Illegal Immigration and the Wall

Many say that adding to the walls and fencing along our southern border will not stop illegal immigration, and they are right. As humans we are incredibly adaptive and creative at finding solutions to problems that face us, problems like a wall or a fence defining a challenge for a potential illegal immigrant. There will still be some that will manage to get over, under or around the wall.

Others say that building more of a wall along our southern border is a useless expense that will do little or nothing to change the number of people entering our country illegally. These people are wrong. Maybe they simply hate the idea of Trump gaining another success during his presidency or maybe they are just not informed on the effectiveness of walls or fencing along a border.

At least 20 countries currently have walls along their borders with another 13 either under construction, being planned or proposed. These countries have secured their borders with some form of barrier because these barriers work. Israel completed a 150 mile section of fencing in 2015 stemming a flood of illegal immigration with now only a small trickle of illegals making it through this section. In our own country the Yuma sector of the border received fencing under the Secure Fence Act of 2006. Since installation illegal immigration through this section has dramatically decreased with apprehensions in 2016 being roughly one-tenth of the apprehensions in 2005.

Building a wall or fence or other barrier along our southern barrier shouldn't be expected to work as an on-off switch, simply because it will not be 100% effective. The impact of additional barriers along the border decrease the illegal traffic in the area of the barrier to a manageable level allowing border patrol to be more effective. It's also going to shift some of the illegal traffic to other areas along the border which are less protected and easier to cross, the areas without barriers. With the unprotected areas getting smaller, these areas will also be easier for border security to control.

There are other areas of our immigration system that need work, but that shouldn't stop us from working on securing the southern border. The U.S. has hundreds of thousands of people flying into our country and overstaying their visas. In these cases authorities should be attempting to track these people down and take appropriate action to either get their visas in order or get them out of the country. Part of the issue with people overstaying visas could be how the U.S. tracks people leaving the country.

The U.S. tracks people leaving the country by air through airline passenger manifests. Given the hundreds of thousands of people flying out of the country annually, think of how much error could be involved in this system. Mexico has a system in which immigration officials check you into the Mexico and then check you out of the country when you leave. Why wouldn't we put a similar system in place?

Tracking down those intentionally overstaying visas is complicated by sanctuary policies but in place at state and local levels. Coordination between local and federal law enforcement would enable more of these people that are now in the country illegally to be found through normal traffic stops as well as more serious crimes. Eliminating sanctuary policies doesn't need any new laws, we simply need to enforce our current laws. Under U.S. laws aiding an illegal alien is a felony. Those establishing and executing these sanctuary policies could be charged with violating Title 8 U.S. Code § 1324. Eliminating sanctuary cities or states only takes the political will and courage to face the media attacks that would happen after the arrest of a few city mayors or a state governor or two.

There's a lot of work that needs to be done on our immigration system but at the same time we need to control our borders, particularly our southern border. Article 1, Section 8, clause 4 of the constitution assigns the congress the responsibility of establishing a uniform process of naturalization which has been interpreted by the Supreme Court to mean Congress has the authority to establish who can come into the U.S. Limits on immigration established by congress are constitutional and have been established. Congress needs to provide funding to make it possible for the President through his administration to carry out his duty to enforce those limits. In other words, Congress needs to do their job and fund extending the barrier, or wall, along the southern border just as the did in 2006.

Additional reading:
Trump: Is a Border Wall Effective? Ask Israel
Borders and Walls: Do Barriers Deter Unauthorized Migration?
Homeland Security secretary: Border walls work. Yuma sector proves it.
'It works': Yuma's fence, manpower make border nearly impenetrable
Walls are the foundation of civilization. But do they work?
Trump is right: Walls work on the southern border
Countries With Border Walls