The lack of trust is why I get the hives every time I hear the words “comprehensive immigration reform”. Its why I don’t want to hear anything about “immigration reform” until after the border has been secured hermetically.
Immigration policy is always imposed from above, and always developed in secret. No one ever asks the citizen what he wants, or explains what are the magic numbers for legal immigration and how that number was arrived at, and just how that number benefits the citizen. I’ve never seen anyone explain immigration policy in terms of how it benefits the citizen, whereas that should be the only criteria. How does it benefit the citizen.
Secure the border, shut illegal immigration down to effectively zero, make immigration policy transparent, and then we’ll talk. Not before.
Any plan that allows illegals to become legal is amnesty. And, by definition, impossible to quantify, qualify, police. It will take quite a while to secure the border, and if it is not a fence, security would be a sham. If there is not a crackdown on illegals already here, any move is like opening a can of grasshoppers.
In 1986, Reagan passed an amnesty for 3 million on the promise we’d get a secure border and it would be the last one. I think it was Buchanan who said they won’t secure the border and we’ll get ten times as many next time.
Fast forward almost 30 years. We have an amnesty on the table, 30 million plus green cards being printed per government contract, and still no border fence nor serious immigration hold.
The failure of the last amnesty should be the reason not to have another one.