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The Illegal Immigration Question I’d Like To Hear
True to form, Jeb Bush went full throttle into to the “we can’t possibly deport 11 million illegal immigrants” zone, and quoted a rate of 500,000 per month. To be honest, he makes a reasonable point. The logistics of it are near impossible.
An Airbus A380 variant flown by Emirates Air can seat 615 people, the largest passenger capacity of any airline. It would require 813 flights of these behemoths every month (i.e, 27 a day) to move that many people. There are only 173 A380’s in service. Jeb may have been exercising hyperbole to support his position, but he isn’t off the mark.
Additionally, identifying and locating that many illegal aliens each month is near impossible and we have no method of doing so now.
Stepping away from the hyperbole, let’s give the candidates some operating room and say they have one term to deport the illegal aliens, which would mean about 200,000 a month. If a half million deportations per month is impossible, 200,000 is only barely achievable.
Relatedly, we need to be realistic about what “securing the border” means. One of my friends is a Texas State Trooper and was one of the first volunteers for the boat squadron that patrols the Rio Grande. His team works closely with US Border Patrol. I visited with him about the situation; suffice to say, border security isn’t as tough-minded as we often think. These days, being detained by Border Patrol doesn’t carry a threat of immediate deportation and is a big reason we continue to see thousands per week streaming into the country.
All that said, I have a scenario I want to pose to Ricochet that I wish was posed to the candidates.
Scenario
Leaving dinner on a Wednesday night, I make a legal left turn with a green arrow when a well-used Mercedes runs the light and hits me head on. No one is injured, but my SUV has to be towed away and — when all is said and done — I’m going to be out $7,000.
The Mercedes was driven by a young man with a young woman in the passenger seat. Neither of them speak English, and neither has a drivers license or any other form of identification. The car’s inspection and registration are both expired and there is no insurance. The girl in the passenger seat is pregnant, about four or five months along. They have little money.
A Spanish speaking officer is dispatched to the scene and one of the of the EMS technicians speaks Spanish. The driver and passenger are not married and admit to being here illegally. They are evasive about how they got here and whether they have relatives in the country or not.
The Question
Sir/Madam, in your administration, what will happen to these two?
If it is verified they are illegal aliens will they be allowed to stay or deported? If they are allowed to stay, will the woman receive publicly-funded healthcare for her pregnancy and child? If their child is born here, will he or she be granted American citizenship?
What I’d Like to Hear
In a Brent Administration, the young couple are taken into custody, their immigration status is determined, and they are turned over to ICE and held until deported. A process measured in days, not years.
They are allowed phone calls and — if family came to visit and found to be here illegally — they will be detained and deported also.
Once detained, they would not be temporarily released or allowed to gather their belongings, money, etc. This may seem rough treatment, but at least we aren’t going house to house doing no-knock raids as happened with Elian Gonzalez.
The Way Forward
This uncomfortable process garners immediate attention, makes people feel “unwelcome,” and challenges those here illegally. If they wish to return home on their own, they can take their possessions, money, family, etc. If they are stopped for so much as jaywalking they are interned in the criminal justice and ICE system until they are released outside our borders.
Not an easy choice and not intended to be. Breaking our laws should not be comfortable or without consequence.
If they elect to stay, live in the shadows, and seek employment for cash, they may do so, but there will be no legal acknowledgement or path to citizenship. Increased use of E-verify and raids on suspect businesses decrease the opportunities to better themselves. As soon as they step out of the shadows, into the purview of law enforcement, or try to get a birth certificate for a child, deportation begins as soon as they are identified without an opportunity to gather their family or possessions.
Summary
Jeb Bush is mostly correct: deporting that many illegal aliens isn’t practical. The steps to solve this crisis include, but not limited to:
- Real border enforcement (no more notices to appear or other hand receipts).
- No incentive to come illegally in the first place. No contorted 14th Amendment interpretation that extends citizenship to the children of these criminals.
- End forcing public education for illegal aliens.
- Conduct government business in English only.
- Increase E-verify and employer penalties
- Restrict repatriation of dollars by non-citizens.
Please note I did not include a wall funded by a third party. Rick Perry made a good point awhile back: build a 14′ wall and they make 15′ ladders. Of course he also supported in-state tuition for those who’d broken our immigration laws, so there was motivation for ladder manufacturing courtesy Rick Perry.
Giving illegal immigrants the opportunity and motivation to self-deport is possible. Raiding homes of people we can’t identify and locate to ship them out on 800 flights per month is not.
Published in General, Immigration, Politics
Mike, thanks for your interest. I have thought of writing a post of my dream tax plan.
The only tax plan I’ve seen this cycle that excites me is Governor Jindal’s proposal. Congress would have an aneurysm (not a bad thing) even bringing up his plan for debate.
Does he take the IRS out of the picture? That’s what I like about Cruz.
Jindal doesn’t and that is a weakness and Cruz is dreaming if he thinks that convoluted mess he proposed runs without the IRS or a similar bureaucracy.
I’ve met him personally on several occasions during the Senate campaign and honestly do not know who is pulling the strings and where he is coming up with some stuff. Ever since the Mercer donation I have had to scratch my head.
Great post Brent – I like your 6 steps. You’ve won my vote.
I see no real prospect for eliminating the IRS either, but I would like the tax code to be shredded down to a few hundred pages in plain English. I cannot do my taxes anymore – S corp and personal just take too much effort and resulting fear of error.
