else, courts, state courts, bad federal courts.
00:19:27
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
activists, protesters, blah, blah, blah, blah. This entire nexus that's designed to um enable this mass immigration, ah what do you what do you do about them? Do you do you just ignore them?
00:19:47
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
you You can say, oh, I ignore the bad press and and and the protests. It's like, okay, maybe that that depends on political will, fair enough. um There's plenty of political will when it comes to immigration in this administration, so okay. But some of them you can't ignore, right? You can't ignore courts, or can you? But in theory, at least you can't. um You can't maybe ignore you know certain elements within the bureaucracy.
00:20:17
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
i how do you How do you see that?
00:20:21
Mark Krikorian
Um, there's several things I'd point to first is they need to have, and I'm pretty sure they are developing a media strategy of their own, a proactive media strategy so that when they arrest, you know, somebody who raped the four year old girl and the, you know, San Francisco city council tries to protect them, that they're getting ahead of that instead of reacting to it.
00:20:38
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right. Right.
00:20:46
Mark Krikorian
Um, that's part of it. And I gotta say. In a sense, all of the challenges you've described are still real. They're still really there, but it's almost better that Trump lost and was gone for four years because all of those institutions have now so so ah additionally delegitimize themselves in the eyes of the public over the past four years that one of the reasons Trump did so well is that they have less power than they used to.
00:21:08
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
True Yeah
00:21:17
Mark Krikorian
Um, and so they, as part of their media strategy, they're going to need to, um, exploit the alternative media pathways that they did podcasters and all the rest of it, you know, conservative media. So they need to have part of it needs to be not just going after illegal aliens. They need a sort of anti legacy media strategy. And that applies obviously not just to immigration, but they're going to have to deal with that if they try to you know, abolish the Department of Education, all kinds of things like that.
00:21:49
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:21:49
Mark Krikorian
um Judges is a, you know, that's a challenge. I'm not one of these, you know, now they ruled, let them enforce it. I still kind of want to have a more or less sort of functional system of rule of law.
00:22:03
Mark Krikorian
But the Supreme Court actually, in the end, ended up um backing the administration on a number like on the the travel ban case. It took them a long time, but they eventually won in the Supreme Court so that they've got precedents now that will make it easier or the that will shorten the amount of time courts can block what they're doing and interfere with it.
00:22:34
Mark Krikorian
The advocacy groups, um first of all, they need to defund them from the federal end because look, they're getting a lot of federal money.
00:22:43
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Definitely.
00:22:43
Mark Krikorian
And the other thing is there are going to be protests. I mean, and they're going to be, you know, they're going to want to like surround, have a human chain around an ICE facility, that kind of stuff.
00:22:50
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:22:53
Mark Krikorian
They're going to do some of that stuff.
00:22:53
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
right
00:22:55
Mark Krikorian
um Again, it's the kind of thing where they need to be proactive in a media strategy. So get them to do those kinds of protests on behalf of the most loathsome people you can imagine, so as to delegitimize the protesters in the eyes of the public at large.
00:23:13
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right. Interesting.
00:23:20
Mark Krikorian
um
00:23:22
Mark Krikorian
You know, I'm not, it's not like I have a ah four point program that I can just email over to them and say, okay, this is what you need to do.
00:23:32
Mark Krikorian
But that's, that's what they need. In other words, there aren't going to just be able to wipe this stuff out, but they can in fact, do better in prevailing against it.
00:23:39
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:23:43
Mark Krikorian
Then frankly, they could have four years ago, because if it had just been a second Trump administration, you know, from 2020,
00:23:50
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
right
00:23:52
Mark Krikorian
they wouldn't have they would be in a They would be in a worse position than they are now in some respects.
00:23:56
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
yeah Yeah, I mean the the the Biden administration has been quote-unquote very good very good for the cause because they went so far on the other extreme.
00:24:07
Mark Krikorian
Yeah.
00:24:14
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Um, just completely abandoning the notion of having any board or any enforcement. Um, yeah.
00:24:21
Mark Krikorian
It was Lenin who said, chem hoier tem luche the worse, the better. And so in a sense, they have pushed this so far that it actually expands what the but what the Trump administration is going to be able to do.
00:24:40
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah. Um. Okay, so there's another issue in this sort sort of whole spectrum of, you know, what do we do early on is, and this is sort of, we're getting to the pain points within the Republican coalition, um which is there's a lot of people who believe, and I i tend to think they're right, but I mean
Worksite Enforcement and Immigration
00:25:06
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
i may not be, you'll tell me,
00:25:08
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah because you know more about this stuff, ah that you're not going to get serious immigration enforcement unless you start raiding businesses and arresting or otherwise punishing business owners who hire illegals.
00:25:26
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
and This is where the sort of the rubber meets the road because of course the business community is, you know, very important to the Republican coalition. Republicans hate to do anything that ah business owners and business leaders don't like. And so,
00:25:45
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um what's what's your what's your view on that, I guess? A, is it necessary to do these raids and and to specifically go after businesses?
