So, how EXACTLY do we round up 12 million illegal immigrants?

[prolesunited]

For all of those saying that's what should be done, please explain how we go about doing that?

Do we stop all Hispanic people on the street and ask to see their papers? If they can't produce them, then what?

Do we load them on trains? Do we put them in camps until we can sort it out?

What do we do with any possessions they've accumulated? Can we seize them? Do we take their bank accounts or any money stashed as well? After all, it was all earned illegally.

Do we just dump them on the other side of the border or do we get them back to their home communities?

And then there's the families? How do we divide them? Husbands and wives? Mothers and children born here, who are U.S. citizens? What if the moms leave the children here? What do we do with them? How about the children born in Mexico and brought here by their parents? Do we punish them because their parents broke the law?


"Deport them all. They're here illegally." Tell me how we do this with 12 million people.

[gaspee]

1. The camps

FEMA is building. I think that's what they're really for.

What did we do with the Japanese Americans' possessions during WWII. Their land? Their assets?

[Richard Steele]

16. Rich developers "obtained" those properties for pennies on the dollar, that's what happened.

Sometimes with all the furniture, clothing and other personal
possessions still in them.

Plenty of formerly middle-class "Japanese-American" business owners
left those camps with nothing more than the uniforms on their backs.

[RB TexLa]

22. You do know the pictures of the "FEMA camps" were on videos in the 90's

as well, except then it was Clinton building camps to lock up "Christians and gun owners." Different president, different targets, same pictures. You just change the script and have a whole new group of people to pay $19.95 for the DVD of the "camps." My favorite has always been the picture of the empty fairgrounds with the 7 or 8 foot turnstile, always accompanied by the phrase, "notice it only opens going in."

[gaspee]

26. Do a little research

I think it was well documented that these are new and the contract went to Halliburton. I'm not a conspiracy theorist and I've never bought a 19.95 dvd that shows empty campgrounds.

But thanks for your concern.

[Karenina]

48. From the cyberkeller...

http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0233/solomon.php

The Gatekeeper: Watch on the INS
by Alisa Solomon
Detainees Equal Dollars
The Rise in Immigrant Incarcerations drives a prison boom
August 14 - 20, 2002

t was a shaky spring for the correctional workers of Hastings, Nebraska (pop. 24,064), as the stagnation in the nation's prison population and the increasingly high costs of incarceration jostled the sleepy town, some two hours' drive from Lincoln. On April 9, the 84 employees of the Hastings Correctional Center were told that the 186-bed facility would be closing at the end of June. State funds were scraping bottom, and the $2.5 million annual price tag for the prison was too big a burden to carry. "We really didn't know what we would do," says Jim Morgan, who had been working at HCC for 15 years and lives to this day in the house where he was born. "There aren't a lot of job opportunities out here, and most of us have homes and kids and couldn't even think about moving somewhere else." For two months, the workers scrambled, filling out applications at nearby meatpacking and cardboard-container plants and anticipating long hours in the unemployment office.

Then salvation came from, of all places, the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Days after HCC closed as a state prison in June, it reopened as an INS detention center.

"It's a win-win," says Morgan. The INS is desperate for more beds for its ever expanding detainee population. And the state of Nebraska, collecting $65 per detainee per day from the INS, rakes in more than $1 million a year over and above the cost of running the place.

County jailers have long known that housing INS detainees pumps easy income into the coffers. Nearly 900 facilities around the country provide beds for the INS, and in interviews over the years, several county sheriffs and wardens have described such detainees as a "cash crop."

Passaic County Jail in New Jersey learned the lucrative lesson after 9-11, as INS transfers boosted its detainee population from 40 to 386 by December 18. The INS paid $77 per day per detainee, compared to New Jersey reimbursements of $62 for state prisoners; some $3 million in INS payments poured into Passaic last year.

[Rosemary2205]

2. Butterfly nets???

Sorry. It's just hard for me to take the "round them all up and send them home" crowd seriously. Those people have a screw loose if they think we are going to do an "Elian" to 12 million people.

