# Should Democrats rethink their policy on immigration? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 6, 2017, 11:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595 "2017-07-06T11:15:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**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:** [July 8, 2017, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/81 "2017-07-08T17:40:30Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Of course the real way to choke off illegal immigration isn’t on the supply side, but the demand side. > > Why do people risk their lives to cross the border? So they can get a crappy job at a chicken processing plant and send money back home. > > If that job didn’t exist, they wouldn’t come. Put the owners and managers of the chicken processing plant behind bars, and suddenly our illegal immigration problem is solved. > > But of course the Republican donor class is unalterably opposed to anything like this, because they’re the ones who hire the illegal immigrants. So they’re happy to go after illegal immigrants who come here to steal jobs from Americans, but they will never go after employers who steal jobs from Americans and give them to illegal immigrants. Part of the problem with this is that employers have perfect plausible deniability. If a prospective employee presents them with documents that imply that they are legally allowed to work in the United States, then the employer has no reason not to hire them. Those documents may be fraudulent, but that is not the employer’s fault. To suspect that documents are fraudulent due to the racial or ethnic appearance of the hiree is discrimination, so, unless they are very obvious forgeries, what exactly is the employer supposed to do here? From [here](https://www.uscis.gov/i-9) > [@](#): > > The employer must examine the employment eligibility and identity document(s) an employee presents to determine whether the document(s) _reasonably appear to be genuine_ and to relate to the employee and record the document information on the Form I-9. My underline. Now, I’ve hired dozens of employees, and for each one of them, I took their ss card and their license and copied down the info onto the I-9 while they did their part. That’s my due diligence to avoid hiring those who are not eligible to work here. If you then discover that one of my employees presented me with false information, is it really your intention to go after me as well? Now, I don’t doubt that there are plenty of employers out there that turn a blind eye towards verification, and accept obviously false documents, but how will you crack down on them, without also cracking down on innocent employers whose only crime was following the guidelines put out by the govt and not discriminating against prospective employees due to their perceived ethnic background? I suppose you could make using e-verify mandatory, but that will just add more regulatory paperwork and bureaucracy to the hiring process, and all it really does is make sure that the ssn used isn’t in use somewhere else, which may cut down on illegal hires, but will not eliminate it. ---
**Author:** ![igor\_frankensteen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/839c29/32.png) [@igor\_frankensteen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/igor_frankensteen)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2017, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/82 "2017-07-08T20:00:26Z")
It’s reached the point, due to the decision to indulge more in propaganda than in actual problem solving, that I don’t think it’s valid to say that EITHER the Democrats or the Republicans have an actual immigration policy. Yes, I’m sure that anyone who wants to can point to a speech here or there, a position paper here or there, or even to an officially published Party Platform, and pretend that those constitute a “policy.” But that’s all an illusion. What matters to voters, has always been what people actually appear to DO. Or, in lieu of any specific actions, what they say the most boisterously. Both of the main American parties have said for many decades that they are opposed to illegal immigration, and both have pretended to support the old (unfortunately fake) American principles of us “holding up a shining light” to guide the huddled masses to our “city on a hill.” But the reason why Trump did fairly well with HIS message, was that he said he WAS going to actually do something about it all. He hasn’t, but he SAID he would. The Democrats used to do well by assuming that working class people would support them for self-interest, since it used to be true that although big unions abused their power, they did cause almost everyone’s incomes and benefits to rise. But that stopped being true in the second half of the 1970’s. The Democrats in leadership positions don’t seem to have noticed that. Hence, when they conjure up “policies,” they focus on small fringe group concerns, instead of working for the largest portion of Americans. The Republican leadership are only slight less lost in time. They still think that it’s enough to SAY they hate and fear illegals, without actually doing anything about them. That’s why even with majorities in both houses AND the Presidency, there’s been no effort to increase funding or give extra power to the INS. They are doing slightly better than the Democrats, because they have managed (due to Democrat political ineptitude) to conflate Democratic sympathy for the downtrodden, with traitorous support for terrorists. But the GOP is still quietly making certain that no large business concerns ever get as punished for abusing their ability to hire foreign workers to increase profits, regardless of those workers’ real value to the United States as future citizens. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2017, 7:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/83 "2017-07-09T07:22:25Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > And this is why comprehensive reform is not possible at this time: each side is convinced the other side is lying. > > (I, of course, disagree with your conclusion here, which is contradicted by the facts. Obama deported a great many people, as did Clinton.) Obama was deporting people only to establish credibility on the issue. When he didn’t get the reform he was looking for, he tried to do his own amnesty. Clinton predates the Democrats’ current stealth open borders position on immigration. What are Republicans lying about? the way the bill was structured, amnesty definitely happens. Border security might happen, and even then most of it was left up to the President. Give us a border security bill with concrete measurables that must be met before legalization of existing undocumented immigrants and we can talk. As in miles of border wall built, numbers of border patrol agents hired, biometric entry/exit systems put into place, E-verify in a certain percentage of workplaces, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2017, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/84 "2017-07-09T16:54:38Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > . . . Give us a border security bill with concrete measurables that must be met before legalization of existing undocumented immigrants and we can talk. . . . . Give me the car, now, and later, we can talk about how much I have to pay for it. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2017, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/85 "2017-07-09T17:15:51Z")
The idea is the amnesty would occur automatically when certain benchmarks were met. That’s fair, isn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![Strinka](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/strinka/32/512_2.png) [@Strinka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strinka)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2017, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/86 "2017-07-09T18:43:45Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > wait, why is that inherently a bad result? Generally speaking, if you make your country less desirable to people outside of the country, you’ll also make it less desirable to people inside the country. The only way to prevent that would be if everyone inside the country has the same values, which are different than the values of everyone outside the country. But how would you make sure that’s the case? > [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > If people have an unrestricted right to \leave\ country A, that makes it impossible for Country A to maintain the kind of community it wants to have. Do individuals not get to have a say in what kind of community they’d like to live in? ---
**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:** [July 9, 2017, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/87 "2017-07-09T20:22:50Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The idea is the amnesty would occur automatically when certain benchmarks were met. That’s fair, isn’t it? The problem with border security is that it literally is impossible to completely secure the border. It is thousands of miles long, we also have thousands of miles of unguarded coastline, and people are clever with tunnels and other methods of getting through what we set up. We will never have a 100% secure border. It is just not possible, no matter how much money we throw at it. We do have a pretty secure border right now, the vast majority of people who enter the US enter through appropriate ports of entry, and the others have to cross over mountains and deserts on foot. I knew quite a few people who came over here illegally, and their stories of walking through the desert for days, avoiding drug runners on their side and border patrol on ours, tells me that putting up a wall and adding a few more guards is not going to stop them. So, what is your benchmark? Right now, illegal immigration is barely a trickle. Do we have to get it down to absolutely zero before we can move on? Look, you are looking for a compromise, I get it, but what you are asking for is not cheap, and will not be effective in the objective you are claiming you want. So, you tell me, what benchmarks, exactly, need to be met before we can deal with the human beings who are here to escape poverty, crime, or corruption and to make a better life for themselves and their families? If you want us to double the spending on border patrol, we can probably find the taxpayer money to do that, even though it won’t make any difference. If you insist on a wall, we can waste billions of taxpayer dollars on that, if that is what you deem necessary before you are willing to budge. I you want drones and satellites and aeroplane coverage of the border area, we can waste our resources on those as well. But, if you want 0 people to cross the border illegally, that is an impossible standard. A much better way of preventing illegal immigration is to increase legal immigration. I don’t know that anyone wants to walk through the desert and mountains, swim across rivers, get raped or robbed by the guides, and spend thousands of dollars for the privilege, when they could simply go through the legal border. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2017, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/88 "2017-07-09T22:26:15Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > This is right, as to the white working class Christians who voted for Trump. They feel they are losing their white privilege. > ! Its not just the white people. You dont think blacks also fear losing their jobs to immigrants? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2017, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/89 "2017-07-09T23:12:04Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > But, if you want 0 people to cross the border illegally, that is an impossible standard. I’m not sure that’s the right question. Or answer. Or something. I mean, I want 0 people to commit murder. And I also want 0 people to be shoplifters. I’m also on record as wanting 0 people to rape anybody. Sure, that’s an impossible standard – but I still want the law enforced against folks caught committing murder, and the same goes for shoplifters and rapists and so on. And, well, I’d maybe throw up in my mouth a little if the candidate I’m reluctantly thinking of supporting put a proud and unabashed lawbreaker up there on stage to cheerfully announce, _hey, look at me, everyone! I’m standing right here!_ ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2017, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/90 "2017-07-09T23:48:13Z")
Sure, but as, say, a City Council member, you wouldn’t say, “I refuse to expend one cent on parks and swimming pools until the murder rate has dropped to zero.” Yes, fighting violent crime should be the highest priority, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t any other priorities at all until all crime has been done away with. (To be fair, I don’t think anyone here, or in Congress, is actually demanding illegal immigration drop to zero before they’ll start negotiating a pathway to citizenship. But they are demanding enforcement first, yet offering no guarantees whatever that such a pathway might be possible later. “What I want, I want now; what you want, we’ll talk about somewhere down the road a spell.”) ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2017, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/91 "2017-07-10T02:34:10Z")
[quote=“k9bfriender, post:69, topic:790595”] So, you are for making emmigration illegal as well. You have to get permission from your government to leave? > [@](#): > > Okay, so you are not just for restricting people from leaving a country, but also for restricting travel within it as well? > > Everyone was trying to leave east Germany. It was an oppressive regime that did not allow people to emigrate, and restricted their internal travel, oh, just like you wanted. > > If you make your country a worse place to live, how is that not a bad result. It is a worse place to live. > Then move to one, don’t try to turn the United States into your preferred police state with control over whether people can leave, where they can live and travel. Are there any rights that you would allow the citizens of your imagined state? If they don’t like the fact that they have no right to travel or move, would you allow them to complain about that to the govt? If you suspect that they may be planning on trying to move, would you send in special relocation monitors to ensure that they don’t? > > At least if you were to have a state like that, you would not need to worry about immigration legal or illegal. “Everyone” was not trying to leave the GDR. An unsustainably high proportion of people did leave (20%), and probably another large chunk wanted to leave, but there were a lot of people who were perfectly satisfied with the system. For good reason: I’ve posted Gerhard Heske’s economic data here in the past, I think, but there are serious questions to be raised about whether the unification of the two Germanies actually increased the rate of GDP growth or not, and serious social advantages (lower economic inequality, and better support for families with children for two) that were sacrificed when reunification happened. As far as “don’t try to turn the United States into your preferred police state”, I’ve read through my previous comments and I don’t think I made any policy recommendations for the United States, per se. I’m expressing a general moral disapproval of the idea of open borders. That doesn’t mean that I support tighter immigration restrictions _for every society, at every point in time_; it means that I support tighter restrictions _as a general ideal_. As far as the United States goes, I did vote for a minor-party anti-immigration conservative last year (Castle, more for his stance on abortion and foreign policy than on immigration per se), but I would probably tactically vote against Trump in 2020: I can see good arguments either way on what the United States immigration policy should be. I am expressing distaste here for the moral ideal of free movement of people: I’m not expressing a political opinion on what US immigration policy should be, and I think there are sound arguments to be made for a liberal immigration policy here and now. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2017, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/92 "2017-07-10T04:08:43Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > So, what is your benchmark? Right now, illegal immigration is barely a trickle. Do we have to get it down to absolutely zero before we can move on? > > . The benchmarks wouldn’t be illegal immigration numbers, which are affected by factors having nothing to do with security, such as the state of our economy, the state of nearby nations’ governments and economies, and generally how welcoming we are or appear to be. I’m betting that just electing Donald Trump will end up slowing down illegal immigration substantially. So the actual benchmarks would simply be previous border security promises that were never fulfilled: build X miles of border wall, add X number of agents for internal enforcement, create X number of immigration courts to clear the backlog, install biometric entry/exit systems(mandated many times by law but never funded), and E-verify in X percentage of workplaces. We could also demand some statute changes that would make enforcement a little easier. One no-brainer would be to alert citizens about suspicious activity involving their SS#. “Hey, did you just get a job in Arizona? We noticed you live in Iowa.” If the citizen responds in the negative, that employer moves to the top of the list for a workplace raid. Of course, if you have E-verify, which requires names and SS#s to match, then that problem goes away. Once you fulfill those benchmarks, you’ve got better border security, better internal security, and much fewer places for employment. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2017, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/93 "2017-07-10T12:15:14Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Obama was deporting people only to establish credibility on the issue. Ah, your famous Obama mindreading act. “Vastly larger numbers of illegal immigrants were either deported or stopped at the border under Obama than under the Bush administration, with prioritization for deportation given to those who had committed other crimes in the US, but Obama only did that to make you _think_ he cared about border security”. Yes, that makes sense. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2017, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/94 "2017-07-10T12:58:40Z")
