Dear Editor:

I love reading books about the old West — Louis L’Amour, Zane Grey, and those guys — and lately I’ve been thinking about the illegal immigrant problem. Cowboys, in the mid-1800’s, had all the skills to go into tough areas, into the thick brush and hazardous arroyos and the rough mountainous regions and bring out all the longhorns and other cattle unbranded and unclaimed by any ranch, running wild. They called such a roundup of rogue cattle “running a jerk line.” Once a herd was built, it was moved in a “cattle drive” to the desired destination.

It was hard work, and called for protective gear – thick leather chaps, stirrup fenders, cuffs, and a trained horse to ride. On average, a single herd of cattle on a long drive (for example, San Antonio to Kansas City would be about 800 miles) numbered about 3,000 head. To herd the cattle, a crew of a dozen cowboys was needed, with three horses per cowboy in a ‘cavvy’ traveling with the herd. That’s about one cowboy to every 250 cows (along with 2 dozen extra horses).

Often, herds would combine along the way, bringing the new arrival cowboys and their support into the larger herd. So, how big would the herd BE in a round-up of illegals? ICE reported to Congress there were 425,431 non-citizens with criminal convictions on ICE’s “non-detained docket” – a database of people facing deportation proceedings but who are not held in ICE custody (many are indeed in jails and prisons, but they, too, would have to be included in this round-up). Of these, 13,099 were convicted of homicide, 15,811 were convicted of sexual assault, and 62,231 were convicted of assault for a total of around 80,000 (20% of those on the “non-detained docket”). These are just those with criminal records. Overall, ICE estimates 17 million “undocumented” people in the USA, 2.5% having some sort of criminal record (other than just being here illegally).

So, what are we looking at, logistics-wise? To herd 17 million would take around 70,000 cowboys plus over 200,000 horses and 6000 chuck wagons.

A herd of cattle might average about 15 miles in a day. If the “roundup” started in Maine, picked up places like New York, Chicago, and Massachusetts, to move to El Paso and the Mexican border, that would be about 2500 miles. Other herds from Washington State to California and from New England to Florida (and all points in between) could join in at various places. The drive would take over 6 months.

To feed a soldier in a combat zone costs about $15 a day. That would be over $260 M a day for the immigrants and another million a day for the cowboys, so for six months would total over $47 Billion, not counting feeding the horses.

The cowboys earn about $180 a day, so 70,000 would cost close to $13 M a day, and for six months that would be an additional $2.5 billion.

So, for around $50 billion (for context, about 15% of Elon Musk’s fortune), we would be pushing those immigrants across the Rio Grande and out of our land in about half a year.

It would create jobs for cowboys and horse wranglers and trail cooks for that half year, and best of all, it wouldn’t require using one ounce of jet fuel or gasoline. As added bonus, those out-of-work cowboys would have their pick of abandoned jobs, from cleaning motel rooms to roofing houses in the summer (103 degree heat) in Texas to picking produce to taking care of rich guys’ kids (they’d have to take a pay cut for any of these jobs). A total win-win for Americans! Those cowboys, if ALL of them took the abandoned jobs, there are an estimated 10 million jobs currently held by undocumented workers. That would mean 9,930,000 jobs would be open for OTHER good Americans to fill! (This might be a bit of a problem, since America’s current count of ‘employable’ unemployed is only 7 million folks. What the heck, with abortion abolished, we should be seeing a population BOOM!)

Also, that ‘17 million illegal immigrants to be deported’ figure might be low, especially since many of those illegals would be joined by family members – spouses, children, grandparents – who may be American citizens (and may have been born here or lived here 20 or more years) but do not wish to be separated from their loved ones. That may add a few more billion to the deport/cattle drive total cost, but think of the benefit! We’d be rid of all non-Americans on American soil! Finally! Yee-haw!

Jeff Harrison

Buffalo TX