Report: Stopping Only Nine Percent of Illegal Alien Border Crossers Would Pay for Trump’s Border Wall

If President Donald Trump’s promised border wall stops only a small fraction of illegal aliens from coming into the U.S., it would save the U.S. billions and easily cover the cost of the wall, a report released Thursday finds.

The non-partisan Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), using the estimated education level of illegal alien border crossers and immigrant education estimates from National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NAS), found that each illegal alien entering the U.S. racks up at least $74,722 in lifetime costs, funded by American taxpayers.

“[I]f a border wall stopped a small fraction of the illegal immigrants who are expected to come in the next decade, the fiscal savings from having fewer illegal immigrants in the country would be sufficient to cover the costs of the wall,” writes CIS Director of Research Steven Camarota.

Even a minimally effective border wall that stopped less than ten percent of illegal crossings would save the U.S. billions. “If a border wall stopped between 160,000 and 200,000 illegal crossers—nine to 12 percent of those expected to successfully cross in the next decade—the scaled savings would equal the $12 to $15 billion cost of the wall,” Camarota writes. Approximately 170,000 illegal aliens crossed into the U.S. without going through a port of entry in 2015, according to a study commissioned by the Department of Homeland Security. “[T]here may be 1.7 million successful crossings in the next decade. If a wall stopped just 9 to 12 percent of these crossings it would pay for itself,” the CIS report states.

“[T]here may be 1.7 million successful crossings in the next decade. If a wall stopped just 9 to 12 percent of these crossings it would pay for itself,” the CIS report states.

“If a wall stopped half of those expected to successfully enter illegally without going through a port of entry at the southern border over the next 10 years, it would save taxpayers nearly $64 billion—several times the wall’s cost,” the report adds.

And that’s excluding the cost of children produced by illegal immigrants. The federal government imposes a massive, unfunded mandate on school districts around the country by forcing American parents to divert funding from their own children to educate roughly 3.62 million foreign students, many of whom are extremely low-performing students and do not speak English.

The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) found it costs taxpayers $59.8 billion per year to educate roughly 3.62 million foreign-born students, children with one or two legal migrant parents, and refugees.

Approximately one in ten students enrolled in public schools is designated as Limited English Proficiency (LEP), and their academic performance has been described as “abominable”: The number of eighth to twelfth grade LEP students performing Advanced work rounds to zero percent, for example.

The CIS report notes that the estimates do not include illegal aliens who overstay their visas, and state and local governments bear a significant portion of illegal immigration’s costs.