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Writing for Libration this September 17, Jean-Luc Mlenchon warned against obsessing with speculation about far-right pundit ric Zemmour running for the presidency. For the France Insoumise (LFI) leader, it would be a mistake to get bogged down in putrid debates with Zemmour and co. Six days later, Mlenchon debated this same polemicist on CNEWS, a TV channel widely compared to Fox. As agreed, the first half of the evening dealt with Zemmours preferred themes (immigration, immigration, and immigration) while at the LFI leaders request, the second half focused on social and ecological issues.

Ahead of Zemmours announcement this Tuesday that he will indeed run, some doubted whether Mlenchon hadnt just played into his hands. Is it even possible, they asked, to have a debate a rational exchange of arguments with an individual who breathes lies, and who has made misogynistic and racist provocations his whole calling in life? And why agree to go on a channel that has so actively contributed to the right-wing turn in French public debate?

We might doubt the sincerity of such questions when theyre being raised by supporters of Emmanuel Macron. They had no objections when the president called Zemmour on his personal phone to comfort him after an attack, or indeed when Macron praised the great soldier MarshalPtain, leader of the Nazi-collaborationist Vichy regime. We might question the consistency of those on the center-left who criticized Mlenchon for debating Zemmour but themselves joined this Mays protests called by far-right police unions.

But behind this polemic with all its share of hypocrisy and petty rivalries is the thorny question of what strategy can contain the fascist threat. Unless one claims to have found the definitive answer already (an unlikely conclusion, considering that the French far right has been making ideological and electoral headway for four decades), then such controversy ought to be welcome; and Mlenchons own choices are, certainly, worth debating. But how has he tried to fight the far right and is it working?

Mlenchons approach is especially a response to the rise of the National Front (FN), and its mounting strength in blue-collar France. During the 1990s, founder Jean-Marie Le Pen dropped his fascination with Thatcher/Reagan-style economic liberalism, and since then the National Front has succeeded in broadening its electorate to embrace much of the working classes. This social turn combined with its detoxification strategy was completed with his daughters enthronement as party leader in 2011.

This has paid off electorally: in the 2017 presidential run-off, Le Pens party scored over 10 million votes for the first time. Marine Le Pen almost doubled the score her father achieved against Jacques Chirac in 2002, and already in the first round captured 39 percent of the working-class vote. While the party (rebadged Rassemblement National in 2018) has fared poorly in first-past-the-post races like parliamentary elections, it can now proudly write on its posters that it is the first workers party in France.

This is itself an alarming development added to the problem that the popular vote for this party is less subject to periodic fluctuations than the radical lefts own. The far rights gradual penetration among the working classes has been concomitant with the erosion of the Communist (and Socialist) vote among these same classes. That said, only a small proportion of ex-left-wing voters have switched directly to Le Pen. Rather, they have mostly taken refuge in abstention, while already right-wing workers have radicalized to the extreme right.

In the late 2000s, the social-democratic think tank Terra Nova concluded that the working class was no longer the electoral heart of the Left and no longer in tune with its values. It thus advised the Parti Socialiste to drop any focus on the working class and instead address various other categories supposedly defined by their liberal values young, female, non-white, middle-class, urban, etc. voters.

Yet Mlenchon, who quit the Socialists in 2008, has never resigned himself to this. In the 2012 parliamentary elections he directly challenged Marine Le Pen in Hnin-Beaumont, an old Socialist fiefdom already turning toward the far right. He insisted on the need to mobilize the working-class vote:

Victories for the extreme right have always depended on the tactical and strategic mistakes of the left. [] The disconnection is not only emotional this left is today unable to prove to the people that its interests are on the left. There is a disconnect between its program and the working classes. We are taking over the reins.

Yet, even with 21 percent support Mlenchon was eliminated in the first round reduced to the optimistic insistence that, I proved able to wrest an important clutch of feathers from Le Pen, to take votes from her.

Mlenchons aim, in Hnin-Beaumont as elsewhere, was to win back those he calls fchs pas fachos fed up, not fascist. This means rivaling the far right for the support of the losers of globalization, whose anger, Mlenchon insists, is misdirected toward the foreigner rather than the financier. Through [fighting] Ms. Le Pen, Mlenchon asserted in 2012, I confront the FNs ideas. [] Will the way out of the crisis be social, or ethnic?

