Immigration Today: Change IS Needed

Estimates vary on how many immigrants entered the country during the last four years. It is possibly 14 million, including more than three million in the past year. 3-million-immigrant-crossings-2024

Combined, CBP apprehension/encounter data under the Biden-Harris administration totals 10,552,984.

This total excludes more than 2 million who illegally entered and evaded capture, known as gotaways. CBP does not publicly report gotaway data. The Center Square first reported gotaway data in 2021 after receiving it from a Border Patrol agent. Retired CBP officials say the number is higher because gotaway data is underreported by about 20%.

Combined, the number of illegal border crossers under the Biden-Harris administration totals at least nearly 14 million.

We should ponder whether these are appropriate numbers and the impact of current immigration policy. Questioning or criticizing this policy is not xenophobic nor racist. The NY Times, however, says voting for Trump and his immigration policies makes one hate-filled. For them racism explains everything.

xenophobia-and-hate-speech-are-spiking-heading-into-the-election

This year is different. Former President Donald J. Trump’s campaign, filled with anti-immigrant rhetoric, is playing out in a country where researchers report seeing particularly high levels of hate speech against minority groups.

As a counter, I ask: should we let in every immigrant with absolutely no vetting? Americans have no abiding issue with immigration; it has been a a long-standing national tradition and it was how the country was established. However, the accelerating increase in numbers, the lack of concern about who exactly is coming in, and the manner immigrants are assimilating are all problematic. These fundamental problems lead to others:

• an inability to locate hundreds of thousands of immigrant children https://www.econotimes.com/New-Border-Czar-Homan-Promises-to-Find-Half-a-Million-Missing-Children–We-Will-Reunite-Them-1693555,
• an increase in drugs coming across the border and increased overdose deaths youth Fentanyl crisis is an international attack on America. We must fight back. (msn.com).
• lawlessness at the border and government’s unwillingness to allow law enforcement to do its job or to confront the Mexican cartels https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mexican-drug-cartels-terrorist-organization-what-would-that-mean/,
• sex trafficking of children https://seek-the-truth.com/2023/07/22/sound-of-freedom-what-controversy/,
• illegal immigrants drawn to a welfare state and encouraged to vote for their benefactor (now or in the future under a potential amnesty).
• infrastructure problems and financial burdens created as immigrants flood the interior. NYC mayor Eric Adams speaks often of the strain immigration placed on his city:
  
  https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/sep/07/new-york-city-immigration-bussing-comments-mayor-eric-adams

The mayor of New York, Eric Adams, has said an increase in migration would “destroy” the city, seemingly blaming the Biden administration for failing to provide federal support as much as the Republican governors who have sent asylum seekers north.

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/08/09/eric-adams-new-york-migrants-cost-00110472. 

“If we don’t get the support we need, New Yorkers could be left with a $12 billion bill,” he said in a formal address to the public from City Hall.

“The immigration system in this nation is broken; it has been broken for decades,” Adams said, declaring: “Today, New York City has been left to pick up the pieces.”

Even more strain is placed on small border towns. Where should immigrants live when there is not enough housing to support them? How are schools, hospitals, public services, etc. to respond to the influx?

Recently, thousands of Haitian immigrants were forced to live in squalor under an El Paso bridge for months https://www.cbsnews.com/news/haitian-migrants-texas-del-rio-international-bridge/.

This is the awful picture of immigration today.

Today’s and Prior Immigrant Booms

Today’s immigration numbers are not unprecedented. The US hit similar immigration peaks in the late 19th and early 20th century. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/09/27/u-s-immigrant-population-in-2023-saw-largest-increase-in-more-than-20-years/

While the percentage of the immigrant population is similar (around 15% back then as well as today), 15% in 1890 was 2.2 million; there are 20+ times more immigrants today (Pew estimates 47.8 million).

Immigration had a long decline between 1910 and 1970 as mostly European immigrants assimilated. There were fewer than 10 million immigrants in 1970 (< 5% of the population) before numbers started increasing again.

In 1986, Ronald Reagan granted amnesty to about 3 million illegal recent immigrants then coming in from the Southern border. Numbers have increased since, but have remained manageable until recently. Fourteen million immigrants just in the last four years (per the estimate above) accounts for almost 30% of all immigrants currently in the country. us-net-immigration-by-president-2001-2024

The recent increase has been mainly due to illegal immigration, but why should illegal immigration be the bulk of the numbers?

The Biden Administration reversed the downward trend from Trump’s four years. They seem content with the current state, and any call for limitations is met with howls of racism.

