The wall isn't a solution. It solves no problem.
Meanwhile, the NY Times isn't even covering immigration any more:
https://www.lcsun-news.com/story/news/local/2019/04/22/122-migrants-dropped-off-las-cruces-24-hours/3542669002/
5
STOP THE PRESSES. Mr. Friedman has actually written the words, "we have an immigration crisis at the border" . Call Nancy and Chuckie, they still thing everything is OK, it fact they want no controls, more the merrier. We need these illiterate illegals to mow the lawns and clean the toilets of the beautiful people. Who would do these jobs themselves? Yuck. This is the first crack in the solidarity of the Liberals, perhaps others will open their eyes to the reality on the border. No border no country. No racism here, we could be being invaded by supermodels wouldn't make any difference.
20
So if I understand you correctly Tom you would only admit "a steady flow of legal, high-energy and high-I.Q. immigrants". Sounds like a plan, we already have far too many low energy, dumb white guys here including our so-called president.
This liberal has never been for "open borders" and contrary to your assertion I doubt most liberals favor them. We do favor immigration reform like the bipartisan proposal back in 2013, you knew that one that was killed by Republicans rather than give Obama immigration reform. So go ahead Tom build your walls, people including human traffickers will devise ways to circumvent them. Security is just a state of mind, so if you feel better and safer afterwards, good for you.
8
I always take Freidman with a large grain of salt. He pushed hard for the invasion of Iraq, and consistently misread that situation. I think he is, again, pushing for the conservative, 3rd century solution, the dumb wall.
11
When did it become acceptable at the NYT to actually acknowledge there is actually a crisis at our border? It certainly goes against everything written during the time Pelosi was stonewalling on the wall.
Could it be that the only reason to acknowledge it is to blame Trump?
16
The last thing Trump wants to do is fix the so-called immigration crisis. It gins up his racist and xenophobic base. It attaches stupid people as far away as Maine to Don the Con. I'm sorry, I meant low info voters. This and 3rd trimester abortion will be the two issues he wants to run on next year.
13
Accurate reporting, couple with sensible analysis.
Americans need to recognize that solutions what is now a very real crisis at the border are not found on the border, the Halls of Congress or American cities where immigrants congregate.
What the huddled masses, targets of gangs, cartels, murderers and rapists, need is not a right to migrant but A RIGHT TO STAY (a phase first used by Doris Meissner, Bill Clinton's immigration director.
Which is why, as Friedman said, cutting off aid to Central America's "northern triangle" stupid. That aid, neither sufficient nor well targeted, needs a boost and an expansion to neighboring Costa Rica and Panama. Nicaragua needs help too but is so dreadfully managed by Ortega that aid would be wasted.
7
First: “peeked” not “peaked.” Come on, New York Times.
Second: I don’t know why this wouldn’t recommend a host of other common sense strategies that many others have recommended. Hire more immigration judges and provide funds for better monitoring. Hire more border control agents.
Trump has poisoned the well for building a wall. Democrats seemed to be trying to talk him into a “smart wall,” which seems to be an acceptable compromise to me.
Finally: why does Friedman not discuss the other side of this issue, which is legalizing the many people who have lived here for a decade or more?
8
this is probably the most astonishing column i've read by Mr. Friedman. i think in ten years, he will look back at it as a nadir.
he goes to the border, and finds a crisis created by an individual who expresses racism from the presidential pulpit, then, comes to the same conclusion as Trump?
why is it that the rate has jumped so high, when Trump has been the "tough" guy? it seems to me like he has created this crisis, from the time he started with the "... they're bringing rapists" etc etc. and the Muslim ban etc etc.
so, now, he has the solution to the crisis he created? so, what will be next after his wall, if they're able to jump or drill under the wall? it sounds like Mr. Friedman will support larger scale round ups? it sounds like he already does.
and Mr. Friedman also warns that Americans might turn to neo-fascists to stop immigrants? wow! what happened to standing for what is right? so, after the neo-fascist is done, will the very values and country he/she claims to be protecting exist anymore?
i have to say i am truly astonished at this column from Mr. Friedman. it is very similar to a recent one by Tony Blair's think tank that also seems to justify the rise of the far right anti-immigrant forces in Europe. and its also similar to Hillary Clinton's apology for the same far right anti immigrant forces recently, saying that left-leaning politicians need to be tougher on immigration in order to win elections. wow!!
4
When I read the following quote form the Atlantic survey I remember an old saying..."figure lie and liars figure". The following statement is just preposterous.
"things have changed so much that I often feel like a stranger in my own country.”
Really, a stranger in the USA? If this is true Americans really need to get a grip, get off their cellular devices, and wake up.
4
Trump is wasting democracy in America. He has to be impeached.
2
So interesting to read the majority of comments posted in reaction to this informative, reasonable and balanced article. Most seem to be posted by those that must not have even read the article. Thomas Friedman listed out the many problems and issues related to the illegal immigration crisis and so many comments are strictly focused on why this flow should continue without any concern to the impact. Ridiculous but not surprising.
21
Several years ago Australia had its own version of this with thousands of illegal arrivals by boat (I guess the equivalent of sneaking across the US-Mexico border).
The law was changed so that anyone attempting to arrive illegally by boat would be sent to an off-shore detention center to await settlement somewhere else or to be returned to their own country. Because they attempted to enter the currently illegally, under no circumstances will they ever be allowed to settle in Australia.
This prompted much hand-wringing from the elite but has the overwhelming support of the electorate.
Guess what? Australia no longer has an illegal immigration crisis.
The US should simply do the same - detain all illegal immigrants and deny them any possibility of future legal entry to the US. The crisis on the border would quickly subside.
If you keep letting them in they'll keep coming. I think we'd all rather live in Hawaii than Honduras.
20
"Been to the Border" doesn't even begin to tell the story. If you haven't been to Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador, meet their people, and understand their history, geography and economics and how its interconnected with the USA, then you know little about the immigration crisis. Borders are a two way street as are all aspects of relations between North and Central America. The USA buys drugs and sell weapons. The USA wants goods and labor from the south but expects cheap prices and wages. The goal should be improving the conditions south of the border so much that very few even want to immigrate. The history of USA and Latin America is the reverse.
11
The wall isn't any part of a solution. We need more people, not fewer. The US needs to massively support Central America to fix the problems we helped create. Those who pass through a screening process should be welcomed.
4
"walls work... but only when paired with a strategy that says 'we’re not only going to build walls. We’re also going to invest in stabilizing the countries with so many people seeking asylum in America' " Well said. I'm all for walls. But I've traveled through Central America, and the only reason Trump wants to end all U.S. humanitarian and security aid in that region, is because he wants this tragedy on our border to get worse, because it helps him politically.
6
I'm going to challenge the premise that we should broadly prioritize highly educated and already affluent immigrants. It's crazy to suggest we should be importing more talent while telling our own young people that they can become engineers or scientists only if they are willing to take on crushing student debt. It's nuts that we are spending money on walls and detention centers while starving our public schools. Existing programs like the H-1B visa are already abused enough; they are used by far too many employers to bring in foreign workers to take entry-level jobs at lower wages. If we really believe that we don't have enough home-grown innovators and talented professionals, we need to examine why that is so and fix it, not paper over the problem with visas.
16
I partially blame Trump for the inability to pass your common-sense plan. But the Democrats also deserve blame. Serious presidential candidates are running on a platform that calls for the abolition of ICE and open borders. Both sides need to compromise.
8
None have said open borders.
5
The most prescient thought in this well written article is that if the Democrats continue to act unreasonably regarding immigration, the public will act unreasonably and elect someone that will do exactly what they want.
Wise up.
20
You mean, as the public has done. That is what happened.
4
I believe that the Democratic House should be pushing for very strong border security and immigration reforms. this should include hundreds of new judges to begin cutting away at the backlog of deportation cases. they should also include specific protections for the types of dangers asylum seekers can claim. Foreign students and highly educated people should be welcomed much more easily. Immigrants, working peacefully for long periods of time should have some form of legality. ICE should be directed to focus on capturing and deporting serious criminals. Dreamers should have protections.
But, I disagree with one area of Mr. Friedman's writings. People are not going to stop coming here from the South. The border has been porous since it was established. We can try to help Central American countries be more stable, But this is something that can only be managed, not solved or ended, short of shooting immigrants, which even Donald Trump has not called for publicly.
4
This is one world, and one humankind. All borders should be eliminated, leading to free migration anywhere. World government is the only possible way to end war (though not murder; that of course is a crime) and face climate change in an effective way. But the egotism of humankind prevents these--and we have only ourselves to blame. Think for yourself, for the benefit of everyone.
11
@Radical Inquiry
You pay for it then! I am not willing to!
16
@Radical Inquiry
So, when "all borders" are "eliminated",
exactly who is going to make the laws and rules that "humankind" live under?
The Congress of the USA?
Elected by the current population of the USA?
Or elected by the population of the world?
And if the latter,
what are all the other governing bodies in the world going to say about that?
The Central Committee of China?
And all the authoritarianism there?
beyond your wildest imagination?
The "parliament" of India?
Which despite being a "parliament",
has not managed to establish any reliable
system of laws there -- and has not managed even to stamp out the caste system.
The Chamber of Deputies of Mexico?
Which despite being supposed elected by "the people",
has not managed to establish any reliable
system of laws there --
and has not managed even to stamp out corruption endemic in Mexico.
Or maybe the more or less actually democratic
"assemblies" of Europe, elected by the "white"populations there who somehow do manage to actually have working democracies in practice as well as in name,
but which, btw, nonetheless have tight borders and immigration controls,
as do most of the other countries in the world,
in Asia, Africa, and Latin America,
authoritarian and non-authoritarian, alike,
corrupt and non-corrupt, alike.
So, get real.
Take your one-world message there.
Or maybe you actually think that "humankind"
are all going to get along and live just ducky
without any laws and rules at all.
31
Are these the initial lyrics for “Imagine” by John Lennon ? Very touching, but when some take their fantasies for politics in the real world, the result is disaster.
23
Finally, someone reports (Frum's essay is quite illuminating as well) details that I can understand, not get emotionally-all-'riled-up-about-it. Not be then pressured IMMEDIATELY for campaign contribution$$$$.
Thank you, Thomas. Excellent approach, only a few commenters are worthy of reading sadly--emotion overtaking them rather quickly.
Trump is wasting the crisis in your eyes, but you're not desperately trying to stay in Presidency.
(Norm Ornstein's perspective about what to do about Impeachment by Democrats is illustrative here. Probably a template that will be mostly followed. The Atlantic)
6
Mr Friedman, permit me to start with a few facts. Although what I have to say starts with the Monroe Doctrine, but for the sake of brevity, I’ll begin the narrative from 1899.
Poor Honduras. In 1907, USA marines landed to help the (American) Fruit Companies become the Viceroys. Of course, America appointed co-operative locals who sat in the front offices while the REAL rulers occupied the back suits, far from the madding crowds.
Poor Guatemala. In 1954, a US engineered coup against the elected Government of Guatemala. In the Civil War (1960-96), US support for the American installed government led to 200’000, mostly indigenous being killed.
Mr Friedman, America HAS TO expiate the Middle American nations for the CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY committed by GREEDY American Businessmen and INVADING American Armies over more than a hundred years.
The present break-down of law-and-order is the consequence of past America wrong-doings. Allowing refugees from Meso-America to come to the US would go some way towards accepting the wrongs of the past.
1
Our government agreed to physical upgrades and smart border technology. $3-plus billion was not peanuts.
With both houses of Congress, Trump couldn't parlay his $8B campaign chant. Who's fault was it- that his estimate for 30- to 35-foot high concrete wall was 10 times too small? Which majority leaders didn't deliver? Democratic leaders were amenable to Trump's $5B ransom to release the Dreamer hostages. Who backed down?
Return that slice of dinner party "logic" back to David Frum who rationalizes 2-plus years of poor performance from this administration - on "the job liberals refuse to do". (Pure propaganda.) Frum is a victim of own circular logic: Job needs done; partisan differences; fascists rule; job not done; blame non-fascists.
"Haphazard immigration"? Either the US lives up to 1951 Refugee Convention & our laws or we change them, capiche?
The majority doesn't want immigration - that's why it's a Lottery System for under-represented countries. Less fair for Chinese & Indian students? Sure. And corporations? They and Trump are in alliance for legal "tremendous numbers". Nativists ARE FOOLED. Trump sons sold development projects in India when Stephen Miller announced the "golden ticket" of proposed Merit Plan.
Trump did insanely cut aid to source countries - along with every other insane act TO FORCE passage of Republicans' employer-oriented reforms.
Cher rightly clarified: "..trump’s PLAYING BUTCHER YOUR ENEMIES & CREATE CONSTANT MAYHEM."
2
There are many omissions in this discussion.
For example, the Trump Organization has no qualms about hiring illegal immigrants, similar to many employers around the country who depend upon cheap labor. Trump had no problem when his wife's parents became citizens, but he rants and raves about chain migration for other families.
For another example, Trump makes no bones about his racist agenda, that impacts not only potential immigrants, not only illegal immigrants, but also legal residents and even citizens who are not white from European backgrounds.
Immigration and work force challenges are real, but every effort to work out a bipartisan, thoughtful solution is blocked by racism that is stoked for partisan purposes.
32
@MEM
Trump or no Trump,
the USA needs tight immigration controls,
and the ones proposed by Trump
sure beat the ones the Dems promote,
hands down.
Trump could promote mothers' milk for infants,
and half the anti-Trumpers would promptly denounce mothers' milk.
13
Exactly! No movement until the Republicans wake up and remove the petty tyrant! I voted to block this thug in office so why should I follow his agenda? The Russia divide and conquered agenda?
I also know that this immigration is zero threat to me and my family! These people just want a chance to live and are no threat to me! This has been going on for decades and I don’t believe for a second this is the right time to do something with all this racial rhetoric and my way or the highway from republicans.
You lost all bipartisan good faith! You threw it away republicans! Enjoy the masses you caused by your leaderships actions crossing the border! You made the mess! Stop playing John Wayne and simply watch him on TV where it belongs!
1
We need to ask ourselves (our elected officials should be leading this discussion) about the pros/cons and costs/benefits of immigration. Friedman says we need more immigrants, but does not get into the details of how many, from where, with what skills, motivation for immigration, cost, value, etc. Some clear fact based thinking is needed. Remember the push to immigrate at our southern border is fueled largely by a general lack of opportunity, political/social unrest, poverty AND rapid population growth. Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaraugua and Belize have some of the shortest population doubling times in the world. The USA is not responsible for taking on others population growth crises.
14
I agree with many points of Mr. Friedman's assay. I agree that we cannot have open border (by the way, no serious person has ever advocated it). No country can assimilate infinite flow of migrants. It is also good to encourage high skill immigrants as Mr. Friedman suggest. However, a significant fraction of legal immigrants should still be reserved for asylum seekers and destitute people who just need opportunities. This is important for three reasons. First, and most importantly, this is the moral thing to do. Trump is taking us down a path of selfishness, fear, and immorality that we must reverse course from. Second, there ARE jobs that more educated Americans would rather not do (these jobs will eventually be done by robots anyway but just not now). Third, many very successful Americans probably have ancestors who were illiterate and would not have "high-I.Q." as Mr. Friedman wants. However, many of their children had done great things and made America truly great.
5
How about an acknowledgement that you're not helping third world countries by allowing their professionals to immigrate to America? It long since reached the point in Mexico where anyone who managed to graduate high school feels they have to make a decision on whether or not to head north, legally or illegally. Mr. Friedman, you're right: this is going to get a lot worse. And if you want to see people able to stay home, the answer is not to ask the American taxpayer to indulge in further nation building. Afghanistan has not been reassuring on that score. So how about giving these countries a fighting chance by telling their more educated citizens to stay put and try building a functional nation. Not necessarily a democratic republic, but at least a nation where only the government has the legal right to use violence against their citizens. Oh, and by the way, for the guilt ridden among you, our local Arizona authorities are picking up a number of MidEastern and Africans at the American Mexican border. Someone should find out how they're getting across the planet.
8
We had a low-grade immigration "crisis" before Trump. But I have zero doubt that the current high-grade crisis at the border was generated by Donald Trump himself. Recall how early he sounded the alarm about caravans -- before they actually formed. It is quite possible he had tricksters working in Central America to instigate the activities. And most certainly his loud calls to shut down immigration greatly increased the numbers making the trip to get in before he closed the door. This crisis is exactly what he wanted. And he has zero desire to do anything at to fix it. He is happy to exploit it and let it ride.
4
I am a progressive Democrat who felt that Sanders in 2016 had gotten on the right side of the immigration issue by emphasizing the negative impacts on the working class. With immense growth rated in desperately poor nations throughout the world, we can expect to continue to experience a an overwhelming demand for immigration that will cause our environment and welfare state to deteriorate as long as better living conditions are available elsewhere.
The solution is not at the border, but at the source. The prosperous first world economies are experiencing a real reduction in fertility as per capita income increases, particularly where women are given more opportunities for workforce participation on an equal basis with men. To end the mass migrations and stabilize the world, we must improve conditions abroad. Would we want to have a fenced in utopia in the midst of a hellishly overpopulated world of misery?
6
Agreed we need a 'smart' plan. One that somehow balances the real need for more people to contribute in those areas where native-born Americans are not willing to contribute in jobs at the bottom end of the economic scale as well as all in those very desirable areas in the STEM careers like doctors, engineers, and computer scientists. And somehow we do need to make room for family reunification and asylum seekers. But, the one thing I disagree with Mr. Friedman is his comment about "high IQ". Seriously??? We have an aging workforce that desperately needs all kinds of people as caregivers We need agricultural workers. We need restaurant workers. None of those jobs require "high IQs" but they do require what we say we value and that is energy and a commitment to succeed.
3
More and more I see a country in decadence: the U. S.
To solve its problems, it is always requiring the help of others: it seems it does not have the capacity of solving its problems by itself.
In the other hand, Trump is offending its allies in Europe and befriending the enemy! What?
The slave owners so called "founding fathers" treated the theme of "Roman Empire"; well, it seems that the U S is in "the last years of the Imperium.
I agree with Daphne below: the Frum "Atlantic" article is compelling, and Mr. Friedman echos its eminently sane prescriptions.
I would underline three points. First, it is vital we solve this problem and seriously harden the border while leaving room for the "best and brightest" who energize our society. Because climate change is coming and will produce an unprecedented wave of tens or even hundreds of millions of climate migrants later in this century. If we are not prepared to control that in-migration, we will be overwhelmed as a society and a political system.
Second, sensible and balanced immigration reform will not be easy. The Demos are now so wedded to "identity politics," while the Republicans talk a good game but actually like all that cheap illegal immigrant labor.
Third, we need to limit to near elimination the asylum system of this country. Asylum has been too widely interpreted (including domestic abuse!!!) and is being used to scam the system.
10
So we read the article and immediately go to our ideological corners. THIS has been going on for decades. Both Democratic and Republican administrations have failed to forge a comprehensive reform package-IT's not just Trump. The only way is for the Democrats to move to the center and the Republicans as well. Turning this into a political battle has to stop.The last comprehensive legislation on immigration, IRCA 1986, became law under a divided government (Democratic House and Republican Senate) and was signed by President Ronald Reagan. Please go back to the Gang of Eight framework, revise and put it into action.
5
We may well agree with Dr. Friedman that the immigration problem needs repair but disagree with his emphasis on a tall wall to stem the tide of immigrants. The problem seems to come mainly from those immigrants who openly crowd the entry points and not from those who sneak in over open land unnoticed by border patrol. Technology--drones, cameras, fast cars to respond to intruders, barbed wire, delay barriers-- can slow the march into America sufficiently to quell a crisis of the unseen flowing in. Furthermore, as in Israel, walls lead to tunnels being built, and with the cartels anxious to continue their illegal entry, they will be build in profusion.
The best way to slow the immigration would be to build up the economies of the source countries. We know that Mexicans have cut their coming here substantially because jobs have increased and the Mexican government is improving infrastructure. To cut aid to the source countries is definitely the wrong approach. Better to help the governments involved to control the gangs and to increase real jobs and industry.
We should temper our need to lower the massive flow with humane consideration of those truly facing deprivation and death in their home countries. And the law says that where immigrants can prove this they should be allowed to enter.
3
A continuous wall from the gulf to the Pacific would be an environmental disaster for the multiple species of wildlife who follow centuries old migration patterns. So, Friedman's wall must not only include a wide gate for legitimate immigrants but also include valuable wildlife corridors, something no one is considering on either side of the issue. Imagine an ugly wall cutting off Big Bend National Park from the protected lands on the other side of the Rio Grande river in Mexico. These corridors can be electronically monitored to eliminate illegal human crossings.
But in typical Republican politics, wildlife, endangered or not, have no rights or value. And not a consideration at all in this column.
4
Tom, what we really need is a new POTUS who can engage the citizenry and embrace a bipartisan consensus. It can be done, just not with an evil vindictive leader
3
"Build a wall, because you know, it will help make the least knowledgeable among us feel a bit more safe and comfy and then they will allow the rest of us to do what is effective."
This is what conservative politics have brought us to, placating our dips to avoid their rhetorical whips, no matter the cost and to think all this wall tripe was created in casual conversation, while trump and stone were trying to think of something to fire up the same people.
2
Nothing good will happen with Republicans in control.
3
Title of lead picture:
"Migrants in Tijuana, Mexico, wait to be allowed to apply for asylum in the United States."
Sorry, but being a migrant is not a reason for getting asylum.
11
@G.S.
They are not MIGRANTS they are ASYLUM-SEEKERS. These are the people whose countries were destroyed in past American political shenanigans: installing puppet regimes in those countries, which worked for American businesses. These countries were insultingly referred to as the Banana Republics.
2
Read the Atlantic article that Friedman mentions. It's long, but it will scare you to death. We have a looming disaster if we can't come up with a plan.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/04/david-frum-how-much-immigration-is-too-much/583252/
52
@Daphne
Yes, it is a worthwhile read that is very thought provoking.
Yet, no matter the clear sightedness of his analysis, pro immigrant critics have been vicious.
15
@Daphne
I was very impressed by the Frumpiest article and have been waiting for the letters taking issue with the analysis so see whether Frum's analysis can be reasonable refuted.
3
@Daphne
I was very impressed by the Friedman article and have been waiting for the letters taking issue with the analysis so see whether Friedman's analysis can be reasonable refuted.
3
This morning fox touted this article as validation of trump and his immigration policies. Hell has truly frozen over.
1
"Without a high wall, too many Americans will lack confidence that we can control our borders, and they therefore will oppose the steady immigration we need."
Assumes facts not provided---do "we need" immigration? Who exactly is the "we"? In the last 50 years, we have been taking in approx 1M persons a year, such that our population has increased from 180M in 1960 to 320M today---and most of that increase is due to immiigration (estimates are our population would be 240M today without immigration). Why, exactly, are we doing this and whose agenda is being served? We have become an overpopulated carbon-toxic society. And yet "we need" more immigration? For whom and why? From my perspective, America and the world could use some slow population decline! That is the unexamined elephant in the room. Immigration is a choice for America's citizens to make, and not a right for every person in the world to exercise.
12
We could institute a national ID card for access to government services and employment along with some accommodation for residents without papers, but who have not done anything to justify deportation. That way we could manage, locate and evaluate asylum claims and enforce employment laws.
Just sayin...
4
This is the first article I've read that's outlined the full scope of the problems at the border, written by someone who has actually been there. Thomas Friedman is great at breaking down complex problems in a way that makes them more understandable and therefore they feel solvable. Thanks, Mr. Friedman- I hope your ideas are implemented and that they work.
5
You mention "high IQ immigrants" So now we're going to test them at the border?? You do draw a good picture of the size and devastation of the problem, which is good to see. Obviously it is overwhelming and it takes a while to stand back and let it all in. That's why we need good people and good minds to work on it. But T only allows what he "knows." That's why he's got Ivanka and Jared as "Senior Advisors." This leaves us with little hope for anything better...only worse and more chaotic.
2
I appreciate Friedman's comment that some migrants seeking asylum, and that some are "gaming the process" in order to escape poverty. It helps highlight the nuance of the situation. Migrants are not stupid, wide-eyed people following each other northward like desperate animals with no plan (though some may be desperate). Many educate each other about how to get through, and what to tell the border people. About who to bring. About how to say the right things to get in. And surely they know they can "melt" into America while waiting for asylum hearings. None of this negates the push factors that cause them to come here, and none of it justifies Trump's stance on immigration but to assume that everyone who comes is a wide-eyed, helpless victim of past US policy in Central America has patronizing, racist overtones of its own. The question of who gets to stay is not easy, and we can't serve them all, even if on some level it is the right thing to do.
4
I can't fathom why Friedman is so gung-ho for "high-I.Q." "visa seekers with energies and talents that enrich and advance our society" rather than poor people willing to fill the entry-level positions on our socio-economic ladder.
Do we need foreign bankers, doctors, and managers to come and take the best jobs? I'd rather promote from within and let the rising tide of low-skill immigrant labor raise the economic boats of the higher-skill citizens educated in our nation's schools.
Fact is , we are far from 'full' and we're facing a demographic problem in that our citizens are not having enough babies. We're fortunate to have a relatively safe and orderly society that attracts desperate asylum seekers. Let's not look a gift horse in the mouth.
And by the way, here's some low-hanging fruit for dealing with the matter presently: allocate a lot more funding for asylum courts so that we adjudicate the claims promptly. Which party could object to that?
5
The United States is now just a third world country where there is little regard for law.
8
"And in an era when more and more countries will fracture under environmental, population, criminal and technological stresses, we simply cannot take everyone who shows up at our border."
Great-- so we'll just take their smartest, most motivated, hard-working people. And the rest of these country's populations can just sink into the muck as the world falls apart. But then they can seek asylum!
You know, this is pretty much what has happened to rural America-- a lot of the smartest, most motivated kids move to the cities to seek opportunity. Leaving behind... Trump country!!!
Maybe instead of stealing all the talent from these countries, we should stop building so many weapons and instead use our money to try to reduce corruption and economic despair, so that these countries don't sink into the muck. And we might also consider doing a better job of supporting rural areas of the U.S.
4
A big problem now is that Trump has lied so often, we don't know who to believe. You sound reasonable, Mr. Friedman, but all solutions, because of Trump (as you mention), now sound cruel and inhumane. Dump Trump and we'll be able to talk reasonably. Because of Trump, all solutions now sound like they involve Polo shirts and Tiki torches.
1
Democrats love to proclaim: "No human being is illegal!" As an immigration law policy, it is absurd and will doom them to permanent minority status. Unless, that is, they are successful first in bringing hundreds of thousands of future Democratic voters in through our porous border. In their view, it's all about growing the base.
11
Friedman's piece misses some basic facts about immigration. In 2006 when Senators McCain and Kennedy introduced their Comprehensive Immigration Reform bill, there were 12 million undocumented migrants in the US. 13 years later, there are 11 million. Say what you will about needing to build a wall, but having 1 million less undocumented immigrants in the US after 13 years doesn't seem like a flood is taking place. If we were to spend a fraction of the resources the US spends on border and internal enforcement on development work in Central America instead, we would see less migration northward. In fact, I believe many of the migrants currently in the US would be happy to return to a prosperous and safe home.
Let's not spend billions on an ugly, self-defeating, wall and let's pass comprehensive immigration reform and assist Central American countries to uplift their people. It's common sense.
2
@Eddie The USA has been giving Honduras money for decades. NOTHING changes; the govt and NGO's pocket the money. Rinse, repeat. The population there is growing at an alarming pace-despite WIDE availability of FREE birth control. As long as it is a heavily catholic country that encourages breeding, nothing will change.
2
“Or bring in their family members through family reunification programs. And that’s no matter their possible impact on communities and social welfare resources or their ability to assimilate and contribute to society.”
First, I’m deeply troubled that the writer equates “family reunification” with immigration abuses like illegal entry and overstay. Family reunification allows American citizens and permanent residents to petition for certain narrowly defined family members, often with wait times of years or decades for visa availability. Second, the writer’s statement is false, either ignorant of our current system or willfully misleading. Even after waiting years for a visa to become available, every applicant (regardless of the petition that forms the basis for the application) must prove that they are admissible to the US, which includes proving that they are not likely to be a public charge (every family petition requires an affidavit of support—tax transcripts and other proof that the petitioner can financially support the applicant, and a binding agreement by the sponsor to reimburse the government for public benefits provided to the applicant).
Perhaps the writer resisted the urge to call it “chain migration”, but the insinuation is just as racist and lazy, and lacking in compassion for family unity, and the inalienable right to pursue happiness, once thought to be a self evident truth.
1
Trump isn't seeking a solution to the immigration problem, he seeks to exacerbate the problems to feed red meat to the base. For the first two years of his presidency he held both the House and the Senate; it would have been a slam dunk to push through effective changes to immigration laws. Instead Trump remained focused on his simplistic demands for a wall and now blames immigration problems on the Democrats. All for political purposes with no real solution in sight.
136
@PaulM
The men and women on both sides of the aisle of the United States Congress need to address the current immigration crisis in a humane way. There has to be ways to deal with this issue. If Congress would put partisanship aside, roll up their sleeves and work together to enact viable immigration laws, people of Trump’s ilk will cease to have a platform for their divisiveness.
5
@Captain Kirk This was done in 2012, with a bipartisan bill, and the immigratioin hardliners in the House prevented a vote. Even Friedman's article frames this as a failure of "both sides", but a compromise of "more border security for reasonable humaneness to immigration policy" has been tried, over and over, and it has always, always, been stopped by the immigration hardliners. It's time to stop pretending that this is a crisis of "both sides"
9
I understand (and part of me agrees with) the impulse to allow in only those who have the exalted qualities exhibited by our natural-born citizens. However, my forebears were uneducated dregs from Italy. My paternal grandfather probably was an "illegal" who jumped ship in New York and stayed. When he died of the Spanish flu, my paternal grandmother, who spoke only Italian dialect, supported her family by opening a produce store. Her children, my father and his siblings, became high school teachers, musicians, insurance agents and other contributing society members. Their kids, my cohort, include multiple PhDs, business owners and bankers.
What we don't measure when rating the "desirability" of immigrants, is the power of their impulse to succeed and in their desire for their kids to achieve through higher education.
2
"we need a serious strategy for mitigating climate change"
I'm pretty sure the majority of south Americans are migrating in order to escape physical/sexual violence, not because they fear environmental collapse. Were talking about low-skilled, low-educated people jumping over a fence, not environmental studies majors.
I'm going to go ahead and assume, therefore, that this sentence was added simply to quell the emotions of liberal readers who might be triggered by the the word "wall".
8
Finally a voice of rationality in this sad and confused debate, Friedman has a whole column in the New York Times to lay out and summarize the multiple solutions to this crises! This is the best article I've read to date on the problem.
But nothing is going to happen if we cannot get a handle on the situation. To do that, we must determine who is and who is not a citizen in this country with the coming census and issue them passports (national identity cards), immediately halt all asylum seekers from crossing into the United States from Mexico (where they are presumably safe?) and deport all illegal immigrants back to their countries of origin, requiring them to re-apply under new laws which redefine more strictly the bases for asylum (will these countries actually kill their own innocent women and children?).
What a mess we have made with our liberal policies that have resulted in nothing but chaos, unfairness to those who not only follow the rules but obey the spirit in which they were framed, as well as the resulting unlimited growth in human trafficking with no end in sight!
15
The truisms of this article have been true for decades. Nothing is particularly new now, except for the rush to America that Trump has prompted.
What no one should lose sight of is that the republican party has used immigration as its issue du jour to distract Americans from the myriad other issues that are equally pressing, if not more: reform of the electoral college and voting (to strengthen democracy in America), health care, retirement security, social security, rising cost of education, etc., etc.
Eventually the republican party beats a drum long enough, and even many otherwise intelligent "liberals" start voicing what sounds remarkably like an echo.
That appears to be what is starting to happen now.
As Donald Trump might say, "sad."
3
Just weeks ago, the left told us there was no crisis on the Southern border. Now one exists, but Trump's wall only "partly" solves the problem. As Democrats realize this is truly a losing issue (along with reparations and voting rights from jail for Dzhokar Tsarnaev), their position is going to increasingly look like Trump's--in substance, while reiterating ad nauseam their vicious criticism in name.
8
Lately we have been reading about the shortage of labor in this country, and especially the jobs at the lower end of the market being hard to fill.
These are exactly the jobs that the new immigrants were able and willing to take. And often the capable, but less industrious Americans, seem to not be inclined to take such jobs as they view them as demeaning or beneath them.
To restrict immigration and build walls instead of welcoming those who seek amnesty, or even just a better life, only serves to exacerbate that problem. We need immigrants and have the capacity to integrate them fully into our society and labor force.
So "Cutting off our nose to spite our face" comes to mind..........
5
Mr. Friedman, it's always a pleasure reading your columns. Not surprisingly, this one too touches upon all the nuances of a very difficult problem. I, personally, agree with almost every point you make here. However, with our current system, it doesn't seem likely that we will be able to resolve this pressing issue any time soon. We have the Republican party, aided by Fox News on one side making false claims to fire up their one-issue voters, and then we have the Democrats on the other side, sometimes reacting to the situation and making it worse. Ms. Pelosi's most recent counter-proposal to Trump's unhinged pitch for 'His Wall' about extending the border wall in places and strengthening the law enforcement agencies and courts, made a lot of sense to me, and I believe, with appropriate due diligence and planning, it could be successfully implemented. If only the other party in this two-party system could put their country before their need to fill the judicial system with conservative judges...
3
"Liberals want to let everyone in" and "Conservatives want to build an impenetrable wall". Both statements are stereotypical, but basically capture the situation.
Immigration is just a symptom of the real problem.
The only long-term answer lies outside of the US.
What is completely ignored in the discussion is addressing the root cause. No one just wakes up on a Tuesday and thinks "maybe I'll risk my life to leave my homeland and try to get into a country that doesn't want me". Illegal immigration is driven by horrible conditions in countries in Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East. Overpopulation (thanks Gag Rule and religious leaders calling for expanding flocks!), corruption and land-ownership imbalances (America and Corporations First!), crime (fueled by the illegal drug cartels) have left many countries dysfunctional.
Until these problems are reduced in these "source countries", we will have immigration problems.
I once posed the question of addressing the root cause instead of the symptoms directly to Janet Napolitano when she was taking up the reins of DHS. It was the only question that night that she didn't have any answer for. The can was kicked and here we remain.
Work on the root cause, not the symptoms.
3
Trump continues with his push for the Wall, and blaming the Democrats, for all the problems on our southern border. But, there is no talk or offer of a solution.
With so much inaction on the part of Congress in past years, we do not see a discussion on solutions. There is little or no debate on those 'Dreamers' and other millions of undocumented migrants already in the country.