The beginning of the gilets jaunes movement in fall 2018 provided a fresh terrain for this battle posing the question of who would draw the electoral benefit in May 2019s European elections. Mlenchon reiterated his earlier analysis, telling RTL: The job of people like me is to talk to all the people, but perhaps mainly to the fchs pas fachos by telling them dont get the wrong anger.

Over the last decade, Mlenchon has made the half-crazy National Front leader his main enemy. This is, firstly, a matter of principle: the most urgent task is to oppose the racist and anti-social content of the National Fronts program, which threatens the cohesion of France as well as workers interests. But its also a tactical consideration. Mlenchon is convinced that power is out of reach, so long as the social-liberals and their Macronist offspring can use the far-right bogeyman to rally a pragmatic vote in their own favor. As he argued in a 2019 blogpost:

Today, a vote for Le Pen is a vote for the system and the system has understood this perfectly. The fchs pas fachos have no reason to turn to this option, which is more than ever the systems life insurance policy. All those who think that France and Europes problems come more from the banker and the billionaire than from the immigrant must be called on to join forces with France Insoumise. This objective remains central for us. This is key to advancing our cause: the mobilization of the popular mass which has today fallen into the Rassemblement Nationals trap.

Theorized by Mlenchon, the reconquest of the fchs pas fachos has become a key ideological marker of LFI. Adrien Quatennens, head of LFIs organization since 2019, recognizes this unambiguously. He wrote in Libration on May 22, 2019 that the Rassemblement National and Mlenchons movement are each in a race against time with victory sure to go to whichever manages to attract the fchs pas fachos into its own fold.

Telling in this regard is the stance of Franois Ruffin, a reporter and filmmaker who is also an LFI MP. Following his victorious run for parliament in 2017, he credited his success to his forgiving attitude toward former Le Pen voters:

Ms. Le Pen took 41 percent of the vote in the Somme in the first round of the regional elections, and 45 percent in the working-class municipality of Flixecourt. I think we have to start from there. [] The unemployment rate among the unskilled, five times higher than that among managers, does not incline them to expect a happy globalization, or even happy alter-globalization. Now, added to their economic and social downfall is a political and moral condemnation. Let them vote FN, let them identify with an ostracized party, and their exclusion will thus be legitimized, [in a] double punishment. [] Macron is basically the only one I have taken as an opponent. I did not attack Le Pen very much. How can people who are doing badly, socially and economically, believe that Ms. Le Pen or her father, who have never governed the country, are responsible for their misfortunes? We should fight the FN by giving another opening to anger, to hope. By offering another conflict than the one between French and immigrants.

So, to win at the polls, it is necessary to spare Le Pens electorate from criticism or even Le Pen herself. But isnt sparing the Le Pens from criticism in order to win over their voters exactly what the mainstream right has been doing for thirty years with the result that the National Front has become ever-stronger? And if, as Ruffin aptly comments, the Le Pens have never governed France, havent their ideas ended up governing anyway, precisely because of the complacency toward them?

The phrase fchs pas fachos denotes a strategic gamble: for the left-populists, electoral salvation comes from poaching voters from the Rassemblement National. But there are two ways to take back part of Le Pens working-class electorate: convince it or seduce it. Between his 2012 and 2017 presidential runs, Melenchon considerably altered his discourse in this regard. While during his first campaign Mlenchon sought to convince the fchs pas fachos by celebrating diverse society and otherness, in 2017 he tried to seduce them by toning down his previous pro-immigration line.

Thus, in his 2017 campaign, Mlenchon insisted that, while France had a duty of humanity toward refugees, the priority was to reduce migration flows, through diplomatic and trade agreements with departure countries. In 2017, LFI leaders no longer just attacked Le Pen for her fantastical specter of migrant invasion. Rather, they simultaneously denounced another fantasy no border ideology and the abolition of borders, as conveyed by the far left and sought to position themselves as a middle course between these two extremes, implicitly put on the same level.

Talking to the fchs pas fachos also means intervening in their preferred media. Mlenchon has for years rejected requests for interviews from centrist daily Le Monde and left-wing site Mediapart, but regularly takes to the columns of the right-wing Le Figaro and goes on the far-right CNEWS.

