I’m not American and I’ve always found it fascinating how a part of the American population defends the existence of illegal immigrants in American soil. It’s crazy.
This is about saying "some people have come here illegally. let's not psychologically torture their children for it" You can be for legal migration and the humane treatment of people at the same time.
If you commit any other crime and are arrested, you will be “separated” from your child, because your child does not belong in prison. Why do you expect this to be any different?
Edit: Someone1234, I would reply directly but I’m rate limited. The incident you’re pointing out is more nuanced than that. To combat human trafficking, we separate children from adults we suspect may not be their parents, pending further investigation like interviews of the children and interrogation of the supposed parents. That has nothing to do with the recent headlines and is longstanding practice.
Edit: A further reply to Someone1234: you are citing these accounts by advocates on one side of the issue as truth. The official government statements are very clear on the situations in which children will be separated from the adults they are traveling with when claiming asylum at a port of entry. All of them concern either fears of human trafficking or other concern that child is not safe with the adult. Do government employees lie? Yes. But a systematic lie like that, involving the repeated illegal detention of children, would not last very long. If there’s one thing federal judges don’t tolerate, it’s being lied to.
This person applied for asylum at a port of entry and was immediately separated from his child:
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/show/migrant-seeking-asylum...
This article goes into detail about several other cases. Quote:
> But there is evidence that even families who seek asylum at ports of entry are being separated. One high-profile case involves a Congolese woman who sought asylum and still was separated from her 7-year-old daughter. In February, NPR's Burnett reported on the legal battle of Ms. L v. ICE.
https://www.npr.org/2018/06/19/621065383/what-we-know-family...
Plus this claim:
> Applying for asylum at a port of entry is not a crime, and none of those people are being detained or separated from their kids.
Was wrong no matter how it is justified.
> Any alien who is physically present in the United States or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters), irrespective of such alien’s status, may apply for asylum in accordance with this section...
https://theintercept.com/2018/06/16/immigration-border-asylu...
> U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents are systematically violating U.S. and international law by blocking immigrants at international ports of entry on the southern border from entering the country so they can claim asylum.
> The blocking works this way: In the precise middle of the international bridges, CBP agents stand, sentry-like, near the imaginary line dividing the two countries — a line often marked with a ceremonial metal plaque. The agents peer at everyone crossing, looking for people they think might be candidates for asylum. If the people say anything suggesting they might be requesting asylum — if they’re not Mexicans, and especially if they’re from Central America — the agents block their way and say to come back another time.
Which is not to say that illegal entry is never excusable. Necessity is a general criminal defense, so if you can show that you really had no choice but to cross into the country illegally or face imminent death or serious injury, then you’ll be off the hook for the illegal entry charge.
1. Refugees with legitimate requests are coming from Central and South America.
2. Many of those countries in question were result of US interference in their governments, leading to pro-US dictatorships
3. The refugees have come to the border crossings to petition for refugee status under international law
4. The US is a signatory for said international law
5. When refugees try to petition, CBP agents have actively blocked their entry to do the paperwork as required for claiming said status
6. Some have crossed illegally, and then unlike in prior administrations, criminal charges are levied
7. Families are intentionally being split up into different for-profit prisons
8. Children are split up, and there is no time limit for processing when they can get back with their parents
9. Deportations have been done where the parents are sent back, then the kids are. Nobody knows where they were sent
According to USCIS "asylum may be granted to people who have been persecuted or fear they will be persecuted on account of race, religion, nationality, and/or membership in a particular social group or political opinion". The "fear" part is tricky of course but it cannot be denied that many of these people are crossing the border for economic reasons.
It is also not reasonable to forcibly separate them from their families when their only crime is to ask to be allowed into the country.
Regardless, at that point it's no longer a matter of "asking to be allowed into the country".
Point is I've seen the term "asylum seeker" a lot recently in reference to the current immigration crisis and the issue of families being separated. Certainly some of the families who crossed illegally are seeking asylum, but I suspect most are, just as always, people looking to immigrate because of the economic advantages of living and working in the US. Whatever you think of that, asylum it does not make.
Edit: I have read of a few cases where apparently families that showed up at an official port of entry were detained and separated. If this is done without serious reason to believe the children are not actually related to the parents, or are otherwise in danger, of course it is wrong. Still most of the cases of family separation people are complaining about are from illegal crossings. Whether you believe that is right or wrong is another issue.
