The fact is that Republicans were, by sins of omission and commission, complicit in the buildup of a population of illegal immigrants in America that is well over 10 million strong. Sure, at some point they intended to grant most of them amnesty of some kind. But in the meantime, people who have built their whole lives in a country they have no legal right to be in are vulnerable in so many ways. They are vulnerable to employers who cheat them of wages, to landlords who cheat them of rent, and to criminals who can take advantage of their unwillingness to call the police. And finally, they are vulnerable to sudden shifts in the political wind, as Trump’s rescinding of DACA shows.

A serious country, one that cared about the democratic nature of its society, would never have permitted a population of 800,000 people who fit the “Dreamer” description build up in this country and live so much of their lives here without legal status. That’s why it was such an easy political win for Obama to grant them a simulation of legal status. He was addressing an urgent issue, and doing so from a position of liberality, even if not lawful.

Three decades of negligence is enough. It has created an America that is more socially divided, it has habituated a population of millions of newcomers to the idea that American law turns on a whim, and it has radicalized people who just want to have what Peter Thiel called a normal country.