In January 2019, prominent cadre Alexis Corbire and political scientist Thomas Gunol (who quit LFI soon thereafter) even granted an interview to far-right weekly Valeurs actuelles, in 2015 convicted for incitement to racial hatred following a dossier entitled the Roma overdose. In the four-page interview, LFI MP Corbire insisted France is a country of immigration and that it is absurd to talk about zero immigration. But he also distanced himself from the no border left. Asked about the FN slogan on est chez nous (this is our home), heard at some gilets jaunes protests, Corbire said: I can see the xenophobic potential of the slogan, but it can also mean a desire to regain sovereignty.

Mlenchon narrowly missed out on the second round in 2017 and seems to think the fchs pas fachos could have pushed him over the line. No doubt he has in mind the 36 percent of Rassemblement National sympathizers who expressed a positive opinion of him just months later (Odoxa survey for Le Figaro, September 21, 2017), or the 26 percent of Le Pen voters who said that Mlenchon was their second choice (Ipsos poll for Le Monde, April 14, 2017).

Was there a reservoir of potential support, here? Some LFI cadres consider that this was where the six hundred thousand missing votes in 2017 were to be found, among the petits blancs modestly off-whites living in peripheral and deindustrialized France. When, interviewing them for my book on LFI, I sought evidence for these claims, these cadres cited geographer Christophe Guilluy, demographer Emmanuel Todd, and philosopher Jean-Claude Micha. But other insoumis challenge this analysis instead locating the missing votes among another segment of the working classes, i.e. the multicultural suburbs of the major cities.

So, have the appeals to the fchs pas fachos borne fruit? The answer is no. When left-wing populists move onto the terrain of right-wing populists, the vote transfers are at best zero-sum, and at worst actually benefit the Rassemblement National.

In the 2017 first round, 4 percent of Le Pens 2012 voters voted for Mlenchon, and 4 percent of Mlenchons 2012 voters voted for Le Pen. A draw, then. In the 2019 European elections, pollsters estimate that the proportion of 2017 Le Pen voters who backed the LFI list was close to 0 percent. Conversely, 7 percent of 2017 Mlenchon voters who voted at all in 2019 backed the Rassemblement National list led by the young Jordan Bardella. To this we can add the 2 percent who voted for Nicolas Dupont-Aignans Debout la France (IFOP data for Paris Match, May 27, 2019). So, about three hundred thousand people who voted Mlenchon in 2017 migrated to the far right in the 2019 European elections, while less than ten thousand people made the reverse journey.

The quest for the fchs pas fachos is based on the idea that part of Rassemblement Nationals base is motivated by social difficulties, so we need to listen to their suffering. There is some basis to this analysis. When voters are asked to explain their motives, many say they are voting because of concerns over precarity (55 percent of Le Pen voters in the 2017 first round said that this was decisive to their choice), unemployment (69 percent), or public services (45 percent) yet this is far less than the numbers claiming to be motivated by illegal immigration (92 percent), crime (85 percent), or terrorism (93 percent).

The drivers of the far-right vote are multiple, complex, intertwined, and difficult to untangle. They also vary between regions; the far-right vote in deindustrialized northern areas like the Pas-de-Calais and the Somme doesnt correspond to the same history or social situation as wealthy parts of the Cte-dAzur like the Var or the Vaucluse. Thirty-nine percent of Le Pens 2017 voters belong to households with a net monthly income of less than 1,500 a month, and 45 percent consider themselves at the bottom of the social ladder. By cross comparing these data, we can reasonably claim that the votes of about half of Le Pens base are rooted in socioeconomic difficulties.

But we can just as reasonably surmise that 90 percent of this same electorate is driven by hatred or at least fear of foreigners. These lepnistes suffer from a disease that the insoumis sometimes find difficult to name: racism. So, certainly, there have always been and there will always be repentant people. Without doubt, political identities are never fixed. Resentment can turn into revolt, and we must not abandon the workers to the far right. But, according to the most solidly grounded surveys on this subject, Le Pens base expresses massive hostility to the practice of Islam, and an antisemitism unmatched by any other electorate. It is culturally, ideologically, and politically rooted in the far right.