Someone who is not eligible to request asylum could definitively be called an illegal immigrant. Treaties signed and ratified by the US (which have the force of law in the US) require that refugees not be punished for unauthorized entry or presence if they present themselves to the authorities and request asylum, so they would definitively not be illegal immigrants. Someone who is eligible to request asylum but hasn't yet done so would be in a bit of a grey area.
You probably haven't heard of this before because asylum seekers are a fairly small portion of immigrants. The number of asylum seekers per year only crossed 100k/year in the past year or so and prior to about 2015 was less than half of that. The total number of illegal immigrants has been close to 1 million/year at some points. This has only made it into the media because of the recent policy change to take punitive actions towards asylum seekers in direct violation of the US's treaty obligations.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/03/06/us/politics/u...
The current backlog is 600,000 cases. You have to wait until your case is heard to determine credible threat to life or whatever your claim is. Till then many disappear into society and are never seen again.
Also 83% of kids didn't arrive at the border with their parents to begin with. They are accompanied by adults who are not their parents. The separation of kids from the adults during the waiting period for asylum affects 17% of kids who are actually with their parents when crossing over.
Between october 2017 to now there has been a 315% increase of people pretending to be families in order to game the system, essentially using kids as a means of getting more humane treatment.
The current outcry is a politically motivated PR campaign against the administration, who is faced with the extremely difficult task of dealing with criminals who are using children to shield themselves from strict consequences, and it seems to be working, thanks to the President's political opponents, who have knowingly taken the bait.
If you wanted to "hack" your way into the USA the steps used to be
1) Sneak across border
2) If not caught, congrats
3) If caught, surrender and claim asylum
4) While waiting for your hearing, disappear
5) Bring kids along to maximize the chance of actually getting asylum, or getting more lenient treatment while being processed or waiting for your trial
[0] http://www.businessinsider.com/zero-tolerance-why-trump-sepa...
The remaining 2000 are held for at most 20 days during which time an arrangement is made to have them stay with a family member or other caregiver.
Separating children from the adults they are accompanied by is a long-standing practice to prevent human trafficking and there are valid reasons for it that both sides of the aisle support, the difference is that ICE is now treating it as a criminal act requiring the aforementioned remanding into state custody while the details are sorted out.
If there is an increase of "asylum seekers" then the time to process them will similarly increase, and as such children with their "families" are in state custody for a similarly increased amount of time.
These children are being ripped from their parents and kept in literal cages in warehouses.
https://twitter.com/DemWrite/status/1008939085384126464
I don't think that is happening in your scenario.
The Mexico visa is a lot cheaper than the whole process to get a US green card. I would not be surprised if this becomes the preferred method for many seeking a life there.
2. There is legal process of entry, they should follow it.
3. Illegal immigration drives down wages, crowding out the most vulnerable citizens of the US.
4. A country decides how and when people are allowed in. There are numerous downsides to mass immigration including stress on services like health, social services and accommodation. Again, to the detriment of citizens.
http://www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings...
> in the unskilled and semi-skilled service sector, a 1% rise in the share of migrants reduced average wages in that occupation by nearly 0.5%
It may seems small but those numbers are variables and for people on the lowest rung of the ladder, every percent counts.
I think you’re vastly overestimating how much people want to move here.
Furthermore, legal immigration would not lower wages. It’s the fact that we don’t provide a legalization process that allows people to charge under minimum wage.
I am not. The US is still the top destination for migrants.
> legal immigration would not lower wages
I agree. We're talking about illegal immigration though. If everybody followed the legal process, great!
Is it? Most numbers seem to compare individual countries, which disproportionally overrepresents the US due to its sheer size.
However by comparison, in 2016 [0][1]:
* 1.49 million immigrants moved to the US
* 2 million immigrants moved to the EU
* 753,060 immigrants were naturalized in the US
* 1 million immigrants were granted citizenship in the EU
So I guess that's another category in which the US has been superseded by the EU (like e.g. GDP, exports and tourism).
[0]: https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/frequently-requested...
[1]: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/...
EDIT: If you think this is an unfair comparison, remember that EU citizenship grants you the right to live and work in any EU country. Citizenship in any one member country is effectively for most intents and purposes citizenship in all of the EU.
See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizenship_of_the_European_Un...
2. The only way to be granted asylum is if you're already in the US. The only way to enter the US legally is using an intentionally overloaded system that may require you to wait for months only to be denied entry -- which is not exactly an option if you're genuinely in need of asylum.
3. Corporations drive down wages. Corporations are exploiting illegal immigrants. Maybe the problem is your government isn't cracking down on illegal employment enough?
4a. I see you don't agree with the concept of asylum. That's okay, but it still makes you a terrible human being. Just saying.