[wakeme2008]

5. see my post three. No Jobs No Illegals simple

:)

[wakeme2008]

3. Go after the employers simple

$5,000 per illegal fee for any company with illegals on their site. Half to go to the local police that found them. Catch and release, maybe you can catch again.

Say Walmart has 8 illegals at a store doing cleanup work at night. Police raid and hands Walmart a ticket for $40,000 fine. Walmart is free to attack a sub contractor but they had to paid the federal fine. $20,000 goes to the local police that "caught" the illegals.

No jobs, no illegals, simple.....

[treestar]

12. What if it's cheaper to pay the fines?

That could be possible, as a business decision.

Laws like that have been on the books since 1986 and the number of illegals grows and grows. We never hire enough personnel to enforce them seriously, and if we did, the enforcement would become really unpopular pretty quickly. It would have to interfere with a lot of people's work and most people don't hate the illegals they personally know.

[A wise Man]

17. That photo is disgusting

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

81. Raise the fine?

Fines are progressively higher and then BOOM, your corporate charter is rescinded.

Game over.

[MazeRat7]

14. Not so simple... you forgot about the percentage of "self-employed"....

Those would be lawn care, house keepers, day labor, etc who are their own employers. As a matter of fact I would venture to say that in a border state like mine, that is a significant number of workers.

The point is there is no "simple" solution.

MZr7

[wakeme2008]

18. You have an illegal doing your lawn - $5,000 fine per worker

half to the local police. Simple

How many illegals would you have working on your grass???

[Critters2]

38. They're not self-employed, no matter what anyone claims

Whoever is paying them to do work gets fined. Period.

[High Plains]

53. How am I, the guy who hires someone to clean the yard,...

...supposed to tell if he is an undocumented worker? Because he has brown skin? Speaks with an accent? What if he presents fake ID?

This is a silly idea.

[Critters2]

57. I suspect that, if such a law were enforced, you'd find a way to

sort the legal from the illegal. Or you could do what I do, clean your own damn yard.

[MazeRat7]

60. Its called a contract and your right... this is a silly idea.

Beyond the fact that a basic understanding of "self-employed" vs "employer" seems to be lacking in this thread, when you contract labor or services the entity offering those services would be the responsible party. A simple yet effective "safe guard" would be to have your lawn guy, or whoever was offering a "service for hire", sign a simple agreement/contract that excludes and shields you from any liability if he or any of his workers are undocumented and/or whatever else you care to write in.

MZr7

[Jim Warren]

61. Gotcha covered

even for the guy to clean his yard.


Work bill would create new ID database

http://news.com.com/2100-1028_3-6185466.html

[kcass1954]

31. Nah... the fines need to be a percentage of gross receipts, and they need to

be large enough to hurt.

I also favor forfeiture of corporate assets, and jail time for both the corporate principals and those directly involved in the illegal hiring.

[Critters2]

41. I keep saying that if the CEO of Smithfield or Tyson

spent some time in jail, this problem would be solved pronto!!

[Ganja Ninja]

52. That's exactly how you go after them.

You make every employer in America declare who their employees are and their legal status. Then you give them so much time to get legal and start going after them. If you fine enough of them and give them jail time the rest will comply.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

4. Concentration camps.

Box cars.

[EFerrari]

58. We should just eat them.

[youthere]

6. First: We go to Gander Mountain and buy a bunch of illegal immigrant calls...

then we disguise ourselves as bushes and hide. We bait a giant circle with green cards and then throw a net on them and Bingo! You gotcher'self some immigrants!

[NightWatcher]

7. Illegal Immigration Started in 1492 n/t

[gaspee]

27. agreed (n/t)

[sharp_stick]

44. I'll go earlier than that

it started with the land bridge from Siberia. Damned cave folk walking over into the land of the bear.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

8. They could follow Adolph Eichmann's example - he was good at it.

Of course, he was "just following orders" and had nothing against the Jews personally.

[Beausoir]

25. Very scary. And so true.

[treestar]

9. What's hilarious, is that even if we did, how soon before most of them

are back?

