Because being “undocumented” isn’t actually “illegal”.
Heck undocumented is a bad term too on its own but for other reasons.
Being in the US without a right to be in it, is a civil matter. Not criminal. It hasn’t been a criminal matter, and there are actually proponents of making it a criminal matter because then these folks would get actual representation in court.
Second, even if being in the US without the right to be in it becomes a criminal matter, you are still innocent until proven guilty. There are thousands of people who may not be able to produce evidence that they have a right to live in the US.
What Switzerland does has no place in this discussion either.
Anyway now that you know illegal is a factually wrong term, are you going to stop using it?
> What Switzerland does has no place in this discussion either.
Why?
I'm from EU; most countries here will require you to go through some legal process to become eligible to live and work there if you're from outside of EU. This is absolutely normal and expected.
Your argumentation is not only wrong, it would be impossible to maintain peace if crossing the border without any authorization was allowed. Can you imagine the number of Russian spies and saboteurs Poland would have to deal with if the borders were just open to everybody? It would be lunacy to allow that.
> Anyway now that you know illegal is a factually wrong term, are you going to stop using it?
It's not factually wrong. In most places in the world it's literally illegal to cross the border without a visa or other permit. You will get detained and expelled for doing that; and for a good reason.
That you might not like it and prefer to call it some other term doesn't change anything.
Russian spies are literally already within the American political system.
We weren’t able to stop spies during the height of the Cold War. We won’t now. Emotional arguments that point at a random unsubstantiated threat doesn’t actually help this discussion.
Switzerland isn’t relevant in this discussion because we’re talking about the US. They’re not nearly in the same situation or league to be compared.
And again, illegal is really mainly for criminal matters. Not civil. You can keep using whatever word you want but calling it a conspiracy that “big media” is doing is just plain wrong.
It's amazing how you avoid all the points I'm making. I've been in discussions like this too many times. There's no value in dragging it any more at this point. Thank you for your comments, but I'd rather put my energy into more constructive discourse.
The word “illegal” applies to both civil and criminal matters. The presumption of innocence doesn’t apply to civil matters. More importantly, labels generally refer to actual facts. You can talk in general about “speeders” or “shoplifters” though obviously the police would have to prove any individual person accused of those things was in fact doing so.
Heck undocumented is a bad term too on its own but for other reasons.
Being in the US without a right to be in it, is a civil matter. Not criminal. It hasn’t been a criminal matter, and there are actually proponents of making it a criminal matter because then these folks would get actual representation in court.
Second, even if being in the US without the right to be in it becomes a criminal matter, you are still innocent until proven guilty. There are thousands of people who may not be able to produce evidence that they have a right to live in the US.
What Switzerland does has no place in this discussion either.
Anyway now that you know illegal is a factually wrong term, are you going to stop using it?