“Here I am with my immigration form
It’s big enough to keep me warm
When a cold wind’s coming
So go where you will
As long as you think you can
You better watch out, watch out for the man
Anywhere you’re going.”

—David Crosby and Graham Nash

Let’s go back about a decade. The American electorate’s dissatisfaction with illegal immigration, which had increased during Barack Obama’s administration, was one of the major factors that propelled Donald Trump into office in 2016. Though Obama talked tough about illegal immigration and took some high-profile (albeit ineffective) moves to stanch the flow for which his own administration was responsible, he was profoundly unsuccessful in addressing immigration in any substantially productive manner.¹

The problem was that Obama and the Democrats were too clever by half when it came to immigration policy. Obama, who saw himself as first in a long line of Democratic succession imagined to last decades, pandered to progressives convinced (despite then irrefutable evidence to the contrary) that new immigrants would likely become loyal Democratic voters, thus ensuring the continuation of the new regime.

Yet the activist Democratic base (along with most of the media), long entrenched in far-left ideology and very resistant to evidence from the world beyond universities and progressive think tanks, met Obama’s attempts to even minimally interfere with their dreams of open borders with criticism, derision, and evasion. On this issue, to them, Obama might as well have been a far-right Republican.

Obama made a grave tactical error in assuming that milquetoast efforts to limit immigration would ameliorate progressive scorn. Instead, it inspired activists and NGOs to leverage their influence over federal agencies and the courts to manipulate the discretion that Obama had granted to agencies dealing with immigration, something that had resulted in a new de facto standard where any migrant claiming some form of persecution was admitted into the U.S. without the capacity to actually investigate the claim. This led to an immediate influx of individuals whose claims were not, and could not be, adequately vetted.

Worse, since these admissions were (ostensibly anyway) legal, these migrants were not illegal. If you claimed otherwise, it might be your ass. “There are no illegals” was both a favored progressive soundbite and a cudgel for cancellation should you, me or anyone else disagree with the Obama DHS version of Catch 22.

Let’s put aside for the moment the fact that not being truthful on most applications is, itself, illegal (ask Donald Trump how that works in real estate valuation). Follow-up with many of these migrants wasn’t possible even without a backlog of cases to investigate because most simply disappeared after walking away from DHS officials. That, too, is illegal.

All of this was encouraged by progressives in order to gain new voters through gratitude when their policies and arguments had failed to persuade existing ones—all other consequences be damned. Sharia law, drugs, crime, and truck drivers who cannot read road signs in English just might be better than things disfavored by progressives, like the plain reading of the First and Second Amendments and a few Republicans in power here and there in the outlands.

To wit. One of the primary drivers of the fentanyl crisis in this country was the open southern border. The left argued that nearly all of the fentanyl and other drugs entering the country came through legal border crossings. This was an absurd argument since one doesn’t know what they don’t know, i.e., how many drugs were not interdicted during massive waves of uncontrolled border crossings.

It’s the same with crimes committed by illegals in this country. Progressives like to vigorously claim that illegal immigrants commit crimes at a lesser rate than citizens. This is prima facie absurd, since they are committing a crime by being here illegally in the first place, and it still fails the smell test even if you factor that out.

Again, one doesn’t know what they don’t know. Since it’s difficult to keep track of illegal immigrants, and since many crimes are unreported in large blue cities where illegal immigrants tend to congregate, how does anyone really know at what rate illegal immigrants commit crimes?

It’s malpractice to claim ownership of facts concerning crimes committed by illegals since there don’t appear to be any. One thing that is certain, however, is that every crime committed by an illegal immigrant, such as murdering a college student out for a run, is a crime that would have been prevented if immigration laws had been enforced and Obama (then Biden) had not allowed “discretion” to be manipulated to open borders.

Trump, on the other hand, has successfully closed our borders to illegal immigration and stanched the flow of illegal drugs that accompanied this—something that both parties assured us was impossible for decades. Finding illegal drugs on our streets has become not only more difficult but also much more expensive. Crime is down and serious criminals are being deported. Truck drivers who can’t read or speak English are suddenly being denied CDLs. All of these are promises kept that helped get Trump elected.

By implementing these measures, Trump defied a diverse coalition of progressives and business interests, who have relied on a flood of undocumented immigrants to satisfy their interests for some time. In a political sense, Trump is entirely unique in this regard. Trump solved a problem that the left and right kicked down the road for forty years because the existence of illegal immigration allowed both sides to satisfy their interests more than fixing the problem would have.

Great Britain and Europe are currently experiencing the consequences of opening borders to unchecked migration and it’s as ugly as it gets. If managed appropriately, immigration from underdeveloped countries can be economically and socially sound. That is not the process that these countries followed. The results are dystopian.

One may imagine that allowing an influx of millions, assumed grateful enough for an economic opportunity to aid in furthering agendas for their interlocutors, works wonders for the cause—but it soon becomes apparent that it can work wonders quite differently than assumed.

In Europe and in Great Britain, massive uncontrolled migration from North Africa and the Middle East has, far from empowering leaders of the nations allowing these migrants in, made them beholden to constituencies they assumed would be beholden to them—and not for the better, as evidenced by rising tensions and challenges in governance that have emerged as a result of these demographic shifts.

Opportunistic acculturation usurped assimilation in Great Britain and Europe. Leaders there don’t own this constituency; it owns them. That’s why a majority of British citizens voted for Brexit back in 2016. They chose a path toward cultural survival over both economic and woke interests, prioritizing their national identity and values in the face of globalization. Good for them.

Here at home, I have absolutely no objection to immigration as long as it is managed in the best interests of those already in the USA. I’m OK with immigrants from nearly every country and most economic circumstances as long as they have the potential to contribute to the American experiment in a useful manner. I do think, however, that we ought to insist on three things from those wishing to join us: a belief in American exceptionalism, a willingness to assimilate (including proficiency in English and social norms common in this country), and a clean criminal record. Oh, and one more thing, the line forms in the rear.

Uncontrolled illegal immigration is perhaps the greatest threat to American exceptionalism in our history. Look no further than uncontrolled grooming gangs in Great Britain and no-go zones for natives in many European cities for a glimpse into our potential future if the Democrats ever regain power.

Associated Press and Idaho Press Club-winning columnist Martin Hackworth of Pocatello is a physicist, writer, climber, skier, motorcyclist, musician, and retired Idaho State University faculty member who now spends his time raising four kids. Follow him on X at @MartinHackworth, on Facebook at facebook.com/martin.hackworth, and on Substack at martinhackworthsubstack.com.