By now, you’ve probably heard all about, or at least in part, about newly-appointed President Joe Biden’s new immigration policies. Then again, they’re not so much new as old rather, as they are the same kind of policies that were put in place under Barack Obama and only recently changed by former President Donald Trump.
Among other things, the Biden administration has promised to stop building Trump’s famous border wall, increase the number of immigrants allowed to cross the border daily, and give illegal aliens more rights and benefits than ever before.
But apparently, all that is not enough.
Now, Biden has decided that the citizen test immigrants must pass to attain citizenship must be changed too. And by changed, I mean made easier, of course.
On Monday, a news release was made by Citizenship and Immigration Services, which is the largest law-enforcement branch of the Department of Homeland Security or DHS. In the release, it was announced that the current version of the citizenship test, the one implemented and put in place by President Trump, was going to be replaced.
But the new version, like much of Biden’s policies, isn’t really all that new. As most of his immigration policies stem from, this test version is actually the exact one implemented in 2008, the last year of the Bush administration, right before Obama took over.
So why the change? well, apart from the fact that Biden apparently needs to change everything Trump touched, it has been said, according to the news release, that the Trump version “may inadvertently created potential barriers to the naturalization process.”
In other words, it was too hard.
Now, forgive me if I’m wrong here, but isn’t the citizenship test, at its core, supposed to create “barriers” for those who maybe aren’t dedicated enough to learn our laws and processes?
I mean, if they can’t answer a few simple questions about our nation’s founding, the laws we keep, and how we put our elected officials into office, do we even want them in our country?
And no, I’m not talking about reciting the Declaration of Independence or knowing all 46 president’s names. Neither does the test describe or ask about all of our laws and the possible punishments for violating them.
This isn’t your middle school or high school history class. It is only the most basic facts about how our country operates. And by basic, I mean, downright simple.
You know, questions like “What are two rights described in the Declaration of Independence?” Or “We elect a US Senator for how many years?” You can see other sample questions here.
In addition to this simplicity is the fact that all answers are given in multiple-choice form.
According to The Washington Times, Trump’s version of the test covered 128 questions that immigrants should study. However, on test day, only 20 questions were actually asked. And of those 20, test-takers only need to get 12 of them correct – or 60 percent.
Now, to me, 12 questions doesn’t sound all that hard, and neither does 20. Then again, I’ve always been somewhat of a nerd.
But apparently, to Biden, this isn’t acceptable.
And so, in the near future, the number of study questions will be cut to 100, and the number given on test day will decrease to 10. Takers of the test still need to get at least 60 percent to pass. But that number is now only six questions.
Yes, that’s correct. Incoming immigrants only have to answer six questions about our county to be approved for citizenship.
Does anyone else find that rather ridiculous? I still think that about Trump’s version.
But some would say that any test is too much, as the case could be made that a good majority of Americans couldn’t pass either version.
And while that may be true, most Americans were taught these things at one point in school. If they have a high school diploma, they most likely took an American history class and were required to pass. If they’ve since forgotten those facts, well, that’s their fault.
It shouldn’t be a problem for incoming immigrants to learn a few of our rules and law and what makes our country tick. After all, they will have to abide by those laws for however long they choose to stay here or risk being deported.
Making an already easy test even easier isn’t going to help them understand American society or how to succeed here.
By doing this, Biden is doing both natural-born Americans and potentially naturalized ones a great disservice.