Several pages back I noted that American citizens have already been deported by ICE. So my question is--along the lines of the death penalty--how many citizens deported is acceptable? How many documented immigrants is acceptable?
In the case of the death penalty, the current thinking is approximately 4% of death row convicts are innocent, so roughly one in twenty. The majority of Americans in 27 states appear to believe that is an acceptable error rate for killing people, as long as we can execute the other 19 within about 20 years or so of the crimes that they commit.
So what is the acceptable error rate for deportating citizens and people here with up to date documentation?
Some other problematic questions: is deportation the correct remedy for someone whose visa is expired? How expired? What if it's bureaucratic problems that caused the delay? How do we appropriately treat asylum seekers, while weeding out the fakers? What about american citizens who have a family member here who is undocumented? Do we deport someone who is married to an American citizen? What about someone whose child is an American citizen? What about the "dreamers?" Children (or now young adults) who have spent most of their lives here and have no support in the country their parents brought them here from--may not even speak that country's language?
There is a lot to unpack here.
I think deportation needs to be limited to those who commit crimes, other than crossing the border illegally. Those who crossed illegally after January 2021 almost kind of crossed
legally as they were enabled and encouraged to do so by the current administration. That makes it tough to grasp in my head.
To those who crossed, they didn't do anything wrong in their minds. To those who came here with good intentions, I'm OK with allowing them to stay.
So, find the bad guys and deport them. It won't be easy, but it needs to happen.
There are also many new steps that need to be taken.
The "sanctuary" city/state concept is terrible and needs to go away. They are "sanctuary" until they run out of resources and beg the feds to stop Texas from sending illegals to their "sanctuary" city. Those resources are being stolen from the poor people who really need them - and they are not happy. I've seen them on TV, inside City Council chambers, furious with their leaders.
Congress needs to address many issues and immigration reform is one of them. They can start with DACA and go from there.
Uncooperative "sanctuaries" do not help solve this problem at all.