OPINION:
Our immigration system is not broken. It represents a long, thoughtful evolution and the endorsement by a generous citizenry (“Former Border Patrol agents call Senate’s immigration plan ’a huge waste of resources,’” Web, July 11).
The persons employed in the State Department are dedicated. We admit somewhere in the neighborhood of a million new citizens each year in an orderly process. These are the legal immigrants who waited for their turn at the immigration turnstile. Those that did not await their turn are cheaters and thieves. Giving them amnesty and citizenship both demeans and impoverishes our legal citizens, and it encourages the honest potential applicants to assume an illegal role. There is no sane reason to sponsor such an enormous transfer of wealth from our citizens to a group of criminal illegal immigrants. An equally insane (and criminal) reason is to build a criminal voter base.
Another stated purpose by amnesty proponents is to provide a source of cheap labor. It is outrageous that legislators would consider endorsing intake of a foreign criminal population at a time when American citizens are having great difficulty in finding jobs. We should not even consider the Senate proposal. It should be dead on arrival in the House. Our own citizens desperately need work, and when legislators discuss amnesty, American employers delay hiring.
There should be no talk of amnesty of any kind, ever, for those persons who entered this country knowing they were breaking our laws. We seem to have a surfeit of enforcement officers in the multitude of federal agencies. They should be used to enforce our immigration laws and to secure our borders. We have already paid for the services. What is that money being spent on? Have the funds been misappropriated?
Deportation of all illegals is both proper and lawful, and it’s long overdue. We need to enforce our existing laws.
CARL SMINK
Milton, Del.
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