Amnesty as a Cause:
The first argument of anti-amnesty proponents is that amnesty encourages people from poor nations to seek a safe haven in the United states as a basis for illegal immigration. For instance, the Mexican immigrant issues is one of the most current conflicts between border states, such as Texas, which anti-amnesty advocates argue is a burden to the functionality of the local state government:
Although it doesn’t take a doctorate to understand that amnesty encourages illegal immigration, Texas had submitted written testimony from Harvard Ph.D. Karl Eschbach, a former demographer for the state and an expert in racial demographic trends, ethnic health disparities, and illegal immigration (Smith para.3).
In Texas, the financial burden of paying for illegal immigrant health care is perceived as a burden, because many illegal immigrants do not pay taxes to pay for these services as a American citizens. More so, Texas provides an example of the disconnect between citizens that pay their fair share of taxes, and those that do not, such as illegal immigrants, as a burden to the state treasury: “With Texas paying out nearly $1.7 billion over the last two years in uncompensated health care linked to illegal aliens, the state needs this kind of expertise: (Smith para.3). This argument demands that illegal aliens be deported because they are not “carrying” the tax burden that American citizens must pay for health care.
Many anti-amnesty advocates define an increasing trend in the criminality of illegal immigrant populations as a result of deregulation in the flow of immigrants coming into the United States. More so, the illegal status of the immigrant is also an extension of the financial burden on state and federal resou...
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...ty of illegal aliens in the country. Historically, the Immigration and Reform Control Act (IRCA) was a crucial turning point in the treatment of illegal immigrants, which allowed them a pathway to citizenship as a means of integrating them into American society and economic life. Also, the reduction of crime in the United states since the 1990s by illegal immigrants defines the illogical assumptions of anti-amnesty advocates that claim a criminal status for these individuals. Therefore, the myth of increased crime is only based on the “misdemeanor “ charge of illegal entry into the United States, but it does not convey a broader crime wave scenario as envisioned by alarmist anti-amnesty advocates. This is why amnesty is a cure for illegal status for immigrants, which can be remove the stigma of criminal identity that has wrongfully been placed on illegal immigrants.
Some viewpoints assert that if a person is in the United States illegally, he should have no rights and no benefits. Proponents justify this position by blaming illegal immigration for economic hardships, such as increasing health care costs, for the American people. This attitude is simply inaccurate. Many undocumented immigrants do contribute to the economies of the federal, state and local governments through taxes and can stimulate job growth. However, the cost of providing healthcare impacts federal, state, and local governments differently.
“What makes someone American isn’t just blood or birth but allegiance to our founding principles and faith in the idea that anyone from anywhere can write the next chapter of our story.” - President Barack Obama. The United States is the melting pot of the world. The great country of American was built on immigration. Look around, so many people have ancestor that risked everything to come to the United States to make something of their lives, and the lives of their children. If it weren’t for immigration, we may not be where we are today. Immigration reform is the term used in political discussion regarding changes to current immigration policy of a country (Immigration Reform, para. 2). In 2013 the Senate passed the immigration reform bill that would give a path to citizenship to the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. If the government passed Immigration Reform there would be many benefits to our economy, and to the individuals looking for a better future. For example, immigration increases the efficiency of the U.S. economy, it enables entrepreneurs to come to America, it brings increased national security, and immigration reform can reduce the deficit (Furchtgott-Roth, 4
Cases involving illegal immigrants have been booming at an unprecedented rate in the U.S. since the late 1990s. To absolve this matter, border security has been enforced throughout the entire country with the objective to reduce the entry of illegal immigrants across the border. These actions include the mass deportation of illegal immigrants, increasing security at the national borders and screening. This whole initiative has reduced the number of illegal immigrants living in the U.S. However, current findings have proven that increasing enforcement and investment in the current method of border security has given a huge negative impact to the nation. The U.S. government should not invest in nor enforce the current method of border security because it prevents the rapid growth of the U.S. economy, robs illegal aliens of their human rights, and, surprisingly, causes an influx in the pool of undocumented migrants in the country.
The United States is known to have one of the most accepting immigration in the world. It has contributed to the country's population growth as well as social change. However, the policy remains to be a controversy because of the topic that is illegal immigration. According to the Department of Homeland security in 2010, there are 10.8 million illegal immigrants residing among the 300+ million Americans. Since then, the number has grown to 11+ million people. The U.S. Congress has always sought to find the solution for illegal immigration, with amnesty being an option. If enacted, an amnesty will give unauthorized immigrants a path to legalization and eventually citizenship. The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) is a prime instance of amnesty, with some 2.7 million people gaining legal status during the Reagan office. With the immigration policy being contested in Congress, a solution to illegal immigration via amnesty should be considered as it may benefit the country's labor force and economy, control the influx of immigrants in the country, and provide the opportunity for the currently illegal immigrants to become productive members of America.
There are three different types of illegal immigrants: fraudulent entrants, visa abusers, and those who enter without inspection (EWIs). Eighty percent of illegals run the border and are known as EWIs (Anderson 54). When people hear the term “illegal immigrant” this is the type people typically think of. Some illegal immigrants are "visa abusers" who overstay their visas (Anderson 54). The Department of Homeland Security estimates that 300,000 people overstay their visas every year (Marcovitz 30). The other type of illegal alien is a "fraudulent entrant" who pays a fortune for forged documents (Anderson 55). Because illegals usually have very little money, this method is the...