> [@Common\_Tater](#): > > I think the great unwashed hick rubes in flyover Jesusland have had enough of the nonsense, it’s hurt the Democrats badly, not surprisingly because it is just nuts at every level. There are something like 90 million Americans recieving some sort of government or taxpayer funded welfare and millions who are unemployed. > > There is simply no need whatsoever for importing unskilled labor by the millions. The native born believe rightly or wrongly they are being treated as “second class” citizens. Back in the early 1990s there were a lot of letters to Chemical and Engineering News complaining about how “there are enough chemists here, there is no need to import foreign PhD chemists!” A letter pointed out that the imports generally entered the US as PhD candidates, and that most graduate schools had serious troubles finding Americans who’d be willing to spend several years living on a doctorand’s stipend. This in turn led to most PhDs being given to foreigners, who then were better qualified than the Americans. That was the last letter on the subject. I happened to be in the same program as the guy who wrote it: in 20 years, there was only one American who requested admission into our program; she was accepted because there was a 25% of positions which were filled preferentially by Americans, but she was woefully underqualified. Her GRE grades were less than half the minimum a foreigner needed in order to be able to apply. If your unskilled citizens aren’t willing to work on getting skilled or to move where the jobs are, they have no more right to complain than those chemists did. Those who are willing to do either may complain away. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2017, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/95 "2017-07-11T19:56:36Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Obama was deporting people only to establish credibility on the issue. He deported undocumented immigrants for eight years at a higher rate than any past president to… establish credibility? For what? His third term? ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2017, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/96 "2017-07-11T20:05:06Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > Its not just the white people. You dont think blacks also fear losing their jobs to immigrants? I already cited the poll numbers. It’s pretty clear that there is a racial divide. And, as I also noted, there are lots of plausible explanations for that. But whatever the explanation, the existence of that divide casts substantial doubt on the theory that economic circumstance is what drives anti-immigrant sentiment. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2017, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/97 "2017-07-13T10:14:30Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > He deported undocumented immigrants for eight years at a higher rate than any past president to… establish credibility? For what? His third term? ICE deported record numbers of people. The President wanted to “get control” of that situation but couldn’t control his own government. Which in this case was a good thing. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2017, 11:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/98 "2017-07-13T11:43:35Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > ICE deported record numbers of people. The President wanted to “get control” of that situation but couldn’t control his own government. Which in this case was a good thing. So you’re simultaneously saying Obama increased deportations to establish cred and he actually didn’t want to do that but couldn’t control the rogue agency. How Orwellian. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2017, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/99 "2017-07-13T11:58:48Z")
With Trump purportedly planning to cut legal immigration by [50%](http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/immigration-trump-senate-cotton-234706), has everyone come around to the view that this isn’t about illegal immigration only? ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Girl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7bcc69/32.png) [@Mighty\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Girl)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2017, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595/100 "2017-07-13T12:44:07Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > Well, the Danish Social Democrats have made precisely that policy turnaround, and is now for immigration restrictionism. Here’s a good review here by a political scientist in Denmark: > > [Social Europe](https://www.socialeurope.eu/2017/05/immigration-policy-turn-danish-social-democratic-case/) > > Also here: > > [http://www.janes.com/article/71569/growing-co-operation-between-denmark-s-social-democrats-and-far-right-df-party-likely-to-impede-effective-policymaking](http://www.janes.com/article/71569/growing-co-operation-between-denmark-s-social-democrats-and-far-right-df-party-likely-to-impede-effective-policymaking) > > And here (actually I’m impressed by how far the Social Democrats have come on immigration, although this is from two years ago): > > [Denmark's election campaign has been a 'race to the bottom' on immigration](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/denmark/11680974/Denmarks-election-campaign-has-been-a-race-to-the-bottom-on-immigration.html) What does that have to do with the US? The political philosophies of the parties in question don’t align, and Danish immigration policy in general is appalling. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-democrats-rethink-their-policy-on-immigration/790595.md?page=6)