> I feel insulted when people praise illegal immigrants

Look carefully at what is being "praised". Few are praising their decision to become illegal immigrants, instead they're praising their children's academic and developmental accomplishments in the face of adversity (anxiety about being deported, likely a poor socioeconomic background, et cetera).

I'm a green-card holder myself, and I do not share your anti-illegal-immigrant stance. I believe in fully open borders and complete freedom of movement of goods, labor and people: Schengen is testament to this. I got my EB3 green-card literally because I have a piece of paper (my BSc degree certificate) - but I know many people who have a greater work-ethic and intelligence than myself who decided that university wasn't for them, or they were unable to go to university for other reasons, and that means they're automatically ineligible for the same privilege I had. While EBx green-cards are largely meritorious they still exclude many "worthy" people.

I hate the "I worked hard to immigrate" argument because I believe the opposite is true: provided you meet the preconditions prior to even applying for the visa you're almost guaranteed a shoe-in: in my case I already had my degree, all of my immigration paperwork was handled by my employer and corporate sponsor, all I had to do was accept a job offer, do my job for 3 years, and wait. No adversity or "hard work" here. My contemporaries from India and China have a minimum 10 year wait for their EBx green-cards, largely for political reasons - clearly they will have to "work harder" for longer than me for the same privilege, how is that fair? Other LPR categories require less hard-work to obtain: marriage and family-based green-cards, or investment-based (literally: buy a green-card for $500k). I'm curious, what "hard work" did you perform that permits you to put yourself on a pedestal above those doing thankless, underpaid, back-breaking agricultural labor?

> To me this is similar to parents robbing a bank and giving children 100K and government is saying "oh, don't punish children for parent's crimes so go ahead and keep those 100K, it's ok". They should be deported and blame their parents for it, not the government.

I'll concede that your analogy is valid - if extreme in its implication. If you agree that copyright infringement isn't theft, then I don't believe illegal immigrants are necessarily "stealing" anything from their new country - they're competing in the open, free market for their labor. There's a whole other debate to be had about what's involved there that I won't get into.

But in short: there are masses of people, willing to undergo hash conditions, to work in the USA - it would be a massive economic mistake not to capitalize on that. It's why Germany was so keen to take in many refugees from the Middle East: you have workforce-aged people entering the country for free: Germany didn't have to pay for their education (including elementary/Primary education) or prior health - allowing them to be employed immediately (subject to the same labor and wage conditions as indigenous workers) will only boost the economy - even if they're "unskilled" workers. If they're willing to trek across Europe, they're willing to go to a trade-school or get certification in the native language.

I also take exception to your conclusion that deportation should be the only and immediate consequence of immigrating illegally. It's dogmatic and reeks of "zero-tolerance" policies this usually thoughtful, reasoned and nuanced community strongly oppose. Nowhere did I say that illegal immigration should somehow go "unpunished" - hence my suggestion for a retroactive taxation-to-citizenship as one possible solution to the problem. Your proposal is analogous to advocating that anyone who commits assault should be shot dead by their victim - while it is a victim's right in Stand-your-ground Law states when applied broadly it's utterly thoughtless; your school of thought places arbitrary nationstate borders above our shared humanity.