House GOP wants to make illegal immigration a federal offense

[BurtWorm]

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-felons15dec15,1,5225757.story?coll=la-headlines-politics
Illegal Immigration Could Be a Felony
House Republicans push legislation that defies Bush's guest-worker plan, under which criminals are not eligible for legal status.
By Nicole Gaouette
Times Staff Writer

December 15, 2005

WASHINGTON — Under immigration legislation being considered in the House, living illegally in the United States would no longer be a violation of civil immigration law. It would be a federal crime.

But making the nation's estimated 11 million illegal immigrants into felons could deal a fatal blow to the proposed guest-worker program that is a cornerstone of President Bush's immigration overhaul, because immigrants who have committed crimes are not eligible for legal status in the United States.

The move, spearheaded by the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner Jr. (R-Wis.), is part of a push by House Republicans to set the tone for the debate over revising immigration laws that will continue into 2006. The measure could come up as soon as today.

House Republicans want tough border security and enforcement provisions in place before discussion of a guest-worker program. Their clash with pro-business Republicans has created tensions within the party and with the administration that the House bill could intensify.

...

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Why not make it illegal-and a felony-to hire illegals?

Don't you bet that that would solve a great deal of the problem? But of course the whole point of what the repukes want is to make sure that illegals their rich fat cat friends hire will never complain about anything.

[eyesroll]

3. It's already illegal to hire illegals.

In fact, the criminal punishment can be pretty serious. Jail time. Big fines.

(The problem is enforcement.)

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

6. I don't know if it is a felony

for the individuals involved. I know that Tyson has gotten into trouble here in AR for hiring illegals, but only think they got a fine....no big deal, was the impression I got.

[nadinbrzezinski]

9. It is a felony

just that our cheap labor pubbies like to posture and NOT enforce the laws alredy on the books, I mean they might have to send the Walton kids to jail if yuo get my drift.

[MountainLaurel]

12. Tyson scapegoated some local managers

And the company had to pay a relatively small fine. You know that someone way up the food chain was well aware of these hiring practices, if these lower-level folks thought it was acceptable to hire coyotes to bring illegals in to work.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

2. How many prisons would it take to hold 11million poor people?

Another brilliant idea by the fascists. What's next? The "Final Solution" to the immigrant "problem"?

[Loonman]

4. Not talking about immigrants

Illegal immigrants, as in against-the-law.

[adriennui]

5. i agree....

the operative word is ILLEGAL. throw the employers in with them (fining them isn't enought because they'll just write it off as the cost of doing business.

what i find amazing is that the working poor in the USA isn't livid and are accepting of being sabotaged.

illegals are helping to suppress wages for americans and making unions obsolute. this is not a good thing.

[Bridget Burke]

7. The Unions have been in trouble for a long time.

And outsourcing has probably killed as many US jobs.

[High Plains]

16. What I find amazing is that people on this board are...

...advocating the mass imprisonment of millions of non-violent people.

[Loonman]

17. Don't want to imprison them

Just deport them. You like rewarding criminal behaviour? Somebody robs you, you give them a gift basket?

[High Plains]

19. As I've argued on previous threads...

...I think the solution is to regularize these people. Grant them work permits or enact a guest worker program (not one that screws them) or something similar. Doing so would protect both immigrant workers (who would then have rights) and native workers (who would not face downward wage pressure from exploited illegals unable to protect themselves from predatory employers).

Neither mass imprisonment nor mass deportations are anything I want to be associated with.

Their "criminal behavior" consists solely of not having a piece of paper.

[Loonman]

22. Regularize...we do that

People apply for, study for and get American citizenship every day. Green cards, work permits, we do that too. Millions still prefer to sneak in like thieves in the night.

Not having a piece of paper, huh? Puh-leeze.

[High Plains]

25. I think our quotas allow for a few tens of thousands of Mexicans...

...to enter the country as legal immigrants each year, but don't quote me on the precise numbers.

Clearly, there are many times that number who want to come. We have a unique situation here in North America. It's the only place on the planet where the Third World bumps up directly against the First World across a lonely, largely indefensible border.

I see parallels to the war on drugs here. In both cases, we find that trying to prohibit something people want (drugs, a better life in the north) doesn't work. We can call for tougher enforcement (throw all the druggies in jail, deport all the illegals), but measures tough enought to succeed end up being at odds with our values. That's why I say we should be realistic: Regulate the drug trade, regulate the illegal immigrants. You can't control that which you prohibit.

Yeah, their "crime" is not having a piece of paper. And actually--I could be wrong--I think they are not committing "crimes" by crossing without documents, but "administrative violations."

[Loonman]

37. The sheer amount of illegals streaming in

The sheer amount of illegals streaming into the country breaks the back of our welfare and social services organizations. We simply cannot afford to assimilate all these people in a thorough manner. Plus there is a national security issue as well.

[sandnsea]

34. Marianas

Heard of it? That's the "petri dish". No thank you. No guest worker program. Legalize the immigrants who are here and only let in immigrants who want to become citizens. More if necessary, but no guest worker program.

[adriennui]

27. i am not advocating prison for the illegals

but i do believe they should be sent back to there country of origin.
seems to me that vicente fox dares to tell us not to keep immigrants out because
he must have lots of embarrassing photos of the chimp. the employers who are outsourcing and employing illegals at substandard wages are the ones who should be sent to prison.

[ultraist]

29. I think imprisonment is INSANE

But I suspect, they will find a way to capitalize off of making it a felony. Aren't prisons big profit businesses now?

