Guest Editorial

Race to earth’s nine billionth inhabitant underway

The arrival of the planet’s 8 billionth human inhabitant, which the United Nations excitedly announced in mid-November, was greeted in some circles as a joyous event. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres hailed 8 billion people as an occasion “to celebrate diversity and enhancements.”
For other population growth enthusiasts, 2037 can’t come fast enough. By then, only 17 years from today, the world population will hit 9 billion. The Washington Post’s editorial board wholeheartedly agrees with Guterres. In its op-ed piece, the editors wrote, dismissively, that “a growing population creates more pressure on the natural environment and man-made infrastructure alike. It is one factor in accelerating climate change.” Disdainfully, the Post encouraged readers not to fret because population growth is “mostly inevitable anyway.” The editorial overlooked, perhaps purposely, other harmful population growth consequences, including, but not limited to, drought and its inevitable water shortages, mega fauna extinction and ground subsidence, as well as pollution in its multiple forms.
Suddenly, or so it seems, everyone is advocating for higher birth rates, and hence more people, but without mentioning the obvious negative effects on the already eroding ecosystem and depleted, irreplaceable natural resources. Elon Musk, father of nine, is sounding alarm bells about what he refers to as a crumbling civilization, inevitable without a population spike.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has joined the more people, the merrier crowd, and uses his advocacy as an excuse to defend the U.S.’s unprecedented and unlawful border invasion. Coinciding with the UN’s gleeful announcement that world population had hit 8 billion, Schumer urged his GOP congressional colleagues to join in the effort to “welcome” more immigration and to put existing illegal aliens, as well as, presumably, those pouring across the border every hour of every day, on a citizenship path. Schumer’s reasoning: the U.S. has “a population that is not reproducing on its own with the same level that it used to.” Therefore, Schumer warned, without immigration, the nation’s economy is doomed.
The magnitude of Schumer’s distorted vision is stunning. The existing illegal immigrants’ exact population is unknown. It is such a mystery that Schumer himself refuses to take a stab at the total. In his plea for a citizenship path for aliens, Schumer referred to “all 11 million or however many undocumented there are here.” Eleven million is the conservative end of the range that, in some estimates, extends upward to 30 million.
A word or two about the border invasion’s totals that must be evaluated as part of Schumer’s grand citizenship plan. Eight weeks into fiscal 2023, which began October 1, a record number of illegals have crossed the border. The number of gotaways – those seen crossing illegally but not apprehended – are on an unprecedented pace during FY 2023 to date: 134,649 since Oct. 1, per CBP sources. Overall migrant encounters also are on an unparalleled pace, FYTD23: 349,216 compared to 275,624 this time in FY22. Assuming those statistics continue indefinitely – and there’s no reason to expect otherwise – at least 2,496 illegals per day will get away, and border agents will encounter 6,467 aliens daily.
Given that more than 5.5 million aliens have entered since President Biden took office, the U.S. population will have increased by roughly 10 million when election day 2024 rolls around. Schumer has nothing to worry about; family reunification will be the impetus for the 10 million total to go ever-upward.
The worldwide migrant community has every incentive to keep coming. The administration gives free-to-them, but taxpayer-funded, airline tickets, train tickets, bus tickets, cell phones, welfare, public education and health care, purposely provided incentives that will help satisfy the seditious goal of Biden and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to destroy sovereign America. For Musk, Schumer and other population growth deniers, Biden’s open borders are a dream come true.

Joe Guzzardi is a nationally syndicated newspaper columnist who writes about immigration and related social issues. Joe joined Progressives for Immigration Reform in 2018 as an analyst. A native Californian, Joe now lives in Pennsylvania. Contact him at jguzzardi@pfirdc.org.