Our "Big Daddy" Immigration Policy

Today marks the 19^th anniversary of the release of the movie “Big Daddy.”  While not originally intended to serve as a thought provoking allegory for problems faced by the Federal government, the movie has some interesting metaphors for United States Immigration Policy.

The movie focuses on Sonny, played by Adam Sandler, whose girlfriend, played by the rare Hollywood conservative Kristy Swanson, dumps him because she does not think he has stepped up to the plate and embraced adulthood; citing his decision to live off a court settlement rather than look for a real job.  Not long after he gets dumped, a five-year old boy named Julian shows up at Sonny’s apartment.  The boy’s mother can no longer take care of him and she sent to him to Sonny’s apartment so he could live with Sonny’s roommate, the boy’s biological father, who has just embarked on an overseas trip.  Initially hesitant to take care of the child, Sonny thinks that introducing Julian to his girlfriend will help him win her back, only to discover that she has already started seeing a much older man. 

After his plan of winning back his girlfriend fails to pan out, Sonny decides to try and get Julian reunited with his mother, only to discover she has died of cancer.  While he waits for a foster home, Sonny takes care of Julian relying on some unorthodox parenting methods best described as “laissez-faire.”  Towards the beginning of the movie, Julian wets the bed.  Rather than actually solving the problem by changing the sheets, Sonny instead decides to cover it up with newspaper; which creates a whole new set of problems.  As he tries to go back to sleep, he cannot sleep because Julian keeps rolling over on the newspapers.  Also, the newspaper did nothing to remove the stench of the urine.

Sound familiar?  The United States of America can trace many of its problems with the immigration status quo to the 1986 amnesty bill officially known as the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 or the IRCA, and sometimes referred to as The Simpson-Mazzoli Act.  Congressional leaders ensured the American people up and down that the amnesty would only apply to a narrow group of people and that it would serve as a one-time solution to a problem that Congress would instantly work to address; namely an insecure border.  The amnesty did nothing to solve the problem of uncontrolled illegal immigration into the United States.  Many of the people who received amnesty brought in their relatives under our “chain migration” system, which gives preference to immigrants who already have relatives living in the country, regardless of whether or not their presence in the country will serve as a net positive to the economy and social fabric of the country.   Many people who did not receive amnesty under the IRCA ended up running to the courts, complaining that the amnesty did not apply to them.  The courts complied, meaning that the number of people who actually received amnesty under the IRCA far exceeded the number originally intended in the original bill.  Or did it?

Throughout “Big Daddy,” Sonny continues using newspapers to clean up Julian’s “messes,” including spilled milk and vomit.  Similarly, many people in the United States Government appear to have learned absolutely nothing from the 1986 amnesty. According to Numbers USA, the Immigration and Reform Control Act served as a blanket amnesty to roughly 2.7 million illegal immigrants.  Subsequent amnesties passed in 1994, 1997, 1998, and 2000; leading to the legalization of approximately 6 million illegal immigrants.  Leaders in both parties have attempted to shove through two amnesty bills since the most recent amnesties passed in 2000.  The McCain-Kennedy Act of 2006 and the Gang of Eight bill in 2013 would have given amnesty to even more illegal immigrants, sending a signal to those living south of the border that if you make it to the United States, the politicians will feel bad for you and give you amnesty.   

So the American people confronted the political establishment in 2016 for their failure to get immigration under control, the same way Julian’s teacher confronted Sonny in “Big Daddy,” scolding him for teaching the boy bad habits such as tripping skaters with sticks, and peeing wherever he wants to.  The American people elected Donald Trump President, a man who had not ever held public office and began his Presidential campaign by highlighting all of the problems caused by illegal immigration.    

The lecture from Julian’s teacher in “Big Daddy” prompted Sonny to change his parenting style.  The discussion on immigration has not surprisingly continued into the Trump Presidency; after all his intention to combat illegal immigration made Donald Trump stand out in a field of sixteen other candidates in the Republican Party. Unfortunately, it does not look like the political class has learned its lesson the same way Sonny learned about the error of his ways in “Big Daddy.”  More than a year after the inauguration of President Trump, construction on the wall has not really started. 

