美国国家公共电台 NPR High-Skilled Immigrants Call Out The Trump Administration's 'Hypocrisy'

 

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

President Trump¹ talks a lot about moving to what he calls a merit-based immigration system.

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PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: One that admits people who are skilled, who want to work, who will contribute to our society and who will love and respect our country.

INSKEEP: Just this past weekend, the Trump administration announced regulations that would deny green cards to immigrants who use public aid such as food assistance. At the same time, the administration is also making it harder for high-skilled workers to come and build lives in this country, as NPR's Joel Rose reports.

JOEL ROSE, BYLINE²: Neha Mahajan loves her job.

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NEHA MAHAJAN: Hello, and welcome to "Center Stage." I'm your host, Neha Mahajan.

ROSE: Mahajan hosts and produces a talk show in Edison, N.J., targeted mainly at Indian expats like her.

MAHAJAN: This is the kind of work I always wanted to do, and picking up topics that typically don't get talked about in the South Asian community. So I am trying to be a change-maker within my community.

ROSE: But Mahajan could lose her right to work in the U.S. because the Trump administration is poised³ to kill the program that gave her a work permit. Mahajan has a master's degree in English literature and worked as a journalist in India. It never occurred to her that she would have trouble finding opportunities here.

MAHAJAN: So here I am in U.S., the most advanced nation on this earth, but I'm in a cage. (Laughter). A metaphoric⁴, golden cage.

ROSE: Mahajan moved with her husband and daughter to the U.S. in 2008. He had secured a coveted⁵ H-1B visa to work as a software developer, but she was not allowed to work when she first got here. That is, until the Obama administration introduced a new program in 2015 that allowed the spouses⁶ of H-1B guest workers to get a work permit if they're already on the waiting list for a green card. Now the Trump administration says that was an overreach.

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FRANCIS CISSNA: For me, one of the main reasons for proposing to rescind⁷ that is because I don't think that Congress intended for the spouses of H-1Bs to work.

ROSE: Francis Cissna is the head of U.S. Citizenship⁸ and Immigration Services, the agency in charge of legal immigration. Cissna did not respond to requests for an interview, but he did give one last month to the Center for Immigration Studies, which favors lower levels of immigration.

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CISSNA: Everything that we do is guided by the law. That's all we're doing.

ROSE: The Trump administration says the U.S. should focus on bringing in immigrants who speak English and are highly educated. But critics say that rhetoric⁹ is at odds¹⁰ with the administration's actions, that the administration is actually making high-skilled immigrants' lives harder in all sorts of ways. It's gotten tougher to get or renew an H-1B visa. That's a program that brings in tech workers, doctors and other professionals. And the administration is getting rid of other visa programs altogether.

DOUG RAND: Show me any policy that's come out so far that has actually made it easier for highly skilled immigrants. I haven't seen any.

ROSE: Doug Rand worked in the Obama White House. He's one of the architects of another program the Trump administration wants to kill, the International Entrepreneur Rule.

RAND: This was designed for entrepreneurs from other countries to more easily come the United States or stay in the United States, build companies here, create jobs for U.S. workers - seemingly uncontroversial.

ROSE: All of this has infuriated corporate¹¹ America. CEOs from Apple, Pepsi and other U.S. companies say the administration is scaring away high-skilled workers, and that could hurt the economy. Dean Garfield is the president of the Information Technology Industry Council.

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DEAN GARFIELD: What the administration is saying is we want to make it difficult for companies to employ anyone who is not an American citizen.

ROSE: But the head of Citizenship and Immigration Services Francis Cissna dismisses that.

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CISSNA: The idea that we are intentionally¹², mischievously¹³, impishly, malevolently¹⁴ trying to build an invisible wall on purpose because we don't want foreign workers to come is false.

ROSE: Nonetheless, immigrants like Neha Mahajan wonder whether the administration is really serious about merit-based immigration.

MAHAJAN: I don't know what to think. Hypocrisy¹⁵, maybe? (Laughter). They want us to stay. They don't want us to stay. Why put people's lives into a limbo¹⁶?

ROSE: Mahajan and other spouses are pushing to save the Obama-era program that allows about a hundred-thousand of them to work. The Trump administration is expected to announce the official end of that program any day. Joel Rose, NPR News, New York.

