What the heck is going on where in the past three years we've had more people entering the country illegally than the entire population of 22 states, yet my ext

What the heck is going on where in the past three years we've had more people entering the country illegally than the entire population of 22 states, yet my extremely qualified friend from the UK (who will work in tech and pay taxes) finds it absolutely impossible to emigrate here? He'd need a big tech company to enter that visa lottery for $10k an attempt, it sounds like.