Philip Greenspun’s Weblog

“One Day on the Border: 8,900 Migrants Arrested, and More on the Way” (New York Times, yesterday):

They come from Brazil, Burkina Faso, Uzbekistan, India and dozens of other countries, a moving global village of hundreds of thousands of people crossing the Rio Grande and slipping through gaps in the border wall at a pace of nearly 9,000 people a day, one of the highest rates of unlawful crossings in months.

(“unlawful”? If they claim asylum as soon as they’re in the U.S., isn’t that “lawful”?)

Driven by desperation, families and individuals are pushing across the southern border and past new efforts by the Biden administration to keep migrants waiting until they secure hard-to-get appointments to enter the nation with permission.

They’re not being pulled in by New York and Maskachusetts promising free housing, health care, and food forever, but being driven from someone else.

“If you don’t take risks, you cannot win,” said Daniel Soto, 35, who crossed with his mother on Tuesday after they sold their car, restaurant and house in Lima, Peru, betting their entire fortune of $25,000 on a weeklong journey to the border near Tijuana.

The Newspaper of Truth says that other people are lying…

Many also believe false claims from smugglers and social media that migrants would definitely be able to remain in the United States if they could make it in.

It is absolutely false, in other words, that migrants can remain in the U.S. (except for the 500,000-ish Venezuelans who were recently granted permanent temporary status by a magnanimous Joe Biden). What’s the truth, according to the NYT?

…. others file asylum claims when they face deportation in immigration court, and are allowed to remain in the United States while they wait for their cases to wind through immigration court, a process that can take years. … Some people will not show up for their court proceedings, and continue to live and work in the United States along with millions of other undocumented immigrants. … Some migrants who arrive using the government app are eligible for permission to stay in the country and work for two years, but may still eventually be ordered deported.

“It will work out,” said Diego Santos, a 23-year-old Brazilian who was heading to Philadelphia after being released by border authorities in San Diego. Ahead of him lay the hope of construction work, but also deportation proceedings that he now has to fight. “I’ll do what I can to stay,” he said.

It is false when smugglers say that migrants can “remain” in the U.S. It is true that migrants can “stay” in the U.S., according to the NYT.

Let’s take Mr. Soto, the middle-class Peruvian described above who sold his car, restaurant, and house in order to enjoy the means-tested taxpayer-funded U.S. lifestyle. Suppose that La Migra tries to deport him. What stops him from saying “I am from Venezuela” and, thus, becoming entitled to stay in the U.S. for the rest of his life? If he’s undocumented then the U.S. by definition can’t demand documents from him to prove his Venezuelan origin. If an extremely sophisticated government employee recognizes a Peruvian accent, can’t Mr. Soto say “I am Venezuelan, but spent 10 years as an undocumented immigrant in Peru and picked up a Peruvian accent.”

Separately, note that Peru follows the U.S. state religion. From the government tourism web site, in which the rainbow flag hangs at equal size and height with the national flag of Peru:

(The rainbow flag reminds me to wish everyone a happy Celebrate Bisexuality Day. See also NBC and Planned Parenthood.)

More Irish people live in the U.S. than in Ireland (31+ million says the US Census, compared to about 7 million in Ireland and Northern Ireland). Joe Biden recently granted permanent temporary status to about 500,000 Venezuelans who walked across the open border in the last couple of years (CNN). Haitians granted temporary status in 2010 still have that status (it gets extended every 18 months) and their U.S.-born children are now nearly old enough to get the parents automatic “chain migration” Green Cards. So let’s assume that the same thing happens with Venezuelans, i.e., temporary status becomes permanent in practice and continues to be expanded to cover later arrivals.

Given the assumptions that the Venezuelans keep accepting our invitation to arrive and, once here, keep creating U.S.-citizen children, how long before there are more Venezuelans here than in Venezuelan?

Population is actually falling in Venezuela right now:

And the Venezuelan population in the U.S. is rising (Pew):

(Note that this may not capture the undocumented since they might not want to answer a lot of questions from a U.S. government Census representative.)

The Pew web page provides numbers through 2021, but migration is rising exponentially and more undocumented Venezuelans arrived in 2022 than in all previous years combined (source):

Perhaps we should assume that migration levels off at 500,000 arrivals per year?

Also from Pew:

6% of U.S. Hispanic females ages 15 to 44 gave birth in the 12 months prior to the July 2021 American Community Survey. The rate for Venezuelan females was also 6%.

(Note the hateful language associating “female” identification with the ability to give birth. This from the same organization that publishes “The Experiences, Challenges and Hopes of Transgender and Nonbinary U.S. Adults” and does “deep explorations of the experiences of LGBT and transgender and nonbinary Americans”.)