After all that effort to deport 12 million people, presumably most of them to Mexico, what's to stop them from coming back again?

The fact there are 12 million illegals shows the laws we have are a failure and do not meet our own needs.

And it is not as easy to deport as the freepers think. The process is quite cumbersome and expensive, especially for nonMexicans. Many of those 12 million are not Mexicans, but from continents across oceans.

[sinkingfeeling]

10. May I remind everyone that less than 50% of all 'illegals' in this country are Hispanic!

How are you going to round up those Europeans, Canadians, Irish, Chinese, Koreans, etc. who have overstayed their visas by years?

[Cleita]

15. Yes, but it seems like it's only the hispanics they are concerned

about and they say we can't say this is racist. :rofl:

[barb162]

19. I think the figure is more like 90% hispanic

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- More than a million illegal immigrants have slipped into the United States in the past few years, raising the total in the country to 7 million, the Immigration and Naturalization Service said Friday.

The vast majority of the illegal immigrants are from Mexico, officials said.
snip
http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/01/31/illegal.immigration/

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

24. We'll have to build walls along Canadian borders, coasts.

[sharp_stick]

46. I'm starting a wall building company

I'll just hire myself a few guys from the Home Depot parking lot.... ahh shit.

[gaspee]

29. I keep trying to bring that up

And I point out that up here in RI, we have very few Mexican Illegal Immigrants. Canadians, Brits and Irish, plus Portugese: those we do have.

The only illegals I've ever met around here are two canadians and an Irishman. Though I suppose they wouldn't tell me, now would they?

[Jim Warren]

33. Ever been to Providence?

Of course you have....now go out onto lower Atwells Ave. You know, the sorta rough section away from downtown.

[gaspee]

36. The few times I've driven through there

it seemed like mostly SE asians. Hmong, Vietnamese, Laotian.

I kind of stick to my hood, which you can probably tell by my username. Going to Providence (5 miles away) requires a packed lunch. Newport requires an overnight stay (VBG)

You know how us RhodeIslanders are!

[Jim Warren]

42. RowDialin

Something to be said about a place where everything in the state is twenty minutes away, at 3am anyway. I used to live in Npt.

[gaspee]

47. I couldn't figure

out how to spell that phonetically. You heard it though!

I've lived in CA (ten years,) Florida (two years) and Texas (ten long months) but having been born in raised in RI, it's definitely the place for me.

[Jim Warren]

51. I used to fish near Oregon Beach

When there wasn't any yellow police tape preventing access there, that is. :evilgrin:

[Mr. Blonde]

11. It would be impossible to just round them up

But that is no excuse to let them off. Many can be caught through enforcing other laws. Illegal immigrants break other laws, but as of now they are just let go. Say an illegal is stopped for speeding instead of letting them go on their way the deportation process should be started then.

And of course the best answer is to make it not worth it for companies to hire them. They will either leave on their own, or be far more inclined to actually become citizens.

[Cleita]

13. You don't, but they are going to have to come up with a better

amnesty than they have now. My proposal is to give amnesty to those who are gainfully employed and/or have American born children. For those "they are lowering the wages and taking my job" types, once they have a legal work permit then they can demand equal wages from employers. Trying to get fines from poor people is stupid. Instead they should fine the employers who hired them in the first place.

If you don't want them hiring anymore undocumented immigrants, then make the fines the employers are supposed to pay stick and hurt. You will see illegal hiring stop overnight. The way it's set up now the employers have huge loopholes and never have to pay the fines they are supposed to. Then we can talk about letting new immigrants in. First we have to start leaning on Mexico to improve the wages and working conditions of their labor pool. Then so many may not want to come in.

[LiberalFighter]

20. Check the homes of elected officials

[Norquist Nemesis]

21. Who's talking about rounding them up?

Those screaming the loudest sound more like they would prefer just shooting them on sight!

[Blaze Diem]

23. Military service for citizenship..one option..

How loyal are you to this country?
What Military branch would you like to join in exchange for citizenship?

There has to be some reasonable solution here, although I agree that it is the mess it is today because of failed policy and unenforced laws.