I can’t speak for the illegal immigrants, but I’ve known foreigners who managed to get a visa for a year or so, timed so that their kids would be born here. I’m thinking in particular of two relatively westernized, educated Turkish women. The phrase “anchor baby” did not come into the discussion, but these friends of mine said that if things went really bad (ie, Islamist) in Turkey, having a child with US citizenship would provide a way out for the whole family.
I would imagine that this might be extremely common among illegal aliens.
You know Brent, America is too far on the back side of the power curve and too close to the ground to really recover. So how about we get Instugator and the boys, a couple of DC-3, find a safe haven in the Caribbean or Perth Australia, putz around with grape fruit and coffee and cavort with the native girls. I’ve got some old DC-3 time and tail dragger time to check you guys out. I’ll probably have to begin to ease into copilot and cavorter in charge. You guys can fly and cavort as required.
11 million people managed to get into this country illegally with little or no problem. I can’t seem to understand the logic that they can not leave this country just as easily. All it takes is a will to do so.
Given the same time frame, sure.
Is the list intended to stop illegal immigration or encourage?
It’s their ticket into the country. It their child is a citizen, then we probably won’t deport the parent, but will provide all manner of financial support to the parent as a means to support the new little citizen.
Its quite a good deal, and many are incented to take advantage of this ‘door’.
They aren’t good a it because they have no will to do it. That is the real obstacle here – our government and their cronies benefit from the current situation – they don’t WANT to fix it.
That is fine. Reverse the flow and lets see how long it takes. The US government has managed to ignore immigration law for 30+ years. If they would enforce it for the same amount of time things would resolve themselves. For one the people like me would not feel like deporting the political class too.
I see one problem with your scenario. Once your changes are implemented, when that Mercedes runs into you the couple will not wait around for the police (knowing that they will be deported), they will flee the scene. Certainly the question of what to do once illegals are in custody is valid, but I think it would make them much more resistant to the police.
Good point, but what I am hoping for is that word gets back home that the U.S. means business on the issue and don’t come here in the first place.
Probably true. Then I would also hope they fear applying for food stamps or hanging out at home depot or begging for money on the corner.
For once, I have absolutely nothing to add to this. Pts. #2 and #5 are particularly effective suggestions.
The original intent of the relevant language was to grant citizenship to freed slaves so, yes, an originalist case can be made.
Good luck getting it past the Supreme Court, though.
The IRS isn’t going anywhere. Even if we can shred the tax code as we all would like, the government still needs people to collect and process the returns.
That doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be downsized and de-powered, mind you.
What makes you think they stick around now? Why would I care if they stayed at the scene anyway? So they can tell me they do not have insurance? So they can figure some way to sue me?
Congratulations on a fine set of solutions for our illegal immigrant crisis, BrentB67.
Next up, rewrite our legal immigration laws so they serve the interests of middle-class Americans and resurrect the old nationalities quotas to preserve rather than fundamentally transform the historic American nation.
Finally, turn your attention to Comprehensive Emigration Reform, to facilitate the departure of all of those who really would like to live somewhere other than this “systemically racist,” unjust country.
Great post!
In the 1800’s it was proven that heavier-than-air flight was mathematically impossible. That went out through the same door as global cooling, remember? Now we have Kasich bleating that it’s just too hard so let’s give up. It would be impossible. Let lawbreakers slide.
During the debate enlightenment came to Mr. Kasich in the form of a panic of blathering, interrupting and ‘hey look at me’. And uttering a famously un-American statement like “we can’t do that…it’s too hard.”
7. Fine the jalapeños out of any company employing illegals.
Decentralize. Leave tax collection to the states. The Fair Tax does this, and I know Brent’s got ideas on the subject, too.
I’d be curious to hear a rebuttal of this point. Sounds solid to me.
I think that’s going to be the tricky part.
Unless I’m missing something, no one has an illegal status: rather, they have a lack of a legal status. If the couple in Brent’s scenario insists that they are legal, but left their identification at home, shouldn’t they be allowed to attempt to retrieve it? What if they can’t find it, but insist it’s been misplaced or stolen? These may be obvious, transparent lies, but — in a system based on the presumption of innocence — I’m not sure that’s sufficient cause to put someone on a plane.
I’m not saying we shouldn’t get tougher; I think we should. I just think it’s going to be a very difficult thing to do in a way that isn’t truly unsettling. Again, that doesn’t mean we can’t do much better.
I’d be very curious to hear from those who are legal immigrants on the matter.
I think Mike’s reasoning regarding anti-poverty is mostly sound.
However, it misses the point. Does the USA exist to allow people to come here illegally and repatriate our funds and serve as the world’s anti-poverty welfare program?
The issue we are discussing isn’t people coming here legally, earning a living and choosing to send some of it home to their family which is their God given right.
The issue is that this becomes an inducement for people to come here illegally. As we’ve seen repeatedly that if someone is so brazen as to break our laws on national sovereignty it doesn’t stop there. They have no shame misappropriating citizen’s SSN’s, claiming tax credits, exploiting public healthcare, claiming birthright citizenship, etc.
The USA does as much or more than every other nation combined combatting global poverty. We don’t need to trash our national sovereignty to somehow prove our generosity.
The poorly informed Mr. Trump is unaware we already have a deportation force and its called the INS.
The commitably insane Mr. Strain at National Review is apparently in his basement gurgling in mortal terror that the INS exists.
You and I are in 100% agreement here.
However, purely as a matter of national self interest, I can see how letting people send money home might decrease the demand to come here. If one illegal can support four of his family members back home, that means they’ve that much less reason to come here. Basically, I agree with your goal, though believe this specific policy may be the wrong means to achieve it.
These things are quite illegal, yes? Then let’s prosecute the stuffing out of people who do them.