We all agree, our southern border should be protected. With continued arrivals at the border, with people seeking asylum, what we are not doing is to arrest this problem. One of the democratic party presidential candidates has offered a proposal to work with those countries in South America. To provide aid to those countries. Those countries should be held responsible for allowing their citizens to cross their own borders. However, the Trump administration, has recently announced cutting off aid to some of those countries. That does not help with any serious efforts towards a durable solution.
3
@citizen
Free, democratic nations cannot stop their citizens from leaving. But certainly solutions within the home nations of these immigrants must be sought.
2
The identification of problems and solutions here is spot-on. However, like all editorializing from one side or the other, the article looks for a bad guy, in this case Trump. As can be seen by the comments, everyone wants to take a side and blame somebody; Trump, Republicans, Obama, Pelosi, Democrats. Why can't we just agree that the solutions Tom Friedman proposes are probably reasonable, are not inhumane, and just might work. Could we get enough people with common sense and the ability to do some critical thinking on both sides of Congress to admit its time to do something? Blaming and name calling is getting us nowhere.
4
The United Nations should send a multinational peace keeping force to either help, guide, or replace the policing authorities in Honduras, etc. until the violance stops. Many of these people don't want to come here, but they are desperate. Although I don't know what's wrong with Mexico or Costa Rica.
1
@Gregory Hahaha! The violence in Honduras is btween gangs and cartels. Most people go by their day. They come here because they are economic migrants who've heard of all the perks you get when you come here, even illegally (aided by multiple NGO's.) There is Costa Rica, panama, ecuador, etc. but they want to come her because those other countries actually enforce their immigration laws.
2
I note in a story broadcast on NPR yesterday and in other media outlets that a vigilante border "agent" was arrested. His crime was detaining immigrants, using weapons, when he was not an authorized law enforcement agent. Where was he operating? - where the wall at the southern border currently ends. Let's be honest, a wall would go some way to stemming the flow of illegal immigration. It's certainly not the whole or sole answer as Trump seems to assert. But it would be one step among others that would make a difference.
9
Mr. Friedman evidently believes that getting a one-day guided tour of a small section of the border endowed him with exceptional knowledge and insight.
Missing are a few hard and constant realities about unregulated immigration.
At least 130,000 undocumented immigrants are observed crossing the border annually but elude arrest. The Border Patrol calls these people "got aways."
As with drugs, immigrants are smuggled in vehicles. Of course, no one can say how many such people enter in this fashion as they go undetected.
There are also those who enter with visas and simply fail to return home when their visas expire. At last count in 2015 there were some 700,000 such undocumented immigrants.
What Mr. Friedman and many other pundits fail to grasp is that at its heart the undocumented immigrant phenomenon is all about supply and demand.
There is a steady demand for immigrant workers in many sectors of the Americans economy, such as agriculture, the service industry and housing construction.
This shows us that to a large extent undocumented immigration is self-regulating. When jobs here are scarce, people curtail northward treks.
Finally, there is the unchallenged "fact" that the U.S cannot accommodate all that seek entry.
With 33 persons per square kilometer, the U.S. among the world's 194 nations, is the 146th most densely populated.
nation. There are only 48 countries less crowded than the U.S.
Objectively, we have plenty of space for millions more.
1
I would point out that all of the Left, and certainly everyone writing for the Times or being a Times board member, has been castigating Trump from Day One, and screaming bloody murder that there was no emergency situation at the border, just in the fevered imagination of the president. Now, with the incredibly obvious emergency situation too obvious to deny any longer, the Times is taking early steps to change its mindset on this without being too obvious about it. I imagine this is why we read this excellent Friedman article in today's issue. Can any regular reader even imagine this piece being printed in Times before, say, the end of 2018? Of course not. Now you wake up to it all, but the harm done over the past two years or so may be irreparable thanks to your, and the politicians of both parties, absolute intransigence/inaction on the situation, and everyone's dedication to denying anything that might even vaguely accrue into a positive assessment of even one Trump position Better late than never, but quite honestly, if Friedman really believes what he is writing now, Trump ought to bring him onboard without delay, even though this would undoubtedly cause his demise where the Times's opinion page is concerned. What is still not stated clearly here, though, is that Trump was NEVER anti-immigration; he was simply anti-illegal immigration, a position every president from FDR through Obama would also have held.
15
@Joe Pearce
Very well said, Joe. Commenters here still can not bring themselves to agree with President Trump that there is a crisis at the border. The closest they will come is to say that IF there is a crisis at the border then it must be Trump's fault. His evil policies against Central America for the past two years must be the reason even if they can't describe those policies, completely ignoring the time before 2016. They also believe that sending money to the CA governments will stop the caravans. Maybe, but not for many years.
They also say that the only crisis at the border is the separation of children from their parents. Sure it was a debacle but it was legal and President Obama presided over the same process. Again, if Trump does it, it must be wrong, and evil.
I hope this opinion piece is the beginning of a meaningful, truthful discussion of the problem of ILLEGAL immigration.
12
Focusing on a wall and even border security, though needed, is not the right approach. The reality is that, apart from the current flow of families seeking asylum, the overwhelming majority of people coming to this country, illegally over the border or on visas and then overstaying, are coming to work. This is as true now as it was when my parents and generations of immigrants before them came to this country. Working is a migrant's primary motivation, and the fact that when they get here they find work, means that there are jobs for them to fill for which there does not exist a sufficient number of American workers. Establishing a temporary worker program that works, i.e., that does not require complicated burdensome government filings by employers, and at the same time putting teeth into the already existing laws penalizing employers from hiring undocumented workers, would go a long way toward solving the problem. It would allow people who want to work to come here legally (thereby avoiding having to climb or dig under a wall, or risk their life by crossing a desert in a trailer driven by a coyote) and employers who need workers to have access to documented workers. Such provisions were contained in the comprehensive immigration reform bill that passed the Senate in 2013 and had majority support in the House but which was not brought to the floor for a vote by Speaker Boehner because of the ridiculous "Hastert rule".
3
"The whole day left me more certain than ever that we have a real immigration crisis and that the solution is a high wall with a big gate...."
Cute.
If the U.S. government policy focused on the deep roots of Mexico and Central American emigration and compelled the corrupt governments of Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador to invest in social and economic development and put an end once and for all to the gangs that control and terrorize large segments of society in those countries, the impact would be much greater than investing in border walls.
1
As usual The empires Messenger ignores the causes of his misdirected border crisis scenario. His refusal to recognize the imperial role the United States plays in prompting a mass exodus from Central America disqualifies his claim to an informed opinion. He briefly mentions humanitarian aid to Central America but only in a passing swipe at the Trumpian absurdity of cutting aid. He needs a history lesson to understand the circumstances these immigrants flee. Circumstances created and supported by U.S. economic and governmental policies that have created intolerable conditions in these countries. He should learn to look elsewhere other than the hotel concierge for his underlying thesis of building high walls and preventative platitudes to combat a human crises which he refuses to investigate in any thorough fashion..
@William McIntyre NOPE. Learn some history and no, not from CNN. Without the USA, Honduras would literally look like Venezuela.
1
Illegal immigration has been a problem no since the Reagan Amnesty. For decades, we have allowed people to enter on tourist visas and stay here. No one wanted to lose votes, so wink, wink, and turn a blind eye to a growing problem. Now we have drug lords and gangs who probably make more money smuggling people (and advertising the ease of gaining amnesty) than they ever made with marijuana. This situation could continue until we have half the population of Honduras, Guatemala, and Salvador arriving for amnesty as well as any African, Cuban, Middle Eastern, etc. immigrants who use the same entries. Yes, it's a crisis, and who in Congress is making an effort to address it. Focused on impeachment and Mueller, they've wasted valuable time with a problem that will destroy our country as we know it. If we don't need a wall, what do we need? Write your representatives today, or live with the consequences.
15
The wall is for people who are ignorant (even those who have visited the border, like Mr. Friedman.) If you could "miracle" a wall into existence tomorrow, it only means people get on boats and come ashore where there will be no wall - so long as circumstances in Central America remain as bad as they are, people will migrate, wall or no wall.
Today's "crisis" is manufactured by Donald Trump's braying about closing the borders. People in Central America got the message - if they want to go, go NOW. That's why we have the spike in numbers. A smarter policy is more aid, smartly employed, in Central America, to improve circumstances there. And, smarter drug demand reduction policy here - more treatment as opposed to mandatory minimum jail sentences. It's US dollars and drugs and guns fueling the violence and misery there. A wall won't change the cause or effects; it will change nothing.
Immigration is an issue upon which we ought to be able to compromise; no solution here would violate someone's religious convictions. No sensible person is advocating for open borders, but any immigration policy must start with compassion and a recognition that US foreign policy helped to create the conditions of poverty and violence from which would-be immigrants are fleeing.
The stumbling block to immigration reform is always amnesty and a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants already resident here. Mention amnesty and the chorus of "What part of illegal do you not understand?" begins. Amnesty is a deal-breaker for the Trump base, just as heartless policy such as "zero tolerance" is a deal-breaker for liberals. Friedman is right when he says Trump doesn't want to solve the problem; he wants to exploit it. It's going to take a president committed to hammering out compromise.
Who honestly thinks things that they're "a stranger in their own country" when someone speaks Spanish near them? That's absurd. Those Americans need to get over themselves.
1
Trump has no comprehension of what an immigrant must endure to be legally admitted to this country. If he did he would supply the borders with enough agents to handle the people
who are trying to enter legally.
Instead he’s the drunk uncle who screams about a wall and says “America is full”. His total lack of leadership is what has caused his so-called crisis. Every day there is another reason to impeach this failure of a man and President.
I question some of the information that you included in your argument for building/reinforcing existing walls at the border.
You say you are pro-immigration, but you include the quote from a recent poll of white working-class Americans from The Atlantic, "things have changed so much that I often feel like a stranger in my own country." While you do appear to be after immigration reform that is strategic and fair, the inclusion of this quote does not support your argument. Instead, it supports the decisive narrative that Trump blasts from his podium daily. It would have been better to include a quote that actually supports your argument.
Additionally, the highway sign you included in this op-ed has been posted since at least the early 1990s. I am a primary resource, as I lived in San Diego at that time.
@KKI think the freeway sign dates back to at least the 1970s.
Thank you Thomas for this timely and informative article. A humane and sustainable immigration policy will be very important in the 2020 election. Without the sustainability component many liberals will coalesce around inhumanity concerns and drive more voters to Trump. Democratic primaries will need to result in a clearly sustainable, perhaps transitory solution, leading to a humane vision consistent with American values.
3
An unaddressed part of this is a reform of the worldwide refugee/ asylum system, ideally with these principles:
1. Refugees are the world's problem, not one country's, and the world needs to pay for it not just the country where the refugee shows up. The UN already has a cost sharing formula and runs a major refugee program.
2. Criteria for asylum should be universal and the benefits to the refugee should be standardized and monitored.
3. The refugee does not have sole discretion on where they want refuge - the receiving country has a say as well.
4. Refugees should be settled where there are linguistic, cultural and religious similarities.
Mexico - or any other Spanish speaking country - can then 'bid' for the Central American refugees and the world pays it. Similarly, instead of Syrians resettling in Germany or Canada, they can resettle in an Arab country that 'bids'. Failing that, a country like India or Bangladesh may want to 'bid' - they can provide more cultural and religious continuity than Finland can.
North African refugees for whom an appropriate country may not be found could still be resettled in a country that is willing (for a price) rather than Southern Europe.
Ideally, confidential refugee processing centers should be set up in all countries so the refugee can confidentially make their case to, say, a UN refugee center in San Salvador and get a decision before they leave. The US could do this right now in our embassies there - it is US soil.
9
Finally, a column that recognizes the complexity of the border region!! Whatever Trump's motives, focusing his political microscope on the the construction of a particular kind of wall belies the layered and dynamic personality of the border.
As Friedman suggests, no one policy can address the crisis at the border. Many of the region's challenges transcend the immediate geography of the border.
So, what to do? It is not clear that a physical wall will have any effect but if it opens the way to a broader focused dialogue, go for it. Technology will help help even more.
We also have to recognize that the border region is fully integrated into the economies and societies of the two countries. Border divide but they also join.
However, the most problematic piece is the precarious situation in Central America. Born of chronic underdevelopment reinforced and exacerbated by drug trafficking, we have to admit that we are contributing to violence and instability in Central America. Simply sending money will not help; we must find innovative ways to spur economic development and create options for would-be migrants. Extreme poverty in the face of gang violence is more than many people can tolerate, especially if they have children. This is where economic migrants become political asylees.
We have the resources to address immigration and the border crisis and secure our national sovereignty but we need the political will and the humanity. Do we have it?
5
This column is high on rhetoric and low on facts and concrete policy proposals. If Friedman is hoping to move the immigration conversation forward, this isn't it.
The vast majority of people agree that immigration (1) is necessary to some extent, (2) should be controlled and regulated, (3) preference should be given to people with skills and talents we need, (4) we should only let in as many immigrants as we can assimilate and afford, and (5) laws should be enforced and asylum claims determined promptly.
The problem--which apparently Friedman overlooks--is that each of these points are open to interpretation and debate. Reasonable minds can disagree on what skills and talents are most necessary and how many immigrants we should take in per year. Saying we want "a high wall with a big gate" doesn't answer ANY of these questions!!
The immigration "crisis," like other seemingly unsolvable issues facing this country, is never addressed because the debate is centered on rhetoric and emotional appeals, not facts and policy. Healthcare is a perfect example. All voters want affordable healthcare, but most don't know jack about specific policies.
These issues will not be solved until voters demonstrate the capacity and willingness to understand these issues and grapple with complex facts and policy, AND that they are willing to vote based upon this understanding. We keep electing people with no intention of actually solving problems and then wonder why nothing gets done.
4
Thank you for a balanced essay on our immigration problem. In 2017 President Trump asked for new immigration laws that were designed to fill the employment needs we have, but his enemies put all of their energy into a divisive "walls don't work" campaign. They have abandoned the dreamers who should be major beneficiaries of any bipartisan reform.
I have followed your efforts with interest and wish that you would focus on an equally practical direction for our mutual CO2 problem. I see a great deal of impractical arm-waving and pseudo morality as a species without predators, now 8 billion strong, races toward its eventual extinction.
3
The crises was created by the ignorant nationalist blabber mouth in the Oval Office. Until he became the Electoral College POTUS, there was no crises. Until he created a focus on the border, immigration and illegal crossings was declining. The big cry for a wall created the (manufactured) crises we now face. Immigrants are streaming in for fear if they wait, they won't be able to immigrate. Thank you Individual-1, and for your childish vindictive ideas in how to deal with it. NOT!
Bull. The crisis has been going for 30 years.
3
The Trump wall extends to our entire country. He has created walls of ignorance around him that have layed waste in every department during his term of a would-be president. The Great American Wall is just an exercise in futility for a very sick man. Trump is not fit to be president.
Friedman can’t give up his neocon bona fires. Has he ever been right about anything?
1
I agree with what Friedman ides in his Column
But
Donald Trump, we all know it has no skin in this immigration solution.
Trump wants a shiny artifact which he can claim his making, like properties in NY real estate. There is nothing deeper than that.
your use of the word "apprehend" implies a criminality that obviously in most cases does not exist. applying for asylum is NOT a criminal offense, or any sort of offense. what's offensive is the wall.
Tom Friedman approaches this complex topic with some helpful reporting and sound analysis. I would like to address three of his phrases:
"So they fade into America." Of course, not the best structure for immigration, but we know these folks don't qualify for government assistance and that they commit crimes at a lower rate than legal residents, so it would seem that they stress our system in one major way: They brown America.
White working class people who "feel like strangers in their own country" blame their problems on immigrants because it has always been more convenient to demonize "the other" rather than understand the complex economic and social implications of globalization, technological advancement, and rapidly evolving social norms. Working class whites have historically feared a perceived loss of status. Trump the demagogue uses this to his advantage.
As for proper U.S. immigration outreach: While we should endorse the ideal of retaining those with unique talents whom we educate in our universities, the use of the phrase "high IQ" immigrants is elitist and inartful. Our aging society is in desperate need of a range of service providers who are inevitably lower wage earners. Job openings for folks who care for the aged and infirm, who tend our landscapes, and who are willing to accept many of the available jobs that American citizens will not, are as vital to sound immigration policy as those with advanced degrees.
3
Strange. So much of the reasoning to have a wall and a controlled, legal entry program seems to be common sense.
Arguments against it show that common sense isn't so common.
12
Early in his presidency, Trump the "demagogue" offered to legalize well over a million Dreamers, far more than Dems ever thought possible in exchange for a "wall" to secure the border. This was the moment for Democrats to come to the table and negotiate all the options that Mr. Friedman lays out in his largely thoughtful essay. Instead they threw the offer in his face, flatly refused to even discuss his proposal, called him a liar, racist, heartless separator of families, and all around disgusting human. Then came the charge that Trump had manufactured a crisis at the border. I'd ask Mr. Friedman to request a meeting with the President to discuss, in good faith, his suggestions. Then Mr. Friedman can go back to the progressives in Congress and present them with a negotiated settlement. I'll pinkey-bet you they reject it. Of course, it might be hard for the President to welcome Mr. Friedman to the White House given the gratuitous swipes he took at Mr. Trump because....well because he just couldn't resist name-calling. The ball's in your court, Mr. Friedman
2
So you're saying nuanced debate and a holistic approach is better than jingoistic sloganeering? Do tell.
What's missing from this analysis is punishment for employers who hire undocumented labor, and incentives for working class Americans to not feel like picking produce is beneath them.
4
YES we must make it clear that we liberals are against ILLEGAL crossings. However, we must also have plans to allow legal controlled immigration. It is estimated we will need millions of immigrant workers to maintain our economy and we know that immigrants allow an increase in GDP. We know that immigration and young workers are necessary for our SS system to be maintained. The problem is how to accomplish all of this in a humane and efficient manner. WE must stop the repubs from using this issue as a fear factor and turn it around into a viable and necessary policy.
1
I have long enjoyed your work. I will say up front that I have not been to our southern border in many years.
You cite statistics from Border Patrol of people entering “illegally.” Are they entering illegally or presenting themselves at our border? How many have entered “legally?” None? We don’t hear about legal immigrants at the southern border. What makes them all instantly illegal?
It seems that the Trump administration conflates all refuges coming to our border as illegal, and once they give the statistics using the word “illegally” journalists quote that. Or am I incorrect? Are there statistics for the legal ones that Trump doesn’t mention?
You say migrants receive information on how to ask asylum. Why is that bad? I need instructions for far simpler things when I am in an unfamiliar place. They then go before a judge for determination. We need more judges.
Our immigration system definitely needs work but Republicans have refused to address the issue. Now we have Trump wanting a monument to himself, and the master of cruelty Stephen Miller calling the shots on immigration.
Democrats are not in favor of open borders. Democrats don’t say that only fascists enforce borders.
Trump uses the “48 percent of white working-class Americans agree that ‘things have changed so much that I often feel like a stranger in my own country’” rather than leading toward a logical and compassionate immigration policy. He has created a humanitarian crisis.
We are not full.
2
@Maryfran "Democrats are not in favor of open borders."
Great, let's hold undocumented immigrants accountable for violating our immigration laws and have therm promptly repatriated.
7
Three months ago, there was a government shutdown over the wall. During that shutdown, the Democratic leadership as well as the liberal news, including the NYT, insisted that there was not a border crisis. Now, three months after the government shutdown, we have Thomas Friedman telling us that, bottom line, we need a wall.
I absolutely look to the NYT to give to me the truth. In this instance at least, I have a feeling that the truth was not reported with deep enough investigation.
10
Agree. They NYT missed this one badly and I feel like it could have been on purpose.
6
Dear Readers,
Another well reasoned articulate piece from the NYT that says everything we need to do. I’m informed now. Let’s review —There actually is a crisis (Trump agrees), we need a big wall (Trump agrees), it’s needs a big beautiful door (Trump agrees), immigrants are illegally gaming the system (Trump agrees), we need to enforce our laws (Trump agrees), we need to change our laws (Trump agrees), we need to do something or we will hire bad leaders to do what needs to be done (Trump May be an example). I’m beginning the think that Trump is a horrible person that may be inarticulate but in this case has broadly been on message. OMG, did I just say that?!
13
Illegal immigration, abortion, religious freedom, gun control, LGBTQ rights, women's rights are red meat hot button issues for the Republican base.
The Republican politicians have had decades to plan solutions to all of these issues. They have shown zero interest in addressing solutions to these issues.
Why would they not want to solve major problems facing the U. S. citizens?
Simple. It keeps their base of angry red meat voters focused and voting.
3
The GOP has been unwilling to resolve long-standing immigration issues because it is a useful tool in exciting their base. They use it to raise money and ensure votes. If it gets "fixed" with some moderate solution, then what? Find another issue to inflame their base and raise more money? Sure, but not while this golden goose is still laying eggs for them. Only when the vote goes against them will their tune change and voters will hear a new "story", as if this one never existed. One more time voters will be manipulated into donating money to stop the "new" threat and help serve the phony agenda of disingenuous politicians.
1
After WW II, countries agreed that people fleeing persecution based on their religion, race, nationality, political opinion, or particular social group should be allowed to request asylum. In the U.S., Congress said our country would offer asylum for these internationally approved reasons. The Obama Administration decided to add an additional 2 reasons for granting asylum - domestic and gang violence - which are hard to disprove, and are the ones being claimed by most Central Americans
Nearly 90% of recent arrivals are Guatemalan. In 2018, 22 people were murdered in Guatemala out of every 100,000 residents. The murder rate in several U.S cities was considerably higher. Chicago’s murder rate was 24, Memphis' 28, Detroit's 40, Baltimore's 56, and St. Louis' 60.
"Hunger, not violence, fuels Guatemalan migration surge, U.S. says” is the title of a 9/22/18 Washington Post article which said, "Rather than a spike in violence, the families appear to be fleeing a hunger crisis in Guatemala’s western highlands, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, citing U.N. and United States Agency for International Development (USAID) food insecurity data as well as the agency’s own intelligence assessments. Years of meager harvests, drought and the devastating effects of “coffee rust” fungus on an industry that employs large numbers of rural Guatemalans is speeding up an exodus of families from villages bereft of food, CBP officials say.”
We could offer Guatemala food aid.
4
Is this possible? Did a NYT columnist just agree with policy that Trump has been pushing hard for years? I thought he was supposed to get impeached for obstruction for the collusion that never happened. What’s going on, where’s today’s Russia boogeyman article?
Seriously, immigration is an important issue that Trump has emphasized and has won on. It’s not fearmongering. He gets it. I’m glad Friedman is speaking out because dems will continue to lose votes until they align better with popular opinion. If you leave loopholes for illegal immigrants and asylum seekers then they will be exploited shamelessly. If you’ve lived in third world you can understand this. Let’s not be dumb as a country.
8
Wow...why don't you write a short story, Mr. Friedman. Asylum is necessary....and the US needs to support it, AND, work with those countries from which people are fleeing to help solve the problems, rather than telling those countries to pound sand. The crisis at the border is a self has been exacerbated by the policies of Trump, from 0 tolerance to focusing on a wall only. Trump is not seeking a solution - he is seeking political points at the expense of people. Is that not a high crime?
Friedman writes: "And in an era when more and more countries will fracture ............. we simply cannot take everyone who shows up at our border." I think that is what Trump wants to accomplish, but like everything else he attempts, he does it ineptly. Worse yet, is that he has someone who is pure evil, named McConnell, who will back him up.
For God's sake, we have 11 million + ILLEGAL immigrants in this country..... politicians on both sides of the aisle cannot escape blame for this situation.
If illegal immigration is allowed to continue, we will soon experience the same political upheaval we see in France, Germany and other European countries. It is time for both parties to unite on implementing a comprehensive immigration plan!!!
5
Thank you for actually painting a picture of the situation and staying objective of what you observed and reported. This has been way more informative than the hundreds of articles repeating opinions rather than what is actually observed. We actually see a story in this piece.
2
The US has a multitude of infrastructure projects that require lots of labor: highways, bridges, water systems, etc. We need to put 2 and 2 together here. Immigrants want jobs, the US has a need for labor for these jobs. This is part of the solution.
(FDR knew this in the depression.)
@Pb of DC The Dreamers, DACA recipient and their parents can easily help provide that labor. No need to import more poverty.
3
America does not need more immigrants, high-IQ or otherwise. Instead, we need to find ways to effectively invest in the human capital already here. The continuous growth model of immigration cannot continue forever.
East Asian countries such as Japan and South Korea take in practically zero immigrants yet have developed thriving economies. They do this by prioritizing education and resources for their own citizens.
American workers are discouraged from even going into STEM fields when they know companies will simply hire HB1 foreigners they can pay less.
8
"Without a high wall, too many Americans will lack confidence that we can control our borders"
The funny thing is that without any sort of wall, illegal border crossings had been decreasing since 2005. And while conservatives have always liked to portray Obama as some sort of open borders advocate, the reality is that he was quite the immigration hawk - expanding funding and resources for the Border Patrol, and deporting a lot of people.
But when a media narrative takes hold, it takes hold (and Friedman tends to be one of the biggest culprits when it comes to pushing conventional wisdom, whether or not it's accurate). So now immigration is framed as a problem where a wall is what will keep us from being "overrun."
Maybe a more useful exercise is to identify those things that were actually working pretty well before an incompetent demagogue came into office and suddenly illegal border crossings spiked again?
108
@Vin I absolutely agree with @vin. Walls may have some nominal value for preventing illegal entry in urban areas like El Paso, but they are of little or no use in remote deserts. They sell both ladders and shovels in Mexico. The Mexican cartels have proven the ineffectiveness of walls for stopping transhipments of drugs and, by extrapolation, the movement of people.
Walls are very effective, though, for preventing the migratory movements of wildlife in the Southwest region. There are populations of jaguar, Mexican wolf, javelina, antelope, and other species that need freedom of movement to be able to maintain their numbers to avoid extinction. A wall would be extremely destructive to their habitats.
The problem with immigration is not on our southern border. It is about 2,000 miles farther south. That is where it needs to be addressed.
13
@Vin
"Decreasing" means the annual inward flow has been decreasing. But there is still large annual inflow. And the cumulative number of illegals is still large.
Just like "decelerating" means that the velocity is decreasing. But "slowing down" is not stopped.
Obama and deportation --
Obama changed the method of reporting deportations. Previously, illegals caught near the border and quickly sent back were not counted as deportations. Obama began counting at-the-border-catch-and-returns as deportations, which greatly increased the overall count of deportations, even though Obama actually reduced deportations from the interior.
Deportations ought to be made both at the border and in the interior, with no categorical exceptions of any kind.
Mexican flow as "net outward" also is not correct.
"Net outward" means outward flow is greater than inward flow.
But the equation makes sense only if the two flows are measured in the same way --
and they are not measured in the same way,
The outward flow is measured from Mexican government statistics (ipso facto raising red flags) which count all new residents in Mexico from the USA -- including anchor babies taken by their parents back to Mexico with the parents who leave -- who of course not included in the U.S. statistics for people born in Mexico residing in the US which are used to get the inward flow.
Further, even that flawed supposed "net outward" flow is only very recent recent and very small.
5
@Vin
Friedman doesn't criticize Obama in this column at all but does criticize Trump for ending the "prosperity" funding for the northern triangle, an Obama policy in 2014.
Tagging Friedman as one of the biggest culprits pushing conventional wisdom based in inaccuracies is pretty disingenuous when your next sentence reduces his recommendations to only the wall.
3
When you tell an agency that should prioritize arrests, mysteriously, they make more arrests. Does it speak to a higher overall flow of immigrants? It's my understanding of the Pew data that we're down a lot from 2000. It also seems like more people are coming from further away. At the same time, we look to be putting pressure on those southern countries, including trying to (sloppily) foment a military coup in Venezuela.
Mr. Friedman, does the behavior of the American state bear any responsibility for the pressures put upon the global south? Have we invented a convenient problem to feed our need for cheap, disposable labor? Where is our moral responsibility for this human suffering? You speak of "properly absorbing" immigrants, but who do you mean? Are we only accepting Indian computer science majors? Can you at least have the moral courage to be honest about what immigration you find acceptable?
If you lack the integrity to discuss the role that class and race plays in our immigration debate, you only serve the interests of the influential, wealthy people who exploit the world's most vulnerable people for personal profit. The kindest reading of this essay is that CPB gulled you during their Potemkin tour into writing this disingenuous chaff. "Visiting" the border is inadequate for understanding the perverse incentives that power this crisis. Please do better.
1
For obvious reasons the US is the preferred place to seek asylum, but why shouldn't there be a program initiated to place immigrants in other countries that aren't unsafe? Plenty of stable countries in South America, why shouldn't they step up and share some of the burden? Or even the EU?
6
@Michael: Colombia and Brazil are absorbing millions of Venezuelans now.
"... 48 percent of white working-class Americans agree that “things have changed so much that I often feel like a stranger in my own country." …. I have little sympathy for people who feel this way. Imagine the changes that most people in the world have been faced with and this seems more than a little self-centered.
2
Many presidents love a good war, and I doubt Trump is an exception. It would boost his ego, and distract from his many, many failures. And the military needs a war so they have reasons to give promotions and medals.
So where shall this war be? Well, our biggest problem are those escaping those three Central American countries, which have turned into basket cases. So why don't we invade and conquer them? They would be pushovers.
Then the countries can become colonies of the US and reshaped to our liking. The need to escape them would go away. Life for the people would be so much better. Just look at Puerto Rico.
1
@Bob in NM
I assume you are being ironic. The last thing the US needs is to become even more of a colonial power.
We need to use our resources to help these “basket case” countries, as you term them, become self sufficient. If we don’t do it, China will, and I don’t think you will like that outcome.
I totally agree with Tom and his multi- pronged immigration plan. It’s not all that different from that which has been proposed with bipartisan support, only to be shot down by the administration.
3
Take note, this article is pro-wall. It makes a good case for it, along with just-as-important complimentary measures. Do the anti-wall leaders and influencers have it within them to acknowledge the role of a wall? It would be hard, and yes Trump & team are precisely guilty as charged for (among other things) leadership by roiling up your base into a frenzy rather than leadership of the country.
I'm very pro-immigration, but I have to admit that my view has hardened during this debate.
The government and laws of any nation should work to benefit the people of that nation first. As the article states, the most coveted immigrants are those earning advanced STEM degrees at American universities, because they have been proven to drive innovation and jobs that benefit all Americans. That doesn't mean all unskilled applicants should be rejected, but right now we don't really have that choice, do we?
Illegal immigration, essentially a gate crash on our border, has robbed Americans of the ability to make their own choice. While immigrants provide many proven benefits to American society, unskilled immigrants also drive up costs for schools and social welfare providers.
Unfortunately, we cannot have a healthy debate about immigration right now. The blatant xenophobia and racism of Donald Trump has turned it into a political hand grenade. When Fox News refers to everybody south of the U.S. border as "Mexicans," Trump supporters wildly chant BUILD THAT WALL, even as they depend on the goods and services provided by the immigrants every day. Meanwhile, to oppose Trump, Democrats have taken the equally unrealistic approach of supporting near-unlimited immigration.
What we need are political moderates who can actually work across the aisle. But in today's hyper-polarized environment, I just don't see that happening. And that's bad for all Americans.
2
I still do not agree that a wall is needed. Whenever it's mentioned I think about the Berlin wall and the barriers between Eastern Europe and the West. Mexico is NOT an adversary and a wall treats it as one. The solution isn't to provide a physical barrier, but to limit opportunity here as well as work to stabilize the countries these people are leaving. Those deserving of asylum should be able to get it, and to rapidly have a legal existence here, but others - especially those who come for better economic situations shouldn't be able to find that. Anybody who hires someone not legal to work in this country should be penalized in a way that it doesn't happen a second time.
3
We need to acknowledge U.S. complicity in creating the poverty and lawlessness in Mexico and Central America. Looking squarely at this might help us to do better. Considering resources, Mexico and Central America are rich. It is the political economy that impoverishes the people and drives them to desperate measures. If we promoted broad-based development in Central America, our border problem would be solved. If we continue to sabotage democracy and promote criminality, the wall will be useless.
2
On June 27, 2013, the Senate passed a compromise immigration bill on 68-32 margin. The bill was not considered by United States House of Representatives and died in the 113th Congress. Speaker Boehner wouldn't bring it up because the 'freedom caucus' told him not to.
We can't have immigration reform as long as Republicans are in charge of any of the branches of government.
1
@Chazak
That immigration bill handed illegal immigrants a path to citizenship. This, in itself, just like the amnesty offered by Reagan in 1986, would have signaled to potential migrants that it was alright to come here illegally ... because another amnesty would eventually pass.
The 1986 bill was also supposed to be a compromise. It offered an amnesty in exchange for ending all further illegal immigration. 3,000 illegal aliens were offered green cards and a chance to apply for citizenship. This sent a message to people world wide - if you could manage to get into the U.S., you would eventually be granted an amnesty.
The PEW Trust estimates that after the amnesty, 11 to 12 million people moved here illegally. Yale University's School of Management estimates the number to be considerably higher - one to be just below 17 million and one above 29 million, with a high probability of 22.8 million.
The 2013 bill you refer to would have offered another amnesty, and so, would have encouraged yet more people to move here illegally, in the expectation that they, too, would eventually be granted an amnesty.
We must not offer any more amnesties, if we are serious about ending illegal immigration.
4
I appreciate Mr. Friedman's light effort to showcase how border communities are affected by immigration--and wish he had delved deeper. Too often, people who support Trump's immigration policies are dismissed as horrible bigots, but people would do well to really think through why some people are so strongly opposed to illegal immigration.
It's easy to say that illegal immigration is no big deal when you're not personally grappling with its consequences. Illegal immigration has very real consequences on some communities, and it would behoove us all to acknowledge that those consequences are real and to start think through how to protect and support those communities even while taking a compassionate stance on immigration.
5
Did I read this correctly? Mr. Friedman stated that there is a crisis on our southern border. A few months ago the majority of Democrats and liberals, perhaps even all of them, were accusing Mr. Trump of manufacturing a crisis just to get a wall built for purely political purposes. What could have possibly changed? Perhaps the fact that the shear number of people trying to enter the US illegally has reached a level of unsustainable proportions that even liberals are starting to become concerned. It takes them a while to understand what is actually happening because they have to look beyond the hate for the President.
The real fact is that there is no end in site to this migration of people from Central America. With a combined population of 60 million all with an aspiration to come to America this crisis will continue for years to come. The real question is can we, 1. stop the migration, and if not, 2. can we assimilate that number or close to it into American society. I think it would be difficult and would add an undo burden on our countries resources. Of coarse it will be up to Congress which right now is not functioning.
6
recently heard: We can't let everyone in just because it's better here. It's always better here and we only have so many resources to go around. You can't just let everyone in.
The problem starts in Central America so addressing our immigration "problem" will not remedy the cause. We need to address the short term problem. Make sure our laws are good providing security and compassion. Quotas is part of that. Smart border security another - walls aren't a solution.
