Immigration Laws and ICE

In response to the video that we watched in class the other day, my main response is concern. This video, on the issues and controversial topics of illegal immigration and the deportation of those immigrants, brings up many hot button questions that do not necessarily have a clear cut answer to them. To put it out there, I will say that I believe that the only reason why there are so many illegal immigrants in the first place is because of how difficult we make it to come to the US legally. Many of these immigrants do not come here with a malicious intent, rather they come here with the purpose of providing for themselves and in many cases their family members because their home is dangerous. I do not see how we can punish people that are simply trying to create a better life for themselves, after all that is the image that America has made for itself regardless of whether or not that remains to be true. We must remember that we are a nation of immigrants ourselves. Secondly, similar to what we discussed in class today, I believe that immigrants (both illegal and legal) are in many ways essential to our economy because they make up the majority of workers in places like farming jobs and other lower pay but equally essential jobs in our economy. On the other hand, I do believe that illegal immigrants that have come here with a malicious intent and have committed a criminal offense should be deported, but even they should get access to a lawyer in court to hear out their case before they are forcibly removed because they could be wrongly accused. Also, the detention centers where people are held need to be severely reevaluated because we should not be allowing places to exist where beatings and acts of rape occur regularly and there is nothing that is done about it except for covering the tracks of the perpetrators. Whether we like it or not illegal immigrants have become a part of our society and community today and the current place of action is tearing people and families apart as we saw in the video. Another topic that was addressed in the video is that many of the children in these families were born here in the US which makes the current issue of illegal immigration even more controversial. I do not claim to have any answers to these hard and complex questions, but I do believe that the system in place at this point in time is not the most efficient or just way of going about things.