Bad Samaritans | Part 5

Part 5. A CRISIS OF PERCEIVED CORRUPTION AND PUBLIC TRUST

When President Reagan signed into law the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, its offer of amnesty to several million illegal immigrants was meant to be balanced out by definitive border security measures. The immigration amnesty was supposed to occur once – on the condition that it would never happen again, and the conditions that had led to it would be cut off.

“The American people, in my mind, will never accept a legalization program unless they can be assured this is a one-shot deal and that this is it, this is a one-time occurrence,” Republican Senator Alan Simpson said at the time, reflecting on the bill he co-sponsored. “And the policymakers in this country are not going to allow it to happen again and will prevent the situation which gave rise to it.”  

If this was what the American people accepted, it was not what they got. Nearly 3 million people gained legal status through the 1986 amnesty – but instead of diminishing, the illegal population of the US steadily increased throughout the 1990s and eventually quadrupled to around 11 million people during the 2010s. 

In President Biden’s first three years, a further 5 million illegal immigrants are believed to have either escaped border agents or been released into the country by them, bringing the current possible total to more than five times the figure once deemed acceptable for a one-time-only amnesty. 

Under President Biden and Vice President Harris, the Democratic Party continues to work toward another mass amnesty – while offering only weak assurances of increased border security, and no claim that this proposed amnesty would be the last one. 

Understandably, such proposals have failed to become law. Among Republicans and even some Democrats, there is a growing understanding that it is absurd to offer amnesty on terms that will ensure a continued increase in the future illegal population. 

Biden, however, has made it clear that he considers amnesty to be a foregone conclusion and a mere formality. In 2014, as vice president, he told the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce that he already considered the country’s illegal population to be “American citizens.” 

“You know, 11 million people live in the shadows. I believe they’re already American citizens,” the future president stated. 

“These people are just waiting, waiting for a chance to contribute fully. And by that standard, 11 million undocumented aliens are already Americans, in my view.”

Kamala Harris, for her part, has supported federal health care for all illegal immigrants in the US, as well as decriminalizing illegal border crossings.

“I’m a career prosecutor. I’ve personally prosecuted everything from low-level offenses to homicides … I know what a criminal looks like who’s committing a crime. An undocumented immigrant is not a criminal,” Harris said in 2015. 

The simplistic views of Biden and Harris do no justice to the serious problems raised by illegal immigration, as we have highlighted in this report: issues such as patriotism and nationhood, impact on the wider world, the priority of citizens, the rule of law, and the prevalence of fraud.

It is dangerous to be governed by those who can simply brush these concerns aside.

All this is bad enough, and yet there is a further problem: an emerging crisis of public trust and perceived corruption, fueled by the Democratic Party’s radical “Shift To The Left On Immigration.” 

Many Americans now suspect that Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and other Democrats are pursuing a deliberate strategy of mass illegal immigration and amnesty – without seriously trying to break this cycle – for corrupt reasons of partisan advantage. 

Donald Trump voiced their concerns in the June 2024 CNN debate – when he alleged Biden “wants open borders,” possibly in order to “pick up those people as voters.”

When combined with radical leftist identity politics, a long-term strategy of illegal immigration and mass amnesty could conceivably expand the Democratic voting bloc into a permanent electoral majority. 

Our purpose here is not to say whether this theory is true or false. While there is indeed legitimate cause for concern, there is perhaps not enough information in the public record to be sufficiently certain and avoid the sin of rash judgment in such a serious matter. 

By the same token, however, it would also be rash to simply dismiss the suspicion that illegal immigration and amnesty proposals have become a corrupt political strategy for the Democratic Party. Such a concern is sadly reasonable. 

If true, such legal and political corruption would be among the gravest offenses in public life, as confirmed by the teaching of the Church. 

As the Compendium of Social Doctrine teaches: 

“Among the deformities of the democratic system, political corruption is one of the most serious … It compromises the correct functioning of the State, having a negative influence on the relationship between those who govern and the governed. It causes a growing distrust with respect to public institutions, bringing about a progressive disaffection in the citizens with regard to politics and its representatives, with a resulting weakening of institutions … Political choices [come to] favor the narrow objectives of those who possess the means to influence these choices and are an obstacle to bringing about the common good of all citizens.”

While we cannot say whether the theory of illegally importing a new Democratic voter base is true or false, we can state that such corruption would be gravely contrary to Catholic doctrine and the common good. 

Indeed, the appearance of such corruption is already a serious problem in American public life, which should be addressed as such. 

That is to say: if the Democratic Party is not trying to use illegal immigration for corrupt partisan ends, it should make a major course correction in both policy and rhetoric. 

If Democrats are serious about refuting this suspicion and regaining public trust, they should abandon their party’s current toxic combination of reckless border policies and divisive identity politics. For it is essentially this combination that has caused many people to suspect Democrats want illegal immigration, to flood the country with their future voters. 

It would be good for the country as a whole if our two major parties could agree on certain basic principles: for instance, that a government should put its own citizens first; and that those citizens are first and foremost “fellow Americans,” not victims or oppressors in a neo-Marxist narrative. 

But if Democrats continue to give the impression of inviting the world across our border, while simultaneously turning American politics into a race-and-class struggle, they should accept their fair share of blame for the crisis of public trust now overshadowing the country. 

Either way, no course correction can be reasonably expected under Joe Biden, or his chosen heir apparent, Kamala Harris. 

For them, cooperation with the cartels is tolerable, the rule of law is optional, illegal immigrants come before Americans, the flood of false asylum claims is no major problem – and a growing suspicion of importing voters can simply be stigmatized, never addressed. 

In their eyes, a homeland with borders becomes President Biden’s vague “idea.” Or, worse still, the raw material of Kamala Harris’s nightmarish “dream” for America.

About the Author: Benjamin Mann is a Byzantine Catholic and has written for several publications including Catholic News Agency, Catholic Exchange, and Real Clear Religion.

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