1. Illegal Immigration: Why should it be eliminated?
Migration of people across the border, without any legal validation and against the cross-border laws, is called as illegal immigration across foreign territories. Mostly, economic and military securities are the reasons for immigration, and it happens from poor to rich countries. It is a rampant problem, and causes various issues like detrimental education, poor health issues, and unfair judicial practices. The problem with illegal immigration is that it is hard to keep count of the population, and due to lack of a proper census, these immigrants often face difficulties themselves, as well as cause problems for the natural inhabitants of the country they have immigrated to. The thesis aims to answer why illegal immigration must be removed.
There are various ways of illegal immigration. Cross-border immigration is one such way, overstaying a VISA is another way. Sham marriages are often countered, for people to gain immigration, without any genuine feeling for the spouse. All these are against the law. Encouraging immigration by these means, even if for a better life, is not ethical. People should be made to understand that if they want to shift to other countries, they always have legal means. An easy route is not always the right one. To educate people against the ill-effects of immigrating illegally, people have to be shown the same. The three most important areas where
2. Illegal immigration needs to be eradicated from immediately are education, healthcare, and judiciary.
Education in New York is of utmost priority and due to the huge population of illegal immigrants, the biggest liability as well. Statewide, FAIR estimates about 120,000 children are in the country illegally and an additional 225,000 are children born here to illegal aliens. Combined, these students represent 11.7 percent of public school kids. This adds around $690 as an added liability to the state. (“Illegal Immigration Costs New Yorkers More Than $5 Billion a Year Finds New Study by FAIR.", 2014) The children born in the country of illegal parents are also educated in the state, and if their cost of education were taken into account, the total cost would be $1.9 billion ("Illegal Immigration Costs New Yorkers More Than $5 Billion a Year Finds New Study by FAIR.", 2014). The budget has increased so much, yet the schools are crumbling apart and the level of education is not good enough. There is an increasingly pertinent question that arises whether the illegal immigrants should be educated at the expense of the state. While some humanitarians advocate education for all, the truth is majority of Americans don’t want their tax money to be spent on people who are not even legal citizens of their country.
The next majorly affected sector is the healthcare sector. The recent outbreak of Ebola virus, especially rampant in the African countries, is a cause of worry. With people from Nigeria, Liberia and other Ebola-inflicted countries flocking to the USA, the disease may break out in the USA too. Mexico-USA immigration is the single largest cross-border immigration, and the immigrants often carry traces of Dengue Hemorrhagic fever to the USA. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention doesn’t keep track of infiltration of diseases, and the same is never
3. Reported to the public.
The doctors are not vigilant to the needs of the treatment for diseases like TB, adult chicken pox, measles, H1N1 influenza, dengue, Ebola( Diseased foreigners streaming into U.S." ,2014). Since disease causing pathogens are one of the major causes for deaths, such cases must be treated with utmost importance.
Public health care is available to everyone living in the USA. So, the immigrants get a whopping $690 million on their health care. That is, in itself, a huge monetary burden on the US government. Besides, there are several barriers for people to get access to medical facilities, when they are immigrants. There might be structural barriers, linguistic barriers, social barriers, deterring the illegal immigrants from getting proper treatment. This in turn can cause contagious epidemics in the whole country. The legal residents of the USA have another issue of concern against the illegal immigrants. The cross-border infiltrates often bring about many crimes in the USA. Homicides, sexual assaults, kidnappings, physical assaults (Fed release of illegal alien criminals prompts outrage." 2014), etc. cause more medical cases of high emergency. Thus, the health care cost increases. High crime rates and high medical emergencies can be correlated directly. Thus, many citizens believe US immigration laws should be more stringent.
The judicial system dealing with illegal immigration often gives judgments as to deport the immigrants back to their countries. The influx of young children has increased by leaps and bounds. On an average, 59 immigrants come over from Mexico to the USA daily. Due to the increasing number of children being involved in illegal immigration, the court has to provide them with legal aid. Many high-profile lawyers work pro-bono for these little immigrants, who don’t want to go back to their native country. Still, there is an increasing and escalating legal cost
4. That threatens to tumble the financial condition of the state.
Unfortunately, even deporting the immigrants back to their original countries comes with expenditure of money, and financial burden on the USA. The immigrant courts are already overloaded with numerous cases, and the workload just gets increasing. There are several cases which take three to four years to even appear for a hearing. That, in turn, causes a paramount escalation of the cost of living for these illegal immigrants for the years they await the verdict. It is not the deportation cases alone. There are instances of death cases or life imprisonment for these immigrants in homicide or assault cases. These cases can’t be judged upon in a hurry; they need careful observation and study for proper justice to be meted out. A single mistake could hang an innocent or let go of a guilty; with the precarious laws of immigration, these cases become even more risky. Immigrants have to be treated on humanitarian grounds in front of the Judiciary, and each convict must be given a legal representation. Thus, the time and money burden of the state goes on escalating, without a respite.
There is also resentment amongst people living in the USA against the illegal immigrants. They feel that they are intruders, who are out there to snatch jobs from their legal counterparts, and not pay any taxes (Henderson, David R,2014). The anger gets worse, and the people who form the illegal immigrant group are out casted, and rarely are given much dignity in any sphere. The irony is the very dignity they strive for when they come to a new country is stripped off them, just because they don’t have a legal validation of their own. A legal and just claim to anything is seen with respect and dignity, else there is no point in going across borders.
5. There was and will be infiltration illegally, unless the laws made by the government of the USA are stringent and tough.
There has to be proper patrolling at the borders, and tough VISA regulations. The education system must be revamped, and so must be the health care system. More judges should be appointed to resolve pending immigration cases faster, and more lawyers have to agree to work pro-bono for the illegal immigrants. Unfortunately, all these measures can’t be implemented in a day. To usher in these changes, too, requires money. Increased expenses entail an increased tax burden on the common men, the legal citizens of the country. That is unfair. So, illegal immigration is indeed an evil and must be curbed soon, for the betterment of the USA as well as the people who come over here, for a better life, but unknowingly cause escalating problems to the USA , as well as themselves.
Works Cited:
- "Fed release of illegal alien criminals prompts outrage." The New American 9 June 2014: 7.General OneFile. Web. 18 Nov. 2014.
- "Diseased foreigners streaming into U.S." USA Today [Magazine] Aug. 2014: 1+. General OneFile. Web. 18 Nov. 2014.
- "Illegal Immigration Costs New Yorkers More Than $5 Billion a Year Finds New Study by FAIR."PR Newswire 20 Sept. 2006. Academic OneFile. Web. 24 Nov. 2014.
- Henderson, David R. "The powerful case for immigration." Regulation 37.1 (2014): 62+.Academic OneFile. Web. 24 Nov. 2014.
