Apr 19 2008
GOP Gubernatorial Candidates Talk Illegal Immigration
All four candidates responded that they would do more to combat illegal immigration.
However, criticism of McCrory’s efforts to combat illegal immigration in Charlotte, which Smith and Orr have leveled in the past two weeks, did not come up.
The sharpest difference on the topic came up with Smith saying the state needed to be judicious in how it used and paid for a program that deputizes sheriff’s departments to enforce immigration laws. Graham said he would deputize all law enforcement officers to do so and would want them to more actively enforce immigration laws than the federal 287(g) program currently allows.
Meanwhile, McCrory said the state needs to persuade the federal government to build immigration courts and detention centers in the state, but Orr said taxpayers should be wary of those costs. Orr said the state should be doing more to recoup the costs of illegal immigration problems from the federal government.
I agree with Orr’s sentiment here. If we start getting into big dollar construction projects to house all of these illegals being rounded up I’m not certain it’s going to be worth it. If the state would simply implement the right solution, severely punishing employers for hiring them, then we wouldn’t need extra detention centers. If the job dry up, they’ll leave.
Arizona and Georgia have already passed extremely strict enforcement against illegal immigrants and they have been fleeing those states in droves. What I suggest will work.
After careful review, anyone with a even a modicum of logic can come to no other conclusion: illegal immigration must be halted, illegal immigrants here now must be deported and legal immigration needs decreased from the approx. 2 million allowed in per year currently.
Please review the following report on the FISCAL COST OF IMMIGRATION by economist Edwin Rubenstein just released this past week:
http://www.esrresearch.com/Rubensteinreport.pdf
A partial summary of the report:
The Fiscal Impact on 15 Federal Departments surveyed was: $346 billion in fiscal related costs in FY 2007.
Each immigrant cost taxpayers more than $9,000 per year.
An immigrant household (2 adults, 2 children) cost taxpayers $36,000 per year.
Legal immigrants were not separated out from illegal immigrants for the fiscal impact study, but if they had been, the fiscal cost per ILLEGAL immigrant would be even more shocking than the figures quoted above.
The most extensive and authoritative study, prior to economist Edwin Rubenstein’s “The Fiscal Impact of Immigration” (April 2008) , is the National Research Council (NRC)’s The New Americans: Economic, Demographic and Fiscal Effects of Immigration (1997).
The NRC staff analyzed federal, state, and local government expenditures on programs such as Medicaid, AFDC (now TANF), and SSI, as well as the cost of educating immigrants’ foreign- and native-born children.
NRC found that the average immigrant household receives $13,326 in federal annual expenditures and pays $10,664 in federal taxes—that is, they generate a fiscal deficit of $2,682 (1996 dollars)per household.
In 2007 dollars this is a deficit of $3,408 per immigrant household.
With 9 million households currently headed by immigrants, more than $30 billion ($3,408 x 9 million) of the federal deficit represents money transferred from native taxpayers to immigrants.
Our national immigration policies have to work for the United States. While improving the plight of the world’s poor is a laudable goal, the finite resources we have available to fulfill that goal would be swamped if there wasn’t some orderly and manageable system in place to limit entry into the United States to what this nation can actually support. The more illegal aliens that are permitted to subvert the immigration system, the fewer immigrants we can accommodate who might actually produce a positive benefit for our country.
The more we become a nation of illegal immigrants, the deeper we fall into anarchy.
CAREFUL WHAT WE WISH FOR: OBAMA = AMNESTY
WHY IS NORTH CAROLINA GIVING THE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES A FREE “PASS” ON ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION? Have we given up because everyone in North Carolina perceives their policies to be so similar? Or do we believe the candidates for state government’s claims that they can fix the problem?
Our state’s job growth and personal income lag the entire Southeast. We are taxed to the bone: the highest corporate tax rate, highest state income tax rate, and the second highest fuel tax and sales tax rates in the Southeast.
The quality of life we enjoy is collapsing. Medical services decrease while their cost skyrockets. Our children’s schools are over-crowded and under-staffed. We now face water shortages, sprawl, traffic, air pollution, and housing for the poor is scarce.
Our state is becoming a crime capital, with international drug trafficking, gang activity, identity theft, drunk driving – the list goes on. Meanwhile we release criminals early because of prison overcrowding.
