About illegal immigrants

There is, as usual, a great deal of emotional over-reaction and misinformation about the current Trump administration “zero tolerance” approach to illegal immigration – to people sneaking across our borders.  First of all, by law people can’t be just sent right back across the border – they need to appear before an immigration judge first. Second, on the basis of a 1997 federal court decision that strictly limits the government’s ability to keep children in immigration detention - demanded incidentally by liberals some years ago - children can’t be jailed with their parents.

So the administration can do two things – they can simply let illegal immigrants go free with their children (since the children can’t be detained), or they can detain the families together, which is prohibited by the court decision. If they let illegal immigrants go free, we essentially have no border controls at all. If they detain the families together they have violated the court order.

So liberals are outraged at the process of separating families. But what do they propose to replace this? It was liberals, after all, who objected originally to detaining children with their parents. And it is liberals, after all, who insist that illegal immigrants have due process before they are shipped back across the border.

I understand that for liberals, especially those suffering from “Trump derangement syndrome”, this is a wonderfully emotional issue to feed their endless outrage. But practically, what do they propose to do about people who sneak across our borders illegally with their children? Nothing? Germany tried that approach with their illegal immigrants, and it is breaking up the EU and may well sink Angela Merkels’s administration.

Illegal immigration is a serious issue, and a difficult one. Past administrations, both Democratic and Republican, have for the most part ignored the issue, which is why we are in the fix we are in today.  Liberal outrage at the moment is part of the problem, not part of the solution. If liberals have a better solution, they ought to propose it.