00:25:56
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
and business owners and and CEOs or whatever, and and B, if it is necessary, are we going to do it and what's the political fallout going to be?
00:26:10
Mark Krikorian
Yes, it's essential. There's no question about it because turning off or at least weakening the magnet of jobs is one of the keys of limiting illegal immigration.
00:26:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Okay.
00:26:20
Mark Krikorian
um you know if you If it's hard to get a job, I mean, the the broad goal of immigration enforcement other than actually yeah other than actually arresting people is to make it as hard, as impractical as possible to live here illegally.
00:26:25
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Sends to read them to me, but...
00:26:35
Mark Krikorian
In other words, that's driver's licenses, all kinds of things, but jobs is is the most important thing.
00:26:35
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:26:40
Mark Krikorian
The reason there's a couple of things that have changed over the years. One is, at least at the big business level, the Republicans couldn't care less what they think anymore in some, to some degree. In other words, large businesses are now part of the opposite coalition.
00:26:59
Mark Krikorian
Now, small business, that's a different thing, obviously, and medium size and all of that. I mean, so so what you're saying is still correct. It's not quite as correct as it was before. Republicans, it's no longer, you know, what's good for General Motors is good for America, as the chairman of General Motors said back in the 50s.
00:27:15
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah. I mean, it hasn't it hasn't changed that much. And those big those big businesses still give a lot of money to to Republicans in Congress.
00:27:24
Mark Krikorian
They do. Yeah.
00:27:26
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah And, you know, if you if you think of a sector like agriculture, for example, ah you know, my understanding is that there's a lot of illegal immigrant labor and and Republicans love, you know, big ag, small ag, medium ag.
00:27:44
Mark Krikorian
Yeah, agriculture is the one place is sort of the last place I would go to.
00:27:44
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um
00:27:51
Mark Krikorian
precise And I mean that in a kind of strategic sense, because number one, it's a tiny share of the economy.
00:27:54
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:27:56
Mark Krikorian
It just is.
00:27:57
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:27:57
Mark Krikorian
I mean, especially the kinds that illegal aliens are involved in. Illegal aliens are not swinging scythes in North Dakota harvesting wheat. they're um you know The vast majority of our agriculture is done with machines.
00:28:11
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
I assume nobody is swinging aside anymore in America because.
00:28:15
Mark Krikorian
I'm hoping not. But if you saw some of the ways that fresh fruit and vegetables are harvested, and this is United Farm Workers makes a big deal of this before Thanksgiving, you know these the your the food on your table is, and they have people, there's this one that really struck me.
00:28:22
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:28:27
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:28:33
Mark Krikorian
It's this guy ah you know kneeling in the dirt and pulling out radishes um and you know and bundling them up or whatever it is.
00:28:37
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:28:41
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:28:42
Mark Krikorian
And it's like, well, You know, it's no disrespect to this guy. He's obviously a hardworking person, but why is a modern society having, you know, feeding itself with peasant labor, kneeling in the dirt, pulling plants out with their hands?
00:28:52
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:28:58
Mark Krikorian
It's insane. But anyway, my point here is that AG number one is a small sector of the overall economy anyway, a very small sector, a share of the illegal workforce and is uniquely
00:29:07
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:29:13
Mark Krikorian
um has unique access to Republicans, because they're in rural districts.
00:29:17
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:29:17
Mark Krikorian
And so my point is, I would, I'm not saying they're off the hook, but they already have an unlimited guest worker program if they wanted to go through the red tape to use it. And to get not to get pushback, I would start with other industries where the illegal aliens actually work.
00:29:35
Mark Krikorian
and But yes, there is gonna be work site enforcement. There's no quite, I mean, Tom Homan has said as much.
00:29:40
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Okay.
00:29:40
Mark Krikorian
And again, it's like the other things that I referred to, you wanna start with employers that are already complete dirt bags and are locking the exits and are employing 13 year olds and all of that stuff and then raid them.
00:29:54
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right, right, right.
00:29:56
Mark Krikorian
You know what I mean? And so we just raid the least sympathetic um employers. And that actually has a real enforcement benefit too.
00:30:06
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
By the way, that employer is probably an immigrant himself.
00:30:09
Mark Krikorian
could be, it's entirely possible. Probably the same ethnic group, too. You know what I mean?
00:30:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:30:13
Mark Krikorian
it's um But the other the advantage of that also is that you want to be able to lock up some American employers for actual criminal activity.
00:30:22
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:30:24
Mark Krikorian
And the problem is the law says knowing employment is what's illegal.
00:30:29
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah
00:30:29
Mark Krikorian
And so you know it's like, well, there's Social Security card with Mickey Mouse's face on it looked OK to me, you know that kind of thing.
