Mr. President, This Is Your Moment to Shine.
Fix Our Broken Immigration System!
Immigrants crossing the Rio Grande into El Paso, Texas
I’ve read two e-magazine articles in the past six or seven days on a “downside” of President Trump’s success in stemming the flow of illegal immigrants through the southern border by simply closing it.
The downside, according to the reports, is diminished agricultural production and construction projects and a dearth of workers in all sorts of service industries, from hotel housekeepers to farm and construction laborers, carpenters and landscapers, nursing and elder-care aides, babysitters and nannies.
This surprised some supporters of Trump’s border policy who had expected that for every illegal immigrant who was taken out of the US labor market, two able-bodied, native-born citizens would be there to take on the work.
That didn’t happen.
Ordinarily, foreign-born workers make up a significant portion of the labor pool in at least a half-dozen economic sectors, and it has always been true that a significant percentage of those foreign-born workers were working without proper documentation.
Stemming the Flow
Biden’s open-border policy was an unmitigated disaster from almost every point of view. Inflation went up, wages didn’t follow, crime rose in every sector but white-collar crime. At least that’s what we thought until the Somali multibillion-dollar rip-off of state and federal taxes was exposed. The biggest expense, however, was the cost of providing social services to more than 10 million uneducated, destitute, and in some cases corrupt and criminal migrants who were welcomed into the border states and then transported by federal trains and planes to targeted cities all over the States. The ostensible aim was to allow for an orderly integration of those immigrants. The real reason was to reshape the electoral demographics of the country by beefing up the population of immigrants/Democratic voters in key voting battlegrounds.
Although the mainstream media did an amazingly good job of completely ignoring the largest shift in US demographics in more than 100 years, the conservative media was putting equal time into exposing what was happening and reporting on any and all crimes and misdemeanors committed by immigrants after they were not just allowed to enter the country illegally, but were then assisted in getting relocated with transportation, housing, and a full range of social services for free.
Gradually, the disturbing news stories about rising crime and the tens of billions of dollars the government spent during those four years reached the awareness of non-partisan voters and “undecided” voters – and poll after poll revealed that most Americans were increasingly opposed to what the Biden administration was doing. That’s why, at the beginning of 2025, the mainstream news and open-border advocates dropped the argument they had been making – that the US is a nation built by immigrants – and switched to claiming that shutting down the border was an extremely complex and cumbersome project that would take years and many billions of dollars to accomplish.
But then, when Trump took office in January of this year, he shut it down completely in less than a month.
What I found interesting about that was not that Trump did it so quickly, but that the mainstream media and the Democrats didn’t have anything to say about it for the first few weeks. It was almost as if they were never in favor of bringing millions of undocumented immigrants into the US, and that their opposition to Trump’s border policies was more about hating Trump than it was about loving immigrants.
I wonder how long those weeks of stillness would have lasted. Perhaps long enough for both sides of the aisle to pass a common-sense border policy? But then ICE happened, and here we are.
Trump has never listened to my sage advice on matters of foreign and domestic policy. In fact, he hasn’t even asked for my advice, even though he keeps emailing me to say what a great American he thinks I am.
If he asked me now, here’s what I would tell him…
My Unsolicited Advice
Mr. President: Your accomplishment in closing the border so completely and so quickly is a triumph that nobody can deny. And although I understand how and why you appointed ICE to reverse Biden’s ballot-stuffing scheme, it’s equally hard to deny that it has resulted in several unintended consequences that have not just lowered your approval ratings among moderate voters, but have allowed the mainstream media to divert the public’s attention from matters that are more important and more urgent.
For one thing, nobody is paying attention to the massive nationwide scam that has robbed as much as $20 billion from the pocketbooks of American taxpayers. This story was and should be the story of the year, because it unmasked the corruption in Minneapolis and other cities that has been largely engineered by the Democrats for more than 50 years.
I know your instinct is to keep pushing forward with using ICE to clear the jails in sanctuary cities of the criminals – mostly violent criminals – that are being protected from deportation by governors and mayors who have made careers of opposing everything you say and do. But if you can put that effort on hold for a few months, you will have an opportunity to accomplish something that no other president has been able to accomplish in the last 50+ years.
I’m talking about putting together bipartisan support for a common-sense border policy that I believe the entire country – even voters, politicians, and media people with severe TDS – will approve of.
