all the talking points you constantly bring up, but your first point that wall funding "can't be the sticking point for Dems" is a good example of why some people accuse you of not being interested in honest discussion. It's clearly their biggest issue in the whole debate because something like 90% of the constituents they represent oppose the wall, and their job in this representative democracy is to represent their constituents. To brush that off (even if half joking) as something they can't legitimately consider a sticking point leads off your whole post with something obviously not based in fact.

Those reductions you're talking about were part of one proposal, and there have been many different proposals. I can't remember which one that was, and if Republicans supported that proposal and Dems supported all of it except for that one part you might have a fair point, but I surely don't remember any proposal only being held up by Dems and only held up on that issue. If you're talking about that one original Trump proposal, the much bigger holdup for the Dems was the significant wall funding and apparently Repubs didn't support it either because it never even got to a vote.

And there have been other legal immigration restrictions Repubs have put in. That "compromise" Trump "offered" in his primetime speech on TV during the shutdown? The actual legislation included reductions in legal asylum admissions and other areas - that had nothing to do with chain migration and I don't remember that one talking about clearing out any backlog.

Your math seems to completely misunderstand what the border crossing numbers represent. The 70K were not given any sort of permanent legal immigration status. The ones that don't claim asylum are turned away and not allowed to stay in the country. The ones that claim asylum and don't pass the credible fear test are turned away and not allowed to stay in the country. You've even pointed out that many of the asylum requestors aren't granted asylum once they make it to court, and despite all the hysteria about people "never return[ing] for hearings," 89% of asylum seekers DO show up in court, and if there wasn't a 2+ year delay until their court date that number would surely increase.