00:30:35
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
and
00:30:36
Mark Krikorian
When you raid a factory, You then have, you can turn the illegal immigrants and say, look, we won't send you to jail. You'll get a free trip home and clean record.
00:30:47
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:30:50
Mark Krikorian
You have to go home, but you're not going to jail if you give us intel on who were the employees of the company, the management.
00:30:55
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:31:00
Mark Krikorian
that knew what was going on.
00:31:00
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:31:02
Mark Krikorian
They did that in Iowa with some success at a meet a meat packer there.
00:31:02
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Oh, really?
00:31:06
Mark Krikorian
um And everybody knew that this was a dirty operation, just in general, all kinds of respects. Over time, occupational safety and health, everything, they couldn't get the goods until they raided it.
00:31:21
Mark Krikorian
And then the the illegal immigrants themselves started singing like canaries. um
00:31:27
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
you It sounds like they should have called the French customs and you know they would have gotten all of the evidence they needed.
00:31:31
Mark Krikorian
Exactly. Yeah, there's a river there's a river that goes through Iowa. They could have done it. to ah but and But the thing is, most employers aren't dirtbags. They're just regular people.
00:31:41
Mark Krikorian
And we need to give them a way to make sure that they're protecting themselves. And that's why E-Verify, which is this online system, when you hire somebody, is essential.
00:31:51
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:31:55
Mark Krikorian
But Um, I actually think there's a way to go beyond it. And one of our board members who was in the first Trump DHS calls it G verify government verifying it.
00:32:09
Mark Krikorian
And this is something that can be done through regulation, which is to say, yeah, which is yeah.
00:32:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Oh, interesting. That was my next question. So can you can you please explain that? Because my impression was you can only do eVerify through ah ah through legislation.
00:32:21
Mark Krikorian
that legislation Yes, E-Verify, everybody assumes it can only be done by an act of Congress because it's voluntary now. Um, there's two wrinkles here. One is one of our analysts is a immigration judge and is long experience on this says, actually, you could probably do even E verify mandated through regulation, because the law says that the government shall determine what the means are or something. I forget the exact wording. He wrote about this, that would go to the courts. Um, nonetheless, um,
00:32:54
Mark Krikorian
My idea was of this GVerify is where you take the all the onus off the employers altogether. Because the way it works now is an employer hires somebody.
00:33:04
Mark Krikorian
He has to enter his information for social security and tax purposes.
00:33:09
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:33:09
Mark Krikorian
And then there's a separate site for EVerify where you enter the name, social security number, date of birth.
00:33:13
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:33:16
Mark Krikorian
um And we've done it it. We use it. We've used it for years. We don't hire that many people. But when we hire people, we run them through EVerify.
00:33:23
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
you You make sure to run them through eVerify.
00:33:25
Mark Krikorian
Oh, absolutely. Oh, absolutely.
00:33:26
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
That's really funny.
00:33:26
Mark Krikorian
Everybody. Yeah. And you have to do it for everybody if you're going to do it.
00:33:29
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Well, I'm good.
00:33:30
Mark Krikorian
ah and And it's easy to do. It's not a big deal. And the main people who come back as negatives are women who didn't change their names with Social Security when they got married.
Introducing GVerify System
00:33:43
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:33:43
Mark Krikorian
but that kind of thing. So it's actually almost a public service to make sure that the government knows your right information. But with GVerify, which they actually did draft a regulation to this effect, so it's not just some sort of vaporware, um when the employer enters the standard tax information, Social Security information, the government then verifies and makes sure it's real on its own. In other words, it's one step. It's taking out this other step. And the employer doesn't have any paperwork requirements about they have to maintain the paperwork on the employer employee for a certain number of years, it takes the whole thing off of them.
00:34:19
Mark Krikorian
The problem there is ah getting Social Security to want to do it. The Social Security Administration wants nothing to do with legal status.
00:34:27
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:34:29
Mark Krikorian
IRS couldn't care less as long as you give them their money.
00:34:31
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:34:32
Mark Krikorian
And so that would be the kind of thing you would need somebody like say Stephen Miller or somebody he's tasked on this to go in there and basically start
00:34:39
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:34:42
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Make them do it.
00:34:42
Mark Krikorian
banging heads together and saying, look, we're going to set up an institutionalized, systematic way of doing this.
00:34:43
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:34:49
Mark Krikorian
And I don't care whether you like it or not. And if you don't like it, you can go to the Greenland office of the state of the Social Security Administration and live there for the rest of your life.
00:34:51
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right. You're fired.
00:34:58
Mark Krikorian
that In other words, that's not a legal challenge.
00:35:02
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes, yes.
00:35:02
Mark Krikorian
It's not even really a funding challenge.
00:35:04
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
It's an organizational.
00:35:04
Mark Krikorian
It's basically kicking bureaucratic behind and getting, once the system is up, It'll be almost sort of self-functioning, but it's getting over that hump.
