illegal immigrants

My opponent has not offered any rebuttals to my arguements, and nothing but a borderline rascist opening statement to argue off, i'll continue attacking the problems of illegal immigrantion within the United States on my terms. Illegal immigration now makes it extremely diffiuclt for legal immigrants to enter the USA! (1) For centuries not just decades, the Canada/US Border was a friendly place. Canadians wishing to drive over to visit friends, do some shopping, or even spend a few months could do so with relative ease. In fact, as long as you declared your reasons for visiting you could walk across the border! Especially the St.Stephen New Brunswick/Calais,Maine border. (1) Now, to fly from Canada to the USA you need a passport. By September, 2008 you will need a passport to drive over the border; along with your drivers license. Permanent residents of Canada have it even harder. Just two years ago, a permanent resident of Canada could just drive over the US border by showing a drivers license, now they need to show a PR card too. (1) The main reason why illegal immigration is unfair is because illegal aliens are a burden to taxpayers for several reasons. For instance, illegal immigrants are typically entitled to free social services. For example, hospitals and emergency rooms are obligated to treat all patients even if they can not or do not pay for it. Illegal aliens can receive welfare checks and food stamps. Sometimes, governments assist illegal immigrants with job searches and transportation to jobs. The children of illegal immigrants, who are often also illegal immigrants, are entitled to education thus overcrowding schools and decreasing the quality of the education. Furthermore, it is perceived that illegal immigrants do not pay any or as much in taxes compared with legal residents, thus they should not receive free social services. In truth, illegal aliens do pay at least some of the taxes that regular citizens and legal immigrants do pay. The actual statistics and numbers of what is not paid are impossible to calculate. (2) Furthermore, illegal immigrants are attributed with job losses for legal residents especially for lower income jobs. In addition, higher crime rates are also sometimes associated with illegal aliens. Illegal immigration is even unfair to the illegal aliens, since they are politically and economically restricted. And finally if and when illegal immigrants are caught, these illegal aliens could be sent to jail and/or deported from the country, again at a cost to the taxpayers. (2) Here are Ten Reasons Why (3): 1. Illegals working in many industries - not just those who do cleaning jobs - will work for far less than legal citizens, causing unfair competition for businesses that DO obey the law and employ only legal citizens. 2. Illegal immigrants are often paid under the table. This is tax fraud and it costs the U.S. Taxpayer billions each year - billions that are made up for in higher taxes for everyone, including corporate taxes. 3. Illegal immigrants are often not fully trained in U.S. safety standards, and frequently do not understand enough English to read printed safety regulations, causing a hazardous work environment. 4. Legal immigrants and the working poor are often most hurt by illegal immigrants who drive down wages in traditional low-wage jobs, which may cause a spike in increased need for welfare and unemployment benefits. 5. A vast majority of illegal immigrants do not pay any state or Federal income taxes. This has put a strain on local, state and Federal governments and has caused business taxes to rise to help maintain infrastructure such as hospitals, roads and schools. 6. Illegal immigrants are unlikely to report theft, corruption, harassment and abuse by other employees, because they fear being turned into immigration authorities, causing unsafe or illegal practices in your workplace to go unreported. Being unaware of these abuses can significantly increase your legal liability. 7. Illegal immigrants may be deported or otherwise return home at any time. That could cost business owners like you all the time and investment you put into training those workers. 8. A Federal raid on your business by immigration authorities that subsequently discovers illegal employees, and the resulting negative publicity that would cause to you and your business, isn't worth it. 9. Hiring illegal immigrants sends a signal to your employees and customers that you condone cheating and support the exploitation of other human beings. Do you? 10. Obeying Federal laws regarding hiring only legal citizens is the ethical thing to do. Behind many of the nation's millions of undocumented workers are someone else's documents. To get a job, illegal immigrants need a Social Security number, and they often borrow one. As victim Melody Millet is fond of saying, U.S. citizens are being forced to share their identities with undocumented immigrants to give corporate America a steady supply of cheap labor. (4) Thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands of Americans are right now sharing their identities with immigrants and don't know it. It is the dirty little secret of the immigration issue: By not dealing directly with the undocumented worker situation, the U.S government is actually encouraging identity theft. In fact, one can argue that the origins of the identity theft epidemic can be traced to the immigration issue. (4) The scope of this problem is vast. Every year, nearly 9 million people pay their taxes using the wrong Social Security number. The name used on W-2 tax forms used by employers doesn't match the name on file with the Social Security Administration. There can be many reasons why -- a data entry typo by a human resources department, a woman changes her name after marriage and forgets to report it, or a man uses someone else's SSN to get a job. (4) When it comes to the impact of illegal immigration, terrorism must be at the top of the list due to its potential to directly harm the greatest number of Americans. It is worth noting that three of the four terrorist pilots in the 9/11 attack were in the country illegally. 9/11 was a precursor. The next big incident could be far greater and kill many more Americans. (5) A recent Homeland Security report, A Line in the Sand: Confronting the Threat at the Southwest Border, reports that in 2005 at least 850 people from countries of "special interest" were apprehended crossing the southern border. How many more successfully crossed is unknown. How many actual terrorists have crossed is unknown. We do know, however, that they are there - see Al-Qaida Operative Nabbed Near Mexican Border. (5) By the way, "countries of special interest" is government-speak for terrorism conducting and sponsoring countries. (5) As can be seen from the aforementioned studies and references, many illegal aliens are not your casual immigration violating, ID theft committing, law breaker. Many are recidivists – a.k.a. career criminals, like Juan Leonardo Quintero, who was deported after being convicted of indecency with a child, but who later came back and then just recently killed a Houston cop in cold blood, leaving a widow and five now fatherless children. (6) In conclusion, i'd like to state that my many sources (and her lack of) shows that illegal immigration is currently a problem within the United States. Vote for Negative. Citations: (1) http://www.helium.com... (2) http://www.philforhumanity.com... (3) http://www.scribd.com... (4) http://redtape.msnbc.com... (5) http://www.usillegalaliens.com... (6) http://www.usillegalaliens.com...