Insoumis leaders seem to underestimate the strength of these roots. In 2018, 85 percent of supporters of the Rassemblement National were avowed racists that is, they claimed this term for themselves. Also, notes historian Hugo Melchior,

when massive vote shifts took place to the detriment of the FN, as in 2007, it was Nicolas Sarkozys free-market right who benefited. Conversely, in 2017, Marine Le Pen managed to attract up to 14 percent of Sarkozys 2012 voters. These two cases, a decade apart, provide evidence of the porosity between right-wing electorates, while LFI, despite its so-called left-populist strategy aimed at addressing the lower classes across partisan divides, has not managed to bring back into its fold even a fraction of this electorate despite a discourse that sought to be more balanced on the migration issue.

Over the last two years, Mlenchons anti-fascist strategy has again evolved. This was evident in his participation, on November 10, 2019, in the March against Islamophobia (a term that the LFI leader now uses, after long rejecting it). So, too, in his praise of cultural creolization, a concept borrowed from the Martinican poet douard Glissant; and his recognition of the fact that universalism can be instrumentalized by the dominant in order to impose their culture and mores on everyone.

We also see this in his changed attitude to the police. Mlenchon today denounces the structural character of police violence (whereas he once saw it as a problem of black sheep), and LFI deputies refused to participate in the police demonstration this May, whereas Socialist, Communist, and Green MPs did take part. Mlenchon has moreover broken off all relations with right-wing personalities and those defending an identitarian version of French secularism (such as Natacha Polony and Henri Pena-Ruiz) while the sovereigntist wing of LFI, as embodied by figures like former defense spokesman Djordje Kuzmanovi, has also been ejected.

These developments seem to suggest that Mlenchon no longer really believes he can win the fchs pas fachos. The secret of his good score in 2017, soaring to 20 percent of the vote, instead lies in his ability to bring the Left together. Indeed, that year, in the first round of the presidential election, the LFI candidate rallied 70 percent of voters who identified as very left-wing, 48 percent of the left-wing and 24 percent of the somewhat left-wing (CEVIPOF data).

Moreover, even the geography of the 2017 Mlenchon vote closely overlaps with territories historically anchored to the Left. Admittedly, many left-wing voters no longer identify with this label, which was undeniably tarnished by Franois Hollandes presidency in 201217. But, if they reject the word Left, they remain attached to the egalitarian content. When Mlenchon debated Zemmour in September, he was not addressing the far-right pundit or his supporters, but left-wing voters.

Looking at how Mlenchon has tried to stem the rise of the fascist danger over the last fifteen years thus provides a series of lessons. Despite its limitations, a left-populist strategy does in certain contexts seem able to allow the Left partly to reduce its distance from the working classes. Yet confronting the far right on its own terrain on its preferred themes (immigration, security, nation, sovereignty) and in its own press organs (Valeurs actuelles, BFMTV, etc.) is a highly risky operation, with little results to show.

But it also needs recognizing that fascism isnt a phenomenon confined to the far right. Rather, it designates, more broadly, a dynamic of fascistization afflicting French society and public debate with the effect that defending the fundamentals of left-wing politics is itself courageous. While the cultural arena is an important terrain of struggle, it simply cannot replace long and hard activist work on the ground as close as possible to the working class from which the Left has gradually been isolating itself for decades.

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The French Left Is Struggling to Win Back Voters Who've Turned to the Far Right - Jacobin magazine

With the election of Donald Trump in the 2016 US Presidential election, one of the issues at the forefront of the campaign was illegal immigration. Coming into a country without permission to live and work there is the very definition of illegal immigration, but coming up with positive solutions to this issue are more complex. Here are some potential solutions to illegal immigration which could work to help everyone involved.

In the US, many illegal immigrants are attempting to escape oppressive regimes or extreme poverty. Instead of just deporting those who are captured, a different system of deportation could be used. During the deportation process, the illegal immigrant could be invited to apply for a legal immigration permit. Then, when that information is processed, they could be brought back into the country.

There is an estimated 11 million people in the US that are deemed to be in the country illegally. Most of these individuals are working here, paying taxes, and contributing members of their community. Under the right set of circumstances, including some penalty for their illegal entry, the illegal label to their immigration efforts could be removed.

The borders of many nations are lengthy and in remote areas, making them difficult to patrol on a regular basis. This makes it possible for illegal immigration to occur. Through the use of drones, unmanned security patrols, camera installations, and other remote monitoring technologies, border security can be centralized and improved so that a faster response by law enforcement can occur.