00:35:15
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:35:16
Mark Krikorian
So anyway, um yes, that's essential because like I said, most employers want to do the right thing.
00:35:19
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
That's fascinating.
00:35:23
Mark Krikorian
They're not criminals, but they need to be given some kind of practical way to stay legal.
00:35:35
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:35:35
Mark Krikorian
And um if you do that, it doesn't mean there won't be any illegal immigration.
00:35:36
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:35:39
Mark Krikorian
There'll still be people working for cash, hanging out in front of the Home Depot parking a lot, that kind of thing. But that's a much smaller phenomenon than the kind of mass illegality we're dealing with now.
00:35:49
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right. Right. Right. um
00:35:56
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
that's That's very interesting. Well, you know, I mean, at least Republicans have a great track record of ah bending the deep state to their will and and implementing policy through the administrative state. So, you know, I'm very optimistic. Well, i'm I'm just being snarky for the sake of being snarky. we're The one thing that's true is we're more aware of the problem than we've ever been.
00:36:20
Mark Krikorian
Yeah.
00:36:21
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um
00:36:22
Mark Krikorian
And more aware of the the i mean the deep state problem, I guess. In other words, not even just the immigration one.
00:36:26
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes, yes that's that's the problem I meant, that that knowing how to actually push through the thing through the administrative machine matters a great deal.
00:36:28
Mark Krikorian
And so, right, right, yeah.
00:36:35
Mark Krikorian
Right. and that is And that is something, I mean, they understand that challenge, broadly speaking, and that's why they're talking about this Schedule F issue, which I don't really understand, but the point is make make it possible to remove bureaucrats much more easily.
00:36:42
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:36:46
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:36:50
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes. Yes.
00:36:52
Mark Krikorian
Because, you know, we had this civil service reform in the 19th century where
00:36:52
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:36:57
Mark Krikorian
Before that, it was all patronage.
00:36:57
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yep.
00:36:59
Mark Krikorian
And basically, every post office was run by whoever you know your cronies of the you know elected official was.
00:37:01
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yep.
00:37:06
Mark Krikorian
That went a little too far. But frankly, past 100 years, we've clearly gone way too far in the other direction now. There needs to be some course correct.
00:37:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Entranage is a sacrament. It is a visible outward sign of an inward grace, and that grace is power.
00:37:20
Mark Krikorian
Yeah, well, there you go. Yeah.
00:37:22
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um That was Benjamin Disraeli. um Because the Brits did it 20 years before, and of course, you know the French did it 500 years ago.
00:37:32
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
But um it's been a mixeds it's been a mixed bag.
00:37:33
Mark Krikorian
Right, yep.
00:37:39
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um Okay, so we we had ah we had a previous interview ah some months ago. um We talked about the Biden stuff, which is no longer current.
00:37:50
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
We talked about the Trump stuff. There was one thing in your interview which I loved, which I thought was very interesting and fascinating, ah and which is evergreen, which is called Remain in Mongolia.
00:38:03
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
So
Asylum Seekers and Third Countries
00:38:04
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
can you please explain what Remain in Mongolia is and why it's a good idea?
00:38:07
Mark Krikorian
Sure. um Let me start with Remain in Mexico, which was the actual program that I wanted to find a country that also started with M.
00:38:11
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:38:16
Mark Krikorian
So that's why I came up with Mongolia. But Remain in Mexico was the Trump administration's solution to a surge, a spike that happened in the illegal crossings at the border.
00:38:28
Mark Krikorian
Interestingly, the spike was caused by the end of that family separation policy. And all the smugglers said, OK, now's our chance.
00:38:33
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:38:36
Mark Krikorian
Let's grab a kid and you'll be able to get in. So Remain in Mexico was the Trump administration solution. It's provided for in statute. It's not called that. um But statute allows the administration either or requires them either to detain illegal border crossers until their court, their case is finished or have them wait outside the country until their hearing dates come up. And so they crafted remain in Mexico. And the point was you come across the border, you say the magic words, you read the card that the smugglers gave you of what you're supposed to say about, I fear persecution.
00:39:15
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:39:15
Mark Krikorian
um And instead of letting you go, they send you back across the border. Mexico agreed to take, Mexico had to agree to it, to take Latin Americans who made those claims, ah Spanish speakers, not you know people from Kazakhstan or whatever necessarily.
00:39:26
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:39:33
Mark Krikorian
So, um and it worked immediately. I mean, it's like almost overnight, the huge surge in bogus asylum claimants stopped.
00:39:42
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
right
00:39:43
Mark Krikorian
um It's you know not dissimilar to what Italy is a deal Italy is trying to have with Albania. um
00:39:49
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah, everybody's doing a version of this or contemplating a version of this.
00:39:51
Mark Krikorian
Right. Exactly. Australia started it, some version of it. They called it the Pacific solution a number of years ago. um the And it worked. It was amazing amazingly ah good. There are two weaknesses, though.
