Leadership broken, not immigration system
Commentary
December 4, 2023
By Matt O’Brien
It has become common for elected leaders, political appointees and talking heads to bemoan our “broken” immigration system. Recently, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, in his capacity as Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, published a statement claiming that our broken Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) “harms people” and “reduces growth and competitiveness.”
Called before Congress to explain why he’s deliberately thrown open the Southern border, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas blamed his own misfeasance on a broken set of immigration laws. And the Center for American Progress has claimed that, “The immigration debate in America today is nearly as broken as the country’s immigration system itself.”
But do we really need to overhaul the rules governing how we admit migrants to the United States? The answer is an emphatic, “No!” If our immigration laws were properly enforced, 95 percent of our immigration problems would disappear immediately.
Those who claim the system is broken regularly cite long wait times, backlogs and the lack of a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants to support their contention. But none of these things are indicators that our immigration procedures aren’t working correctly. They are merely inconveniences to people who want totally open, restriction-free borders.
https://irli.org/leadership-broken-not-immigration-system/
