Univision anchor Jorge Ramos insisted on Tuesday that a border wall will not prevent illegal immigrants and drugs from entering the country and said Americans must accept that the U.S.-Mexico border is “nothing more than an invention.”
“No matter how much you might want to seal the border between Mexico and the United States, its simply not possible. You might temporarily stop, delay, complicate or hinder the flow of immigrants and drugs from south to north, but nothing will ever stop it entirely,” he wrote in his Tuesday Univision column. “Though it may upset some politicians who’ve spent years making false promises, this is the reality of the situation.”
Ramos, who has said that the United States has a responsibility to “absorb” Central American migrants, said that “if there is anything immigrants are known for, it’s for their innovative thinking. When they come to a wall, they simply go around it. Or over it. Or they find a ladder to climb it. Or dig a tunnel underneath. Or they arrive by plane and overstay their visas. Walls by themselves are pretty useless.”
“If by some magic (or through behind-the-scenes negotiations), President Donald Trump could get the $5.7 billion he’s been asking for to build a wall, it would be of very little use,” Ramos continued. “That money would only get him about 234 miles worth of wall, according to the White House. What about the rest of the border?”
The amnesty activist also said that the “border has been a crooked proposition from the beginning, and it will continue to be twisted to meet political ends,” adding that many open-borders activists still insist that “people didn’t cross the border, the border crossed them.”
“At some point we will have to accept the fact that the border between Mexico and the United States is nothing more than an invention. It was demarcated in 1848, following a war that cost Mexico about half its territory (it’s no coincidence that cities like Los Angeles, San Antonio and San Francisco have Spanish names),” Ramos said. “Also, it’s been said a thousand times that many people didn’t cross the border, the border crossed them. And the cultural and commercial ties between the two sides remain in place to this day. Look at the fellowship exhibited by cities like El Paso, Texas, and Ciudad Juárez, Mexico even if barbed wire and concrete barriers have been erected in some places along the divide.”
Ramos criticized Trump for comparing the U.S.-Mexico border wall to Israel’s because he said the United States and Mexico are not at war like the Israelis and the Palestinians. He also said “there isn’t a crisis at the border warranting a wall or the deployment of troops.”
“Yes, all countries have the right to mark and protect their borders. But the histories and traditions of countries like Mexico and the United States are so intertwined that there is no practical or legal way a wall would keep them apart,” Ramos added. “Some politicians, like Trump, may well try to come up with a way, but they are doomed to failure every time.”