Before I start my argument, I would like to thank
Chernobyl for accepting this debate.
Also let's get definitions of what I mean by, secure, and open etc.
This is the definition of Secure I am using in this argument.
Open: "not restricted to a particular group or category of participants"
This is the definition of Open I am using in this argument.
Better: "more advantageous or effective"
This is the definition of Better I am using in this argument.
(Specifically meaning borders for the USA, and no other countries.)
This is the definition of Border I am using in this argument.
Ok now that we have gotten definitions out of the way, I can start my argument.
Crime Rates
Crime rates in the USA, are highly affected by open borders, and weak border control.
"According to a new report from the U.S. Justice Department, almost half of all of the criminals prosecuted in federal courts in 2018 were aliens, charged with crimes ranging from drug trafficking to murder to kidnapping. While a small number of those over 41,000 criminals were in this country legally, the vast majority—38,000—were illegal aliens. Compare this to 1998, when there were only a little over 18,000 aliens prosecuted in federal courts.
The special report, “Non-U.S. Citizens in the Federal Criminal Justice System, 1998-2018,” goes to extraordinary lengths to avoid using the politically incorrect (but legally correct) term “aliens” in the report. Instead, illegal aliens are referred to as “undocumented non-U.S. citizens.”
Political correctness aside, the report cannot disguise the dangers and costs represented by the raw numbers. In many instances, illegal aliens are repeat offenders. For instance, of the illegal aliens prosecuted in 2018, 12.5 percent had at least one prior federal or state criminal conviction, 18.5 percent had two to four prior convictions, and over 10 percent had five or more convictions. Hispanics dominate the criminal prosecutions, representing 74 percent of the criminal illegal aliens.
The crimes committed by these aliens ranged from drug trafficking to “violent offenses” including murder, sexual assault, robbery, and kidnapping. In fact, 24 percent of all federal prosecutions for drug offenses were of aliens. And we are not talking about simple possession. As the report states, “drug offenses” are defined as the “manufacture, import, export, distribution, and dispensing” of dangerous drugs like methamphetamine. So, aliens are a major source of the debilitating drug problem that is a scourge on our society.
While these numbers are distressing, what’s even more distressing is that they only represent the proverbial tip of the iceberg. The vast majority of crimes committed in this country are prosecuted at the local level, not the federal level. These federal numbers are only a fraction of the crimes committed by criminal aliens. The latest report from the state of Texas alone, for example, reports that between June 1, 2011, and Nov. 30, 2021, 356,000 criminal aliens were booked into Texas jails, of which over 243,000 were identified as being in the country illegally. Those illegal aliens were charged with more than 401,000 criminal offenses, including 742 murders, 47,737 assaults, 7,524 burglaries, over 11,000 sexual assaults and other sex crimes, and numerous kidnappings, thefts, robberies, and drug and weapons charges.
Many criminal aliens were convicted of federal immigration offenses, including “smuggling of persons,” a relatively benign-sounding term for human trafficking, a cruel practice that often results in the exploitation, abuse, and sometimes rape or death of its victims.
Eighty percent of aliens were charged with illegal reentry—something that would not be happening if we were actually securing our border.
The result? Illegal border crossings over the past year reached 1.7 million in October, the highest number of illegal crossings since records began being kept in 1960."
Our amount off illegal aliens has cause the crime rate to spike in the USA.
"In fiscal year 2020, the Border Patrol recorded 458,088 encounters with illegal immigrants at the southern border. That figure has spiked to approximately 2 million in fiscal year 2021.
In 2020, 2,438 of the illegal immigrants encountered at the southern border already had criminal records at the time of entry. In 2021, 10,763 illegal immigrants encountered had criminal records.
It’s troubling enough that lax border policy permits thousands of convicts (and scores of suspected terrorists) to enter the country illegally. The evidence shows, however, that tens of thousands more illegal immigrants will commit crimes while in the United States (not counting the hundreds of thousands of crimes related to facilitating illegal immigration such as crimes related to identity theft, obtaining false driver’s licenses, improperly accessing public benefits, using fraudulent green cards, etc.)."
Taxpayers Money
The loose security at the border, and the number of illegal aliens that have crossed the border, into the USA, have had big effects on taxpayers' dollars.
The cost alone for time in federal prisons can get up to 40,000 dollars a year, which has had a big effect on the U.S. taxpayers.
"In addition to the horrendous human costs of their crimes, when you consider the costs of law enforcement related to their arrest, prosecution, and incarceration, these aliens are also costing U.S. taxpayers a tremendous amount of money. According to the government, the incarceration cost alone for criminals serving time in federal prisons—such as these aliens—is between $35,000 and $40,000 per year per inmate. At the end of 2018, 19 percent of the prisoners in the Federal Bureau of Prisons—30,848—were aliens, costing the American taxpayer between one billion and 1.2 billion dollars a year just to house them.
Heritage is a biased source; use more reliable sources.
Crime:
https://news.wisc.edu/undocumented-immigrants-far-less-likely-to-commit-crimes-in-u-s-than-citizens/ states the undocumented are less likely to commit victim producing crimes.
Welfare:
I support an open border policy and the undocumented should get kicked off of government aid programs like welfare and food stamps. If you want to come here, be productive.
I want as many people as we can get here because according to my calculations, it would be wonders for the stock market. Quadrupling the US population would roughly quadruple the US stock market, making my stock $130,000 more valuable.
In cases like this, the debate can often come down to disagreements over the terms, so I could see taking that route. Wouldn't like doing it, but I can understand it.
Honestly, my approach would have been to sidestep PRO's line of reasoning entirely, use a completely different definition of "secure" (since neither a dictionary nor a definition was provided in the description) and then built my case off that.
I'd also make some case about Merriam Webster being a joke dictionary written by hacks (there's NO SHORTAGE of academics and experts who state this) and, if necessary, go into the lexicographical origins of "secure" to prove my definition is more reliable. PRO would be forced to defend his definition, which is the crux of his whole argument, and the debate sides in my favor from there, since I have successfully discredited his dictionary and therefore his definition, and remade the debate in my favor.
And THAT is why I always say which dictionary I am using for debates. Because someone actually did something similar to ME before and demolished me. I had to spend the whole debate on damage control and fighting two fronts instead of arguing the topic.
Fewer still will take a debate where the instigator has explicitly stated that they will define the terms in their opening round, most likely to their great favor. This will either become a semantic debate where your opponent makes hay out of the extreme definitions you will almost certainly provide, your opponent will just run a Kritik, or they’ll just forfeit every round.
If you want a well resourced, thorough examination of the issue as your description suggests, then be straight up with your definitions and provide them in the description.
The resolution, as it's currently worded, is extremely vague - few people will take a debate that's going to be 90% arguing about definitions.
As a former trapsetter, yes, I can't trust you if you are going to define everything once this debate is accepted.
I would define what I mean in my first argument.
How secure is secure and how open is open? I believe essentially what you are trying to argue for is that a measurable value under a threshold is more fit than if the value is over. Without defining how this value can be calculated would bring forth numerous models that are not only different but conflicting.