Nobody living in this country should be considered illegal

[Hugabear]

If you attempt to cross the border illegally - and are caught in the act - then you could be charged with the crime and deported.

But once you're in this country? How does one prove that someone crossed the border illegally however many years ago? What crime are they committing simply by living in this country? Can anyone point to the law they are breaking?

We don't charge people for the crimes of their parents. You wouldn't arrest someone in college and arrest them because their father or grandfather shoplifted 50 years ago. So why should that same person be arrested and deported for something their parents did?

[Systematic Chaos]

1. You just said we should all be considered illegal.

lulz

[ChairmanAgnostic]

2. double negative? Huh?

[Brickbat]

3. Delete your "not" and you're good to go.

[Motown_Johnny]

4. First, that is a double negative

and it implies that everyone in the country should be considered illegal.



The fact that they were not caught in the act does not mean they are not guilty of a crime. Almost no criminals are caught in the act. If I break into your home but am just sitting there eating a sandwich and watching TV I am still there illegally.



I do agree that minors brought here by there parents should be considered victims and not perpetrators. The DREAM Act would have helped move things in that direction and the recent change in enforcement is a small step in the right direction.

[Hugabear]

5. FIXED

Sorry - I had originally titled it something else, forgot to correct the double negative.

So many damned grammar police on here.

[clang1]

6. Either you got 'papers' so to speak or you don't

Depending on country, a Visa, something...Citizenship can be validated. I mean to me your post reads like nobody knows anything about who should be here or not, or has a right to be here...Not True.

[4th law of robotics]

7. "How does one prove that someone crossed the border illegally however many years ago?"

Simple.

They're within the borders of the United States and are not here on a visa or as a legal citizen.

Unless they were teleported here against their will that implies that they crossed the border illegally.

[clang1]

8. Exactly. Real simple answer. Then there are some valid exceptions IMO

These are very specific situations. Beyond that, hey...fair game for deportation and should be deported.

[EFerrari]

12. They're not "game", they're people just like you. n/t

[HopeHoops]

9. Anyone who isn't Native American is illegal. I at least have N.A. blood.

[Marinedem]

16. Not really.

If you are going that route, NAs are here illegally too. Everyone comes from Africa.

You may as well say "Everyone that isn't in the rift valley is illegal."

Of course that is a stupid way to look at anything.

At the end of the day, we have laws in place for a reason. The act of intentionally entering a country without that country's knowledge IS illegal.

Immigration needs to be reformed, no doubt. I don't think anyone is debating this.

Reform doesn't mean the world is magically going to be some borderless utopia either.

[HopeHoops]

20. Our "founding fathers" were all illegals. My bloodline goes back way before any of theirs.

[4th law of robotics]

23. I've always found that to be an interesting argument in support of illegal immigration

The founding fathers were here illegally (not really since there were no written laws they were violating or anyone enforcing them but we'll run with it for now).

Ok.

So how did that work out for the native population who failed to effectively enforce their borders?

Not really a comparison you want to invite if your goal is anything other than arguing for stricter border enforcement.

[HopeHoops]

26. I think the answer is a single word - "muskets".

[4th law of robotics]

18. If they can enforce such laws, sure.

Of course Native Americans aren't some homogeneous group.

Like saying that if you're European you can live anywhere in Europe.

It was very much broken down in to territories that were fiercely fought over. So if you're a cherokee you can be in certain parts of the country. If not then you are trespassing.

[HopeHoops]

21. Mine's Susquehannan - curiously, about 12 miles from where I live now and before I found out.

[progressivebydesign]

10. Can someone tell me something....

At what point did we morph from "give me your poor, your tired, your hungry..." To "give me your immigrants with suitcases full of money, and the poor, tired, and hungry, are not allowed?" Seriously, I've talked to people that did the legal immigration and it takes money, and family here to help you sustain while you wait.

I just want to know WHY no one is upset that Chinese women are coming to America, pregnant, with tons of cash, and giving birth in tourist birth centers to that they can have American citizen babies. Yes, it happens every day in California. And all the authorities can do is maybe bust the place that has turned a single family home into a birth center without permits. The tourists leave with the new American citizen, then send them back to go to school or live, or come back with them.

I'm totally not bagging on the Chinese immigrants, but at what point did America decide that hispanic immigrants are evil, but those from Asia with money, are welcome to create anchor babies? Chinese immigrants now outpace all over nationalities, but the hispanics remain the dog whistle for the right wingers. I sincerely want to know this. Is it money??

(the illegal Chinese birthing centers usually in the Bay area or San Gabriel Valley are easily googled http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2077693,00.html.)

[Meiko]

13. Anchor babies are created by

both ethnic groups, it is not unique to the Chinese. I live in Arizona and we see this scam all the time. There is another one that is used as well but I'm not going to post it, no use in aggravating people.

[clang1]

15. Good god, this pejorative on DU? WTF?

Last edited Tue Jun 26, 2012, 08:08 PM - Edit history (19)

The entire post is. The entire premise of it is pejorative. It is rightwing trash talk.

