I'll start out by saying that I'm all for immigration, and I want anyone who wants to come to this country for a better life to have that opportunity. However, that's far too simplistic and not quite the issue here. The first, most pressing question, seems to be what to do with the people here illegally. In short, I say that we should have secure borders, and give immigrants today a pathway to citizenship.
Look, unlike some folks on the left, I'm not for completely open borders. Granted, conservatives often use "open borders" as a pejorative for anyone with liberal immigration views, but to me, open borders sounds like letting anyone in the country with no enforcement whatsoever. I don't support that. It's a nice idea, but just seems irresponsible, dangerous, and unrealistic. You need to know who's coming in, and I don't expect any country to be able to handle unlimited immigration.
That said, we need to treat people who are already here humanely. This especially goes for the children of the migrants, often known as Dreamers. These people came to this country by no fault of their own, and for many of them, the US is the only country they have ever known. As far of the question of whether to say "illegal" or "undocumented," I can tolerate the word illegal for those who willingly cross the border without authorization. They did break the law. However, not so for the children. They had no say in the matter. Those who insist on deporting the children would have to make the case that illegal immigration is such an existential crisis that it warrants punishing people for crimes that their parents committed. Nobody has made that case, to me.
So DACA seems like basic decency, to me. Let's let all these kids stay, and give them a pathway to citizenship. And do the same with any law-abiding undocumented folk who want to make it here. I'm fine with deporting criminals, but beyond that, you would, once again, have to convince me that we have an existential crisis on our hands in order to justify mass deportations.
Now, onto securing the border. Look, a wall across the entire border is a mess of an idea. Besides the ugly, incendiary rhetoric behind it, the wall is wildly impractical. It's very expensive, and even Trump seems to have now given up on his ridiculous promise that Mexico would pay for it. The wall would be very disruptive towards trade and tourism, which could hurt a lot of local economies by the border, in both the US and Mexico. If you really want to stop immigrants from crossing the border, harming Mexico's economy is hardly the way to it. The wall would also have quite an environmental impact, disrupting plants and wildlife. Finally, much of the land at the border is privately owned. Some of those owners in border states like Texas, are no doubt, Republicans. Some of them probably support Trump. Imagine how they'll feel when he comes to take their land.
So let's have border patrol officers and satellite cameras at the border, securing it. And fine, you can have a wall or a fence in spots that don't cause the aforementioned problems. In fact, we already do. But most countries secure their borders without a giant wall. The US should be able to do the same.
Finally, all of these changes must happen in an official law. Until we have legislation directly telling the government what to do, we will permanently be stuck in limbo. Protest ICE all you want, but we really need new laws so that we don't keep running into these same problems again and again.
-Jack
References:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/trumps-wall-could-cause-serious-environmental-damage/
http://time.com/4509501/donald-trumps-border-wall/
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ct-border-wall-take-private-land-20170321-story.html
No comments:
Post a Comment