How Many ILLEGAL Aliens Is Enough?

The illegal immigrants, by whatever name or label they’re called, keep on coming. Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York scoffed that “America was never all that great.” He took it back only after he was inundated by several days of outrage and by the thousands who arrive every day having argued with him with their sore feet.

Lonely singles and entire families make the grueling journey from the miserable lands they leave behind. It was ever thus. According to the Department of Homeland Security, 9,258 illegal-immigrant families were detained by U.S. agents along the southwest U.S.-Mexican border in July, down a trifle from the 9,434 detained in June and 9,485 detained in May.

But those are mere guesses, some more educated than others. No one knows for sure what the accurate number would be. The arrest tallies raise a serious question that needs not only to be asked, but to be answered. Public policy on immigration, legal and otherwise, must be based facts, not guesses. The figure most often cited and widely accepted is that there are 11 million or a little more illegal aliens now residing in the 50 states. The 11 million or slightly more figure was arrived at through analysis by demographers at the Pew Research Center, extrapolating from estimates of two U.S. Census Bureau surveys, the Current Population Survey and the American Community Survey.

Both surveys ask respondents where they were born and whether they’re citizens but not whether they’re here legally. Pew refers to the illegals not as “illegal” or even “undocumented,” but as “unauthorized.” Pew calculates that the 11 million figure has been unchanged since 2007. The nonpartisan Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) rightly cautions that the accuracy of any head count of illegals is compromised, “given that illegal aliens have a motive to lie about their immigration status, in order to avoid discovery.” No one keeps track of the “out migration,” not even of the liberals who loudly promised to leave the country if Donald Trump were elected. The numbers of those having fled the Donald are believed to be small.

Read the rest of this Washington Times editorial HERE.