4b. Show me a study that proves that immigration is a long-term net negative. There are cherry-picked samples showing short-term negatives, yes, but they're intentionally misleading.
Why are those seeking asylum being essentially entrapped in a web of systems and then being punished for not being lawyers whom memorized every single little detail on the books?
What is it that makes crossing a border seeking refuge from violence worse than people who drive drunk and get leniency, or those that speed or endanger the lives of other people?
And why do people keep making moral judgments as if a law by the virtue of existing makes it just or sound. Every day I guarantee you violate some sort of law and yet even people convicted of misdemeanors never lose full access to their family.
Not every crime is prosecuted and not every conviction means prison. Why should immigration be different?
(And that's before we even get to the question of reports where people presenting themselves for asylum -- a legal process -- have been treated as if they're breaking the law. Or ways in which recent policy seems to have been tweaked to otherwise gum up legal immigration avenues.)
Prosecution of illegal immigration is a bit special as anything short of full enforcement is arguably open borders. It’s unreasonably to expect an illegal entrant to show up for a court date. They’ve already demonstrated they won’t respect the law.
For example, there are people that have gotten away with driving drunk and killing people. Does that mean we've effectively legalized drunk driving? What kind of twisted logic is it that if we don't prosecute every single illegal immigrant to the absolute full extent that it results in open borders?
Why should people seeking asylum be treated worse than murderers and killers?
The asylum part is irrelevant for anything beyond creating a sob story for marketing politically divisive messaging.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/migrant-seeking-asylum-say...
You may apply for asylum regardless of how you entered or your current status.
1. You are being persecuted for something like religion or ethnicity. Poverty and ordinary gang violence doesn't count.
2. You must declare asylum in the first safe country you reach. Given that both Canada and Mexico are considered safe countries, it is extremely difficult to meet this requirement. You'd pretty much have to sneak onto an airplane without being caught.
It is a criminal offense to illegally cross the border, a misdemeanor, but undocumented => illegally crossed is not always true or obvious. For example, one could overstay their visa.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1325
"... Any alien who (1) enters or attempts to enter the United States at any time or place other than as designated by immigration officers, or (2) eludes examination or inspection by immigration officers, or (3) attempts to enter or obtains entry to the United States by a willfully false or misleading representation or the willful concealment of a material fact, shall, for the first commission of any such offense, be fined under title 18 or imprisoned not more than 6 months, or both, and, for a subsequent commission of any such offense, be fined under title 18, or imprisoned not more than 2 years, or both. ..."
I would also suspect, that knowingly demanding/putting ones children into position to protect parent's illegal activities, should be illegal. Although, admittedly, I do no know by which statue.
The asylum process takes a lengthy indeterminate period of time and their parents choose to apply for asylum -- repeat: their parents are informed of this and they make an informed choice to be placed into custody while this process occurs. They always have the choice to voluntarily be deported with their children back to their country of origin.
Attempting to illegally enter the US is a crime, if that wasn't self-evident enough. Criminals are placed into custody and children are not allowed to be placed into custody with the adults they arrived with.
A humane thing to do, is for the parents that are committing the crime of illegal entry, and being deported -- to take their children with them.
But instead, they are dropping their kids off here, knowing that US cannot deport them, together with their parents.
And then they are crying-wolf, together with a few intellectually-dishonest politicians, that US immigration law, when enforced, is not humane.
An inhumane thing to do, is to you use your own children as a shield, to avoid being punished for the crimes you are committing.
Trying to put myself into shoes of those parents or children , the feeling must be horrifying.
I guess the horribleness of the situation, is the same regardless of the nature of the crime.
I wonder if criminal offenders will demand similar treatment, and argue in court, that their offense justifies similar treatment.
Is there a country/policy that allows children and parents to stay together in temporary incarceration or detention? This is one of those things, I hope none of us would have to experience.
Also, as I am reading more: it seems that there are 2 separate initial positions:
A) one that every illegal immigrant must be treated as asylum seeker, unless proven otherwise.
B) An illegal immigrant committed a crime, and is not an asylum seeker. That is: asylum seeker must report him/herself as such, at the legal border entry -- and let the border agent determine next steps.
I know, and have worked with plenty of people whose papers weren't in order. They are people, just like you or me. I certainly have violated the law in my life, and perhaps with less noble intentions than seeking a better life in another country.
We are witnessing a series of trial balloons, and they got just a little ahead of the ball on this one. Today, Mexicans. Tomorrow, dissidents.
PS. I know, I am assigning a stereotypical job to an undocumented immigrant.