00:40:06
Mark Krikorian
One is Mexico had to agree and because they're a sovereign country and yes those people came through Mexico and they shouldn't have allowed that but they did and once they're in our there you know it's a it's like musical chairs when the music stops you know we we were stuck with them.
00:40:09
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:40:20
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:40:24
Mark Krikorian
um The other problem is that it's basically kind of a half measure because they're still allowed to apply for asylum in the United States When in fact, they already passed through usually at least half a dozen other countries before they got here So why should they even be permitted to apply for a asylum?
00:40:35
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:40:39
Mark Krikorian
And so this is the insight I this is my remain in Mongolia idea is that we need to develop relationships with a number of other countries And so that when someone crosses the border illegally and makes an asylum claim, ah our response is not, okay, we're gonna put you in the queue with an asylum judge and you'll see them in 2037 or something.
00:41:08
Mark Krikorian
And in the meantime, have a nice day.
00:41:09
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yep.
00:41:11
Mark Krikorian
Rather it would be, have a work permit, yeah.
00:41:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Not just have a nice day, have a work permit.
00:41:16
Mark Krikorian
Or hold you in custody and have to pay for all of it the whole time. you know The response should be, you may or may not have an asylum, a legitimate asylum claim. We're not even going to ah assess it. We don't care because anyone who makes an asylum claim after having crossed illegally, we ship to Mongolia. And you can make an asylum claim in Mongolia, and we're going to have to pay them and you pay Mongolia to do it obviously and pay for you know holding all of that stuff it's going to cost us money but it's a bargain at twice the price compared to the alternative and once people realize that
00:41:50
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:41:55
Mark Krikorian
crossing the border and making an asylum claim will end you up in Mongolia, a lot fewer people are gonna do it, let's face it.
00:42:01
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:42:02
Mark Krikorian
And it wouldn't just, again, Mongolia, it starts with an M, and they may actually be willing, because they're sandwiched between Russia and China, and they may wanna have ah you know ah friendly relations with the United States, and they're a big country, and we'll pay them handsomely, and you know buy their mistresses, apartments, and all of that stuff, you know what I mean?
00:42:02
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:42:20
Mark Krikorian
so
00:42:21
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah
00:42:22
Mark Krikorian
But you know it could be Botswana, it could be Paraguay. um The British Foreign Office, when they were still pursuing this Remain in Rwanda, as I called it, a version, where they would send people to Rwanda, they went around and talked to countries all over the world to see whether they'd be willing to do it.
00:42:39
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yep.
00:42:40
Mark Krikorian
To Armenia, to but I think Botswana, all kinds of places. And some of them were a flat out no. I think Kenya said no under no circumstance. They got no more Somalis and they know what to do with.
00:42:50
Mark Krikorian
They don't need more people. um But some of them, I think Armenia was one of them, said, well, you know, what's it worth to you? So in other words, they were willing to do business because the numbers just wouldn't be that big because people would stop coming.
00:42:59
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:43:06
Mark Krikorian
Australia had a deal like this with Cambodia, where if you came over in a boat and they got you, they would put you in these detention facilities.
00:43:06
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:43:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yep.
00:43:14
Mark Krikorian
They had two of them in in nearby island countries. But they would fly you free to Cambodia and make an asylum claim there. And only five people took them up on it.
00:43:25
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah Beautiful country.
00:43:26
Mark Krikorian
Even though Cambodia, I mean, you know it's I probably wouldn't, I mean, yeah, it's it's a beautiful place. it's Nobody's gonna kill you there. You know what I mean? It's a normal place. um Five people took them up, four of them gave up and went back to their home countries after going to Cambodia.
00:43:40
Mark Krikorian
So obviously there weren't all that interested. They weren't real asylum seekers.
00:43:45
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:43:45
Mark Krikorian
And you're seeing something, a smaller version of that now in Mexico where if we end, you know when Trump comes in and the party's over, there Um, reporters have spoken to like Venezuelans and others who were like, yeah, this stinks.
00:43:59
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yep.
00:44:01
Mark Krikorian
I'm just going to go home. Okay. Well, you weren't really inside. No Jew fleeing Nazi Germany in 1937 is saying, Oh, well, I'll just go back to Germany.
00:44:05
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right. Right.
00:44:11
Mark Krikorian
Those are real asylum seekers.
00:44:13
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:44:14
Mark Krikorian
Almost no one who is seeking asylum in the United States now is an actual asylum seeker.
00:44:20
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
right I mean, that's that's the genius of it, which is it sort of calls the bluff, and which is exactly that.
00:44:25
Mark Krikorian
Right.
00:44:27
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
like if you If you're actually like desperately free fleeing you know a Holocaust or a genocide or whatever, you will say, yes, please, fly me to Mongolia. um and and and And the United States has you know saved somebody from ah from from from a horrible genocide.
