Here is my personal idea...Make no mistake, this only stops illegals..it would still let legals in. First, build a fence and wall combination along the entire border...And a fence that you can't climb over or break through. Then, along the U.S. side of the border, build a good dirt road that would make it easy for the border guards to patroll the area. Next, at the border crossings, install a second passage right next to the original...this second would be for cargo trucks. This would make it easy for custom agents to quickly search the trucks for illegals. Finaly, to take care of all the illegals currently in the country, offer them 1 month to obtain papers to pay for ALL the taxes they have dodged, to officially register with the government.... or, if they served in the armed services (or some related field) to prove they want to be an americans, they could stay. Any illegal that doesn't do this within the month gets deported...no exceptions. As for buisnesses hiring illegals, they have 2 months to turn in any illegal still employed, or in hiding..If they don't very steep fines await. Ok, that is my idea...And could somebody tell me how many trillions of dollars illegals are costing our government each year because of the well-fare and other things they steal???

I think you can't resolve this question without uprooting some very basic ideas we have about who we are as Americans. Humans in general, and Americans in particular, are strongly biased in favor of "group membership" ideologies -- belief systems which distinguish between "us" and "them", and grant a sense of personal identity to individuals which is based on very tenuous distinctions or differences (skin color, geography, language). The mindset that arises when we take these group memberships too seriously is a fractured view of reality which distorts all thinking along the fault lines of the divide. Notice how much attention we pay to (for example) a child kidnapped in the U.S. relative to, say... 110 people dying in a ferry accident in India. The former will get a LOT of press for days, the latter will end up on page 3 in a single column on a Wednesday. That's an example of the cognitive distortions (in this case, irrational allocation of attention) grounded in nothing more than the abstract division between Americans and non-Americans. "They" don't really matter, but "we" do. Our ideas about illegal aliens... even the word "alien" ... are very much entangled with this group-identity confusion, and all of our talk about how to manage our borders and relate to people of other nationalities is distorted by it. All human beings are members of the largest group of all FIRST -- humanity as a whole. Less encompassing groups, such as nationalities, religious orders, ethnicities, etc., are JUNIOR to that primary membership, and should not be allowed to displace our recognition of that primacy. "I'm a member of humanity" trumps "I'm an American" to someone who sees this clearly. So with that as background, what to do about someone who crosses the national border looking for work or a better life? Should we send them back? Send them to jail? Try to help the economy of our neighboring countries? These are still difficult questions to answer, but the KINDS of answers that come up are very different if one is standing on the platform "humanity is a whole" than they are if one is standing on "us vs. them".

First, I think the immigration "crisis" has become the darling child of the media and politicos. I'm not sure anyone's got the real numbers and statistics or that it's any more of a crisis than it was 5 years ago. I don't think it's realistic to think the US has the money, manpower or know-how round up millions of people without papers and deport them. That's been the policy for years and it doesn't work. In fact, it's had some very serious consequences. Deportation of young illegal gang members caused MS-13 to become a worldwide menace. And do we want to become the modern China, with fortressed walls running the length of our borders? People immigrate to America for a better life. If we create an undercurrent of angry illegal people, stimatize them and threaten them with the law at every turn, we will likely end up with dangerous pockets of people who will continue to live in this country. If, however, we streamline the immigration process so it's easier to use and make honest citizens of the illegal workers currently here, we can mitigate the damages and create a more unified country. The US is part of the world; we can pretend we're a protected, homogenized place.

I think the solution is simple. Enforce the law. In 1986 a law was passed that allowed for severe monetary penalties for businesses that hire illegal immigrants. We should enforce this. The problem with illegal immigration is that the immigrants take jobs from Americans, consume many resources, and they do not contribute to paying for those resources. Enforcing the law will solve these problems (and we don't need to build fences or hire more border patrol agents). If businesses actually had to pay heavy fines for hiring illegals, many would stop doing so because it would be cheaper to hire legal citizens. For those that continue to hire illegals, the fines will contribute to the lost tax revenue that results from illegal immigration. In addition, less employers hiring illegals means many of the illegals won't be able to find work, thus eliminating the reason they came to America in the first place.

Enforce labor laws and put heavy punishment on anyone hiring illegal workers. That will eliminate the demand for their work, and they won't have any reason to come illegally. The illegals already here should be allowed to stay - IF and ONLY IF they are willing to pay back taxes on any and all income they have gotten in this country. They say they are law-abiding citizens. Let them abide by the tax laws too. If they want to become citizens, they should pay taxes on what they have earned. If they can't, send them home and give them equal opportunity to re-enter legally and start new. (Providing they have no criminal background, etc.)

If we stop providing the plethora of free services to them, and the word gets back to their country of origin, that might help.

I don't think the US can solve the problem by itself. I think Mexico has to take responsibility as well. Why do citizens from Mexico immigrate illegally to the US? The standard of living is so much higher here. Instead of investing more tax dollars in social programs intended for American citizens, that are being overwhelmed by illegals. Take the money and make low interest loans to Mexico to get its own house in order. If the shoe were on the other foot and I as a US citizen. Things would have to be pretty bad for me to abandon my citizenship here, seeking a better life in Mexico.

Put up an expanse where no one can go, like Korea. Anyone found in that area will be subject to interrogation/deportation/death. About 4 or 5 miles should do it. As for the existing illegals, we shouldn't deport them. They make produce so much cheaper. Americas agricultural community relies on them too much and removing them would be traumatic. Force them to pay taxes though, or have them simply pay for all their own benefits.