The policy itself isn’t complicated, as I’ll explain in a moment. The big problem is getting bipartisan support for it. And the good news is that you are in the rare position – even with all the hatred and divisiveness in America right now– to get it done.
And that is because we know from the history of politics since the early 1970s that almost every major political change did not happen with the presidents that were thought to be aligned with those changes. On the contrary, they almost always happened because of the actions taken by a president representing the other side.
Consider the reforms that reshaped American life over the last half-century. Overwhelming civil-rights legislation was passed under President Lyndon B. Johnson, a Texan conservative who nonetheless marshaled his own caucus to do something many in his party opposed. President Richard Nixon, to the astonishment of many, opened diplomatic relations with China. President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, signed welfare reform that alienated many liberal activists. These presidents acted not because the issues were simple – they weren’t – but because the political conditions allowed solutions that transcended the usual partisan gridlock.
Immigration has never received that kind of treatment. The familiar talking points have persisted not because they were right, but because they served political ends. Republicans warned that large numbers of low-skill immigrants would depress wages for native workers. Democrats focused on the sentimental narrative that the country was built by immigrants, a phrase that, while true in certain historical contexts, is a poor guide for 21st-century policy. By focusing on generalized slogans, both sides avoided grappling with the actual economics of labor supply and demand.
The economic reality that Washington refused to confront for decades is quite simple. American industries have long depended on immigrant labor in sectors where native-born workers are scarce. Men fill jobs in agriculture, construction, warehouses, and food processing plants, while women are disproportionately represented in domestic work, childcare, and elder care. These jobs are essential to the functioning of many communities, but they are also physically demanding, often seasonal, and not attractive to most Americans seeking upward mobility. The data back this up. Persistent labor shortages in precisely these sectors are repeatedly documented in federal workforce reports, especially in construction and agriculture, where vacancy rates consistently outpace the national average.
Because we never built a large-scale, enforceable system of temporary work visas tied to real labor demand, immigrants have often entered unlawfully and remained here in legal limbo. They came with an intent to work, and many did so quietly and productively. But without a lawful mechanism to govern their entry and departure, they lived under perpetual fear of detection, deportation, or permanent separation from their families. That created a shadow workforce, unmonitored and outside the protections of law, and laid the groundwork for exploitation and public resentment. This wasn’t chaos because of unwilling workers. It was the predictable outcome of a labor market without legal pathways.
This gets us back to where we began. During the first two years of Biden’s term of office, 7.8 million illegal migrants were stopped at the border, given a “report yourself voluntarily sometime in the future,” and then released into the United States. In addition, roughly 1.5 million “got-aways” seen by surveillance were never apprehended.
That’s a total of 9.3 million illegal immigrants let into the country. By 2023, independent research estimated the unauthorized immigrant population at approximately 14 million, the highest in US history. And that figure, too, does not include the got-aways.
Your announced goals began to slow illegal immigration the day after you were elected, and by the time you took office 13 months ago, illegal immigration was already slowing to a crawl. Last month, the Census Bureau and independent demographers reported the first net negative international migration in decades – meaning more people were leaving the country than entering it. Dept. of Homeland Security figures show that in a single year more than 2.5 million unauthorized immigrants departed the United States, including approximately 1.9 million voluntary self-deportations and more than 600,000 formal removals.
What if you announced tomorrow that you were forming an advisory board of Republicans and Democrats to come up with an immigration policy that made common sense by not just allowing but encouraging and assisting half a million or more immigrants to come into the country to help American businesses do the jobs they are meant to do?
You could do that because all the people with TDS who have been opposing you would be forced to agree with it.
The outlines of a sensible system are not complicated or fuzzy. They are clearly visible to anyone who understands the facts about immigration and wants the US to have a program that will benefit everyone involved – our industries, our workers, our government, and even the millions of immigrants who would love nothing better than to spend time in the US, doing work that they are happy to do.
What would a common-sense border policy look like?
1. You would implement a large, enforceable, and temporary work visa program. A program that matches labor demand in specific industries with labor supply from abroad. These visas should be time-limited – typically three to nine months, depending on the job – digitally tracked, and tied to clear exit requirements. A system like this would give employers confidence that they can find the workers they need, give workers legal protections, and reduce the incentives for illegal entry.
