What Should Happen to Illegal Immigrants? Journalist Who Came to the U.S. Illegally Answers the Controversial Question

Jose Antonio Vargas came to the United States from the Philippines at 12 years old illegally and went on to become a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist for The Washington Post. He revealed a secret he had been harboring since his youth -- that his grandfather bought Vargas fake documents and he was in fact not a citizen.

Tonight on The O’Reilly Factor, Vargas spoke about the Supreme Court’s decision on the Arizona immigration law. He told Laura Ingraham, who was filling in for host Bill O’Reilly, that he understands the “fear and frustration, especially that Latinos have on this.”

However, Vargas noted that during the Supreme Court’s ruling today, Justice Kennedy stated, “As a general rule, it is not a crime

for a removable alien to remain in the United States.” Vargas responded to that line, saying, “How can I not be hopeful, I mean from that line it seems to me that the ruling says that I’m not illegal.”

Ingraham asked Vargas, what about the people who are back in their countries trying to come to the U.S. legally for years, “they don’t have fraudulent Social Security numbers, they don’t lie on their forms like you did, how do you think they feel today … Should everybody be allowed to come in or just the people who are here illegally and lied?

He said, “What we really need is a process. I am not looking to bump the person from Nigeria or Pakistan.” Ingraham pointed out that he has indeed “bumped” their spots, to which he answered, “If we create a process so that the 12 million undocumented Americans can come forward and say here, here we are, now give us a process. And again if you want me to get in the back of the line to not bump anybody off I’d be happy to do that.”

Vargas added, “I’ve been in this country since I was 12, I pay taxes here, so this is my home. Before I’m going to go back to the Philippines, I’m going to make sure that I can go back to my home here in New York City.”