It is a bad game where nobody wins

One of the most fascinating games being played out in American politics these days involves illegal immigration. The old rules of the game used to be simple: Both Democrat and Republican politicians pretend to care about illegal immigration for humanitarian reasons with the D’s citing the welfare of the illegal immigrants and the R’s citing the welfare of the citizenry.

Since both sides benefit from the status quo (to varying degrees), there has been little motivation to resolve the issues at the southern border. This came to a head during the Trump administration.

With full control of the House and Senate, R’s sat on their hands on border security. Ostensibly, the R’s were afraid the D’s would call them racist if they strengthened the border wall. Instead, the R’s preferred to have the D’s call them racist while not strengthening the border wall.

Later, when the Trump administration offered a path to citizenship for the ‘Dreamers’, the idea was scoffed at by the D’s. In a stunning rejection of incrementalism, the D’s main gripe was Trump’s offer did not go far enough. The reason is clear: the D’s prefer to call the R’s racist while not addressing the issue they profess to care about.

Obviously, the grift the elites are playing is more complicated. But from the Bush-era push for cheap labor to the Obama-era border cages, the message is clear: the elites have a general disdain for their own citizenry. They don’t care about solving the problem because it is not a problem for them. Or as the Z-Man Blog puts it:

“The Cloud People define themselves by their opposition to and essential difference from the Dirt People”

And that’s not to say there would be an easy solution to illegal immigration if both the D’s and the R’s worked in conjunction (now that’s a scary thought). The problem is complex with the cost of reducing the number of illegal immigrants in the country through deportation being prohibitive juxtaposed against the immense strain on institutions and infrastructure that stems from not doing anything.

In any case, a rational country would start by finding ways to restrict the continued influx of illegal immigrants in the country. That would allow scarce resources to be spent on improving the lives of the illegal immigrants already in the country, not to mention the ethnic communities that are often their end destination, by diverting resources allocated to dealing with the illegal immigrants not yet in America.

That’s what is so fascinating about the game that Abbott and DeSantis have been playing lately. Each governor has been trying to one-up the other by shipping more and more illegal immigrants to D strongholds. This strategy is a large departure from, and even in opposition to, the R’s usual method of complaining without acting.

The latest in a string of relatively effective political stunts came this week as DeSantis sent Venezuelan illegal immigrants to Martha’s Vineyard on a couple of charter jets. Abbott, for his part, sent more busloads of illegal immigrants to Washington D.C., dropping them off on the doorstep of Kamala Harris’ house.

Given people in these areas vote overwhelmingly for welcome mat border policies, the reaction has been both hilarious and revealing. D.C. has declared an emergency over the influx of illegal immigrants and the media finally seems to care about immigration law. Aside from that, we are witnessing in real time many of the R arguments being unknowingly adopted by the D’s in their anger.

Even as the media is reporting on how kind and caring the people of Martha’s Vineyard have been towards the immigrants, the people living there can’t shut up about their lack of resources and an alleged housing crisis (that wasn’t even making local headlines before yesterday).

It should be noted that a housing crisis in Martha’s Vineyard is different than a housing crisis where you or I live. Here’s an excellent summary of the 2020 U.S. census written by the local newspaper. There are 17,530 housing units on an island with a year round population of only 20,600 or about 850 housing units per 1000 people. For context, that is about twice both the U.S. and Canadian average — with houses twice as nice. If you want to see overcrowded housing, look at on-reservation housing where it’s common to find about half as many units per 1000 people as even the U.S./Canadian average (and proportionally half as nice).

49% of homes are only seasonally occupied, which means they are likely already vacant as we head into fall as shown by the hundreds of empty rooms on Airbnb. Consider, too, the size and luxury of some of these places. Obama’s 7000 square foot mansion on a 29 acre estate could probably house the majority of the 50 illegal immigrants sent to the island. Nor do the residents of the island have any want of money to throw around on necessities.

If the people on the island are so happy to help, then housing, feeding, and clothing the illegal immigrants, even in the long-term, would be absolutely no problem. In fact, Martha’s Vineyard may be uniquely positioned as one of the best locations on the entire continent to deal with a massive influx of illegal immigrants in a humane manner. Yet, it took less than a day before they were ferried off the island. Money truly does speak. Cloud people, indeed.