We need a Democratic candidate that will address this properly. Saying that you are against Trump's wall by itself is not a winnig proposition. A smart immigration plan that addresses immediate problem, places resources where needed most not just a wall and addresses problems in our hemisphere that are the root - that is a winner for Dems, Independents and Republicans sick of the corruption and inaction in their party.
It's economic distress, climate distress and political corruption. If we'd been dealing with our issues here instead of destroying countries in the middle east we probably would be talking about this.
2
As the grandson of immigrants who arrived without a college education or ability to speak English, I respectfully disagree with your proposed selection process. Most of my grandparent's grandchildren, thanks to our public education system, are doctors, lawyers, scientists, professors, or wealthy businessmen. Studies show that, this story is the norm. Immigrants of all kinds and from all places pay taxes, create jobs and their children and grandchildren assimilate.
1
Among other steps we should take is examination of hacking and social media campaigns by Russians in the northern triangle countries. It is more than curious that the number of asylum seekers has ballooned despite Trump’s harsh policies. What are they being told that drives them north when not too long ago numbers were falling? Scenes like those depicted in this article are like high octane fuel for Trump’s rallies and #FoxSpews. I’m sure Russia’s IRA has figured this out.
Finally, the NYTimes is publishing rational and balanced articles on immigration. For so long, the Times and other publications, and Democrats in general, have spent all their energy on being outraged by Trump's policy. It's clear what we're against (family separation, bigotry) but not clear what we're for (totally open borders? reasonable rules and enforcement?).
Neither side has had calm or reasonable discourse on immigration since Trump was elected. There won't be viable solutions until we do.
I'm still anti wall, though. Very expensive and I'm skeptical it does work in the big picture. Mr. Friedman talks about how specific homes and neighborhoods were transformed once a wall was built, but didn't that just push the problem someplace else? When people are desperate, don't underestimate their ability to climb, dig, break, or walk around a wall--or find alternative means like trucks and boats.
Rather, I'd love to see more judges and courts to speed up the asylum hearing process. I'd like to see more robust enforcement of labor and hiring laws to prevent illegal immigrants from obtaining work and incentivizing them to do it legally. I'd like to see more aid to the nations they are fleeing to prevent people from wanting to leave in the first place.
2
If Democrats don't have some coherent form of immigration policy, they will loose, so this is BIG. Although we have long accepted immigrants, everyone knows we cannot accept all immigrants. The main motivation for most asylum seeking migrants is work. If employers were forced to properly verify their workers status, it would vastly reduce the total number of immigrants. Illegal jobs are fewer and at higher risk. Just ask Trump, since all his hotels hire workers with fake green cards. Since most very liberal Democrats see Denmark as the highest standard of liberalism, it's useful to look at whom they now accept. Here's the breakdown:
54% Immigrating under EU economic rules of free movement
19% International students
8% Labor Migrants with work permits
6% Family reunification
5% Asylum seekers
Note, only 5% are asylum seekers and almost 20% are students, whom any nation would want. We used to have a quota system, which was very clear. Some form of that needs to be re-instituted. Until we have an immigration system that is coherent even to the 'coyotes,' we will continue to have people testing the limits of an incoherent and underfunded system. Rule of Law also applies to immigration.
4
As things stand now there is no chance of a comprehensive political solution. What Friedman is talking about is a dream while Tump is president.
So, what can be done in the meantime?
Build some fencing as it was determined in the recent budget deal, build more facilities (this can happen very quickly if Tump was really willing to do something), increase border patrol and immigration judges as much as possible and increase assistance to Honduras and Guatemala (this is also something that can be done quickly and efficiently).
But we have a deranged president right now who does not think rationally. He is only thinking of how to be re-elected.
1
The problem is that smart and wall have been politically debunked. Wall supporters oppose humanitarian law and humanitarian application of the law. Even if funding were linked to new laws or regs, the handling of immigrants would change once construction was complete
Moreover, there is little motivation for highly trained immigrants. People can live well at home in their culture with their families. Why move across the world? Does a doctor from country X really want to be a waiter in the US?
Mexico (but not US) is party to the 1984 Cartagena Agreement, and agreed to accept refugees from neighboring Central American states as provided under the international refugee treaty, just like UNRO camps worldwide. Those crossing the border with Guatemala who seek asylum, the agreement states, are to be housed in camps near the southern border with Guatemala so they can return when conditions improve. They don't need to be provided work permits nor given free transit to the US. Note that refugees from socialist Nicaragua are similarly now given asylum in Costa Rica. Mexico should comply with Cartagena and not shuffle problems to USA. The US has helped Mexico with their southern wall but Mexican politics interfere.
2
"since October, along the whole southwest border, from California through Texas, there have been 190,000 apprehensions of “family units”..... Well, there certainly does seem to be a problem; but why? The situation in Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador did not suddenly become desperate. It has been bad for years. Further, when Obama left the White House illegal immigration into the U.S. was at a 40 year low and there were no caravans of asylum seekers crossing Mexico. Something has to have changed rather dramatically; and the most reasonable assumption is that Mexico is no longer cooperating in helping to secure our southern border. Maybe that's what happens when you refer to Mexicans as rapists and murderers.
3
Friedman chose an apt cautionary quote from David Frum writing in "The Atlantic"--“If liberals insist that only fascists will enforce borders, then voters will hire fascists to do the job liberals refuse to do.” That is more or less what has happened in several eastern European nations and has contributed to the surge of far right parties in western European nations such as Germany. And, of course, there is President Trump here. The kind of unfeasible open border stance that some "progressives" implicitly advocate risk raising the odds that Trump will be serving a second calamitous term.
7
There is remarkably little daylight between this view and that of Trump. Totally unexpected
3
He does not want to fix it and neither do the Republicans. They need the "invasion" issue for the 2020 election. It brings in two voting blocks who want to oppose "the other": Bigots/Nationalists and The Religious Right
1
This entire op-ed appears to be based on a tour "guided by a US Border Patrol team". I wonder, did Friedman ever meet with human rights orgs working on the ground like Al Otro Lado, Border Angels, or San Diego Rapid Response Network? Did he speak to any experts or academics who study the border? Insultingly, he ends his candy-coated right-wing proposal by saying "anybody who tells you otherwise has never been to the border," erasing the myriad human rights workers and everyday people who live in the borderlands who would find his proposal anathema. Most people along the border do not support the wall!
This op-ed is just a literary press release; the Trump administration succeeded in placing an op-ed in the NYT by a reasonable sounding moderate columnist who signed on to their ultra-nationalist agenda of "build the wall," while making it sound like a liberal solution. Yet, Mr. Friedman reveals, as usual, that he is not the expert he thinks he is. Where to begin...He repeatedly and inaccurately refers to asylum-seekers, who have a legal right in international and domestic law to ask for asylum, as "illegal immigrants." He doesn't mention the US-Mexican illegal system of metering at San Ysidro or much of anything about immigration detention, where immigrants who have committed no crimes wait for months. He suggests that a significant number of asylum seekers don't appear in court. 96% do. Friedman's analysis is typically ham-fisted and error-filled, but this is a new low.
They must be all sent back home,once they cross the border they are CRIMINALS, no less than any other. If they disredard the laws,they are not fit to live in America and this writer is a dead head to bring emotion into this about so called no criminals. When sent back,they should be told thety have to apply from their own country..
4
Oh, so there really is an illegal immigration crisis after all.
8
"Hey Democrats!" "Fight smart!" "Make a deal!" Give Trump what he wants on immigration. He's a one trick pony. There are other issues that you can win on. Health care! Labor! Education! The public will tire of him without his signature issue. And come next election he, and his party, will stand naked before your spears.
3
Recall that not too long ago the so called gang of 8 was working on a comprehensive immigration plan only to see the no nothing tea party types scream amnesty, until that threat is eliminated, status quo.
Trump's "wall" is a fantasy at best; a bottomless boondoggle at worst. Only angry old white men (i.e., Trump's base) would ever think it's going to even partially solve the immigration problem.
Trump’s wall poses grave threat to a precious research resource to one of our nation’s defense crown jewel of its technological superiority,—stealth military aircraft in evading detection by enemy radar, and in the future, visual detection by enemy space satellites! Years ago, a paragraph in a Business Week magazine, “Developments to Watch” section, noted that scientists and engineers involved with stealth technology were interested in the anatomical anatomy of the wing structure of the Monarch Butterfly because its gorgeous coloration is derived from its diffraction grating structure rather than through pigmentation or dyes. More recently, an article in the Australian newsletter, “Silicon Republic” noted similar interest. The population of the butterfly species has declined some 86 percent in recent years. Trump’s declared emergency powers of eminent domain threatens to completely and utterly destroy the functions of preservation of the National Butterfly Center, located near or in Mission, Texas, by being sliced in half by the klieg night lit thirty-feet tall wall! Our national security threatens to be TRASHED on the alter of highly questionable border security value. One could hope that common sense be imparted into John Bolton, a noted defense security hawk and Trump’s national security advisor, and stop this destructive madness. The website for this priceless resource is www.nationalbutterfycenter.org.
Finally some sanity in the madness going on for years. From separating children to abolish ICE, it has been nothing but madness; herd mentality of thinking one way or the opposite. Thank you Mr. Friedman for your thoughtful analysis and your ideas for solving the crisis.
20
@DipThoughts Good post....worthy of repeating.
This has got be the most superficial analysis of the immigration issues I have seen from a supposedly informed observer. He visits one place on the border, he quotes numbers and gives no perspective (the current numbers pale in comparison to the 2008 - 2009 time period), he gives no numbers on catch and release (84% return for their asylum hearings - per ICE) , doesn't discuss why the land owners along the Rio Grande in Texas have been fighting seizure of their land to build border fencing since 2006 and but not least he doesn't discuss legal immigration (far larger than the number of illegal immigrants).
And most damning, he doesn't mention the fact that most hard line anti-immigration people are basically racists and no matter how many miles of fencing you build they won't contribute to any reasonable solution on solving our border problems
Please tell me you Ivdid not hear you say that we need a wall! If so, I have to inform you that you suffer from Stockholm Syndrome. You mention the programm with which people come here to study and then have to leave again. What could possibly be wrong with that? You mention immigrants who have their families follow them. What’s wrong with that? That you even mention the Lottery program is surprising: It is only for a small number of people and was created to have immigrants from other countries that have not “sent” many in recent decades. What’s wrong with that? Immigrating is very, very difficult and honestly, Americans who have not wittnessed it up close don’t have a lot to say about it and are misinformed. Ask immigrants. They know how difficult it is already and that any change only made it worse. If the U.S. does not want so many desperate refugees from Latin America, go help them in their countries! Do something at the source of the problem that you helped create.
1
Democrats don’t want a rational, metered, immigration system like Canada’s.
Earlier this year they refused to fully fund the programs discussed in this article.
Democrats want mass migration. That’s how they vote in Congress. Abolish ICE they say.
You’d better learn Spanish and adjust to the disappearance of your favorite foods from the local grocery stores. At least if you’re Catholic there will continue to be one Mass in English a week.
And in 20 years time? Your grandkids better learn Arabic, Mandarin and Urdu.
5
Democrats need a coherent plan that addresses this reality. Saying "comprehensive immigration reform" with out saying what that would be doesn't help. Abolish ICE and anything that can be characterized as "open border and that anything less is racist" WILL NOT WORK.
It's not hard.
Build a wall. Provide for DACA kids. Some legal status but not citizenship for illegals. Use E-verify to stop hiring illegals off the books. And a "point system for controlling legal immigration and citizenship similar to Canada's
3
It is not an immigration crisis. It is a refugee crisis. Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala are failed states, and parts of Mexico are the same way.
Climate change has devastated traditional agriculture. We are seeing the first wave of what may turn into civilization-shattering migrant flows.
A wall will do absolutely nothing about this situation. Sooner than we think, the results will be militant socialist revolutions or fascist military dictatorships. Because capitalist "representative democracies" have failed.
For decades our politicians have manipulated voters with simplistic solutions. A war on drugs. Militarization of the border, fences and walls.
The first was self-defeating on its face -- the more you limit supply, the higher the price, the more resources for smuggling and the greater the profit.
The second was also self-defeating. By making the border harder to cross, we stopped the circular flow of migrant farm labor. It became too expensive to return to Mexico every year. So migrants stayed and started families.
Among seniors, Latinos are 6%. Among millenials, 20%. Among post millennials, 25%. And the latter are native-born citizens.
Now we have a refugee crisis. Against starvation and having your thirteen-year old daughter taken to become a "girlfriend", Trump promises jail -- food, shelter, clothing, medical care.
What would you do ... stay for rape and death or flee to an American jail?
And forget long-term solutions. The crisis is now.
Tom Friedman: trump is for everything you mentioned in your article on fixing our outdated immigration system. It’s your friends on the democrat side, the newspapers who print your opinion stories and the liberal judges, who thwart every move trump takes to fix the system. Simple fixes to the loopholes that exist would take no more
than one hour of our legislators time. Unfortunately, they are all “missing in action,”.
3
There are no "climate change" stresses fracturing any of these countries. The immigrants on the southern border are coming from countries fractured by altogether more prosaic reasons.
Just as with border enforcement, if liberals insist on living in a world that exists primarily in their imagination, then the rest of us will be forced to vote for other people. Powering your house intermittently with a windmill will not in any way mitigate the actual stressors that cause people to flee Guatemala.
3
@Bob Incidentally, according to Berkeley Earth, the mean rate of temperature change in Honduras since 1990 is -0.63C per century, and the mean rate in Guatemala is -0.17 per century since 1990. So, for the past 3 decades, the temperature has been going down, not up. But I guess Friedman figures he might as well just throw it out there, since no one ever fact checks or thinks skeptically when "climate change" is used as an explanation for something, no matter how overtly preposterous it may be.
http://berkeleyearth.lbl.gov/regions/honduras
http://berkeleyearth.lbl.gov/regions/guatemala
Why fix it and lose it as a base energizer?
These problems among others have been going on for decades.Ask yourselves why DT is president? It is not because of the Russians, racists, or anything other than total ineptitude over the last 30 of our elected officials at the national level.
3
Texas has millions of undocumented. Most Texans do NOT support mass deportation.
We know the Mexicans and Central Americans work very hard, especially outdoor work in the Summer (construction and landscaping). We know that's why our housing prices are low. We know they commit fewer crimes as well (out of fear of the police). Truth is, they are very honest...just as much or more than the 'natives' (including our large Vietnamese and Nigerian populations).
Predominantly "white" states: your future will be more like Texas, and that ain't bad.
Friedman should not be calling it a crisis, feeding into administration lies. The only crisis is the one they have created for purely political reasons. There are three important concepts that elude our rabid and brainwashed anti-immigrant electorate. 1) Without robust immigration Social Security and Medicare will collapse even sooner than projected. We desperately need more younger workers while population replacement is decreasing. 2) Without immigration, legal or not, the price of produce will skyrocket. Instead of walls we need clearly delineated guest worker programs with enforcement and safeguards against worker exploitation. 3) The United States is anything but full and our rural areas are withering away. An influx of new blood would be a win-win situation for everyone. Instead of hatred and divisiveness we desperately need comprehensive reform.
1
This picture says it all.
Wall.
5
Excellent analysis, Mr. Friedman, except for all the "wall" rhetoric.
When you know how loaded that term is, why do you keep hammering it?
One thing is CERTAIN: There is no confidence or trust in an incessant pathological liar and known bigot and racist called Trump.
Any comprehensive addressing of our southern border will have to await his departure.
Who would have thought that the NYT and Mr. Friedman would publish and write one of the best articles ever written on our immigrtion crisis? Superb! Thank you.
I ask that you do a follow-up article that also presents facts and thoughtful observations on the related subject of: Are we full?
Friedman claims that we need a steady stream (or flood) of immigrants. I and others disagree. Our society was much healthier in the 50's (economically and socially, though not politically) than it is now. We had approximately half the population we have today.
But even if one argues that we need to expand the population, there is no doubt whatsoever that the expansion is needed only in areas that have suffered significant population losses. Australia has a system that manages to funnel controlled immigration to areas whose citizens want more people. We should do the same. Mr. Friedman, will you please investigate this issue in the same comprehensive, truthful and thoughtful manner in which you investigated and wrote this article?
If somehow NYT could get this article to become the basis of our national debate on immigration, I believe it would merit a Pulitzer Prize.
2
I'll admit that I stopped reading this article when Friedman referred to the "high IQ" immigrants whose families are wealthy enough to send them to college in the U.S. Exactly how did he assess their IQ's?
Why doesn't he just admit that he really prefers wealthy immigrants over poor immigrants who are fleeing their homelands to save their lives and their children's lives?
It's actually very much along the lines of what Trump wants.
1
Excellent if obvious write up
Step 1 would be for Democrats to simply recognize that we do have a border crisis. Public mea culpa. Short of that there is no way forward
Second we need a plan from both democrats and republicans to address both the short term crisis and the long term one.
Third we need to stop making this about a wall. Build the stupid thing and get it out of the way of more critical reform. Stop fixating on a symbol
I think Democrats have become the biggest obstacle to solving this problem. Trump’s a buffoon but the issue he raises is real. Trump would be violating his oath if he did not address it. Why not lean in and help
If democrats do not they will get blown away in 2020—and deserve it
1
If this administration truly thinks that the Southern border is a crisis, then why has Mike Pompeo only made 6 trips to Mexico / Central America / South America since he became Secretary of State? In contrast, he has made 17 visits to Asia and 16 visits to the Middle East.
Thank you Tom for admitting that the wall is at least part of the solution. On these pages your words are tantamount to treason.So let's start with this part, and see how far it goes toward solving the problem. We can then proceed to the other parts.
2
Thomas Freidman claims to be pro-immigration but his version of immigration isn't much different than the line the current Republicans in office are taking.
Firstly, favoring those with "energies and talents that enrich and advance our society" is coded language for exclusion of the most effected by state decay and gang violence. Meritocracy is not the way to "humanely" create immigration policy. In fact, some ethicists argue that taking the most educated citizens away from economically struggling nations creates a "brain drain", stifling organic growth and development in their home country.
Considering people escaping extreme poverty and violence to be "gaming the system", while you are a comfortable baby boomer who benefited from the economic momentum of the 20th century at the exact same time that the US was systematically overturning legitimately elected governments in Central America, is the product of Thomas Friedman's pompous patriotic exceptionalism. Laughably, he offers "governance assistance" and "stabilizing" as solutions to the unrest in the countries from which the migrants are fleeing, as if he forgot the last 50 years of American foreign policy and the havoc that it has wrought.
Altogether, this guy is advocating for changes that only seem reasonable in the Trump era, where the perspective of the "measured conservative" is a sucker's breath of fresh air and, in reality, offers nothing of value to the conversation.
Everyone following the immigration debate should stay abreast of who is on the entitlement rolls. Hint: Hispanics are on the rolls at about twice their proportion of the population. Why would that be? Many of those coming across our border have very little formal schooling. They don't earn much. Legal or illegal, they have kids. Some or all the family ends up on entitlements.
Guess what happens when those with little formal schooling have kids? They can't work with their kids so they do well in school.
Here's the data on which groups make up the non elderly enrolled in Medicaid. Check out your state.
https://www.kff.org/medicaid/state-indicator/distribution-by-raceethnicity-4/?currentTimeframe=0&sortModel=%7B%22colId%22:%22Location%22,%22sort%22:%22asc%22%7D
5
So..Mr. Friedman...what are you willing to concede?
In the grand negotiation of our lifetime, we can either both dig in our heels and watch this problem grow 5 fold...or we can each concede certain things that allow us to broker an agreement that makes neither of us happy, nor either of us mad.
I for one would not object to allowing every undocumented immigrant to remain in the U.S. provided they are crime free, register for a guest worker visa; agree never to apply for U.S. Citizenship unless they go back to their home country and register legally; and if they stay as guest workers..they agree that any child born of them will not become a U.S. citizen nor will they ever be allowed to vote in an election at the federal, state or local level until such time they become a U.S. Citizen.
We build the wall...quadruple enforcement on expired visa's and E-Verify..and we double the # of legal immigrants allowed in each year..based on merit..not family ties.
Propose this to any undocumented immigrant here today and they will take this deal in a heartbeat.
So why won't Nancy Pelosi agree to this? More importantly..what is Nancy Pelosi willing to concede. What are any of you willing to concede? Will you give up your house cleaner, your nanny, your gardener..the entire kitchen staff at your local restaurant?
Money..and power...stealing congressional seats and electoral votes and federal $ from WI, MN, MI, PA, OH, MO, and other flyover states... pre 2020 Census.
If the President refuses to lead.. Then where is Nancy Pelosi and HER solution? She can easily book an hour on a major network and explain [to the American people] the Democrat's plan. And before everyone starts screaming, "They already submitted a plan!".. Then I want to see it and hear it again from Nancy!
1
WHY NOT TRY --"IF I IMMIGRATE AM I A RESPONSIBLE PERSON". All immigrants should be identified as to their personal responsibility to the country they say they are fleeing. If they are able to afford the journey to America maybe they are the privileged ones of their country and therefore why are they leaving .They should learn to be responsible citizens of their own country and collectively march on their country's soil about the atrocities being committed against them. Leaving their country in the condition they say it is in shows little respect for their fellow citizens.
Fleeing to America will never resolve their own country's problems. If one cannot solve his own problems how does that person expect a foreign government to do it for them. America's involvement in other nation's cultural and political issues has invariably resulted in resentment by the people of that country.
To stop this flagrant irresponsible activity by migrants, legislation regarding the hiring of any illegal should impose fines on that company and civil action against the management of that company. Next all illegal immigrants found to be using any form of illegal documentation for deception as to being a citizen of America should be deported and never allowed to be a citizen of America. Finally no illegal immigrant should be eligible for any social program assistance of any kind. And wouldn't it be nice if they assimilated into the American culture and learned English. WOW a solution.
1
As I previously said in other comments, climate change refugees must be granted asylum. You cannot deport these people to nations or areas that are under water.
And more consideration must be given to women and children because of the horrific conditions in nations where they are fleeing from:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/04/05/opinion/honduras-women-murders.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2016/nov/23/central-america-gangs-migrants-sexual-exploitation-prostitution
A feature of the current migrant surge which Friedman failed to mention is that coyotes are using children as a tool to successfully smuggle adults into the U.S.
A child is paired with an adult or an adult couple, and this unit presents itself to the border patrol as a family. Once this "family" is in the U.S. the child returns to Mexico to form yet another sham family, and the process repeats. Endlessly.
Mr. Friedman pushed for the Iraq war despite being "worried that Mr. Bush has told us the right thing to do, but won't be able to do it right." ( https://nyti.ms/2sSkPQV ). How did that work out? Now he's doing the same with immigration.
The US was instrumental in the defeat of the Third Reich and Imperial Japan. We sent men to the moon several times. We certainly have the ability to control our borders and repatriate a few million unarmed aliens. We are just too hamstrung by outmoded laws designed to coddle law-breakers. Four more years of Trump and Stephen Miller may be the only answer if Democrats continue to turn their backs on America.
5
Mandatory E-verify is a great idea.
Unfortunately, California has already passed legislation barring mandatory E-verify.
No surprise here.
8
I find the distinction between economic dislocation and tyranny odd. It seems absurd that a blogger from Singapore who was jailed for a few weeks for inciting religious hatred is considered more worthy of asylum than a poor person from Honduras. The Singaporean blogger is better off on any conceivable metric. Extreme poverty should be grounds for asylum every bit as much as tyranny.
50
@Aoy
If extreme poverty becomes a criteria for asylum we could easily triple our population and turn into a third world country.
20
@Aoy
If poverty should be grounds for asylum, then convince enough other Americans to get the law changed. Your view is insufficiently popular to pass now. Until then, please don't advocate breaking the law, or give a pass on those that do.
12
@JimH And how would that happen? Our richest nation is now actually taking care of others vs. the fallacy of the one percent? I'll take the extremely poor over the extremely annoying rich any day and I'll also take native brown over racist white any day.
1
The current failure of Democrats to do more than excoriate the Racism ,white nationalism, and cruelty of Trump and his Igor, Stephen Miller, makes them seem tone deaf and dismissive of legitimate concerns.
And it is a uniquely clever Trump strategy to get the Democrats to try to out do each other as in, “candidate X doesn’t care enough about the human tragedy but I do.” Or “I was the first to speak out about the children in cages, and candidate X is late to the party”. Or worse still, “candidate X is racially insensitive”.
Democrats need to articulate a sensible plan to solve the problem. A plan as robust and well thought out as Medicare For All. Voter’s concerns about immigration present a teachable moment for Democrats to speak to them sensibly—it begins with saying that Trump has failed to fix our immigration system and has turned a problem into a disaster. It will make the election a whole lot less close than it should be.
Trump is using the "border crisis" the same way the Religious Right uses the abortion issue -- to stir up his rabid, bigoted base.
Trump doesn't care if this nation ever gets meaningful immigration reform. And his voters don't care either. So why do they literally foam at the mouth about the "Wall"? Because it is a symbol of their bone-deep hatred of brown-skinned people.
Fix the immigration problems in this country, and Trump voters will have to openly admit their racism and bigotry. They will no longer have brown-skinned targets to go after.
And this is what they really want. If given the chance, Trump voters would gladly drive out tens of millions of our brown-skinned citizens. Their braying about "illegals" is a fig leaf for their racism. It is a "politically correct" way to vent their bigotry.
Trump voters won't be glad when the "immigration crisis" is handled. They'll be enraged. For some years now, they've used this issue as a cover for their bigotry. With it solved, anyone who believes Trump's bigoted voters will be satisfied is painfully naive. Trump voters will simply turn their gun sites on brown skinned people who are legally within the country, citizen and permanent resident alike.
Make no mistake -- this is their true end game. And we've given them a pass for far too long for their ethnic hatred. They will not "reward" us with "dialogue". They will not "reward" us with "compromise". And we will see their racism laid bare.
1
wow, wasn't it just a few months ago that darn near every democrat was calling the problem at the border a "manufactured" crisis? my how things change once the truth comes out. and let's face it, this has been going on for decades and way past time to act.
4
Trump is using the "border crisis" the same way the Religious Right uses the abortion issue -- to stir up his rabid, bigoted base.
Trump doesn't care if this nation ever gets meaningful immigration reform. And his voters don't care either. So why do they literally foam at the mouth about the "Wall"?
Because it is a symbol of their bone-deep hatred of brown-skinned people. Fix the immigration problems in this country, and Trump voters will have to openly admit their racism and bigotry. They will no longer have brown-skinned targets to go after.
And this is what they really want. If given the chance, Trump voters would gladly drive out tens of millions of our brown-skinned citizens. Their braying about "illegals" is a fig leaf for their racism. It is a "politically correct" way to vent their bigotry.
Trump voters won't be glad when the "immigration crisis" is handled. They'll be enraged. For some years now, they've used this issue as a cover for their bigotry. With it solved, anyone who believes Trump's bigoted voters will be satisfied is painfully naive.
Trump voters will simply turn their gun sites on brown skinned people who are legally within the country, citizen and permanent resident alike. Make no mistake -- this is their true end game.
And we've given them a pass for far too long for their ethnic hatred. They will not "reward" us with "dialogue". They will not "reward" us with "compromise". And we will see their racism laid bare.
1
The current border situation is just practice for the not very distant future. As climate change makes the equatorial zone uninhabitable everyone living there is going to leave and most will come north to the US. We either find a way to accommodate this population or ?. Right now we are failing the test. We should be shoring up our facilities and preparing for the future not regressing to past failed strategy.
The heart and mind of Thomas Friedman are in the right places, when he recommends a “high wall with a big gate — but a smart gate.”
The problem is that the Republicans and Donald Trump will pay attention to the “high wall” part and ignore the part about the “smart gate.”
That is why negotiating a bipartisan, comprehensive immigration reform bill has to be the first step.
2
This situation has reached at the heart of our moral responsibility to others. What happened to the children? Why have we not seen the authorities wiping noses and changing diapers? Are we so afraid that those children will grow up to be like us? hard hearted? dismissive? selfish, self seeking? Why?
There are no answers, Mr. Friedman, except in the hearts of the people. We can open the doors at the same time as we keep the frame in place. We can train judges, police personnel, clergy, all to take a closer look with eyes inside their chests.
The Democratic party has chosen to let Trump brand it as the party of illegal immigration. Nancy Pelosi has firmly declared that all border walls, and by extension all border controls, are immoral. This is political malpractice. Any American who believes that his nation's borders must be policed is left with no choice but to vote Republican.
Handing your opponent a stick to beat you with is never a good idea.
4
While enforcing immigration laws like all laws should be a priority. But what will a wall do? Will we building a war along the Canadian Border too? Since many people come into the U.S. with legal visas then what? Do Trump's White supporters want to pay more taxes to spend enough money on immigration services?
Thank you for painting an accurate picture, even if this piece is thin on constructive solutions.
1
Thank you for a most informative and balanced article.
2
1. You can’t build a wall across the entire 2,000 mile border.
2. Where there are border walls today they are tunneled under and circumvented.
3. The “crisis” is created by people turning themselves in for asylum. Walls don’t prevent that.
4. Drugs come through legal channels (hidden) not illegal crossings.
5. Illegal entries, overwhelmingly, come here for work. And they get hired. Prevent that and your crisis dries up overnight.
1
This is one of the most important articles Tom has ever written, and believe me, I’ve probably read most of them. This article should be sent to every politician running for office, which means DEMOCRATS!!! I live in a border state; Arizona. I’ve been involved across the border over the years helping to build orphanages in Mexico. At one point in my earlier life, I probably believed in so-called Open Borders. NO LONGER! We need to act now, especially with the new elections coming up. I wish I could send this to Mayor Pete, Biden and Sanders!
To write a column of this length without devoting even a single word to discussing the illegal employers who prefer to exploit slave laborers rather than pay living wages to Americans—farmers, construction contractors, meatpackers, golf course owners—most of the them Republicans—is completely irresponsible.
It’s like writing about the flow of drugs coming across the border without asking where they’re going.
2
This is crazy. Only a few months ago, the media wanted Trump sued for declaring a border emergency. Now they are all saying there is a crisis at the border and even call for a wall. I gotta give it to Trump, he can still manipulate the media. I guess it is not so hard, given the kind of drivel that often passes for news nowadays
1
Republicans position on immigration has made me WAY more sympathetic to immigrants. I think stealing and loosibg their children went too far. Demonizing desperate and vulnerable people has back fired on them. Way to go geniuses.
@JANET MICHAEL Every initiative taken on controlling illegal immigration and enforcing duly passed laws has been stopped by unelected federal judges.
1
Why not do it the right way, Tom? We know that most of these migrants come from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. Mexico’s economy improved substantially since Trump went down the escalator in 2015.
The case of Mexico proves the main reason why migration from There is near net zero.
Like Friedman argues, it’s insane for Trump to withhold humanitarian assistance from the three countries needing it most. Properly established, this type of aid is the best case for serving American interests.
The better way to deal with immigration at the border is to remove the incentive for desperate people to go in the first place.
So Mr. Friedman believes the wall is necessary? Part of the solution?
The US was founded by settler colonialists only some of who were seeking asylum, who from the beginning had a fragmented and exclusive immigration policy. We have a deep history to overcome. Read A. Chomsky to get the story ("They Take Our Jobs and 20 Other Myths About Immigration).
Immigration is a sound bite for his base, a justification for giving money to Trump’s friends who are for-profit jailers, in the fencing materials business or who own property on the border. In other words it is a microcosm of Trump’s corruption of the US.
A balanced and cogent position. Thank you for appealing to reason based on facts. The ideologues on both sides of our national debate must be totally ignorant of the French Revolution for the radicals handed over their country to a tyrant after devouring themselves.
Thomas:
You really should be speaking to the Democrats who don't want to do anything to fix what is going on at the border. No money for the Wall (which I am not sure can be done), no extra money for border security (e.g. additional funding for Homeland Security). I could go on.
Not saying that Trump's ideas are the right ones, but pretending that there is no crisis, having journalists go out to border areas where people are jumping over fences, dropping kids over walls. etc. and saying out of the other side of their mouths "No crisis here."
At least Mr. Trump understands that there is a crisis. Whether or not Congress does is something else again.
Let's hear from them shall we?
2
'A May 2016 poll by the Public Religion Research Institute and The Atlantic found that 48 percent of white working-class Americans agree that “things have changed so much that I often feel like a stranger in my own country.” '
This is the core issue undermining our democracy, and opening the door to fascism. If you doubt it, then I urge you to read the award-winning book, "Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right, by the sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild.
http://tinyurl.com/yyeyyuld
3
This article is an eye opener to the current reality at the border. The instigator to this avalanche of illegal immigrants and asylum seekers was Trump. However, even in the unlikely event that Trump will come up with a good compromise for an overhaul of the immigration and asylum problems, the Democrats would not be able to give him a win over his wall.
This article takes the position that a wall fits into a comprehensive approach to immigration, because we need it to convince a segment of the population that we’re being serious. The problem with that idea is that the wall was never part of a rational approach to immigration. Trump was never interested in whether it’s the right approach or not.
The wall is a symbol for an attitude toward immigrants expressed succinctly in Trump’s rallies as “Kill them all.” The wall is the next best thing.
Shocking! Uber Liberal Friedman agrees with The President. Although sending more money to corrupt governments is an idea that has failed over the past 40 years.
bravo, bravo:
all my fellow Democats and presidential contenders PLEASE READ THIS
2020 will not be about the economy, stupid
It will be about immigration.
1
No, no, no.
When the U.S. accepts mainly "high-energy and high-I.Q." immigrants, it effectively multiplies the flood of others from the same country who would have stayed if only the gifted and capable stayed as well.
2
What's that expression from Billy Wilder's "The Fortune Cookie"? Oh, yes:"Every time you build a better mousetrap the mice get smarter, too." I don't mean to compare humans with rodents, but putting up high walls simply means that those who wish to bypass them will come back the next night with stronger shovels. Which is to sat that walls will ultimately accomplish nothing, even if Mexico were to pay for them (!).(For that matter, why not pay Mexico to build a wall across ITS southern border, which is a good deal smaller than the one at its border with the U.S.?) I also disagree with the notion that immigrants should be chosen primarily from the ranks of the educated. Seriously, who's going to pick the fruit, clean the latrines and perform all those other low-paying manual-labor jobs that U.S. citizens won't accept? In general, let's first grant legal status to the Dreamers and also to their parents, who've been hiding in the shadows for decades even while contributing to the nation's economy. Then we can deal with the newcomers on a case-by-case basis with more case reviewers and judges and better-equipped border agents. Anyone apprehended after crossing the border illegally should automatically be denied legal admission. Anyone caught doing so twice should be incarcerated (with minor kids returned home). Renew financial assistance to Central America while reducing it elsewhere. For Pete's sake, let's get rational! Submitted 4/14 at 1:23 AM
1
Without a high wall, too many Americans will lack confidence that we can control our borders, and they therefore will oppose the steady immigration we need...
