It was 2016. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton were battling it out as the last presidential candidates of the Republican and Democratic parties. One statement said by now President Trump forever rings in our heads day after day as his inauguration is beginning to take effect. Trump proclaimed, “I will build a great, great wall on our southern border, and I’ll have Mexico pay for that wall.” Today, after experiencing the longest government shutdown in history, many have seen emergency actions happening before their very eyes. According to CNN, Trump is preparing a draft that will put national emergency power into his hands to fund the wall with over seven billion dollars. With this new addition almost becoming reality, we should ask ourselves: do we need this wall?
David Bier of Cato Institute researched this very matter. According to his studies, “a 2016 Migration Policy Institute review of the impact of walls and fences around the world turned up no academic literature…and concluded somewhat vaguely that walls appear to be ‘relatively ineffective.’” With a wall being studied to be ineffective, why does the president believe that the answer to keeping illegal immigrants out of the US is by a gigantic wall paid with their hard earned paycheck? Many people living at the border also do not agree with the making of a wall.
In an American Magazine article by J.D. Long-García, the writer interviewed people near the border about the wall and their opinions on the matter, “The idea of a wall is absurd,” said the Rev. Julio López, the director of Casa del Migrante in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas. “The Berlin wall fell, why are we thinking about more walls?” Rev. Julio López has a point. The Berlin wall was built by communists and stands as a symbol of lack of freedom during its time, and now America, the land of freedom, is building their own. The wall has become a laughing stock in America because of the absurdity of actually building a great wall that probably won’t even have an effect on the immigrants who pass through the border unnoticed. President Trump has stated that the immigrants need to be removed from this country because of how millions of them illegally cross into America and take our jobs. As many research concludes, this is actually not true.
In a study by the Economist, Mexicans who were apprehended crossing over the border illegally have been slowly decreasing. In 2000, 1.7 million arrests were made at the border, with 90 percent of those arrests were Mexicans trying to illegally cross the border. During Obama’s presidency, only 47% of the 400,000 arrests being Mexicans. This steady decline started when the federal government built a fence in 2006 that stretched across the border to keep illegal immigrants from easily crossing over. With this information, Trump believes that a 40 foot wall will be a substantial upgrade and surely wipe out all forms of illegal immigrants in America coming from the southern border. The wall will not change anything, as criminals will find another way into America. It’s just a waste of American taxpayer money, but soon enough, it probably will be towering 35 feet over Mexico as a reminder of Trump’s promise to America that he is the president and this is what he’s chosen to do with our money. If anything, Mr. Trump, you’re the wall that’s stopping people from living in America.
