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This post’s title was shamelessly stolen from a sign I saw at a recent reproductive rights protest.
Katie Britt is running in the primary for the 2022 United States Senate election in Alabama on a pro-freedom, small-government platform. But on immigration, Britt veers decidedly big-government. She wants to finish building Trump’s border wall to stem the tide of drugs, crime, and national security threats from undocumented immigrants.
Britt also supports cutting the number of legal immigrants we allow into the country by half, restricting diversity visas, and restricting birthright citizenship to the children of citizens and immigrants who entered the U.S. lawfully. She believes immigrants drive down Americans’ wages and supports government mandates requiring all employers to use E-Verify.
So how well do these claims stand up to scrutiny?
Evidence that undocumented immigrants increase crime and threaten national security is thin and shoddy. A large and growing body of evidence shows the opposite. Most immigrants come here to work and stand to lose more than native-born Americans by committing crime. Last year, the Cato Institute released a new study showing that both legal and undocumented immigrants are significantly less likely to commit "just about every type of crime," including homicide, sexual offenses, and larceny. “A burgeoning collection of analyses throw cold water on the notion that immigrants pollute communities with crime,” Billy Binion wrote for Reason.
As for illicit fentanyl, the vast majority in the United States is made in China. While some may come via Mexico, experts aren’t sure how much. We do know that CBP data showed that last year saw declines in seizures of cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine among border crossers.
As for national security, most experts agree that a wall will have little impact on national security or illegal immigration. The vast majority of undocumented workers don’t use the southern border. A 2018 Catp study found that authorities have apprehended seven terrorism suspects after entering the US illegally. All came through Canada.
The idea that immigrants drive down native Americans’ wages is perhaps the most widely discredited of Britt’s immigration beliefs. “Decades of research have provided little support for the claim that immigrants depress wages by competing with native workers,” wrote Giovanni Peri, Research Fellow at the University of California, Davis. An analysis from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine found immigration levels have “small to zero effects” on native wages. Cato found the same. For Alabama specifically, there’s compelling evidence that immigration is neutral-to-good for native-born workers.
Not only does immigrant labor increase economic growth and lower food prices, but immigrants’ lower average wages can also help curb inflation.
Pervasive worker shortages are disrupting supply chains and business operations and raising costs for companies and consumers. Limiting immigration will only exacerbate these challenges.
Britt wants to force all employers to use the federal government’s intrusive and unreliable E-Verify system to help ensure all workers are documented. This huge intrusion into private companies’ hiring doesn’t square with her small-government ethos. Like most big government programs, E-Verify is expensive, glitchy, and creates a significant Fourth Amendment threat. As the ACLU pointed out, E-Verify gives the government the power to grant or revoke your right to feed and clothe your family.
Perhaps most importantly to Alabama voters, we should look at how Alabama’s last attempt to severely limit the supply of foreign workers impacted our state. HB 56 cost Alabama billions in lost GDP. One study estimated Alabama lost more than $130 million per year in tax revenue alone. The labor and tax revenue losses hurt pension funds, forced business to close, and raised prices. The law is such a failure that the legislature has spent the years since its passage quietly dismantling it.
A border wall is an expensive and wasteful big-government boondoggle. Immigrants crossing the southern border pose no measurable threat to national security. Immigrants are not to blame for fentanyl or crime. E-Verify will only increase the size and scope of government while creating hassles for employers. Cutting legal immigrantion by half will only harm Alabama.
Katie Britt might be a great candidate with good ideas on other issues. But when it comes to immigration, it’s time for her to be honest about the situation. Immigration isn’t harming Alabama. Big government is.
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