Commentary: How U.S. is encouraging illegal immigration

Commentary: How U.S. is encouraging illegal immigration


June 26, 2019

Peter K. Nunez


From the early 1970s through the recession of 2007-2008, over 1 million people were arrested every year trying to enter this country illegally. But the number of arrests dropped dramatically over the next 10 years, due primarily to changing economic conditions in both the United States and Mexico.



For the last two years, we have witnessed a dramatic increase in border arrests, with every indication that this surge will continue, despite an unprecedented effort by our current president to deal with this crisis.


No president in history has made stopping illegal immigration a greater priority. Yet the numbers of arrests continue to soar. Why? Because despite the president’s efforts, this country continues to encourage illegal immigration, in a multitude of ways.


We encourage it by rewarding it. It is a crime to knowingly hire unauthorized immigrants, but we refuse to enforce those laws. We allow employers to hire people who have no right to work in this country, because they can pay them less, provide fewer benefits and worse working conditions, and fire them if they complain.


We encourage it by providing financial benefits to unauthorized immigrant adults and their children, from free public education and in-state college tuition to free medical care, public housing, and food stamps (SNAP).


We encourage illegal immigration by granting amnesty to those who came illegally, and by promising future amnesties for those who come illegally in the future.


Some state and local governments encourage it by providing “sanctuary” to those here illegally. State and local officials promise undocumented immigrants that they will be protected from federal government efforts to locate, arrest and remove them. Even those who have committed other crimes while in this country are hidden from federal law enforcement.
We encourage it by allowing an unprecedented abuse and misuse of our asylum system that permits hundreds of thousands of immigrants to game the system. Most of those arrested recently are non-Mexicans, mostly Central Americans, who claim asylum when arrested. A recent “caravan” traversing Mexico contained citizens of 60 different countries.

Mexican citizens who are arrested trying to enter illegally can quickly be returned to Mexico, usually within hours of their arrest. That is why we were able to “process” the millions of Mexican citizens who made up the vast majority of people arrested during the last four decades.
But third-country nationals cannot be returned to Mexico; they must be returned to their native country. This requires the U.S. to detain non-Mexicans until their country of citizenship agrees to take them back.


Compounding this problem is the asylum system. Those claiming asylum have a right to a hearing before an immigration judge; even if their claim is denied, they can then appeal. Ordinarily the person would be detained pending their hearing and appeal, but when there is not enough detention space to house everyone who has been arrested, they are released and told to return at a future date.


Many do not appear, and even if they do and their asylum claim is rejected, they remain at liberty pending their removal. Over 800,000 aliens who have already been ordered removed remain at large as fugitives. Our unwillingness to locate and remove those already ordered deported is just one more way we encourage illegal immigration.


We also encourage illegal immigration and asylum abuse by letting unauthorized immigrants and smugglers use children as a get-out-of-jail-free card. An unprecedented number of children are being arrested at the border; the word is out that the U.S. does not have the capacity or the will to detain children.


Separating children from their “parents” has been loudly condemned; legal rulings have limited the length of time that children can be detained. Accordingly, if we cannot detain the children and we cannot separate them from their families, then the children and their families are released pending future court hearings. Given the number of people and families requesting asylum, court hearings are typically scheduled many months, if not years, in the future, allowing the aliens to disappear into the fabric of America.


The only way to stop illegal immigration is to stop rewarding it. Congress has the duty to act, and could fix everything that is wrong with our broken immigration system easily — if they wanted to. But both political parties — for different reasons — continue to ignore this disaster because they each are dependent on special interests that benefit from illegal immigration. What’s best for America is not part of that equation.


Nunez is a former federal prosecutor. He was U.S. attorney in San Diego from 1982-1988.



(Editor’s Note: Nunez used the term “illegal alien,” a legal term, throughout his commentary but under Union-Tribune policy, the term was changed to unauthorized immigrant.)

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com...al-immigration