Illinois taxpayers foot $4.7 billion cost of illegal immigration

To the Editor:

As President Obama considers sidestepping Congress to loosen U.S. immigration policy, a Reuters poll shows that 70 percent of Americans are deeply worried that illegal immigration is threatening this nation's culture and economy. Because Congress cannot agree on comprehensive immigration reform with amnesty as its goal, Obama is threatening to act alone in the next few weeks through an executive order to give work permits to up to five millions undocumented immigrants and delay some deportations.

A report in September of last year indicated that 11.7 million illegal immigrants are residing in the U.S. In Illinois the illegal immigrant population has remained constant since 2010 at 550,000. Although the unemployment rate in Illinois dropped to 7.1 percent in June of this year, (not counting those individual who have stopped looking for jobs), it was still 1.0 percentage points higher than the national rate for the month.

The state's dismal employment picture isn't helped in that, according to FAIR (Federation for American Immigration Reform), 394,015 jobs were held by illegal aliens in 2013.
If five million illegal immigrants are given work permits through an executive order signed by Obama (which many feel is illegal because it would bypass Congress), not only would it be easier for these illegal aliens to be hired, but it would also signal to others crossing the border illegally that in time they too will be so honored.

The cost already spent per year by Illinois tax payers on its illegal immigrant population is $4.6 billion, with $2.6 billion alone going to educate the children of illegal immigrants. Of concern is that the Department of Justice doesn't have receipts for half of the unaccompanied alien children who were apprehended at the southwest border by Border Patrol during fiscal year 2013 and fiscal year 2014 through June. Government records show there were 85,000 apprehensions with only 41,592 total receipts marked as juvenile in immigration courts. Of these 41,592, very few will keep their court dates.

Despite this lack of documentation, most of the unaccompanied children so far crossing the border from Central America will never be sent back, as they fall under the bipartisan William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008. Children have been coached to game the system, having been schooled on the magic word to say something along the lines of "asylum," or “political asylum" or to say "fighting in my home country." By so doing they quality for refugee status and will remain the burden of tax payers for many years to come.

Why then did Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel on July 29 ask the Department of Homeland Security to send at least 1,000 more illegal immigrant children to Chicago where they will be housed, clothed, fed, schooled and legally represented for free, when the city is already caring for more than 500 of the kids in secret facilities. Is anything really for free?

Some of the recent illegal immigrant children are suffering from drug resistant tuberculosis, dengue fever, swine flu and other infectious diseases. They will soon be attending public schools throughout this nation. The illegal immigrant "children" also include MS-13 gang members, who say they are 16 but are really much older.

Shouldn't citizens have some say in who enters this country and stays? With a debt of $17 trillion dollars, this nation can ill afford to bear the costs associated with illegal immigrants. Although the unaccompanied children do arouse feelings of compassion, there are millions of needy and poor children in this nation in need of help.

As related by Rep. Sean Duffy (R-WI) with Stuart Varney as guest host on Fox News “Your World,” DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), announced in June of 2012 by the Secretary of Homeland Security, must be changed to allow our government to quickly process these kids and send them back to their home countries and back with their parents. It would send the message to parents and the next wave of kids, "Don't send them. Don't endanger them. Don’t subject them to being raped, abused, murdered, or maimed."

This is the humane thing to do as our federal government is facing a rapid and unsustainable growth in debt and the American people are over-burdened with taxes.
It is also time to enforce the laws that are already on the books. Regarding the crisis at the southern border, Bill O'Reilly asked Charles Krauthammer a very simple question on Tuesday, July 1: "How do you secure the border, Charles?"

In response, Dr. Krauthammer offered an equally simple answer:

"You start with a fence. It’s very simple. … If fences don’t work, why is there one around the White House? If they don’t work, why is it that the Israeli fence which separates Israel from the West Bank has cut down terror attacks within Israel by 99 percent?"

Nancy Thorner
Lake Bluff