A remarkable poll taken by Gallup shows just how seriously our borders are under threat of being overwhelmed.
Gallup asked the whole population of Latin America. There are 33 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. Roughly 450 million adults live in the region. Gallup asked them, “Would you like to move to another country permanently if you could?”
A whopping 27% said “yes.”
So this means roughly 120 million would like to migrate somewhere.
The next question Gallup asked was, “Where would you like to move?”
Of those who want to leave their Latin American country permanently, 35% said they want to go to the United States.
The Gallup analytics estimate is that 42 million want to come to the U.S.
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It gets worse.
Forty-two million seekers of citizenship or asylum are watching to determine exactly when and how is the best time to make the move. This suggests that open borders could potentially attract 42 million Latin Americans. A full 5 million who are planning to move in the next 12 months say they are moving to the U.S.
We all know why 42 million Latin Americans want to move to the U.S. Most of them live in oppressive left- or right-wing dictatorships with few economic opportunities. The region is ravaged by murderous drug cartels. If you want a rigged system, you should look no further than the third-world hellholes to our south (sorry, but “hellholes” is about as kind as I can be).
So the questions asked by Gallup CEO Jim Clifton are wholly relevant to both opponents of legal immigration and proponents of open borders.
Rather than find a solution for the several thousand potential migrants currently at the border, let’s start by answering the bigger, harder question — what about the 42 million who would like to come? What is the message to those millions who will seek entrance either legally or illegally? What should we tell them?
Most U.S. citizens like me just want to know the plan. What is the 10-year plan? How many, exactly whom and what skills will they bring? What do we want? Answer these questions, and the current discussion can be resolved.
The system is broken. We can’t protect our borders. We can’t figure out how to determine who should be allowed in, under what circumstances, and what criteria we should use to make our country a stronger, better place?
Even those who advocate for increasing legal immigration need to think about these questions. How many new immigrants can we absorb? How fast? Most open borders advocates refuse to consider such questions and many border security hawks won’t even discuss them.
It’s a helluva way to make public policy.