The left (and I include many in the GOP) has been successful in conflating immigrants and illegal aliens.
The immigration system isn’t broken, millions have used the path to citizenship that we already have.
It’s those who ignored that path that are illegal aliens and the refusal of the government to enforce the laws that are the real problem.
They do that purposefully as an obfuscation tactic and one that gives the typical legal Hispanic some distress at attitudes that are falsely contorted to denigrate them personally.
It’s a despicable tactic and we are allowing the lexicon of the narrative to be bastardized in favor of liberals who only want votes without consideration of the impact.