Jose Antonio Vargas has a good story - he is an educated, literate man with a flair for writing. But he is also an illegal alien who, despite being 30 years old, could never figure out how to become a legal one.
Is the process that hard? Well, no, the problem, as you will see if you look at his story objectively, is that his grandfather was trying to take shortcuts, buying him an illegal green card, falsifying data to get him a Social Security number, encouraging him to lie so as not to endanger the chances of other family members - none of that is due to American immigration policy, it is due to wanting to circumvent the process millions of others went through. In short, it is selfish.
But along the way, Vargas was helped by some terrific people and some less so, at least ethically - San Francisco State University gave him a scholarship, despite his being in the country illegally and turning a wink-wink blind eye to it, his high school superintendent and principal did their best to prevent him from getting caught instead of helping to fix the problem. This enabling network found ways to circumvent even more laws, getting him a driver's license in Oregon by faking letters to the address of a friend there so it looked like he had residency.
But during the next 8 years instead of fixing the problem, he hoped it would just go away and the laws would simply change.
It's impossible to criticize all the people around him who decided to help him - this isn't the USSR, where friends turned on each other over a loaf of bread - and his boss at the Washington Post (still there, though oddly, he is likely being applauded for lying to his bosses and putting the entire company at risk) wanted to be part of the solution but the solution remained - get legal documentation.
I mean, the guy ended up winning a Pulitzer Prize, he could have done the paperwork. At age 30, he finally had enough and decided to come clean.
So I’ve decided to come forward, own up to what I’ve done, and tell my story to the best of my recollection. I’ve reached out to former bosses and employers and apologized for misleading them — a mix of humiliation and liberation coming with each disclosure. All the people mentioned in this article gave me permission to use their names. I’ve also talked to family and friends about my situation and am working with legal counsel to review my options. I don’t know what the consequences will be of telling my story.
I assume faking the paperwork to get a Social Security number is a Federal crime that involves jail time. We wouldn't let terrorists do it, or you and me, so having his story in the NY Times is not a free pass. That said, he was put on this path as a young man so perhaps a jail sentence could be commuted though, ironically, voting - a key aspect of being a citizen - would be denied him. I'd even pitch in for his legal defense.
He's a good man. He's a good American and we're lucky to have him. But he has to be a legal one or the entire system collapses and it just becomes a good ol' boy network based on who has money or friends in the right places. That is exactly what immigration policy is supposed to prevent; it is supposed to promote fairness for everyone.
If only the supposed 11 million other illegal aliens in the United States were having such a positive impact, there might be less of a debate.
My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant By Jose Antonio Vargas, New York Times Magazine
