Open borders — A gift to elites, a weapon for politicians, a burden on citizens
There was a time when I believed in open borders, but then reality hit me in the face.
Delise Tattum | February 13, 2026
There was a time when I believed in open borders. I believed in the ideal. The slogan. The dream. A world where people could move freely, build better lives, and contribute to their host countries. A win-win arrangement where immigrants worked hard, integrated, and made their new nation their priority. Families wouldn’t be separated by bureaucracy. Human potential wouldn’t be trapped by geography.
It sounded compassionate. It sounded enlightened. And before I saw the negative consequences, I supported it.
I can see now how naïve I was. I wanted to believe that most people are decent, trustworthy, and come with honorable intentions. I assumed that those who crossed a border would respect the country that took them in, follow its laws, and contribute in good faith. But the world is not built on ideals. Not everyone plays by the rules. Not everyone comes to integrate or give back.
I also learned that open borders are not promoted for humanitarian reasons but for political and financial gain. To justify their agendas, politicians and elites peddle the narrative, that every arrival will be hardworking, law-abiding, grateful, and eager to contribute. That claim does not hold up to scrutiny. Many immigrants do fit that description, but national policy cannot rest on sentimentality or exceptions.
This approach does not merely welcome the diligent family fleeing danger. It also admits criminals, human traffickers, gang members, and those with no intention of integrating or respecting their host countries’ laws. And a government that refuses to acknowledge this reality and secure its borders is not compassionate, it is negligent.
Most Western nations are welfare states, and no welfare state can indefinitely absorb the world’s poor without buckling under the strain. How can such systems function when millions enter illegally, having contributed nothing to the tax base, and often little afterward? From day one, these migrants draw on citizen-funded infrastructure, such as:
- Housing assistance
- Healthcare
- Schools
- Roads and public transportation
- Emergency services
- Social welfare programs
The taxpayer foots the bill. The citizen bears the burden. Politicians call it “kindness.”
Low-skilled labor may benefit certain industries, but it does not sustain generous welfare systems. The math simply does not work, and the resulting pressure is obvious to anyone outside insulated enclaves.
None of this is an argument against helping genuine refugees. True asylum seekers fleeing war or persecution deserve protection. But the system has been deliberately blurred.
During the 2015 migrant crisis in Europe, Migration Watch UK calculated that over 60% of those arriving in Europe were economic migrants, not refugees. Yet governments and media presented the influx as purely humanitarian.
Why? Because “refugees” make a useful shield. If you question the policy, you are told you are questioning compassion itself. It is emotional blackmail, and politicians know it works.
One of the most alarming features of recent migration waves, both in Europe and the United States, is the large number of arrivals without identification. Some deliberately discard passports before reaching their destination. Without verifiable identity, how can governments:
- Confirm asylum claims?
- Screen for criminal records, extremist affiliations, or prior deportations?
- Ensure public safety?
They cannot. This results in chaos, surrender and political posturing disguised as virtue.
We are told by the politicians and elites that immigration is good. That the population is declining, and citizens are getting old. We need a larger tax base to fund our cost of living and way of life.
Yes, managed immigration can be very good.
But if politicians genuinely wanted more immigration that benefited their countries, they would expand lawful pathways by streamlining processes, but still include background checks, skill assessments, and security vetting—while also repealing the Hart-Cellar Act. Third world cultures do not allow for assimilation, and all that “diversity” just destroys societal cohesion.
Legal, and managed immigration offers dignity to newcomers, security to host nations, economic benefits from high-skilled workers, and realistic prospects for integration. Instead, many governments tolerate and encourage illegal entry, because disorder serves political ends.
Mass migration delivers short-term gains for certain politicians and their allies, demographic shifts that create future voting blocs, cheap labor for corporate interests, and moral posturing that wins media praise. The long-term consequences are economic fragility, social division and declining safety which becomes someone else’s problem.
Elites reap the rewards of:
- Cheap labor
- Virtue-signaling capital
- Political leverage
Ordinary citizens absorb the costs of:
- Overcrowded schools
- Strained hospitals
- Housing shortages and price inflation
- Wage suppression at the lower end
- Higher taxes
- Reduced public safety
- Greater social fragmentation
The burden falls disproportionately on working- and middle-class communities, not the gated neighborhoods of the powerful.
Western governments have compounded the problem by doing little to encourage native population growth. Family-friendly policies, incentives for childbearing, and cultural support for stable households remain scarce. Instead, leaders treat mass importation as a quick-fix for demographic decline, an easy path that avoids harder domestic choices.
Most unforgivably of all, lax border control puts citizens at direct risk. A nation that cannot secure its borders ceases to function as a sovereign state and invites disorder and lawlessness.
I once viewed open borders as compassionate. I now see them as reckless and politically motivated, a tool, a gift to elites, a weapon for politicians, and a burden placed squarely on the backs of ordinary citizens.
Open borders are not simply about compassion. They serve agendas.