The reason why illegal immigration typically occurs is because people and families are looking to find a better life for themselves and their children. Many will come to a new country without a job simply because thats better than their current alternative. By creating a thriving economy and a streamlined foreign jobs program that allows for easier legal entry, illegal immigration could naturally reduce because there are more real opportunities to pursue happiness that exist.

Governments could offer those who are identified as being an illegal immigrant a stipend to deport themselves back to their country of origin. People could then voluntarily sign up for this program and receive the benefit once they have left the country to reduce fraudulent claims.

Implementing military forces on domestic soil would be a rather unprecedented security move for a country like the US, but some would say that these are unprecedented times when it comes to illegal immigration. The cost of using military personnel is already budgeted within most annual defense budgets, so the added cost would be minimal.

The Supreme Court of the US has ruled that the Second Amendment allows every eligible person to own a gun. Theres also language about having a well-regulated militia present. These militias could be authorized to protect US borders. Other nations could authorize volunteer militias to patrol their borders. There would be training costs involved and legislation would need to be approved to grant them certain intervention powers, but it could be a solution to illegal immigration.

Under the current structure of law enforcement in the US for illegal immigration, federal authorities often contact local police to apprehend suspected individuals. Cities like San Francisco and Seattle have pledged not to participate in such activities, creating what is essentially a sanctuary city for illegal immigrants. By changing the structure of law enforcement to provide federal representatives to local police, this issue could be resolved at a minimal cost.

Although the number of illegal immigrants receiving benefits and entitlements is small, it is still a practice which encourages illegal entry. Stopping these benefits to those who cannot be properly vetted or verified, including the provision of a state-issued ID, would be a potential solution. These vetting and verification methods could also be used to ensure job applicants are in the country legally as well.

The solutions to illegal immigration may not always be easy to implement. They will not please everyone. At some point, compromise is going to need to happen for results to be achieved. With ideas like these in place, it will become easier to look for ways to compromise.

Crystal Lombardo is a contributing editor for Vision Launch. Crystal is a seasoned writer and researcher with over 10 years of experience. She has been an editor of three popular blogs that each have had over 500,000 monthly readers.

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9 Solutions to Illegal Immigration - Vision Launch Media

Republican Glenn Youngkin has embraced much of the Trumpian policy playbook in his bid for Virginia governor, with a glaring exception of the illegal immigration issue.

Mr. Youngkin hasnt aired a single radio or TV ad about immigration at a time when the U.S.-Mexico border is a mess, Republican governors are sending National Guard troops to help and Republican politicians are making pilgrimages to be photographed with Border Patrol agents.

President Trump, meanwhile, blasts out press releases about the situation on a nearly daily basis.

Rather than hammer illegal immigration, Mr. Youngkin is making a strong play for Virginias growing Hispanic population. He hopes Hispanic voters will help him edge out Democrat Terry McAuliffe in the neck-and-neck race for governor.

Clearly, Youngkin and his team believe the notes he is hitting on inflation and economic issues are more aligned with and more effective at winning over voters than talking about MS-13 or immigration issues at all, said Jacob Rubashkin, an analyst with Inside Elections, a nonpartisan campaign tracker. If the Youngkin campaign thought that was a winning message, they would be running on it.

The strategy marks a significant break from four years ago, when Republican gubernatorial nominee Ed Gillespie ran ads warning of a nexus between illegal immigration and crime. He homed in on MS-13, a violent and ruthless immigrant-dominated street gang prevalent in Northern Virginia.

Mr. Gillespie accused Democrat Ralph Northam of enabling MS-13 by voting as a state senator against a bill that would have banned sanctuary cities.

The Latino Victory Fund, backing Mr. Northam, fired back with an ad featuring a White man in a pickup truck with a Gillespie bumper sticker and a Confederate flag that was menacing children on the streets.

Mr. Northam easily won the race and led a Democratic sweep of the states top offices.

That race played out during Mr. Trumps first year in office. He campaigned on plans for a border wall, more deportations and a travel ban on predominantly Muslim nations. Republicans said those issues helped put Mr. Trump in the White House.

Four years later, illegal immigration remains a hot topic nationally, as the Biden administration oversees what analysts describe as the worst year on the border in modern history.

Members of MS-13 also have wreaked havoc on communities across Virginia.

