Borders have been besieged by legions of “unaccompanied minors,” for whom doors are opened wide out of empathy. It must be difficult for children to travel by themselves all the way from faraway Third World hellholes to the extravagantly generous welfare states of the West. It helps not to be a child at all, but a full-grown adult.

Remix News reports from Spain:

In 2024, authorities in the Madrid region opened 848 age-determination proceedings for individuals claiming to be unaccompanied foreign minors…

Because colonists do not tend to bring valid ID, wrists are x-rayed to determine bone age.

Of the 378 individuals who underwent the test, only 112 were confirmed as minors, while 266 were determined to be adults — approximately 70 percent.

The colonists have incentive to cheat:

[C]laiming minor status grants significant advantages under Spanish and EU rules, including placement in specialized protection centers with housing, education, healthcare, and legal safeguards.

There is also significantly greater difficulty in deportation; and, in many cases, pathways to family reunification or residence permits unavailable to adults. Many claimants disappear from centers once age verification begins, avoiding confirmation of their true age.

In France, the fraud could be even worse:

French MP Charles de Courson highlighted the financial burden in a parliamentary speech, “Eighty percent of unaccompanied migrants in France’s northeast Marne department who declared themselves thus are not minors, with the cost of caring for these 160 false minors costing €5,000 per month, which equals for €60,000 per year for each one.”

Then there is Paris:

A separate 2019 experiment by the Paris prosecutor’s office examined 154 formally identified “minors” and found 91.6 percent (141) were adults via medical exams.

Similar results have been found in Sweden (84%) and Belgium (74%).

No doubt the fraud has been going on for some time, with authorities allowing it so as to present themselves as the noble defenders of children as they systematically displace Europe’s population.

On a tip from abcanc.

Housing prices rose during the last Democrat administration. This was largely the result of policy. Opening the border to millions of illegal aliens accounted for 30% of the increase in housing prices.

Just the News reports on a working paper from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas:

“From early 2021 to early 2024, the U.S. experienced an unprecedented boom in unauthorized immigration, followed by a rapid slowdown beginning in mid-2024. We provide the first systematic empirical assessment of the labor- and housing-market effects of this episode,” the working paper said.

“The total weighted-mean increases in house prices and rents over this period were 22.4% and 22.6%, respectively. Putting these together, for the average MSA [metropolitan statistical area], UIWF [unauthorized immigrant worker flows] can explain approximately 30% of the total increase in house prices and 20% of the total increase in rents,” it added.

Homebuilding could not meet the sudden explosion in demand. This was likely to be especially true in jurisdictions ruled over by Democrats, who strangle home construction with hyperregulation.

Meanwhile, Democrats bark “Affordability!” as if the word were a magic incantation. The magic word worked for Zohran Mamdani.

Their war on immigration enforcement makes clear that if Democrats secure power, they will open the border as wide as ever, with extra incentives to attract welfare colonists in unsupportable numbers. The cost of housing will skyrocket.

On a tip from abcanc.