As many immigrants arriving from Mexico and other Latin American countries are young males with little to no formal education or skills, they fall deftly into classic American stereotypes of criminality – meaning that much of the public baselessly associates Latino immigrant populations with higher levels of criminality and incarceration than the U.S. average. The mass media has wrongfully portrayed Mexican immigrants as foreign desperados; shaping public opinion using generalized case studies rather than aggregate data, the American public would be led to believe that immigrant crime – especially against U.S. citizens – is incredibly high and a dire threat to our national security and way of life. Contrary to these assumptions, first generation Latino populations in fact have significantly lower incarceration rates than all U.S. born ethnicities – including non-Hispanic white. This low incarceration rate holds true even for undocumented Latino populations within the U.S. – a commonly stereotyped group in regard to
In 2013, nearly 1.7 million immigrants entered the United States -- a nation built with the blood and sweat of the millions of immigrants who came to it -- in search of a better life, one free from tyranny and oppression. However, only nine hundred thousand of these immigrants entered the country legally, vesting their time and resources into the legal residency “green card” program -- the very first step to full citizenship (Monger). The other seven hundred thousand immigrants entered the country illegally, exploiting security failures on the US southern border, and policy failures in Washington, DC (Morgan). While a large proportion of the undocumented population poses no immediate threat
Imagine yourself in a life of poverty. No healthcare, earning low wages in poor working conditions. This is the life of an illegal immigrant, surprisingly, in the United States of America. What, exactly, is an immigrant? According to the World Almanac of U.S. Politics 1997, “Not subject to any numerical limitation, immigrants [are] classified as immediate relatives (spouses, parents, or natural children) of U.S. citizens; returning permanent resident aliens; certain former U.S. citizens; and certain long-term U.S. government employees” (Wagman). The fear stemmed from being caught as an illegal immigrant hinders every decision of his livelihood, from education to employment—their whole lives are affected in a negative manner. No one needs to live that way. The solution, however, is not to simply accept every willing immigrant freely, but to give all foreigners a more fair and reasonable chance of becoming a citizen of the “land of the free and the home of the brave.” Strict enforcement of a more streamline verification process by the government in supervising legal immigration is needed to continue America’s evolution culturally and economically with the addition of individuals from foreign nations trying to properly enter the United States of America.
Provine, D. M. and Doty, R. L. 2011. The criminalization of immigrants as a racial project. Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 27 (3), pp. 261--277.
The issue of undocumented immigrants has been a huge debate in the 2016 Presidential Debate. The increase in undocumented immigrants to the US has Americans scared that the increase is more like an invasion, but there are so many other reasons on why it is better to keep our undocumented immigrant population than deport them. The fact they better our economy, by taking low end jobs, or increasing our GDP per capita by 4% is a great place to start(). Most Americans say that deporting the undocumented immigrants is in America’s best interest, but in reality, the undocumented immigrants help America and even Americans themselves.
There are 11.7 million illegal immigrants living in the US nowadays (Preston 1) who support economically the country as they raised legal workers’ wage a 10 percent between 1990 and 2007 and make an earning of fifteen billions per year to the Social Security trough payroll taxes and a ten percent of its Trust Fund (Davidson 2). On the other hand, Illegal immigrants’ deportation has a very elevated cost and thus, it is not easy to send them home. Although there are 400,000 deportations each year in the US (Preston 1) ‘’In …2007, ICE Director… estimated that to detain and remove 12 million people would co...
A topic crucial to the world today is illegal immigration. Illegal immigration is when people live in a country without permission from the government, nor have any legal documentation. As more and more illegal immigrants enter the United States, it either upsets some people, or others feel like they should just grant them ability to pursue life, liberty, and happiness because that is what the Constitution says. Some people feel that illegal immigrants should be protected by the same rights and laws as American citizens. On the other hand, many people believe that this is a horrible mistake. They feel that the rights of citizenship should be earned and not extended to people who haven broken the law just by being in the United States.
A program in 2008 called Secure Communities was launched with the purpose of focusing on illegal immigration of “serious convicted criminals” (Esquivel, 2012, p. 1). In this program, the FBI shares fingerprints from county jails with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Some local leaders and state leaders found that many immigrants that are caught in the system did not have any criminal records or they had low-level offences (Esquivel, 2012).
The first major concern regarding the borders for the United States is illegal immigration. In January of 2000, the INS estimated that there were 7 million illegal immigrants in the United States with the number growing by about 500,000 a year. Under the Bush Administration, funding has increased along main entry points, displacing illegal immigrants points of entry into the country. Yet the increase has displaced immigration to rural immigration points, causing many every year to die from starvation and heat stroke. Despite the harsh conditions, immigration has grown rather th...
The thought of arriving immigrants in any host country has been accompanied by reactions of exclusion, and continues to expand throughout the years. During any social illness, immigrants tend to be the first to be held responsible by their recipient societies. Most crimes are associated with immigrants due to the fact that they may not posses the same socio-economics status as natives. Another contributing factor is the media that conducts numerous stories that highlight the image of immigrant crimes to recall the alleged difference between native and foreign born. Undoubtedly, the correlation between immigration and crime has become one of the most controversial discussions in current society. As we enter a new era, immigrants will have more impact on society than ever before (Feldmeyer, 2009).