Cato Institute, January 24, 2019:
Averaging national public opinion polls conducted in 2018 reveals that 6 in 10 Americans oppose building a border wall. For instance, a CBS News poll conducted in October 2018 found that 60 percent oppose “building a wall along the US-Mexico border to try and stop illegal immigration,” while 37 percent favor building a wall.
Even in opinion pieces, generalizations need to be accurate.
"... the whole family has to be released inside America within 20 days ... So they fade into America." The wall is a sham. Trump has now defined himself as more "open borders" than any Democrat. Migrants with their families have no choice but to flee the rampant violence in their countries. Otherwise, they and their children will be murdered. They stack up on the border and then flow into the United States, because Trump ensures there are pitifully few asylum judges. So migrants do not even have to make a firm case for asylum anymore in order to gain entrance into the United States. If Trump were smart, he would fully staff asylum judges, and these judges would send the majority of migrants back home, because most are economic refugees, not political refugees. Word would get out, and fewer migrants would attempt the arduous journey to America. Trump is a fool playing to his base for their gut-level approval of a physical border barrier. He has no idea what he is doing, he did not imagine he would actually be elected, and he could not care less about helping anyone, migrants included. Still, this is all great news for those fleeing for their lives from countries like Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, where American policies have wholly failed them. So ... Suffer the trip. Do a little research (get coached) when you arrive at the border. Your kids won't be locked in cages anymore. Tolerate a few weeks, and you're in. Welcome to America! Donald Trump welcomes you.
2
Countries like Japan and China are suffering the economic problem of an aging population. The United States needs a young workforce to balance its own aging population. It's a pity that the old, white, racist uneducated and poor who can be rallied by a wanna be dictator will control the conversation.
When America wakes up to the reality of the world as it is, not as it was, we will no longer be a world power.
1
Glad that Friedman showed up at the southern border - he is usually much more comfortable at Saudi Royal Palaces or at Davos - and now thinks a high wall with a huge gate, but since it’s Friedman, it’s, of course, a smart wall also that is needed. Why didn’t any think of a smart wall before? So clever that Friedman. Maybe Friedman is clever enough to get Mexico to pay for this high wall with a huge gate thats smart.
Except for a small, sometimes vocal, minority, the clear majority of Democrats, liberals, progressives believe in a secure border - that can include barriers, walls, but actually mainly fences from a practical standpoint, where it makes sense. They don’t believe in open borders or unlimited immigration - legal or illegal. Democrats have repeatedly offered legislation to address all aspects of the immigration issue. They believe in comprehensive solutions that actually work. What Democrats oppose is Trump’s magical wall to satisfy a notion born from Trump rallies (with a punch line that Mexico will pay for it) that is a vanity project that satisfies Trump’s desire and strategy to take a real issue and offer a ridiculous “solution” that’s really just a way to demagogue, hate/fear monger the issue. What Democrats oppose is taking a legitimate humanitarian crisis at the border (not a fake National Emergency) and using cruelty and incompetence as responses, which is the Trump/Miller approach, which has both deliberately and unintentionally made the crisis worse.
1
For all the comments favoring the "best and brightest" approach to immigration, I have to ask: just who do you think is caring for our most vulnerable?
The “statistics” have changed but illegal immigration has been a “known problem” for decades. Even President Reagan tried to address it and it went nowhere! Why?
Why? Because the Democrats see illegals as strengthening the Democratic Party while the Republicans see an inexhaustible source of cheap labor that can be abused simply by threatening to call INS if a worker complains.
And so, while people cried “woe is me” over illegal immigration, EVERYONE in power wanted things to remain exactly as it was. Hence nothing was done for decades.
Now we are getting overrun and the electorate is getting angry with aiding and abetting law breakers with things like “sanctuary cities” drivers licenses for illegals and a guy like di Blasio who wants to give money we don’t have for college aid to illegals when lifelong taxpayers are strapped for college tuition themselves.
I don’t like Trump and I didn’t vote for him but at least he’s not candy coating the problem. He’s gruffly in your face about it. Crude..you bet. But Congress is far worse! Are we a country of laws or aren’t we? See how Congress tap dances around that!
6
You, go, Tom, and tell like it is. The pen is mighty, the path ahead is not clear, but shining a light like you did will help us all find a way.
1
You say, '..more countries will fracture under environmental, population, criminal and technological stresses...', but you left out societal. You don't talk about inequality here. We're the worst. We've become the billionaire's American Dream; a hotbed of oligarchy, plutocracy, madness. Don't forget this aspect of who we are.
I'm sorry so many are desperate and walk here for hope of a better life. We do need to help the world's economic well-being. But, how can you be 'pro-immigration', as you call it, and not expect many of these folks to end up with the rest of the bottom half of America: struggling, desperate, used?
If Americans can watch a billionaire (says he) cut taxes for the richest citizens, and then believe he's somehow their 'champion', then our ignorance outdistances our honor. We've been had.
Tell me, what jobs are you offering? With technology and robotics and computers doing more and more, where are the good jobs for the hundreds of millions already here? Who is We the People?
68
Thank you for summarizing the technology induced labor crisis that will soon be undermining the economies of the developed world. It appears to me that the innovations created by Capitalists will ultimately cause mass unemployment and civil unrest among the laborers due to robotics and self driving vehicles.
White collar professional jobs will soon follow: https://www.wsj.com/articles/white-collar-robots-are-coming-for-jobs-11548939601
9
This group will be out of luck if they plan on heading north to claim asylum in Canada.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is defending controversial changes to asylum laws in Canada.
The changes would prevent asylum-seekers from making refugee claims in Canada if they have made similar claims in certain other countries, including the United States -- a move Border Security Minister Bill Blair says is aimed at preventing "asylum-shopping."
4
First, Mr. Friedman, thank you for a critique that does not devolve into outright contempt and disrespect to OUR president. Like him or not, he is the president. Indeed, he has brought much upon himself...but, to be fair, if any president has ever had a right to feel provoked, it's this on.
One of the things that the left gets wrong (I can only assume it is unintentional) is that the key issue of the wall is NOT immigration! And it never was. No, the wall is about ILLEGAL immigration.
When someone crosses illegally, they are NOT immigrating, they are trespassing. And we have every right to ship them home.
Those who have a legitimate need for asylum (besides the undeniable worthiness of just wanting a better life for one's family), should, of course, be skipped to the front. But the reason asylum requests have went up is almost certainly due to the thinking that it gives one quicker access to entry.
And while we absolutely should have pity on the tired, poor, teeming masses, we can quickly become guilty of creating a permanent underclass in American society. We must temper our compassion with reason. Yes, we will take SOME poor...and we will take SOME highly-educated, etc.
This is a situation that has no good answers. Someone is either going to not get in...or someone is going to have to pony up the resources needed to deal with those who come without much to offer in terms of money/ability.
Again, thank you for a reasoned critique instead of just a slap.
3
Trump doesn't want immigration policy to be improved or reformed - Trump wants to keep out everyone who is not white and Christian.
First thing he did was the Muslim ban. Second thing was refuse refugees from Syria seeking asylum.
Next came work and student visas from all black, brown and yellow nations.
Now the southern border - as if it's an emergency.
it is heartbreaking, not just for these migrants, but many voters who voted for Trump out of fear for, yes, their very livelihoods.
any well meaning opponent of this wretched liar in the White House, Democrat or Republican, must find a rational, humane answer that alleviates the anxiety of much of middle America, not racists, but simply wanting to preserve their way of life (who on this earth doesnt?) while still allowing a controlled flow of energetic, hardworking human beings who will be the lifeblood of future generations to populate this great land.
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@Ramesh G
Like Mr. Friedman and Mr. Frum, if journalists keep shining a very bright light on the actual processes, problems, solutions and impact; over and over again, reasonable solutions will emerge. The flip side of Trump's fear and loathing tactics is that the majority of Americans are exposed to this topic, and want to know more; all of it. Infants alone in cages, and today; a three year old wandering alone in the desert, is shocking. Refugees are fleeing in any way they can to the United States and too many others are dying in the Texas deserts, abandoned by heartless coyotes. Trump is a fool and will continue his diatribes of hatred and fear of immigrants every day. We are overwhelmed by his intentional hurt of powerless people, and, oddly, at the same time, reminded by his hate to do much, much better. That is my hope, Ramesh G.
1
Now that’s a comment o can get behind. And I’m for blocking this discussion until good faith is restored and hateful Trump is removed.
1
We have a crisis - in leadership.
Somehow, we citizens accept our leader's inability to address immigration, thus leaving a window open for opportunists to use the problem for their own gains.
But why do we accept this? Are we really so polarized we would rather see all this human misery than compromise on a solution?
As a Texan, I am especially embarrassed by our state politicians sitting on the sidelines on this issue and letting the federal govt decide what's best for our border and our neighbors.
The real issue is that our leaders...aren't.
1
I'm with you on much of this, yet I am still very opposed to the wall especially in Texas....and I know this border. I lived in McAllen for a number of years and have myself crossed the border to Mexico from Brownsville to Matamoros, McAllen to Reynosa, Laredo to Nuevo Laredo, Del Rio to Acuna and El Paso to Juarez...as well as hiked through Big Bend National Park. Too much of this border impacts private land, natural beauty, riverside parks, animal migrations...farther west more animal migration patterns, a border spanning Indian reservation...the ugliness and divisiveness of the symbol of the wall causes the objections from the left. I believe the wall threat is what sent so many immigrants scrambling up to the border at once.
There certainly other things we can and should do...starting with stabilizing the Central American countries with some smart aid and economic development. Reopen immigration reform in Congress to make our laws clear and fair. Find some accommodation for those who have been here for decades and have extended families and/or businesses woven into our society as opposed to ripping them apart and orphaning American children. Create a worker program for employers who need to fill unfillable jobs and punish those who circumvent the process. And give deserving DACA recipients the permanent right to stay here with some reasonable path to citizenship.
The Atlantic article by David Frum that Thomas Friedman cites has a worrisome idea: The undocumented immigrants in this country don't qualify for social security or medicare. But in the coming decades they will become older and need help.
When we plan for Social Security and Medicare overhaul, we will realistically have to factor in very large numbers of currently youngish or middle-aged immigrants who will become older (a calculation I assume is not part of our discussion currently) because as David Frum says: "They are here and we can't let them get sick and die without help."
It will be nice to think that the rich people who benefited from the cheap labor will be taxed to cover this, but likely that won't happen, and instead, benefits for middle class/working class will be cut to cover the gap (including minority working class people.)
One quibble I have with the liberal position is that politically, liberals have never been able to raise taxes on the wealthy, so an amount of suffering from the middle class accompanies their policies. (At least in recent years.)
I know people will say immigrants do pay into social security and they deserve to get it; true. But I don't believe we are factoring such costs into our analysis of Social Security/Medicare economic viability, and when we do, it will be sobering.
3
In the final line of this piece, Thomas Friedman suggests that a comprehensive immigration plan must include new walls, and that "anyone who tells you otherwise has not been to the border."
Though my liberal sensibilities lead me to reflexively disagree with this sentiment, the truth is, I have not been to the border (and neither has the overwhelming majority of Americans). My knowledge of these matters comes from the media stories I consume, which, if I am to be honest, supports my liberal sensibilities rather than challenges it.
In this way I am not much different from the conservative who only watches Fox News and thus denies that climate change is a real crisis, with a man-made cause, and resists all plans to address climate change.
Ultimately, I believe we all face a crisis that much more problematic than either illegal border crossings or climate change: the crisis of epistemology (i.e., the acquisition of knowledge).
Most people simply take for granted that what they are told - by a journalist, cable news pundit, or college professor - is true, without investigating it themselves. In this way we are all susceptible to being misled by those with a range of intentions. My recommendation is that for everything you learn from an external source, ask yourself: "How do I know this is true?"
http://johngcottone.wixsite.com/quixoticpublishing/single-post-template/2019/03/06/WHAT-DO-YOU-KNOW-Part-1-of-3
1
I have thought a partial solution would be to have a jobs fair and prescreen migrants close to the Central American border.
We need more population growth and there are certain industries that need workers. This approach could help both without placing a rush at the border.
@Tim Straus We need less population growth. I'm continually amazed by liberals who are (justifiably) concerned about climate change but, with no apparent realization of the contradiction, say things like 'we need more population growth."
5
There's a contradiction built into the immigration decision set. For practical reasons, we want to let in the people who would contribute the most to our country, but for compassionate reasons we want to let in people who need us the most.
These are two different sets of people. The people who can contribute the most here are the same people most likely to contribute to the country they came from. They might not get as good a deal there, but in either place they will get a better deal than the people with few or no job skills.
Given the current state of our political system, it is unequipped to deal with even straightforward decision sets. Confronted with a contradiction, it freezes up like a robot faced with a decision that its programmers did not anticipate. "I did not understand your response. Press 1 to return to the main menu."
Meanwhile, the third world is melting down. All the problems we face here, including inadequate infrastructure, climate change, concentration of wealth, political corruption and the rest, are worse there. We can try to help, but we can't fix it. Expect the crowd at the border to get bigger.
Here we are. Welcome to the future.
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While the Democrats can certainly be criticized for having no coherent policy on immigration, it should also be noted that the current crisis has very little to do with a wall. These people are not sneaking in; they're giving themselves up as asylum seekers.
This is an opportunity for some Democratic candidate to address the actual problem. Obama had a crisis with a surge of unaccompanied minors--and did something to fix it.
4
No Republican Senator or Representative can compromise in any way on Immigration without facing a near inevitable primary. Most old white people want the US as it was in their largely imagined youth, and most old white people vote Republican, thank you. Why should Democrats “compromise” with the party of white nationalism, of automaton right wing judges, of disregard of the Constitution, and of cozy kow tows with Russia? Defeat these people. Nothing good is possible before then.
4
This excellent article describing just how out of control things are at the border convinces me that a complete moratorium on all immigration from the South is warranted until proper controls can be put in place. I’m with the President on this one.
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While there is much that makes sense in this column -- we certainly need both secure borders and a sensible immigration system -- there are also some very disturbing elements. When one reads Mr. Friedman's suggestion that the US should admit immigrants based on factors like their ability to "assimilate and contribute" and their "high energy and high IQ," you cannot help but be reminded of the bad old days when the US immigration policy was based on racial and ethnic prejudices -- even eugenics. That was when the US judged that only those from northern European countries could assimilate and contribute while Italians, Africans, Asians and all others lacked the energy and IQ to necessary to become US citizens. Mr. Friedman should know well that such judgments have long been used against various ethnic groups, from Irish to Jews, in deciding immigration status. On what basis would we now decide who had the energy and IQ needed? Would someone who had the stamina to walk hundreds of miles across Mexico and the intelligence to maze of smugglers, opportunists and border agents qualify? Or do you need a college degree? Yes we need a rational immigration system, but it must be based on reason and compassion, not the prejudice and fear that the categories Mr. Friedman suggests can lead to.
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As someone who does not fall in with either party’s default position on immigration I have to applaud your common sense approach.
We have a big problem on our hands one which has been created by years of inaction by cheap labor Republicans and “demography is destiny” Democrats now whipped into a red hot crisis by demagogue Donny.
Thanks for reminding us that there are common sense solutions out there. Perhaps the next president will be able to break through the impasse but I’m not holding my breath. There are too many members of the donor class benefiting from the status quo for our politicians to do the right thing on this.
3
A very thoughtful essay that gives me some idea what the real issues are. It is very confusing from this side of the world having lived many years away from the US.
One of the things I wonder about is the illegals often ended up in agriculture back when I lived in the US many years ago. They are evidently paid substandard wages. As long as we don't have an attitude that we would rather pay more for our vegetables, fruits, etc., I don't see how we will have a situation where we don't continue to encourage this merry-go-round. Along with the reform of our immigration laws, we need an environment where the real costs of labor are not disguised by an artificial system.
2
In my opinion no real solution can exclude stabilizing the nations to our south as this is the greatest cause of people fleeing the area. If a comprehensive solution can not be found to reducing the horrific violence, exploitation of people and corruption then why would anyone want to stay in the country where they were born?
We do not report the "hyper'ISIS like violence" in Mexico because we can't (Mexico is too dangerous for reporters) or don't want to. The West was shocked by the be-headings and torture committed by ISIS but we have ignored crimes that were similar or worse in Mexico and Central American countries for years. Does that make any kind of sense? Does it not concern anyone that there are "no go" areas in Mexico like Michoacán?
Corruption too seems to be endemic with no real path to stamp that out.
The huge numbers of people at our countries border is symptom and not the core issue.
And then of course how do we know which individuals are bringing this violence to our country instead of fleeing from it?
Where is our debate about this?
2
We need a "high wall with a big gate" to keep the people who are already here feeling comfortable? That's quite a memory lapse, Mr. Friedman. When have the people already in this country ever welcomed immigrants? Did they welcome yours, figuring that more Jews would add valuable cultural diversity, or mine, figuring that Catholics would bring a valuable new aspect of Christianity to the US mainstream?
And where is the evidence that the current newcomers (like our ancestors) are more likely to commit crimes or consume safety net services than the people already here? All the data I know suggest the opposite.
5
@Peter D'Eustachio
I agree. And while we're at it, maybe part of the asylum process should be an intelligence test, so we don't grant asylum to people with lower IQ's. Or maybe genetic engineering to make sure that those low IQ individuals don't produce more people like themselves. And so on.
@Peter D'Eustachio The citizens of the United States, Europe, Japan and Australia are not interested in becoming over-crowded, resource-depleted and culturally transformed against their wills by mass immigration from regions of the planet that refuse to practice family planning.
2
Immigration law and enforcement is hardly worth talking about any longer. The one thing that would help neither Republicans nor Democrats even talk any more: mandatory, universal E-verify and a crackdown on employers of illegal residents and sellers of fake documents. They will stop coming if they can't get jobs and employers large and small will stop hiring them if they face jail time.
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@abigail49 Touche!
3
@abigail49 Yes, harsh penalties for those who employ undocumented workers would choke off most of the flow of illegal immigration.
But, that won't stop those legitimately seeking asylum in fear for the lives or well-being of themselves or their families. Asylum is a special case; usually if conditions in their home countries markedly improved, asylum seekers would love to go home. Those claiming asylum but really want to stay here are not real asylum seekers; they're attempted immigrants. Those who are granted asylum might seek to become full immigrants if conditions home are not getting better and probably won't for the foreseeable future; that can be determined case by case.
Immigration and asylum can intersect at some points, but they're essentially two different reasons for foreigners to come to America. I would say that asylum seekers can apply for immigrant status just like any person outside of the US, they just happen to reside here in asylum status while that process proceeds. If the US helped stabilize their home countries, I think most of them would be glad to return. Even if not, they still have to qualify for immigration under whatever laws are on the books. The legal premise should be that you are an immigrant if your goal is to stay in the US permanently, which would include an automatic path towards citizenship. Not in that category? Then you're not an "immigrant", and other restrictions and expectations apply.
We use the word "immigration" too broadly.
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@abigail49
Seriously, have you never heard of cash? Or paying under the table? E-verify would just force this labor further into the shadows, but doubtfully make it disappear. Instead, it would just be an added nuisance (as well as take away ability to write off these labor wages), but employers will just pass the added costs to their illegal employees in the form of even lower wages.
Another article missing the elephant in the room...
When people come here illegally, there are Americans waiting on the other side to give them a job to save a buck.
The reason Trump talks up 'the wall' is to distract from this fact. The Republican party wants to be seen as 'tough on the border' but don't want to rock the boat for businesses having access to cheaper labor from those here illegally.
Enter 'the wall'. It looks like it's doing something, but the fact that it would be easily circumvented is of no concern because it's only for show.
4
I am surprised that in twenty first century and the climate change perils are faced by the international laws created for nineteenth century normal world. Asylum laws and immigration laws need modification - the role of countries that generate the asylum seekers need to be part of the solution. US should change the Asylum procedure and accept the asylum seekers only in their home country or a list of foreign countries far away from US boarder. The protection of asylum seekers need to be provided by those countries and US can compensate them if necessary. The solution is to divert the asylum traffic away from US boarders and secure US boarders for entry of legal immigrants and tourists/business persons. This is an artificially created problem and billions of tax payer money is wasted for an artificial problem. Trump should ask Congress to modify the asylum laws.
6
@Kalyan Basu
This solution makes alot of sense. Additionally, we should electrify the border fences and put barbed wire on top, along with a rifle patrol, so illegal entrants would know the consequences if they try to cross. Finally, you should have an employer to sponsor you, even if a temporary worker, or H1A visa holder, who is responsible for escorting you OUT OF THE COUNTRY and pays a fine if you don't leave. Holding employers accountable is the best way.
2
The humanitarian crisis that is at the root of immigration is occurring now; any wall is a multi-billion dollar enterprise that would take years to complete. Further, willing people, desperate or defiant, can scale a wall in seconds.
This means the greater issue, as I see it, is that a wall would still require people guarding it. Those charged with this task would do well, then, to deploy at the border. So someone tell me why I cannot travel from my home in Southern Arizona to the Southern Arizona city of Tucson without being delayed at a mandatory Border Patrol checkpoint? This is a situation that exists North of every border crossing I have visited. There are mandatory checkpoints on east/west freeways well North of the border. There are border patrol agents on horseback and ATVs all over the countryside, North of the border. Border patrol agents fly overhead in small aircraft, for hours on end, well North of the border. Get the picture? What could amount to a small army of agents is nowhere near the border, while the citizenry of Southern Arizona live an eyelash away from Martial Law.
Rather than spend billions of dollars and massive political capital on a wall, why not begin by allowing those already employed in "defense" or our border, to do what their title suggests, where it might have some effect? Meanwhile, maybe some of those billions would be better spent in an effort to improve the lives of desperate people in their native lands.
1
I would love to see a breakdown of the money spent on immigrants and the money/subsidies given to giant corporations, farmers, etc. Wouldn't that be edifying?
2
I must say this is the first time I've read an article about building the wall that makes that seem like a good idea. And I disagree with a point in the article as a liberal. I do not want open borders or no borders. I have never seen this idea is backed by the Democratic party. I don't know if any Democratic presidential candidate does.
The point I fastened onto from your article is the one about having a president that cares to actually work the problem. Trump is just a firestarter. His whole career is nothing but creating crises. He must go.
6
As often, Mr. Friedman see the problem of our border crossing dilemma in true perspective, and offers many good ideas and solutions. We very definitely are going to need more workers over the next few decades, and the sooner we begin to absob and integrate these willing workers into our society and economy, the better for all. The problem is, of course, our congress which has had 50 years to deal with this issue but has passed over and over again.
1
@david g sutliff
Some corporations are benefiting ( detention centers, cheap labor and no accountability ) and are paying off the politicians via lobbyists to continue the difficult but solvable problem.
@david g sutliff
We don't need more workers, so long as middle class tradesmen and manual labor workers' wages continue to decline. You used to be able to be a carpenter and make a middle class living, but with the competition of illegal immigrants willing to work for next to nothing, those days are past. You can't even start your own business unless you're willing to violate the law and hire illegals: you will be undercut at every turn.
Make US great again-DumpTrump
As someone else here mentioned, I always think Tom Friedman is right on the money. One of his solutions, however, was perhaps too facilely suggested, perhaps because of the difficulty of implementing it, and that is sending aid down to Central America to encourage those citizens not to leave their homes. Before Trump cut funding, there indeed were results from this NGO internally administered program. They were not miraculous solutions, but were better than nothing.
Two things are sure: despotic and corrupt Central American governments are pleased as punch that their population is fleeing northward, so that they will not need to enact any programs on their own. Secondly, any monies given to NGOs must be accompanied by monitors who will make sure these funds are used effectively, and do not fall into the hands of corrupt governments.
So, what Tom might want to consider in a future column is how to construct a Marshall Plan for this hemisphere that will effectively reduce the number of people coming up to our border.
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@David I would prefer effective immigration control plus a Marshall plan to fix the crumbling US infrastructure.
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@NSf
And no housing, food, healthcare or education for anyone simply because they cross the border. Harsh, yes, but not enough resources for citizens here in the US, let alone people coming from outside countries with no skills and 8 family members, no education or literacy , etc.
10
@Mary
"Harsh, yes, but not enough resources for citizens here in the US, let alone people coming from outside countries with no skills and 8 family members, no education or literacy , etc."
?????
We're a first world country. How is it possible that we don't have enough resources for our own citizens? We have the largest GDP on the PLANET, but we don't have enough resources for even ourselves? What? We have some of the worst inequality, where certain people possess billions of dollars, but hey, we can't accept anymore poor people because sorry, we're just all out of resources!
3
If you disapprove of how Trump has handled this, you have to start your advocacy by getting on the right side of the law...which means acknowledging those individuals in the US not processed by customs are in the US illegally. Period.
Any opposition to the current state of affairs must starts here...and those folks that don't start here are really harming their credibility as agents of change as it relates to this issue. We are either a country of laws or not.
From there lie many forks in the road...most of which Mr. Friedman has addressed here.
The one thing he did not discuss is Illegal immigration is not simply about "them". It is about American citizens providing safe harbor and/or exploiting people here illegally. So there is an enforcement/accountability problem within our borders for which we currently have no effective tools to address.
To that end, I favor using Real ID as a national identity card...which should bring some rhyme and reason for anyone concerned about immigration enforcement and how to make it happen in consistent understandable ways. Real ID will also put to bed the nonsense about phantom voters, etc. as well.
It is no accident that border staffs are under-staffed. This is a crisis with a major assist from the President...who expects to ride this issue all the way to a 2nd term.
4
Truth be told, Trump entered with a congress both controlled by the Republicans, but he waited till the Democrats mid-terms to really push the "wall". Mistake, no, calculated measure to place blame at the feet of his opponents. Don't have to like the man or his policies, but one must admit he knows how to work the game in his favor and his base.
2
I think you should be President. At least you have a plan. This immigration crisis has been in the making and Trump has made it worse. I think part of it is on purpose to get his wall. Oh, that's right, that emergency, we're still waiting for. If only he would think about the good of the country and actually get input from people who really know (border patrol agents in the field), and come up with a plan, then this immigration crisis could be addressed with a wall, technology, drones, and more. Instead, people suffer, agents become overwhelmed and quit, cars and trucks wait in lines at ports of entry. If Trump was a person who cared, he would have proposed something better by now.
1
Immigration is an issue all Americans need to address.
Our politicians have made a mess of this.
America was made great by immigrants.
Are we up to the task? To come together and solve a serious problem?
All of us?
Finally some agreement that hundreds of thousands of unauthorized entries on the southern border is a crisis and must be addressed. Mr. Friedman did not address one of the sensitive root social causes, which is chronic overpopulation. In addition to cutting off aid, the overly conservative US government also limits funding for women's health programs that could help prevent unwanted births. Funding of women's health and education programs in Central America should be one of the measures to address the crisis.
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@Scott L
Overpopulation? That's your cause? Not the last half century of imperial interventions under the Reagan Doctrine or the hundred before that under the Monroe? It was less than 40 years ago that we were giving direct military aid to some of the most brutal regimes in the world in El Salvador and Guatemala, regimes that massacred thousands. All in the name of continued economic dominance. US interests have played an outsize role in the deliberate underdevelopment of Central America, which is a, if not THE major cause of the rampant socioeconomic inequality and violence that drives today's immigration patterns. These are human beings fleeing death of one kind or another, and they risk death to make the journey. Simple human decency demands that we let them in.
10
@Scott L..."Finally some agreement that hundreds of thousands of unauthorized entries on the southern border is a crisis and must be addressed."....Now the next step is to ask why this was not a crisis when Obama was President. What did he do that was different?
3
@Will HD 2 observations, 1, I think you missed his point. He. Like you, was adding another facet to an already complex situation which, in my opinion, is valid in most situations regarding immigration. Overpopulation is a factor and a very real one. 2, you make a very valid point as well. The role of the US in central and South America has been as you describe and underscores Friedman’s point about the insanity of eliminating aid. Having said that, I also have concerns about how the aid we’ve sent has been used. I listened on NPR, to an interview with the Honduran Ambassador. It did not give one confidence that our resources are wisely utilized.
7
I don't think we need "high IQ" professionals. We have enough. What we need are people with grit and determination. I'm sitting in a nice house, comfortably retired, with a PhD because 100 years ago some poor, illiterate, Italian peasant had the guts to get on a boat in the hope of a better life for themselves and their children. Anybody that has the will to carry their child the length of Mexico in a similar hope has something this country needs. We should build a system that will allow them legal and orderly entry. Whatever that system is is certainly isn't what we have now or can expect from the current administration.
8
Mr. Friedman’s take on this feels like a breath of fresh air. I may or may not agree with all his conclusions but at least he’s not following the increasingly rigid dogmas of both the left and right, where either a wall is the ONLY answer or any suggestion that any type of border control is need is instantly condemned as racism.
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He needs to proceed with a more detailed plan. How much foreign labor do we need? What classes of labor? Does E-Verify work properly (many people say it’s broken.) What are our responsibilities regarding asylum? How can we solve the humanitarian problem?
The times is pretty good at investigating things, but I’ve yet to see the whole picture.
4
@Bruce Thomson’ we have a whole Congress and administration whose job it is to develop the “whole picture”.
7
The only people benefiting from this 'immigration crisis' are those, from the top down, who have been illegitimately elected to govern our soon to be former democracy. As long as they remain in power, things will continue to get worse before they get better.
Vote.
4
Trump is not a thoughtful person. He is a made-for-to demagogue. To assign him any more credibility is ludicrous.
1
Twice Trump blew up - at the last minute (after first saying he'd support it) - a deal in Congress for a long term solution. Trump only wants chaos, self-publicity, and suffering.
9
We should add that the president by defunding So. American countries and raising the spectre of closing the border that Trump has made the migrant flow of bodies to the border worse not better. By not working proactively with the governments to stabilize and make their societies safe, it encourages more migration north. The root causes of people fleeing their countries has to be addressed. If they feel safe at home and can find gainful employment there, they will not make the trek up to the States. By misusing this issue as his primary campaign technique for getting votes, the president doesn't really solve the problem, because at bottom he doesn't want to. He wants to make it worse so he can justify his claim to an "emergency", a "crisis".
This is beyond stupid as public policy, but Trump deep down doesn't really care about that. He just wants a way to stay in power. Making it worse rather than solving the problem does that, so that will be the plan going forward.
9
@IntheFray
"the root causes of people fleeing their countries"
has to be addressed by THEIR GOVERNMENTS.
NOT OURS.
2
@Mary
Why? If we could contribute to a solution, why wouldn't we? The problems with their governments are creating a massive problem for us.
1
@Mary You can wish that everyone would solve their own problems but that is a pipe dream. So do you want the problem to persist or do you want to take the steps and find the solutions so their people don't end up here? That is the grown up answer, sorry.
Finally! Someone has the guts to argue that a wall, as part of a comprehensive immigration strategy, is only common sense.
8
@NT Thomas Friedman is among the voices who pushed for the Iraq War; why do you have confidence that he is correct about "The Wall?"
Excellent analysis, Mr. Friedman, except for all the "wall" rhetoric.
When you know how loaded that term is, why do you keep hammering it?
One thing is CERTAIN: There is no confidence or trust in an incessant pathological liar known as Trump.
Any comprehensive addressing of our southern border will have to await his departure.
3
@srwdm
If the Democrats don't get ahead of this issue with reasonable solutions, Trumps departure will be in 6 years.
1
@dan
Wrong. Trump’s departure will be 2020 or earlier.
Even his most ardent supporters understand what he is.
1
This is the best reporting I have read on what is happening at the border and why. Thank you, Mr. Friedman. The only thing I would ask about is how that new fencing you mentioned got built. I believe Democrats have supported and funded additional fencing in recent budgets. It's not like they want zero "wall." Do we need a coast-to-coast wall? I doubt it, but President Trump could have gotten a lot more "beautiful" fencing from Congress if he had approached the subject factually and respectfully. Instead, he demonized both the migrants and Democrats in his "Build the Wall" campaign rallies, exaggerated the threat to stoke fear and lied about Democrats' immigration position. He did all that to get elected and then continued it in office. No president gets his agenda passed by insulting and lying about the members of Congress whose votes he needs. That is just stupid.
6
"the wall' isn't any part of any solution. These people are dirt poor and are living lives that can be snuffed out in a heartbeat. If there's work here for them, thy'll find a way to get here. Wall or no wall. There are already laws against the hiring of undocumented workers. Maybe try enforcing those and you'll find that you don't need some stupid wall. No work, no reason to come here. But what you'll also find, at least in my state, is that a lot of right wing ranchers and growers out in the Central Valley who rely on undocumented workers are going to go broke. These people are rich, Republican and they donate. So don't hold your breath on those laws getting enforced.
6
Trump is wasting the immigration crisis?
Are you kidding?
He and his fellow illegal employers—farmers, construction contractors, meatpackers—continue to enjoy unfettered access to a vast pool of slave labor, which they exploit with impunity.
He has the enthusiastic support of the white supremacists who control the Republican primaries.
He could spend tens of billions building a wall and nothing will change.
And he has successfully blamed Democrats for the entire mess.
If you think this is wasting a crisis, you’re not thinking like Donald Trump.
The fact is, Trump has deliberately provoked and exploited this crisis to preserve and enhance his own power (and incidentally, the power of the Republican Party—after all, the GOP Congress did not so much as hold a hearing on immigration legislation in Trump’s first two years), surviving dozens of scandals that would have crushed any other President.
The fact that he has plunged the nation as a whole into a worse immigration crisis or that millions are suffering is, of course, utterly irrelevant to Trump.
6
Trump wastes everything. He wasted the TPP. He wasted the Paris Accords. He wasted the Embassy move in Israel. He wasted the Golan Heights move. He wasted as well the immigration conflict. He wasted everyone’s life who comes in contact with him. He wasted the Iran nuclear deal. He’s wasting a cooling of tensions between Israel and Saudi Arabia. He is cultivating an unhealthy subservient relationship with Putin. He’s wasting 70 years of good Will in Europe. He’s wasting our country’s unparalleled optimism. He’s wasting the woman in New York Harbor He’s wasting a partially recovered economy which was envied by all. He’s wasting continued progress on decreasing abortions rates in the US These are true whether you agree in principle with some or many of the things Trump supports
Pick a horse and ride it. Donald Trump picked his horse when he based his hateful 2016 election strategy on demonizing brown immigrants (illegal and otherwise). Rather than providing leadership to resolve the decades long stalemate by offering what Mr. Friedman has suggested, he will prefer to maintain the status quo, keep the crisis in the forefront of his 2020 strategy, and ride this horse to re-election. Shameful, especially when resolving the crisis is what most Americans want.
1
The chickens have come home to roost. After 100 years of America’s failure in South America,we have a humanitarian crisis on our hands. This did not happen over night. We have over thrown elected governments, supported corrupt dictators, turned our backs on ethnic cleansing of indigenous populations. The reason for these people at the border has more to do with that they no longer can survive in their countries than it does with them wanting to move here. Friedman is correct in that the solution is complex but with Stephen miller in charge,the only goal is a wall and no more immigration period. None of the other solutions are under consideration.
