# Trump's Immigration Proposal **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 17, 2015, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082 "2015-08-17T16:07:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/121 "2015-09-01T03:58:09Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Given how the question was asked I"m actually shocked it wasn’t 90%. “Forced deportation” is the law. > > You might as well ask people if they favor forced tax collection. Well, the question is whether the authorities should get really, even more aggressive about it. Which perhaps they could, but . . . there are at least 12 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. – and if they left or were deported all at once, we’d really miss them, major economic disruption. I’ve heard that if you walk into any restaurant kitchen in L.A. and shout _La Migra!_ there will be nobody left to make dinner. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/122 "2015-09-01T14:19:30Z")
Yes, and if you jailed all the tax cheats our economy would collapse from that too. ---
**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:** [September 1, 2015, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/123 "2015-09-01T14:28:55Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Given how the question was asked I"m actually shocked it wasn’t 90%. “Forced deportation” is the law. > > You might as well ask people if they favor forced tax collection. Right. I am about as liberal and border-open-y as they come, but I don’t have a problem with people being deported. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/124 "2015-09-01T14:36:39Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Right. I am about as liberal and border-open-y as they come, but I don’t have a problem with people being deported. And people \*are \*being deported. But Trump & his pals like to pretend we have Absolutely Open Borders & Those Swarthy Folks are the cause of \*all \*our problems… ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/125 "2015-09-01T14:41:54Z")
That’s not quite accurate. we do have open borders in the sense that an individual’s odds of being deported are pretty low, and getting back into the country doesn’t seem to be too challenging. That murderer in Cali was deported five times. There’s just no excuse for that miserable performance. None at all. As for them being the cause of all our problems I don’t think anyone, anywhere is arguing that. The cause of all our problems is a government that doesn’t serve the public and that is unaccountable to the voters. THe dirty little secret is that the government IS accountable when we make it accountable, and we’ve been making it accountable by having quite a few wave elections in recent years. So we just have to keep on firing politicians until they get the message. Or maybe finally just elect an independent voice as President to show that we actually mean it. I’d note that none of the independent candidates, including Sanders, are particularly friendly to a liberal immigration policy. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/126 "2015-09-01T14:58:26Z")
And what is a “liberal immigration policy”? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/127 "2015-09-01T15:01:16Z")
More legal immigration, laxer enforcement. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/128 "2015-09-01T15:03:28Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > More legal immigration, laxer enforcement. No it’s not. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/129 "2015-09-01T15:05:06Z")
Then explain it. All I hear from Democrats is that we need to urgently fix our broken immigration system, but yet the only thing they want to do is amnesty, and everything they agree to to get amnesty is a “compromise”. So explain where I’m getting it wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/130 "2015-09-01T15:09:03Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > More legal immigration, laxer enforcement. Can you quote a Democrat in authority saying we need laxer authority? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/131 "2015-09-01T15:10:10Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Then explain it. All I hear from Democrats is that we need to urgently fix our broken immigration system, but yet the only thing they want to do is amnesty, and everything they agree to to get amnesty is a “compromise”. > > So explain where I’m getting it wrong. Simple-You put things in your own words to get the results you want to hear. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/132 "2015-09-01T15:13:11Z")
[![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/rlITNzoihIE/hqdefault.jpg "Pelosi: Raids are "Un-American"") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlITNzoihIE) Well, we have the Speaker of the House at the time, saying that workplace raids are “un-American”. And workplace raids were cut back: [http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/illegal-immigrant-workersask-not-to-be-deportedwhile-congress-debates/2013/07/22/e17233a6-f2eb-11e2-8505-bf6f231e77b4\_story.html](http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/illegal-immigrant-workersask-not-to-be-deportedwhile-congress-debates/2013/07/22/e17233a6-f2eb-11e2-8505-bf6f231e77b4_story.html) > [@](#): > > Large-scale workplace raids were dramatically cut back, especially after a high-profile raid on a meatpacking plant in Iowa in 2008 that ended in 389 arrests and devastated the local community. Immigration officials shifted to making “paper raids,” especially tax audits, and pursuing employers of illegal immigrants rather than the workers. This goes beyond proritization of resources though. The government can do workplace raids, they just don’t want to. This is a classic case of pulling back on enforcement because it actually was too successful. It would be like cutting back on cocaine interdiction because one day they found too much and arrested too many people. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/133 "2015-09-01T15:16:17Z")
To me, quite far to the left, a better immigration policy would do the following: 1. Address those who have come here in violation of the rules. I’m not a fan of amnesty so much as putting them into the queue and letting them remain while in it. If they’re deemed inadmissible, though, they should be deported regardless. 2. Instead of the convoluted system of zillions of types of visas, including the Diversity Lottery based on country of origin, allow _everyone_ a chance to apply for a visa. By all means use the points system (so many for being in good health, being educated, speaking English or Spanish, having a job offer lined up, etc.; negative points for criminal convictions in the last 10 years, etc.) I don’t mind rigging the points system so that educated professionals with a job offer can basically be rubber-stamped “approved” barring criminal convictions. 3. A faster turn-around time. In the internet age, we should be able to say “yes” or “no” within six months, and why. ---
**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:** [September 1, 2015, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/134 "2015-09-01T15:26:31Z")
But that doesn’t really solve the “problem,” which is that lots of people want to come here who don’t already have jobs lined up or have educational credentials. You can either reduce that demand somehow by making our country worse or theirs better, you can reduce the “supply” through draconian enforcement of immigration laws, or you can create a system of laws that recognizes this fundamental reality and seeks to impose some reasonable order on it. That last bit is what comprehensive immigration reform sought to do, with partial amnesty, guest worker programs, etc. If you don’t opt for that, then Trump’s wall is pretty much what remains. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/135 "2015-09-01T16:14:08Z")
That’s why I think we need a candidate who will explain the relevant issues clearly. It seems that we either have people peddling simplistic solutions, or people telling us what we can’t do because it’s too hard. What we should do is let anyone who wants to come here come here, if they are employable, law abiding, and don’t have contagious diseases. All it should take is a background check, physical, and sign a contract stating that you can support yourself and will not depend on taxpayer support for the first few years of your residency. That should all be accomplished in 30 days or less. The reason we can’t have that is because of public opposition to higher immigration levels: > **[More in U.S. Would Decrease Immigration Than Increase](https://news.gallup.com/poll/171962/decrease-immigration-increase.aspx)** > > Although U.S. public support for increasing immigration has increased over the past 15 years, it remains the minority position. By 41% to 22%, many more Americans still think immigration should be decreased rather than increased. So some minds have to be changed for that to be possible. Part of doing that would be convincing Americans that the political class isn’t trying to pull one over on them, because the current system sure looks like that’s what they are trying to do. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/136 "2015-09-01T16:32:03Z")
Is there one single Republican candidate who would support that? Jeb!, maybe? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/137 "2015-09-01T17:14:56Z")
There aren’t any Democrats who would support that either. Expressly supporting more immigration is politically toxic. The Senate immigration bill does raise legal immigration levels, but promises lower immigration overall through reduced illegal immigration. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/138 "2015-09-01T17:22:15Z")
Did you not read your own link? The majority of Americans continue to favor immigration, the divisive question question is how much to allow. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2015, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082/139 "2015-09-01T17:30:36Z")
Which would be overwhelmingly the same, or less. The same is actually ridiculously low, and the senate immigration bill also falls well short of demand. I think the annual cap in that bill is 350,000. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trumps-immigration-proposal/728082.md?page=6)