Summary
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez warned that Trump’s mass deportation policy could lead to labor shortages and higher grocery prices.
Experts say agriculture, construction, and healthcare will be hardest hit, with farm output losses estimated between $30 and $60 billion.
Deportations could cost the U.S. economy up to $88 billion annually.
AOC argued that immigrant labor is vital to economic stability, urging Congress to pursue immigration reform.
I understand higher food prices is rough for the general public, but I’m struggling to find a reason we shouldnt deport illegal immigrants. I’m concerned that illegal immigrant labor is akin to H1b or prison labor, where the worker has diminished rights and is abused more than other groups.
Why are democrats or people in general in favor of illegal immigration?
I don’t disagree with you, and I think that’s why people call for immigration reform. We need to look at what we want to do about immigration as a nation.
One thing I’ve never understood from democrats perspective is that there is a reason to control how many people can immigrate to ensure the country can support those people.
What I’ve never understood about Republicans is why go after the immigrants and not the companies hiring their labor. Make the penalties brutal for hiring illegal immigrants and youll solve many issues with immigration.
Did it occur to you that even with the diminished rights and abuse, they still chose to immigrate? And that they still wish to stay?
You’re not protecting them by deporting them. If you want to protect them and help the economy, give them a path to citizenship so that they can continue to work essential jobs while receiving the labor protections of citizens that - oh, whoops. Those protections are being threatened too. Almost like the people doing the deportations have no interest in protecting people and are actively harming them.
I understand illegal immigration benefits the immigrants, thats a ridiculous point to feel the need to make. I’m asking why as a country, a state, or a community anyone would want illegal immigration. Legal immigrants are great, no problem with them.
Right now people are freaking out because Trump has doubled arrests for illegal immigrants. Okay, so why’s that bad? People bring up higher prices, and my response is that I dont want low prices if it depends on slave labor. How is the price of goods more important than how we treat other people?
If those illegal immigrants could come her legally they would, they dont prefer breaking laws. Just because they can’t make it here legally does not mean they are entitled to be here anyways. Americans wouldnt promote illegal immigration to another country, so why would they promote it tk their own?
In the hope they become legal, productive members of society. Would that not help all parties involved?
Not when you’ve got over 350 million people and the world’s most expensive health care.
And when you have one of the largest land masses on the planet, and some of the most valuable natural resources, and a declining birth rate and increasing childhood mortality, and the cost of your health care is entirely caused by artificial scarcity… hm. Maybe the problem isn’t immigrants.
Country full huh?
Are you specifically concerned about illegal immigration, or just immigration in general? Because if it’s the former, that’s a silly distinction because the government (we the people, aka Elon Musk) decides what is illegal or not. If the next wave of politicians decides we should have actually open borders, then there would be no such thing as “illegal immigration”.
Do you have specific examples in mind where immigrants are exploited? If you do, look at those examples and ask yourself: “could we pass laws to protect these people from abuse?”, and you’ll find that the answer is obviously yes.
Maybe your definition of “abuse” is that they need to work harder to earn less? Well, that’s the society we live in. Capitalism has its problems, but it has worked good enough for us for the past 248 years. For the immigrant, US minimum wage is likely far better than whatever they received in their home country, and I suspect most would happily take that deal. I think that’s what they’d call “the American dream”, as their children will be able to go to school and have a better future than they did.
…If your issue is with immigration in general, then I don’t know what to tell you. That’s entirely opinion based, and nobody knows what the correct answer is (despite what they might claim). 100% open borders has risks, 100% closed borders has risks.
I guess I’m just silly for thinking breaking laws to get into a country is a bad thing.
Bro did all the thinking for you and you still can’t grasp it smh
Right, he made the great point that maybe we could pass laws to protect people we dont even know are in the country. That makes a lot of sense. Illegal immigrants are a protected class now!
I’m frustrated that everything trump does gets misrepresented to the point where people are just shouting random fears into the void. Apologies for refusing to jump to conclusions like the rest of the circle-jerkers on this platform.
I am opposed to quite a lot of what trump does but kicking people out of the country who didnt arrive legally isn’t one of them, because I simply can’t think of a reason why people who broke into the country deserve the right to stay.
