Why do you oppose them?

• The crime they don't bring?
• Economic losses they don't cause to citizen workers?
• Economic gains to domestic businesses?
• The contributions to social security & medicare they don't get back?
• Because they're not white?
• Because outsiders are convenient scapegoats for politicians to blame & flex power?

It's important to pin down clear, substantiated reasons.

From The Business of Migrant Detention covering the history of anti-immigration policies & its disparate treatment of white & brown immigrants

ARABLOUEI: OK. If federal government's spending all this money to detain and then deport people and a lot of times they're coming back in the country, and it's not actually achieving anything economically in terms of supporting American workers and it's actually hurting American companies, why? Like, why are they doing this if there's no material benefit to the economy or to protecting workers?

NOFIL: To me, it is a core question of sort of who is an American. Immigration detention's roots are in this moment that is so blatantly racist, that sort of - you know, the Chinese Exclusion Act pulls no punches about what it is doing. It is targeted to a specific group of people. But that is where we get the legal precedents that undergird this entire system today. It is a system that has only really ever, to my opinion, receded. Immigration detention is only really ever rolled back when it is seen as threatening whiteness. And it is a system that has, you know, continually expanded and gained public support by, you know, targeting racialized people, by targeting people who Americans are encouraged to imagine as maybe kind of criminal anyway, right? It is doing political work, and it is doing work that I think is, like, really revealing about how the nation sees itself.

I am yet to hear a justification for opposing illegal immigration that doesn't tie back into racism or racial prejudice, let alone a justification that actually makes sense if you take it apart.

Someone prove me wrong, and I'll change my mind.

I feel like "illegal" immigration as a concept is inherently racist and being upset and anyone for not coming over the "right" way is also racist.

I feel like if you're asking then you're searching for validation. A sort of way to not feel guilty about being racist. Tell me, what bothers you most about immigrants? This country wouldn't exist if it weren't for immigrants

Every time I meet someone who opposes illegal immigration but claims to support legal immigration I ask one question. If the law changed so that all immigration was legal, you'd be fine with it, right?

Nobody so far has been fine with it. I conclude that the question of legality is a dodge for people who are embarrassed about their actual motives.

Not intrinsically, but pretty commonly it is driven by bigotry over culture, religion or skin colour.

You know all the people up in arms over the wave of Ukrainian refugees? Oh wait, there's nothing of the sort? Well, there you go.

It really depends on why you oppose them. There is no real answer to that question.

In the US and many other countries, immigration violations are not crimes. Therefore, those immigrants are not illegal. It is actually a civil infraction, like a parking ticket... So, your question reveals hidden xenophobic bias. That alone is immoral. Is it racist in itself? Probably. It is very difficult to be xenophobic without also being racist.

No

Usually, yes
Because usually the reason they have to be illegal is racist, and the person complaining about illegal immigration is fine with it.

It's racist to use immigration law to maintain a racial underclass. For instance, many essential agricultural workers in the US do not have access to the courts or law enforcement to protect their rights. If a citizen assaults one of these workers, the worker cannot safely report the assault to law enforcement without being punished for doing so.

no.

however, it is racist to oppose them because they're not your race.

No human is illegal

No, but it is racist to assume that a person is an illegal immigrant based solely on their race.

Likewise, i think there is a deeper connection being made, that theres an assumption that an illegal immigrant is a bad person, and i also do not think that is a valid assumption.

To know if a person is a bad person, you have to know the person.

No, race doesn't have anything to do with it.

If you oppose illegal immigration, though, you should ask yourself why.

If it's solely that you don't want people coming over to your nation illegally, then it's very likely that they aren't able to because of how complicated and exclusive your nation's immigration system is.

I wouldn't say it's racist to oppose illegal immigration, but it makes me suspect you might be and also makes me think you have very little empathy.

No, not on it's own, but it's rarely on its own. In the US opposition to illegal immigrants and racism tracks nearly one to one.

One could imagine a country where illegal immigration itself was a distinct problem, where the society was balanced in such a way that legal immigration was at an optimal rate and additional people coming into the country had downsides that outstripped the positives, when though, for example, the immigrants were of the same culture/class/standing as the existing citizens.

The US, on the other hand, is nowhere near an optimal legal immigration rate, even though we benefit pretty significantly from both legal and illegal immigration. Illegal immigrants, for example, contribute significantly to the economy while not drawing 'as many' benefits away. Overwhelmingly the actual arguments against illegal immigration are grounded in cultural differences and language and, to put it simply, the desire for one class to want a reason to consider themselves better than another class by an easily recognizable yardstick.

Nothing makes you more racist than having a legal alibi to hide your racism.

This question reeks of asking if keeping slaves when they were "legal" racist? If it's legal, what's the big deal?

Considering the high proportion of the population with ancestors who were illegal immigrants, there's also a question of what you consider as acceptable.

If illegal immigrants in the US are all white Christian beautiful women filling jobs that locals don't want to do in healthcare, is it different than Pedro from Honduras who works in construction but looks like he could be a drug mule.

YES.

If you're an American, our entire history of immigration legislation is racism bundled on racism following in the tradition of racism. Were it not for chattel slavery and our betrayal of the native tribes our racist immigration laws would be the most shameful part of our history.

And if you're not American, your own country's immigration laws are almost certainly based on either racism or "nationalism", with the latter mostly being a holdover from when "French" and "English" were considered different races.

Unlawful emmigration to a country should be, at worst, a bureaucratic fine and probation. Anything more is simply bigotry in a polite suit.

Yes because this is all land stolen by illegals. Assuming you're in North America. Canada and United States both literally illegally migrated here. No excuse or logic that would make sense that others shouldnt do the same. The end.

Yes.

Just ask yourself why there is even a barrier to entry in the first place. Prejudices and paranoia.

Maybe. Depends. It's complicated.

First off: technically, almost everyone opposes illegal immigration—the issue is whether it should be reduced by deporting undocumented immigrants, or by changing the laws to legalize more of them. (The exceptions who do support illegal immigration as-is are generally employers who exploit immigrants.)

Second: If the current law is racist, then supporting increased enforcement is racist while supporting reform (probably) isn’t. (And I would describe a law as racist if it disproportionately impacts racial minorities when alternative laws with an equivalent effect on public safety would not.)

I worry a lot of it is human trafficking or at least human trafficking lite. A lot of employers really like having employees they don't actually have to pay properly or obey workplace safety and other protections for, and who will be afraid to speak up about fraud and other illegal practices.

But to me that would be easily solved if we only made it illegal to hire people without a permit, but never deport or otherwise penalize the workers. And publicize that heavily. So if you don't have a permit and your boss is abusing you, just call the hotline on the billboard and let us know and we'll arrest them and you can go find another sketchy employer and tell on them too when they piss you off.

No one would be hiring people without permits if there were actual consequences for the employer. We wouldn't be stuck with trying to figure out how to deport people and whatnot. They'd only be able to hire people the law is already protecting as workers. but nobody actually wants to hold rich people accountable for having caused all this trouble in the first place.

yes

It depends on where you are.

e.g. in NZ, we don't have a problem with illegal immigration, but completely legal "temporary migrant workers".

The issue, isn't the people, it's the load on already stretched infrastructure. Because they are "temporary", they are not factored into the calculations for infrastructure spending.

This wouldn't be a problem, if a short team need was being met, but it isn't... There are always temporary workers, because we as a country can't fill all the jobs from local supply.

With birth rates and other immigration, our population growth is around 1.5%, not the 0.5% we target our spending at.

If we spent at a rate that accounted for the real population growth, everything would work better for everyone.