Will Illegal Immigration Be The Death Of Europe?

Given the unchecked flood of illegal immigration now taking place across the European continent and Britain, the headline above asks a valid question: Will Europe in the future exist only as a territory, but not as a civilization and a culture?

Spain is the latest flashpoint in Europe’s battle to maintain control over its borders.

Last week’s stunning border break in Ceuta, a North African enclave that has been part of Spain for over 400 years, should be a wake-up call for all of Europe and the U.S., too. More than 60,000 migrants crossed en masse, with at least 57 dying in the violent chaos of breaking through the border and swimming ashore to Ceuta, population 80,000.

Blame Spain for the surge.

Spain’s socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s government in April passed a plan intending to give legal status to about half a million illegal immigrants. Instead, the program unexpectedly attracted a million applicants.

Meanwhile, a recent decision by Spain’s Supreme Court that any illegal immigrants arriving to Spanish territory by sea couldn’t be immediately deported might as well have been an engraved invitation.

The message went out: Spain’s now open territory. Desperate North African men (those arriving were overwhelmingly men, and all were desperate) saw this as an open invitation, with lots of potential loopholes to exploit.

Not surprisingly, terrified European Union countries are reacting, heaping criticism on Spain for its lax border controls and even talking about suspending the Schengen Treaty with Spain, which lets EU’s citizens freely move from one country to another. EU nations fear being overwhelmed by waves of new illegal immigrants, thanks to Spain’s irresponsible policies.

“The prime ministers of 22 out of 27 EU member states have written a joint letter to the EU, demanding an emergency summit over the invasion of illegal migrants in Ceuta,” wrote Visegrad 24 on X. “They are outraged by the recent ruling of the Spanish Supreme Court.”

President Donald Trump has jumped in, calling the illegal rush into Spain a “catastrophe” and an “invasion.”

The U.S. State Department also wasted no time in criticizing Spain, calling the migrant surge “unacceptable” and part of “the Spanish government’s deliberate efforts to enable and facilitate mass illegal migration into Europe.”

But as bad as Spain’s open-door immigration policies are under Sanchez and his socialist allies, the EU has little room to criticize. It has had disastrous open-border policies for decades.

Tragically, across the EU, and in Britain too, the experiment with lax immigration has brought violent crime, created a low-productivity welfare culture, turned once-quiet suburbs into hostile immigrant enclaves, and brought aggressively anti-Western radical Islamists into Europe from North Africa, the Mideast, and South Asia.

The once-boring post-war capitals of Europe now teem with angry, unassimilated immigrants. Swaths of many major cities — London, Berlin, Paris, and Rome among them — are no-go zones.

So the EU’s stinging criticisms of Spain ring a bit hollow. Many EU members have been doing the same thing since at least World War II. But now governments across Europe are feeling the heat from conservative and centrist political parties that seek stronger border controls.

It’s fed by the fact that the EU no longer has enough babies to increase its population and boost economic growth. Take away immigration, and Europe’s shrinking, as the chart below shows:

Source: Rockwool Foundation, Berlin (https://www.rfberlin.com/cream-report/03-2026/).

So Spain has become a major illegal immigrant spigot. Estimates show that between 50,000 and 70,000 new illegal entrants come to Europe across Spain’s beaches each year. Meanwhile, Spain’s leftist government (and the EU) has looked the other way.

“In 2024 alone, the (Spanish) population rose by over half a million, driven overwhelmingly by immigration,” wrote Spanish journalist Antonio O’Mullony. “At the same time, the number of (native-born) Spaniards fell by roughly 130,000. Spain adds inhabitants but loses nationals.”

Spain and the rest of the EU hope that the tide of illicit newcomers will fill low-level jobs that native-born Europeans won’t do, while paying the exorbitant taxes needed to keep the EU’s bankrupt socialist-welfare state model afloat. Euro-socialists just love illegal immigration.

Sadly, socialist thinking is common these days. Indeed, in the U.S., if the self-avowed socialists who now control the Democratic Party win Congress in 2026 and the White House in 2028, America will be in big trouble, Spanish-style. So your vote will matter.

For America’s socialists, open borders are a first step to getting rid of the rule of law and the Constitution, both of which the Democratic Socialists of America have as stated goals.

Spain and the rest of the EU have failed their own citizens by letting in millions of people who will never be productive, patriotic citizens. So to answer the question in our headline, yes, Europe is dying. And if the U.S. wants to avoid the same fate, it shouldn’t repeat the EU’s immigration mistakes.

— Written by the I&I Editorial Board

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