3
School bullies now chant "Build the Wall!" at all Hispanic kids, including those here legally. Thanks to Trump's rhetoric, the wall is a symbol not just of rule of law, but of white supremacy.
You note that "48 percent of white working-class Americans agree that “things have changed so much that I often feel like a stranger in my own country.”" Would they feel any different if all Hispanics here were legal immigrants?
Is there a way to fix immigration without stirring up racism? Yes, but not with Trump in office.
2
Please stop using the word wall. Obviously we need an effective border security and an intelligent immigration system. Democrats have proposed both but republicans do not want to govern. They want to rile their base by spreading and exploiting xenophobia for one purpose: cling to power.
A great bargain and compromise could easily be achieved: Democrats want for good reason a pathway to residency or citizenship for undocumented workers and would agree to Republican demands on border security and immigration.
We will not get common sense solutions until Trump is out of office.
Vote democrat in 2020 and send home the clowns.
5
We have a manufactured crises re: immigration. This is a political mess, not a real one. Logic has no place in the argument as it is displayed in the MSM. What happened to our 'national emergency'? It became old news fast.
It boils down to the fact we are not actually looking for solutions, just publicity for Trump/Miller/GOP who, among other crimes, have actually created concentration camps throughout the US for people of color.
Trump and his masters are using this to corrupt our democracy and move us to an authoritarian state, a police state. Call it paranoia but the parallels between the US now and Germany in the 30's is chilling.
4
Trump wants to turn the figurative "Wall of Racism" along the border into a literal one; during the government shutdown, Pelosi called a wall, "an immorality",
So, who is going to vote for the wall that Thomas L. Friedman wants now? Will Democrats now vote for this immorality? Wouldn't that alienate their anti-racist voters? Furthermore, Trump would then blame the Democrats for the shutdown. If Democrats don't flip, for Congress to vote the necessary billions for the wall -- wouldn't that require Republican control of the House?
Didn't Friedman give his readers a Code Red in the midterm elections to prevent that?
Even if the Democrats flip-flopped to take some of the winds out of Trump's sails in 2020, can't he up the ante with more draconian anti-immigrant policies to energize his loyalists?
All such issues are pragmatic only; the big problem with the Wall of Racism -- smart, dumb or otherwise -- is that in correct ethics, the ends will not justify evil means.
3
He's not just "wasting" it, he's making it demonstrably worse!
By acting as if the border will soon close, people rush to get through now.
By slowing down authorized border crossings, people rush to get there first or to go across elsewhere so that they can be detained.
By suggesting that people will be sent to sanctuary cities throughout the US, people rush to get through now.
By withdrawing aid from South American countries, rather than starve people are rushing to get through now.
And, because South and Central America are in turmoil from their own poor leadership decisions, people are escaping terror and starvation. That is the dominant force push thousands north just as Trump is making poor leadership decisions here based on his twisted reading of politics vis a vis his core supporters.
This is a mess.
2
We need to chip away at the immigration issue wherever and whenever we can. Two examples would suffice:
1. Double or triple the number of immigration judges and gang the number of judges to the number of CBP/ICE detainees.
2. Staple a green card to the back of every advanced degree (masters or doctorate level) earned by a foreign national. These degree earners can help us move our nation and by extension the rest of the world sooner to a carbon-neutral future, easing immigration pressure worldwide.
1
This issue is why we have a crazy man as Prez of US. The Dems are so enamored of their presumed voters they can't see damage to the country, environment or schools.
The US, or parts of it, could begin to break down in a similar fashion to the countries they are now trying to escape.
I think people don't vote so much for the Reps, as against the Dems.
The wall is NO part of the solution. It is a nothing but monument to racism and paranoia. Friedman should have better things to do than pander to the fear Trump has stoked with his horrific statements and policies.
1
This column is an amazing reincarnation of a short story "Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote" by Jorge Luis Borges. We should make exactly what Trump proposes but it will have a totally different meaning.
This is not going to stop until we put a stop to it, by:
1. reforming our immigration laws as to refugee status
2. increasing personnel everywhere along the border
as well as adequate tent-cities for those waiting.
3. intervening in San Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala,
in order to improve the conditions in those countries.
We had no problem intervening there in years past-
for business and political reasons- and seem to have no
problem intervening in the middle-east,
where nobody is capable of simply walking here.
Transfer unneeded military into the border patrol.
4. End our never-ending war on drugs that has never
worked to stop the illegal importation. It only works
to raise the price and up the demand, creating the
powerful gangs that in effect run those countries.
Make drug abuse a medical, not legal problem.
Thousands of DEA and etc can work the border.
5. Build a wall if you can, where you can, but realize
that with the thousands of miles involved, private
property rights, environmental concerns,
it will not happen quickly anywhere.
6. And because most of the above will not happen,
just try to get used to it...because we human creatures
are very obstinate and will struggle and suffer the
unimaginable to improve our sad lives.
1
Sorry but expecting a "smart" solution from a president and administration motivated by racism and hatred and looking for ways to fire up their "base" isn't realistic. Any meaningful immigration reform will have to wait until the next president.
1
These people are gaming the system and an immigrant from Asia needs to be treated the same as an immigrant from Central America. A Honduran has fear, okay, go to Guatemala or Mexico. Illegal immigration is harming legal, legitimate immigration. I fear Dems on the issues of immigration and terrorism, so I support Trump and Republicans. Hillary should not have thrown away a formerly sensible view on immigration to "fit in."
1
It appears that smugglers have a better handle on immigration then we do. They have gamed it to perfection. To bad congress has quit legislating for the foreseeable future.
3
Excellent article, really gets to the heart of the matter. I'm a liberal leaning independent, and I agree every country has a right to border control. The problem is when these issues are made into binary choices, wall or no wall, we are forced to pick sides. I think if Trump were to propose addressing all these issues to the Dems, they would largely agree and we could move forward as a country. So long as Trump benefits from sewing seeds of discord, I don't think we will see any meaningful immigration reform.
2
How those the number of people who overstayed visas compare to people walking across the boarder? The point being of course that the wall mainly equates us to the Berlin Wall and Maginot Line - like all physical barriers our wall will look very bad in the history books.
Have we all forgotten President Reagan: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”
Pretty much everything our current government does is exactly the opposite of what needs to happen to lower immigration: do everything possible to fight climate change, provide poor countries with contraception, finance education and economic progress to lower their birth rates. There is a reason the waves of immigrants was falling under Obama and is sky rocketing under Trump...
6
Trump agreed that a wall is only a partial solution. He proposed several other changes such as work permits and a path to citizenship for Dreamers. Democrats fortunately, stood strong together and said the system is just fine the way it is.
7
@Richard Winchester, you can't go on NYT website and gaslight people. Most of us read and know what you say is at best hyperbole. Trump and many of his base view the world in binary, wall or no wall, Thomas Friedman makes the point its more complicated than this. Instead of screaming "build a wall" at rallies, maybe they could try " bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform"
3
@Richard Winchester That is an absolute lie propagated by Trump, just like the "Democrats want open borders" lie. Every Democrat I know and I know a lot, want immigration reform along the lines of what is suggested in this excellent column by Thomas Friedman. Democrats did offer Trump substantial money for his wall last year but he refused to consider their proposal because it included a pathway to citizenship for the Dreamers. He does not want a solution to the immigration crisis because it's the fuel that runs his re-election campaign. Trump is a conniving liar who just wants to win; he has never been interested in actually governing and doing positive things for America.
You know what Republicans are good at - unfortunately? Blaming others! And you follow suit. Republicans held all three branches of government for two years. And what type of legislation concerning immigration was presented and subsequently passed? Zero! But somehow this all the Democrats fault? Trump has twisted Truman's proclamation about responsibility on it's head. For the President and his supporters it's simply:
The buck stops with everyone else but them.
One thing is clear, huge influx numbers are part of the problem, but while resources for wall construction seem to be unlimited, resources for other activities like agents and processing of immigrants, are not. At the contrary, we all seem to have forgotten that the Trump administration in fact cut funding for these. Neither Friedman nor many others people that write about the border crisis do talk about one essential element in all this and that is funding to deal with the migrant numbers and do not mention the funding cuts.
1
"In sum: we need new walls; we need a serious strategy for mitigating climate change and offering economic and governance assistance to countries to our south that are being destabilized by poverty and extreme weather; we need to rethink who is entitled to asylum, so people fleeing economic dislocation don’t overwhelm our borders and harden our hearts to people truly fleeing tyranny; we need to encourage legal immigration of people who can help our country thrive in the 21st century; and we need to partner with Mexico on a Mexican-American plan to manage the flow of migrants through Mexico to our border."
Other than this, our border policies are working perfectly.
4
Tom says "The whole day left me more certain than ever that we have a real immigration crisis and that the solution is a high wall with a big gate — but a smart gate". This is exactly what Trump says and Tom still blames Trump. Any plan without a wall as proposed by Democrats is an open border policy. It is a tragedy that even pundits like Tom is scared to say the truth without blaming the truth teller. TDS is causing rational people to act irrationally jeopardizing national interest of America.
5
Thank you Tom Friedman for looking at this complex, emotionally arousing, and tortuous issue sanely without politicization. The only issue you missed is the immigrants who come in legally in other ports of entry and overstay their visas. While I don’t like the idea of a national identity card because of its historical connotations and its associations to a police state, I think we’re going to have to institute that at some point because our borders are just not controllable.
We also need a pool of workers who can pay taxes and pay into the social security system to keep it viable.
The energy, ambition, wish for and belief in freedom and hope that immigrants bring is sorely needed in our country. Our treatment of these people is currently ( or should be) a source of shame for us.
Ironically I think Trump’s cruel folly has made potential immigrants fearful of a permanent border closure and has INCREASED their numbers thus making reasonable consideration of this issue LESS likely.
This lack of reasoned discussion, which is what a democracy should be capable of, is yet another manifestation of Trump’s threat to the intact functionality of our struggling democratic processes.
5
@CassandraRusyn
I agree with you on both the pros and cons of a national identity card. This is the only way we can send back a large portion of the 30 million plus who need to go back to where they came from.
As for "needing a pool of workers who can pay ... into the social security system...", this is utter nonsense. As another commenter points out, if this were true, then we'd eventually need to have the entire world's population here, because each generation (of immigrants) would be larger than the prior, and when they retired, would be paid Social Security.
Yes, we may well need a pool of properly paid legal guest workers to do jobs (busing tables, picking crops) for which there are insufficient Americans. But even jobs like cutting grass could be performed by lazy young Americans who currently spend much of their waking hours playing with their cell phones. If their parent(s) didn't have Mexicans to cut the grass, maybe they'd have the gumption to tell Junior to cut the grass (which would be good for Junior!) or she'll lose her cell phone.
Finally, you need to leave Trump alone. He got elected because he was willing to speak out about problems -- free trade, illegal immigration -- that Clinton and the entire Democratic party refused to address.
1
Nice try at fence sitting. There's little chance that our hyper-ventilated politics could ever invent a "smart door".
America's image as a shining city on the hill is just the reflection off the razor wire. Half a proposal from both parties is not a solution.
1
As people continue to see US immigration law as optional and unenforceable, other areas of law will be increasingly challenged and fail as well. What if the masses begin challenging tax law or customs? Both could easily be overwhelmed and collapse as well. This is a dangerous precedent for all US law.
6
I'm glad to see Friedman outline our immigration problem so clearly and agree that David Frum's piece in the Atlantic is a must-read. Frum's core argument is that continued large-scale immigration could create a fascist political reaction in the United States. That has been my concern for a decade or more, and I would say we now see a proto-fascist politics emerging with the help of Donald Trump. Our current immigration policy is a mess and probably unenforceable -- a majority of those entering this country do so without an immigration visa, which means we have no policy. Like Friedman, I want this country to continue the tradition of welcoming immigrants and providing safe haven for refugees. The basic tradeoff of a political compromise are easy to see: reduce immigration in return for offering citizenship to the 11 million or so undocumented aliens now living in this country. The big question is how many immigrants the U.S. should accept each year and the best answer (I would say) is the goal proposed by a presidential commission chaired by the late Barbara Jordan in the 1990s: about 600,000 people.
2
@Tom
I agree! But from the 600,000 we'll need to deduct a portion of those already here illegally (30 million, not 11 million), and by no means will we ever allow them to become citizens.
Also, I agree with your legitimate fear that this divisive issue, created by those who feel they have the god-given right to invade our borders, will lead to a "fascist" solution if more sensible people don't solve the problem. In fact, when you combine this issue with the other crazy demands of Ocasio-Cortez and her ilk, our country is moving towards a second civil war. And one side has most of the guns. This is no longer an issue of participation trophies vs real trophies. Our society is riven by some very fundamental issues.
@SXM "From the 1980s to the mid-2000s, the government reported annually apprehending around 1 million to 1.6 million foreigners who illegally entered the United States at the southwestern border." NYT 6/20/18
Unlawful entry declined during the Obama presidency to between 400,000 and 600,000 per year.
Still too many but a steep decline. The main difference now is that migrants are paying smugglers as family units bringing children a thousand miles through the desert because they know that once here, they are more likely to be granted entry with children, will get free health and education for those children and are unlikely to be deported later because of the children (see DACA).
It used to be that men came to work and went back and forth. Once word got out that you could stay and get benefits with children, 'family units' started showing up en masse. That's the crisis. And that's on lawmakers, federal judges and several previous administrations.
2
This isn’t the first time the immigration crisis has been wasted by those seeking political advantage. The Trump administration is certainly the most obvious about it, but the Obama administration utilized it to their political advantage as well. Real dialogue and compromise needs to be had by principled legislators on both side of the aisle once and for all - and it should start with building tall walls and a wide, smart gate.
2
If the immigration issue were likened to a fire, Trump is pouring gasoline on it by ceasing aid for central American countries that the people are fleeing from. Even the idea that a wall may be built likely causes more people to try to get here because they want to arrive before the wall is finished.
The simple reality is that a wall won't do much to stop the flood of immigrants, most people here illegally initially arrive legally through gates or on planes and then overstay the visitor or student visas.
Closing the Southern border would be a disaster. I read recently (in the Guardian I think) that more people came to the US illegally via the border with Canada than the border with Mexico in the current fiscal year.
All of this is a distraction from:
- A $2 trillion addition to the debt caused by the tax giveaway to the ultra-rich.
- Dismantling of the ACA causing 10's of millions to lose affordable coverage.
- Worsening wealth imbalance caused by attacks on unions and workers' rights.
- Crumbling infrastructure
- Poisoning of the air and water
- Voter suppression and filling the judicial system with right-wing hack judges
4
This is a substantial improvement over other recent essays on immigration by Thomas Friedman. He cites a good article by David Frum in the Atlantic, an essay which finally explains some of the complexity of the immigration problem. I do not fully agree with Frum, but his article is closer than Friedman's to presenting a realistic appraisal of what is needed for immigration reform.
There is a tendency for politicians to simplify. Simply saying it is racist to oppose "open borders" is not a solution.
We need an in-depth discussion.
Global warming threatens to bring humans to a new Dark Ages in the next several generations. But global warming is merely one of the noxious consequences of too much population growth.
The book of 1972, Limits to Growth, presented quasi-mathematical models of possible scenarios with continued population growth. One was outright starvation, which we have seen in South Sudan. Another is civil war as in the Congo or in Syria, genocide as in Rwanda, the breakdown of order as in Sudan, the rise of drug cartels in Mexico as described in Don Winslow's novel, "the Cartel."
World population has approximately doubled since 1972. We continue to wait for the rational discussion without which democracies die.
After the Great Chinese Famine which killed perhaps 40 million, Deng Xiaoping introduced a one-child policy for China in 1979 which ushered an amazing improvement in living standards.
But Joe Biden characterized this policy as "repugnant."
5
@Jake Wagner you probably have 3 cars and 5 motorcycles as typical in Los Angeles .
It seems to me that in a comprehensive package that an essential item is a US Govt issued ID with an employee identification number. In addition we should significantly increase the penalties for employers who hire immigrants under the table. Then our new guest workers can contribute fairly to our Federal, State and Local government. And, if after time they are able to integrate into our country that we grant them permanent status.
By the way the Democrats offered Trump a 28 billion dollar package last year for border security but because it contained provisions for our Dreamers Trump rejected it. The Republican party could have over ridden Trump but they prefer to go along with him and his White National base.
11
For how many years and how many presidencies have we been talking about reforming immigration and immigration laws. This is a problem that has never been properly addressed by our political elite. Neither our democrat or republican lawmakers have put forward any viable solutions. Perhaps if they were to stop castigating each other, and, finally were to strategize on what is best for the American electorate, and work together, we might move forward with an immigration plan.
Is that too much to ask of our polarized politicians?
13
@bsb. Once elected our representatives and senators have one thing in mind is getting reelected and not dealing with real issues in this country as they were elected to pursue. They have a national audience and with few exceptions they brag when on the media of having great ideas, but politics and vote getting triumph in the end. Great talk makes up for doing nothing. Very disappointed in our political elite.
1
“According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, since October, along the whole southwest border, from California through Texas, there have been 190,000 apprehensions of “family units” (a child under 18 with a parent or legal guardian) who crossed illegally from Mexico, up from 40,000 a year ago. That’s an increase of 374 percent.”
Any thoughts as to why it’s a crisis now, but hadn’t been for years before Trump started with this wall nonsense?
Leading answer would be unrest in the countries the immigrants are running from.
Another answer could be that Trump incessantly is bragging about how great America is, mostly bragging about low unemployment, thus creating the perception of better opportunity here than in their home country than there had been under Obama.
Or maybe it’s that these immigrants fear that they will never make it to the USA once the wall is built, so their opportunity is now.
All three of these can be attributed to Trump and his actions, like decreasing aid to these countries, bragging about the economy and stoking fear that foreigners will no longer be welcome.
All I know is there wasn’t a problem of this magnitude in the years prior to Trump.
5
surprised mr friedman has nothing to say to the democrats
in congress who refuse to discuss any solutions to this immigration crisis that includes walls and will not work with this administration to solve the problem for what is clearly political purposes and part of resistance to the duly elected president. They simply are focused on regaining power in 2020 .
3
@Abe Topiel That's not true. The Democrats offered Trump a comprehensive immigration reform package early last year that included substantial money for his wall but he rejected it because it also included a path to citizenship for the Dreamers. Trump is racist who needs the "build the wall" mantra - not the actual wall built - to keep his rabidly xenophobic base motivated. The last thing Trump wants is a truly viable solution to the problem of immigration.
2
Immigration reform is overdue, but I can't stomach the prospect of taking any action that would (or could be) taken as an endorsement of President Trump's inhumane characterization of immigrants or his fear-mongering. Even if he were to roll back his rhetoric now, no one would be fooled into thinking he had a change of heart.
2
Friedman fails to mention the sticking point -- what to do about the millions of illegals already here. No reform of immigration laws will be possible without a legal path to immigration - aka amnesty, in one form or another. But Republicans will never agree to that, because any resolution of the problem would favor demographics that would soon vote many of them out of office.
What Trump - and now Mr. Friedman - are calling an "immigration crisis" is just a way for them to maintain power. If the crisis goes away, they will too. It's always about P-O-W-E-R. And no analysis, no matter how "smart," is going to change that fundamental fact.
3
Friedman overlooks several key points:
1. Trump doesn't really care about immigration and walls. He hit on that when campaigning and just uses it as red meat to throw to his supporters.
2. Nothing is said about sanctions on employers who hire illegals or undocumented workers. Trump himself did it.
3. Since the GOP effectively controls all three branches of government, why don't they change the asylum and holding laws to be more practical?
4. The United States is already bursting with people. In just 9 years since the 2010 Census, we've added 18 million people, which is more than the population of New England and almost half the population of California. Have we added infrastructure at the same rate?
5. Almost 14% of the U.S. population is foreign born, which is over 43 million people. Regardless of your politics, that is a staggering number!
5
@Bob Garcia -- you're right that neither Trump nor the Republicans really care about illegal immigration. If they did then universal E-verify and stiff penalties against employers who hire illegals would not only stop most illegal immigration, but it would also cause many of those living here already to leave (including dreamers), unless a compassionate green-card system were created for them.
Key Republican constituencies depend on cheap illegal immigrant labor: farming, food processing, hotels and hospitality, gardening ... including golf courses of course!
As to illegal immigration's effects on demographics it's a mixed issue. Your 2 million/year is total population increase, not illegal immigrants -- some estimates put net illegal immigration during that time as near zero. 2 million per year is 0.6% per year in a population of over 300 million -- that is not a high growth rate, and indeed the American population is below ZPG except for immigration (both legal and illegal).
4
@Bob Garciayour point #3 is incorrect.
The good thing about a wall is that it acts immediately upon arrival. Deportations are costly and end up further injuring the social fabric among the communities affected. As an alternative to deportations, walls are socially and economically preferable.
The problem with building a wall is that it is ugly, prevents animals from migrating (which could lead to further ecologic catastrophe), and does not easily accommodate changes in the borderline.
Maybe more importantly, the circumstances that make a wall seem helpful speak to a much deeper problem that the wall does nothing to solve. If the richest nation in the world can't even maintain enough stability in the country immediately south of it to prevent a mass-migration crisis, then some critical global economic and humanitarian principles are falling apart. A wall won't fix that.
At this point in history, the US should be EXPANDING its regional halo of prosperity, order, and peace. A wall signals that we are instead collapsing inward, putting up a flimsy barrier to delay our complete destruction.
13
How much of the aid we've been sending to Central America has actually been reaching people in need, and how much has been siphoned off by the corrupt elites who rule those countries? We shouldn't send another penny that might end up in the hands of those calling the shots in Guatemala, Honduras, or El Salvador.
Corrupt, extractive elites and uncontrolled population growth are Central America's real problems, and neither is America's fault. It isn't fair to ask us to serve as a safety net for problems they've created themselves.
18
"We shouldn't send another penny that might end up in the hands of those calling the shots in Guatemala, Honduras, or El Salvador." Of course some money gets siphoned off. But, historically we have seen that money helps stabilize foreign countries. It's why such programs were first tried and then continued: they helped. No doubt money gets stolen (just look to Washington who wastes and abuses the monies they get, also from tax payers!) Washing our hands of the problems in the Northern Triangle countries will--according to non-political officials--only exacerbate this problem.
If democrats' hadn't stonewalled Trump on the wall, we'd have had a deal. Trump is clearly open to all measures, including DACA, but he insisted on the wall.
Democrats' refusal killed any chance of reaching deal.
13
Uh Trump was the one who torpedoed an offer of $24 billion in wall funding in exchange for DACA protections after he went on air and praised the deal.
16
@Jon & @AACNY -- and of course Trump did nothing when the Republicans held all of Congress up through 2018.
Trump didn't even really ASK for the wall, when the Republicans were in total control. And the fact is that Republicans did not want it, don't want it now.
He only started to care about it after the Democrats took the House, and right-wing commentators called him out.
But it's obvious those commentators didn't really care about the issue up till then either.
5
@AACNY
Republicans controlled the Congress for two years and didn’t even hold a hearing on immigration legislation. Nor did they fund the wall. Instead, they cut inheritance taxes for Ivanka and Jared. Republican farmers, construction contractors, meatpackers, and golf course owners enjoy having a vast pool of slave labor to exploit. They have no intention of being forced to pay living wages to legal American residents.
2
Great column on the complexities of this far-reaching problem. I would add as part of the nuanced solution -- get rid of birthright citizenship. The United States and Canada are the only developed nations that grant automatic citizenship so expansively to children born within their borders. It's a vestige of another century and its time is long past.
34
@John Jabo
Absolutely!
And another absurd cause of this crisis is the "present yourself at the border" aspect of our asylum system. Instead, we need to change it to "present yourself on the internet", and we'll get back to you after we have considered your request.
3
Let’s build the wall now, which will significantly mitigate many of the problems Mr. Friedman describes. Once it’s built, we can calmly develop a smart strategy to implement the other measures he describes.
22
@Jon
How about if we lock up a couple of illegal employers overnight, like drunk drivers, before we spend tens of billions of dollars on a wall. I expect that if farmers, construction contractors, meatpackers, and golf course owners used E-Verify and stopped hiring illegally, the situation would resolve itself pretty quickly, for free. (That’s what most countries do.)
12
@kkseattle - a reasonable counter-point, thank you.
Building the wall has a few advantages. First, it satisfies the deeply angry political right, which feels betrayed by the abandoned promise of border security in the 1986 Simpson-Mazzoli act. A wall will calm them down and bring them to the table on these other important measures. Second, walls are permanent. Cheating is hard (they do work) and they cannot be undone or surreptitiously weakened, like E-Verify, surveillance drones and other non-physical measures. Third, they send a message to other countries that we are shutting down illegal border crossings. This will put an end to smugglers, dangerous desert crossings, migrant caravans and other terrible aspects of the current crisis. Again, once this wall is in place, we can calmly work out how we are going to reform our immigration system, and how we are going to help other countries plagued by violence, poverty and the effects of climate change.
2
Build it tall! As well as have a smarter Southern border.
It is the responsibility of congress to develop and place into law an immigration policy. It should not be left to the President. However as Congress has demonstrated in the past-it can do nothing. Immigration is only one area that needs the attention of Congress- we need an energy policy as well.
7
@clayton: Population growth will overwhelm any energy policy.
Tom's suggestion is measured and responsible and there are both Republicans and Democrats who would (and have) embraced these ideas. Unfortunately, the President sees immigration as a big drum to beat for votes rather than a problem that could be solved by a logical process. It is unfortunate that some very loud open-border partisans will not accept any restrictions and they make it easy for those who want to absolutely close the border to all but white people to pillory Democrats. Democrats need to get ahead of this issue and acknowledge the need for some form of physical barriers at the border as part of comprehensive immigration reform. We have almost been there several times until a few absolutists on both sides have stolen victory from the majority.
9
@Mister Ed In essence your comments are solid but according to reports of the past 2 years, most illegals in the country are those who entered through airports and then overstay their visas. Maybe the first step before a huge, expensive border wall is a substantial increase in immigration judges. Some wall would make sense, it seems. But, the all or none phenomenon President gives little room for compromise.
3
@drjec20002
There is a difference in the quality of the data collected between those who overstay their visa and those who illegally cross our southern border on foot, car, truck or train.
All the news reports ignore this difference.
We can count the number of people arriving by air, who all have travel documents, and get a pretty accurate estimate (if not count) of how many leave by air.
I believe in 2017 something like 700,000 visitors who arrived at the airports overstayed their visa.
In contrast, the only number we have for people who cross the border is the number who were caught, which misses entirely those who make it across without being apprehended. We do not know how many actually cross successfully. In 2017, something like 300,000 were apprehended at the border. There is NO DATA of how many successfully crossed. So how then, can a statement be made that visa overstays outnumber illegal crossings?
And independent of the issue of inaccurate or incomplete data is this: there are two major illegal entries to this country, both of which need to be addressed. Arguing that one is more urgent than the other misses the point: the border needs to be protected AND the visa overstays need to be addressed.
2
Mr. Friedman, thank you for your fact checking trip to get beyond the articles we mainly see in the media reflecting mostly positions by the immigrant advocacy industry.
What we have now is chaos and people are very upset - not at brown or black people but at the sheer numbers over the decades. Trump has tapped into that.
When the Yale study predicts 27/28 million and even that is felt to be underestimated, we have a problem. A correction is needed.
Perhaps your article will trigger a realistic conversation that does not demonize anyone.
10
@Blanche White You source Yale at 27 million and then you weaken your point by claiming without source a number higher than the Yale number. It is Yale's name that gives the number credibility. Why would you think some unnamed source would have credibility when it undermines the work Yale did?
@Blanche White
To a large degree the problem is indeed that these people are "brown" people. The problem, however, is not related to the color of their skin, but rather to their culture of non-education. Once here, their high school drop-out rate is far higher than that of native-borns of any color. Native-born Latinos have much higher drop out rates than any other ethnic group. So, just as Asians seem to do well in school, Latinos seem to do poorly. It's a cultural issue that can't be ignorred.
We struggle to provide jobs for our own citizens who fail to prepare themselves to participate in our economy. (There are in fact plenty of unskilled jobs available, but our elite thought it was a bright idea to export those jobs to Mexico and China!) We don't need to add to this problem with floods of people whose main skill seems to be cutting grass.
So the fact that most of our illegal immigrants are illiterate or semi-illiterate, and that most never learn to speak comprehensible English, is indeed a problem.
2
Trump had a Republican House and Senate at the beginning of his term and should have insisted that they develop and pass an immigration plan-he ran on the crisis at the border! Immigration was not high on his to do list- first he had to pass a tax plan to make his wealthy donors happy.The immigration crisis served his need for the build the Wall rant-he saw no urgency to work with the Republican majority to mitigate the problem.
5
@JANET MICHAEL
Trump passed major tax and prison reforms in his first two years He also tried very hard to close holes in the border.
Democrats have stonewalled on the border, and everyone knows it. This is why democrats are accused of being for "open borders" and why some democrats may leave the party. Fighting every measure to close the border is, by default, being in favor of keeping it open. Few Americans support their position.
16
@AACNY: The Trump tax scam was nothing more than a vast corporate stock buyback subsidy, that accelerated wealth concentration.
1
@AACNY
The Republican Congress didn’t even provide two nickels for Trump’s wall. But apparently this is all the Democrats’ fault.
1
Whenever I read about immigration crises (Yes, the Mexican-U.S. border is but one of many in the world) I cannot help thinking about the fact that most immigration is not voluntary. Most immigrants -I am sure- would rather stay in their country among people of similar ideology and culture instead of risking their and their childern´s lives to venture into countries where they will be mistreated and if "lucky" will probably become second class citizens.
Most people fleeing their countries are trying to escape violence, climate change, economic disaster and so forth.
In many cases, they try to enter the very countries that one way or another are responsible for their misery.
For instance, violence in Latin America (particularly in Mexico) is mainly driven by drug cartels which are armed by the United States gun-crazy market. These same cartels make billions of dollars selling most of their "product" to the US drug-addicted society.
In the future island countries will disappear due to climate change, in spite of their inhabitants´ carbon print being minimal when compared to that of residents in rich countries. These people will probably seek to enter the countries whose population is more responsible for climate change and who -ironically- don´t want immigrants to come over.
It only seems fair that the countries that are responsible for these immigration waves (i.e. Rich countries such as the US) also take responsibility for the people they so obviously affected.
7
@ME
Users of illegal, recreational drugs should be exported to Central America.
Tom has little understanding of immigration issues. (He is he same guy who thought we could bring democracy to Iraq by bombing them to smithereens). The huge increase in immigration from the triangle countries is an indicator that their civil societies are breaking down at an apocalyptic rate. Like a person faced with the choice of jumping out of a burning building or being burned alive, the migrants have little choice but to leave and seek the slim chance of settling in a law abiding country. The US should dedicate the resources to deal humanely with lawful asylum seekers.
7
Not that I want to defend Tom here, but Iraq is more democratic now. Their last elections being Oct 2018.
Finally a rational approach to this fraught issue. I am a legal immigrant. I was a fervent Hillary supporter. And if the Democrats do not embrace the program laid out in this article - build the wall, turn away fraudulent asylum seekers, increase legal immigration, especially of educated people - I am voting for Trump. It makes my blood boil when I see PhDs waiting for a green card for decades, while illiterate breeders whose only qualification is having produced as many babies as they can, waltz into the country, straining its resources and becoming a burden to its taxpayers. If the Democrats are so blinded by their hatred for Trump that they cannot see that even a broken clock may be correct twice a day, they’ll lose. Incidentally, most legal immigrants agree with me on this issue. Ask an Iranian computer scientist who can’t go back to her country to visit her family because of the fear of losing her status what she thinks of Honduran drug dealers pleading for asylum, and you’ll get an earful.
27
@Mor
Does it make your blood boil to see President Trump illegally hire people without green cards to make his bed and clean his toilet so he can further fatten his wallet? If not, why not? Why do illegal employers—farmers, construction contractors, meatpackers, golf course owners—mostly Republican, many of whom are rich, powerful white men—bear none of the blame for the problem and none of the responsibility for fixing it?
2
@Mor
Blind hatred of Trump has caused the democrats to take awful positions on immigration. Just awful. They are doing the country a great disservice pursuing their vendetta against him.
5
@Mor, yes, speaking only anecdotally, I know legal immigrant friends from China and from South Korea who are equally appalled. The friend from China is not a citizen and thus cannot vote in federal elections but the friend from South Korea is now. She has made clear she does not support the Democrats anymore (nor does her husband, an American whose parents came from South Korea).
4
Chaos was created by the United States in the Middle East in a grab for Iraqi oil under the pretext of destroying Hussein's non-existent WMD. Millions have fled the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria and have tried to escape ISIS terror, flooding Europe with countless immigrants.
NAFTA released a sea of low-priced tax-subsidized US corn into Mexico. This forced thousands upon thousands of Mexicans to abandon their small farms and because they could no longer survive in the face of massive low-priced US grain exports. Many Mexicans have fled north across the borders in an attempt to feed their families.
Trump in the US, Salvini in Italy and many other politicians across the board are using anti-immigrant fear and hatred to gain unprecedented power for hard-core right wing white nationalists.
The most important action to be taken is to elect officials who understand the long term global implications of their policies. The fact that there is an ignorant anti-immigrant racist in the White House is a reflection of a much greater problem: the impact of corporate greed that rules our nation.
9
I am unable to get beyond the headline.
"The Wall is only part of the solution." Giving any kind of legitimizing nod to "the wall" makes me not want to read any further.
I've been to the border. The manufactured "crisis" there may overwhelm those without a deep moral compass or fundamentally humanitarian soul, but to even refer to "the wall," except to denigrate it, legitimizes it. While not the writer's intent, I believe that's what it does.
This unspeakable, deliberate humanitarian crisis is solvable (so writes the author). But, instead, it is intended to sear into people's minds "hoards" of "invaders" & resurrect racist fear-mongering. So are the humiliating & denigrating images of brown people being forced to sit on the ground in the dead of night by self-appointed vigilantes, guns & bright lights flashing in their terrified faces.
Trump's wall will have nothing to do with solving the "border crisis" being suffered by these refugees.
If I were sitting among them, frightened & helpless, not understanding the orders being barked at me in English, I might wonder if I had left the violence of my country behind at all.
7
Unfortunately, the left will only acknowledge a border or immigration "crisis" if it can blame it on Trump. Nice try, but, no. He's the only one trying to actually create a real border.
9
The Democrats offered 25 billion for border security in exchange for a path to citizenship for DACA children. Republicans, and Trump, turned it down. That sure seems pretty shortsighted, inflexible, cruel and stupid right now, doesn't it?
