The United States should adopt a more relaxed immigration policy with Mexico.

Response to my opponent's objections: 1. Immigration policy does not discriminate on legal or illegal aliens. It encompasses both categories. 2. We are debating the following: "The United States should adopt a more relaxed immigration policy with Mexico." Mexican immigrants come both legally and illegally; as such the resolution permits a discussion of both. Rebuttal A. The point of relaxing or immigration policy is to use the $113 billion dollars that illegal immigrants currently cost tax payers for better purposes. What those purposes are, I cannot say -but it seems absurd to waste money keeping people out when you can benefit from allowing them in. At present, taxpayers are unnecessarily overburdened with the task of keeping out a viable labor source at the expense of the opportunity cost of the prospective economic growth a relaxed immigration policy would yield in addition to the tax dollars we waste annually in pursuit of securing our borders. "Yes, lessening the intensity of the restrictions for legal immigration, meaning citizenship or guest workers." -We are not talking about citizenship, or guest workers any more than we are stipulating employment policies for immigrants of any variety. This is only a debate over wether we should lessen the intensity of our current immigration regulations. The purpose of this debate isn't to determine how we would implement a "relaxation" of our immigration policy, only wether we should or should not entertain the possibility. Once we decide wether our immigration policy merits reform or not we can then move to a discussion of what, specifically, that reform may be. The prospective implications of relaxing our immigration policy serve as cause to reform; the policy itself is the means to the end we intend to effectuate. At present, we only discuss wether we should relax our immigration policy -not how we would do it. B. If the purpose of my opponent's refutation is to demonstrate how relaxing our current immigration policy would be harmful on a conceptual level, I encourage him to more clearly articulate his points in pursuit of that end and stray from a discussion of the implementation of the policy as stipulated by the resolution. C. Immigration has a positive impact on the US economy. My opponent has offered no substantive evidence to the contrary. Citizenship is not at issue because a relaxed immigration policy would only allow workers to enter the United States, not necessarily obtain citizenship. C1. The point that I was making with regard to Mexican immigration is that we already unduly discriminate against mexican immigrants more than we do immigrants from any other country. In consideration of this claim, I would ask my opponent to turn on the news and listen to any news caster or politician describe Mexican immigration. They all oppose it vehemently, championing the cause of border security with no purpose other than to pander for votes from a non-minority electorate. That we built a fence and have border patrol officers guard the length of the US-Mexican border is proof enough that we treat mexican immigrants differently. (We don't afford the same level of intensity to the canadian border, for sure). The Accordingly, to treat them just as we would immigrants from any other area of the world would be a good start because all people are created equally -regardless of nationality. C2. Blue collar jobs are currently decreasing because the cost of labor is dictated by a minimum wage. Workers who wouldn't necessarily be bound by such regulations (or ought not to be) could revamp our manufacturing base (which this country desperately needs). As to any sort of entitlement of natural born citizens to jobs because they "had them to begin with" I would ask my opponent to consider what happens when companies outsource their manufacturing plants. Where the cost of production is too high to remain competitive in an open market, companies go elsewhere to cut costs -and then who looses? The entire town. When the manufacturer leaves town a primary source of tax revenue is eliminated, people loose all jobs, and no one benefits. I would rather loose my job to go to someone who was willing to work for less than me than loose the company to outsourcing. Besides, wages ought to be set by market value anyway -not by government regulation.