 |
|
|
 Editorials | June 2007 
Mexico Corruption Soils Visa Program
 San Antonio Express-News
go to original
Crossing a river that represents a broad chasm between hope and despair, illegal immigrants fall prey to the human smugglers called coyotes.
For some immigrants, however, working within the legal system provides no guarantee against exploitation.
Designed to match Mexican workers with employers in the United States, the H-2 visa program is burdened with corruption that damages both the immigrants and the businesses seeking to hire them.
Visa applicants often deal with recruiters who charge exorbitant "process fees" similar to the rates charged by coyotes, the Express-News reported recently.
Poorly regulated and supervised, the guest worker program depends on recruiters in isolated communities, leading to a booming business that exploits the workers.
"There are a lot of cheats," a visa applicant told the Express-News. "There are many recruiters who charge lots of money and are complete pirates."
The exploitation leads many workers, eager to make up the money they lost to recruiters, to overstay their welcome in the United States, U.S. authorities said.
"It is problematic for us for a number of reasons," Mark Perry, the H-2 program director in Monterrey, said. "If the worker has paid a lot of money for a visa, there's a chance that he's going to stay and work longer than the contract specifies."
Burdened with a bloated bureaucracy, the visa program inundates both workers and businesses under mounds of paperwork, but the failings of the system are exacerbated by unscrupulous players in Mexico.
The Mexican government must ensure that workers who want to follow a legal path to the United States do not get penalized for doing so. |
| |
|
Vallarta Weddings
Tell a Friend
Site Map
Print this Page
Email Us