8
@Jim Dennis
Trump demanded a wall. Pelosi said "No one dollar!" A deal requires compromise. Democrats refused to compromise on the wall because they knew Trump had promised one to his voters.
@AACNY - At one point, Shumer offered over $20 billion for the wall in exchange for protections for DACA protections. Trump declined the offer. The Pelosi comment came later.
1
We need to change our asylum laws immediately. No birthright citizenship, no chain migration.
This is getting out of hand
16
@NYC Dweller
Don’t you find it interesting that the Republicans controlled the entire federal government for two years and never even held a hearing on immigration legislation? Instead, they cut inheritance taxes for Ivanka and Jared. Priorities, you know.
10
@NYC Dweller
You can be certain that any measure to change asylum will be fought by the left.
1
@NYC Dweller Republicans had two full years to solve it but they literally took no action other than continuing to chant "build the wall." They do not want a solution to the immigration crisis; after all, who would tend to their stately gardens, cook their meals, clean their houses, watch their kids, walk their pedigree dogs, drive their luxury cars, keep the golf greens looking spiffy, eh?
1
Of the 209 countries and territories on our planet, 122 of them are either total dictatorships or "partly free" countries (at least 50 are brutal dictatorships). That's a LARGE pool of potential asylum seekers. The "system" is indeed overwhelmed: the easier we make it for the magic words "I'm seeking asylum" to work, the more out-of-control things will get. At least Mr. Friedman makes viable, sensible recommendations, and from my liberal perspective, they might work if taken in total.
5
Thomas Friedman deserves a Pulitzer Prize, not only for his perspicacity, but also his courage in writing this definitive report on our growing border crisis.
3
I do not always agree with Mr Friedman but I applaud his his capacity to be constructively controversial.
Like most (all) countries the US is approaching capacity and cannot continue to absorb legal and illegal immigrants at present or past levels. People who argue for massive migration on the basis of economic benefits are looking at the past and forgetting the principle of diminishing returns. Either that or they have a financial interest in exploiting economically-vulnerable newcomers.
Mr Friedman advocates a "wall" to control excessive entry and better "gates" to vet entrants. Both make sense. A "wall" does not have to loom like the Gates of Mordor. Since a wall is no stronger than the men who stand on it, a significant boost to the resources of the Border Patrol will be necessary no matter what happens.
A bigger boost to the Border Patrol would probably be more successful than a physical wall and less environmentally and socially destructive.
Those who criticise Mr Friedman on humanitarian grounds must acknowledge that the earth is 20-25% in excess of a sustainable population and this cannot be solved by simply shoving "pieces" to different parts of the "board".
7
The President is a 2 dimensional politician. Build a wall or destroy the ACA comes first in his mind. BOTH of these issues require solutions on many levels and in many directions. This President and his ruling party are unwilling to govern and far too many of their supporters are simply incapable and unwilling to understand each reality. Solutions have been offered and Republican obsession and hyper focus prevent their consideration.
4
Are you kidding me? Trump has done anything and everything he could to coax the Democratic leadership into an immigration compromise. He even proposed one that included the wall, immigration reform and legalization of DACA recipients.
The response of Democrats was to send out the infamous talking point, “manufactured crisis”. Well, it’s not a manufactured crisis and the people that are wasting the opportunity are Democrats - specifically the leaders of their party.
13
@William
William, you have it backwards. It was the Democrats who agreed to $25 billion for the wall in exchange for DACA, and the White House (Stephen Miller) that killed it. You can read about it here, or if you don't like Bloomberg as a source, there are others that tell the truth.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-12-13/how-trump-let-his-goal-of-building-a-border-wall-slip-away
1
This is not about Trump or Pelosi, democrats or republicans who are seeking political advantage. Isn't there anyone in Congress who can rise above party and pass bipartisan immigration reform? All of the snide comments about Trump do nothing to help solve the problem. It seems that Trump haters would rather have this real problem increase then try to solve it. Yes a barrier in some locations will help as Friedman points out. All you armchair experts should go visit the border, see the problems in towns overflowing with immigrants, and see the school taxes paid for illegal children.
If some of you are so altruistic and want to have open borders, why not start facebook pages volunteering your homes for immigrants to stay in and paying their bills why they get jobs and start school
8
What crisis? You mean there's a crisis at the border? I thought that was just manufactured by Trump. A wall may be part of the solution? Mon dieu! I thought walls were immoral although strangely, they had unusually high bipartisan support about 5 years ago. Just shocking.
Open borders and the immorality of walls were all the narrative rage less than 2 months ago. Now that we can acknowledge we have a crisis (ironically, it's all Trump's fault naturally) perhaps both sides can sit down and work out common sense, practical and workable immigration laws. What a novel idea.
Good ideas and solutions can come from anywhere so let's put aside Trump for the moment.
There's plenty of credit to go around for all sides.
8
Trump doesn’t want a solution, he wants a problem to scare his base. The is of “those people” is what brought him to prominence. It started with the “birther movement” and morphed into Mexican rapists. If he or anyone in his party solve the immigration problem, how would he scare people into supporting him. His argument for votes is there are problems and I am the only one who can fix them. Once the problems are gone, so is the need for the strongman. Trump is not that creative to develop a whole new crisis to frighten voters.
6
My experience with low education immigrants is that really just want jobs but would rather live with their families back in their home countries.
It seems we should expand the work VISA system to sustainable levels and allow workers for months at a time and with the freedom to cross back to their home country.
These immigrants should have sponsor US employers who will have credits from the government to make sure they don't cancel out US workers.
With better trade policies with our neighbors to the south, we can help create light and heavy industries there to supply food and manufactured goods to the US and export to yet other countries.
Wall, maybe, but it should not be based on racists fear of change. If most of these immigrants are coming here for "economic dislocation" they likely prefer to be home.
4
Is no one considering sea-borne immigration? One might bypass the end of the border by launching into the Pacific or the Gulf of Mexico. Or sail from the Yucatan peninsula, via Cuba, to the westernmost Florida keys, crossings of 124 and then 86 miles, comparable to the 88-mile shortest route between Africa and Sicily.
Let's not forget that employment "squeezes" can happen at the high end too.
When preference is given to high energy, high IQ immigrants, US residents may be pushed aside. With competition for college entrance to elite schools at a fever pitch, we do not appear to lack for high energy, high IQ talent within our borders.
5
Well said, Mr. Friedman. This is one of the first truly sensible pieces that I have read on immigration reform and the migrant crisis. Because it has been one of Trump's signature policy recommendations, 'the wall' immediately seems like the suggestion of a simpleton to most progressives. He has polluted the issue so much that Democrats have retrenched behind a redoubt further from the already nonsensical position they had just a couple years ago.
Some ideas: Build a wall, install surveillance systems, increase the number of CBP and ICE agents, hire more judges, build more holding facilities, increase the number of H1-B visas, reduce the lottery system, reduce processing times for asylum claims, create specialty visas for needed occupations, create a path to citizenship for undocumented workers and their families, insist that the path include a basic language requirement so immigrants more rapidly assimilate into society, provide free language training for immigrants so they can meet the requirement, end chain migration, increase foreign aid to Central and South America to stabilize those countries, and perhaps investigate military options to battle the gangs plaguing them. Then, increase our quotas for refugees and asylum-seekers, and tie their visas to residency in the vast underpopulated areas from the Rockies to the Appalachians.
There is something in there for everyone. It really doesn't have to be this hard.
4
The US southern border is a laughingstock of the world.
Democrats and other liberals are intent on destroying Trump by overturning the result of the 2016 election.
Mr. Trump will continue to use immigration as a wedge issue to win the 2020 election, and until then, given the advantage of this unsolved issue and the Democrat insanity of focusing on continued investigations, a comprehensive immigration solution is impossible. It is likely though that, properly positioned, illegal immigration will aid in returning control of the entire Congress to Republicans.
If all this comes to pass, including the failure of all investigations to lay a hand on him, Mr. Trump will be relatively free to work with a Republican Congress to pass comprehensive immigration reform which will include some of the items mentioned by the suddenly enlightened Mr. Friedman, but will most certainly not include the patently unfair path to citizenship for illegal immigrants - unfair to Americans, and unfair to legal immigrants.
Once this is accomplished, the next President will likely be Mike Pence or Nikki Haley, and the Democrats will be in for a very long winter. The cause of their coming debacle is the attitude exemplified by this publication and many of its readers towards illegal immigration in particular, and Mr. Trump in general, both of which are well known, assisted by an incomprehensible and suicidal lurch to the extreme left.
We promise that we will say we told you so when this happens.
10
@John Xavier III
Maybe if Trump and his Republican buddies—farmers, construction contractors, meatpackers—started using E-Verify and stopped illegally exploiting slave labor for profit, the problem would largely fix itself.
Of course, that would require rich, white men to prioritize the interests of the nation over their own greed. What was I thinking.
2
Three quick partial fixes while we try to come up with a solution acceptable to all sides: 1. Stop the demonization of immigrants. It destroys logical discussion on both sides, by ratcheting up fear and racism among 45's base while causing infuriated Dems to dig in their heels and demand less control at the border. 2. Increase aid to Central American countries. Take the money out of 45's absurd military budget. 3. Increase the number of judges dramatically and process asylum-seekers quickly and fairly.
7
@Charlene Sorry, but some of us don't think the defense budget is absurd.
10
Spending more annually on defense than the next eight countries combined is the definition of absurd not to mention obscene.
6
@Charlene
4. Throw a couple of illegal employers in jail overnight, like drunk drivers. Maybe they’ll have to start hiring Americans at living wages again.
2
We need a wall so that Americans will feel safe? We need a wall, in essence, as a political sop to immigration reform?
I do not buy it, despite the other fine suggestions made here.
We need modern, technologically sound, theoretically based, scientifically tested, enforcement techniques on our borders.
That may include some new advanced barriers here and there, but certainly not a wall, and certainly only as one part of a larger enforcement solution.
We need to solve the enforcement side of the equation as an ENFORCEMENT issue, not as a POLITICAL issue. Then, Americans will feel perfectly safe.
Doing what Donald Trump wants does not make me feel safe. I do not believe he has my safety, or any American’s safety, at heart. I think he has HIS POLITICAL SURVIVAL at heart. The wall is to be built for HIS SAFETY not for ours.
Anything that makes him feel safe makes me feel utterly exposed and vulnerable as an American citizen.
12
Kudos to Thomas Friedman for linking the David Frum article in The Atlantic. That said, it is disingenuous to suggest Trump has solely focused on the silly and likely wasteful "wall." In fact, Trump has repeatedly embraced and supported virtually all of the recommendations of President Clinton's own Bipartisan Commission on Immigration Reform, led by African-American, Democratic Congresswoman and civil rights icon Barbara Jordan. Including chain migration reform; elimination of the diversity visa lottery; reduction of legal immigration (Ms. Jordan recommended going back to the 1980's average of 550,000 per year); & stronger enforcement vs illegal immigration, including mandatory E-verify.
Trump has repeatedly supported all of this, as well as a path to citizenship for not only all registered DACA recipients but for an additional 1 million illegal aliens who never registered for DACA but might otherwise have qualified. Trump has supported numerous reform proposals in Congress, including the RAISE Act, introduced and reintroduced in US Senate, to finally enact the core Jordan Commission immigration reforms that Clinton turned his back on in the months after Barbara Jordan's tragic death in early 1996.
In Jan and Feb of 2018; and again in May and June of 2018, Democratic Party rejected Trump's immigration principles and the concrete, specific legislative proposals based on the Jordan Commission to enact them. Hard to make a deal when Dems reject so much.
25
@GRH I’m sorry, but that’s ridiculous. Schumer offered Trump the entire funding of his wall in exchange for DACA. Trump didn’t take it.
Referring back to a proposal from over twenty years ago isn’t reasonable when illegal immigration was much higher (yes, there’s been a bump now, after years of decreasing numbers under Obama). The Democratic Party also took a much dimmer view of immigration. You might as well say that Trump’s position on gay rights reflects Bill Clinton’s, since Clinton signed DOMA. It’s simply not applicable to how Democrats view gay rights today.
7
@Mercury S, correct. Schumer and the other Democrats rejected chain migration reform; elimination of the diversity visa lottery; the silly wall; and citizenship for DACA + 1 million other illegal aliens.
And instead counter-offered around $25 billion for the silly wall in exchange for DACA and legalization of around an additional 3 million illegal aliens. President Trump did not accept this because it did not include any of the recommendations of the Jordan Commission (which notably did not suggest path to legalization nor citizenship for any illegal aliens).
Illegal immigration rates were higher then but total illegal alien population in the US was much lower. Pew Research Center now estimates around 10 to 11 million; and Yale and MIT's nonpartisan joint analysis now estimates between 16.9 million to 28 million.
And, yes, I agree, millions of voters are well aware of how the Democratic Party has evolved over the last 20 to 25 years from being pro-immigration growth at a rate of around 550,000 to 600,000 per year; to currently being pro-immigration growth at a rate of at least 1.3 million legal immigrants per year and seemingly unlimited numbers of illegal immigrants per year, to join the existing population of 10 to 28 million.
People will view the Democratic Party's evolution perhaps differently but many Democrats or former Democrats and now independents supported the recommendations of Jordan Commission & were shocked when Clinton betrayed her legacy.
10
@Mercury S, also, looking back now, according to news reports at the time, Schumer initially offered $20 billion funding for the wall for just DACA (without requiring citizenship for an additional 3 million). Anyway, either way, as you mention, today's Democratic Party is dramatically different on this issue than in the mid-1990's. They seem to have more in common with the Koch Brothers and Chamber of Commerce today than they do with their former colleague, Ms. Jordan.
8
We need a "ranking system" for potential immigrants. Those with a STEM degrees from American (or other) universities should have a higher priority than brothers or sisters of existing immigrants. They should have a much higher priority than parents of existing immigrants because the parents will require social services without ever contributing to the system that provides them.
After all the high-skilled labor "slots" are filled, remaining legal immigration places can be allocated for family reunification.
Tom missed the whole employer side of illegal immigration. Until and unless we rigorously enforce labor laws, we'll never get rid of illegal immigration. We'll have no more success stemming the tide of illegal immigration without employer enforcement is like fighting the opioid crisis through drug interdiction. You have to reduce the demand!
23
Good write up Mr Friedman, it’s always been obvious to me that the situation is severely broken and it is a crisis.
Dems are the ones that have sat back with the hope that a disaster like this could hurt Trump. This is a grave mistake on their part.
Furthermore if you read some of the posts here you will see that many do believe in a utopia where no country exists and humans cross in and out of our land mass as they like. These same people also would like a complete social safety net for all. I am sorry to say that they are unfortunately delusional. If we are having trouble paying for the net today how can we do that for unlimited amounts of migrants streaming across the border who overwhelm our schools, do not pay taxes and drive down salaries.
I blame Trump for his rhetoric, Dems for their resistance at all costs and the newspapers and media for not accurately reporting the facts on the ground and the costs to our country.
Hopefully your article and more that will hopefully follow will cause a bipartisan reform to arise that secure the border, repair our immigration system by instituting both a merit based and also a compassionate component.
Legal immigration is needed, is American, can also grow our GDP and enhance our country further.
18
@Rafa, the newspapers and the media have done a great disservice by generally refusing to try and educate the American public about the history of immigration policy in this nation and reform efforts over the last 25+ years, going back to at least the Jordan Commission during President Clinton's first term.
Trump also deserves some blame because he is not necessarily informed enough to provide the leadership & use the bully pulpit to discuss this history. It is not all the media's fault. And absolutely Trump's rhetoric has frequently been divisive and inflammatory.
But the Democrats seem insistent on shooting themselves in the foot and in danger of giving away the 2020 election because Trump does at least understand that an immigration system designed in 1965, prior to Reagan-era weakening of labor unions; prior to NAFTA; prior to China's admission to WTO; prior to 9/11 (and the several hijackers who had overstayed their visas with zero consequences or enforcement action); prior to globalization and in-sourcing and out-sourcing; and prior to election of Trump himself (could there be any bigger red flag?) - that an immigration system designed over 50 years ago and before all these changes is in dire need of real reform that consists of more than just abolishing ICE and legalizing everyone without a felony without making any other changes. Democratic Party seems only interested in pursuing the latter 2 reforms.
15
@GRH
Trump himself has been illegally hiring workers with obviously fake green cards for decades. Why? To make money.
Saying that Trump wants to reduce illegal immigration—which has been a source of considerable profit for him that he has eagerly exploited—is like saying that Trump is concerned about the epidemic of adultery in America, so kids should read the Bible in school.
3
@kkseattle
Yes, exactly. Clever punch.
2
Finally some sanity in the madness going on for years. From separating children to abolish ICE, it has been nothing but madness; herd mentality of thinking one way or the opposite. Thank you Mr. Friedman for your thoughtful analysis and your ideas for solving the crisis.
4
Thomas Friedman's solution is that of a dedicated middle-of-the-roader. Compromise in the moment. Build a high wall and figure out a "plan" to make America greater by harnessing Mexico. But this is no time to compromise with Trump or to accept any part of his xenophobia.
Friedman should know that strict borders-based nationalism is not a worthy goal because it neglects the larger truths of shared planet, shared pollution, shared culture, natural sciences, and the rest. Human beings have lived in the area of the border and travelled the area for thousands of years. A great wall is a poor way to modify human behavior, whether it is built across China, Israel/Palestine, or Berlin. But Friedman took a trip to "the border" and, surprise, now he thinks it's susceptible to his favorite solution: a compromise– this time with Trump and the extreme nationalists.
Real solutions must arise from history and science, not from a trip to the border. Real solutions require time, and dedication of resources spread across many countries. They don't come as a reaction to a temporary "crisis". Real solutions don't automatically come from compromise.
18
This crisis has many causes, the greatest of all being aggressive US meddling under the cover of the Monroe Doctrine that worked to corrupt Central American governments for over fifty years in order to protect domestic commercial interests like those of the United Fruit Company. America must shoulder its responsibility not by building new walls, but by making proper restitution for its myriad egregious transgressions throughout the region that served to destroy countless lives to fatten profit margins. Americans should count their blessings that thus far these vulnerable migrants are looking for work and a safe place to raise their children, and not revenge.
13
Great read Tom. May not agree on all points but the issues were clearly laid out there. Now only if the political class will act.
13
Traditionally, one part of a president's job was considering the long-range implications for U.S. security of how a diverse set of facts and possibilities could interact.
Because even the most vigorous enthusiasts of Mr. Trump's presidency would acknowledge that long-range thinking is not what he does best, it's probable that nobody in the administration has considered several critical points that relate to future security.
First, water issues concerning the Rio Grande and the wall. These are numerous and complicated.
Second, returning people, particularly youthful males, to their home countries angrier with the U.S., and more militarized than before. What could possibly go wrong?
Third, instead of deciding the rest of Central and South America is not our responsibility to take care of, take a realistic look at how cost-effective soft power can be. If we want people back in their own countries and friendly to the United States, let's invest in cooperation projects that produce wells, more efficient food production, and economic growth.
Oh, and everybody deserves an explanation about why the administration isn't calling for the most immediate step to ameliorate the "crisis": making E-Verify mandatory.
23
@Grennan
Mr. Friedman makes some excellent points and You have filled in a few of the gaps. Soft power is the key and China is doing a great job on that with their Belts and Roads projects all over the world. And in the meantime we're fussing among ourselves about detention beds and walls.
The two things that could be done immediately to great effect would be:
1) Make e-verify mandatory
2) Congress should eliminate gang and domestic violence as reasons for asylum.
The Board of Immigration Appeals , in and asylum case brought before it in 2014, expanded "social groups" to include gang and domestic violence and that is the big reason we have so many families coming now. THINK OF THE BILLIONS OF DOLLARS THAT ONE DECISION BY 3 JUDGES HAS COST THIS COUNTRY.
5
No one who is here illegally should be eligible for citizenship. The same should go for asylees. However, that should not stop us from rewarding their hard work. After all, if their labor can be cheapened, so can ours. So, a percentage of their wages should be put into IRA's that they can collect an income from when they move back to their country of origin. Those counties need a middle class. We can help them create one.
8
@caveman007 Stupid idea. If a person is a climate change refugee, THEY HAVE NOWHERE TO GO BACK TO!
And if a woman is running away from brutality in a nation whose government refuses to protect her, a place where both she and her children are subject to murder and torture by machete, where even female police officers are tortured and killed by the goverment, she needs asylum and to be kept safe from those who will kill her.
Gangsters, and men to arrive solely for economic reasons (including H1-B intellectualls who are looking for high paying jobs) need to be rejected. We have millions of American college students who need those jobs.
But anyone whose life is in danger must be welcomed.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/04/05/opinion/honduras-women-murders.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage
Reasonable, right up to the point about walls! A real wall along the entire border would be an ecological disaster that the land and rivers will NEVER recover from a human lifetime. What is needed along MOST of the border (out in the wild, wild) is a smart wall, using drones, sensors, etc. etc. As has been said, we have the technology (and it's inexpensive compared a horrible physical wall. Friedman shoud know this! Of course, the smart wall will need to be staffed, but the smarter the wall, the fewer people. And yes, more facilities for holding people will have to be built until the humanitarian crisis in Central America is solved and asylum seekers numbers fall back to the average.
9
@coolstar True. The Mexican government has already said that if the wall is built they will shut off water rights to the border area, and they have a right to do that. But a wall will be more than a ecological disaster. It will be a legal disaster, an environmental disaster and a worker's compensation disaster. Some REAL estimates are that the wall will actually cost between $70 billion and $100 billion.
https://www.brookings.edu/essay/the-wall-the-real-costs-of-a-barrier-between-the-united-states-and-mexico/
I say make the people who want the wall pay for it!
3
@coolstar
Nearly one hundred thousand people are approaching our southern border per month now. Do you REALLY see any smart wall handling THAT?
Reportedly, seven groups of Latin Americans are headed here.
A physical wall is the ONLY choice.
2
@coolstar
The real "ecological disaster"is -- by far --
overpopulation.
America already has 330 million people.
More are not needed.
And more will not be good for "ecology".
Overpopulation is the elephant in the parlor.
As for the rest of the world, of course,
even more wildly overpopulated than the USA.
But it is not a solution to the problem of the rest of the world for the USA to import their problem.
Foreign Aid??
Yes, but only for population control,
including birth control,
and education of young women,
especially well before menarche.
Any other foreign aid is money down a rathole.
2
It seems to me Thomas that you are calling for the US to undo much of the damage done to Latin America by US foreign policy - particularly since 1945. So why not call for American troops on the ground in Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador, in particular, to secure their civil societies and private enterprises and provide greater aid to their governments and public servants? After twenty years of such policy, these countries would be much better able to stand on their own two feet as stable, reasonably prosperous democracies. To pay for it you could use all the money you wasted in Iraq. Whoops! And that's right - belief in democracy in on the wane in the US itself and you're only interested in promoting it abroad where there's oil.
3
I look at this wall and wonder if this is the USA in cooperation with Mexico to build their Olympic rock climbing team. Certainly there’s a less expensive way to advance the sport, but still, I have to applaud the spirit of the effort! Go team!
2
I suppose that, after living for nearly seven decades in the US, I shouldn't be surprised that many of my fellow Americans think that the "immigration crisis" is mostly about us, rather than mostly about the desperate people who are fleeing intolerable conditions, under regimes we have long supported . . . but I continue to find our selfishness and mean-spirited, defiant ignorance surprising.
17
@Douglas
Does the population explosion over the last 40 or 50 years not have something to do with the desperation of these people?
I have a hard time being tolerant of people who keep making the same mistake over and over again.
2
@Blanche White nicely played! I believe some of my British compatriots used these same arguments about the Bengali famine in 1943 and the Irish potato famine starting in 1845. And somehow *we* were the bad guys! I'm sure they would be appreciative of modern American support, though!
(the immigrant American part of my brain feels the burning need to emphasize my sarcastic intent; whilst the British core of my brain screams that that would be to utterly defeat the point).
1
"The system needs to be fixed, but “the wall” is only part of the solution."
I'm sorry, but the wall is no solution. We need to find other ways to solve the problems we face.
11
@MJ Does your home have a door? Why or why not?
I don’t have a wall around my house. If someone unauthorized is in my house, I don’t pay them to stay there just because they’ll clean it for less than an authorized person would—you know, like President Trump does.
If I have a problem with raccoons because I leave dog food on the front porch, which should I do—build a wall around my house? Or quit putting out dog food?
Throw an illegal employer or two in jail overnight, like drunk drivers, and I expect the problem will resolve itself pretty quickly. Most nations are not surrounded by walls. Most nations do, though, have pretty strict employment enforcement regimes (similar to E-Verify).
3
The USA needs much stronger immigration control,
not so-called "compromises" with giveaways to immigrants.
The USA already has 330 million people,
including 45 million foreign-born.
Every year, we grant more than 1 million "green cards",
the right to legal permanent residence,
with a clear path to citizenship,
plus, on top to that, every year, hundreds of thousands of supposedly "temporary" visas for work and study,
in a plethora of categories.
That is plenty.
We do not need more.
The world has well over 7 billion people,
rapidly approaching 8 billion.
Hundreds of millions would come here if we let them.
But we have no need for them.
And they have no right to come.
We do not to grow the "economic pie"
by bringing in more people --
not when the slices do not grow.
Pretending to "grow" the "economic pie"
with more people
means dividing up that pie among more people,
with the result that the individual slices don't grow at all.
What does grow is more overcrowded roads and schools and hospitals and parks.
We do not need that.
We do not need more immigrants to solve the funding crisis for Social Security and pensions and Medicare.
That is a giant Ponzi scheme --
the mother of all Ponzi schemes.
Some day, in the not so distant future,
all those supposedly young immigrants
(and many are actually not so young)
will themselves get those benefits,
creating a supposed "need" for still more immigrants,
on and on ad infinitum.
Raising the retirement age is a better solution.
19
The immigration policies have needed to be fixed for the past 10 years. This is nothing new. We don’t need another feel good liberal approach to immigration. Do liberals realize that roughly 100 thousand people were stoped at our southern border last month alone. To put the figure into perspective, it’s nearly double the capacity of yankee stadium or 20,000 more than the capacity of Met Life Stadium (82,000) each month. It’s an insane number. The problem was not of Trump’s making, yet his Administration is on the receiving end of a problem created by the prior administration. Give credit where credit is due, to the Democrats for this quagmire.
9
@George "Give credit where credit is due, to the Democrats for this quagmire."
As I recall, it was the Republicans who blocked the last comprehensive immigration reform proposals.
17
@George George W. Bush and John McCain developed workable immigration reform with Democratic backing. A Republican Senate voted against it. This is a long-term problem which requires a unified approach, not another knock-down-dragout blame fest.
6
@George
President Obama had a Republican House and Senate for 6 out of 8 years. Why is it the fault of the Democrats?
The truth is that Republicans and their Chamber of Commerce WANT immigration, especially poor and desperate people. And Trump, who obviously likes immigrants because he hires a huge number, WANTS to have an issue to stir the pot and create division.
So, there is a problem no doubt, but it exists because the corporate masters want it this way.
6
What comes through this article is that we don't need a wall of iron and concrete. We do need a wall of border patrolmen, decent detention facilities, judges, telemetry. A lot more of each. Oh, and some fences that won't stop migrating animals, etc.
But if the world environment continues to deteriorate and more countries find themselves over-populated and under-governed, things could get very very grim.
14
Amazing! In an article on immigration and with over 50% of illegal immigrants those who overstay visas, there is no mention of penalties/fines for employers hiring those here illegally via border crossings or overstayed visas. Employer fines could be progressive, increasing for each successive violation and being high enough to have a deterrent effect.
28
@Hadel Cartran
Also, much tighter standards and controls
(including financial responsibility standards)
for issuing visas in the first place,
including "visitor" and "temporary" visas,
with special emphasis on visas for all applicants
from countries with high rates of visa overstays.
6
E-verify required and applied universally. Visa overstays: tracking and follow up — not rocket science to create and manage this data and the people it represents.
1
wow, an informative article/editorial about the southern about the border situation in the NYtimes and an accurate description of where the wall ends. - this is the first one I have seen in the liberal news media. The problem is not only trump, it is also the democrats who feel they benefit by illegal immigrants by false census counts and misappropriated congressional seats, and also eventual new democratic voters. The change in the political super majority from republican to democratic in California can be explained largely by this. There is some reason to believe trump is interested in a real solution that partially includes walls, but more importantly, changes in asylum procedures, but the democrats appear not interested. Just look up the nonsense N. Pelosi has said about walls and the continuing inaction by the democratic majority congress. Hopefully she reads this editorial
13
@sh, David Leonhardt also deserves credit for his opinion piece, "The Democrats are Confused on Immigration." And since Trump's election, the NYTimes ran a piece by Senator Tom Cotton about the RAISE Act (to do some of what Friedman discusses here); and a piece by Harvard prof George Borjas, examining some of the negative impacts of our current rates of immigration and immigration system. Admittedly, the articles/editorials run about 500 to 1 in the other direction as the NY Times has abandoned the center and become more of a high-end Fox News or Breitbart of the left, but at least, unlike Breitbart, they do occasionally air a different opinion.
3
And, from the opposition party, it certainly doesn't help matters for one of its leaders to call The Wall immoral. This was a ridiculous statement - both parties have funded the building of the wall, starting with Bill Clinton.
When will Congress earn its pay on this and many other matters?
20
Aren't we partly to blame for the state of the migrants' home countries? They're devastated by drug gangs -- don't we (Americans) buy the drugs? Mr. Friedman likes to stress how the world is now interconnected and interdependent. Then, maybe, the migrants' plight is connected to something we did (or ignored)?
14
Okay, Thomas L. Friedman, I'll get on board with this. I just have one demand: Can our cooperation come with a promise that the Crimson Carbuncle will not seek re-election in 2020?
4
"we need to encourage legal immigration" and stop giving people asylum. Very well, then. What are you going to do? Build "not only" a wall? That doesn't work. They will (as they do all the time) put ladders on them and that's a waste of resources. Don't you think you've forgotten something? Why are these people fleeing?
3
You have not only broached the problems comprehensively and laid out some compelling solutions, and there's your problem. Trump doesn't want a solution. He wants a crises. To alleviate, in any way, the problems with immigration humanizes the people seeking asylum, a free ride or a better future. The key to Trump's approach to immigration is hate, fear and exclusion. If he wanted to fix this problem on his own terms, he had two years to produce them. He doesn't fix things, he breaks them. He doesn't feel for the families, he hates them. He doesn't wish to cull worthy newcomers from unworthy ones, he wishes to exclude them all. He's only wasting this opportunity if he's looking for answers. As it is, the more crises he can foment the more hatred, confusion and divisions he can sell. It's "the Art of the Double Deal."
12
@rick so it is a crisis? I thought it was a ‘manufactured crisis’. At least Trump has been consistent throughout. Democrats are all over the place as the politics of the situation shift underneath their feet.
9
The White House press secretary is one of the most demanding jobs in any administration, requiring innate intellectual depth. Look at Bob Gibbs, Jay Carney and Josh Ernest to name just three. Each could respond to virtually any policy question while displaying extensive knowledge of the subject matter and a precise understanding of their administration’s position. Honest PR pros will admit there’s less than a handful of people who can handle this position. With all due respect, Ms. Sanders is not one of them.
3
@Peter I believe you have confused this article with another article re Sarah Sanders. I know it’s tough to keep track of all the liberal propaganda here but this is an opinion piece about immigration.
1
A thoughful and informative piece of writing. I think you got it right. I could see this in the fog of rhetoric expounded and reality sorrounding this conflagration, but I couldn't put my finger on the solution. Once global warming becomes the driving crisis on earth, nowhere will there be enough room for all the displaced. There may not even be enough to eat in this country for those already here. Unfortunately, Democrats will be voting for Trump-like demagogues at that point. I hope more people keep their senses about them and vote for something better than that. It's going to be a harsh future.
4
What would it take for the UN to get involved and set up tent cities in the countries people are fleeing or in Mexico?
Why can't we change the asylum application system so would be asylum seekers must apply in your own countries, and the US will only accept those who applied and have been approved down there?
Why do we have to let in so many needy people when we cannot even take care of our own?
11
@Andio
By definition, people seeking asylum *from* a country are fleeing a level of crisis that interrupts orderly systems. International law is extensive, and may not even consider "asylum seeking' to exist until an individual leaves the country he or she is fleeing.
4
I'm at loss here. Has Trump offered a compromise on immigration? A compromise so generous some ultra conservative GOPs rejected it along with unilateral rejection by Democrats. I see no immigration plan from Democrats, please Tomas don't fantasize about one. All Democrats want in one way or another are OPEN BORDERS. That is what I gather.
13
@Crow No, you are incorrect. Trump offered a laughable plan that was filled with poison pills. No compromise at all.
Schumer, in the other hand, offered Trump $25 billion for his wall in exchange for DACA. Trump chose not to take it.
Democrats have also offered billions of additional funding for a “smart wall.” Trump responded by shutting down the government for 35 days.
“Open borders” is a canard. It is true Democrats largely don’t have a policy on immigration, but they’ve amply demonstrated an openness to a deal. See also: the DREAM Act, scuttled by a Republican Senate.
3
@Crow Americans take it for granted that if they want to travel anywhere on the planet, they can just buy a ticket a go there. We are very used to having free movement and we were appalled when communist countries would not let people travel even inside their own borders. If we can go into other countries whenever we want, why can't other people do the same?
@Mercury S What are poison pills for some is common sense for others. Green card lottery has no sense at all - I see people who came as lottery winners trading counterfeit bags on Broadway or driving Uber. Does our economy need this? Chain migration have to stop also.
There are root problems: 1. President Trump 2. The lack of USA addressing assistance and guidance to countries in crisis. DJM
3
America does not have the vision, determination, patience or unity to build a wall and control its borders. The extant haphazard system is the only system there is. It will continue.
In the same vein, America will also fail to address tax reform, inequality, drugs, guns, health care, education costs, infrastructure, deficits, global warming and getting out of Iraq and Afghanistan. America is in public policy gridlock - on everything - and will be 30 years from now.
23
@r a
This is a sad reflection, and not without a basis in reality. I think of Yeat’s famous poem, “The Second Coming,” and its prediction of the center not holding any more. I’m seventy, and can’t remember a time when the country seemed so fractious, and my confidence in the Left (my normal political home) so depleted. I can’t think of one Democratic candidate who is being honest about the crisis at the border . However delusional though, I prefer Friedman’s guarded optimism and faith in solutions .
4
The democrats are failing us as well. This is a golden opportunity for them to step up and actually deal with the problem. And I don't mean, let everybody in, which is what they look like. They are dropping the all.
18
@Audaz
Democrats passed a great bill with bipartisan support years ago.
The Republicans wouldn't give it a vote.
2
@priceofcivilization, the 2013 "Gang of 8" bill that did not pass amounted to "pay to stay" citizenship for everyone in the country without a record of multiple felonies; and increased legal immigration in every immigration category, from what is already most-generous-in-the-world rate of 1.3 million per year to numbers far higher.
