What am I missing here? The path to solving the illegal immigration problem is clearly evident with common sense.
- There are roughly 12 million illegal immigrants living in the US, around 4% of our total population.* Many have lived here for decades. We aren’t going to deport families and children. Give them a path to citizenship. Criminals cannot remain – catch and deport them.
- A nation which cannot control its borders doesn’t control its destiny. Stop the influx of illegal immigrants. A half million people are apprehended at the border each year. How many escape? Do whatever is necessary as a national priority! Build a wall, enhance border security, authorize the use of troops, increase penalties, use non-lethal force, intercept illegal immigrants at sea, keep asylum seekers out of the US until their cases are decided, find and deport anyone with expired visas and tighten the criteria for authorized entry. In a controlled manner, let’s welcome immigrants who can contribute to our great nation – from wherever they may currently reside, without ethnic restriction.
- It defies common sense to argue that the US has some duty to admit immigrants from foreign countries. The Constitution doesn’t mention immigration, but gave Congress the power to pass laws to regulate naturalization. Once an immigrant arrives in the US, many Constitutional protections do apply. In a nutshell, that’s why illegal immigrants must be stopped before they cross the border. It’s much easier to prevent entry than it is to deport.
- Consider a Constitutional amendment denying automatic citizenship to children born of illegal immigrants. It’s inhuman and impractical to even consider deporting the non-citizen parents while the citizen minor children have a right to remain in the US. However, just because you are pregnant when, or become pregnant after, illegally entering the US shouldn’t result in automatic citizenship.
I’m tempted to say much more on this topic, but I’ll hold back. There’s no doubt that illegal immigration costs the US taxpayers tens of billions of dollars per year for education, medical, justice/law enforcement, welfare and other government programs. There’s nothing to be done about the cost of supporting undocumented residents already here. All we can and should do is stop making the problem bigger – stop illegal immigration in any way possible.
*Estimates of illegal residents vary since they are undocumented. For the estimate and related discussion, take a look at www.dhs.gov, www.irli.org, www.cfr.org, www.pewresearch.org, www.fairus.org and https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/03/06/us/politics/undocumented-illegal-immigrants.html. Also https://www.quora.com/Is-the-United-States-required-by-law-or-the-Constitution-to-admit-immigrants-from-foreign-countries.