Rand Paul Touts Work Visa Program to Combat ‘Border Welfare State’

U.S. Sen. Rand Paul wants people to know he views immigration reform and border security as a priority, as he ramps up his efforts to try and win the GOP’s 2016 presidential nomination.

Via KTAR.com: “I think something has to be done. If you aren’t for doing any kind of immigration reform, you’re for another 10 (million) or 11 million people coming in unaccounted for,” said Paul.

While saying he remains in favor of a work visa program, he also invoked economist and writer Milton Friedman to make a political point:

You can’t have open borders and a welfare state. We’ve kind of got both of right now — we have a completely open border and we’ve got this enormous welfare state.

So you’ve got to stop one of them, and so right now what we really need to do is secure the border. We need to know who comes in, who leaves, we need to make sure none of them are terrorists and then we have to control the border, that’s part of it.