Several recent federal indictments have charged MS-13 members with kidnapping and grisly killings. In one case, the victim was stabbed over 140 times with knives and a machete before the dead body was dumped into a river.

Still, Mr. Youngkin has stayed far away from the topic as he battles Mr. McAuliffe, who is seeking to return to the governorship after a term from 2014 to 2018.

Polls suggest the strategy is paying off. Mr. Youngkin is pulling 32% to 55% of the Hispanic vote. Surveys also show the groups that have become the most disenchanted with Mr. Biden are self-described independent and Hispanic voters.

Mr. Gillespie lost the Hispanic vote by a 67% to 32% margin in 2017, according to exit polls.

Analysts say Mr. Gillespie turned to immigration because he carried too much political baggage and struggled to keep Republican voters engaged. Mr. Youngkin, a former private equity CEO and political newcomer, lacks that baggage.

Although he has welcomed Mr. Trumps support and echoed the former presidents calls for election audits, he has avoided the more pointed complaints of election fraud. He also has downplayed issues such as abortion. In a caught-on-tape moment this summer, he said he didnt want to scare off independent voters.

Instead, he has targeted voters who are frustrated with the Democrats one-party rule in Richmond and have misgivings about Mr. Biden. He has honed messages about inflation, jobs and schools.

Rep. Morgan Griffith, Virginia Republican, said Mr. Youngkin is picking the right fights.

I think you have to have some hard-nosed issues, but the people who, I think, would be moved by [MS-13 and immigration] have already completely moved into the Republican camp, so you dont need the message there anymore, he said. The cutting-edge issue is education this time.

He credited Mr. Youngkin with having a firm grasp on the challenge facing Republicans in statewide races.

There isnt any question you have to bring over some people who are in the middle or on the edge of both parties, he said. So you want to shore up the soft Republicans and bring over the soft Democrats.

To do that, Mr. Youngkin has turned to a staple issue: education.

He has tried to tap concerns about what schools are teaching and parental involvement. These have become hot-button issues during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mr. McAuliffe gave his opponent a gift in the final debate. I dont think parents should be telling schools what they should teach, he said.

Democrats, meanwhile, have tried to nationalize the governors race by making it another referendum on Mr. Trump.

On immigration, they say a Republican in the governors mansion would push Trump-style enforcement policies against illegal immigrants.

Mr. Youngkins lack of direct campaigning with Mr. Trump is denting the comparisons, so Democrats have tried another tactic: driving a wedge between the former presidents supporters and the Republican candidate. The Democratic National Committee recently flew a plane near Mr. Trumps Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida with a banner that read, Why wont Youngkin let Trump campaign in VA?

Former Sen. George Allen, Virginia Republican, said the focus on Mr. Trump has fallen flat.

Glenn is nothing like Trump in his personality and manner, but on the issues, sure, he said. It is not unique for Republicans to be for lower taxes, energy independence, regulatory reform, reasonable regulations and high accountability in schools.

As for issues related to crime and immigration, Mr. Allen said voters are directing concerns at the states parole board and the defund the police movement.

They are different times and different issues, and there are different people running, Mr. Allen said.

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Youngkin ditches issues of illegal immigration, MS-13 ...

Illegal immigration is defined as the act of crossing a national border without permission with the purpose of living full-time in a new nation. When discussing the topic of illegal immigration, every country deals with these border crossings to some extent.

In North America, however, the primary topic involving illegal immigration involves unauthorized border crossings from Mexico into the United States.

There is a benefit to illegal immigration from an ethical standpoint. Opening ones borders to allow people to have the chance to start a new life for themselves is a morally correct position. Although some will always take advantage of an open borders policy, the benefits to society by having welcoming arms will outweigh the negatives that come from bad actors.

The disadvantage of illegal immigration is that, by definition, it is a legally incorrect course of action to take. There are legal methods of immigration available in most nations today. Skipping that legal process de-emphasizes the costs and sacrifices that many households make to start a new life for themselves that does follow the law.

Here are some more of the key pros and cons of illegal immigration to discuss.

1. It provides local economies with a boost.Illegal immigrants might cross the border without permission, but they can still contribute to local society. Many of these immigrants find work in cash-under-the-table positions that are needed, but not often worked, by those with citizenship or a legal immigration status. Increases in production create improvements in living standards and that eventually helps everyone find more success.

