"Secure borders" is such a vague phrase - in various courses you can learn about the history of borders, the political theories and history of nation states and concepts of human rights, the socioeconomic drivers of migration, etc. There's no "Open Borders 101 Class", and confidently proclaiming that "They learn these things from someone" is a huge red flag.
You CAN hear about "Border security" from politicians of various persuasions, but as far as I can tell there's not a lot of ideological (or really any kind of) consistency to be had from them.
Statistics published by federal agencies show miniscule levels of threats at the border compared to domestic threats. "Threats" abroad is and always has been a dogwhistle for Pentagon funding and expenditure, and that's not even addressing the question of how the US can reasonably expect to have jurisdiction in such cases rather than addressing these things diplomatically.
> realistic takes
Normative stance with absolutely zero authority. That is, until you make it clear what you consider "realistic". Dollars to donuts it's going to be cribbed directly from institutional (read: tautological) "common sense".
This conversation has already happened millions of times before. You're not actually addressing things in a way that moves the conversation forward.
Domestic policy, especially around jobs and employment, has been hostile to domestic workers. The US re: management of the economy does not correctly account for inevitable immigration, so the response is a reactionary one to conditions that could and should have been anticipated. We can make room in our economy for more workers because we know how to improve productivity: capital investment into productive enterprises.
The way we do capital investment today is largely by incentivizing private investors to take ownership of shares in companies, but as we've seen that creates perverse incentives around maximizing shareholder value -- see: massive layoffs of late, commonly justified by the phrase "wages are up to half of expenditure". It's a direct consequence of fiscal policy and the way the economy is structured. This doesn't even address things like wealth and income inequality, which are for this discussion out of scope.
What about a more holistic approach, with public money invested and public ownership of companies? This puts the companies in a context where they are measured not just by pure microcosmic profit measures, but by their contribution to GDP as well as exports. The government uses different functions for optimizing different metrics than private citizens. Free marketeers pretend that private investment can achieve the same macroscopic goals but we've seen exactly how and how often those assumptions, hopes, and dreams fail to be borne out in reality.
With more public investment, and easier paths to citizenship, US productivity re: GDP and exports would skyrocket if implemented correctly. American exceptionalists would come full circle to the ideals of earlier times by creating strength through diversity on the shoulders of a "nation of immigrants". What's more American than that?
All of this goes against institutional common sense, but even that's somewhat besides the point, because the point is that GP just assumes that their view on the matter is obviously and absolutely correct so the conversation ended before it ever began. To echo the pithy and trite tone of GP: know-it-alls and pooh-poohers are un-American.
You're not worried about indoctrination. You're worried you won't be able to be the one to indoctrinate.