Actively or passively facilitating or incentivizing illegal immigration only appears to be compassionate. In the long term, it is actually uncompassionate because it undermines legal immigration and fuels globalism, which deconstructs the USA as a sovereign nation, creates and perpetuates unnecessary border crises of suffering, promotes lawlessness, and it costs more to fund than securing the border and supporting only legal immigration. [1] Ultimately such misdirected compassion changes the culture of the USA into the very culture illegal immigrants left, an impoverished dictatorship or mobocracy, which benefits no one.
To seek to justify illegal immigration because not enough people can come into the country through legal immigration is really an argument for legal immigration and against illegal immigration. Legal immigration sets limits that allow for proper assimilation into the country, which benefits everyone, citizens and immigrants alike, whereas illegal immigration ignores the citizens and offers only short-sighted compassion that gauzily conceals the deconstruction of a just and compassionate system for immigration.
Active or passive promotion of illegal immigration raises the question of where do illegal immigration supporters draw the line on how many illegals do they think we should welcome? If they suggest an amount, then their arguments supporting illegal immigration are found to be implicitly hollow; they only disagree on the number and possibly their home country, but at some point, they will turn against illegal immigration. I reject it now on principle, and they will eventually reject it based on quota. Although, I fear, for many, it will be too late.
If those who favor or facilitate illegal immigration do not have a limit which would cause them to oppose illegal immigration at some point, then they expose themselves as true globalists without the best interests of America or its citizens in mind; such a position is profoundly uncompassionate! From what I have seen in some international meetings, Christianity and our mission enterprise do not fare well in a one-world government enterprise.
Many of the supporters of illegal immigration are of the same mindset as those who fought to destroy the concept of America as a melting pot. People from everywhere come here and become Americans. These supporters push multiculturism, which is not merely learning about and even appreciating various aspects of other cultures. Rather, it is the perspective that all cultures are equal. Consequently, they loathe the concept of the melting pot and support the complete deconstruction of such an America; replacing it with a borderless, constitutionless, multicultural experiment governed by the citizens of the world or the United Nations.
In our constitutional republic, it is not as though our society is bereft of a process for people to immigrate into our country legally or to renovate our legal immigration process if needed. The argument that the legal immigration process is broken does at least raise the question, broken according to whom and what standard? Clearly, it is not broken to the over one million who become legal American citizens each year.[2] To bypass the legal process in a constitutional republic is to undermine the very foundation and fabric of the society, including legal immigration. Willfully permitting illegal immigration is a direct attack upon legal immigration and devalues those who come legally.
In 1986, President Reagan signed the “Immigration and Control Act,” which legalized approximately 2.7 million illegal immigrants. [3] Including Reagan’s act, there have been at least six events in which a large number of illegal immigrants were given legal status since 1986. [4] Obviously, since we are still dealing with the same issue, every promise to secure the borders was at best insufficient, and, at least in some instances, apparently, demagoguery to get support for the legalization of illegals with little or no intent to secure the borders. By securing the borders, I include whatever is needed to stop all forms of illegal immigration into America. To seal up our porous borders, both geographically and administratively, in such a way so that the imperviousness of our borders becomes known to all; this is the most compassionate way to virtually eliminate the human suffering that results from illegal immigration.
The pattern of the last thirty-three years normalizes illegal immigration, unnecessary personal suffering, and marginalization of legal immigration and the law simply because politicians do not get the outcome they want through legal immigration, which is mobocracy. Many Democrats seem to actively support illegal immigration, whereas, some Republicans act like they are against it, but their unwillingness to take measures to eliminate illegal immigration demonstrates they are at least passive supporters. I do think some support illegal immigration out of compassion, but I believe their compassion is parochial and short-sighted.
It is the lack of will to secure the border that births and fuels every human crisis at the border and the continuous problem of what to do about the millions of immigrants who enter our country illegally; this is the reality of the problem, at least, since Reagan. Incidents of people suffering at the border are not because of border security. Rather they are because of previous failures to secure the border, failures that span over three decades.
Although to properly explore the options requires another article, let me briefly state that securing our borders, both geographically and administratively, while treating illegal immigrants Christianly are not mutually exclusive endeavors; it is really not as difficult as many want to make it out to be.
Since the repeated agreements to first resolve the problem of illegal immigrants who are in our country based upon the promise that afterward everyone will work to secure the border has failed every time, we must reverse the order. Without reversing the order, those who do not have the will to secure the border lose interest, and we unchristianly perpetuate the same illegalities and human suffering. Therefore, President Trump is absolutely correct to prioritize building the wall before making an agreement about what to do with those who are in our country illegally. I believe the most compassionate and Christan plan is to agree upon securing the border and then deal Christianly with those who are here.
The claim that legal immigration is broken is not a legitimate reason for supporting illegal immigration any more than it would be to support illegal acts in other areas because the legal system is ineffective. To do so actually undermines repairing the broken process through legislation or a vote of the people. Such a practice leads to America becoming a culture that normalizes illegal behavior in an area where the system does not work at all or does not work as some think it should; even though legal immigration does work for over a million immigrants a year.
Imagine a highway that has a speed limit of 60, but everyone disregards it and drives 80. Would the authorities seek to protect those who drive illegally or would they send more police officers to the highway to give out tickets? We know the answer. We are told to be responsible and secure our homes, lock our cars, and responsibly protect ourselves; if we do not, we are irresponsible. Why is it right to lock and secure our homes even to the point of forcibly stopping unwanted intruders, but it is not right to secure our homeland from those who refuse to enter legally? The very same people who support illegal immigration lock their homes to keep people from coming in illegally. America is our home and deserves the same protection. If we fail to secure our borders, we may find one day we can no longer secure our homes. See my previous article on immigration, Suggestions for a Compassionate and Just Immigration.
[1] President Trump has asked for $5 billion to $25 billion to build the wall and secure the border. He has stated that the cost of funding illegal immigration is from between $200 billion and $280 billion. Conservatively, the cost is at least $54.5 billion according to the Heritage Foundation. https://www.heritage.org/immigration/report/the-fiscal-cost-unlawful-immigrants-and-amnesty-the-us-taxpayer, accessed 12/28/18. In either case, the cost of illegal immigration is more than stopping illegal immigration.
[2] https://www.migrationpolicy.org/programs/data-hub/charts/Annual-Number-of-US-Legal-Permanent-Residents?width=850&height=850&iframe=true accessed 12/5/18.
[3] https://ballotpedia.org/Immigration_Reform_and_Control_Act_of_1986 accessed 12/5/28.
[4] https://www.newsmax.com/fastfeatures/illegal-immigration-amnesty/2015/08/11/id/669659/ accessed 12/6/18. Numbers USA says it is seven times, https://www.numbersusa.com/content/learn/illegal-immigration/seven-amnesties-passed-congress.html accessed 12/6/18.