You lack empathy. And you need to understand that you are only a victim here for being a sociopath, not for simply discussing trumps actions.
And you lack a coherent response, unless you think name-calling is effective. Good thing all of you taught my why I was wrong.
So you don’t care about immigration, you only care about the “illegal” aspect of it? Does that mean you’re pro-immigration reform, so that more people can immigrate to the US without “breaking laws”?
I seem to remember there’s a word for people who feel that all laws must be followed no matter how unjust. I think it starts with an F.
I have no issue with people immigrating legally.
Good to know! I also hate illegal immigration, which is why, at least on this issue, I’m voting for democrats for the foreseeable future. The republican party is hell bent on increasing the amount of illegal immigrantion in this country, and I just can’t support that. Of course, the dems would never go so far as to eliminate illegal immigration completely (by adopting open borders), but I’m confident they’re at least more open to finding a middle ground that makes most people happy.
You know what a “false dichotomy” is? If no, this is a beautiful example. Immigration reform is an entire world of options, “deport all the brown people” and “open borders and free subsidized piñatas for everyone” aren’t the only options like you’re presenting here.
The programs that work get killed because they require companies to pay on the books and at a reasonable rate and provide certain protections which effects company profits.
Nobody likes being told to stop exploiting something when they’ve been doing it for years…
This, I find most of people’s problems with “The Left” are based on their failure to understand what a False Dichotomy is
I had a friend of mine tell me that he didn’t support Democrats or Republicans because he felt the options were “I can vote Right and get politicians who wanna kill black people, or vote Left and get politicians who worship black people like Gods!”
and I had to be the one to tell him, that no one is out here worshiping black people as gods.
Well, maybe fans of Morgan Freeman in reference to his role as God in Bruce Almighty, but even then that’s just one black guy and not all black people.
He tried to say that “Some Leftists do…”, but ultimately he caved and realized how silly his claim was…
I still can’t get him to vote, though he claims he supports Democrats as a lesser evil option…
Which doesn’t really matter because he doesn’t fucking vote.
You literally avoided my whole question. Why do you want illegal immigrants here? I’d think youd want them here legally rather but maybe I’m just crazy. Is it just mean to deport people? If I was in Canada illegally and they arrested me and sent me back to the US, I wouldnt think Canada was a shitty country for it.
I addressed the premise of the question because it’s fundamentally flawed, any direct answer would have to tacitly acknowledge those flaws as valid or be intellectually dishonest.
Left-wing people aren’t in favor of “illegal immigration”, they are in favor of immigration reform.
Not the person you initially responded to, but my understanding is that even with immigration reform we’ll still have legal and illegal immigration. In the country we’ve had fairly strict immigration policies for over 100 years.
I don’t think the democrats want open borders, so what happens to the illegal immigration debate after reform?
And what do we do in the meantime while we dont have immigration reform? Pretend we do and ignore laws?
You know what a “false dichotomy” is? If no, this is a beautiful example. Immigration reform is an entire world of options, “deport all the brown people” and “Ignore all the laws” aren’t the only options like you’re implying here.
This is a very, very old topic. What have we been doing, before it was politicized into a fiery hot-button issue? What, historically, have we been doing that is effective?
I never implied those are the only options. I only specifically said I have no issue with deporting illegal immigrants, which is what’s currently happening. Why should we permit illegal immigrants to stay in the country and/or attempt to gain legal residence?
It sound like a lot of people are upset that if we get rid of our indentured servants and slaves, then we won’t be able to afford all the useless shit we buy constantly.
You very much did, and you very much are continuing to present hyperbolic examples as reasonable interpretations.
An illustrative but lazy counterpoint might be: Why aren’t you more comfortable with putting immigrants in concentration camps? Don’t you see how open borders would harm this country?
I’m exaggerating how? I stated that illegal immigrants are currently being deported, and then asked why that would be a bad thing. And apparently the answer is that the question is framed unfairly?
If you can’t answer the question I dont know why you keep replying.
Let me rephrase: trumps current executive orders have led to double the amount of illegal immigrants being arrested as before. Why is this bad for the country?
If you dont want to answer the question, feel free to reply but I likely won’t answer you again.