2 - If there wasn’t cheap immigrant labor available to work the fields, slaughterhouses, resteraunts, janitorial positions, etc those jobs would not simply dissapear into thin air. The employers would be forced to raise wages and improve working conditions to attract local workers and the living conditions of poor and working class americans would be dramatically improved. That’s a fact, you don’t have to like it but you can’t ignore it. We live in a market-based economy, you can’t just wish the market away or pretend it doesn’t exist. This is a function of capitalism. If you like capitalism you have to accept it.

3- patterns of seasonal migration from mexico through the southwest pre-date the mexican-american war and go back to the time when the southwest was part of mexico. thinking those patterns can be stopped by building a wall is just stupid. The actual result of the tightening of border control has been to INCREASE the number of illegal immigrants in the US. Since the costs and erisks of entry are so much higher it takes a longer stay to make it worthwhile, so now - instead of coming and working for a year and then going home - people from mexico and elsewhere come, find a job, and stay. and then invite their friends and relatives to come too. So border control has actually made the situation worse and is the real reason why the illegal population has gotten so incredibly big in the last ten years.

4 - The people who gain the most in a climate of mass illegal immigration are the owners of the business that violate the law & exploit and abuse people seeking a better life. That’s why the government hasn’t - and probably won’t - take serious action to resolve the issue. Illegal immigration is good for business and bad for working class people, and the government is far more interested in protecting the interests of business then they are of protecting poor people of any nationality. By framing the issue as “immigrant rights” wealthy people co-opt leftist rhetoric to protect a fundamentally right-wing agenda that enriches a minority at the expense of the majority. The actual “illegals” are being used and manipulated as pawns.

4 - The people who suffer the most are the immigrants who spend decades living in fear and uncertainty working obscene hours in obscene conditions. The other big losers are poor americans, especially african americans (who used to perform the low-wage jobs but are now suffering from chronic unemployment).

5 - so this IS an issue of class and race, it’s just that most of the so-called radicals have their analysis completely backwards. Fighting for the rights of poor people and supporting immigrants wouldn’t mean supporting continued mass immigration through amnesty programs, it would mean putting in a system where seasonal migration is allowed and regulated and where businesses that hire illegal immigrants face MUCH stiffer penalties. Like maybe all their assets are seized and sold at auction. That would dry up the demand for illegal labor in about 10 seconds flat - and with no jobs to attract them the people who are coming here would stay at home and contribute their ingenuity, intelligence, and work ethics to build up their local economies. And maybe even organize to overthrow the despicable puppet governments that the US has set up in their home countries.

Let’s also not ignore the fact that a great number of immigrants are here paying taxes, even with fraudulent papers. Taxes like Social Security and Medicare that there are not going to be able to get back. They are contributing to a system that most experts agrees would be bankrupt in a couple of decades and therefore helping the retirees to keep collecting their retirement money. Funding a Medicare system than less than 1% of them use (Yes, you are right they don’t have a right to use any of it, but they still funding it for people that have the right to use it like you).

I’m sorry about your experience with Identity Theft but I think you portray your situation like something Hispanics do in a daily basis. Identity-Theft is the fastest growing crime in America, almost 10MM people suffered last year. If you do a little research you would find no many people reported being abused by Hispanics. If you are so certain of who did it to you, turn them in to the police. Don’t just complain, act on it.

America was founded by immigrants. We took them when we need it and now we are just going to sit and look the other way until somebody else find a solution to this problem. This is not the way we were taught. We need to find a solution that is fair to the legal immigrants here and to the American citizens and at the same time that’s fair and humanitary to the people that’s here illegaly, becuase they are here only because we allow them to came here and stay, because we wanted our cheap salads, our affordable houses, our nice home improvements, economic child care, affordable house cleaning, cheap service. Yes, we are responsible for the situation too. We have a need that the market took care of fullfil and now we need to deal with it. Just remember that before we send them back home we need to figure out who we are putting out there on the field to cover all those jobs, because believe me, most of these jobs are the ones you wouldn’t take.

I’m from Marin County and I see the recent raids challenged by the ACLU…because a boy 6 yrs old was caught up in the immigration raid of an illegal alien from Mexico who received deportation orders and didn’t leave. Well, the parent knew this and knows he’s here’s illegally, knew he received a deportation notice - where’s the surprise? I question the responsibility of such a parent who knows he’s here illegally and chooses to stay, breaking the law and not making arrangments to go home.

Sorry, my compassion is with American citizens (who are burdened by the depletion of social services, hospitals, education by illegal aliens who are lawbreakers; Americans who see their wages being driven down by looking at their paychecks and/or seeing their jobs disappear)…. and victims like myself who was targeted in a retail store when I wrote one sole check so I know the who, I know where, my ID was handled by an Hispanic manager which resulted in the theft of my ID, a drive by of my house by four latino men who came to my house, then returned driving slowly looking for my mailbox. All the money was stolen by my “impersonator” who went into two out of town Banks and took it all, leaving me without funds to pay my real estate taxes; I was asked to leave the Bank for fear it would happen again. After hearing fake documents are $50 and a half hour’s drive away and the Sheriff changes his credit card numbers every 6 months, I closed most of my charge accounts, lowering my credit rating. Now a year later, I got a call from a thickly accented Hispanic man to my unlisted, unpublished number - he wouldn’t give me his name nor leave his number, he wanted to discuss my medicare.

I’m grateful to finally hear I.C.E. is in the area and shame on Mayor Newsom for going out of his way to re-declare SF as a sanctuary city…..Mayor Newsom thinks he’s excused from obeying the law, circumventing the law - picking and choosing which laws he’s willing to obey. I hope San Franciscans stand up to him and show him who’s paying his salary.

Thanks.