In a nation of immigrants, intense argument about the legitimacy of immigration may seem illogical or self-serving. But the question has been given new urgency because of a change in immigration itself. Un-attended children are crossing our southern border with Mexico in record numbers. As of right now (July 7, 2014) 52,000 children were caught since October. All Mexicans were sent home. All others are being held for assessment.
The children have been sent by their parents. Smugglers may charge up to $12,000 per child, which poor parents find difficult to pay. The incentive is that smugglers tell parents the children will certainly be allowed to stay and become American citizens. This idea has been spawned by overly lax legislation, according to some legislators, which the Obama Administration denies. However, children continue to arrive from Mexico and countries south of Mexico. Some are as young as nine.
The original idea, starting with the Mayflower and continuing at least until the Bicentennial in 1976, was that immigrants were fleeing impossible conditions elsewhere: brutal poverty, crime, political unrest or an actual threat to their lives. The American idea was that these people would follow the American dream and become citizens, earn money, pay taxes, and basically become American. Sadly, this has become less and less the case. Some immigrants work for years to get their citizenship papers but never succeed. Occasionally, this tears up families as one or two family members are deported after spending years in the United States. The currently more relaxed laws followed some very high publicized and traumatic situations, such as Elian Gonzalez from Cuba, deported to his father years after he had entered the U.S.
In my novel “Skyscrapers” I wrote of a Mexican female who entered the United States as a child, worked her way up through the public education system, went to college on scholarships and loans, and became a CEO. This embodies the American dream. I know this is not an imaginary or impossible dream because my Cantonese daughter-in-law entered the United States in utero, and grew up in Chinatown. She went to public high school, the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and Loyola Law School, supplementing scholarships with student loans. She immediately began practicing law in Chicago.
But a child, let’s face facts, is a drain on the social safety net. I’ve worked in philanthropic organizations benefitting kids for many years, because kids can’t vote and kids can’t earn money and kids can’t take care of themselves. Therefore, people like me and millions of others step up to help. But if 9,600 unaccompanied children cross the border each month, as they did in May, 2014, we cannot catch up and provide all of them with safe and healthy environments, plenty of food and equal opportunity. In other words, we can’t provide what they were sent here to receive. If a child arrives here at the age of eight, he will need some sort of aid and supervision for ten years. The public will pay for it. Multiply him by the numbers above, and the problem can be seen in its true light. This is not immigration per se. This is child-dumping. It’s an ugly term, and the kids are innocent victims, but nevertheless, smugglers are getting rich selling the American dream to parents who want the best for their children.
On CNN’s Crossfire, July 7, juvenile immigration was the topic. John Boehner was mentioned as a stumbling block in solving the issue partly because he has theoretically prevented the House from voting on child immigration, and partly because he sued President Obama for law immigration laws, which was described as a “stunt” by Newt Gingrich. Immigration, once a very difficult but very real ladder to opportunity, is entirely different when unattended children are the immigrants. They have all been told what to say to the border guards, so all their stories are similar and similarly plausible and virtually impossible to check for veracity. It’s a problem I did not foresee when I wrote about Eleanora Torquemada Smith, who succeeded in business in spite of her humble origins. I can’t hazard a guess as to where this ingress of innocents will lead us in terms of future immigration policy and border control. I can predict a clash of the Senate and the House, because that is where all major American political arguments seem to end: in sectarian clash rather than cooperative action. It’s good the Founding Fathers aren’t around to watch politicians who may use this very real humanitarian crisis to burnish their own images, push their own agendas, and let the taxpayers pay the bill which will accumulate exponentially if sane and enforceable decisions are not made soon regarding these children.
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