Thread: Billions Flowing out of U.S. from Illegal Remittances

Exclusive: Report: Billions Flowing out of U.S. from Illegal Remittances
Michael Cutler
Author: Michael Cutler
Source: The Family Security Foundation, Inc.
Date: May 3, 2007



Illegal aliens have found new ways to smuggle money out of the United States, making such traffic undetectable to our government. In this shocking new report, FSM Contributing Editor Michael Cutler provides you with extremely disturbing new dimensions to the illegal problem.



Report: Billions Flowing out of U.S. from Illegal Remittances


By Michael Cutler



The President has been trying to paint a rosy picture pertaining to our illegal immigration crisis. Last year he claimed that because arrests along the Mexican border were up, it should be interpreted that the Border Patrol was doing its job and the Border Patrol was dealing with the flood of illegal aliens across that border. This year the Border Patrol is claiming to be making fewer arrests and the President is now claiming that this indicates that there are fewer illegal aliens crossing our border with Mexico. It would seem that no matter what the statistics are, the President would find a way of showing that the crisis along our border with Mexico is being taken care of. It is a bit like saying, "Heads they win; tails we lose!"



The bottom line is that it is extremely difficult to know how to truly interpret these numbers. Are the arrests along our nation's southern border down because fewer illegal aliens are attempting to run our nation's border? Or is the Border Patrol performing its job less aggressively because many of their members have been intimidated by the outrageous arrest of Border Patrol Agents Ramos and Compean and others who were targeted by United States Attorney Johnny Sutton? There are so many variables in this equation that it is virtually impossible to decide effectively what the numbers really mean.



The challenge is to interpret statistics correctly, in order to determine what is happening with illegal immigration. The reason for which the majority of illegal aliens enter our country is to get jobs and then send money back home to assist their impoverished families. The article appearing in the April 30 issue of the Washington Post shows how each and every year the amount of money being wired out of the country has been rising dramatically. These wire transfers of money are known as remittances. When you consider just how much money is being wired out of the United States each year, it is easy to refute the arguments of those who claim that it would be far too expensive to hire enough Border Patrol agents and ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) Special Agents to deter the huge numbers of aliens who either run our nation's borders or enter through our ports of entry.



The Washington Post article pegs the amount of the remittances last year at $62.3 billion dollars. This is not, however, the only way that money is being drained from our nation's economy. Often illegal aliens, especially those involved in serious criminal activities such as drug trafficking and other such crimes, smuggle money out of the United States to make it undetectable to our government and to the governments of the countries to which the money is being sent. The reason for this is obvious. There are limits to how much money can be sent before reporting requirements kick in. When someone sends a large amount of money, it raises suspicions as to how the money was acquired, and red flags are raised.



In the movie, "All the President’s Men," the character who came to be known as "Deep Throat" told the reporters to "follow the money". That advice was actually very sound and should be considered whenever any crime is being investigated. In the case of illegal immigration, following the money trail will lead you to the countries from which the illegal aliens come. Looking at the drastic increase in the amounts of money being wired out of the country should make it clear that the reason the amounts have increased so drastically is because the number of aliens who are wiring money out of the United States has also increased dramatically. This is further substantiated by the fact that the number of alien fugitives has nearly doubled since September 2001. At that time, just over 300,000 such aliens failed to show up for deportation hearings. There are more than 600,000 such absconders today.



While the Washington Post article attempts to understand why there has been a dip in the remittances being wired out of the country, I believe that the report raises some reasonable explanations that can shed light on this phenomenon:



"Questions are surfacing over whether political and economic changes in the United States may be affecting the way immigrant workers spend their money,” one official said. “The bank is conducting a survey of immigrants to determine why they are sending less home. Anecdotal evidence suggests that raids on migrant communities by U.S. law enforcement officers and fear of deportation has prompted some to curb spending,” he added. “Others may be saving money to pay U.S. citizenship fees, wagering that a congressional debate over immigration law would result in allowing them to pay a penalty and legalize their immigration status. A downturn in the U.S. housing industry could also be trickling down to immigrants, who fill the majority of U.S. construction jobs."



The bottom line is that the illegal immigration crisis is costing the United States in many ways. When the President and other proponents say that the illegal aliens (undocumented workers in their intentionally-obfuscating parlance) “do the jobs that Americans won't do,” they are insulting every hard working American. If Americans will work in coal mines and steel foundries, drive garbage trucks and do all of those back-breaking, dangerous and filthy jobs, then I believe that there is no job an American won't take, as long as the paycheck will enable them to support themselves and their families. The massive influx of illegal aliens has caused huge sums of American dollars to be exported to other countries and these dollars are permanently lost to the American economy. The explanation is simple. Illegal aliens take the jobs Americans used to do but cannot afford to do any longer because the illegal aliens are willing to work for far smaller wages under far worse conditions. As a result, Americans often find themselves out of work and ultimately wind up under-employed if not unemployed.



I would suggest you read a report prepared in 2004 by Dr. George J. Borjas, who is a highly respected economist teaching at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. Dr. Borjas painted a disturbing picture of the reduction in wages that have been caused by the massive influx of aliens into the United States. As bad as it was in 2004, I suspect that the negative impact would paint an even bleaker picture today.



