: Open borders
Republicans like to fearmonger about Democrats by saying that liberals want “open borders.” This take is laughable because Democratic lawmakers have virtually never called for open borders, or even pressed very hard on immigration reform. The last episode I can remember was the DACA debate way back in the Obama era, and that was really more about an edge case than fundamentals.
I am probably not as progressive^TM as most liberals, but the exception I have is that I think I pretty much do believe in open borders? I don’t know if I would throw them open all at once, but I think it’s the ideal we should be striving towards.
Someone once said that all men are endowed with certain inalienable rights, to include life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Those words are not written into the law—that’s the Declaration of Independence, not the Constitution. But if we believe in the underlying principle, then we must admit that those rights belong to everyone, not just Americans. (America was not even a country when the Declaration was issued!) Moving to a different country where you may have a better chance at life, liberty, or happiness seems, to me, like a basic exercise of those rights.
Quite simply, I do not have any prejudice against people on the basis of what country they came from. Republicans fret about “Mexicans taking our jobs” but to me, even if we accept the premise that it’s a zero-sum exchange (it isn’t), it does not make me more or less happy if a given job is held by some random American vs. some random Mexican. They are just … two people I don’t know.
I am reluctant to share this opinion because I worry it plays into a Republican narrative about liberals who won’t compromise extreme positions, but like, this is one issue where I feel like my beliefs aren’t even that provocative? I’m just starting from a different set of assumptions than most Republicans, who believe (I guess) that to be American is to be Special and deserving of special protection. But protection from what, exactly? From the creation of new Americans through immigration? It just doesn’t make sense.