Jordan Bardella, France’s Political Rock Star, Has an Immigration Plan That Could Be a Memo to Washington

They did it once — could they do it again? Without backup from the French the Battle of Yorktown might not have resulted in a British surrender in the fall of 1781. As America faces a migration crisis along its long southern border without precedent, might it be time to canvass our Gallic cousins for some fresh ideas?The head of France’s resurgent National Rally party, Jordan Bardella, has just supplied some. It is not likely that President Biden will pay much, or any, attention to them. The plan that Mr. Bardella unveiled on Monday, though, offers some intriguing guideposts that could resonate on both sides of the Atlantic.This is happening as election fever grips France. The first round of voting in the snap parliamentary vote is on June 30, the second round a week later. Polls indicate that the National Rally could clinch an absolute majority in the Assemblée nationale — at least 289 seats out of 577. Were that to happen, President Macron ould have little choice but to appoint Mosnieur Bardella as prime minister.In the spirit of his mentor, Marine Le Pen, the charismatic Mr. Bardella is taking nothing for granted. Ahead of a televised debate Wednesday with the current prime minister, Gabriel Attal, and Manuel Bompard of the radical left France Unbowed Party, he has been working overtime to woo undecided voters to the National Rally — in part by keeping the immigration issue front and center.He calls immigration the “third major emergency” after public safety and the cost-of-living crisis. Earlier this week he said that he wants to see an end to the droit du sol — the French birthright to citizenship. He said it with characteristic National Rally flourish: “The automatic acquisition of French nationality is no longer justified in a world of eight billion people, at a time when the daily evidence of our inability to integrate and assimilate is multiplying on our soil.”Consider that before January 2024, any child born in France from foreign parents could automatically obtain French nationality at the age of 18. At present, the child must initiate a procedure between the age of 16 and 18 to apply for French nationality. Mr. Bardella’s plan would abolish that right. Mr. Bardella also wants to deny dual nationality to people in order to be able to deport foreign criminals and re-establish the offense of illegal residence. The denial would even extend to individuals holding strategic government positions, such as diplomats. Some of Mr. Bardella’s proposals are squarely at odds with those of the European Union. Part of the National Rally platform, say, includes opening negotiations with its European partners to preserve for European nationals only Schengen-free circulation. The Schengen area comprises 29 European countries that have done away with controls at their mutual borders. That makes it easy for, say, an Italian passport holder to enter France — but it also makes it easier for illegal immigrants and bogus asylum seekers to sneak across borders. This is a huge issue across Europe. On a single day in June, nearly 900 migrants crossed the English Channel in more than a dozen small boats that left from the coast of France. The British tend to blame the French. The French, not without justification, point a finger at Brussels for making it relatively easy for refugees to come. Mr. Bardella, a seasoned Eurosceptic, is well aware of Mr. Macron’s failure to help manage the migrant flows. So when Mr. Bardella suggests that there be a “double border” with passport controls reintroduced at all French as well as EU borders, he means it. Any such measure would be in contravention of the EU’s Asylum and Migration Pact. That law was adopted last May, but the measure is unpopular with many Europeans who feel alienated by the Brussels bureaucracy and who perceive illegal immigration to be out of control, compromising both public finances and security. Mr. Bardella’s brass tacks language echoes that emanating from some European capitals beyond Paris. Across the Continent a quiet shift is taking place toward facilitating a smarter kind of immigration. It includes things like greater ease of acquiring residence permits for wealthy investors and high-tech laborers.Mr. Bardella believes such things can work better for France than does the current dysfunctional model. Reformed views on managing illegal immigration could in theory work for America too, but unlike in the corridors of the emerging French power, our own political will still seems to be lacking.

Jordan Bardella, France’s Political Rock Star, Has an Immigration Plan That Could Be a Memo to Washington

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