1
Sure, the system needs to be fixed.
Sure, the "wall" is only part of the solution.
Here are other parts of the solution --
More border patrol personnel.
More ICE personnel.
More equipment.
More detention beds.
More internal enforcement.
More workplace enforcement.
Mandatory, uniform, nationwide, biometric on-line ID system.
More monitoring of visa overstays.
More vetting of visa grants.
Tougher visa standards (e.g. tougher financial responsibility standards) for all visa applicants from countries with high rates of visa overstays.
Tougher standards for "temporary" visas for work and study.
Tighter controls (including changes in the law where needed)
for "asylum".
Annual numerical limits.
Here are things which are not part of the solution --
Increases in existing numerical limits.
Amnesties.
Endless "process".
"Catch and release".
Obstruction of funding for enforcement.
Obstruction of deportations.
21
Thank you Mr Friedman for a level-headed treatment of the immigration situation. A voice of reason! Everyone is breathing a sigh of relief!
Merit-based immigration is certainly desirable, but it neglects a large group of people around the world who may have had little access to educational opportunities, but are hard working and ready to uproot themselves from their homeland.
How about an improved, utterly fair lottery system that is based on what the Parks service has for the Grand Canyon?
Mayors or county executives around the country give a number of immigrants they would like to settle in their community every year, which in aggregate sets a quota for the whole country. Any nationality can apply, no discrimination based on country of origin, religion, etc. A starter stipend is provided to those who are willing to come to ailing, shrinking towns, paid for by application fees.
You sign up for the lottery by yourself or as a family unit. Everyone gives their fingerprints. You accrue points for every year that you don't win, which rewards patience and persistence by increasing your chances of winning the longer you've been on the list. If you win, you will have to pass strict background checks. If everything is in order, off you go to your new life.
Having a real path to immigration, without having to resort to dangerous smugglers and questionable asylum chances, will almost certainly ease the crush.
4
@Jule We already have a lottery system for immigrants -- a very generous one. But our neighbors to the south can't be bothered with all that paperwork and waiting, so they just ignore the legal process and come in without asking.
We need to revise U.S. immigration and asylum laws to make decisions made by Homeland Security officials at the border final. It should take a few hours, not a few years and thousands of immigration court judges to determine whether an illegal border crosser has entered the country without authorization or meets asylum criteria.
When foreigners abide by the rules and apply for immigration visas, the decisions of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services officers are final. Applicants denied visas don’t get court hearings. Foreigners who enter the country legally but overstay their visas get don’t court hearing when they are ordered out of the country. But illegal border crossers who request asylum when apprehended at the order get court hearings, a process that now takes three years or due to the immigration court backlog.
When detention centers overflow, the migrants are released with notifications to appear at court hears set years in future. They refer to the notifications as “permisos” because they permit asylum seekers to reside and work in the United States until the dates of their hearings roll around. About 80 percent of asylum requests are denied because the applicants don’t meet asylum criteria. but the percentage is even higher for illegal border crossers. Those released with permisos know no one will look for them if they don’t appear for the hearings.
16
“And Trump fans need to realize that, yes, walls work — but only when paired with a strategy that says “we’re not only going to build walls.”
I don’t know one Trump supporter- and I know plenty— who wants only a wall and not other immigration reform. The system is broken top to bottom, and Pelosi and Schumer love it.
8
Lately I have tried to understand the anger about immigrants coming from Trump's base. Reading your article gives me pause and heartache. I grew up a mile from the Texas border and am friends with many 'illegals'. Most just want safety, jobs and a decent education. I have always been accepting of illegal immigration because it was the fabric of my life. I also saw how hard new immigrants worked and were proud when my friends became doctors, engineers, business owners. I will never forget 25 years ago I was back visiting McAllen while crossing the border saw an old friend working the checkpoint. He told me to enjoy myself as it would in 15 years be dangerous to visit when almost everyone was working for the cartel including the police to supply drugs to America. He said more and more illegal immigrants would be trying to escape into the U.S as violence erupted. I enjoyed it a few more years taking my kids but havent been there in many years as it became just as he predicted. We need to listen to Krugman the people he talked to know what is happening. I am sad because refugees need America but we do have a priority to take care of those already here. It's apparent many are abusing the system. Our leaders need to work together and put a comprehensive plan together to ensure those in dire need have sanctuary but the drug smugglers are caught. I am not sure how a wall would work on the Rio Grande River in Texas but sadly it's time to figure it out even if we did this to ourselves
11
@Austin Proud Republicans put a great deal of value on law and order. The crisis at the border is a lawless and orderless mess. It’s as simple as that. Bring law and order to the situation and you will see Republicans supportive of those efforts. Eliminate the ability for immigrants to enter illegally. Grant permanent residency status to DACA recipients. Establish merit based criteria for immigrant selection. Do those things and you will have our support.
There are approximately six BILLION people living in overpopulated, impoverished, often violent third world countries. It is NOT our job to save them from themselves.
Our own country is suffering. Citizens are struggling to provide a basic standard of living for their own families. We have millions of homeless wandering the streets, including veterans, while our healthcare system is in shambles. Our country’s infrastructure is falling apart while our natural resources are being depleted....water, for instance.
Our nation has never been more ideologically divisive and culturally chaotic. We can’t AFFORD to play host, patron, and nursemaid to the world’s teeming masses.
36
Then maybe we should stop poking our noses into their business, focus on rational trade, defund the military and socialize the profits of globalization right?
A physical wall on some parts of the border makes sense, which is why we have them, and perhaps we need some more. But 2,000 miles of wall would be incredibly expensive to defend from tunnels, ladders, ropes, power tools, drones, and general human enguiniety. More judges, more facilities, more trained professionals, and updated laws, rules, and standards would be a good thing. Who is writing the bill in Congress? We could use some real leadership in Washington.
19
If there was a some glimmer of hope that we could achieve a just solution to managing immigration your article would be timely. But cutting aid to Central America, multiple attempts at immigration reform ending in failure (and I'm looking at your, Republicans), etc. have worsened the situation, leading to the crisis we have now. Who wouldn't agree to better border security? But, too many, including the President, will stand in the way of establishing reasonable processes for both humanitarian relief as well as ensuring a workforce that will meet our needs and enhance our economy long-term. Dream on, Tom. Or, at least, dream of meaningful electoral change in 2020.
9
@Eric Cooper Since when electoral change ever brought any good?
A simpler solution would be to withdraw from the international agreements on asylum and refugee protection. The US is not the only country overwhelmed with the issue of illegal immigration, which the right to asylum facilitates. I disagree with the assessment that many of the Central American migrants meet the eligibility requirements for asylum. The former Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristjen Nielsen, stated that less than 10 per-cent were awarded asylum. The majority do not qualify. As for assisting the migrants home countries with humanitarian aid, so that they do not want to leave, that strategy has been put forth by Angela Merkel who proposed improving the economic situation in African countries so the migrants don't want to leave. But that would take generations, if it was successful, and billions have already been poured into the African continent with not much to show for the effort. Don't blame Trump - the problem is the 1951 Refugee Convention, written for and in a different era. Research paper (if interested) - google - "The Problem with the 1951 Refugee Convention"
19
@S Sm
What might have been weighing on everyone's mind in 1951 that would make them agree to protect refugees?
Our moral obligations have not changed.
7
@S Sm
I agree.
1
@Alan; World population at the time of the 1951 Refugee Convention grosso modo 2,5 billion. Today, we are approaching 8 billion at an alarming rate.
2
Outstanding description of a very sad situation at the border. This situation requires a much stronger diplomatic and economic effort in the Central American countries which my friends from these countries tell me have developed a very high level of misery. Now, the situation is inhumane and beneath the dignity of this country.
I read David Frum's Atlantic Magazine piece and the first thought I had was, why are we not resourcing a diplomatic, A.I.D. effort to deal with the economic, environmental, and government failures in this region.
Border security starts at the borders of these neighboring countries, that I list here so that your readers will know that they are not all the same but any successful solution will require a multi-lateral compact to end the misery for the people in these countries. Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Belize.
I also suspect that there are contractors in these countries who are making money off of the misery of these people who are also making money transporting illegal goods as well as people.
Bottom line: we need to continue to offer opportunities to come to the United States in an orderly way but I am reasonably certain that the disorganized effort at our border that your write about is a huge humanitarian and policy failure.
I believe if you took a tour of our embassies in these countries and talked to some of their ranking government officials, and wrote a piece, it would help focus the U.S. effort.
5
I can't believe I'm reading this in the NYT. Someone talking about reasonable immigration policy, rather than the extremes? My only quibble is that in large sections of the border a physical barrier will not be effective because it really requires agents to be nearby to monitor people climbing over it, tunneling under it, etc. You can buy a 50' ladder, for instance. But if in those areas electronic surveillance is used, then a significant reduction in illegal crossings could be achieved. And, the asylum application review process needs to be expedited, with the backlog cleared.
10
What right do people have to put a wall where no natural barrier exists? Nature does not recognize the separate countries. Wildlife needs to move back and forth. If we want to control humans, do it with a high tech virtual wall, not an environmentally devastating barrier.
11
@Chesson5 I think my house and all those pro immigration celebrity actvists‘ houses have walls too. The only difference is the celebrity houses have tall, electrified walls with multiple HD cameras. They also have massive thick doors. We should apply the same standards at the national level without being ashamed of it.
1
"In sum: we need new walls; we need a serious strategy for mitigating climate change and offering economic and governance assistance to countries to our south that are being destabilized by poverty and extreme weather; we need to rethink who is entitled to asylum, so people fleeing economic dislocation don’t overwhelm our borders and harden our hearts to people truly fleeing tyranny; we need to encourage legal immigration of people who can help our country thrive in the 21st century; and we need to partner with Mexico on a Mexican-American plan to manage the flow of migrants through Mexico to our border."
Ok. Fine. No argument; all correct and logical.
What is always missing though Mr. Friedman are some real, actual suggestions as to how to do this. You are excellent always in describing the problem, but when it comes time to describe the solution, we are left with platitudes.
So how about one viable step, describe some aspect of how to re-organize. The only solution you seem to offer is:
"Where there is now a proper fence, and crossing the border illegally is virtually impossible, you see shopping centers, schools and new housing."
"Where crossing the border illegally is virtually impossible"!
6
Terrific reporting! Mr. Friedman has taken the time to investigate what is a overwhelming subject. He details humanely the critical, painful details of the immigration crisis.
Send a link to your timeline. Get real news out the old-fashioned way--disseminate it to your friends who will read it.
Mr. Friedman has outlined a solution for a problem no one really wants to solve.
6
Don’t give Trump the crisis he needs. Immigration is the ONLY and best arrow in his quiver. All the other identity “others “ pale by comparison. Immigration needs to be sidelined if Democrats are to be assured of victory in the upcoming election. When in power, we can do the right thing. Drop the ego. Victory is essential, if not existential.
2
@RjW What part of this article leads you to believe that there is no crisis, or just a Trump created crisis? Immigration is a huge issue and will not be sidelined no matter what Dems want. I'm happy that someone on the left like Friedman finally stepped up and said something that made sense; as opposed to saying: what crisis? I don't see any crisis.
7
@RjW - Yep, tell the voters one thing, and do the opposite when you win the election. Is it any wonder the voters don't trust the Dems?
This problem is like so many other problems we have in this country. There are reasonable ways to deal with it, but not in the context of a political system that is funded by big money. When people can make money off of something, it is very difficult to stop it. Immigration is another example of this.
There is simply no reason why we shouldn’t have an E-Verify system that punishes employers for hiring illegal immigrants. You can’t recognize immigration it as a problem and pretend that you are solving it by allowing employers to hire illegal immigrants.
I’m always amused that we have technology that allows banking by texting a picture of a check to your bank, but we fail to use these systems for objectives such as immigration control.
18
@K. Corbin - But you know the UK has recently attempted verification of applicants in regard to housing by landlords, banks, and the National Health Service. The government received huge criticism over the Illegal immigrant crackdown in the name of human rights. That is likely to happen in the US too.
1
So why exactly do we need unskilled illegal immigrants? Surely we have enough uneducated people who could use a job. Employers will not hire them because they suspect, correctly, that they will not work as hard for as little money as illegal immigrants will. But if no one else is available, then they will be hired. A recent NYT article described a factory in Indiana training prisoners from the local prison because they couldn't get workers. That's what would happen if there were no illegal immigrants.
As for educated immigrants, we also have many very well-educated people who can't find suitable work. While we might be able to use a few brilliant scientists and entrepreneurs, most of the routine professional jobs, including routine computer programming, could be filled by US citizens. Our people will study and train for these jobs, if they think they can get them. If it's 'only Indians need apply', then they'll major in finance or try to get into med school.
38
A compassionate, responsible, comprehensive, well researched bipartisan approach to what will be a continuing problem into the future should be a no brainer. Climate change will displace millions that live in vulnerable lands around the world. To deal with this burgeoning problem will require a collaborative effort by the parties involved. That ability to collaborate does not exist in government currently. Grudges and beefs are in the way. It doesn't help that the President sees the immigration issue as something to ride roughshod over to exploit as an election tool.
2
Reasonable people can disagree about what the U.S. immigration policy should be. One can reasonably be for very limited immigration, for a large amount of immigration but less than currently allowed, for even more immigration, for family reunification, against family reunification and for more skill-based, for open borders -- the number of reasonable options are huge.
But I hope we could all agree that our current system is not at all a reasonable system. We have laws that put certain limits on immigration, but then we haphazardly and ineffectively enforce them. We tell people it's against the law to come in illegally, but if you get in, maybe you can stay, maybe you can't, maybe it's ok to work, maybe it's not, etc. We need to decide what the rules are and enforce them. Of course, enforcement will not be 100 percent effective -- no enforcement of a law ever is -- but the insane system we currently have has to be eliminated.
22
Tom, I AM a fan and, as usual, you've got it right...again! Thank you for such a thoughtful and sensible presentation. I used to be a Democrat, but like Howard Schultz, the party abandoned me. I voted for Trump and am not sorry. But, I do know that "the wall" is not the only solution. And I know that "the wall" can come in many effective forms. I believe most of Trump's supporters share my belief...the wall is necessary in some form. I agree that's it's not sensible to train foreign students in skills we need in our workforce, only to send them back to their countries. I only hope Congress reads your opinion piece and takes it seriously.
15
We need sensible immigration reform, but not one motivated by racial hatred. Yes, immigrant waves can overwhelm a society. But they also tend to bring down crime and help places do better economically — those are just facts.
We need a balanced approach, not one motivated by revenge. We’re projected to have a labor shortage and we benefit from immigrants, legal and illegal, paying into taxes and Social Security.
We still need to do more to help stabilize these countries for our own interests and theirs. For too long we have been buying their drugs and arming their gangs while supporting regimes that crack down on unions and prevent a stable middle class from emerging.
8
@J. G. Smith The problem with "the wall" is that it's all Trump offered. For two years his party held full power in Washington, and did nothing about real immigration reform.
Why? Because effective immigration reform must include things that will inflame Trump's base, such as a path to legal status for the 11 million+ illegal immigrants here already (many with American citizen children) and a comprehensive guest worker program for agricultural workers.
Not to mention an e-Verify crackdown that will scare the bejesus out of the GOP donors who depend on cheap illegal labor in their chicken processing plants. (And country clubs, like Mar-a-Lago)
I'm glad that YOU know the wall is not the only solution. Maybe you can get Fox & Friends to do a very special episode to inform the president about that.
1
@Elizabeth A, because some institutional norms still remain thus far, such as the legislative filibuster, no legislation passes the US Senate without 60 votes. So, no, the Republicans did not hold full power in Washington for two years, at least with respect to the issue of passing immigration reform.
We are being swamped by migrants at our southern border. And I believe that our President does not want to "solve" the problem. He just wants it to keep getting worse so that he can rally his base.
What we need to do, first, is to deal with this flow. One way to do this would be to hire more immigration judges and then have them work not on the oldest cases but on those crossing the border now. Have full, formal hearings at the border.
Second, come up with a better system. In reality there are only four ways to become a legal immigrant: (a) marry a citizen or green card holder; (b) come in by family unification; (c) win the "diversity lottery"; or (d) get in on an "investor" or "Einstein" visa. Since there is no legal way for most potential immigrants to come, ever, they come illegally.
Then, admit that our system has been broken, and give legal status to the undocumented who are here and have not committed serious crimes. We can debate whether there should be a path to citizenship, but we must rule out mass deportation.
I consider myself a progressive Democrat who wants to support immigration, but if we do nothing we will end up with an overwhelming populist demand to deport everyone.
20
Tom, I am not really a fan. Most of your columns seem like hand-wave analysis to me. But this time you have hit it out of the park. I have never agreed with you more. Not only are you right, but you seem to be the only one saying this. I am a conservative who has no problem with legal immigration, even robust immigration, but we MUST control our own borders and immigration into our country.
There is nothing fascist about this. If you want to know what happens if you don't control your own borders, ask Native Americans or Palestinians. If you are okay with a policy that incentivizes trafficking children, then keep refusing to support stricter enforcement of our borders. If you want even more people "living in the shadows" in America then continue to incentivize illegal immigration, by providing benefits and lax enforcement. There is nothing humane about our current immigration dynamic, and Democrats who refuse to be willing to fix the problem are at least as culpable as Trump for the inhumanity at the border. We should adopt a system more like Canada's, which encourages immigration, but still strictly controls it (47% of the residents of Toronto are foreign-born).
36
@Charles - Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently announced changes to rules regarding asylum. Many illegal border crosser's come in from the US and claim asylum. Put through as part of an Omnibus bill, thus bypassing the official parliamentary protocols which take forever. New rules are - Asylum is not permitted if the applicant has previously applied, been denied, and deported (who knew? I was amazed this was ever allowed), asylum is not allowed if the applicant has previously applied for asylum, started an application, been granted asylum, or denied, in one of several countries which Canada shares intelligence - UK, France, Australia, New Zealand, and the USA. The rationale being that all countries mentioned have similar standards for determining asylum eligibility. Good move on Trudeau's part. Of course the immigrant advocates and refugee lawyers have raised a stink and are planning court challenges.
8
The problem with your analysis is that the original immigration law which provided for the diversification of legal immigrants was signed by LBJ in 1965. Numerous amendments since then signed by presidents of both parties have made for the crazy quilt immigration system we have today. But neither you nor your readers want to study which changes since 1965 have caused which problems. We have alternated between forgiveness and hatred since then. Hatred always wins and you do nothing in this column to explain what changes have to be made to return the US to where it was when LBJ signed the law prohibiting discrimination in legal immigration on the basis of race, religion or country of origin. Maybe we should just go back to the 1965 law. Otherwise we will have a country that Groucho Marx would understand. We will accept immigrants only from countries whose citizens have no desire to emigrate to the US. Just putting out a want ad for the "best and the brighest" doesn't mean anyone will come.
6
A different approach is certainly required to address the myriad of challenges discussed here. However a critical part of any solution is not included in this column and that is our relationship with Mexico and their government. Whether it is caravans of refugees that are able to travel freely through Mexico to the US or the endless river of drugs transported by cartels, Mexico can and should do more. Unfortunately we have a leader who launched his campaign by insulting and demeaning the country and its citizens, and who hasn’t really moderated his language or approach. Until that changes we won’t have complete cooperation from Mexico.
9
The drug problem is due to the US demand for narcotics. Mexico will not be able to do any thing until we curb demand.
1
Population is what is driving the numbers.
There is something contradictory in open border advocates who say conditions are so bad and yet defend asylum seekers who are having so many children . If it is really that bad - where comes the the time for producing so many kids? Most animal species automatically have less offspring when times are rough.
19
@Ben Ross I agree that population is driving the numbers - the fertility rate of most Latin American countries have plummeted, which is why you do not see a massive amount of desperate Mexican, Brazilian, Columbian or Panamanian migrants. Given the ability to do so, women in these countries have controlled their fertility. In Honduras and Guatemala, women are brutalized and have little access to birth control. So why did this administration cut off international family planning aid? Does Trump believe in abstinence? Hah. Perhaps a social problem unsolved is politically better for Trump than a problem that is solved.
5
@Ben Ross
Nearly 90% of recent arrivals are Guatemalan. In 1955, Guatemala had only 3,625,300 people. Today it has 17,577,842 with an average age of 21. Many Guatemalans start having children in their teenage years, and continue having them through their 20’s and beyond.
Here are comments made by Ray Suarez and those he interviewed for the 3/8/11 PBS Newshour segment titled "In Guatemala, Family Planning Clashes with Religion, Tradition”.
"Stories about the dangers of birth control are often linked to religion, where family-planning methods such as monthly pills, tubal ligation, and IUDs have long been against church teachings.”
"We will follow God's will. We believe this is natural law. And we have heard too many stories about birth control, like injections and pills that cause cancer.”
"Here, populations are overwhelmingly Mayan and overwhelmingly religious. Women typically have eight, nine, 10 children.”
Years ago, more children meant more hands to work the land. But generation after generation, farms are divided into smaller and smaller plots. There's less food to harvest. And with big families comes more mouths to feed. Nearly half the population of Guatemala suffers from chronic malnutrition.”
“ ...46 percent of children are stunted.”
"Malnourished children have 12 points less of I.Q. than a normal child. We will have a great majority of the population with diminished mental capacities.”
5
George W had the right idea. Give all those in the US green cards and fine them $2000 or so for breaking the law. Then e verify every employee that is hired and fining the employer 25K for hiring someone not verified. The second offense 50 K and the third 100K. You will have effectively shut the border down if there are no employers to hire them - the least expensive wall there is.
42
@bjoc Great idea, especially if you are volunteering to work in a slaughterhouse, pick produce under the hot sun, or clean window exteriors on the 40th floor of a skyscraper. Or clean ashtrays at Trump's golf clubs.
2
@bjoc I wish I could recommend this 1,000 times.
4
@bjoc - We tried something like that in '86. It didn't work if you haven't noticed.
The solution is to just do the e-verify part without giving out any green cards or visas.
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To Sharon and all those commenting against High Tech Visas
Especially in IT, the job is becoming more and more globalized. The US college graduate has to de-facto compete for jobs globally.
If we shut down H1-B, more and companies will open their development offices in India or China. This will create local ecosystems like that in Bangalore or Silicon Valley. With today’s H1-B crisis, google is hiring on a massive scale in India.
We want the ecosystem to be in Silicon Valley or Boston. That is why we are inviting/poaching the best engineers in the World to come to USA to build American Companies.
And yes, with an H1-B you can change jobs. The visa is not tied to a company. It is a global free market.
Canada staples a residency permit to every Ph.D degree. Mitt Romney once advocated in doing the same!!
4
@Deep Thought, I would staple a green card to every Master's Degree in a STEM field. If Canada wishes to admit deconstructivist French literature doctorates, I wish them well. America offers a competitive advantage to any brilliant engineer, designer or scientist: Strong IP protection (well, unless you're a drugmaker, then the headhunters are out for you), deep (perhaps the deepest) pools of edgy venture capital and the most unheralded of all: Courts where you get a fair shake.
@Deep Thought I don’t know you know the full H1-B thing. Yes, you can change jobs on H1-B. Please talk to people who try that and find out how ‘easy’ it is.
Also when a H-B comes in they get half the salary of a US guy and that is exploitation!
1
@Deep Thought
Nobody is talking about H1-B Visas! We are talking about the hundreds of thousands of uneducated, Central American migrants who are taking advantage of our broken immigration system.
3
May 2006: Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006, Senate passed 62-36, bipartisan support. The Republican House refused to take it up.
June 2013: Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act, Senate passed 68-32, bipartisan support, every Democratic Senator supported it, 14 Republican Senators supported it. The Republican House refused to take it up, to compromise and find a real solution for our broken immigration system.
Since then Republicans voted for an openly racist, white nationalist supporting President, that 90% of Republicans still support no matter how outrageous/dangerous/criminal his behavior. A President who only wants to demagogue and hate/fear monger the immigration issue and refuses all good faith attempts by Democrats to deal with the real issues.
If you want the immigration issues solved, help Central Americans, build a better relationship with Mexico, address man-made climate change - all issues Friedman genuinely cares about - then vote for a Democratic President, Senate and House in 2020. That’s the only way any real issue will get solved in America.
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Even Mr. Friedman is coming around to the idea that a wall does indeed work, to an extent. Build it quick and reform the books quick. Both should be done simultaneously.
5
Walls and fences make sense where they make sense, but that's not from "sea to shining sea" at the southern border, thanks to terrain, issues of property rights and environmental impacts, etc. The place Mr. Friedman visited - good candidate for a wall or other barrier; bottom of a steep, impassable ravine - not so much, better to put the money and ingenuity that would be spent there on the other measures outlined.
Instead, the state of our discourse is that legislators who have previously supported well-planned, targeted barrier projects and oppose an unrealistic and wasteful "sea to shining sea" wall are accused of hypocrisy, personal vendettas, radicalism, and every other bit of projection Trump and his supporters can throw at them. I'm hopeful that some of his supporters have simply had their lack of imagination preyed upon and if presented with the reality that there's a middle ground between all-wall and no-wall, they would come to the table. But the really concrete thinking cohort (including Trump himself) whose buy-in to immigration reform depends on a literal, continuous, sea-to-sea wall in order to gain their "confidence"... I don't know that we can work with them here in the real world. I'm pretty sure that's exactly the project the coiner of the term "boondoggle" had in mind.
7
The border is out of control. The numbers are getting worse and as such have nothing to do with weak liberal policies, note the 347% increase is over last year, when Trump was already POTUS. It simply reflects deteriorating situations in Central America, which is neither a problem attributable to Democrats or Republicans. Slashing our foreign aid to those countries certainly won't help though.
Friedman's got it all wrong though. In an ideal world we only accept the best and brightest of those wishing to immigrate from foreign countries. In reality that just creates a huge brain drain problem for smaller countries who continue to fall further and further behind. Doesn't really matter for countries like China and India with talent pools to draw from that are exponentially larger than ours in many areas. Even that's debatable to a certain extent. But for smaller countries like Guatemala? That can choke off their future if we take too many of their doctors, lawyers, engineers, entrepreneurs, etc.
Ask folks still living in places like Syria or Yemen what it's like to see the crème de la crème gone, either killed by war or gone in search of greener grass. Ask Cambodians who had no "intellectuals" left after the Khmer Rouge decided they were a threat to their autocratic regime.
Thomas Friedman's column in ten years- he's talking to a taxi driver in Tegucigalpa who explains to him that the economy plummeted because all the smartest ones left for the USA.
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@foodalchemist The problem may have been acerbated by deteriorating conditions in central America, but the real driver of the increased family migrant flow is the realization that if you have an accompanying child you will be admitted to the U.S.
4
@foodalchemist...."It simply reflects deteriorating situations in Central America,"....I disagree. This didn't happen when Obama was President.The deteriorating situation is in the White House and the inability of Trump to get cooperation at the border from those Mexicans he calls rapists and murders.
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@james lowe
And the primary driver of migrant flow has always been that if you make it across the border, a farmer, construction contractor, slaughterhouse owner, or golf course owner—in other words, a Republican—will illegally exploit your slave labor for profit and pay you to remain.
1
Ultimately, Trump and his minions are not the ones to deal with this crisis. They are unwillingly to listen to reason or seek evidence-based solutions. We will continue to have a crisis at the border until Trump is out. The US needs to seek meaningful relationships with Mexico and Central American countries to find a shared solution. Our Executive Branch is in no shape to make these deals, given that it views the US as the only country that matters.
14
The system needed fixing for several decades now and Congress failed to fix the problems related to migrants and those entering from outside legal entry points. Trump will be glad to know that at least one NY Times veteran opinion columnist thinks that "the wall" is only part of the solution, at least only part.
The major part of the solution could be the failed corrupt overpopulated countries be resurrected so that they to not need to drive thousands of their people from their motherlands through dangerous terrain and towards an uncertain future.
6
@Girish Kotwal, "corrupt overpopulated countries [should] be resurrected."
Nation-building?
Perhaps the NYT should do an article about the bipartisan 2013 Immigration Reform Bill and who sabotaged that effort. Maybe readers need to be reminded of Paul Ryan's words in 2015 when he vowed not to do immigration reform while President Obama was in office.
The Republicans held both houses of Congress and the presidency beginning in 2017 for two years and did they change the asylum laws? Do Republicans really want immigration reform or would they rather keep it as an election issue year after year?
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@LucindaWalsh
Neither party wants to “fix” the system. It is too lucrative for the GOP and Dems in both economic and political terms. Business likes open borders and so do the constituents of both parties who have economic and political power.
3
@Barooby
As someone who considers herself a moderate, I believe strongly in pragmatic solutions to problems so that everyone can benefit and thrive in our incredible country. However what I have observed in this past decade is that there were too many Republicans who were determined not to give President Obama any "win" so to speak. Their very own words and actions made that very clear.
After the Secure Fence Act of 2006 many miles of wall were built during the Obama Administration. Democrats did and do want now much more that walls alone. Senator Michael Bennett of Colorado explained this cleary in January of this year in a Senate floor speech which is available online.
I too want actions not obstruction.
12
@Barooby
1) the bill OP is referring to passed the Senate. It never passed the Republican House.
2) "until recently supported a wall." Ya, and they still do. The caveat is that they only want to put walls where it makes sense to do so. Every single democrat-proposed budget has included funds to expand or improve border fencing, just not enough for Trump's liking. Oddly, they are in favor of policies and structures that actually serve some purpose, rather than constructing useless monuments to serve the President's vanity.
Your attempts to both-sides this issue are simply wrong. Democrats certainly have their flaws, but at least be accurate when attributing blame
5
I agree with most of this and David Frums article. What I don’t like is this high IQ immigrant idea and HB1 visas. This system deprives our college graduates of jobs. College graduates who have paid exorbitant college tuition and are saddled with debt. Most of these immigrants have wealthy families, the only way they got the requisite education. The visas are tied to a business or company so the immigrant can’t apply for other jobs and negotiate higher wages. Great for the companies, especially tech companies, who get to pay much lower wages. This drives down wages in an entire industry
Second, visas tied to buying real estate have got to end. Drives up housing prices and,once again, only helps wealthy families. So much for meritocracy
Last, rich immigrants should not be allowed to come here to give birth to give their children US citizenship. If you’re here on a temporary or vacation visa and are pregnant, you should only be able to enter if you forego citizenship status for the child. I know birthright citizenship is in the constitution but this is fraud.
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@Sharon
As someone in the tech industry, I would like to correct the notion that H1B visas deprive college graduates of jobs. That statement is not wrong per se, but the situation is more complex and nuanced than that.
Broadly speaking, you will find two categories of H1B candidates: (1) those filling IT roles, which can and do get easily outsourced to IT consultancy firms. These result in job losses here. (2) those going to research and engineering positions with tech companies.
By and large, people in the 2nd category have obtained graduate education (Masters, PhD) in a US university and so they are competing directly with domestic graduate students. Now, if you look into a MS/PhD classroom in an engineering program at a US university, you will probably find that most, if not all, graduate students are of foreign origin. So the problem is really that there are very few students entering into post-graduate STEM programs, and thus the pipeline of domestic students is running nearly empty. I will also tell you, from experience, that most foreign students are not from wealthy families and quite a few do take loans to pursue higher studies here.
The key point, which you alluded to, is that college graduates here have paid exorbitant tuition. For most foreign students, though, undergraduate education has been either free or very low cost. So it is easier for them to take on the debt for grad school. Making college truly affordable would go a long way in solving this problem
Finally Tom Friedman gets it right. Unfortunately, I do not think that much will change, as the Democrats will not budge and continue to take the position that unfettered immigration is the best thing what can happen to the US, that there is place and money for everybody, that the plains can still be settled and other Kumbaya mode shaped opinions. David Frum is absolutely correct, the fact that Democrats are unwilling to deal with the immigration crisis makes them responsible for our current strongman regime, and I bet that their complete policy failure in this regard will directly cause a second term for the Trump presidency.
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@Tom Mix Did you miss the fact John Boehner, a Republican, wouldn't even let a bill come up for a vote? Or the Republicans controlled the House, the Senate and the Executive office? Who benefits from all this chaos?
Which states still refuse to implement E-Verify? Why aren't employers held truly accountable.
I am a Democrat; I oppose illegal immigration, illegal hiring, and I even want to see legal immigration reduced to give the country a chance to catch its breath and integrate who is already here. Lots of Democrats feel the same way.
37
@Tom Mix
I am a Dem and I will not vote for anyone singing kumbyah by the campfire with open arms for immigrants. I have Dem friends that feel the same way that I do.
Paul Ryan, McConnell came up with zero plans when Trump called for immigration reform early in his presidency.
8
@JMM
I and all the democrats I know feel very strongly about the need to have a pause on immigration and digest what we have. Yet I'll weigh all the cards on the table before casting my vote.
I would urge you to look at all the issues before us instead of letting one issue guide your decision. Think of those in the NRA who say I'm not going to vote for anyone who won't let me keep my gun! So they vote for someone who'll let them keep their gun while not noticing that their pocket is being picked !!
Be thoughtful, please!
2
I think what is called for here is a type of H1-B visa system for migrants. We also must change the law that allows anyone access to the U.S. based on whether they are seeking asylum or not. Otherwise, continuing the acceptance of asylum seekers would entail accepting half of all the migrants in the world, something we cannot do. We must whittle down the number of migrants we accept, based solely on what they can contribute to this country. It is both fundamentally and economically impossible for the U.S. to accept the multitudes of migrants seeking asylum here.
13
I always hear people reflexively talk about how we should accept the best and the brightest from every country, or as Mr. Friedman refers to them here, high IQ immigrants. Granted, many high IQ immigrants to America today come from countries that aren't necessarily major sources of asylum seekers, but I wonder if in general the negative aspects of brain drain aren't adequately discussed in our utilitarian accounting of immigration's ultimate impact.
Take for instance Venezuela, where something like 3 million or roughly 10 percent of the population has fled the country since 2014. About 40 percent of that exodus has been to bordering Colombia, but I recently read in the FT that some of the most well-off and educated Venezuelans have been setting roots down in Spain instead. This kind of brain drain is sure to hurt Venezuela's prospects longer term.
I think there may be an inherent contradiction in reflexively letting in high quality human capital from around the globe versus the longer term issue of how to stabilize many of these countries so as to reduce the outgoing exodus of people to begin with.
The problem is that for many liberals immigration to America is viewed almost as some sort of sacred right that anyone else from around the globe is entitled to, so that it's hard to have a rational discussion about the precise motivations and goals of a coherent immigration policy to begin with.
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@Yan Shen
You wrote: "The problem is that for many liberals immigration to America is viewed almost as some sort of sacred right that anyone else from around the globe is entitled to, so that it's hard to have a rational discussion about the precise motivations and goals of a coherent immigration policy to begin with."