2. At the same time, you would expand your plans for increasing legal immigration for skilled workers – doctors, engineers, researchers, and entrepreneurs – through a merit-based track. A large body of economic research shows that high-skill immigrants contribute disproportionately to innovation, productivity growth, and fiscal health. Countries that attract global talent tend to outgrow those that don’t. Strengthening this pathway is not ideological, it’s strategic.
3. You would make it clear that you want the new policy to deal humanely and efficiently with the existing unauthorized population.
This is something you have already begun doing. Look at the numbers: According to most of the sources I found, your “self-deportation” idea has worked amazingly well, with 1.9 million voluntary self-deportations since you announced it.
That is an amazing number. And you did it not only by offering self-deportees a ticket back home and a thousand dollars. They went home because the prospect of getting caught and being sent back was unattractive. And because part of the deal was that if they did self-deport, they would be able to apply for legal immigration status as soon as they got home.
The cost of that program was much less than the cost of forceful deportation. Formal removals often cost governments more than $17,000 per individual, whereas modest incentives to leave voluntarily cost a fraction of that.
Imagine if you raised the ante to $2,000. Or $3,000. Or even $5,000! It’s quite conceivable that we would see 5 million or even 10 million foreign-born nationals who are living in the US now take the option and return home.
Americans, at their core, think practically about issues like these. When asked whether they are willing to financially support or house illegal migrants in their own homes, many answer no. That reaction isn’t rooted in cruelty, but in a common-sense understanding of order, community, and personal responsibility. A legal system of immigration that respects sovereignty, enforces rules, and matches labor needs to economic demand is more likely to earn lasting public support than one that keeps borders porous and policies vague.
I’m not a psychologist, Mr. Trump, but I do remember you saying that your greatest wish was to be remembered as “the most loved” US president of all time.
That’s a high hurdle – especially considering the amount of irrational hatred half the country has for you. But minds can change. Especially when conditions change for the better. You’ve secured your legacy as perhaps the most anti-war president we’ve ever had. And you are on your way to cleaning up the multitrillion-dollar scams that have plagued our government for decades.
Getting a bipartisan immigration-reform policy passed would be another monumental achievement that nobody will be able to deny.
You have already accomplished something your political opponents said was impossible – restoring control of the border. Now comes the next challenge: turning that control into a constructive, lawful system that works for Americans, for workers, and for the nation’s future.
You can do it!
At this moment in history, only you can do it. It can be another great part of your legacy – another part of the challenge you gave yourself: to make American great again!
Sources
* US Customs and Border Protection, Monthly Operational Reports, 2025
* US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Outlook Handbook and Job Vacancy Surveys (2025)
* US Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Reports on Border Security (2024)
* Pew Research Center, Estimates of Unauthorized Immigrant Population (2023)
* US Census Bureau, Population Estimates and International Migration (2025)
* US Department of Homeland Security Annual Enforcement Report (2025)
* US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Cost-of-Removal Data (2025)
* US Dept. of Justice Press Releases on Fraud Prosecutions Including Feeding Our Future Cases (2024)
Just the Facts
Border Crossings and Encounters
Federal records show border encounters have collapsed from crisis levels in the early 2020s to numbers unseen in decades, creating the conditions for law-based reform.
2021-2024
* Border encounters: ~7.8 million
* “Got-aways” (not apprehended): ~1.5 million
* Estimated net increase: 3.5–5 million
* Total unauthorized population (2023): ~14 million
2025-Jan. 2026
In 2025, Border Patrol recorded ~238,000 border crossings, lowest since 1970. And last month, federal records recorded zero illegal border crossings.
Self-Deportation and Enforcement Costs (2025)
Financial incentives for lawful departures are significantly cheaper than detention and forced removal, suggesting a fiscally pragmatic policy tool.
* Voluntary departures: ~1.9 million
* Enforcement removals: ~600,000
* Cost per formal removal: ~$17,000+ per person
* Cost per voluntary departure program exit: ~$1,000–$2,000
Share of Workers Who Are Foreign-Born (2024)
Agriculture: 44%
Construction: 30%
Landscaping: 46%
Housekeeping: 38%
Meat Processing: 37%
Childcare: 22%
Research from the National Academies of Sciences (2017) found that immigration has small overall wage effects, but can have negative wage impacts for native-born workers without high school diplomas.
Fiscal Impact on States and Cities
New York City alone projected spending over $12 billion between 2022 and 2025 on migrant housing, healthcare, and related services. Chicago and Denver reported similarly significant unplanned expenditures.
