Amos says -

I meet many Mexican immigrants and their descendants here in San Diego.

The ones I meet are hard-working, straight and decent people, an asset to the community.

This is a very common confusion of the issue at hand, and one that affects both Mexican immigrants and the rest of the population.

There is no question that "Mexican immigrants and their descendants" have made a valuable, and valued, contributions to US society and to the US economy. There are, however, legal ways of immigrating, and illegal ways of entry. The contributions made by legal immigrants are frequently cited in opposition to any new regulation, as if their contributions in some way validate those who enter illegally.

The magnitude of the "problem" can be perhaps realized from an article that appeared in the ¹Washington Post recently (sorry, no link available) in which writer SPENCER S. HSU reported:

The U.S. Border Patrol arrested nearly 1.2 million people last year — the vast majority of them Mexicans who were returned across the border — and estimates that 500,000 others evaded capture.

These are just the "incoming," and these figures omit the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants already in the country.

Mr. Hsu, in this article laments that while those identified as Mexican nationals can be, and generally are, sent back to Mexico, Mexico refuses to accept anyone who enters the US through or from Mexico who is not a Mexican citizen: according to Mr. Hsu, 160,000 "other than Mexican" immigrants arrested each year.

Since our jails are already filled to overflowing with our own petty (and a few not-so-petty) criminals, the Immigration Service has no place to hold any newly arrested who require any significant processing.

The cost, for those held, is in the vicinity of $35,000 per year per person. It makes little difference whether it's one person for a year, or 365 persons each for one night. Those picked up by INS for whom there is no space for detention typically are issued an "order to appear" for a hearing to determine whether, and to where, they may be deported. Understandably, INS agents refer to this as the "Order to Disappear."

INS currently doesn't even attempt to process "illegals" that are picked up by other than their own agents, except in cases where death or injury appears. Newspaper reports, in the past two months in Kansas alone, have cited at least a dozen incidents in which groups of a half dozen to two dozen "obvious illegals" have been intercepted, usually because of accidents, major traffic violations, or illness of some or all of the illegals. The reported total of persons involved has been more than 140. IN NO CASE were any uninjured persons arrested or detained, largely because there's no space to do so.

Of course, unless they are found attempting to obtain employment or otherwise "establishing illegal permanent residence" these "travellers" can always claim they just came to visit. One might question the Mexican tradition of packing 14 people into an unventilated 4x8 UHaul trailer with no windows (in 95F+ [35C] weather) to "see the country," but...

Believe it or not, some people also are concerned that a few hundred people each year are found dead attempting illegal entry. Mininum fees to the "transporters" who promise to get them in are reported at about $1,000, with up to $15,000 claimed by some, and it frequently turns out to be a really bad trip.

The US can and should accept new people, but there is a front door, and it needs to be used. Quite possibly, it needs to be opened a bit wider for those who'd like to come here; but that's really not the present issue.

¹ The article by Mr. Hsu appeared in my local paper 15 May 2006. I haven't been able to find it online (and Mr Hsu isn't really a very good writer). Cited for convenience, as his numbers agree generally with other sources.

John