America’s Open Border Crisis

Immigration has been a serious issue in the U.S. for years. Recently, it been worse with the border open. Hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants have crossed the southern border in recent years.

In September of 2021, it peaked at over 200,000 immigrants, a majority of which are trying to seek safety from their corrupt countries. 

Unsurprisingly the leading states with the most undocumented residences are California, Texas, Arizona, Illinois, New York, and Florida. At least 5.0% of undocumented immigrants, live in the population of the U.S. 

Now, why would we want to keep people from escaping from corrupt countries to come to ours? Well, it’s not because we are trying to keep them from escaping such bad countries but because we don’t know anything about these people. Even if undocumented immigrants are only trying to cross to get to a new home, that doesn’t justify their actions. Many of these people can be dangerous and shouldn’t just be let into our country without going through the process of becoming a legal American citizen. Many of these people even have COVID-19.

A lot of immigrants crossing are put into migrant camps with inhumane conditions. These camps are overflowing and people are piled on top of each other, barely having enough room to sleep or stand.

Not only that but places for the general public are being used as facilities to care for the migrants. For example, Anzalduas Park in Mission, Texas, is now being used as a testing area for migrants to see if they have COVID-19.

I believe that this shouldn’t be happening since it’s a park. It’s supposed to be used for families and citizens to enjoy, not to be used as a testing area for undocumented immigrants. A previous site was originally at a hotel but they were relocated because their numbers grew to over 2,000 migrants.

Private property and homes along the southwest border are also being trespassed by migrants, trying to make it to bigger cities and civilizations. Many ranchers find areas of their property where undocumented immigrants have rested while traveling through the harsh deserts of the southwestern states.

Homeowners are alerted by a knock on their door by a passing migrant, stopping to get some food and water, and then to continue on their way. Some migrants stop by the houses of ranchers to find a job to work for a while.

But, many ranchers end up finding areas which migrants have stayed for a while, finding trash at the site, and it isn’t rare to find corpses of these individuals laying around, hidden within the brush of Texas’s unforgiving deserts, which is what these ranchers deal with year-round.

There are also many types of trafficking. Many of these unfortunate immigrants, found dead within these deserts, were left behind by smugglers who have told them that the lights within the distance would be a city such as Austin or Dallas, only to realize the lights of these “cities” are the lights of small towns, and the real cities are hundreds of miles away, and to walk all that way would be a 100+ hour trek. These people pay their guides thousands of dollars only to be scammed.

To reduce the number of migrants crossing the border, we should have more stern border patrol enforcement. We shouldn’t have migrants illegally crossing the border and taking jobs that should rightfully go to American citizens. By getting rid of our border patrol, hundreds of people lose paying jobs from which negatively affects the economy and harms their lives and their families.

I think we should build a wall. A wall isn’t gonna fully keep undocumented migrants out but it creates that barrier between our border patrol and them. Our border patrol will be able to see who is on the other side without having to be only a few feet away from them to see if they will be a danger or not.

Like mentioned earlier, many of these people can be dangerous, and without any form of barrier an agent or officer can be harmed at any moment. With a wall, they can see who’s coming ahead of time as well.    

Of course, we will never be able to fully restrict people from illegally crossing over, but it will help make the country a better and safer place if we reduce the numbers.