Why don’t illegal immigrants just do it the right way?
This line is frequently repeated in American immigration debates. It sounds reasonable on the surface: follow the law, wait your turn, and respect the process. How hard can it be to apply for and gain citizenship? But the phrase only works if this “right way” is realistic. It would work if the system truly worked to match the pace of valid migration. However, it doesn’t—the U.S. immigration system is confusing and narrow in terms of eligibility categories, numerical caps, and huge backlogs—for many people, there isn’t a practical legal path at all. For others, it requires not months, but years, and sometimes decades. When people say “do it the right way,” they imagine an orderly and efficient process that doesn’t exist for most migrants, and they ignore how historically selective and politically convenient the American dream can be.
To see why they can’t “just do it by the book,” you have to understand what legal immigration entails. There isn’t a universal way to simply come to America. Most routes to a green card are limited to a few categories: family sponsorship, employment sponsorship, and humanitarian protection (i.e., asylum). There are millions that don’t fall into these obscure categories, yet seek a better life for themselves and their families.
Employment-based immigration is perceived as the smoothest legal pathway. With specialized skills, we urge the best of the best to continue their practice in America. But the Visa Bulletin revealed that in the October 2025 bulletin, the employment-based second preference (EB-2) cutoff for India is April 1, 2013. Applicants doing it right are still waiting over a decade to even be approved because of backlogging, despite already having the skills and finding an employer. It becomes more than personal responsibility, but also per-country limits, and a system designed to ration opportunity. Even after attaining a green card, permanent residency is not citizenship. Most people have to reside in the U.S. for at least five years before being eligible to apply for naturalization. The “legal way” often takes years to obtain an approved petition, years for a visa to become available, years for paperwork, and then at least five more years before citizenship can be considered.
The asylum system—another pathway often cited—is also not as simple as it sounds. The legal standard is again narrow, and the court system is overwhelmed. TRAC reported that at the end of Dec. 2025, the immigration courts had 3,377,998 active pending cases, and 2,339,623 of those involved people who had already filed for asylum and were waiting for hearings or decisions. This matters because “doing it right” means years of limbo. If the courtroom line is in the millions, legality is simply not attainable.
Americans also act as if the U.S. has always applied one consistent rule. The country loves to mention how its foundations are built on the backs of immigrants seeking a better life, and continues this legacy of the American dream. But the modern system likes to nitpick. U.S. immigration policy has always been shaped by politics, race, and foreign policy. It’s not that the U.S. was universally welcoming but that it decided which immigrants it wanted and bent policy accordingly.
A perfect example of this is Cuban migration. For decades, Cubans were treated differently in regard to immigration policy because when Congress passed the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966, it allowed Cubans who reached the United States to become permanent residents after being physically present for at least one year, a significantly faster pathway than what most other nationalities could access. This is not to criticize Cubans for using the system available to them; it is to show how dishonest it is to pretend there has always been one timeless “right way.” It also shows that no matter how flawed the system is now, it doesn’t have to stay that way.
The “right way” is not only overtly simplistic but morally unsettling: international adoptees—especially Korean adoptees—grow up in America and later discover they are not citizens. The Child Citizenship Act—granting adoptees automatic American citizenship—did not apply to those 18 or older. As a result, some adoptees reached adulthood without citizenship and only learned of their status later when applying for a passport, financial aid, or a job. 30,000 to 70,000 adoptees never became U.S. citizens and can face consequences, including deportation, because of it. Timing and legal luck are big factors at play for “the right way.”
This is not to say immigration should be unregulated. Open borders would be chaotic and impractical. But it doesn’t mean Americans shouldn’t keep pretending the current system is a fair moral sorting mechanism, where good people wait, and bad people cut the line. If anything, by design, the path is long, painful, and costly. That line, “to do it the right way,” is a sad excuse that lets the country celebrate its immigrant past while condemning immigrants in the present.
This is a reminder that, as ICE continues to threaten the livelihoods of Americans, new and old, to have compassion. This is a complex issue with real people, real families, and real lives at stake. What is mentioned as “the right way” is an oversimplified statement meant to justify wrongdoings done by ICE and does not, in any way, paint an accurate picture of the struggle first-generation Americans face when coming into this country and making a name for themselves. The “right way” is costly, grueling, and in many ways, non-existent.
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