DW Gibson (LA Times) in The Day, Feb. 9, “How to turn down the border pressure,” displays either negligence or willful deception. He claims that those who say that immigrants swarming the border should wait in line like everyone else, are ignoring the “fact” that there are only 140,000 special work visas per year to wait in line for. That’s insulting.

Those who say ‘wait in line’ are not talking about the small number of special work visas, but about the one million per year regular immigrant visas for those who want to come and live and work legally in the US on a permanent basis. It’s the line for those million per year regular immigrant visas that is pointed to.

Millions around the world are waiting in orderly fashion for those million immigrant visas every year, and they are being cheated by those who jump the line at the border. The small number of special work visas are not even a guaranteed path to permanent immigration status. They are there only to fill job openings today for which no current citizens or residents are qualified and willing to fill, and they are time-limited.

James Bridgeman

Quaker Hill