It seems reasonable to assume that the declining population of Venezuela levels off at 20 million. Humans have more babies when more resources are available and dividing Venezuela’s resources by a smaller population should result in a birth rate high enough to offset the continued exodus to the U.S.

With that assumption, we can simply try to predict when the Venezuelan-origin population in the U.S. will exceed 20 million. For natural increase, let’s use the 3 percent annual population growth rate that Venezuelans had circa 1980 (it might be larger in the U.S. given our provision of taxpayer-funded housing, food, health care, etc.). In other words, births will exceed deaths and amount to 3 percent of the total (this might not be the best assumption given that the migrant population is younger than average because of the physical rigors of the journey).

It’s tough to estimate a population of the undocumented (Yale study), but let’s assume that we have about 1 million Venezuelans here in the U.S. right now. Our model shows that the Venezuelan-origin population of the U.S. will exceed that of Venezuela in 2048. (If you are preparing to criticize my model for its unsupported assumptions and simplicity, keep in mind that this is in complete accordance with Coronascience! See, for example, Coronascientists are the modern Aristotles?)

“Unlawful Border Crossings Are Rising Fast After a Brief Decline” (NYT, September 19):

During President Biden’s time in office, the number of illegal crossings has reached notable highs, exceeding levels seen during a prepandemic influx in 2019 during the Trump administration.

The administration said the decline in unlawful crossings in May and June was driven by new enforcement measures and new legal pathways for people to come to the United States.

Officials have attributed increases like these to several factors, including misinformation spread by the Mexican cartels that traffic drugs and smuggle migrants. Shelter workers, advocates and migrants say that some people who have been waiting months to access these legal pathways have grown impatient and are willing to take a risk.

Even as federal officials signal that there are consequences for illegal crossings, migrants who are given permission to stay in the country temporarily often tell family and friends in their home countries that they made it to the U.S. successfully. Such messages can encourage other migrants to take an often dangerous journey to the United States.

After crossing onto U.S. soil, most migrants turn themselves in to Border Patrol agents, with plans to apply for asylum, instead of sneaking into the country and trying to evade detection.

A few questions… The Newspaper of Record (TM) does not provide any examples of the misinformation that Mexican cartels are purportedly spreading. Are the cartels saying that those who cross the border and request asylum will be released and allowed to stay? That’s exactly what New York Times says is happening:

This influx has strained the capacity of many border facilities where migrants are held for processing by the Border Patrol. And Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers, where many single adults are sent, are running out of beds. When shelters cannot accommodate migrants, authorities start to release them into communities.

“The Border Patrol essentially is releasing people as they process them to decompress their facilities,” Diego Piña Lopez, director of the Casa Alitas shelter network in Tucson, said. “It is leading to street releases all over the place.”

Is it “misinformation” if what the cartels are saying is true?

Also, if low-skill immigration makes existing Americans better off, why would anyone be upset by an increase in what the NYT calls “illegal crossings” (if it is legal to apply for asylum, how can any crossing be “illegal”?)?

Last year, a record of nearly 250,000 people traversed the Darién Gap, a jungle straddling Colombia and Panama, in an attempt to make it to the United States. This year, despite efforts by the United States to curb the flow, that number has risen to 360,000 as of Sept. 10, according to Panamanian authorities.

Why is the U.S. trying to “curb the flow” if immigration makes us better off or if, alternatively, those who are arriving are entitled to asylum and we continue to offer asylum?

Official stats on the migrants who choose to announce themselves to the CBP:

The last line is interesting. The U.S. was officially closed due to coronapanic and yet nearly half a million new Americans arrived and introduced themselves to the CBP officers (plus an unknown number who quietly migrated). Covidians say that we could have eliminated COVID-19 if every American had done his/her/zir/their duty by wearing a mask, staying home except for trips to the “essential” marijuana and liquor stores, etc. But how would a Zero COVID situation have been sustainable when 50,000+ walked across the border in September 2020? (the Federal fiscal year FY2020 ended in September 2020)

Circling back to the main theme of this blog post… what are Mexican cartels saying? What is the procedure for getting them deplatformed or at least demonetized from YouTube, Facebook, and similar services?

Related:

• “Biden administration to offer thousands of Venezuelans temporary protections” (Axios, yesterday): The Biden administration plans to offer nearly a half-million Venezuelan nationals temporary permission to live and work in the country legally, the Department of Homeland Security announced Wednesday night. … Venezuelans currently qualify for TPS if they arrived by March 8, 2021.
• “US again extending temporary protected status for Haitians” (AP): “The Biden administration is allowing eligible Haitian nationals residing in the U.S. to apply for a new 18-month designation for temporary protected status, reversing a Trump administration effort that had sought to end the special consideration. … DHS initially designated Haiti for TPS in January 2010..” (i.e., “temporary” so far has been 13 years)