Illegal immigration has been a long-standing issue in the United States. In the 1990s, it was relatively easy for immigrants to enter the country without proper documentation by walking across the border. Since then, laws and border security have increased in an attempt to stem illegal crossings. However, estimates suggest illegal immigration still numbers in the hundreds of thousands annually. The public remains divided on how to address illegal immigration, with opinions split on whether to build a border wall or pursue other policy solutions.
Illegal immigration has been a long-standing issue in the United States. In the 1990s, it was relatively easy for immigrants to enter the country without proper documentation by walking across the border. Since then, laws and border security have increased in an attempt to stem illegal crossings. However, estimates suggest illegal immigration still numbers in the hundreds of thousands annually. The public remains divided on how to address illegal immigration, with opinions split on whether to build a border wall or pursue other policy solutions.
Illegal immigration has been a long-standing issue in the United States. In the 1990s, it was relatively easy for immigrants to enter the country without proper documentation by walking across the border. Since then, laws and border security have increased in an attempt to stem illegal crossings. However, estimates suggest illegal immigration still numbers in the hundreds of thousands annually. The public remains divided on how to address illegal immigration, with opinions split on whether to build a border wall or pursue other policy solutions.
Illegal immigration has been a long-standing issue in the United States. In the 1990s, it was relatively easy for immigrants to enter the country without proper documentation by walking across the border. Since then, laws and border security have increased in an attempt to stem illegal crossings. However, estimates suggest illegal immigration still numbers in the hundreds of thousands annually. The public remains divided on how to address illegal immigration, with opinions split on whether to build a border wall or pursue other policy solutions.
Eng-112-204 March 7, 2019 How Illegal Immigration Has Affected the United States
Illegal Immigration has been a major dilemma in the United States in the past and even in
today's time. Many laws have been put in place over the years to stop illegal immigrants from
coming into the United States. However, there are controversies about people entering the US
illegally and whether people know how much this occurs regularly.
In the early 1990’s the issue of illegal immigration along the U.S. and Mexico border was
relatively abandoned. Immigrants from throughout Central and South America could travel to
border towns and openly walk or run into the United States. Once they were in, they could easily
get away by simply just buying a bus ticket from one’s hometown to a border city. “The
difficulty of getting into the United States was minimal and no special smuggling services were
needed for many migrants (Guerette 1).” The people that entered the U.S. successfully without
the proper paperwork went without any major punishment if they got captured by the United
States border agents. The border agents would and still today put them on a bus and ship them
back down to where they came from. Nonetheless immigrant’s will still try and slip through
again and again. Unquestionably, illegal aliens from Mexico is by far is the largest flow of
immigrants into the United States.
Estimates of the numbers of illegal migrants vary, but they indicate a sharp
increase throughout the late 1990s. According to some calculations, the number of
illegal immigrants reached 500,000 or somewhat higher per year during the late
1990s, almost twice as many as in the first half of the decade (Guerette 2). Back in 1999, the United States border control agents apprehended over 1.7 million illegal
immigrants that had entered the country illegally or if their visas had run out. In the mid 1980’s
the U.S. Congress passed several acts and laws to prevent illegal aliens from coming into the
country without all the necessary paper work.
Illegal immigrants coming from Mexico are usually trying to get into the United states to
have a better life for them or their future generations. If not that than they are usually running
away from some kind of trouble but most of the time it is because they are trying to protect their
kids and give them a better life, then what they had to deal with. Other people that benefit from
migrants coming in the U.S. illegally is some people take advantage of them and hire them for a
cheap labor so that they can save money on labor. “We find that, while illegal immigrants suffer
a large wage penalty compared to legal immigrants at all education levels, the penalty decreases
with education (Caponi).” Americans widely reject the policy whereby families entering the
country without permission are treated as criminals and children are separated from their parents.
“Only 22% of the public expresses support for this policy. More than seven in ten Americans
oppose such a policy that would separate immigrant children from their parents (Public Religion
Research Institute Survey Reports).”
Most American citizens definitely don’t like illegal immigration because they are coming
in and taking our resources and our jobs. That’s why there has been talk about building a wall at
the U.S.- Mexico border but from a recent survey:
The public is not any more supportive of building a wall along the U.S.-Mexico
border. Thirty-one percent of the public favor the construction of a wall while
63% are opposed. Public views have not changed significantly over the past six
months. In 2017, roughly one-third (36%) of Americans expressed support for the construction of a wall along the country’s southern border (Public Religion
Research Institute Survey Reports).
That’s why part of the U.S. is split between parties and on our problems, “the struggles of many
Americans who feel that their prospects and their children’s prospects are diminishing, and that
they are on the losing side of globalization (Kerwin 6).” The laws of immigration impact this
type of people by sending the aliens back to where they are from. “President Trump famously
began his presidential campaign in 2015 by saying Mexicans are “bringing drugs” and “bringing
crime” into the United States. Since then, he has often invoked anecdotal cases of violence
committed by undocumented immigrants in order to legitimize immigration as an issue
(Mckenna).”
In conclusion the main issue is that if illegal immigration is good or bad for the United
States. Weather it helps the U.S. or the migrants and weather the U.S. should allow it to continue
or to build a wall and make the border stronger, so they have to either stay out or get the proper
paperwork. In saying all that we don’t know whether the country will be safer if we have a wall
or if we just keep it like it is.
Citations
Guerette, Rob T., and Ronald V. Clarke. "Border Enforcement, Organized Crime, and Deaths of
Smuggled Migrants on the United States - Mexico Border."European Journal on
Criminal Policy and Research, vol. 11, no. 2, 2005, pp. 159-174. ProQuest,
Rivera-Batiz, Francisco. "Undocumented Workers in the Labor Market: An Analysis of the
Earnings of Legal and Illegal Mexican Immigrants in the United States."Journal of Population Economics, vol. 12, no. 1, 1999, pp. 91-116. ProQuest, https://login.proxy039.nclive.org/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/230438 334?accountid=10163. Espenshade, Thomas J. "Unauthorized Immigration to the United States." Annual Review of Sociology, vol. 21, 1995, pp. 195. ProQuest, https://login.proxy039.nclive.org/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/199732 593?accountid=10163. Kerwin, Donald. "Moving Beyond Comprehensive Immigration Reform and Trump: Principles, Interests, and Policies to Guide Long-Term Reform of the US Immigration System." Journal on Migration and Human Security, vol. 5, no. 3, 2017. ProQuest, https://login.proxy039.nclive.org/login?url=https://search.proquest.com/docview/192816 5340?accountid=10163. McKenna, Chris, and Chris McKenna. “The Wall: A Conversation with Rep. Henry Cuellar and Brookings Expert Vanda Felbab-Brown.” Brookings, Brookings, 12 Jan. 2018, www.brookings.edu/blog/brookings-now/2018/01/12/the-wall-a-conversation-with-rep- henry-cuellar-and-brookings-expert-vanda-felbab- brown/?gclid=CjwKCAjw96fkBRA2EiwAKZjFTaTwmmKE3GSkmxNSUhV2scXoQG 3Ac9DboE90PM6FQ4tSopogjZOXBhoCyfgQAvD_BwE.