You nailed it. Too many people in this country think about immigration in naive and simplistic terms. To them, any and all immigration is fine, when in fact excessive low-skill immigration is very dangerous to our future. If this goes on for much longer, the underclass will explode, and the demands on our social safety net will break that safety net. It's all about numbers. There is a distinct possibility that the US will become the world's largest 3rd world country - just because people don't think clearly.
14
There can be no compromise because Trump has made democrats so nuts that common sense ideas of fences, walls and saying no to any immigrants has become anathema to them. To concede that Trump was right about anything regarding the border and immigration is a line that can't cross. They would rather see the border swamped and immigrants camping out in our town squares than work with Trump.
65
@Mike - Let's not forget that there was a comprehensive immigration reform bill developed 10 years ago that had bi-partisan support (including Marco Rubio who helped draft the bill), but then the tea-party Republicans killed the bill. Wouldn't we be much better off now if that bill had become law?
16
@Chris I'm puzzled how a wall is viewed as an actual solution, rather than a metaphor or philosophy. There is plenty of walls / fencing now. Some people go over them. some through the crossing claiming asylum. A few go through the desert. I don't see how another wall changes that one bit. People climb all manner of rock faces, walls, cliffs, mountains etc
3
@Mike
"Dems have been seriously working on this for decades."
Really? This is either total nonsense designed to pull wool over our eyes or the Dems are total incompetents, because they were in power too in the past with chance to do something, anything.
1
This is congent. As was Frum's piece.
I just hope our leaders can work together to fix the border without backsliding into the debate about "comprehensive immigration reform", which seems to just be progressive liberal code for extracting amnesty for illegal immigrants as part of any legislation.
So if you hear Pelosi or Biden or Sanders or Warren sidestep the border crisis with talking points about "comprehensive immigration reform", just remember that essentially means "nothing gets fixed unless we get amnesty".
73
If there is another amnesty, or even the whisper of one, I guarantee a Trump re-election. He might even do really well.
8
@Mmm You just lied. Show me where they ask for amnesty, and before you lie again, a "path to citizenship" is not amnesty.
There really is an opportunity here to use this crisis to come to a workable compromise. Now, wouldn't it have made sense to have accepted the Democratic proposal of 25 billion for the wall and border security in exchange for a path to citizenship for DACA people? But, no, that simply made too much sense for this administration, plus they never want to get caught compromising when they can use the problem to rile up the racist base. Trump doesn't want a solution, he wants the hate. He has zero leadership skills. Zero.
2
So what about the largest source of illegal immigration, overstaying visas? Wall won't help that. And before we spend the money, disrupt the environment, and make a bad situation worse. I'd like to see some hard proof that walls work in solving the problem of illegal immigration.
14
@Vicki Ralls
No one thinks it "solves" the problem. More wall and other border enhancements are just one part of a comprehensive immigration enforcement system. By the way, the LA Times is reporting that the Trump administration is beginning to go after visa overstays. Yes.
3
Asking for asylum is not an illegal request. You seem to confusing the request for asylum with being an illegal immigrant. These people have risked their lives to come here. They have left behind them conditions that we would find daunting. In fact, most of us would not survive what they have left behind. It takes more courage to leave your country, take your babies or young children with you, cross several equally unfriendly countries, etc. than it does for us to say no.
These asylum seekers want to be here. They want to live in a safe country. They want to succeed and to see their children succeed. They would be excellent citizens if given a chance. Trump is determined not to give anyone a chance to be a citizen unless they are white, rich, and need nothing. We're spending money on a crisis that needn't exist but for Trump.
If we really want to help these people we should be putting money into helping their countries succeed. We put plenty of money into interfering in some of their elections, with some of their choices all because of the Cold War. We put money into deposing Saddam Hussein, into Afghanistan and in both in enlisting the local people to help us. We promised them asylum too.
All this "crisis" is proving to the world is that the United States under Trump does not like Hispanics or Muslims. There is no principled reason for not accepting the thoroughly vetted immigrants or the asylum seekers who have a credible fear.
4/23/2019 8:40pm
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@hen3ry You say "There is no principled reason for not accepting the thoroughly vetted immigrants or the asylum seekers who have a credible fear." Here in Los Angeles there 40-50,000 homeless people on the streets, overcrowded school classrooms, overburdened social and health services, overtaxed police departments. One very good principled reason for not letting in more needy people is we do not have the resources to take care of them. Maybe they do in Westchester, NY, but not in LA or many other big cities in the US.
125
If we had same tax laws, we would not have these problems. Our services are strained because we do not tax enough to have the funds to deal with our issues. Ignoring these problems will not make them go away.
17
@hen3ry
Requesting asylum is not illegal under present laws.
But those laws need to be changed to say that there can be no request for asylum in the USA from anyone already in a country (e.g. Mexico) that is not the locus of the supposed "persecution".
Also, even under existing law,
there is no right to have asylum granted.
Furthermore, unless and until the asylum is granted,
asylum seekers can be -- and ought to be detained.
And when the request is not granted,
as is the case in 90% of the time,
the asylum seeker can be -- and ought to be -- ordered to leave,
and when he/she does not leave,
he/she becomes illegal.
And there is no right to "asylum"
from "poverty",
nor from "domestic violence",
nor from "gang violence."
There is no right to "asylum"
"to seek a better life".
35
The only thing that will prevent illegal immigration is full implementation of E-Verify, for all employers, including you and me if we hire nannies, etc. A wall won't do it, though it may slow things down a bit.
The prime motivation for coming to the US is work. That was true for my grandparents, and it's true today. If work is truly unavailable to anyone here illegally, much of the flow will stop.
When something like this was tried in the Reagan administration (pre-computer), employers objected strenuously, and it was withdrawn. E-Verify will be a lot quicker and easier to do, but it will put businesses and farms at the mercy of immigration/guest worker quotas--can't hire workers illegally any more without a big penalty.
The problem with this is that it means we have to choose what sort of workers we want from abroad. It means we also have to figure out what we mean by "refugee." That's not easy.
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@Ken Gallant
Agreed.
But instituting across the board E-Verify would raise the hackles of our stingy oligarchs who like all the cheap labor that they can exploit coming across, which also has the added benefit to them of making citizens less likely to demand better wages or working conditions or, heaven forbid, organize unions.
This is why it hasn't been accomplished--in our one dollar one vote political system, the very rich call that tune
25
Agree completely. Before this most recent spike, illegal immigration had been on the decline due to the Great Recession and high unemployment. Stop the demand for cheap, exploitable labor, and the flow will diminish. However, the consequences would be felt not only by employers, but all of us (how much would CA strawberries be if picked by people earning minimum wage??). We need some honesty about this in the immigration debate, and a recognition of the ways in which we all benefit from America’s shadow labor force/the economic value they produce.
14
@Ken Gallant, in the last 2 and a half years since Trump was elected, Senator Grassley has introduced and reintroduced mandatory E-Verify legislation in the US Senate. President Trump has supported it. Not a single Democratic Senator has been willing to cross the aisle to support Senator Grassley's legislation.
In California, a super-majority of Democrats control Sacramento. They passed a law prohibiting the state; and all counties and municipalities from mandating E-Verify. Not sure why, given that E-Verify was among the recommendations of President Clinton's own Jordan Commission on Immigration Reform, but today's Democrats seem to be on the sides of the employers who want illegal labor to undercut wages and US citizens. Strange times but not the Democratic Party of old that was pro-labor.
7
It remains to be seen how Trump's "gratuitous brutalities" serve him. All his horrors have been recited over and over, including the Gothic cruelties at the border and in his speeches. But what to do about them? The Constitution constrains us, pull as we may against the bit. We can vote in 2020. But he was elected once, and if enough voters think the economy is doing well, he's likely to be re-elected. We are players in the theater of the absurd. The well-intentioned who suggest one or other remedy need to recognize that perception is everything in politics: policy proposals are secondary and can be shredded and slimed by the neo-barbarians. The atavistic and tribal fears of the people have been used in the past to launch crusades, pogroms, and wars. I fear that the advanced individualism shown by many of the Democratic contenders, while typical of modern humans, will be a barrier to the team effort that is needed to awaken the better angels of those who have thrown their lot in with Trump.
5
Our laws are really crazy. An illegal "immigrant"/asylum seeker can present at the border and make a "credible fear" claim (whoa, how hard is that, eh?) and pass into the interior. But, you have to wait. Very inconvenient. Uncomfortable.
Or, you can just cross the border illegally. If not caught, you just join up with your relatives/village already illegally residing in the US. and remain as a garden variety illegal "immigrant". But, if you are caught, no problem, you just say "credible fear", ask for asylum and you're no worse off than if you had waited at a border crossing to utter the same easily mouthed words.
Completely insane process.
119
Which is why, I suspect, Trump is a shoe in for re-election. Democrat’s can’t espouse free college, Medicare for all, etc. and also be for open borders. The math doesn’t work.
111
@Kurfco
Actually, no. If you read the article - if you fail to apply for asylum when you come in, you are not permitted to apply for it later.
4
@Bejay. You can apply for asylum after being arrested, but it is a defensive application to avoid deportation, and you will most likely be incarcerated during that time.
1
One can’t help but admire Liberal chutzpah. After violently ridiculing, kicking and screaming in denial for two years, when finally beaten into submission and resigned to face the truth, their response? “Now let me tell you what the problem is and how to fix it.” Not even a thank you.
18
Don’t listen to Thomas Friedman. And don’t listen to President Trump.
Listen to the experts, the Customs and Border Patrol. They are asking for an extension of the border fence for about 300 miles and replacement of much of the existing fencing.
This is a fairly modest request. Let’s give them the tools they need to do their job.
And, yes, let’s revamp our immigration system for the 21st century. Let’s follow the example of Canada, New Zealand, and other countries and implement a merit-based system.
We should have:
• Continued immigration of probably 1 million people or so per year.
• A point system weighted toward education and skills with some consideration of an immigrant’s financial resources. (No consideration of gender, race, ethnicity, or religion)
• Continued/expanded guest worker program for low-skilled labor, but only at wages 50% higher than industry medians
• Humanitarian immigration of up to 100K per year
But no immigration plan is worth anything until/unless we can prevent people for circumventing the system. And for that we need to follow CBP’s advice and expand the border barrier.
41
Two things: 1) the economic versus the political asylum distinction is idiotic. What does a person do if they are starving to death or can't get proper healthcare? Or, can't get a job? You are just as likely to die from starvation or ill health as from politically inspired violence. 2) How about modifying our foreign policy and intervening in the countries that can't control political violence and protect their own citizens? The elites in some Central American and South American countries are incompetent and have failed in their responsibility to run their countries effectively. However, there is a mitigating factor in judging foreign elites. Americans must take moral and economic responsibility for acting as a huge market for the illegal drug trade. We have to fix this problem at home and in countries where the supply chain for this recreational activity destroys lives, even entire societies. If we don't approach these problems intelligently and instead engage in the dishonest defining of what constitutes legitimate or illegitimate asylum seeking, we will never solve the immigration issue. Oh, I forgot, mass migration is a global issue and globalism is unpopular in the US right now.
2
Tom, I'm delighted. You are beginning to get it. Haven't you ever wondered why those fleeing terrible situations in their home country waited until the US economy started to boom, labor shortages began to appear, and wages began to increase? Why, it just became intolerable to stay in Honduras once all the illegal relatives residing in the US began telling everyone that jobs were plentiful.
35
Yet, the US has "crossed over" and caused our neighbors to the south to suffer while Banana Republicans made money. that Banana Republican money is what the rest of us have to pay for to repress immigration from the very countries we allowed to become destitute. While the Banana Republicans were making money and we let them, we ought to have realized that we'd be stuck with the bill, again. So why not let them in? As many as possible? For how else can we tilt policy decisions away from what is now proving to be such of a problem?
1
@Maxine and Max
Over 90% of recent migrants are from Guatemala where women have 8, 9, or 10 children. In 1955, the Guatemalan population was 3,625,3000. Today it is 17,577,842.
Guatemalan culture encourages large families, but places little importance on education.
With its poor educational system, the Guatemalan economy has not evolved beyond agriculture. But, with so many people, there is not enough land for everyone to farm.
Guatemalans are fleeing the poverty brought about by their overvaluing of large families and their undervaluing of education.
A web page on fertility in the U.S. titled "Fertility and Birth Rates" on the site Child Trends said, "In 2017, fertility rates were highest among Hispanic women (67.6 per 1,000), followed by rates for non-Hispanic black (63.1 per 1,000), Asian or Pacific Islander (59.3 per 1,000), non-Hispanic white (57.2 per 1,000), and American Indian or Alaska Native women (40.8 per 1,000).”
"Among Hispanic women in 2015 (the latest data available by country of origin), Central and South American women had the highest fertility rate, at 93.7 births per 1,000.”
These migrants continue to have many children after moving here. Hispanics have the highest rates of teen pregnancies and school drop-outs.
6
@ann
Astonishing and very worrisome!
4
Trump, like his Republican Party, are not "wasting" the immigration 'crisis". They never waste any crisis, problem or national issue. They aggravate and exploit them as eternal campaign fodder to scare, enrage and stoke hate in their core bigoted base.
When have they ever solved things and not made them worse? Thought you might have noticed...
6
Friedman, are you actually self-aware enough to realize you just wrote an article that restated Trump’s exact stance and arguments regarding his wishes for border alterations? Stop them. Are the merit-worthy? let them in. if they work out, welcome to America. Give Trump credit.
18
It's NOT Trump...Its Congress ...if Trump was not elected there would be Open Borders and a Meltdown/ The Democrats were saying as loud as they could NO PROBLEM ...Well there is a PROBLEM...and now we are going from WAlls don't work...to O WALLS and we all so need this ...no wonder the Liberals do not Know what to believe...The Border patrol has 100 percent said they need Walls in Key area's thx to Trump it IS Going to Get done....and yes the rest of the Fixes needed will go thru come 2020 when the Democrats can stop Dreaming and centering there whole focus on RE Election!
16
Any description about intelligent immigration policy creation should include data that verifies that a few states are truly overburdened with the cost of illegal immigrants-while many other states welcome the workforce, the tax base, and the future entrepreneurial impact that immigrants bring with them. I feel like the lone voice in favor of a version of directed settlement to new homes that have the capacity and interest to welcome newcomers with housing, education and employment assistance.
5
@common sense advocate
A 2/17 Inter American Dialogue Report titled "Educational Challenges in Honduras and Consequences for Human Capital and Development” said the average Honduran, age 15 and above, has only a 4th grade education. Even those Hondurans who have attended school for more years do not do well on international tests for their grade levels. Honduran education is focused on remediation. Guatemala and El Salvador have higher illiteracy rates than Honduras.
Many people who migrated to the U.S. in earlier centuries were able to sustain themselves and their families despite having little formal education, but would not be able to do so today. It does not matter where migrants are coming from - if they have little education, today they would have a difficult time. Today’s poorly educated migrants will be heavily dependent on welfare and other subsidies for the rest of their lives.
Many of the Salvadorans who migrated here in the 1980’s were so poorly educated they could not find places for themselves in our culture. They formed a gang - MS -13 through which they committed such horrendous crimes that many of them were deported. Today’s migrants are no better educated than their earlier counterparts. How many of them will turn to gangs to supplement their incomes?
Which states want such uneducated migrants?
15
@Mike
Legal immigrants tend to commit fewer crimes than the native-born. There are no hard numbers on how many crimes are committed by illegal migrants and their anchor children.
In addition to not having numbers on the illegal migrants who have been convicted of committing crimes, please be aware that many crimes go unreported.
1. Illegal migrants tend to settle in cities, increasing the cities’ populations. They pay little in taxes so the cities cannot afford to hire enough police officers to cover their larger populations. Residents learn that they have to wait hours for the police to respond to calls so many decide not to bother calling the police to report anything but the most egregious crimes.
2. Illegal migrants who commit crimes against other illegal migrants are often not reported to the police as their victims fear the discovery of their own illegal status.
6
Instead of walls, lets work on fixing the issues that cause massive immigration.
Decriminalize opiates for addicts, this would neuter criminal organizations and allow addicts a known quantity of a drug thus preventing overdoses.
Take climate change seriously and do anything we can to reverse it. Walls won't keep out the starving throngs that will come in the next few decades.
Recognize that countries like Honduras and Guatemala were largely destabilized by our government in the Reagan years. We should take responsibility and provide them with aid and guidance to once again have functioning societies.
5
This is perhaps one of the most eloquently worded opinion articles explaining the many reasons why our country most certainly needs a wall. We need the semblance of order in our immigration system and security that this wall will provide.
I know that the way trump describes this wall seems tainted with racism and paints a different picture of America than we want. He may have flawed reasoning but we should not ignore a good idea, wherever it comes from.
47
What is urgently needed are more immigration judges, more border guards and more facilities. This has been known for at least two years but little has been done. I guess that is because we have been told that all that is needed is a big, beautiful wall. Also, without these judges, guards and facilities the immigration situation becomes more desperate and dangerous and thereby helps Trump with his fear mongering.
6
“family units” (a child under 18 with a parent or legal guardian)
or other adult. There is undoubtedly a certain amount of "rent a kid" being used to exploit our system.
35
@Mike
The world is literally swarming with people with as valid an argument as anyone from Honduras or Guatemala. Have you been to Nigeria, New Guinea, Algerian, Niger, Egypt, etc. ? I have. Do we let them all in or just the ones who live close enough to trek their way in?
Even in the heyday of Ellis Island, when we were actively welcoming immigrants, we screened out 20% and sent them home. Sick, mentally ill, or likely to "become a public charge".
49
@Mike
The data you frequently reference is data about all immigrants, legal and illegal. It combines Sergey Brin and Elon Musk with Juan Valdez and your local carwashero. The only reason "immigrants" as a group look favorable is because we have only looked at them as a group. Illegal "immigrants" and these "asylum seekers" are the very definition of "public charges".
5
Family reunification is about the people "already here." You get to have your family, but they can't? That isn't right.
As for our "need" for immigrants to work, no we don't -- not until wages rise and unemployment drops. Right now, what is stalled is those who want work, not employers seeking employees.
Sure, every employer would like more qualified people, and cheaper too. They like factories in the back of beyond for that reason. That does not make a healthy country, and it certainly is no future for the US.
17
I always agree with Thomas Friedman. However, I have strong feelings against a high, physical barrier at our southern borders. A behemoth, a monument of exclusion and in "honor" of nativism, even with a large welcoming "smart" gate, is in direct contradiction to our democracy built through the sweat and tears of immigrants from afar. Time and time again I think back during the Obama years when the Senate put forth an immigration reform bill. It would have worked. But like anything else related to decency and civility in a GOP Congress it was shelved.
Every action, every word and thought from Mr. Trump exacerbates an ugly racism and bigotry which refuses to die. Do we want something done? Yes. Do we need something to be done? Absolutely. But the most feasible and affordable of means is shunned by the unfit and unstable Donald Trump along with his abetters in the Cabinet and Congress and his vociferous MAGA supporters. First, as Thomas writes, resume humanitarian aid to these Central Americans. They are desperate to free themselves from poverty, violence, and oppression. Let us start at the root of this crisis. Next, reread the formula which the new Democratic House put forth in the beginning of this year. It can work, it will work. Please, no multi-billion dollar.
6
@Kathy Lollock Oops, "...no multi-billion dollar WALL."
Every country has a right to defend its borders and decide who comes and who does not. The majority of asylum seeks are rejected by an immigration judge. Some illegal immigrants skip the court case altogther -disqualifying themselves from being granted asylum. This means that perhaps 40-25% of illegal immigrants coming into the country will never be legal themselves nor their family members. They will spend their lives in the shadows - picking up work illegally, being subject to deportation. If they have a child, he or she would become citizens but the people who came in illegally are still illegal. Their status does not change.
You don't have to be a genius (or else just extremely naive) to see what is happening here: the way to get into the U.S. is to come with a kid (because then you have to be released within 20 days) and to claim asylum because even though you won't really be granted asylum, it will take a long time before your court case is heard and you are in protected status until that time. Further, many illegal aliens will choose to forego the court case and slip into the country. So the status quo is being very badly abused. Asylum is just a ruse to enter and stay in the country illegally. The law needs to change on this & change quickly.
Perhaps the most important step that Congress can take is this: having "asylum-seekers" apply from outside the U.S. and they can wait outside the U.S. for their claim to be processed. That would help this situation a lot.
159
@Mike We can't take everyone. We know that. We have to do something soon because the situation is getting worse by the day. It’s worth noting that in absolute terms, nearly 140,000 non-detained immigrants were ordered to be deported between 2012-16 because they were not present in the courtroom, according to Justice Department data. That's too many people wandering around the country illegally....way too many. Logic and common sense would dictate that the situation has gotten much worse not better. The law has to change and will change because this crisis is veering out of control according to CNN last week. Dept of Homeland Security predicted 1 million new illegals this year. More than 76,000 migrants crossed the border without authorization in February, more than double the levels from the same period last year and approaching the largest numbers seen in any February in the last 12 years.
“The system is well beyond capacity, and remains at the breaking point,” Kevin K. McAleenan, commissioner of Customs and Border Protection.
This will eventually push schools, hospitals and other social services to the breaking point, bankrupting affected cities and states. We need to restore order and faith in our immigration system. I'm not being an alarmist. Look what happened to Germany, Greece, and Italy a few years ago with the Syrian refugee crisis. Do we want to repeat that mistake and the complete chaos it entails? Hopefully not. Time is running out. Congress do something!
57
@Bill Brown
I would think the circumstances people are fleeing in most legitimate asylum cases don't lend themselves to staying put and waiting for an answer from an embassy, no?
3
@S That these people want a better life is understandable. But what are we going to do with thousands of semi-literate young men and women? They must first of all be educated to find work in a modern society, that, even as we speak of this, is itself on the threshold of a new technological revolution that will make these new migrants even less likely to find employment opportunities. Most if not all illegal immigrants pass through many safe countries to come to the U.S. According to international law a person can only claim refugee status in the first safe country they find themselves in. We've somehow arrived at a point where only the migrants have rights, we have no right to regulate our borders, to prepare for a future with fewer low-wage jobs instead of letting in a huge workforce of young people increasing competition for those jobs. Why is the only answer, that they have an unrestricted right to come to the U.S.? The more we take in, the easier we make it, the more will try to get here. It is a impossible equation. Too many people believe they have prescribed right to gatecrash Europe & the U.S.– endlessly, regardless of where they come from, regardless of the laws, & regardless of the reality that we can't accommodate all of them. They're country shopping for the best benefits, the treaties & conventions made decades ago that were never meant to facilitate the transfer of huge swaths of one continent to another. We need responsible immigration reform now.
15
This is new ground for Mr. Friedman. Ligitimatizing Trump and by extension all he stands for.
4
Really..” by extension all he stands for.”
Your prejudice is showing and isn’t that what is really the problem in America...
If Trump had not harped on “ a wall” but pushed for our right to know everybody in or trying to enter our country..
which might necessitate a wall...wouldn’t that be more palatable...or are the anti Trump blinders that limiting..
8
AMEN! This article is right on!. I worked for Customs, and later CBP for more than 30 years, and the only thing I would quibble with is Friedman's estimate of legitimate vs. illegitimate asylum claims. In my experience the vast majority of asylum claims are not legitimate, most crossers are really economic migrants. Being forced back to "Catch and release" is a real disaster for this country that accelerates the problem. Effective cooperation with Mexico in deterring this activity is the short-term solution. A thorough overall of the the Immigration and Nationality Act along the lines Friedman proposes is the desperately needed long-term solution.
279
@Mike If an illegal immigrant shouldn't be here in the first place, how is any immigrant crime acceptable?
40
@Mike
While what you say has some merit, if the law at the border will not enforced, why should we enforce the law at the presidential level? We are supposed to be a nation of laws, but I guess that has gone out the window in both cases.
16
@Mike
Your phrase "crime-free immigrants" is just as untrue as anyone claiming that immigrants are criminals. Talk to the cops in large cities, and see if they agree with you that immigrants are "crime-free".
Furthermore, there have been studies indicating that children of low-skill immigrants are more prone to crime than their parents.
10
President Trump is preventing a solution? Really? Since when does he write and pass legislation. The swamp has ignored the immigration problem for decades. And they still do, refusing to create and pass comprehensive legislation. Why? A big reason is Democrats refusal to deal with illegal aliens. It's easier for them to do nothing, padding census numbers for electoral reasons, rather than do the hard thing.
44
@Mark: "Why? A big reason..." And a bigger reason is that the masters of the US economy need willing hands and backs to do a lot of hard, dirty work at low wages. Every western-style economy needs more and more workers. It's cheaper for employers to use those who can be exploited but denied education--and who can be deported as needed.
9
@Mike
I wasn't referring to Presidents. It's Congress that's the problem.
5
@Des Johnson
The masters of the US economy are us, the consumers. I completely agree. A huge, and usually ignored, reason is that aliens, especially the illegal ones, are used to provide cheaper products and services compared to citizens.
Don't forget that large numbers of aliens, coming in under various legal foreign worker visas, underwrite these low costs. I'm in the IT business and, while not affected by that too much, have read about it. Disney, amongst others, have been party to that.
9
Trump will never approve any rational bipartisan immigration policy change. He will not relinquish the #1 issue that keeps his base motivated. The worse the immigration problem is the better for his xenophobic messaging.
6
Wow. Seriously considering cancelling the NYT. Thanks for nothing, Trumpist Friedman!
4
Trump isn’t looking for any real strategy here, he seeks a visceral appeal to his base. And his cruelty is such that even Kirstjen Nielsen was insufficiently villainous for him, and he wanted to take ICE in an even harder direction. Trump is the last person who should be addressing immigration policy.
336
@NM
Indeed. There are too many ''politicians'' that want the issue instead of any actual solution. Keep in mind that there as a bipartisan solution/bill passed in the Senate in 2013, and the republican speaker wouldn't even allow a vote (it would have passed)
One wonders where the country/continent would be if it had, and the then candidate didn't have the issue to demagogue to a 2016 win ?
Sigh ...
36
@NM Americans welcome LEGAL immigrants, but do not want ILLEGAL immigrants. They recognize that the US cannot afford (or choose not) to support our own citizens: the poor, the ill, elderly, disabled, veterans, et al., and that they and other US taxpayers cannot possibly support the hundreds of millions of foreigners who would like to come here.
US laws allow foreigners to seek entry and citizenship. Those who do not follow these laws are in this country illegally and should be detained and deported; this is policy in other countries, too.
The cruelty lies not in limiting legal immigration, or detaining and deporting illegal immigrants, or forcing those who wish to enter the US to wait for processing. What is cruel, unethical and probably illegal is encouraging parents to bring their children on the dangerous trek to US borders and teaching the parents how to game the system to enter the US by falsely claiming asylum, persecution, etc. Indeed, many believe bringing children on such perilous journeys constitutes child abuse.
No other nation has open borders, nor should the US.
17
@NM Exactly. Trump is incapable of resolving any problem yet alone any crisis. He has bungled in every disgraceful way this exodus of oppressed and abused Central Americans. We are hardly a Promised Land, not under this Trump-induced hateful rule and environment. People who are in desperate need of aid, aid which is denied by this cruel bully in the White House, come to our so-called democratic nation only to be placed in cages and tents; to have their kids torn from their arms, children who become ill and lost in a system in which the word “disorganized” is too weak of an adjective. A Wall is not the answer. It will only serve as a monument to a narcissist, nothing more.
7
the crisis? the detention camps are empty! And trumps building more!
1
This isn't the right way to discuss immigration.
First and foremost, one must start with a condemnation of the Trump administration for assiduously pursuing racist policies that, in effect, render it as the second coming of Jim Crow.
Arrests at the border are not new. Practically all recent administrations have followed one version or another of this policy, as would most nations. What is different is the use of separation of children from their parents, no matter the age, and their intentional relocation thousands of miles from where the parents are being held, to facilities that do not have staff that keeps the children in safe conditions. There have been reports of rape, beatings, druggings, of those children by federally-employed staff. The administration has not shown concern nor has it made any kind of statement of its intent to treat these children humanely, in accordance with international law.
The wall, while important, is nothing compared to the intentional crisis created by Trump, Stephen Miller, John Kelly, Kirstjen Nielsen and, now, her successor who is claiming that the policy to separate children wasn't worth it. I guess he's not interested in being given the job,
This is a stain on all of us. That we don't discuss this issue while using the proper and most severe language is disturbing.
Our government is racist; openly so. Democrats in the House need to step up condemnations
---
Things Trump Did While You Weren’t Looking [2019]
https://wp.me/p2KJ3H-3h2
13
@Rima Regas Why are you bringing race into this? Are you aware of the difference between legal immigrants and illegal ones?
49
@Rima Regas:"The wall, while important, is nothing compared to the intentional crisis created by Trump,"
Trump said caravans of illegals were headed to the US. The NYT said it was all a false alarm until suddenly it isn't - kind of the like the children's surge of past years.
Hate Trump all you want but he was spot on about the caravans and surges.
When you finally admit they exist, well then it's all Trump's fault. You betcha.
55
@Eugene
When a Swede, Norwegian, Irish or French illegal immigrant family (they exist) gets separated, their children sent thousands of miles away to be under the care of people who are not treating them with respect and care, do me a favor and email me a link to the news report.
Absolutely no one other than these South and Central Americans are being mistreated in this way.
That is Jim Crow racism, perpetrated in your name, for the sake of keeping Trump's base happy.
11
People of good will can have honest disagreements about immigration policies. Tradeoffs are complex and consensus on priorities is difficult. Diffiy but not impossible.
But the problem is not a lack of ideas or even consensus. The bipartisan Gang of Eight's "Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act of 2013" included many of the points Mr. Friedman wrote about.
The problem is a lack of people with good will in the GOP. It easily passed the Senate 68-32 but the GOP majority in the House would not even bring it up for a vote.
And now? Good will is as dead among Republicans as respect for the constitution.
The cruelty shown by the Trump administration between court orders to stop breaking the law serve no purpose besides indulging a pure expression of nativist fear and hatred.
But then the whole point of the Trump Presidency is indulging the fear and hatred of the 63 million Americans who cheered an openly racist, nativist, hate-filled man all the way into the White House.
There is no hope of any immigration reform until Trump is gone and enough of his base decide that voting for politicians who support putting children in cages and destroying families is a sin not a solution.
11
@LT
The Gang of Eight’s bill, commonly called "Comprehensive Immigration Reform", would have offered amnesty to illegal immigrants. They would have been allowed to apply for green cards and citizenship. This, in itself, would have encouraged more illegal immigration.
Charles Schumer was one of the Gang of Eight. He had also written the immigration bill of 1986, signed by Ronald Reagan, which gave amnesty to 3 million illegal immigrants in exchange for ending all future illegal immigration. Rather than ending it, this amnesty inadvertently encouraged people to move here illegally, on the gamble that they, too, would eventually be granted an amnesty. The PEW Hispanic Trust estimates that 11 to 12 million migrants have moved here illegally. Professors in Yale University’s School of Management thought the PEW estimate was too high so they made their own calculations. Using new data streams, they surprised themselves by finding a much higher estimate - 22.8 million. Whether the number is closer to 11 or 23 million, granting amnesty to illegal immigrants encourages more illegal immigration.
Just like the 1986 amnesty, the Gang of Eight’s "Comprehensive Immigration Reform" bill would have offered hope to potential migrants that they, too, could move here illegally on the premise that they would eventually be granted legal status and a path to citizenship.
If we want to end illegal immigration, we must not offer another amnesty!
19
A high wall on the southern border would be an environmental disaster.
33
@Bar1 Thank you...we forget the enormous toll this will have on endangered species, fragile habitats and migration.
4
@Bar1 Millions of illegal immigrants entering this country illegally would be an economic and environmental disaster.
7
I am a liberal democrat, but I can see some value in the wall. When climate change makes a lot of Central America uninhabitable, we will want something like the wall to keep desperate people away. Things will get pretty medieval when that happens and it will be every man woman and child for themselves.
71
@Mike
Sort of.
Visa overstays were historically the largest source of illegal immigration, but given the recent increase in illegal border crossers, it may not be in 2019. More importantly, however, the number of people who cross the border and make bogus asylum claims will soon be as large as illegal immigration.
It is worth noting that President Trump just signed a memorandum ordering a further crackdown on visa overstays.
Illegal and fraudulent immigration is a multi-dimensional problem that requires multiple solutions to be implemented simultaneously.
34
@Mike
But at least visa-overstays were vetted by US authorities prior to obtaining their visas. Unauthorized border-crossers are not vetted, and the lowest and most dangerous elements can and do take advantage of that route. Please stop arguing for the unsustainable and dangerous free-for-all on our southern border.
17
@Mike, because we can't chew gum and walk a straight line at the same time? Or because the preferable is properly the enemy of the desirable?
1
Do my eyes deceive me? An opinion piece in the times that says a wall is part of a solution? I always thought Tom Friedman was a cut above. More proof! Thanks !
76
Build the high wall first. Once that is in place and we know it's sufficient, we can decide who and how many we want to let in.
36
@JamesEric: Planes they can blow up? Tunnels? Mini-subs? When Americans stop using illegal drugs and hiring illegal labor, the problems will solve themselves. And how much effort is Trump putting into that? Nada!
2
The border is not the problem, but merely a byproduct of what is the problem - a failed war on South & Central America.
Nowhere in the summation of this essay is there mention of the prescription drug epidemic of the last decade HERE that has created massive violence (even more so than usual) there.
Nowhere in the summation of this essay is there mention of this republican administration's foreign policies for south of the border that have created a tangible uptick in the numbers, and directly opposite of the numbers that were on a steady decline for the Obama years.
Now that a large population of Americans are hooked on their prescription drugs, but can no loner afford them, then they are turning to heroin and fentanyl. Those come from the south of the border, whereas the profits are unlike at any time before in history. The gangs have multiplied and become more vicious - hence the violence, failed states, (that cannot cope or are corrupt) and the fleeing up north.
Now that trade agreements are being ''renegotiated'', embargoes (especially on oil) are implemented, and continued meddling by the United States, then of course coupled with above, even more people are fleeing.
Aye, we need an ''all of the above'' strategy, but I think we first have to look in the mirror, before we even attempt to address the problems.
Of course, we have to change this administration too.
82
@FunkyIrishman
The crisis, the most serious one, is the one Trump and his henchmen created, separating thousands of children from their parents and placing them in the hands of people who are mistreating them.
Many of those children are quite young, ranging from infants, toddlers, preteen to teens. The damage that is being done will be irreparable. Some of those children were given away, like property, to foster families. Some were adopted.
Walls, policies, foreign and military policy - all are things that can wait until 2021. These kids? Every day that passes is added trauma for a lifetime.
8
@Rima Regas: That is a crisis, yes. But is a consequence of ignoring the roots of the problems.
11
@Des Johnson
Oh, I don't disagree. The roots of the problem have been rotting away for years and years and this administration isn't the one to fix anything. They're mostly into breaking.
5