# Let's talk about 'rational' immigration policy **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 16, 2019, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754 "2019-08-16T17:41:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/101 "2019-08-20T19:32:10Z")
> [@XT](#): > > So, if you come to a country illegally but manage not to get caught until you get caught doing something (else) illegal, you should have the same legal rights as ever other citizen because…? How does this make sense? They are here illegally already. If they break a law and are caught, why shouldn’t they be deported to their country of origin?? 😕 Because it’s mean. That seems to be the primary objection to this, and to a lot of other stuff like revoking birthright citizenship. The arguments against them seem to revolve around the fact that they’re disruptive and make life uncomfortable for the people caught breaking the law, and conveniently disregard the culpability and responsibility of the people doing the breaking. I mean, if revoking birthright citizenship means that illegal immigrants’ children become some sort of underclass (presumably after some kind of amnesty/warning), then whose fault is that? The US government doesn’t really owe it to lawbreakers that we be nice to them, and make what happens to them convenient or comfortable. That said, I don’t agree with breaking up families and some of the more inhumane things that the recent administration has been doing. ---
**Author:** ![Airbeck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/airbeck/32/6574_2.png) [@Airbeck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airbeck)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/102 "2019-08-20T19:34:05Z")
The kids didn’t break any laws by being born, and it’s in the constitution. So you really need to start working on an amendment if you think this is worthwhile to talk about. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/103 "2019-08-20T19:34:30Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > the fed is in charge of enforcing immigration laws. I personally think the current laws are whacked, but by your own admission, you say that the government should be enforcing immigration laws. Last I checked, the enforcement of current laws is what many people in this country are in uproar over. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/104 "2019-08-20T19:46:30Z")
> [@Saint\_Cad](#): > > I will point out that many first world countries have laws in place to make it impossible to immigrate there so why is the US singled out in particular? For one point, as has been said: because the USA was built upon immigration. For another point, for me personally as well as for a significant number of others commenting in this thread: because it’s our country, damn it. The USA was also built upon the principle that this is the country where it’s legal to criticize the laws of the country; and to do so publicly. I would go so far as to say that it’s the proper patriotic duty of US citizens to do so (which doesn’t mean that we have to spend every minute of every day at it.) For a third point, or maybe for both a third and a fourth: I think it’s also short sighted, as well as unkind, for other countries to refuse to take immigrants; and in fact I often see them criticized for not doing so, so I don’t think the USA is actually ‘singled out’ about this. But I’ve got more business commenting on the way my own country’s behaving. And the USA is more vulnerable to charges of hypocrisy on the issue than most. > [@Kearsen1](#): > > If you come into the country illegally, every single day you are here “illegally”, you are still breaking that law … Since you know, you are “living in a country illegally” > **[Albany mayor: being undocumented in the U.S. is not a crime](https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2017/dec/01/kathy-sheehan/being-undocumented-immigrant-us-not-crime/)** > > Albany Mayor Kathy M. Sheehan said in a national television interview that it’s not a crime for immigrants to live in th > [@](#): > > “simply being in this country without documentation is not a crime.” [. . .] > We rate it Mostly True. You might want to read the link, which gives a good bit more detail. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/105 "2019-08-20T19:59:53Z")
> [@Kearsen1](#): > > Why? Who would want to deport 11 million people (most of them are surely working)? I can almost guarantee you there are very few people who really want all those workers gone. Not Republicans, not Democrats. > > What _I_ want done is for them to go through the proper channels. What a lot of people who say that fail to understand is that for many of these people there are no proper channels. > [@Saint\_Cad](#): > > I will point out that many first world countries have laws in place to make it impossible to immigrate there so why is the US singled out in particular? Which ones? ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Kearsen1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen1)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/106 "2019-08-20T20:08:22Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > No, that’s not true. While it is true in criminal court, it is true as a civil matter. The reason it is a civil matter (in my opinion) is that it much easier to deport someone if they aren’t being held for trial. Nor do we have to give them due process or offer them attorney privileges as well as the burden of proof being on them to provide documentation that they are here legally. So, you are correct in regards to it not being a criminal issue but not entirely correct. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/107 "2019-08-20T20:15:46Z")
