So my girlfriend/myself and her (platonic) partner have a lot of different viewpoints. For starters, the partner, “Alex,” believes that undocumented immigrants are “illegal” and breaking the law, but my girlfriend and I think that immigrants of any kind make countries better. Alex hates ICE because Alex thinks they are at least too brutal, and Alex supports LGBT as a non-binary person but is a Christian with a lot of more “conservative” views (Alex isn’t COMPLETELY conservative, but their views could be considered that).
I can speak to one part of it, I used to be one of those people who held the viewpoint that “Well, they are breaking the law to be here, aren’t they?”
Until I was set straight that simply being in the country without proper authorization is not actually a crime. Yes, some people might commit crimes in the course of coming here, like people who somehow evade border checks and make their way in without declaring themselves properly. But simply being undocumented is not a crime. Most people who are here without authorization came here legally (for instance, on a tourist or student visa), then simply didn’t leave when they were supposed to. That is not a crime.
And this is also the reason why immigration “courts” are not part of the judicial branch here, they are administrative courts under the Department of Justice. And that is because they don’t decide criminal matters.
But, explaining all this takes too long, and simply calling them “illegal” is much simpler, isn’t it?