Graduate student Brian Palmer-Rubin reports on the immigration session of the 2010 U.S.–Mexico Futures Forum which featured Amalia García Medina, Governor of Zacatecas; Maria Echaveste, co-founder of the Nueva Vista Group and lecturer and Berkeley Law; and Tamar Jacoby, president, and CEO of ImmigrationWorks USA.
What issue captures the complex relationship between Mexico and the United States better than immigration? With roughly 10 percent of Mexico’s population living north of the Rio Grande, and hundreds more crossing the border daily, it is clear that immigration is among the most important foreign policy issues facing the two countries. Participants in the Immigration Panel of the U.S.–Mexico Futures Forum held on March 29 in Zacatecas, Mexico, reinforced the urgency of the issue. A 90-minute discussion of immigration trends, government programs, and proposals for reform on both sides of the border underscored the fact that Mexican immigration to the United States, a binational issue by definition, must be dealt with through binational cooperation.