> [@Ale](#): > > Believe me, I know all that, I’ve been an emigrant for over a decade and sending remittances back home ever since. > I personally know several other people who left my country, and many more anecdotally; from my observations the overall effect of people leaving is detrimental to the development of their country of origin. > For instance, where I come from its a contentious issue when college graduates (that benefited from free education up to university level) leave to work abroad since the investment made by the country ends up, in essence, subsidizing First World countries. > > I’m not against people moving into other countries for labour, but every time I read discussions like this one the overall underlying tone I pick up is how to exploit a resource, a kinder version of old colonial attitudes, suggested by the frequency of the argument about the usefulness of immigrants to provide services for the local population, as in the first part of the post I quoted before. > > What I hardly ever see is discussion on how to avoid the situation of large number of migrants moving across borders. For example agricultural subsidies by developed countries are a major factor in putting people in undeveloped ones under economic stress; it’s hardly an example of enlightened politics when the farm hand that is allowed to work in the US as a migrant worker has to do so because the economic policies of that same country created the need to leave their country in the first place, that is to say, being driven into poverty and then used as cheap labour, is not exactly nice. > [@bump](#): > > Maybe I’m missing something, but why is that our problem or obligation? . > [@XT](#): > > It isn’t even any sort of problem…it’s a feature. It may look at first glance like a feature from the USA’s point of view; but Ale’s point, as I understand it, is that it’s a problem elsewhere. And the reason that its being a problem elsewhere is also a problem for the USA is that the USA does better, not worse, if other countries don’t collapse or even get into serious trouble. This is not only not a zero-sum game in which any gain to the USA must come from damaging other places; it’s the reverse – is there a term? – in which the damage the USA does to other countries tends to come back to bite us eventually. I don’t think restricting immigration is the solution, though. I think the solution is for the USA, and other places in a position to do so, to take a whole lot harder look at the likely long term as well as short term results of our behavior in the world, and to behave better. > [@bump](#): > > I mean, if revoking birthright citizenship means that illegal immigrants’ children become some sort of underclass (presumably after some kind of amnesty/warning), then whose fault is that? Certainly not the fault of the children. And, as I pointed out earlier, the existence of such an underclass does damage not only to the people in it, but to citizens of the country that the underclass exists in. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Kearsen1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen1)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/108 "2019-08-20T20:42:33Z")
“While it is true in criminal court, it is true as a civil matter.” That should read NOT true in criminal court. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/109 "2019-08-20T21:16:38Z")
> [@Saint\_Cad](#): > > I will point out that many first world countries have laws in place to make it impossible to immigrate there so why is the US singled out in particular? > [@Nava](#): > > Which ones? Maybe not impossible, but these countries have very strict immigration laws beyond even the US Japan Denmark China South Korea Switzerland Austria ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/110 "2019-08-20T21:23:14Z")
> [@bump](#): > > Because it’s mean. That seems to be the primary objection to this, and to a lot of other stuff like revoking birthright citizenship. > > The arguments against them seem to revolve around the fact that they’re disruptive and make life uncomfortable for the people caught breaking the law, and conveniently disregard the culpability and responsibility of the people doing the breaking. They are also bad for us. Immigrants are good for our company, and xenophobia is bad for our culture. > [@](#): > > I mean, if revoking birthright citizenship means that illegal immigrants’ children become some sort of underclass (presumably after some kind of amnesty/warning), then whose fault is that? The US government doesn’t really owe it to lawbreakers that we be nice to them, and make what happens to them convenient or comfortable. The one person whose fault it is not and cannot be is that of the child, and that child is the one who is bearing the full weight of the punishment. You can blame the home country for being a “shithole” that they wanted to leave rather than raise a family there. You can blame our immigration policies for being stupid. You can even blame the parents for leaving for a better