If the level of my income is a function of how many other people are denied the ability to do the same job then I've got bigger concerns than my income level.
The quote engraved on the Statue of Liberty comes to mind...
“Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
A) is not what the Statue of Liberty is about, it's about Liberty
B) was added well after the statue's construction and
C) is a poem, not a law of the USA.
If you really knew what Emma Lazarus's (EDIT: wrong last name used at first) views were, it might give you pause... (hint: she hated Ashkenazi Jews and saw them as low-class)
We have had some quote it as if were law, which I why I mentioned that. It isn't law, nor is it a foundational/original view of the USA dating from the Revolutionary War.
As for your hinting, it's BS. Emma Lazarus was Jewish herself, get involved in activism when Jews were suffering pogroms in Russia and many of them began to emigrate to New York, helped found a school for Jewish refugees and wrote numerous advocacy articles on behalf of said refugees. I'm sure you can find an example of something she said that seems cringeworthy 130 years later.
EDIT: Why am I being downvoted?
I asked a legitimate question. If illegal immigrants moved into your neighborhood and affected the socioeconomic status, school ratings etc of your neighborhood, how will you react? Will you advocate for the same policies you are advocating now?
I have a feeling most of the people who are supporting illegal immigration don't have skin in the game.
P.S. I am not stereotyping all dreamer kids, anecdotally, my wife who works in a school told me some of her best students are dreamers.
Also, it is not always corporations that are hiring people. I have a gardener who comes to my house with assistants, some people told me his assistants are undocumented. Am I supposed to racially profile people and ask for their immigration papers? Sounds racist to me.
The most humane policy is to make the expectations very clear to potential illegal immigrants. If you enter this country illegally without a legitimate asylum claim we will deport you without mercy.
My comment was a single sentence, and it wasn't about what I wanted but about what many American business sectors do.
Like it or not, the US benefits greatly from illegal labor. Having a "merciless" immigration policy in a country full of immigrants and the descendents of immigrants otherwise happy to exploit illegal immigration en masse is hypocritical.
>The most humane policy is to make the expectations very clear to potential illegal immigrants.
No, the most humane policy is to treat people humanely, not warn them beforehand of your intent to do otherwise.
Although, granted, they can't legally give it to an illegal immigrant, they can still legally not let you keep it.
In fact, as birth rates decline in the first world and countries' populations age, immigration is becoming an important lever to maintain a sufficient supply of labor to fund retiree's pensions and healthcare.
The real beneficiaries are the oligarchs pushing the open borders agenda.
Why not make their homelands better places to live instead? Why must all culture & communities be perpetually disrupted with war, economic liberalism, socialism, drugs, human trafficking?
Let's fix the root issues. Most of these people would rather have good homes with intact communities where they are from. Who wants to be a refugee or an illegal immigrant?
Let's be pro-human for a change, without the fake double-speak that destroys culture & families.
---
Edit: Why the downvotes? Are you pro human trafficking?
Here's an analogy. What happens when you open the membrane of a cell? Would it be atomist to not allow anything & everything to penetrate into the internals of the cell?
The USA has the benefit of a strong economy & a strong set of laws. When you open the border, the laws are weakened while criminal elements that have been nurtured in states with weaker laws (& weakened culture) are naturally drawn to the strong economy & weakened set of laws.
All one needs to do is look around for the proof. Illegal Fentanyl & Heroin is trafficked through Mexico. Law abiding Mexican people are the victims of gruesome cartel violence.
5 of the top 10 most dangerous cities in the world are in Mexico. All of the top 10 most dangerous cities in the world are in Mexico, Venezuela, and Brazil. Something very wrong is happening & opening the borders in NOT the solution. In fact, it's part of the same system, with the same people being responsible, that is destroying these countries.
We need to look beyond labels (e.g. Humanitarian) and look at the results of the works. Sometimes what is seen as a "good deed" is really a Trojan Horse of misery.
One thing about psychopathy; these people don't care about ideology. They care about dominating others & will collaborate with other psychopaths, across ideologies, to further their aims.
Open Borders is push by wealthy people who don't have to deal with the consequences. They benefit from destroying the surrounding culture because with a debased culture, they can dominate the population. Many are also manipulative. They will encourage outrage over myopic matters, to control the narrative to distract everybody from the real issues at play.
I would then try to improve myself and get a job where I cannot be easily replaced by someone who likely doesn't even speak the local language.
Well, to be fair, most immigration policy can be traced to blatantly racist policies, for instance against people of chinese descent.
Benjamin Franklin directly puts forth and supports the notion of America as a place for white people(British/saxon) in the 1750s.
