In John Stossel’s column regarding Ron Paul’s view on immigration (“Paul explains immigration views,” Jan. 31), Paul said that he didn’t think our government could find all the people who are here illegally. This is a big misstatement of fact.

Our friend, the IRS, has three computers that record all the Social Security numbers on tax returns. Between the duplicate numbers that are filed by the illegal immigrants and the actual files of the person who owns that Social Security number, the illegals should stand out like a sore thumb.

You might think that not many people who are illegal immigrants file tax returns, but that is not so. Every married couple who has children and makes a salary in the $20,000 range will receive a refund of between $2,000 and $4,000 and pay no taxes.

If the government wanted to round up the people who are filing these returns, they could do it in less than a week, and our government wouldn’t be spending billions of dollars paying earned income credit to illegal immigrants.

-Ian L. Edward

Marysville