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IPFS News Link • Immigration

For Immigration Answers, Look to Liberty

• The Daily Bell - Ron Paul

Many Republicans, including Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, have the idea that they can round up 15 million people and ship them back to wherever they came from. Many Democrats, on the other hand, would grant them blanket amnesty, give them citizenship, and make sure as many as possible are fully signed up to the welfare ranks.

Has anyone thought for a moment about how difficult, expensive, disruptive, and dangerous to our civil liberties it would be to turn over every stone in this country to search for someone who might not be here legally? How many billions of dollars would it cost? The government would likely introduce a national identification card in effort to determine who should be here and who should not. The cards would no doubt be equipped with biometric data to transmit to the government information about law-abiding American citizens that they have no right knowing.

But on the other hand, how many billions of dollars per year does it cost to provide federal, state, and local welfare and other benefits to individuals who are not legally in the United States?

The situation seems impossible and it is true there are no easy answers. I have suggested in my book Liberty Defined that some status short of citizenship might be conferred on a case-by-case basis. Perhaps a "green card" with a notation indicating that the person is not eligible for welfare and not permitted to vote in the United States. I don't think there is any doubt that many who come to this country illegally simply want to work and will take jobs that Americans refuse to take.


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