I guess we could just open the borders to anyone and everyone..c'mon in and help yourself ..while it lasts, that is.
In exchange, natural born American citizens should be allowed freedom to roam the borders throughout the world. Grab the best of what ever social services there exists, expect and receive all services offered to any natural citizrn of that country.
We should be allowed to "Smash N Grab" our way from border to border.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

28. Um, are you planning on enlisting?

You're saying the immigrants should be more loyal than you, and American citizen?

[Blaze Diem]

39. UM...did you read my question?

"in exchange for citizenship". An option some may indeed like to consider if offered.
I doubt you speak for all who come to this country seeking a chance.

There is a group & I don't recall the name. A certain organization, they are Hispanic and do advocate entering this country by the legal means. They choose to argue with those who advocate illegal entry and abuse of American laws. If anyone can find their name I would like to know it. I'd like to know more about their philosophy.
I think it has something to do with 'not with my name", or something like that..
tks if you can help me out. Sounds like they have something to say, also, about this issue.

[Jim Warren]

45. You Don't Speak For Me

http://dontspeakforme.org/

[TahitiNut]

49. There are 40,000 non-citizens in active military service.

I find it beyond disgusting that military service is seen as one of the "jobs Americans won't do."

[Cleita]

62. You are so right.

We are becoming Romans, wherein the legions started out as citizen soldiers (Cinncinnatus leaving his plow to go to war and when the war was over returned to his farm and plow) and ended up being populated by barbarian mercenaries. This became the start of the decline of the Roman Empire.

[prolesunited]

64. Yes, let's let them be fodder for our imperialist policies

If you survive, you can stay. If you die, oh well.

Think of the foolish policies already pursued with CITIZENS' lives. I'm sure they'll be much more careful with the lives of poor, brown foreigners. :eyes:

[marlakay]

30. You won't plain and simple

I heard on the radio yesterday a guy called in that worked construction and worked with illegals. He said most of them think this is a joke, they don't want to be citizen of this country and just want to send money home to families. They aren't going to go back to Mexico or pay fines and aren't worried because they say nothing will change the status quo. No one will stop them in the future anymore than they stop them now.

[BuyingThyme]

32. You charge them $5000 for work visas which expire in a year.

If all goes well, they get a $4,000 rebate as they exit the country.

[IChing]

34. Out source the work to either China or India.

It would be cheaper and save money.

[Virginia Dare]

35. Construction jobs can't be outsourced...n/t

[IChing]

37. We could import slaves from Africa and trade that for rum

Oh, nevermind..........:evilgrin:

[Virginia Dare]

40. You're a very bad boy IChing...

:spank: :rofl:

[Sapere aude]

56. Sure they can. We could move all our construction companies to Mexico and then the companies

would transport their employees to build our houses. We make a terrible mistake when we think that if the illegals some how go away we will get the jobs at higher wages. Silly Americans!

[Virginia Dare]

43. Send them all letters informing them that they..

have won a 10 million dollar lottery but they must be physically present to collect.

[prolesunited]

65. And then what?

First off, send letters to who? Like we all have them ID'd in some database or they even have home addresses. Do you realize how many migrant farm workers there are.

Look at the original post and answer some of those questions.

[Virginia Dare]

86. It was sarcasm...n/t

[slackmaster]

50. Free beer usually works pretty well

Maybe some pizza too.

[ComerPerro]

54. Children of Men had a good idea with the cages and prisons and deportation, lets try that

:sarcasm:

[Sapere aude]

55. Offer them higher wages in Mexico.

Move all the farms to Mexico and pay them higher wages. We could use all that farm land to build more houses for ourselves. That way we don't have to worry about deluding our culture and we can stop printing all those government forms on Spanish. Their kids can go to school there and that would stop the over crowding. They can go to emergency clinics in Mexico saving us the cost of their medical care.

We will have to pay more for our food but at least we won't have all those Hispanics to deal with.

[krispos42]

59. The same way that Ohio reporter recommended disarming Americans

Police cordon off a section of a community and comb through all the houses looking for guns. Gun owners go to jail for a year per gun.