It is important to remember that additional economic issues include the use of emergency rooms by illegal aliens as their primary health care provider has caused a significant number of emergency rooms and hospitals to close. While many pro-open border advocates claim that illegal aliens pay taxes, I can tell you from my many years as an INS special agent that most illegal aliens who do file tax returns claim so many dependants that they actually receive tax credits, meaning that they get back more money when they file their taxes than was taken out of the salaries as withholding.



Beyond the extreme economic impact of illegal immigration are other factors, including the entry of narcotics and criminals who enter our country across our porous border with Mexico and, quite possibly terrorists.



I could go on to list all of the deleterious impacts of illegal immigration but the thing to remember is that the situation is not even close to being effectively addressed. Moreover, the President's Guest Worker Amnesty Program would only exacerbate this crisis without helping to solve it. As a final point, I would ask you to consider that as a result of the Amnesty of 1986, our nation had virtually no illegal aliens present in the United States. This begs the obvious question; if the amnesty of 20 years ago eliminated virtually all illegal aliens, what happened to cause the greatest influx of illegal aliens in the history of our nation?



The answer is quite simple.



Our nation did not secure its borders and did not hire an adequate number of special agents to enforce the immigration laws from within the interior of the United States. These agents were critical to the success of the employer sanctions program to penalize unscrupulous employers knowingly hiring illegal aliens. No matter how tough laws may seem, without an adequate cadre of dedicated, motivated agents to enforce the laws, the laws will not be enforced. Interior enforcement, however, entails more than employer sanctions. It requires that those who produce fraudulent identity documents and create schemes to enable illegal aliens to circumvent the immigration laws must be made to feel that they may well be targeted for investigation, arrest and prosecution for their criminal conduct. This is how deterrence works.



Additionally, special agents are needed to track down those aliens who fail to show up for immigration hearings or who fail to surrender themselves for deportation once they are ordered deported. Furthermore, special agents need to seek those aliens who, although they entered the United States legally, fail to depart the United States when they are supposed to. Similarly, when aliens file applications for immigration benefits - such as residency based on a marriage to a resident alien or a United States citizen - they must be made to understand that there is a real chance that their application may be investigated by an ICE special agent. If the application is denied, they will be sought out by agents and deported. Aliens who apply for naturalization should be subjected to a background investigation, not just a name and fingerprint check on a computer. United States citizenship represents the "keys to the kingdom." For this reason, our country should not be blithely handing out those keys without knowing to whom we are giving them.



All of those critical missions were all but ignored. Instead, the message our government sent out was a clear one. If you come to the United States in violation of law, by running our nation's borders, we will not do much to punish you. Indeed, the ongoing debates about a Guest Worker Amnesty Program have actually sent an even worse message: the United States wants to reward you for violating our laws! Meanwhile, employers of illegals were no longer intimidated, and many of the aliens who participated in the 1986 Amnesty were able to obtain lawful status in the United States. They went to their employers with their newly minted immigration cards in their hands and demanded decent wages and working conditions. Their greedy bosses simply hired the next wave of illegal aliens who were continuously arriving, while firing those making up the previous wave of aliens. The new illegals had been emboldened by the Amnesty of 1986, hoping that if they could enter the United States, their turn would ultimately come to benefit from yet another amnesty program. We are now faced with those aliens who are currently demanding amnesty and United States citizenship.



Today the President and other politicians are doing their best to deliver that amnesty program to the millions of illegal aliens present in our country today. Now as in 1986, our nation lacks the mechanism to secure the borders. Now as in 1986, the immigration system lacks integrity. In fact, one could actually argue that as bad as the former INS was, the current situation at ICE, CBP and USCIS is even worse. This is absolutely outrageous! Our nation is engaged in a "War on Terror." We know that non-secure borders and an immigration system lacking integrity represent a severe threat to national security. Bad as this situation is, what would happen if our nation did the unthinkable and created a new guest worker amnesty program for the many millions of illegal aliens who are present in the United States? How would our government prevent history from once again repeating itself with still more illegal aliens entering our country with the hope that eventually they too will ultimately be rewarded for violating our borders and our laws?



How would the inept bureaucracy at USCIS prevent terrorists from gaming the system and obtaining fraudulent identity documents for the purpose of circumventing the various “terror watch” and "No Fly" lists as they embed themselves in our country?



Given the perilous situation our nation finds itself today, it is imperative that our nation's leaders provide real answers to these really important questions before they implement any program that would legalize millions of illegal aliens. (Hint: hope is not a strategy!)



Lead, follow or get out of the way!





http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/ho ... id=943430#

Remittances to Mexico are now the Mexican govt's largest source of revenue, exceeding even earnings from Pemex.
Keep in mind the illegal aliens sending money back home to Mexico are the very same illegal aliens that skip out on their hospital bills and cheat and bilk the US taxpayer in any way possible. And we are supposed to want these people as citizens of the United States? They lie and cheat with impunity now, citizenship will not change that one iota.

Well put Camille.....How anyone can say they are "good" for our economy is beyond me. If they are making such low wages and sending half of it back to Mexico while living 10 to an apartment and a lot obviously getting government aid, because how could they "afford" to live here on low wages like that, How in the world would they be contributing to this economy? Um Besides sales of beer that is.

I heard the same thing a while back