That's not a very accurate reading of American history. There have been many instances in America's past of anti-immigrant sentiment, and even violence.
Here's a particularly good article about anti-immigrant cartoons from the early 1900s: https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/11/racist-...
Would you say the same for other laws and rights, like gun ownership?
Asking that immigrants be treated humanely is not the equivalent of asking for no restrictions on immigration at all.
For ~40 years now, people have consistently wanted restrictions on illegals coming into the country.
We have had essentially, tyrannical lawlessness at the Federal level in the refusal to seriously enforce immigration laws.
My impression is that gun laws have tightened, at least in the area of schools (banned on school grounds), but I can't say for sure.
This is a naive reading of the politics. Very few people are actively in favor of illegal immigration. Many people believe the cures (that is, the ones that politicians push for) are worse than the disease. My personal view is that if we really wanted to solve the problem, we would do it on the economic side; there are whole sectors of our economy that everyone knows are propped up by the employment of illegal immigrants. Nobody talks about that because the people who benefit most are strong, organized, and relatable (upstanding well-to-do businesspeople). Instead, everyone goes after the weak, disorganized, and unrelatable (scary foreigners who don't even speak our language).
People who own hotels and golf courses, for instance.
This would just drive up the value of stolen identities and make illegal immigrants even more indentured to organized criminals that supply them with such.
On a side note, a few well-told and politically neutral stories out of Hollywood wouldn't hurt here. We'll likely have immigration solved before we could actually expect that, but a guy can dream.
For example, one of your workers disappears and you discover that they walked off with $millions worth of your stuff. You report this grand theft, giving the police the supposed identity. The police later tell you that this person died 3 years before you hired him.
For example, you hire somebody who uses a stolen identity to pass your background check. They just got out of prison for beating their previous boss to death.
For example, you hire a supposed professional with some sort of certification. They might claim to be a doctor, a Professional Engineer, a lawyer, or a Certified Public Accountant. By identity theft, they convince you that your business can depend on them to meet legal requirements and do competent work.
Correct identity is rather important.
Allow any immigrant to declare themselves. Give them an immigrant specific id so that they can go to an employer and work legally while paying local, state, and federal taxes.
Keeping the system closed is what allows exploitation. Stolen identities are needed to work in the closed system else the boss needs to break the law, and plenty of employers do just that.
Right now the employers are held accountable in many cases. They are the first line of defense to make sure someone we have decided is an illegal immigrant and not allowed to work in the US, doesn't work. We selectively enforce this behavior with laws that punish businesses that allow illegals to work.
The Voter ID laws are all about putting a barrier in place to prevent $DEMOGRAPHIC from voting, then making it exceedingly difficult for $DEMOGRAPHIC to pass that barrier, even though it’s well within $DEMOGRAPHIC right to vote.
How familiar are you with the voting laws in Brazil and the reasoning behind them?
In my opinion, the voting laws in Brazil are not bad.
The US is very different than Brazil. One big difference is that in Brazil the TSE and the TREs and also the electronic ballot are standard. Here, each state has its system of voting and counting vote.
I believe that Brazil's problem is not at the vote, but after the politicians get elected.
Here, there's gerrymandering, vote suppression, Citizens United, super PACs. Very different problems.
But fear not. At the rate the current administration is implementing ignorant, racist and stupid policies, soon we will be just like Brazil.
The irony? The corruption at the highest echelons of the government and people cheering up bad leaders is not what I had in mind when I wished some stuff here was more like in Brazil (I thought more about food and extroverted people).
I think the federal courts struck it down.
Almost all of them have come back that (a) they discourage elderly, minorities etc from voting and (b) they have no impact whatsoever on the levels of voter fraud.
To start, in America the vote is not mandatory like in Brazil. Here, the "ID requirement" is not being implemented as a way to make better elections or prevent fraud, but as a way to suppress and limit the power of minorities, which by many complicated reasons, usually votes do the left.
Also, illegal immigration is/was a product of the prosperity of the country. It only became an economic issue after 9/11, when the government tightened policies and made impossible for people without proper documents to contribute.
Undocumented immigrants can't buy and drive a car (in most states) or be able to pay for health-insurance (it used to be much cheaper when they could). Instead, they drive without a license to feed their families and when they get into an accident or have a health "scare," we food the bill.
Unfortunately, the system seems beyond repair at this point. Some political groups take advantage of the fear and lack of information of parts of the population to gather support for their agendas. Not even children are out of limits, and the top of the pyramid is taking advantage of the situation, throwing even more gasoline on the fire.