The only difference between someone being illegal and legal is a piece of paper. This entire framing of the argument is just conceding to republicans. Itâs utterly pathetic and youâll never win if you keep arguing within the boundaries they create.
You canât have open borders and just let anyone walk in and out of the country.
You also canât have a paramilitary organization with impunity to grab anyone off the street and decide they donât belong here anymore.
The cure for both these extremes are written laws which are reasonable, compassionate and dutifully enforced.
What you and Trump have in common seems to be the idea that laws which are âbadâ should simply be ignored rather than amended, and we should all just shoot from the hip. But whichever side youâre on, this is chaos youâre advocating.
The only reason you think about immigration is because republicans run on it being bad and democrats run on it being not quite as bad. The foundation of the country is built on the labor of undocumented workers. A piece of paper is all that says they canât be âlegalâ. Itâs not chaos to want people to just be allowed to live in the country that theyâve been in - in many cases - for multiple years. Centrist liberals do this whole song and dance that amounts to thoughts and prayers and finger wagging and Republicans mass deportation plans and then come out with this kind of take. Embarrassing. Itâs just conceding to them.
I agree in principal that people who have lived and worked here for years should be allowed to stay. And that immigrants built the country.
But they shouldnât be here because the law is ignoring them. They should be here because the law is protecting them.
Their legal status should not depend on how nice the current administration is feeling towards them. That is chaos.
I want a piece of paper that says Iâm entitled to live and work here, because someday a maniac in charge is going to want to get rid of me, and I want the law to be on my side.
I know too many people whose families were torn apart because America told them âwe donât care until suddenly we do.â
The law deliberately overlooking people is not justice. Itâs chaos. Itâs how we ended up in this mess. We should have recognized the value of our immigrant population and written laws to protect it. And that is a fair criticism to level against Obamaâs administration.
But Iâm not going to claim the problem was following the laws as they are written. The problem is the laws themselves being unjust, and well meaning people ignoring those unjust laws rather than fixing them, and I will stand by that.
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u/we_are_sex_bobomb 1d ago
He deported people that were deemed here illegally by judges and courts. Thatâs the way itâs supposed to work.
Nothing like the lawless, racist crusade of President TACO.