Once upon a time, there were two ways of coming to the U.S. One way was to apply for entry, wait your turn, fill out documents, not be a public charge, undergo a criminal background check and so on.  It’s the way most people came in. The other way was to gain entry because you were a political refugee or were escaping communism. This is how I came in with my parents in the 1960s.

Both groups were grateful for the opportunity. In my own case, I thank my late parents every morning that I got to grow up in the U.S.  Who knows what would have happened to me if I stayed in Cuba? For sure, I wouldn’t be posting on something like AT and expressing my viewpoints freely. My father’s cousin did something like that and ended up in a political prison for 14 years.

Under President Biden, the system was broken.  Some say on purpose, others say that it was incompetence. The net result is the same though, and reasonable Americans, even naturalized U.S. citizens, are wondering what in the world is going on. This is a great post from Victor Davis Hanson:

It is hard now even for Democrats to defend illegal immigration, given that the Biden administration allowed in more than 10 million entrants. Among them were an estimated 500,000 criminals. No one believes that was wise or should ever be repeated.

Worse, the message went out that there would be few, if any, deportations and no real ICE kinetic activity beyond the border.

The world’s poor, sick, both law-abiding and criminal, young and old, understood that anyone could now enter the U.S. at will. Deterrence and legality were lost.

In its place, the message went out that if it was permissible to cross the border unlawfully, then, by extension, it would be seen as equally fine to reside illegally as well—and perhaps further to ignore laws, on the theory that the host had sanctioned all such exemptions.

Ain’t that the truth. They’ve even changed the language. They are now “undocumented” rather than illegal. I guess that they are people who crossed the border and lost their wallets on the way? Doesn’t everybody lose their wallet when they have to walk a long distance?  “Undocumented” has a softer sound to it, whereas illegal means that you broke the law.

Please don’t get me wrong. If I were a Haitian I’d rather live in Miami too. And you can say something similar about most people in poor countries. However, that’s not immigration. That’s resettlement, or replacement, or whatever. It doesn’t mean that the people are bad. It means that you are bringing people in for the wrong reason.  We should remind countries, like Haiti or Mexico, that the purpose of immigration is not to send remittances back home.

Add to this that some of these people are now marching in our universities or complaining about whatever government services they get, and it’s inevitable that most reasonable people are fed up.

As my late Cuban mother used to say, these “Americanos” are so nice. Look how generous they are. Well, the Biden immigration policies, to paraphrase the aforementioned Victor Davis Hanson, “...have turned the most generous nation in the world from the most welcoming to increasingly resistant to mass immigration of any sort.”

It’s not racism. It’s common sense or the reason that Star County, the most Mexican county in Texas, voted for Trump in 2024.

P.S.  Check out my blog for posts, podcasts, and videos.

Image generated by AI.