2. It creates more diversity within the culture.Diversity can provide a number of positive impacts to a society. It allows the society to grow because there are new ideas, perspectives, and cultures contributing to it. It offers everyone the chance to experience higher levels of growth because there is more access to information. Illegal immigrants combine their knowledge and skills to that of everyone else to create a stronger, responsive, and more productive outlook.

3. It reduces the costs of deportation.The vast majority of illegal immigrants break no other laws beyond their initial unpermitted border crossing. Deporting illegal immigrants is a costly venture. In FY 2016, ICE spent $3.2 billion to identity illegal immigrants, arrest them, detain them, and then remove them from the United States. They handled 240,000 of the 450,000 deportations which took place that year. Each deportation conducted by ICE cost an average of $10,854 per illegal immigrant deported. Stopping just 100 deportations could save $1 million.

4. Most illegal immigrants have established residency.In the United States, as of 2012, about 60% of the population that immigrated to the country illegally has been present for at least 10 years. At the same time, the illegal population that has been in the U.S. for less than five years has dropped from about 40% to less than 20% in the from 2004-2012. One in three undocumented immigrants above the age of 15 lives with a child that is a U.S. citizen. About one in three undocumented immigrants even own their own homes and pay property taxes.

5. It eliminates the cost of child care for legal children, but illegal parents.About 4 million children in the United States have citizenship, but their parents do not. If the government deports these parents, then it falls onto the government to care for them if there are no legal family members involved. Children who have their parents deported become withdrawn, anxious, and may suffer from depression. The cost of foster care per child averages about $160 per day. Multiply that figure by 4 million and thats a cost that can be eliminated if illegal immigration was transitioned to legal immigration.

1. Many illegal immigrants fit into a less-educated, lower-income demographic.The fiscal impact of illegal immigration is generally based on the taxes they pay minus the costs they create. A net increase in the economy can occur when immigrants are more-educated and have a higher income level. Many illegal immigrants do not fit into that category, which means they create a net fiscal drain for many communities.

2. Illegal immigration creates an ongoing security threat.Illegal immigration provides the means and opportunity for terrorism to exist. It presents opportunities for crime. A vast majority of illegal immigrants may follow all the laws, but not all of the do. Yet criminal aliens make up 27% of the total population of federal prisoners, despite the fact that they are an estimated 9% of the total adult population in the United States. In 2003, more than 55,000 illegal immigrants had been arrested nearly 460,000 times, while committing nearly 700,000 criminal offenses.

3. It changes employment dynamics.A free market economy relies on supply and demand for pricing and wages. If there is a lack of skilled labor available to a market, then wages go up. If there is a lot of the same product, then the price for that product goes down. When illegal immigration is present, the job market is suddenly given more workers than it would normally have if those who crossed illegally were not present. More workers correlate to depressed wages, which ultimately means the value of work is priced lower.

4. Illegal immigration can lead to overcrowding.Illegal immigration can change the population dynamics of a community very rapidly. In California, about 50% of the students starting school are either immigrants or a child of immigrants. With the added capacity of these students, nearly 15% of schools in the U.S. exceed their capacity by at least 6%, and sometimes as much as 25%.

The pros and cons of illegal immigration are variable based on each community. Some can take on more illegal immigrants without issue, while others struggle with those who are already present. Without a meaningful dialogue, this issue will remain unresolved. That is the purpose of these key points to start the conversation.

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9 Pros and Cons of Illegal Immigration Vittana.org

March 2009

The impact of immigration on our public health is often overlooked. Although millions of visitors for tourism and business come every year, the foreign population of special concern is illegal residents, who come most often from countries with endemic health problems and less developed health care. They are of greatest consequence because they are responsible for a disproportionate share of serious public health problems, are living among us for extended periods of time, and often are dependent on U.S. health care services.

Because illegal immigrants, unlike those who are legally admitted for permanent residence, undergo no medical screening to assure that they are not bearing contagious diseases, the rapidly swelling population of illegal aliens in our country has also set off a resurgence of contagious diseases that had been totally or nearly eradicated by our public health system.