1 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

2 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

3 poised   

a.摆好姿势不动的

参考例句：

• The hawk poised in mid-air ready to swoop. 老鹰在半空中盘旋，准备俯冲。
• Tina was tense, her hand poised over the telephone. 蒂娜心情紧张，手悬在电话机上。

4 metaphoric   

adj. 使用隐喻的；比喻的；比喻意义的

参考例句：

• It was a metaphoric(al) phrase; we didn't really mean that he has green fingers, only that he is good at gardening. 它是一个比喻的词组；我们并非说他长了绿手指而是说他擅长园艺技能。
• The ubiquitous mouse input device is not metaphoric of anything, but rather is learned idiomatically. 无所不在的鼠标输入设备没有任何隐喻；相反，是习惯用法的学习。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓

5 coveted   

adj.令人垂涎的；垂涎的，梦寐以求的v.贪求，觊觎(covet的过去分词)；垂涎；贪图

参考例句：

• He had long coveted the chance to work with a famous musician. 他一直渴望有机会与著名音乐家一起工作。
• Ther other boys coveted his new bat. 其他的男孩都想得到他的新球棒。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 spouses   

n.配偶，夫或妻( spouse的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Jobs are available for spouses on campus and in the community. 校园里和社区里有配偶可做的工作。 来自辞典例句
• An astonishing number of spouses-most particularly in the upper-income brackets-have no close notion of their husbands'paychecks. 相当大一部分妇女——特别在高收入阶层——并不很了解他们丈夫的薪金。 来自辞典例句

7 rescind   

v.废除，取消

参考例句：

• They accepted his advice and rescinded the original plan.他们听从了他的劝告，撤销了原计划。
• Trade Union leaders have demanded the government rescind the price rise.工会领导已经要求政府阻止价格上涨。

8 citizenship   

n.市民权，公民权，国民的义务(身份)

参考例句：

• He was born in Sweden,but he doesn't have Swedish citizenship.他在瑞典出生，但没有瑞典公民身分。
• Ten years later,she chose to take Australian citizenship.十年后，她选择了澳大利亚国籍。

9 rhetoric   

n.修辞学，浮夸之言语

参考例句：

• Do you know something about rhetoric?你懂点修辞学吗？
• Behind all the rhetoric,his relations with the army are dangerously poised.在冠冕堂皇的言辞背后，他和军队的关系岌岌可危。

10 odds   

n.让步，机率，可能性，比率；胜败优劣之别

参考例句：

• The odds are 5 to 1 that she will win.她获胜的机会是五比一。
• Do you know the odds of winning the lottery once?你知道赢得一次彩票的几率多大吗？

11 corporate   

adj.共同的，全体的；公司的，企业的

参考例句：

• This is our corporate responsibility.这是我们共同的责任。
• His corporate's life will be as short as a rabbit's tail.他的公司的寿命是兔子尾巴长不了。

12 intentionally   

ad.故意地，有意地

参考例句：

• I didn't say it intentionally. 我是无心说的。
• The local authority ruled that he had made himself intentionally homeless and was therefore not entitled to be rehoused. 当地政府裁定他是有意居无定所，因此没有资格再获得提供住房。

13 mischievously   

adv.有害地；淘气地

参考例句：

• He mischievously looked for a chance to embarrass his sister. 他淘气地寻找机会让他的姐姐难堪。 来自互联网
• Also has many a dream kindheartedness, is loves mischievously small lovable. 又有着多啦a梦的好心肠，是爱调皮的小可爱。 来自互联网

14 malevolently   

参考例句：

• She watched him malevolently. 她恶意地看着他。 来自互联网
• The little woman advanced slowly with her eyes fixed malevolently on the pink paper. 那小妇人慢慢前进，眼睛恶意地盯在那张粉红钯的纸上。 来自互联网

15 hypocrisy   

n.伪善，虚伪

参考例句：

• He railed against hypocrisy and greed.他痛斥伪善和贪婪的行为。
• He accused newspapers of hypocrisy in their treatment of the story.他指责了报纸在报道该新闻时的虚伪。

16 limbo   

n.地狱的边缘；监狱

参考例句：

• His life seemed stuck in limbo and he could not go forward and he could not go back.他的生活好像陷入了不知所措的境地，进退两难。
• I didn't know whether my family was alive or dead.I felt as if I was in limbo.我不知道家人是生是死，感觉自己茫然无措。