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Illegal immigration burdens economy

by Cait Jacob


"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."

This, the inscription on the Statue of Liberty, offers immigrants an open invitation for a chance at a better life in the United States - a country founded by immigrants. And we should never close our shores to them.

According to the Census Bureau, about 11.5 percent of people living in the United States are foreign-born, and accounted for in that percentage are eight to nine million illegal immigrants. According to the Immigration and Naturalization Service, there were an estimated 40,000 illegal immigrants just in Ohio in the year 2000.

Now though there is nothing wrong with immigration, there are many things wrong with illegal immigration, and just as many problems with how the government is dealing with it.

According to a Jan. 10 Associated Press article, "Mexico says illegal immigrants should not be treated like criminals," Mexicans living in the United States sent home more than $16 billion in remittances in 2004. Clearly, even illegal immigrants that have come to the United States to work are more concerned with bolstering the quality of life in Mexico rather than permanently residing within our borders. Mexican President Vicente Fox has called the United States' recent attempts to better secure its borders "shameful." The real shameful thing is that Fox seems more concerned with chastising the U.S. than improving his country's economy, which cannot effectively support its citizens.

It is understandable that some Mexican citizens cross the border to work and accumulate a larger amount of wealth than possible in Mexico, but doing so illegally puts an unfair monetary burden on citizens of the United States - who either themselves or whose parents immigrated legally.

According to the Center for Immigration Studies, illegal immigrants put a tremendous strain on the federal budget. It is estimated that each year the government pays about $2.5 billion in Medicaid costs, $2.2 billion for medical treatment of uninsured illegal aliens, $1.9 billion in food assistance, $1.4 billion in federal aid to schools, $1.6 billion extra to the federal prison and court systems - not to mention other costs.

And just for the skeptics out there, most reputable organizations agree about the trend even if their estimates are marginally different. According to an Aug. 2004 article in the Washington Post, "Illegal Immigrants' Cost to Government Studied," illegal immigrants cost the federal government more than $10 billion a year (about one billion less than the CIS estimates).

According to the Federation for American Immigration Reform, Ohio requested $3.5 million in 1999 from the federal government in compensation for the cost of incarcerating illegal immigrants. But Ohio only received $1.3 million, forcing Ohio taxpayers to cover the extra $2.2 million.

Illegal immigration has re-emerged as an important issue in U.S. politics since volunteers from The Minuteman Project began guarding the border between the U.S. and Mexico. The House of Representatives passed a bill last December that would build a fence on the border in Arizona and Texas, and make it a felony to hire or harbor illegal immigrants. President Bush supports a far more lenient plan which would allow illegals already in the country to apply for the temporary worker program if they have a job. They could stay in the country for three years and have the option to renew their permits once. The president told Congress on Jan. 4, 2004, that the U.S. does not issue enough green cards to people who want to come to America to work.

The president's plan is to forgive millions of people who have shown no respect for our immigration laws, unlike millions of others who have filled out stacks of paper work, taken citizenship tests and patiently waited to come legally to this country.

The Immigration and Naturalization Service estimates that about 78,000 people enter the United States illegally from countries that the government associates with terrorism. Although some might think that Mexico presents such a threat, because of the porous nature of the Mexican/American border it could be a welcomed point of entry for terrorists that can no longer enter through traditional means.

There is nothing wrong with wanting to come to our country looking for a better life, but when doing so illegally puts an extra burden on those already here, it becomes a problem.

And one that the government must address.

- Cait Jacob is a freshman journalism major. Send her an e-mail at cj150204@ohiou.edu.