According to Dr. Laurence Nickey, director of the El Paso heath district Contagious diseases that are generally considered to have been controlled in the United States are readily evident along the border ... The incidence of tuberculosis in El Paso County is twice that of the U.S. rate. Dr. Nickey also states that leprosy, which is considered by most Americans to be a disease of the Third World, is readily evident along the U.S.-Mexico border and that dysentery is several times the U.S. rate ... People have come to the border for economic opportunities, but the necessary sewage treatment facilities, public water systems, environmental enforcement, and medical care have not been made available to them, causing a severe risk to health and well being of people on both sides of the border.1

A June, 2009 article in the New England Journal of Medicine noted that a majority (57.8%) of all new cases of tuberculosis in the United States in 2007 were diagnosed in foreign-born persons. The TB infection rate among foreign-born persons was 9.8 times as high as that among U.S.-born persons.2The article documents the medical testing process for TB required of immigrants and refugees, and this points to foreigners who are unscreened, especially the illegal alien population as the logical source of this disproportionate rate of TB incidence. It should also be kept in mind that among U.S. citizens who contract TB their exposure to the disease may well have come from exposure to a non-U.S. citizen.

The pork tapeworm, which thrives in Latin America and Mexico, is showing up along the U.S. border, threatening to ravage victims with symptoms ranging from seizures to death. ... The same [Mexican] underclass has migrated north to find jobs on the border, bringing the parasite and the sicknesscysticercosisits eggs can cause[.] Cysts that form around the larvae usually lodge in the brain and destroy tissue, causing hallucinations, speech and vision problems, severe headaches, strokes, epileptic seizures, and in rare cases death.3

The problem, however, is not confined to the border region, as illegal immigrants have rapidly spread across the country into many new economic sectors such as food processing, construction, and hospitality services.

Typhoid struck Silver Spring, Maryland, in 1992 when an immigrant from the Third World (who had been working in food service in the United States for almost two years) transmitted the bacteria through food at the McDonalds where she worked. River blindness, malaria, and guinea worm, have all been brought to Northern Virginia by immigration.4

We're running an H.M.O. for illegal immigrants and if we keep it up, we're going to bankrupt the county.

Los Angeles County supervisor Michael D. Antonovich, New York Times, May 21, 2003

What is unseen is their [illegal aliens] free medical care that has degraded and closed some of Americas finest emergency medical facilities, and caused hospital bankruptcies: 84 California hospitals are closing their doors.

Madeleine Peiner Cosman, Ph.D., Esq. Illegal Aliens and American Medicine, Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, Spring 2005

Contrary to common belief, tuberculosis (TB) has not been wiped out in the United States, mostly due to illegal migration. In 1995, there was an outbreak of TB in an Alexandria high school, when 36 high-school students caught the disease from a foreign student.5The four greatest immigrant magnet states have over half the TB cases in the U.S.6In 1992, 27 percent of the TB cases in the United States were among the foreign-born; in California, it was 61 percent of the cases; in Hawaii, 83 percent; and in Washington state, 46 percent. The Queens, New York, health department attributed 81 percent of new TB cases in 2001 to immigrants.

Immigrants are often uninsured and underinsured. Forty-three percent of noncitizens under 65 have no health insurance. That means there are 9.4 million uninsured immigrants, a majority of whom are in the country illegally, constituting 15 percent of the total uninsured in the nation in the mid-1990s.7The cost of the medical care of these uninsured immigrants is passed onto the taxpayer, and strains the financial stability of the health care community.

Another problem is immigrants use of hospital and emergency services rather than preventative medical care. For example, utilization rate of hospitals and clinics by illegal aliens (29 percent) is more than twice the rate of the overall U.S. population (11 percent).8

As a result, the costs of medical care for immigrants are staggering. The estimated cost of unreimbursed medical care in 2004 in California was about $1.4 billion per year. In Texas, the estimated cost was about $.85 billion, and in Arizona the comparable estimate was $.4 billion per year.9

One of the frequent costs to U.S. taxpayers is delivery of babies to illegal alien mothers. A California study put the number of these anchor baby deliveries in the state in 1994 at 74,987, at a cost of $215 million. At that time, those births constituted 36 percent of all Medi-Cal births, and they have grown now to substantially more than half or the annual Medi-Cal budget. In 2003, 70 percent of the 2,300 babies born in San Joaquin General Hospitals maternity ward were anchor babies. Medical in 2003 had 760,000 illegal alien beneficiaries, up from 2002, when there were 470,000.10

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