(This article and yesterday’s, which I posted
here - http://crushlimbraw.blogspot.com/2017/03/trump-does-central-america-favor-by.html
- illustrate in spades the absolute asinine ‘compassion’ of Leftists and
Churchian do-gooders. Aiding and abetting massive immigration is a LOSE/LOSE
result for both countries – it overloads our social welfare system, schools and
jails and devastates the countries that send them. Tell that to your
‘compassionate’ Leftist/Churchian idiots who claim a higher virtue by spending
your tax money. It’s time for them to take their heads out of their
hindquarters and use the brains God gave them.
The following reply to one of my Disqus posts
was so good, I repeat it here:
“Illegal immigration has had a devastating
impact on the societies that ship illegals. The govts may benefit from the
remittances but they do not benefit from the raw talents of their people, they
just take the money and leave the people for us to take care of. This is why
productivity is so low, the people have never been invested in and their
creative ideas and talent are never used in the home country. It also excuses
the govts from educating their people. Central Americans have the lowest
education levels of all immigrants. Illegal immigration is also bad for
families - why do you think MS-13 emerged? Fatherless boys. Why were they
fatherless? Because one parent was away from the family working illegally abroad
in the states. It's devastated the society. Now they have rising incomes from
remittances but along with rising incomes comes a demographic time bomb, they
don't have enough population growth, this always happens with rising incomes.
What is going on is that they will get old before they get truly rich. Such is
the impact of encouraging illegal immigration.”)
Critics of the border wall proposed by
President Trump have said the cost
is prohibitive under current
budget and economic conditions, that no way is Mexicogoing
to pay for it, and shifting funds away from the TSA, Coast Guard, and FEMA
are counterproductive in terms of national security.
These criticisms ignore the costs to the
U.S. in terms other than money -- increased crime, overtaxed law enforcement,
the drain on public resources such as education, medical care, etc., and the
driving down of real wages through an endless supply of cheap labor.
In fact, thanks in large part to the mere
threat of the wall, the sudden enforcement of existing law, and the stripping
of funding from sanctuary cities by
President Trump, illegal immigration has plummeted by 40 percent in February, a
trend that if continued will reduce the costs and burdens of illegal
immigration to the point that the benefits of enhanced border security,
including the wall, will be more than paid for. As the New
York Post noted:
The number of illegal immigrants crossing into the United
States from Mexico declined by 40 percent from January to February, Homeland
Security Secretary John Kelly said on Wednesday.
The downturn came after President Donald Trump took office
on Jan. 20 vowing to deport many of the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants
in the United States…
He said the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency,
which compiled the data, historically sees a 10 percent to 20 percent increase
in apprehensions of illegal immigrants from January to February…
“Since the administration’s implementation of Executive
Orders to enforce immigration laws, apprehensions and inadmissible activity is
trending toward the lowest monthly total in at least the last five years,”
Kelly said.
President Trump has shown that border
security is not that hard. It merely requires willpower and resolve that puts
the impact of illegal immigration on America and its citizens above the impact
on the political fortunes of pandering politicians. Now comes a study
from the Center for Immigration Studies showing
that this ongoing reduction in illegal immigration will reduce related costs to
the point the wall is paid for:
President Donald Trump’s border wall only needs to stop
about 10 percent of illegal crossing in order to pay for itself, according to
an analysis by the Center for Immigration Studies.The estimated $12 to $15
billion cost of the wall would quickly be offset by the savings to the
government if fewer illegal immigrants arrive in the country over the next
decade, CIS found. Only a small portion of the population of people
who are expected to attempt an illegal crossing in the next decade -- between 9
and 12 percent -- would have to be stopped for the wall to totally pay for
itself.
The analysis from CIS, a group that advocates for
moderating immigration levels, relies on fiscal estimates from the National
Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NAS) for the average cost to
taxpayers of illegal immigrants. NAS estimates one illegal immigrant costs
state and local governments approximately $75,000 in a lifetime, taking
into account taxes paid and the cost of providing benefits such as education and
health care.
Critics say the costs of illegal
immigration fall largely on state and local governments and it is a federal
government burdened with debt that has to write the checks. But the costs in
either case are born by the American taxpayer and the American worker. Ask Kate
Steinle’s father what the true costs of illegal immigration are and who pays
for them.
Trump was able to begin immediate
construction of the border wall and opening up bidding for contracts thanks to
a 2006 measure signed
into law by President George
W. Bush and supported by Democrats including then-senators Barack Obama, Joe
Biden, and Hillary Clinton.
Democrats are already grumbling about Donald Trump’s
proposed border wall, though Barack Obama and other leaders in their party
voted not so long ago for George W. Bush’s proposal to build a major wall
on the border with Mexico.
Bush signed the proposal into law in 2006, after it was
passed by huge bipartisan majorities in the House and Senate. The law ordered
the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to construct about 700 miles of
fencing along the southern border, and authorized the addition of lights
and cameras and sensors to enhance security. The law
explicitly required the wall
to be constructed of “at least two layers of reinforced fencing.”
Two-thirds of the Republican-led House approved the bill,
including 64 Democrats, and 80 of 100 senators approved the bill in the Senate.
Then Sens. Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton were among the 26
Democrats who approved the bill. Supporters also included Sen. Chuck
Schumer, who is set to take over leadership of the Senate for Democrats in
2016.
The Secure
Fence Act of 2006 required
the construction of 700 miles of new border fence along the 2,000-mile
U.S.-Mexico border. “The Secretary of Homeland Security shall provide for at
least two layers of reinforced fencing, the installation of additional physical
barriers, roads, lighting, cameras and sensors…” the act said.
It was to be modeled on the success of the
border barriers in the San Diego sector of the U.S. border. The operative word
was “secure.” Instead of this two-layer secure fence what has been built
consists of flimsy pedestrian fencing or vehicle fencing consisting of posts
people can slither through.
The two-tier fence in San Diego runs 14
miles along the border with Tijuana, Mexico. The first layer is a high steel
fence, with an inner high anti-climb fence with a no-man’s land in between. It
has been amazingly effective. According to a 2005 report by the Congressional
Research Service, illegal alien apprehensions in the San Diego sector dropped
from 202,000 in 1992 to 9,000 in 2004.
Cameras and sensors played a part but the
emphasis was on physical barriers and roads that were patrolled by real live
border guards, not by robots. Then in 2006 the Democrats took back Congress
and, in 2008, the White House.
They saw in unrestricted immigration a
means to fundamentally transform the demographics of America and its political
landscape. A wave of what some called “undocumented Democrats” would be allowed
to flood across the border as ICE was told not
to enforce the law. Former border state governor Janet Napolitano, who
became DHS secretary, reportedly once said: “You show me a 50-foot fence and
I’ll show you a 51-foot ladder at the border,” The rest, as they say, is
history.
But the consequences of unrestricted
illegal immigration soon became too big to ignore and with a candidate willing
to touch the new third rail of American politics, border security, a political
movement chanting “build the wall” swept Trump into power.
The San Diego fence worked. So will
Trump’s wall. Build the Wall.
Daniel John Sobieski is a freelance writer whose pieces have
appeared inInvestor’s
Business Daily, Human Events, Reason Magazine and the ChicagoSun-Times among other publications.