life. But how do you blame the child for being born? And, it is also bad for us. Having stateless citizens means that we have a group of people who cannot go somewhere else, but aren’t really welcome here. That doesn’t end well for anyone. And what happens if they have the audacity to have children themselves? Now you’ve got kids born to stateless parents, who are still being punished for what their grandparents did. > [@](#): > > That said, I don’t agree with breaking up families and some of the more inhumane things that the recent administration has been doing. > [@Omar\_Little](#): > > I personally think the current laws are whacked, but by your own admission, you say that the government should be enforcing immigration laws. Last I checked, the enforcement of current laws is what many people in this country are in uproar over. :dubious: Interesting selective quoting there. My point was that enforcement is not up to local LEO. Anything else you have taken there as an “admission” is entirely fabricated and isn’t supported even by your severely out of context quote. > [@Kearsen1](#): > > If you come into the country illegally, every single day you are here “illegally”, you are still breaking that law … Since you know, you are “living in a country illegally” If you speed on the way to work, is every minute that you are at work still breaking that law? The law is that you are not to cross the border without being authorized to go through a proper point of entry. The law does not say anything about living here. They broke _A_ law, once. A misdemeanor. If they pay the fine, does that mean that you will stop thinking of them as “illegal”? ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/111 "2019-08-20T21:44:15Z")
I don’t know immigration but I wish we could pay people to renounce their citizenship and send them off to some other country where their “severance pay” would let them live moderately comfortable lives in some third world country. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/112 "2019-08-20T21:55:45Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > I don’t know immigration but I wish we could pay people to renounce their citizenship and send them off to some other country where their “severance pay” would let them live moderately comfortable lives in some third world country. Which people? And why? ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/113 "2019-08-20T22:55:23Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > Which people? And why? People who cut me off in traffic. Damn them! Damn them all! Oh, and also Trump. Hmm, if you become a non-citizen _while_ president, what does that do to the presidential qualifications? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/114 "2019-08-20T23:03:33Z")
> [@Omar\_Little](#): > > I personally think the current laws are whacked, but by your own admission, you say that the government should be enforcing immigration laws. Last I checked, the enforcement of current laws is what many people in this country are in uproar over. We have laws against speeding. And I personally think speed limits are a good idea. But if the federal government decided to enforce those laws by spend billions of dollars on a special police force to track down speeders - even those who broke the speed limit twenty years ago - and lock them and their families up in camps, I would be the first to say the government was going too far in its law enforcement. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/115 "2019-08-20T23:13:37Z")
> [@Saint\_Cad](#): > > I will point out that many first world countries have laws in place to make it impossible to immigrate there so why is the US singled out in particular? I’m an American. It’s natural that I’m going to take more of an interest in American laws and government policies than I am in the laws and government policies of other countries. That said, I feel that the immigration policies I’ve advocated in this thread would be beneficial to any country. ---
**Author:** ![Ale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@Ale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ale)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/116 "2019-08-21T03:44:38Z")
> [@Wrenching\_Spanners](#): > > I agree with you, but I don’t know if there’s any reasonable solution to the problem. Country A invests a huge amount of money into the upbringing and education of a young person who then moves to Country B in his 20’s. How should Country B compensate Country A? Country B could institute government-to-government remittances, but that’s not going to be very popular with the Country B natives. Country B could mandate immigrants make payments to their home countries, but enforcing that’s going to require administration and would act as a disincentive to immigration. There’s foreign aid, educational exchange and support, and government support of multi-national education systems, but those are all drops in the bucket. All the things you mention are palliative measures, things that treat symptoms instead of the causes; I think it better if Country B would start by not institution policies (such as subsidies, unfair trade relations, propping up corrupt governments, etc…) that help to engender the situation in the first place. TLDR version: don’t actively screw up countries. ---