00:44:47
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
like we've We've done it. um But of course, you know the reason why this horrifies the left is because they know just as well as we do that 99% of the asylum claims are bogus and they don't care and they just want to f flood the country with immigrants and they don't care who they are or how they come here.
00:45:06
Mark Krikorian
yep
00:45:07
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
So I just i just think it's ah it's ah it's wonderful and I think it's very aptly named.
00:45:13
Mark Krikorian
Yep.
00:45:16
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um So I have ah one last question, which is ah more of a science fiction question. um
00:45:26
Mark Krikorian
I'm a big sci-fi fan. so so
00:45:30
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
not act not Not literally science fiction, um but kind of. So basically the question is, ah and i'm i'm I'm going to sort of ah elaborate on why I think it's not as stupid a question as it sounds.
00:45:46
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
What do you think are the prospects for legislation on immigration? And I'm i'm trying to look for a synonym of comprehensive, because obviously the term comprehensive is cursed.
00:45:59
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Something that's actually comprehensive, like a big bill that that gets passed by Congress and signed by the president that that solves most of the issues related to immigration and sort of lasts for decades the way that Reagan's law for whatever it's its pluses and minuses lasted for decades or hard sell or whatever its pluses or minuses lasted for decades.
00:45:59
Mark Krikorian
Right.
00:46:23
Mark Krikorian
Right.
00:46:23
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um and and And so the precipice for this is always, you know, the discourse was ah why won't Republicans get behind comprehensive immigration reform is because they got screwed over the first time under Reagan where we said, oh, you know, you have to amnesty people who are already there, but don't worry, we'll enforce everything. And so we won't have this problem again. So, you know, you're just grandfathering people who are already here, but then it's going to be fixed.
00:46:53
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
And they got completely screwed over and so they don't want to be screwed over the second time. Well, the flip side of that is, you know, if Trump and Homan and Miller and all those other guys solve and then really solve the problem of illegal immigration.
00:47:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Then why not, you know, sit around a table with, you know, whatever sane Democrats are out there and say, all right, let's, let's, we all know H1B is broken.
00:47:23
Mark Krikorian
Make a deal.
00:47:24
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
We all know all a bunch of this stuff is broken. Like let's actually fix it. So science fiction.
00:47:31
Mark Krikorian
Right. No, not really. um It's, and and the way you're describing it, the sort of sequence of events makes sense because the previous deals, either the 86th amnesty or the various ones that failed under Bush, Jr.
00:47:51
Mark Krikorian
and Obama,
00:47:51
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:47:52
Mark Krikorian
All were amnesty first promises of enforcement in the future.
00:47:56
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:47:57
Mark Krikorian
And, and and in addition to promises of enforcement they just increase the numbers illegal immigration numbers in addition to the whole thing was a total disaster all around.
00:47:59
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:48:05
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
right
00:48:07
Mark Krikorian
um What we need to see, from my opinion, to get to a more kind of an equilibrium on immigration. It's not like everybody's going to agree, but like you said, get to a system that's more or less functional and more or less broadly supported.
00:48:24
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:48:24
Mark Krikorian
Is enforcement first without any print quid pro quos? No deals, no nothing.
00:48:30
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah.
00:48:31
Mark Krikorian
The enforcement has to happen. The illegal population will shrink. It's not going to disappear, but it'll shrink. then once there is real credibility on immigration, and we have in place the systems that are necessary to limit future illegal immigration,
00:48:51
Mark Krikorian
um then you have a kind of Nixon goes to China moment.
00:48:55
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:48:57
Mark Krikorian
And i'm know to me, that seems like the kind of thing that happens in the JD Vance administration.
00:49:09
Mark Krikorian
where um you know the illegal immigration problem has been tamed. It's never going away. People still steal cars. It's illegal. But it's not like in most places, unless you're in like San Francisco or something, that that's you know endemic.
00:49:18
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
a
00:49:23
Mark Krikorian
um So once we tame illegal immigration, the deal that I would foresee that we sit around a table with Democrats is, OK, the illegal immigrants who are still here ah We amnesty.
00:49:40
Mark Krikorian
Not a lot of 13-year path to citizenship just ripped the Band-Aid off. you know The way we did in 86, it was actually relevant. They had to take a class on civics and what have you in English.
00:49:50
Mark Krikorian
like I mean, I don't know.
00:49:51
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Really?
00:49:52
Mark Krikorian
Huh? They did.
00:49:53
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Really?
00:49:53
Mark Krikorian
Yeah, they did.
00:49:54
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Oh, that's funny.
00:49:54
Mark Krikorian
um but But the,
00:49:57
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
That's, that's like an SNL sketch, you know, waiting to happen, you know, the, the, the, the, the like nice lady P-score volunteer and like the Mexican, you know, uh, orange picker.
00:49:59
Mark Krikorian
yeah, well, I know. Yeah. Yeah.
00:50:07
Mark Krikorian
and the group's got all this money, yeah, the group's got all this money for it too. you know So it was that part, up that part, maybe maybe I won't be for.
