Immigration

In my previous position, I had the opportunity to twice visit the El Paso, Texas border with Mexico and receive briefings by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) on border security.  The undeniable fact is that the border wall is very effective in reducing by an order of magnitude the number of illegal border crossings and attempts, and makes the job of the under-staffed CBP much easier in areas where a wall has been built.  However, the wall is by no means impenetrable and does increase illegal border crossing attempts in more rugged and potentially dangerous parts of the border where a wall does not exist. 

 

While the statistical evidence does bear out the merits of a wall, again I would argue it only addresses a symptom and not the cause of illegal immigration—oppressive, incompetent, or nonexistent governments.  Unfortunately, I have to include the United States in the "incompetent" category.  We have to share the blame for the violence south of our border which has made life untenable for so many—violence caused by our insatiable appetite for illicit narcotics! 

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Here is a summary of a few key facts from the Council on Foreign Relations (https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/mexicos-long-war-drugs-crime-and-cartels):

 

• Mexican drug cartels are leading suppliers of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, and other illicit narcotics to the United States.

• The cartels and the drug trade fuel rampant corruption and violence in Mexico, contributing to tens of thousands of homicides in the country each year.

• Since Mexico launched a war on the cartels in 2006, the United States has provided it with billions of dollars in security and counternarcotics assistance.

 

The most inconvenient fact is the following:

 

The U.S. government, despite waging a “war on drugs” and conducting other counternarcotics efforts abroad, has made little progress in reducing demand. In 2017, Americans spent $153 billion [PDF] on illegal drugs, including cocaine, heroin, marijuana, and methamphetamine. The growing use of synthetic opioids, including fentanyl, has contributed to a public health crisis.

 

Yes, my fellow Americans, your hundreds of billions of dollars spent on illegal drugs is fueling poverty, corruption, gang and cartel violence, terrorism, and murder south of our border (as well as inside our borders!).  As a result, it is also fueling the large number of desperate migrants willing to take any chance—legal or illegal—to cross into what they believe is the safety of the United States.  The sooner we are able to embrace this fact, the sooner we can have an intelligent and mature conversation on how to address not only illegal immigration, but also our own illegal drug use. 

 

I will argue that our anti-drug efforts so far have been wholly incompetent because they have primarily focused on interdicting drug shipments and punishing drug traffickers.  Basic economic theory teaches that as long as there is demand for a product, someone will always figure out a way to supply it.  If there is no demand, supply is irrelevant.  Our partisan politicians have continually refused to apply any serious effort to stem the use of illicit narcotics in our country i.e. to go after the drug users!  The best they can offer is naloxone (a.k.a. NARCAN®) in our schools and communities to be administered to those suffering from fentanyl and other opioid overdoses—how pathetic.  If elected, I will declare war not on drugs but on DRUG USE!  But in this war, I have no desire to fill our prisons with drug users.  Instead, I will employ a combination of education, hefty fines (to take the profit out of the drug trade), and forced rehabilitation (funded by the hefty fines) to stem our drug appetite.  It is the only way we will ever have a chance to win the drug war and bring some peace and stability to our southern neighbors (and our own drug-ridden communities)—and help our drug addicts get their lives back on track!

 

But even if my approach in addressing all of the causes of illegal immigration are successful, it still doesn't solve the problem of how to deal with illegal aliens already in the country, especially those brought here at a very young age. 

 

I will never forget what I believe is one of the biggest failures of President Trump and one of the first of what came to be many times where he managed to snatch defeat out of the hands of victory.   I also believe it was a key turning point in his presidency.  In a highly publicized press conference with the House and Senate leaders of both the Democrat and Republican leaders on the topic of immigration reform, Trump indicated that he really didn't have an opinion one way or another on the solution.  He then challenged the party leaders to work together to negotiate a bill they could all live with which he explicitly promised to sign:

 

Trump told the lawmakers that he trusted them to reach a good bipartisan agreement.  "When this group comes back, hopefully with an agreement," he said, "I’m signing it. I’m not going to be saying, ‘Oh, gee, I want this or I want that.’ I’ll be signing it. Because I have a lot of confidence in the people in this room."  (https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/dealmaking-daily/in-the-room-where-it-happened-a-tale-of-two-meetings-nb/)

 

At the time I thought it was a brilliant maneuver.  He was very civil in his discussions and looked very presidential.  After much hard work and weeks of negotiation and compromise, and a refreshing example of how the two parties could work together, they succeeded in drafting a bill both sides could support.  When they presented it to the President with smiles on their faces, Trump refused to sign it because it supposedly lacked enough funding for his border wall—you know, the one Mexico was supposed to pay for—essentially pulling the rug out from under them and destroying any credibility he may have had, certainly with the Democrats. I will never forget the totally dejected and frustrated looks on the faces of the lead Senate negotiators as I'm sure they felt Trump made fools of them. 

 

So what should we do about illegal immigrants already in our country?  I would argue that many of these immigrants comprise our country's modern day slave labor force.  They are paid substandard wages, work in unlawfully hazardous conditions, receive few if any benefits, live in crowded substandard housing, and are in constant fear of their "master" employers, or their smugglers, reporting them to immigration authorities or inflicting physical harm if they don't obey orders or repay their debts.  I would also argue that "sanctuary cities" only perpetuate their hardships.  I've heard it argued that while these accusations may be true, their conditions are still better than from where they came from and they keep our consumer prices low.  How familiar a justification for human bondage. 

 

Then there is the human trafficking and sex slave trade facilitated by our country's obsession with pornography and sexual perversion.  These illegal immigrants are true victims and need to be treated as such.  Another reason why we need to clean up our act and figure out how to ban pornography (see my "Mass Shootings" section for more on how pornography is destroying our youth) and crack down on those soliciting prostitutes.

 

But getting back to the bipartisan deal reached at Trump's request that he refused to sign, it did have some good ideas:

 

Under the proposal, Dreamers would be given a 12-year path to citizenship, but in a concession to Republicans, their parents would not be eligible to become citizens. The deal would allocate $2.7 billion for border security, including Trump’s requested $1.6 billion for a border wall. And in line with Trump’s request, the Democrats agreed to replace the current annual random lottery for 50,000 U.S. visas with merit-based visas given to immigrants from underrepresented countries. 

(https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/dealmaking-daily/in-the-room-where-it-happened-a-tale-of-two-meetings-nb/)

 

I also think some of the current bipartisan proposals have merit.  Although I am not yet prepared to outline an entire immigration policy, I am in favor of granting automatic U.S. citizenship to any immigrant who serves a tour of duty in our armed forces.  I will also vow that if I promise to sign a bipartisan deal, I will keep that promise!