Office of Management and Budget estimated the cost of providing these services to be between $1 and $2 billion each year. The cost is not the only drawback of the entitlements of Executive Order No. 13166. It ultimately enables immigrants to avoid learning English which. regretfully. hurts their chances of effective assimilation into American culture. Historically. one of Americas greatest attributes is the unity provided by having a language that is commonly used throughout the country. It is important for new legal immigrants to learn this language so they might communicate and achieve success. As President Bush said in one of his messages. learning English "allows newcomers to go from picking crops to opening a grocery [store] . . . from cleaning offices to running offices ... from a life of lowpaying jobs to a diploma. a career. and a home of their own." I cant think of any issue we have had before the Senate during the time I have been here that is more popular than this. A 2006 Zogby poll found that 84 percent of Americans. including 71 percent of Hispanics. believe English should be the national language of government operations. According to a 2002 Kaiser Foundation survey. 91 percent of foreignborn Latino immigrants agreed that learning English is essential to success. We have polling data going all the way back to 1996. In each case. 84 to 90 percent of the American people want this to take place.
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immigrants