**Author:** ![Ale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@Ale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ale)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/117 "2019-08-21T04:18:29Z")
> [@XT](#): > > It isn’t even any sort of problem…it’s a feature. And one we have and should continue to take advantage of. If highly skilled people can’t find good work in their home countries, by all means they should be able to take their skills to some place where they can get what they want. And I think the US should be such a place. It’s the “taking advantage” part that is not OK; specially if the conditions for doing so can be traced, in part, to actions taken by those eventually benefiting from them. Case in point the crippling economic policies imposed to countries in South America in the 90s known as [URL=“[Washington Consensus - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Consensus)”]the Washington Concensus.[/URL _“For example, the Washington Consensus stated a need for investment in education, but the policies of fiscal discipline promoted by the International Monetary Fund have sometimes in practice led countries to cut back public spending on social programs, including such areas as basic education.”_ What I’m saying is that for a rational immigration policy a good starting point would be not driving your neighbour into economic despair. ---
**Author:** ![Ale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@Ale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ale)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/118 "2019-08-21T04:19:50Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > It may look at first glance like a feature from the USA’s point of view; but Ale’s point, as I understand it, is that it’s a problem elsewhere. > > And the reason that its being a problem elsewhere is also a problem for the USA is that the USA does better, not worse, if other countries don’t collapse or even get into serious trouble. This is not only not a zero-sum game in which any gain to the USA must come from damaging other places; it’s the reverse – is there a term? – in which the damage the USA does to other countries tends to come back to bite us eventually. > > I don’t think restricting immigration is the solution, though. I think the solution is for the USA, and other places in a position to do so, to take a whole lot harder look at the likely long term as well as short term results of our behavior in the world, and to behave better. > > Certainly not the fault of the children. > > And, as I pointed out earlier, the existence of such an underclass does damage not only to the people in it, but to citizens of the country that the underclass exists in. Yes, that ^ ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/119 "2019-08-21T05:42:21Z")
> [@Omar\_Little](#): > > Maybe not impossible, but these countries have very strict immigration laws beyond even the US > > Japan > Denmark > China > South Korea > Switzerland > Austria Three of the countries you name are EU or quasi-EU; inmigration from EU or EFTA members is super-easy. It sure was easier to Switzerland than to Sweden, for me and for several of my coworkers in both places: the Swiss have work permits without quotas, the Swedes don’t seem to understand the concept of “I’m inmigrating here without being a refugee”, but their population is a lot more colorful than it was barely 50 years ago thanks to an even-older policy of being pretty open to refugees. Immigration does not equal naturalization, and in the US the backlog and the mistreatment of inmigrants includes those who are and are not in naturalization paths as well as those who are already naturalized. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754/120 "2019-08-21T09:58:37Z")
Can I just pause for a moment and point out that we’re talking about people here? People whose lives may be horribly uprooted by these policies? It feels like throughout this entire discussion there is very little talk of the very real human cost of immigration enforcement, and the _utterly perverse_ ways this can play out. Case in point: to my understanding, **Cheesesteak** is more of a liberal. And yet… > [@Cheesesteak](#): > > 3 - Reduced chain migration. If you have a kid here you’re not guaranteed to stay here forever. Even if your kid is a US citizen, you are not. The end result of this policy is orphans and family separation. It’s [this picture](https://edition.cnn.com/2019/08/08/us/ice-raids-girl-cries-father-trnd/index.html), hundreds of thousands of times over. Is that something we’re okay with, as a society? Is that something we can justify to ourselves? Similarly, “deport violent criminals” may sound like a reasonable policy, in a vacuum. In practice, sometimes what happens is that someone who came here as a 6-month-old child gets sent to a country they’ve never lived in and whose language they don’t speak [to die in the street](https://edition.cnn.com/2019/08/08/politics/deported-iraqi-national-dies/index.html). I dunno, I guess the schizophrenic homeless man should have been a more upstanding citizen, and we wouldn’t have had to kill him - and yes, we did absolutely kill him; it would have been more merciful for the ICE agent to put a bullet between his eyes before he was put on the plane. And then you see stuff like this: > [@bump](#): > > Because it’s mean. That seems to be the primary objection to this, and to a lot of