Jessica Vaughan - Director Of Policy Studies, Center for Immigration Studies Joins Houston's Morning News

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right. The good news is, DHS says that over
two million people who were in the United States illegally
have gone one way or the other back home, been
repatriated to their countries of origin, some of them because
of the efforts of ICE, some of them taking advantage
of the program offered by DHS, which pays them to
leave one thousand dollars, a plane ticket and a possibility

(00:20):
of coming back. In all told, DHS says two over
two million people are now gone. Joining us to analyze
is Jessica Vaughn, Director of Policy Studies at CIS, the
Center for Immigration Studies. Good morning, Jessica, Good morning. So
we are hearing that the numbers are not big enough.
In fact, DHS Secretary Noome wants to expand the net

(00:42):
a little bit, and there's some conflict with ICE on
that effort. But yet two million are gone. How are
we supposed.

Speaker 2 (00:49):
To view this? Well, you know, considering that the target
population of people who are here legally is probably about
fifteen million people. It's true that you know that that's
a big job and it's going to take some time,
but you know, it didn't happen overnight, so it's not
going to be cured overnight. And I think that it's

(01:11):
very impressive what I have been able to do thus
far with they say that about five hundred thousand people
have been arrested and forcibly removed, and more than one
point six million people have left the country on their own,
and we have never seen those kind of numbers in

(01:33):
a in our history as long as people have been
keeping track of that, and that's really really impressive. And
this is something that they can sustain now that they
have received funding from Congress through the Appropriations bill that
passed earlier this summer, the Big Beautiful Bill, and so

(01:53):
you know, I think that they will be able to
maintain this pace. What's really impressive, and this is huge
for taxpayers and for communities that have been suffering under
the disaster that came with the four years of open borders.
And you know it may you can understand this conflict
that you alluded to between the leadership at DHS Secretary

(02:16):
Nome and the White House and ICE the sort of
Tom Homan branch of this. There are well over a
million illegal aliens who have criminal histories, who are causing
problems in their communities, who are violent, who are committing crimes,
you can understand why they would want to target them first,

(02:38):
and that makes a lot of sense. And we know
now despite being told for a long time that self
deportation with a fantasy and a myth, we know now
that that is exactly what happens when there is muscular
enforcement and messaging that illegal immigration is not going to
be tolerated, and when people are not getting benefits like

(03:03):
free housing, healthcare and so on if they're here illegally,
that people will start to go home on their own.
There are three times as many people who've gone home
on their own as who have been arrested. And if
we keep that up for a few years, then you know,
we're going to see a restoration of integrity in our
immigration system that I think is necessary for people to

(03:26):
support the legal immigration, probably at a reduced number, but
that's what people seem to want. So, you know, I
think that the home Infaction is probably right in saying that,
you know, they need to be targeting on the criminals
because there still are so many of them that are

(03:48):
in American communities, primarily because of sanctuary policies that prevent
ice from getting custody of them. And then you know,
the numbers sort of take care of themselves once people
get the message they can't get away with being here illegally.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
Jessico, one quick follow up. We don't have a ton
of time here, but since you brought up legal immigrants,
you're right about the number being reduced. Vice President Van
spoke at Turning Points event in Mississippi a couple of
nights ago, and he was asked about that, and he said, look,
just because there are some good people here who came
here legally and did things the right way, doesn't mean
we can import a number of you know, a limitless

(04:25):
number of them. We have to be smart because of
the illegal immigration during the Biden years. We have to
lower the number of legal immigrants simply because we cannot
support everyone here, especially when they drive wages down. Do
you have any idea what kind of numbers we're looking
at for legal immigration.

Speaker 2 (04:42):
Well, if you got rid of chain migration for extended
family members and visa lottery program which really you know,
provide it just sort of like gratuitous immigration for no purpose,
and cut down on asylum seekers and refugee programs, we

(05:04):
could probably get down to seven hundred thousand a year.
Which is still very generous and if we avoid amnesties.
Amnesties are one thing that drives chain migration and illegal
immigration and is very costly to Americans. And the other
category that is costly is allowing people to bring in

(05:26):
their parents. You know that numbers should come down as well,
because that has been abused by people you know coming over,
and you know, it's just you know, when you have
people who have not contributed to our social security system
and you know, disability system, that's going to be costly
because they're going to be making claims on that as

(05:48):
elderly immigrants. So those are the areas that have been
shown to be you know that we should cut back on,
and that would allow us also to expand migration of
skilled people that employers are asking to hire, who will
be self sufficient and benefit the economy.

Speaker 1 (06:06):
Jessica Von a terrific analysis. I appreciate all of the information.
Director of Policy Studies with CIS, the Center for Immigration Studies.

Speaker 2 (06:13):
Jessica, thank you, thank you,