The Cost of Illegal Immigration

It is costing the state’s taxpayers nearly $2.1 billion per year for education, medical care and incarceration due to the illegal alien population residing in New Jersey.

Based on Census Bureau data, studies estimate that households headed by illegal aliens used $10 billion more in government services than they paid in taxes. If illegals had been given amnesty, the fiscal deficit at the federal level would grow to nearly $29 billion.

The average illegal household pays more than $4,200 a year in federal taxes, for a total of nearly $16 billion, but they impose annual costs of more than $26.3 billion, or about $6,950 per illegal household.

Amnesty would increase costs because many illegal immigrants are largely unskilled; their tax payments would be very modest. However, once legalized they would have access to many more government services.

Illegal aliens receive free public education; states grant illegal aliens college scholarships and reduced in-state tuition. An estimated 11.7 percent of the K-12 public school students in New Jersey are children of illegal aliens.

Free medical care at taxpayer expense. Those who do not qualify for Medicaid will receive Charity Care paid by the State. Taxpayer-funded, unreimbursed medical outlays for health care provided to the state’s illegal alien population amount to an estimated $200 million a year.

All are great incentives for illegal aliens to enter the US illegally.

Over 17% of our Federal Prison population consists of illegal aliens. The uncompensated cost of incarcerating deportable illegal aliens in New Jersey’s state and local prisons, amounts to about $50 million a year.

Iranians have been caught sneaking over the border. Over 100,000 illegal aliens from the Middle East currently reside in the U.S. If we can’t deal with the influx of illegal aliens in the US, how would we protect ourselves from terrorism?

The costs associated with illegal immigration, Medicaid ($2.5 billion); treatment for the uninsured ($2.2 billion); food assistance programs ($1.9 billion); the federal prison and court systems ($1.6 billion); and federal aid to schools ($1.4 billion).

A proposal requiring employers to fire workers who falsify identity documents, is favored by Seventy-nine percent (79%) of Americans, 74% believe that they should be required to provide documents proving they are in the country legally if a person wants to rent an apartment.

Sixty-eight percent (68%) of Americans believe it is very important to improve border enforcement and reduce illegal immigration, a view that is held by 80% of Republicans.

By a margin of (60% to 28%), Americans believe it is more important to gain control of the nation’s borders than to “legalize the status of undocumented workers already living in the United States.”

Sixty-two percent (62%) of Americans support doubling the number of border agents.

A majority of Americans (54%) oppose the current U.S. law that grants automatic citizenship to children of illegal aliens born in the United States, 63% opposes automatic citizenship.

The options we have are simple. We either accept the costs created by the presence of the large pool of illegal aliens, or enforce our laws by reducing the numbers of illegal aliens in the United States.

When we have groups in our nation flying their flag above ours, when we have people entering our country illegally and demanding that we as an American people live by their standards, we will lose our heritage and our traditions.

Ask any illegal if they would be willing to die to protect our freedom in order to remain a permanent citizen of our country.

We are either American or un-American. Our veterans who fought and died for our rights and individual freedoms will have fought in vain.

If the people of our nation lack the conviction to follow their conscience and vote purely on partisanship in November, it will be impossible to place the lock back on Pandora’s Box and stop the anarchy we will have unleashed.


Joe Sinagra
NJ 18th District
Assembly Candidate