In America, the core problem is mostly racial hysteria driven by conservative media. No one in MAGA world even talks about the 271,000+ Ukrainian refugees.
The other component is that the process at the Southern border is underfunded and has been for decades. There’s no appetite to fix it in Washington and there hasn’t been for my entire adult life. Both sides use it as a bargaining chip and then it inevitably becomes a campaign issue where compromise is impossible.
So, whereas a situation like more organized refugee resettlement allows — actually requires — the refugees to find work and housing (usually) within 6 months, even people obviously fleeing violence entering from the South have to go through an interminable and labyrinthian legal process to prove they aren’t secretly economic migrants.
If we had a functioning legal immigration system, this wouldn’t be an issue. If we had enough judges and facilities at the southern border to process asylum requests in a timely fashion, this wouldn’t be an issue. But to many in Congress, a “crisis” at the border is more valuable as something to demagogue than solving problems. (That was most evident recently when Republicans insisted border funding be tied to Ukraine aid and then reneged on the deal because — and they were quite open about this — Trump wants to campaign on immigration and they don’t want Biden to have an election year victory.)
In America, the core problem is mostly racial hysteria driven by conservative media. No one in MAGA world even talks about the 271,000+ Ukrainian refugees.
The other component is that the process at the Southern border is underfunded and has been for decades. There’s no appetite to fix it in Washington and there hasn’t been for my entire adult life. Both sides use it as a bargaining chip and then it inevitably becomes a campaign issue where compromise is impossible.
So, whereas a situation like more organized refugee resettlement allows — actually requires — the refugees to find work and housing (usually) within 6 months, even people obviously fleeing violence entering from the South have to go through an interminable and labyrinthian legal process to prove they aren’t secretly economic migrants.
If we had a functioning legal immigration system, this wouldn’t be an issue. If we had enough judges and facilities at the southern border to process asylum requests in a timely fashion, this wouldn’t be an issue. But to many in Congress, a “crisis” at the border is more valuable as something to demagogue than solving problems. (That was most evident recently when Republicans insisted border funding be tied to Ukraine aid and then reneged on the deal because — and they were quite open about this — Trump wants to campaign on immigration and they don’t want Biden to have an election year victory.)