 

Some of the President’s advisors attempted to convince the President construction on the wall can only get started if he gives amnesty to the roughly 800,000 illegal immigrants brought to the country as children who President Obama shielded from deportation under an executive order known as DACA.  In an effort to get Democrats on board with his immigration priorities earlier this year, President Trump proposed increasing that number to roughly 1.8 million.  The effort failed; the Democrats could simply not bring themselves to support any proposal that actually reflected the President’s immigration priorities (i.e. building the wall, ending chain migration and the diversity lottery, which Chuck Schumer had previously supported), even if it meant amnesty for the DACA kids that they supposedly care so much about.    

As the debate about immigration heated up last week, the House of Representatives held a vote on the Goodlatte bill, the lesser of two evils that House Leadership agreed to vote on in an effort to shut up the amnesty squishes pushing for the discharge petition.  Thanks to “no” votes from 41 House Republicans, the bill failed to pass. Most conservatives on the Freedom Caucus decided to give the bill a chance, obviously seeing it as far superior to the “compromise” bill.  Most of the “no” votes came from Republicans who signed a discharge petition that would have forced votes on a series of immigration bills against the wishes of House Leadership and/or wrote a letter to House Speaker Paul Ryan encouraging him to hold a standalone vote on protection for the “Dreamers.”      

Democrats suddenly become fiscal conservatives when it comes to national security; citing the high costs of the wall and the construction of more detention centers.  Wouldn’t it make much more sense to make it so that we don’t need to build more detention facilities?  The wall requires a one-time payment of $25 billion while the transfer payments that American taxpayers hand over to illegal immigrants right now totals more than $100 billion according to the Federation for American Immigration Reform.   

Back to “Big Daddy,” Sonny uses the kid as a pawn to pick up girls in the park, similar to the way many illegal immigrants use children as pawns to allow them to remain in the United States.  Unfortunately, many adults who claim to have a biological relationship to the child they have brought with them have outright deceived the Federal government.  A Senate report found that the Obama Administration placed illegal immigrant children in the hands of human traffickers claiming to have relationships with the children, many of whom ended up sending the migrant minors up to Ohio to work on an egg farm.      

The “Big Daddy” analogy also applies to other areas of public policy as well. Rather than pass a budget that will last the whole year, the Federal government has spent the past several years funding the government for months at a time with continuing resolutions; basically the equivalent of covering it up with newspaper.  

As Milton Friedman pointed out, “It’s just obvious that you can’t have free immigration and a welfare estate.”  The establishment fails miserably to realize this. Most of the 10,000 unaccompanied minors and roughly 2,000 family units who have crossed our southern border illegally come from Central America, meaning that they first have to travel through Mexico.  The parents of many of the unaccompanied illegal immigrant girls give them birth control pills because they expect them to get raped on their journey.  Does the United States Government really want people to make this dangerous journey?  Considering the fact that Mexico has nine US consulates and one US embassy for those legitimately fleeing political violence to take refuge in, many of the recent arrivals at the Southern border have come to the United States to take advantage of our government benefits.  Employers who have already enslaved many politicians in the Republican Party will all too happily take advantage of them.  They learned from the 1986 amnesty and the government’s continued obsession with giving illegal immigrants amnesty that most United States politicians and their allies in the mainstream media are suckers for sob stories who have become “all talk” when it comes to securing the border.

Back to “Big Daddy,” Julian keeps demanding that Sonny play a tape of his favorite song, “The Kangaroo Song,” which he always listens to after his nap, despite the fact that Sonny would rather watch the hockey game.  Julian keeps uttering the phrase “Kangaroo Song” until Sonny gets tired of his whining and finally gives in.  That’s basically how Republicans handle the Congressional Democrats; consistently giving them what they want just so they stop whining.

If the American people want any of the problems with our government, especially our immigration policy, to change, they will have to start electing politicians who want to solve the problems at the source rather than just covering them up with newspaper.  While the “Big Daddy” approach to parenting provides a source of entertainment that still makes people laugh nearly twenty years after its original release, in The “Big Daddy” approach to government has failed the United States miserably.