00:50:12
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah, of course.
00:50:17
Mark Krikorian
But anyway, the point is a relatively clean,
00:50:19
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
We'll, we'll send them a list of YouTube videos about the constitution. How about that?
00:50:23
Mark Krikorian
there you go. Yeah,
Future of Immigration Reform
00:50:24
Mark Krikorian
that's better than better than the alternative maybe. But you know a kind of streamlined amnesty for the bulk of people in exchange for
00:50:32
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Okay.
00:50:36
Mark Krikorian
permanent deep cuts in legal immigration in the future. That would be, in other words, it's um sort of combining 1986 law with the 1924 immigration reductions.
00:50:50
Mark Krikorian
You know what I mean? It's sort of a hybrid of those.
00:50:52
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Interesting. Interesting.
00:50:53
Mark Krikorian
That's the deal and it that kind of calls the democrats bluff because it's like, okay Well, you're saying that however many million illegal aliens are still left Let's say there's seven million illegal aliens left after real enforcement has squeezed it and all of that Which is not crazy.
00:50:58
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:51:06
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right. Right.
00:51:10
Mark Krikorian
I mean, I'd prefer maybe five or six could be seven.
00:51:11
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah. Sounds about, yeah.
00:51:14
Mark Krikorian
Um If you're serious about stabilizing those people so that they can function normally above board in society, which frankly they kind of do anyway.
00:51:26
Mark Krikorian
But with the new enforcement rules, it will be, I mean, it will be pushing people back into the shadows because they say, you know, illegal immigrants are in the shadows. And then I open the front page of my newspaper and there's illegal aliens talking about, so not really in the shadows all that much.
00:51:40
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:51:40
Mark Krikorian
But if we have a real enforcement regime, they will be back in the shadows. And so the calling the Democrats bluff is like, okay, we are willing in a streamlined, relatively simple way, let these people participate in normal life.
00:51:53
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:51:57
Mark Krikorian
The deal is we're cutting legal immigration by 50 or 60% in statute without a lot of escape hatches and all that BS. So we don't, you know, we can kind of bring this latest immigration wave to an end the way the 1924 law brought the Ellis Island wave to an end.
00:52:19
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yep.
00:52:19
Mark Krikorian
Now it did it in a stupid way back then with these national origins quotas. It was all based on this, you know, Nordic head shapes or superior, whatever. It's all kind of this baloney from the 19th century.
00:52:32
Mark Krikorian
But, you know, without that nonsense, we can just reduce immigration dramatically. in a relatively simple, with a system that's relatively simple, that is the way I see it. And that's not quite science fiction. I think that's potentially doable, though I wouldn't be betting my mortgage on it's actually happening.
00:52:54
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Okay. um All right. Well, it's episode five of 500. We haven't had like our traditional question to end the interview with. ah I'm going to come up with one on the spot.
00:53:11
Mark Krikorian
okay like what's my favorite food or something like that or oh just any kind of any book ah um I would say
00:53:11
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um
00:53:16
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Recommend a book, preferably one that's not about your your your topic of professional interest. um Any book, fiction, nonfiction, and then explain why.
00:53:39
Mark Krikorian
canticle for libowiz
00:53:40
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
That's a very good choice.
00:53:42
Mark Krikorian
yeah
00:53:42
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Very good choice. All right, why?
00:53:43
Mark Krikorian
i um I've read it twice now and the first time I read it I think I was in high school and it really it's a post-apocalyptic book and um it kind of you know it appeals to my various ah interests you know it's Leibowitz is like some ah Jewish guy who was going shopping during the you know when the nuclear war happened and they end up turning him into like a saint and they have a monastery ah devoted to Saint Leibowitz and all this and the point is
00:54:16
Mark Krikorian
it's ah It's a pessimistic book, and I'm a conservative, so I'm kind of a pessimist, although I'm an optimistic pessimist, I think, by the way, to put it, because humanity destroys itself again, you know, in the in the end, and it sort of, yeah, it, it you know, it moves forward.
00:54:29
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Oh yeah, that's right. That's right. Spoiler alert.
00:54:33
Mark Krikorian
Yes, spoiler, yeah, sorry. Okay, yeah, well, the book's been out for a while, so what can I say? So, yeah.
00:54:37
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah, it's a classic. you yeah i Spoilers don't count for classics.
00:54:41
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
You're supposed to have read the classics.
00:54:41
Mark Krikorian
Yeah.
00:54:43
Mark Krikorian
Yes, exactly. So that's my, there's other classics I haven't read, but that one I have.
00:54:48
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah i I totally second that recommendation. um it's ah It's a book with a deeply Catholic imagination and it's also, um the prose is great.
00:54:56
Mark Krikorian
Yeah.