Or as I suggested, they'll imprison them in labor camps.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

8. And, the Nazis were talking about Jews.

Victimizing the victims is soooo easy.

[Loonman]

10. Bad analogy

Compare fishsticks to firehoses, next.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

21. OK. Try the internment of the Japanese during WWII.

11 million people in prisons? Internment camps? Concentration camps?

[Loonman]

23. Worse analogy

The Japanese were not wrongly interned for infiltrating the country to find work.

Thank you for playing.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

24. Well, if it looks like racism, smells like racism, and sounds like racism.

Guess what?

As the son of an immigrant who came here to escape poverty my sympathies lie with the oppressed rather than the oppressors.

As for "playing": The game is fixed by the fatcat capitalists who are preying on the immigrants.

The Japanese were wrongly interned because they weren't white. Unlike the Germans and Italians who were.

[Loonman]

36. I'll go home and get my violin

So I can play you a little tune while you pull the race card and some boo-hoo victimhood bullshit.


If the oppression in your native land was that bad, maybe people should have done something about it instead of fleeing to go sponge off another country, illegally, mind you.

[Tarc]

39. There is nothing oppressive

About wanting people to come to this country via the front door, rather than sneaking in through the side.

[Telly Savalas]

33. Like the millions of Americans who illegally smoke pot.

[Loonman]

11. Who's fault is it that they're poor?

Could it be Vicente fucking Fox?

[MountainLaurel]

13. Throw in Bill Clinton

NAFTA has driven down the prices of Mexican agricultural goods. Plus not all illegal immigrants are Mexican: a huge portion come from the other Latin American nations. You know, the ones we've been supporting dictatorships in for the past 40 years?

[Loonman]

15. Good point

I never supported NAFTA.

[ultraist]

28. They'll just set up internment/labor camps

Or let them go out during the day to work. So instead of paying them under the table or min wage with no benefits, they'll get them to work for free.

[High Plains]

14. I remember when people used to say "let's not make a...

...federal case out of it," but I guess that's just so 19th Century.

As if our prisons weren't already full enough of non-violent people.

Do they really want to send people to prison for trying to make a better life for themselves?

On edit: Do you?

[Loonman]

18. Don't want to send 'em to prison

Just deport them.

[High Plains]

20. Gotcha--see my response upthread. n/t

[hogwyld]

26. Just let them in!

It's not like they're taking joe sixpack's job. I'm sure he wouldn't be out there picking strawberries! Let them take all the jobs that we don't do such as gardening, dishwashing, busboy, etc. Once all of those jobs are filled, there's no more demand!

[Viva_La_Revolution]

32. I'm more than willing to wash dishes, or pick strawberries, or busing

tables, and as a matter of fact, I have done each of those. I can't however support 3 kids on what they are willing to pay, because they can get someone else to do it cheaper.

It is an absolute bullcrap statement to say Americans won't do those jobs. We would IF we could support our families on the pay.

[sandnsea]

35. Oh good grief

There may be need in some regions, and for some jobs. But I am so sick of hearing that Americans won't do immigrant jobs. YES they will, they do. If they're paid a fair wage. In case you weren't aware, they're bringing in immigrants to do nursing jobs too. There is NO job that immigrants can't do, and for a cheaper wage too. We're cutting our own throats with this attitude.

[Loonman]

38. Ludicrous

The reason why people won't take those jobs is because the wages are so depressed for menial labor due to being able to pay illegals pennies on the dollar(non-taxable, too).

[Cleita]

30. Yes, now that they are more illegal than ever, felonies, if

you wish, I guess we are going to have to build concentration camps to herd them into for a final solution because the prisons are already bursting at the seams. Since they will have no status or rights in this country, it seems like the thing that is going to have to happen.

God damn! Can't you see what is happening?

[LizW]

40. Bingo!

America flipped to a service economy years ago. The Cheap Labor Party is faced with the dilemma that most service jobs can't be shipped overseas to where the cheap labor is, so the cheap labor has to come here. Fortuitously for the CLP, there's a large poor population right next to us. (Don't think it's an accident that America under the CLP does NOTHING to help improve economic conditions in Mexico.)

The problem for the CLP is that the slave wages they love for the illegal immigrants also depress wages for Americans. Americans are getting angry. The CLP has relied on blaming and vilifying the illegal aliens for some time, but soon it won't be enough. The CLP has been in power for so long, Americans might start to blame them and they have to get a new plan.

Bush's "guest worker" plan is dead in the water because they CLP has spent too long vilifying the illegals and blaming them for the ills suffered by American workers. It's too hard to go back and reshape public opinion now.

But this new plan - make them felons - works on so many levels. It plays into the established vilification of illegal aliens; it keeps the supply of cheap labor coming; it pacifies the angry American workers; and best of all, America has a long history of accepting prison slave labor, so that shouldn't be a problem. The cheap illegal alien labor will be even cheaper.

Oh, and the best part: the cost of feeding and housing the alien labor force (privatized, of course) will be footed by the TAXPAYERS, not the corporations who use the labor!

Somebody should burn in hell just for coming up with something as fiendish as this.

:puke:

[sendero]

31. Cheap Labor Republicans..

... are not going to do JACK SHIT about illegal immigration, you can count on it.

Our entire economy depends on it. Nothing would get picked in California, nothing would get fixed in Texas.

It's a bunch of bullshit posturing for the base, and nothing more.