Have you ever called a number for customer service? One of the first things you hear is “Press one for English, Press two for Spanish.” This is because many people are crossing United States borders illegally. These people are coming into this country, with little or no knowledge of how to speak English, and are receiving the same jobs and benefits that American citizens receive. The illegal immigration problem this country is facing needs to be dealt with sooner, not later, or America might turn into what the illegal immigrants are running from.
Illegal Immigration hurts many people, though many people would like to paint it as a victimless crime. The truth is it hurts the poor and the minorities, many of whom are in the country legally. While illegal aliens come in and take jobs, Americans deserving or needing those jobs are left to look elsewhere and remain jobless. The illegal aliens are willing to work for less, hurting the minority workers and those without a high school degree. The illegal immigrants are also a strain on public funds, since they receive money, from either jobs or elsewhere, but do not pay taxes, or pay taxes so small it does not make up for the amount of funds they receive. More victims of illegal immigrations are the schools. The children of illegal aliens go to school where, in some cases, the classrooms are close to overfilling. This hurts both the students and the teacher, as the teacher cannot do his or her job effectively and the students are given less attention should they be struggling in their studies.
Illegal immigration is a threat to this nation itself. It has been noted that three of the four terrorist pilots were in the country illegally. 9/11 could have been avoided, or at least less devastating, as one of the pilots was legally in the country, if the government would have taken illegal immigration more seriously. Homeland Security reported that at least 850 people from countries of special interest, meaning terrorist conducting and sponsoring countries, were apprehended crossing the southern border. Another danger of illegal immigration is disease. Legal immigrants are required to have medical screening, where illegal immigrants are not screened, resulting in the accidental bringing of dangerous third world diseases into America. Such examples of these diseases are malaria, leprosy, tuberculosis (TB), and Chagas disease. These are just a few of the many diseases that illegal immigrants brought into, or back into in some cases, America.
Other concerns about illegal immigration are the crime rate and the overcrowding of the populace. People, especially immigrants, can commit a crime and go flee the country without being tried. This is a judicial problem, as the person who committed the crime should be tried, but cannot. Illegal immigration also leads to overpopulation, so the homeless rates for cities go up, making the respective cities look bad in terms of cleanliness.
So why are there so many illegal immigrants in America and where do they all come from? According to recent studies, 56% of illegal immigration is from Mexico, 22% from other Latin American Countries, 13% from Asia, 6% from Europe and Canada, and 3% from Africa and other countries. Those from Mexico are trying to flee economic depression, while those in other groups are tourists who are overstaying their visas. Though crossing the border or overstaying your visa is a crime, illegal aliens are not solely to blame. It is also the fault of the border patrols. The door is left open and people walk in.
So what can we as Americans do about illegal immigration? One way is to ensure that illegal aliens do not receive jobs, public assistance benefits, public education, public housing, or any other taxpayer-funded benefit. This sounds great, and would work if not for one problem. People lie. People will also try to help out anyone in need and supply fake documents to these people. The government needs to step up and put more laws into effect to stop this problem. Some things the Congress and the Executive branch could do are to beef up investigation capacity, reform asylums, improve detention and deportation procedures, improve intelligence capacity, and improve federal/state cooperation.
In conclusion, illegal immigration hurts the economy and education, threatens the livelihood of this nation, and overpopulates cities. The border patrols are doing very little against illegal immigration and the government needs to either make a law severely punishing those who enter illegally, or the states need to make stricter laws, much like Arizona has. If America does not make an effort to put a stop to this, then this country may transform into what other countries are; desolate countries with economies that might never recover. Then, it would be other countries that would have to worry about illegal immigrants, especially those from America.
