Should Constitutional Rights be extended to Illegal Immigrants?
Constitutional rights are about protecting individuals from abuse by the government. I don’t see any particular reason why illegal immigrants are any less susceptible to abuse. They are more so if anything. At the very least they should be accorded basic due process of law when it comes to determining whether or not they are illegal in the first place and whether they have some legal right to stay. I doubt if anybody thinks they should be immune to paying taxes on their earnings which means they should be protected by the same rules that protect legal resident tax payers. They should have access to the courts to resolve their disputes just like anybody else, if for no other reason than because it’s better than having people outside the system making up their own rules. Personally, I think most of the hype about the “illegal immigration problem” is mostly just right wing politicians and media blowhards puffing smoke at the bigots, racists and xenophobes in the base. The country has more