I am posting the jury response to my alert against the post above. Not to trash it but to disagree with it. I want others to see the jurors comments, which I appreciate them adding.

JURY RESULTS

A randomly-selected Jury of DU members completed their review of this alert at Tue Jun 26, 2012, 07:44 PM, and voted 1-5 to LEAVE IT ALONE.

Juror #1 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: True.
Leave it.
Juror #2 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: A "perjorative" post would call a group a name, e.g., "those **** Chinese." This comment falls within the bounds of normal discussion.
Juror #3 voted to HIDE IT and said: I do not like the term "anchor babies" but did not realize it was so negative. A quick google search shows me it is. I'd recommend pming the poster if this does not get hidden so they could correct it. Here is a wiki page on it for further information and I will make sure to never use it. Live and learn. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anchor_baby
Juror #4 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: We use the term 'anchor baby' in immigration law all the time. It's not pejorative necessarily. A lot of women from all over the world come here, paying exhorbitant fees to some agencies, with the sole purpose of giving birth to babies who are U.S. citizens. Again, this is not a new thing and the proper term is 'anchor babies.'
Juror #5 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: No explanation given
Juror #6 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE and said: No explanation given

Thank you.


--The entire premise of what is proposed in the post IS pejorative. That is a fact. I want others to read the post, the jury results, to read themselves about this if they NEED to, think about it, and then decide for themselves. It is completely insulting and IMO even inhuman to say something like that about people that are merely trying to be HUMAN. People have sex and try to start families ANYWHERE UNDER NEARLY ANY CIRCUMSTANCES EVEN. It is a completely callous thing to say and lacking any humanity. It's sickening.

Thank you DU jury for reviewing the post, but I disagree with your decision and I believe most other people would too.


MORE DIVISION=LESS VOTES and this is rightwing hate talk and it divides people and is bullshit. As usual people are their own worst enemies. Frankly some people just need to go back to school or just do something other than spouting this filth. Damn.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

17. Anchor babies are created by

Breeding adult anchors. Some even use chains.

[4th law of robotics]

19. Has there ever been a time since we formed a nation

when entirely unchecked immigration was allowed?

A funny thing about Ellis Island . . . it was a legal checkpoint for immigrants wanting to come here legally and become citizens.

And they sent plenty of people back for a variety of reasons.

[treestar]

22. Probably the early 19th century

The founding fathers wanted more Europeans to come to help settle the huge vast land. I don't think they thought in terms of restricting it. Even Ellis Island was just an attempt to keep out people thought of then as riffraff.

Basically immigration laws would have been unenforceable in the 19th century - they could disallow certain people to be sworn in a citizens and try to deport some, but there were no controls that could effectively work.

Even in the 80s it was thought for every Mexican deported, five more came over the border including the one who was just deported.

It's only with modern Identification technology that the government can even start trying.

[4th law of robotics]

24. Even then it was regulated

The 1790 Act limited naturalization to "free white persons"; it was expanded to include blacks in the 1860s and Asians in the 1950s.[14] In the early years of the United States, immigration was fewer than 8,000 people a year,[15] including French refugees from the slave revolt in Haiti. After 1820, immigration gradually increased. From 1836 to 1914, over 30 million Europeans migrated to the United States.[16] The death rate on these transatlantic voyages was high, during which one in seven travelers died.[17] In 1875, the nation passed its first immigration law.[18]

The peak year of European immigration was in 1907, when 1,285,349 persons entered the country.[19] By 1910, 13.5 million immigrants were living in the United States.[20] In 1921, the Congress passed the Emergency Quota Act, followed by the Immigration Act of 1924. The 1924 Act was aimed at further restricting the Southern and Eastern Europeans, especially Jews, Italians, and Slavs, who had begun to enter the country in large numbers beginning in the 1890s.[21] Most of the European refugees fleeing the Nazis and World War II were barred from coming to the United States.[22]

We've always done our best to regulate immigration. Like any nation.

[treestar]

27. naturalization is different from immigration

We could refuse to naturalize people. But couldn't stop them from coming. With two long borders and two long coasts, people could land/cross with impunity.

Even today, that's hard to stop.

[meow2u3]

11. Not everybody who's in the country illegally crossed the border illegally

A large number of undocumented immigrants overstay their visas. They entered legally, usually on tourist visas, but they never returned to their home countries when their visas expired.

[clang1]

14. Yep. Overstays. n/t

[lame54]

25. Bush and Cheney live here

[kudzu22]

28. We do have laws

on who is allowed to be here -- citizens, resident aliens, and those with valid visas. Everyone else is breaking the law. Now, we can make a good argument that they didn't really do anything terribly wrong, and don't deserve to be deported. The correct solution to that problem is of course simple -- change.....the.....law. But unfortunately nobody has the balls to do that for fear of pissing off one group or another.

I was hopeful that Obama with his huge democrat majorities in 2009-10 would have done something about it and come up with a comprehensive, compassionate and fair immigration reform plan. In fact he promised to do just that during the campaign. One of the problems with having so much hope is it invariably leads to massive disappointment.