ONE MAJOR REASON: OUR STATE HAS BECOME A HAVEN FOR ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS. Estimates place our current illegal immigrant population (primarily from Mexico) at over 650,000. In a state with less than nine million legal citizens, that is a “NUMBER OF CRISIS PROPORTIONS.”
The simple fact is Washington refuses to enforce the laws on the books. This FAILURE OF THE RULE OF LAW costs taxpayers in North Carolina $1.4 to $1.7 BILLION annually. The money goes to educate the children of illegal immigrants and to pay for federally-mandated medical care for the 58% of illegal immigrants who are uninsured. We are all concerned about the state’s slow job and personal income growth. A study by UNC - Chapel Hill estimates illegal workers depress North Carolina’s payrolls by about $1.9 BILLION each year.
SOME LEADERS IN WASHINGTON ARE PUSHING FOR AMNESTY. Their plan, similar to the 2007 measure, would directly cost North Carolina taxpayers an additional $3.2 billion annually. Our sympathy should go out to ALL the innocent victims, including the illegal immigrants running from their own government’s neglect. Mexico has one of the largest economies in the world and is rich in natural resources. However, it is a corrupt country, ranked even lower than Columbia. But why fix the problem when you can push the victims on to your neighbor? It is unfair for us to pick up the tab. The best way to show compassion for illegal immigrants is to END illegal immigration.
RIGHT NOW WE CAN DO SOMETHING TO PROTECT OUR COMMUNITIES. We will likely decide the Democratic nominee for president. If we fail to use this opportunity to look out for our own interests on May 6th, OUR FATE WILL BE SEALED – WITH AMNESTY.
North Carolina does not like Hillary Clinton. She certainly has not led the charge to enforce the country’s immigration laws. John McCain let us down, although he has retreated. BUT BARACK OBAMA EQUALS AMNESTY. We are poised to nominate the worst candidate possible for North Carolina!
OBAMA’S PRO-AMNESTY RECORD BEGAN BACK IN 1998. When elected to the state senate, he immediately advocated state-funded welfare and Medicaid benefits to illegal immigrants. He has continued throughout his career. His campaign recently wrote:
“His father came to this country for the same reasons that millions of immigrants come to this country. Barack Obama believes immigration reform (AMNESTY) is an issue for all Americans, which is why he discusses the issue often on the campaign trail, why he has been a leading voice on the issue in the Senate and why he is committed to reviving immigration reform in his first year in office.”
CONSIDER THE POLITICAL CALCULUS INVOLVED (you can be certain Obama and his advisors are). Obama tells North Carolina he will be tough on illegal immigration, and we believe him. But the facts speak for themselves:
- Hispanic Democrats comprise about 6% of eligible voters nationwide;
- North Carolina Democrats account for less than 1%;
- The Hispanic vote is critical to winning four “swing states;”
- North Carolina is a solid “red state” - we handed Bush a 12 POINT VICTORY in 2004.
Bottom line: Barack will say anything to get our vote to win the nomination. But he knows he is highly unlikely to win North Carolina in the general election: Obama has already written off his assurances to us and pledged his allegiance to the Hispanic community (what do you think he promised Bill Richardson for his support?).
OBAMA’S PLEDGES TO THE HISPANIC COMMUNITY:
1. PUSH FOR AN AMNESTY BILL HIS FIRST YEAR IN OFFICE.
(MCCAIN is learning his lesson on the issue; HILLARY has said nothing more than “we’ll see”).
2. GRANT DRIVER’S LICENSES TO ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS.
(Clinton opposes driver’s licenses for illegal immigrants).
OBAMA’S SHOWED HIS TRUE BELIEFS IN SAN FRANCISCO:
“It’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or ANTI-IMMIGRANT SENTIMENT or anti-trade sentiment AS A WAY TO EXPLAIN THEIR FRUSTRATIONS.”
McCain would be good for North Carolina. Hillary is far less passionate about amnesty than Obama. She does not have desire or charisma to push a harmful bill through Congress. BUT OBAMA’S FERVOR, PASSION AND AMNESTY PROMISES ARE TOO DANGEROUS FOR NORTH CAROLINA. Why are we about to take that chance?