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070425/OPINION04/704250310/0/OPINION

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=118x139998

So, while we're doing that, we can also process the people we force from their homes while we're warrantlessly searching them for immigration status.

While we're at it, we can also do checks for safe storage of cleaning chemicals, flammable liquids, illegal drugs, working smoke detectors, radon, and anything else the nannys can think of.

[lumberjack_jeff]

63. In buses. n/t

[DemGa]

66. It's an illegal employer problem

But we cannot go after the corporations that lure illegals here. The real solution does not even seem to be on the political radar.

[in_cog_ni_to]

67. Put an nice little ad in the papers. Ask "pretty please" come to your local immigration office so we

can deport you? Please? We'll be nice to you. Promise! (fingers crossed behind their backs). :eyes:

Sending them all back home is absolutely ILLOGICAL. It cannot be done. HOw the FUCK do people expect to round up 12 MILLION people??? It's INSANE.

[Megahurtz]

68. Who Cares How? Just Do It. n/t

[Sapere aude]

70. You know, that's why is hasn't been done. No one knows how. You don't know.

But somebody just do it!!!!!!!!! Get them brown people out of my country!

Great cop out!

[Megahurtz]

73. The Cop Out Is

not forcing Mexico to take care of their own people and deal with the problem.

That is The Cop Out.

[prolesunited]

74. And how do we FORCE them to do it?

Should we invade them as well?

I see a bunch of sound and fury here signifying nothing.

[Megahurtz]

75. That would Be Up To Our Own Government

to do, but they get their cheap labor, and the Mexicans send the money they make here back to Mexico while the Mexican President in all his wealthy pomp doesn't have to lift a finger for his own economy. It's a win/win for the Rich NeoCons and the Mexican people at the expense of the American poor and Middle Class.

Of course if you or anyone else is not in the latter catagory then you're not going to care
because it doesn't affect you.

[prolesunited]

85. Actually, NAFTA destroyed *both* country's economy's

When the big corps moved in, they pushed the campesinos out. Small farms were either bought out or went under. Mom-and-pop operations were put out of business, just like Wal-Mart here.

We helped devestate Mexico's economy. People were literally starving. Why else would you risk death to cross a desert or be smuggled into a country where half the people hate you.

You should study history more. This is nothing new. They did the same thing during The Depression.

[TankLV]

82. Just. Do. It. Already.

Enforce the law.

"Illegal" is the key word here too many apologists here miss...

[Hekate]

69. Most people in this thread seem to understand: turn the US into a police state...

...complete with Iron Curtain, Berlin Wall, mandatory checkpoints everywhere, and papers presented upon demand for everyone, especially minorities.

Only -- who exactly would we be then? what exactly would America be?

We always prided ourselves on our open borders with our two neighboring countries, something few if any other nations could claim. That's gone.

The Mexicans are not the enemy, yet Bush is building a godsdam WALL on our southern border. Everyone in this country wants their cheap and earnest labor, but they are a convenient whipping boy for every jingoist and racist.

As to the WALL, has ANYone asked what will happen to migrating animals?

What in the name of all the gods have WE done to OURSELVES? :cry:

Hekate

[SoCalDem]

71. No need to if the legislators were brave enough to do what's necessary

1. Issue passports to ALL ...ALL US citizens'
2. Make employers crosscheck passport numbers BEFORE they hire anyone.
3. Mandatory-minimum JAIL sentence for CEOs/company managers for FIRST VIOLATION
4. Confiscation/sale of CEO's property/company on 2nd violation
5. Passport required to enter PUBLIC school
6. Forfeiture of property for hiring undocumented nannies/housekeepers/gardeners/handymen

......................................

This approach is NOT racist, since people who are less than "lily-white" come from ALL nationalities,but our congresspeople are too afraid to tackle this problem head-on because their libertarian/paranoid constituents do not want a national ID.

