Offering guest-worker status to either group, at the very least, will do nothing at all to reduce border-jumping. Hopefully we can agree on that much.
And if, for the sake of argument, we do make the distinction you're talking about, the distinction would have to be between those who come before this program is enacted, and those who come after, is that not right? Since no such program has yet gone into effect, everyone who's currently jumping the border would fall into the "before" category. Each time this proposal is floated, therefore, especially by someone as high-profile as the President, it gives encouragement to foreigners to continue jumping the border. These facts can not be denied.
I think people who are looking for an easy answer (eg., build a wall between the US and Mexico) are deluded. There are many ways to get here, and I've already mentioned many of them. Border control is only one part of it.
But it is a part of it. I don't see how it can reasonably be denied that closing the land border to unauthorized entry will substantially reduce the number of people who can get into the country illegally each year.
No, we don't agree. I think the people we really would like to have here are the ones who would choose a legal way to get here if they could. The problem is that it has been many years since there has been a legal way. Guest worker status would allow us to sort out the ones we want from the ones we don't.
Right now, border crossers are both the "good guys" and the "bad guys". A guest worker program would reduce that to just the bad guys.
And if, for the sake of argument, we do make the distinction you're talking about, the distinction would have to be between those who come before this program is enacted, and those who come after, is that not right?
Yes. That's why I think the guest worker program has to come before, or at least at the same time, as a border control program. People who have a choice between legal status and illegal status are in a different category than people who have no choice (other than to stay in poverty in their homeland)
I don't see how it can reasonably be denied that closing the land border to unauthorized entry will substantially reduce the number of people who can get into the country illegally each year.
People who can get here legally will prefer doing it that way. It will be much easier to find the ones who can't.