other stuff like revoking birthright citizenship. > > The arguments against them seem to revolve around the fact that they’re disruptive and make life uncomfortable for the people caught breaking the law, and conveniently disregard the culpability and responsibility of the people doing the breaking. > > I mean, if revoking birthright citizenship means that illegal immigrants’ children become some sort of underclass (presumably after some kind of amnesty/warning), then whose fault is that? The US government doesn’t really owe it to lawbreakers that we be nice to them, and make what happens to them convenient or comfortable. > > That said, I don’t agree with breaking up families and some of the more inhumane things that the recent administration has been doing. “Because it’s mean”? Because it’s _cruel_. Because it’s inhumane, vicious policy, that causes immeasurable human harm. Because when we ignore things like chain migration, we end up with absurd cases like the ones highlighted above _all the time_. Families separated, refugees [sent back to be murdered](https://www.thedailybeast.com/report-60-immigrants-killed-after-being-deported-despite-warnings-to-us-officials-2), communities uprooted… This is all deeply cruel, inhumane shit. Brianna Rennix has an ongoing series at Current Affairs detailing some of her experiences working as an immigration lawyer, and her article “[Waiting for the Holy Infant of Atocha](https://www.currentaffairs.org/2019/05/waiting-for-the-holy-infant-of-atocha)” details some of it: I work primarily with people who have failed their interviews and are on the verge of deportation, trying to appeal their cases. I had a run of several months where it feels like nearly all my clients were very young women with very small children. By bad luck, they all happened to have the kind of case that is especially hard to save—out of confusion, or fear, or both, they didn’t say quite enough in their credible fear interview to pass the threshold screening. The details these women withheld, had they emerged in the original interview, would likely have gotten them through, but the new information isn’t quite horrific and dramatic enough for the asylum office to think it’s worth giving them a second chance. One night, I played peekaboo with a fussy one-year-old and, in between “boos,” asked his 20-year-old mother if the sexual abuse she suffered as a child had ever made her feel suicidal. She raked the settled muck at the bottom of her memory, painfully extracted every buried trauma, let me look at them under fluorescent lights. She gave me everything I asked her for. She told me things she said she had never told another living soul. It was not enough. They deported her. Sometimes, the ones we lose vanish into the void, and we never hear of them again. I think about the living person that was in front of me—where is she? Maybe she is alive. Maybe she is alive, but maybe she is crying and afraid. Maybe someone is holding her down and hurting her right now. Maybe she is dead, maybe she is rotting in a black bag somewhere under a few inches of dirt, maybe no one knows where her killer hid her. Where is her little boy? Where is his little body? Who is taking care of him? Other times, I get text messages and voicemails from the outer darkness. _Abogada, they deported me but I never agreed to it, I never signed my papers. That’s not right, is it? Can you appeal my case? I can’t work because the gangs are threatening me again. I have so many debts from my journey. My child is hungry. Is there someone who can help me_? And for what? Seriously, what does all this immigration enforcement actually _do_ for us? What was the tangible public benefit of deporting several hundred workers at a chicken processing plant (other than [stifling worker power](https://www.democracynow.org/2019/8/8/headlines/ice_raids_targeted_company_whose_workers_won_discrimination_lawsuit) and [shutting them up about sexual abuse](https://thinkprogress.org/ice-raids-follow-massive-sexual-harassment-settlement-mississippi-plant-koch-foods-d95eb2720f67/))? Did we get those jobs back for “real Americans”? No - “real Americans” [aren’t in a huge hurry to compete for those jobs](https://www.npr.org/2019/08/10/750172206/ice-raids-hit-poultry-processing-plants-that-rely-on-latino-immigrant-labor), as it turns out. Did we help our economy? [Almost certainly not](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/making-sense/4-myths-about-how-immigrants-affect-the-u-s-economy). Immigration, even illegal immigration, is a massive boon for the US economy, and illegal immigrants contribute far more to social welfare systems than they take out. Did we keep ourselves more safe? The evidence on that is somewhat lacking but there is [virtually no disagreement among serious scholars that immigrants are less criminal than natives](https://www.cato.org/blog/illegal-immigrants-crime-assessing-evidence). Did we “uphold the sanctity of our border”? That and a fiver will get you a happy meal for the 11-year-old American citizen whose parents you just deported. What do we _get_ from all this cruelty? If we’re going to throw hundreds of thousands of people into this bureaucratic meat-grinder every year, _what do we get out of it_? I’m just kind of lost here. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-talk-about-rational-immigration-policy/838754.md?page=7)