A passport requirement (first time FREE) would also open the door for a national health care system (which they also fear), since the passport would prove who was a citizen and who was not.
It would also prove positively who was "allowed" to vote..(another thing they fear)

We already have to show our SS card/give the number when we apply for work, so why not just go with a passport? SS cards can be faked so easily, but the newer RFID passports are not so easy to fake.. ( and I seriously doubt that there is some agency tracking your every move while you man the fry-station at Taco Bell)

I am NOT saying that people should have to present their "papers" at checkpoints on every street corner, but when they vote, when they apply for work, and eventually? when they seek medical treatment, why not have the best ID possible?

[murloc]

80. Thats not a bad idea.

Although I would make all passports, including renewals free.

[BlooInBloo]

72. Oh white folks excel at that sort of thing.

[leftofthedial]

76. well., it would be crappy, low-paying work

so let's hire them to round up themselves

[murloc]

77. Deport 15 to 25% of them, the remaining 75% will do it themselves

Deport as many as possible, crack down on illegal employers, make it very undesirable to live here as an illegal.

If illegals cant get a job here, can't get an apartment, can't get a mortgage, all their friends are being shipped back home...and the ones we don't catch will go home voluntarily.

If they can steal their way in across the desert in the middle of the night, it'll be breeze to cross back home in the day in full view with our blessings.

In fact we could even hand out free airline tickets to their country of origin to make it easier for them go home.

As for those that we do deport. Do it with dignity. No need to seize assets, put them on trains or other strawmen nonsense. Deportation isn't a new concept and has been done for decades for illegals of all nationalities. Just need to do a whole lot more of it.

edit to add:

The more I think of it, you would not even have to deport any of them. Just make it impossible to get a job, mortgage, apartment, bank account or to wire money. Offer free transportation back home and the illegals will deport themselves.

[rucky]

78. Or deport 150% of them, just to make sure nobody falls through the cracks. n/t

[MonkeyFunk]

79. Thank you Prolesunited

for asking this.

Obviously, there is no feasible way to do it. I've known many illegals, and I welcome them here. The ones I've known work hard (a helluva lot harder than I want to work) and are just trying to improve their lot in life, and provide a future for their children. I have no problem with that.

If I were Mexican, I'd probably do the same.

The long-term answer, of course, is a real international labor movement - one that would elevate the opportunities for Mexicans - in Mexico.

[Hekate]

83. You've got it: elevate opportunities in Mexico. Over 25 years ago I realized that if we were sincere

...about keeping illegals out, or stemming the flood, or whatever catchphrase is current -- if the US really meant it, then the US would do everything in its considerable power to turn Mexico itself around.

But no. Somewhere there's a gentleman's agreement that benefits both governments without solving anything: Mexico provides cheap labor to the US by the millions, and the US provides a safety valve so that the poor don't often take it into their heads to rebel against economic injustice at home.

The fat cats on both sides of the border win.

Sadly enough, this was my first real exercise in regarding US policy with cynicism.

Hekate

[KamaAina]

84. Are we even sure there really are 12 million undocumented immigrants out there?

Where are those numbers coming from? Presumably not the census, which has a tough enough time with undercounts even in poor urban areas with mostly citizens.

I remember reading a discussion of this in a book. The author postulated that many people come up from Mexico for seasonal work, then go back down to spend time with their families. Thus, studies that come up with numbers like, I believe it was 10 million at the time, are counting the same immigrant over and over again when he comes north, but not subtracting him when he goes back south.

Oh, yes, the book was The Nine Nations of North America by Joel Garreau.

It was published in 1981. Plus ca change...

[Cerridwen]

87. Let's round up illegal *employers* first

Apply painful fines and the corporate death penalty (rescind corporate charters).

Then let's see how many immigrants are still crossing the borders illegally.

[prolesunited]

88. Agreed

I just had this conversation with someone last night. If you look at how abused many on the illegal immigrants are in the workplace (safety rules, hours, breaks, pay, etc.), why victimize them again.

When you see these raids with dozens or the majority of workplace being rounded up and shackled, does anyone honestly think the employers didn't know? The CEOs should be marched out in shackles alongside them and forced to pay HUGE fines, ones so big that the risks of getting caught far outweigh the savings by abusing our fellow proles.