00:55:01
Mark Krikorian
I say this, i' I'm Armenian Orthodox, just to be clear, but it's the it's it's a deeply traditionalist Christian
00:55:07
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
ah
00:55:11
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right, right.
00:55:11
Mark Krikorian
ah animated you know animated by those views. Anyway, sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you.
00:55:15
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
yeah Yeah, no, no, no, ah but as as somebody who has practiced the craft of writing on a professional or semi-professional basis for many, many years, it's also a book with wonderful prose, which is something that I always notice and cherish. I would say people will send me angry email. or No, they won't because nobody watches this. ah In science fiction,
00:55:42
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
It's where to find writing where the quality of the prose is at the levels of, you know, high literature or whatever.
00:55:48
Mark Krikorian
Right.
00:55:52
Mark Krikorian
Not to get off topic, but there's another author I really like who isn't all that good at prose, Harry Turtledove. Have you read his stuff?
00:55:59
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
I don't, I, no, I haven't read it.
00:56:00
Mark Krikorian
He writes alternative history. his the The book that really broke through was Guns of the South.
00:56:05
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Oh yes, yes, I'm actually reading it now.
00:56:06
Mark Krikorian
where Yeah, it's a really good book. You know, South African apartheid hardliners develop a time machine and take AK-47s back to Lee's army because AK-47s are simple enough that they could actually produce the ammo.
00:56:11
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes. Yes, it's really it's really it's really, yeah. Right. Yes, yes.
00:56:22
Mark Krikorian
Because if you go back to ancient Rome and with an aircraft carrier, what happens when you run out of gas? You know what I mean?
00:56:27
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right, right.
00:56:27
Mark Krikorian
It's like, but anyway, Turtle Dove, that book was actually tightly edited, I think.
00:56:30
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes, yes.
00:56:34
Mark Krikorian
um He's written a lot. He writes just constantly, churn stuff out.
00:56:35
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
No, he's written tons of them.
00:56:38
Mark Krikorian
ah The problem is that the stuff that he churns out isn't edited all that carefully and the writing isn't always great.
00:56:48
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Uh, there, there, there's another one so that it i it's funny because Guns of the South, I bought it like a week ago and started reading it.
00:56:56
Mark Krikorian
Okay.
00:56:57
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Um, and that's yeah.
00:56:57
Mark Krikorian
We didn't plan on this. That's complete coincidence.
00:57:00
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
And that's because I previously read another book. I'm going to find it. Uh, Jamie pull it up. Um, uh,
00:57:14
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
agent of Byzantium.
00:57:16
Mark Krikorian
Yeah, right.
00:57:17
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
And the the concept there is that...
00:57:21
Mark Krikorian
I just read that actually a few months ago.
00:57:22
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Oh, really?
00:57:23
Mark Krikorian
It's a series of short stories, yeah.
00:57:25
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:57:26
Mark Krikorian
Well, he's got a whole universe.
00:57:26
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
it's It's like episodic.
00:57:28
Mark Krikorian
He has a whole universe and there's a whole bunch of stories, novels and short stories where Mohammed becomes a Christian monk and and then sort of, yeah, and the empire survives, you know, into the middle ages in as a big functional empire.
00:57:29
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah. Oh, really?
00:57:35
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes. Saint Muamit.
00:57:40
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes. Right.
00:57:43
Mark Krikorian
Anyway, but my point is, you know, some of the,
00:57:44
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yes.
00:57:48
Mark Krikorian
Some of his short stories are tighter, and so the writing is better.
00:57:52
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right.
00:57:52
Mark Krikorian
When he ends up having to fill up a seven novel series, um the writing, so you know, my writing probably wouldn't be great if I had to fill up seven novels either.
00:57:53
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um okay
00:58:02
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Right, right, right, right.
00:58:03
Mark Krikorian
So, but no, Harry Turtledove is definitely worth reading. A lot of his short stories are really striking.
00:58:08
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah, yeah, no, way of the I also second that recommendation. And so agent of Byzantium, ah very very, very, very good, very fun. And so so the universe is a Muhammad converse to Christianity.
00:58:22
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
There's no Islam and therefore the Roman Empire sort of continues forever. And agent of Byzantium is a set of of short stories about a man who's like the secret and the the secret agent of the Byzantine Empire.
00:58:35
Mark Krikorian
Right.
00:58:37
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
um Yeah, no, it's it's it's great. And I've only begun Guns of the South, but ah it certainly it certainly seems like a lot of fun. Well, there you go. I found my i found my final question. ah it's been ah It's been great. ah Thank you very much for your time ah and your expertise on a very important issue in which your truly one of the leading experts in the country. um And I hope people enjoyed this. And next week's episode will be, I don't know who, because that's how we do things at the High Production Values for your podcast. All right. Thank you very much.
00:59:19
Mark Krikorian
Thank you, Pascal. And I recommend to all your listeners to subscribe to your Policy Sphere daily news roundup.
00:59:28
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Yeah. Thank you. Bye.