Republicans correctly impeached Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in February, saying he “willfully and systematically refused to comply with immigration laws,” and “breached public trust” by falsely telling Congress the border was secure.

The manner immigrants assimilate today differs greatly from the prior immigration boom. We once expected immigrants to learn the language and adopt the principles of our nation’s foundation. But folks like Mayorkas who open the gates willy-nilly, often reject founding principles and set virtually no entry standards. I think they see immigration as a means for re-making the country.

In October 2024, VP Kamala Harris finally admitted immigration has been a problem, but said it transcends administrations (Full interview: Vice President Kamala Harris sits down with Bret Baier in ‘Special Report’ exclusive | Fox News Video ). Yes, immigration has been increasing for fifty years, but the problem spiraled out-of-control during the Biden Administration.

Why exactly has the Biden/Harris Administration been so eager to bring increasingly more immigrants into the country and why have they ignored the problems it caused?

Differences: Then and Now

Immigrants once came by boat to places like Ellis Island (Ellis Island, the most notable port of entry, was open for 62 years). Immigrants were processed legally, given health inspections, and asked questions regarding their identity, their character and their intentions. Today, we ask few questions and immediately release them into the country.

In 1890, our vast country was relatively unpopulated, with wide open spaces to settle into. America is far more populous today. Where are millions of immigrants arriving today to go? There is no longer a Western Frontier to populate. Instead, border towns are overwhelmed. States then move migrants to interior towns. Springfield, Ohio is a middle America town of 60,000, which has been overwhelmed in a few short years. https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/19/us/springfield-ohio-haitians-immigration-cec/index.html

There’s no official tally. Mayor Rob Rue told CNN the city’s population has grown about 25% over the past three years, in part due to the arrival of Haitian immigrants.

The biggest concern during the prior immigration boom was medical; the government sought to prevent infectious diseases from entering. Today, we have immigrants from more than 100 countries. COVID screening was not even done the last four years. There should also be no doubt our enemies today take advantage of the porous border to spy on our military, infiltrate our education system, or create terrorist cadres intent on future damage.

The sheer numbers of immigrants across multiple entry points make it impossible to recreate the rigorous Ellis Island process. Therefore, we do not screen for people who are threats. They claim political asylum and are shuffled along.

Foreign criminal organizations also take advantage of the golden opportunities available:

My home is a Tren de Aragua war zone — yours could be next (nypost.com

Members of Tren de Aragua — a vicious Venezuelan prison gang that has brought sex trafficking and violent crime into communities across our country — began patrolling my apartment building with guns, beating down doors and demanding keys from my neighbors.

They made life as uncomfortable for us as possible — blasting music at all hours, exerting armed intimidation while loitering outside our doors, banging on the walls, riding motorcycles into the buildings, and revving engines to fill the air with exhaust while we slept.

Then they took over units in my building floor by floor.

They started changing the locks on our buildings; in some cases, they even changed the doors.

They would pull people over at gunpoint in the parking lot.

The illegal immigrant convicted of killing Georgia nursing student Laken Riley was a Tren de Aragua member; this gang is now present in Georgia and several other US states.

Venezuelan migrant gang Tren de Aragua now operating in 16 states: report | Fox News

The bloodthirsty Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua (TdA), which has been terrorizing neighborhoods across the country, is now operating in 16 states, according to a new Homeland Security memo cited by the New York Post. 

Riley’s killer’s story is actually a microcosm of the problem. He was originally detained by the border patrol in Texas, before being allowed into the country. He was then bussed to New York and given a residence (all at taxpayer expense). While in New York, authorities discovered he had a criminal history. Still no action was taken. He was later arrested for endangering his five-year-old step-child. Next, he was given a work permit in New York. Sure, why not? He was then reunited with his brother in Georgia (again at taxpayer’s expense). In Georgia, he was involved in yet another legal incident; this time at Wal-Mart. His brother, by the way, had also been arrested for DUI. Weren’t there enough red flags prior to the death of Laken Riley? Her death could have been avoided. https://www.11alive.com/article/news/crime/jose-ibarra-accused-killer-laken-riley-georgia-immigration-system/85-0294133e-f5e1-4e2f-a2df-ab017b498508

Venezuela Emptying Jails?

