Actually, there are records of the illegals that border patrol/immigrations pick-up. I saw a clip on border patrol on MSNBC about a week ago and they did have yearly statistics around the 100,000+ mark ( number of people crossing illegally ).

What percentage of illegal border crossings do you think border patrol actually documents?

I don't know if that number is an estimate based on the amount that they do catch, or what. I guess I should have paid more attention to it, but none the less, over a hundred thousand a year. A lot more mexicans up in here than lost tourists and students.

Okey, I admit it...
 

I just don't wanna pay for sending folks back...

I'd rather spend the money it takes for making sure undocumented babies get formula from WIC, than to pay all the money to send some dude from across the ocean on a 1st class ticket to Tahiti. I mean dayum, I wanna 1st class ticket to Tahiti...

I've been on 1 jury where EVERYBODY was undocumented and they make a fool outta the Border Patrol agents chasing them. Wasting my tax dollars putting them in jail...

And there are options... Although it will be against Geneva Convention and violate a lot of human rights, but, there are those options...

So, really, it is cheaper to keep the labor on this side and not relocate big business--such as agriculture to another country--and have some folks think they are American and buy into the American dream...

It's a form of propagandizing folks... And it's our greatest export... Everyone wants to be an American--right? Yeah, right...

Well maybe everyone wants to be an European with the Euro going... Although France just jacked that off...

How can one be on a jury full of undocumented immigrants? They use the DMV records to pull for jury duty and at least in California you can't get a drivers license unless you are here legally. Granted you can buy one in downtown LA, but the DMV isn't going to call up a fake license.

Realistically speaking, the government isn't going to waste the time to try and deport them all, it's not efficacious.What the hell are you talking about with France? That comment was out of nowhere and made no sense.

I will have to respectfully disagree. I deal with a lot of undocumented people and their children in my job, and in a lot of respects I can tell you that those who are here have "bought in" to the American dream and want to stay because it's a much better life here than it is there, wherever there may be. Many of the parents of the students at the school where I teach want to become Americans in the future.

I'm all for a guest worker program, but it can't be done the way it's been done in Europe. It's ridiculous to tell people that they can come work in our country, but they can't get citizenship. Heck, get the guest workers to pay taxes to help pay for some of the programs that are being used to help them here. Granted it won't solve all the problems, but it can't be much different than it is right now.

I think she meant that she was on a jury where the subject of the case was undocumented immigrants (ie, 15 Hispanics all caught together in a Geo Storm with not 1 driver's license in the group), not that the rest of the jury was undocumented.

yeah stats!
 

courtesy of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services website and stats section (uscis.gov)

turns out we're both right (cause my stats were old)...

"nonimmigrant overstays" or those immigrants who came here legally and simply stayed past their paperwork DID account for a higher percentage than "border jumpers" up until the mid to late nineties

HOWEVER - as of 2000

"Roughly 2.3 million, or 33 percent, of the 7.0 million unauthorized immigrants residing in the United States in January 2000 were estimated to be nonimmigrant overstays."



***new stats will not be available until the next census, so who knows...

my bad!

- marissa