Immigration Deluge Will Drain Water Resources

Article author: 
Bonnie Erbe
Article publisher: 
Santa Barbara NewsPress
Article date: 
1 June 2013
Article category: 
Our American Future
Medium
Article Body: 

As the Obama administration attempts to press its version of immigration reform through Congress, here are three relevant issues unlikely to be considered in the debate.

First, you probably won't hear a thing about droughts, either present or future. Yet according to the Science World Report website, 2013 has the potential to outdo the record drought of 2012...

Second, you'll hear no mention of the fact that the Colorado River -- which serves the needs of 40 million people living in the Southwest and irrigates 4 million acres of farmland growing 15 percent of the nation's food -- is drying up...

Third, don't expect to hear about how our rapidly growing population is depleting groundwater resources...

What does immigration reform have to do with water shortages? Plenty.

The vast majority of U.S. population growth since the 1970s has been fueled by massive legal and illegal immigration and the children of new immigrants. The fertility rate of U.S.-born American women has been at replacement level since that time.

There's irrefutable evidence that the U.S. is on the verge of a major water shortage.

Wouldn't it be easier to have a national conversation about the environmental impact of mass immigration and to make a rational decision about the number of immigrants we might comfortably accommodate?...