Have you noticed how the open borders crowd and the media hyperventilate at the mere mention of the $8 to $20 billion associated with building a wall on the southern border, but don’t even flinch at the billions of recurring costs being spent yearly to house, relocate, and care for illegal border crossers?
Don’t take my word for it.
After President Barack Obama opened the floodgates for hundreds of thousands of unaccompanied minors to migrate over the border, he felt compelled to usher in a new budget that allocated up to $4 billion to tend to and relocate those individuals who should never have been here in the first place.
Where was the outrage?
An article from Forbes confirms that $3.5 million has been spent since 2015 for these very limited purposes. The New York Daily News confirmed in a June article that it's costing $1 billion annually just to house unaccompanied minors.
Moreover, in the past year, the "coyotes" who smuggle the illegal immigrants realized they could secure placement of their clients into the U.S. by simply claiming that they were seeking asylum. According to a report issued by the Federation of American Immigration Reform (FAIR), it's costing American taxpayers almost $2 billion a year to care for asylum entries.
This new trend has handcuffed the Trump administration, since liberal judges have ruled that asylum seekers can't simply be turned around and sent back to their country of origin without first having a court hearing.
Leftist jurists further inhibited the feds from holding the illegal border crossers for more than just a few weeks. To add salt to the wound, the American taxpayer has to pick up the tab for housing, relocating, and educating these illegal immigrants.
To deal with the recent surge, President Trump has been forced to seek an allocation of huge sums to help expedite court hearings and care for those who were with in federal custody in order for them to be placed with others within U.S. territory.
According to the National Immigration Forum, in fiscal year 2018, the federal government budgeted $3.076 billion on Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Custody Operations.
So, do the math
That’s billions that have been spent by our taxpayers, without anything being done to stem the tide of the illegal flow. That’s before you even consider that FAIR reports that the net annual cost to American taxpayers to house, educate, feed, incarcerate, and provide medical care for all illegal immigrants and/or their children equates to $116 billion.
Meanwhile, the Center for Immigration Studies issued a report stressing that if a wall managed to prevent just 10 percent of the normal illegal border crossers, it would pay for itself within a decade.
Isn’t it simple common sense that putting in a more permanent solution, such as the wall, while possibly costing as much as $20 billion, would be well worth it in the long run?
The expenditure would be a one shot. It would alleviate the need for these constantly recurring allocations of billions of dollars to care for and educate people who are not rightfully in the United States.
The next time someone tells you we can’t afford the wall, the proper response is — We can’t afford to not build the wall.
Steve Levy, former New York state assemblyman, Suffolk County executive, and candidate for governor, is now a distinguished political pundit. Levy's commentary has been published in such media outlets as Washington Times, Washington Examiner, New York Post, Albany Times, Long Island Business News, and City & State Magazine. He hosted “The Steve Levy Radio Show" on Long Island News Radio, and is a frequent guest on high profile television and radio outlets. Few on the political scene possess Levy’s diverse background. He’s been both a legislator and executive, and served on both the state and local levels — as both a Democrat and Republican. Levy published Bias in the Media, an analysis of his own experience, after switching parties, with the media's leftward slant. Levy is currently Executive Director of the Center for Cost Effective Government, a fiscally conservative think tank. He is also President of Common Sense Strategies, a political consulting firm. To learn more about his past work and upcoming appearances, visit www.stevelevy.info. To read more of his reports — Click Here Now.