Now that the Covid 19 relief package has been passed and signed what is next?  I know a lot of people will scream the economy but let’s wait and see how the relief package works first. Some will say our crisis is at the border. Well, we have two crises at the border, one is people wanting to get into this country legally and then there are people trying to get in illegally. One of our problems is that we like to lump both of those together when they are two separate problems. Now to think about it, maybe there are three separate problems: asylum seekers, illegal immigrants and the racism that always has followed.

Asylum seekers are people who want to enter our country legally. Let’s just say they are people that are asking us for help. They are asking us to help them get a better life. The problem is there are just too many of them and they are overloading the system. We are not the only country with this problem at the border.  Is that the fault of Biden? Is that the fault of Trump? The answer to both is “no”. Immigration has been a problem that has been debated for decades in this country.  It isn’t new that immigrants are discriminated against. The Irish were. The Italians were. I grew up in Kenosha, Wisconsin and we had a huge Italian population. The city north of us had a larger black population. One of the jokes I remember from my youth is, “Why did Racine get all the Blacks and Kenosha get all the Italians?” They then would say, “Racine got first choice”.  That is not only a bad joke, it was also discrimination. I always find it interesting when I hear a grandchild of immigrants complain about immigration, even though without immigration they wouldn’t be here.  

Today’s asylum seekers are no different from those of past generations. They all want the American dream. Now from a religious standpoint it is hard for me to understand the argument against asylum seekers. Mary, Joseph and Jesus had to seek asylum in Egypt. It is right there is the Bible. 

Now I live in Florida now and everywhere I go there are immigrants. They are cooking my food at restaurants, they are cutting the lawns, and they are working construction. I wonder what the Florida economy would be without them. I would be willing to bet that we would be a lot worse off if immigrants were not here. 

Now asylum seekers are coming to our door and asking to be let in. They are not the ones here illegally. Now some people always envision some dirty Hispanic sneaking across our border as our problem of illegal immigration.  Most of our illegal immigrants come into this country by some other means. Building a wall was never the answer. Building a wall was just, in my opinion, a monument to racism.  It is America’s thirst for cheap labor that has caused a lot of our illegal immigration problems. We always focus on the illegal immigrant but not the people that are profiting from it. As long as people are getting rich off of illegal immigrants there will always be a problem. You want to stop illegal immigration you must stop the people getting rich off it.