During the 1980s, Fidel Castro sent thousands of Cuban prisoners to the U.S. in the infamous Mariel boat lift. Today, a U.S. Congressman has a source within the Customs and Border Patrol (CPB) who says Nicolas Maduro is doing it again. https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/09/us/tren-de-aragua-venezuela-gang/index.html

If true, it justifies Trump’s tough immigration stance. Of course, PolitiFact defends President Biden’s honor saying it is untrue: politifact-claim-about-venezuela-sending-prisoners-to-US

• The Department of Homeland Security did not confirm the existence of an “intelligence report” about Venezuela sending criminals to the southern U.S. border. The claim originated with a Breitbart News article that cited an unnamed Customs and Border Protection source.
• PolitiFact was unable to find any evidence of the report’s existence or any proof that Venezuela is taking those actions

Interestingly, PolitiFact uses government sources to validate claims. Progressives of the past always doubted government claims. Ironically, the original claim came from a US Congressman tipped by CBP officials.

Tren de Aragua’s US presence has been prominently highlighted by all media, so Democrat politicians acknowledge the problem is real but say these are one-off incidents.

Were these gangsters sent by Nicolas Maduro or did they come of their own volition? Even if he Maduro is not involved, let us at least acknowledge all the incentives for overseas criminals.

President Trump, of course, walked into this fray.

https://www.factcheck.org/2024/06/crime-drop-in-venezuela-does-not-prove-trumps-claim-the-country-is-sending-criminals-to-u-s/

“Venezuela was crime ridden,” Trump said in remarks on May 31 after his conviction in the hush money case. “Caracas, their cities, crime ridden two years ago, three years ago. They just reported a 72% drop in crime in the last year because all of their criminals, most of them, and the rest are coming in now, the ones that didn’t come in. In Venezuela, their prisons have been emptied into the United States. Their criminals and drug dealers have been taken out of the cities and brought into the United States, and that’s true with many other countries.”

This article, which displays skepticism for Trump’s claims, still provides supporting circumstantial evidence for his claims:

Although Venezuelan security officials in May reported a 25% drop in crime this year compared with the same period in 2023, “the absence of official reports makes it impossible to verify the data,” LaSusa said in a May 28 report.

NGO, the independent Venezuelan Observatory of Violence, in December reported a 25% decrease in violent deaths between 2022 and 2023. (Violent deaths include homicides, deaths by police intervention and suspected violent deaths under investigation.) That drop was widely reported in U.S. media. If Trump is citing the murder tally as a proxy for overall crime, he is vastly overstating the one-year drop.

Trump’s numbers may be overstated, but the charge may indeed hold water. Why not suspect a miscreant like Maduro to export his problems?

The government created two commissions to review the cases of prisoners and to determine if they should be “granted freedom,” Nieto said. “In fact, there are many who have been released.”

“The Ministry for the Penitentiary Service many years ago gave the order not to allow the entry of new people [to the traditional prisons] if they did not authorize it,” Nieto said. “This ministry prohibited the entry of new inmates into Venezuelan prisons, which is where they should be. This caused the preventive care centers to collapse and the preventive care centers to become, as they are today, the new prisons of Venezuela.”

According to the World Prison Brief website maintained by Helen Fair of the Institute for Crime and Justice Police Research, Venezuela’s prison population (not including pre-trial detainees) declined from 37,543 in 2020 to 32,200 in 2022 (and had been declining for the four years before that as well).

This article ends with the following opinion:

Andrew Arthur of the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates lower immigration, wrote a column noting that Cuba did something like that in the 1980s, and he argued that since there are ideological and political ties between Cuba and Venezuela, “the idea may not be as specious as some have claimed.”

Of course, criminals represent a small portion of all immigrants, but those few are very problematic and perhaps even undercounted:

But among the large number of Venezuelan migrants who are crossing illegally into the U.S. and then seeking asylum status, “I think they absolutely are by and large good people,” Owens said.

Nonetheless, he said, there is “a very small amount” among those apprehended that have criminal backgrounds, including “convicted sexual predators” and “convicted gang members.” Owens said it is only logical that there is a “higher incidence” of criminals among the so-called gotaways, because they are afraid to turn themselves in for CBP scrutiny.

Why is this Allowed?

The last election demonstrated Americans have made the connections between unfettered immigration and unintended consequences. Americans are not bigoted to note:

• there is a small percentage wreaking havoc or here for the direct purpose of subverting our government or to kill Americans
• cities have had difficulty absorbing large numbers of immigrants in a very short period
• immigrants themselves are often abused or taken advantage of by foreign criminals shepherding them in

Furthermore, Americans are legitimately concerned about a government which has:

• deliberately allowed as many immigrants as possible to enter while the Homeland Security Secretary refuses to acknowledge the border is out-of-control dhs-promoted-illegal-immigration
• refused to set entry standards or demand recent immigrants assimilate into our culture as has done throughout our history
• created “sanctuary” cities and states which openly defying the nation’s immigration law

Limiting immigration to two million per year is not the solution.

