14 Comments

• CP 11th Apr '13 - 6:21pm

  *faints*

• Anthony Hawkes 11th Apr '13 - 7:00pm

  Is this a first? I find myself agreeing with John McCain.

• RC 11th Apr '13 - 7:47pm

  Just because it might be right for an historically ethnically and culturally diverse country founded on mass immigration with a low population density (34 people per sq km) does not mean it is right for an historically ethnically and culturally homogeneous (in global terms) country with very high population density (260 per sq km or 401 per sq km in England alone).

  Why should millions of illegal immigrants have to continue to live and work in the shadows?
  Answer: No one is forcing them to, are they?

• ATF 11th Apr '13 - 8:06pm

  He has said similar things recently, but the factt the Republicans lost the election in part due to winning so little of the Latino vote there is a heavy party political dimenson to his remarks.

• Alistair 11th Apr '13 - 8:31pm

  The US may be the world’s most successful economy according to Nick Thornsby’s reckoning, but there are still rather a large number of Americans living on food stamps and living in trailer parks.

• Alex Sabine 11th Apr '13 - 8:56pm

  Good to see, especially given the entrenched partisan posturing on most other subjects in US politics at the moment. It’s sobering to compare it to the sterile debate on immigration in this country.

  ATF – Fair point about if we see a spate of GOP converts, but McCain has argued for a qualified amnesty for illegal immigrants for years, possibly decades. In fact George W. Bush argued for reform but the hostility of Republicans in Congress scuppered his efforts.

• MBoy 11th Apr '13 - 9:43pm

  McCain believed this years ago, then stopped believing it to try to fight off a Tea Party challenge to the Senate nomination. Glad he’s back to believing it again.

• Tony Greaves 11th Apr '13 - 10:06pm

  There are not, of course, “millions of illegal immigrants” in this country, in or out of any shadows.

  Tony Greaves

• Nick Thornsby 11th Apr '13 - 10:27pm

  @ Tony Greaves

  That’s a very good point, and worth making. Good piece from Jonathan Portes on “the numbers”: http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/jonathan-portes/illegal-migrants-immigration_b_2116028.html

• Liberal Al 12th Apr '13 - 12:39am

  “Why should millions of illegal immigrants have to continue to live and work in the shadows?
  Answer: No one is forcing them to, are they?”

  Wait, is this a serious question?

• nvelope2003 12th Apr '13 - 12:43pm

  Business people prefer to employ low wage immigrants rather than taking on unemployed local people so it is not surprising to read John McCain’s comments

• Roland 12th Apr '13 - 12:54pm

  Other than the Latino vote, I wonder whether some well heeled US citizens, and probably Republican supporters are starting to feel the heat…

  For “millions of illegal immigrants have to continue to live and work” in the US, they need financial sponsors, namely bona fide US citizens and taxpayers who are prepared to employ them as housekeepers, cleaners, casual labourers, farm workers etc. etc.

• Susan Rounds 12th Apr '13 - 10:07pm

  We’ve already been through this in 1986. Why would anyone think that this time around will produce different results? As long as employers continue to break the law and hire illegal immigrants, this problem will never change. We are doomed to repeat this over and over again.

• JoeBourke 15th Apr '13 - 5:19pm

  Interesting account from an asylum seeker now settled in UK in todays independent North Korean defector Joo-il Kim .

  “I went to China, then Vietnam, then Cambodia, but they don’t accept North Korean refugees and I could not claim asylum so I could not settle there. I eventually went to Thailand, but even there they issue a UN document allowing people to stay but not as permanent residents.”