The Astronomical Costs of Illegal Immigration Escalate

“Anchor babies” sink public school funding

(Photo by Qian Weizhong/VCG via Getty Images)

Recent reports that so-called “anchor babies” (children born in the US to illegal parents) are consuming as much as 25% or more of public school resources further support conservative positions that legal and illegal immigration must be better controlled. As political conflagration in Los Angeles erupts literally in torched vehicles, increasing numbers of American Independent voters are joining conservatives in opposition to open borders. The monetary toll on public schools from anchor babies has grabbed the limelight as a monumental economic drag despite Democrat gaslighting that “all immigration is good.”

A Giant Sucking Sound?

America’s swelling underground population of illegal immigrants, ushered in either deliberately or negligently by the Biden administration, has created two classes of residents – illegals who often receive more money in benefits than native-born citizens, and taxpayers who foot an increasingly unbearable economic tab for the former. The flood of immigrants has created a housing shortage and pushed up rents and home prices.

That’s just housing. The costs of immigrants enrolled in public education are crushing state budgets nationwide and driving up property taxes, an astonishing socialist wealth transfer accomplished without a single representative vote.

The very term “anchor babies” is rooted in the concept that foreigners aspiring to live the American dream seek to gain a foothold or “anchor” here through giving birth to a child. Liberal writers and NGOs widely condemn the phrase as disparaging. Yet, a poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation reported “about three in four (77%) immigrant adults say they moved to the U.S. for a better future for their children.”

Seeking the Right (or Left) Words

It is an apparent trend of post-modern times that one cannot call things what they are. Violent riots and looting are called “peaceful protests,” immigrant gang members are “asylum seekers,” men in drag are “women,” and children born in the US to illegal immigrants are only to be called “US citizens.” Any descriptive moniker, even grounded in poll-measurable facts, is verboten.

Whatever descriptive term one applies to children born in the US to illegal immigrants, a rose by any other name is, in this case, still a daunting economic burden. The Federalist recently reported:

“…as much as one-quarter of U.S. public school enrollment could be anchor babies, meaning children with at least one parent illegally present in the United States. This alone amounts to at least $145.6 billion in public resources diverted from U.S. citizens every year.”

Immigration Burdens Escalating

The effort to gaslight Americans into unquestioning acceptance of an increasingly unbearable economic drag does not change the impoverishment of working taxpayers by utopian spending that ignores balance sheets. If this is not a deliberate effort to destroy the nation, it is simply a delusional road to fiscal Hell paved with good immigration intentions.

Much of the political debate is hinged on an assertion by unhinged Democrats that children of illegal aliens are automatically “birthright” citizens, and any discussion of their drain on public resources is discriminatory. This is a tactic designed to silence discussion of the very real impacts of this now-rampant immigration problem.

Anchoring a Legal Definition

Ann Coulter explained where this false claim of citizenry arose in a 2010 commentary at Human Events:

“Democrats act as if the right to run across the border when you’re 8 1/2 months pregnant, give birth in a U.S. hospital and then immediately start collecting welfare was exactly what our forebears had in mind, a sacred constitutional right, as old as the 14th Amendment itself.

The very author of the citizenship clause, Sen. Jacob Howard of Michigan, expressly said: “This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers.”

And then, out of the blue in 1982, Justice Brennan slipped a footnote into his 5-4 opinion in Plyler v. Doe, asserting that “no plausible distinction with respect to Fourteenth Amendment ‘jurisdiction’ can be drawn between resident aliens whose entry into the United States was lawful, and resident aliens whose entry was unlawful.”

Whatever legal or linguistic niceties one seeks to employ to shroud the nature of the phenomenon, the real-life impacts of immigration and children born to immigrants are becoming undeniably evident. Pro-immigrant Center for Immigration Studies notes:

“There are 55 public school students per 100 immigrant households, compared to 33 per hundred in households headed by the U.S.-born.

“The lower income of immigrant households likely creates challenges for schools in some areas because tax contributions generally reflect income levels. As a result, immigration can cause a significant increase in enrollment without a corresponding increase in tax revenue.”

The Center lists numerous districts with extremely high percentages of immigrant students, including 96% in Elmhurst and South Corona, New York City, N.Y., 87% in Northeast Dade County, North Central Hialeah City, Fla., and 83% in Los Angeles County (Central), Los Angles City, Koreatown, Calif. These statistics serve as a national roadmap showing where the encouragement of illegal immigration by the Biden administration has impacted communities the most.

The Plyler v Doe precedent will likely be challenged by states seeking to limit the tax burden inflicted on local schools by runaway immigration and obstruction of ICE. Tennessee is contemplating a bill (HB 793/SB 836) that would “allow school districts to charge tuition to, or ultimately deny, undocumented students.” As the riots and mayhem of Los Angeles pervade headlines and agitate partisan divisions, the nation cannot avoid addressing whether it will one day be compelled to throw out anchor babies with their fiscal bathwater.

(Originally published in Liberty Nation News.)