In 2023, Vivek Ramaswamy posited a theory regarding immigration. Of course, it was immediately attacked as a white supremacist conspiracy:

vivek-ramaswamy-great-replacement-theory

Midway through last week’s Republican presidential-primary debate, the entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy started running through conspiracy theories like a frustrated child mashing buttons on Street Fighter, alleging . . . that the so-called “Great Replacement” theory “is not some grand right-wing conspiracy theory, but a basic statement of the Democratic Party’s platform.”

It was slightly more bizarre to watch Ramaswamy justify “the Great Replacement,” a white-supremacist conspiracy theory holding that, in the words of the disgraced former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, “the Democratic Party is trying to replace the current electorate, the voters now casting ballots, with new people, more obedient voters from the Third World.”

Yet, a year later, in the midst of the 2024 presidential election, former President Bill Clinton said the same thing:

Bill-Clinton-stumps-for-Harris-calls-for-more-immigration

“We’ve got the lowest birth rate we have had in well over a hundred years,” Clinton told voters in Georgia. With the Harris-Walz logo right over his shoulder and while discussing immigration reform, he added, “We are not at replacement level, which means we have got to have somebody come here if we want to grow the economy.”

Does President Clinton’s use of the word “replacement” make him a white supremacist? Furthermore, why is importing more foreign workers the best solution? How about Americans have more babies and stop aborting them?

Perhaps, Ramaswamy and Carlson are more correct than Clinton: Democrats determined twenty-five years ago a new electorate would better serve their political fortunes.

Virtually all prominent Democrats were not long ago strident opponents of illegal immigration:

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/nidhiprakash/bernie-sanders-immigration-record

“I believe we have very serious immigration problems in this country,” [Senator Bernie] Sanders said during a 2007 press event, with AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka behind him. “I think as you’ve heard today, sanctions against employers who employ illegal immigrants is virtually nonexistent. Our border is very porous.”

“And I think at a time when the middle class is shrinking, the last thing we need is to bring over in a period of years, millions of people into this country who are prepared to lower wages for American workers,” he later added. Sanders voted against the 2007 bill, but went on to vote in favor of a similar 2013 bill while making plain his fears that it could exacerbate the issue of immigrant workers “making it harder for US citizens to find jobs.”

Yet, Senator Sanders now wants border crossings decriminalized. In other words: let everyone in. He and his Democrat colleagues have completely reversed their positions; they are fully aligned with the Biden/Harris disastrous policy of the last four years.

Is it because Democrat fortunes have been aided by a growing share of Hispanic American (19% of the population) and Asian American (6%) voters? It is good for business to import potential voters more likely to vote for your party (either illegally now or legally in the future). Prior to the 2024 election it was estimated 61% of Hispanic and 63% of Asian voters are Democrats or Democrat leaning, compared to 35% and 36% who are Republicans.

And there’s more. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton recently sued the US government for not verifying citizenship of 450,000 voters.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/texas-ag-sues-biden-harris-admin-not-verifying-citizenship-450k-potential-ineligible-voters 

The US government sued the state of Virginia to keep non-citizens on the voter rolls. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/10/15/doj-sues-virginia-voter-rolls/75683352007/

The Democrat controlled U.S. Senate refused to consider the SAVE act which would require proof of U.S. citizenship to vote (it passed the Republican House).

Are these measures intended to allow non-citizens to vote? What’s racist about that conclusion?

Please ignore the immigrants hiding behind the curtain.

Change is Coming

Change is coming because enough Americans recognize the Biden/Harris administration ignored legitimate concerns for too long.

Allowing millions of people, from places unknown, to INVADE and take over our Country, is an unpardonable sin. OUR BORDERS MUST BE CLOSED, AND THE TERRORISTS, CRIMINALS, AND MENTALLY INSANE, IMMEDIATELY REMOVED FROM AMERICAN CITIES AND TOWNS, DEPORTED BACK TO THEIR COUNTIES OF ORIGIN. WE WANT PEOPLE TO COME INTO OUR COUNTRY, BUT THEY MUST LOVE OUR NATION, AND COME IN LEGALLY AND THROUGH A SYSTEM OF MERIT. Donald Trump on social media, September 16, 2024

We who voted for change recognize the value of immigration, but we want standards before allowing immigrants into the country, expectations for assimilation set, and reasonable limits on the numbers allowed in. These concerns have nothing to do with race or ethnicity and everything to do with common sense.

Dave about-me
seek-the-truth