It makes no sense. Granting citizenship is a gift, some say our greatest gift to others. But not giving a gift is not the same as punishment. You are simply choosing not to improve their lives over what they would normally experience. But if you want to be charitable to these children, thats another animal altogether. But its not punishment. Lets tone down the liberalspeak.
What hogwash, if a child receives the same treatment that his/her parents receive for a crime then that sounds like punishment to me.
But that punishment is rarely worse than deportation to where they came from and at best it is staying illegal in the most prosperous country in the world which is much better than south of the border.