Americans are compassionate. We want to do the right thing, even when the right thing is hard to do. But we’re deeply divided about amnesty for 11 million illegal immigrants.

Amnesty advocates are focused on the plight of illegal immigrants, most of whom are poor, don’t speak English, and lack a high school education. Illegal workers perform many back-breaking jobs at low wages. Many have American-born children. Amnesty advocates fear families being divided if laws are enforced.

The Senate immigration reform bill (S744) would provide a sweeping amnesty for all 11 million, including those who came only months ago, enhanced enforcement at the border, and a huge expansion of legal visas, so that future foreign job seekers could get American jobs more easily.

Those on the other side say “hold on.” This is amnesty number eight. We’ve already pardoned 6 million. Illegal immigration is not a victimless crime. Illegal immigrants have committed multiple felonies, including identity theft, document fraud and tax evasion.

If the Senate bill passes, at least 33 million green cards would be issued in the first decade alone. That number includes the 11 million illegal workers. By comparison, the U.S. issued 3 million green cards to foreign job seekers in the l960s.

Employers get amnesty, too. Self-serving employers who knowingly hired illegal workers, committed wage and labor violations, helped workers get fraudulent documents, colluded in identity theft, paid them under the table, evaded taxes, and built the recruitment chains from Mexico, also receive immediate forgiveness. No penalties. No fines.

According to The Sunlight Foundation, a government transparency/accountability organization, business-funded pro-immigration lobbies spent more than $1.5 billion lobbying for amnesty and expanded legal immigration since 2007.

But most importantly, the legislation is bad news for Americans with the highest unemployment rates — minorities, the young and unskilled.

According to a recent analysis of Current Population Survey 2012 data, the unemployment rate for native-born Hispanics without a high school education is 43.1 percent, and for African Americans it is a whopping 65 percent. But these American workers can’t get the jobs currently held by illegal job seekers because government officials play “wink and nod” enforcement with the employers.

Enforcement raids at chicken processing and meatpacking plants during the Bush administration put to rest the canard that immigrants are needed to “do the jobs Americans won’t do.” In plants across the South, local inhabitants, many of them African Americans, lined up to apply for the newly freed positions.

Many black leaders have decried the devastating impact of legalization on black communities. Frank Morris, former executive director of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, has called on Congress to oppose amnesty and protect black labor, and he was joined by three members of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.

And finally, the price tag for this amnesty, dumped on future generations, is jaw-dropping. When illegal immigrants naturalize, they are eligible for means-tested programs — Medicaid, food stamps, public housing, SSI, TANF, etc., and eventually, Social Security and Medicare. And the infrastructure costs would be enormous: 33 million people need roads, bridges, schools, hospitals, etc.

Someone has to pay.

Robert Rector of The Heritage Foundation, one of the architects of President Clinton’s welfare reform legislation, recently estimated that over the course of their lifetimes, amnestied, undocumented immigrants — after taxes paid — would generate a fiscal deficit of $6.3 trillion.

If amnesty doesn’t pass, what are the options? More drones on the border is not the solution. There is a communication problem. U.S. laws are not respected.

Immigration officials need to crack down on the employers and mandate workplace verification — an action recommended by multiple previous commissions and supported by more than 80 percent of respondents in a recent New York Times/CBS News poll. Such legislation would immediately free up 8 million jobs for the 22 million unemployed/underemployed Americans at little cost to taxpayers.

When illegal immigrants lose their jobs, many would likely return to their native lands where they have relatives and are citizens. When their American-born children turn 21, they could sponsor their families for legal immigration, following the same rules as legal immigrants, who must often wait to join their relatives.

Enforcing the nation’s laws may be uncomfortable, but it’s fair. And any expansion in visas for foreign job seekers should be openly presented to the public, not slipped into an 870 page bill.

There’s no need to rush. Elected officials need to take a deep breath. Don’t let the business and ethnic lobbies decide immigration. It is too important.

Let’s get it right.

Jonette Christian is one of the founders of Mainers for Sensible Immigration Policy. She lives in Holden.

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