ATTRITION THROUGH ENFORCEMENT WORKS!

Attrition Through Enforcement Works!
  
NumbersUSA believes that state and local involvement in immigration matters will have three important effects:
  • It will send a strong message to illegal aliens that there are consequences for violating our laws and encourage them to leave communities, which will make jobs available for unemployed and underemployed legal residents and reduce governmental costs.
  • It will create a cascading effect under which other communities, faced with an influx of illegal aliens and the accompanying costs, crack down as well leading illegal aliens to eventually self-deport.
  • It will send a strong message to Congress and the Administration that the American people will no longer accept the status quo, so they should assist in the effort to rein in out-of-control immigration or be prepared to be voted out of office.

We know that Attrition Through Enforcement will work because it is working now.

The principle idea behind Attrition is that through all kinds of federal, local, government and private efforts, living illegally in the United States becomes less and less satisfactory for foreign nationals. Instead of the taxpayers paying large sums of money to deport them, the illegal aliens buy their own bus and plane tickets back home.

We know this will work because it is working now even under rather moderate pressures. It appears that around 200,000 settled illegal aliens are self-deporting each year.

The federal records for the most recent year (1999) show that 183,000 settled illegal aliens left the country on their own that year. NumbersUSA agrees with those other experts who believe that mandatory workplace verification, mandated federal cooperation with local police and several other increased enforcement efforts could quickly raise the annual self-deportation figure to a half-million and then more.

It took 20 years to create an illegal population of more than 12 million; it may take at least 10 years to substantially reduce that number. But every year of a half-million to one million self-deportations will discourage further illegal migration from their home countries and will steadily improve the quality of life for Americans living in the communities with the declining illegal population.

People Who Left the Ranks of Illegal Aliens in the Most Recent Year of Official Record

183,000 Self-Deported
152,000 Amnestied (allowed to adjust to legal status within U.S.)
63,000 Removed by Federal Authorities
27,000 Died
456,000 Total

Imagine how many more illegal aliens would self-deport and how many less new ones would come in the future, if our government would stop giving amnesty to any of them.

And imagine how the self-deportation would increase still further if the deportation (removed) number were to go up only by a modest 60,000.

Then, imagine what would happen if most jobs in America simply were no longer available for illegal aliens because all companies but the shadiest in the underground economy were doing computer checking of the right to work.

Source:
Office of Policy and Planning, U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service
See Table C on page 10
  
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