America’s immigration policies are failing

SO YOU WANT to come to America. Venezuela, your home country, is suffering under Nicolás Maduro’s violent kleptocracy. What to do? Good luck getting a green card: employers won’t bother sponsoring a low-skilled worker like you, and you have no immediate family in America to vouch for you. Your WhatsApp is filled with news of friends who have crossed America’s southern border. You decide to follow them and, after a hellish trip, make it to the Rio Grande. You could try to slip across undetected—about 600,000 “gotaways” managed it last year. Or you can tell the border agents who intercept you that you want asylum. Odds are that they will release you with a court date scheduled in several months’ time, kickstarting a process that may take years. Welcome to America.