CLT
UPDATE
Friday, September 5, 2003
"Aztlan" invades US - taxpayers fund its army
If we must listen to Sen. John Kerry criticize
President Bush about the deficit during the campaign for president, then
we should also be reminded that it was his vote that killed the federal
balanced budget constitutional amendment that would help prevent
deficits and control the national debt....
The NTU got the vote in the House. The Senate vote,
on March 6, 1997, was 66-34, one vote shy of the required two-thirds.
That one vote was Sen. John Kerry’s.
CLT News Release
Wednesday, September 3, 2003
Sen. John Kerry and the federal deficit
In a dual-language event designed to appeal to Latino voters, the candidates paid
particular attention to immigration issues and hazarded a few stilted phrases in
Spanish, adding a slightly different dimension to an otherwise predictable discussion
of foreign and domestic policies....
But if the disagreements aired during the debate failed to highlight sharp differences
between the campaigns, the evening did give the Democratic Party an opportunity to
target those who will be key in the general election -- voters in New Mexico, an
important battleground state, and Hispanics, who represent an increasing share of the
electorate and who have been heavily wooed by Bush.
The debate was carried by Univision, the Spanish-language station that sponsored the
event.
The Boston Globe
Friday, September 5, 2003
Democrats rip Bush in 8-way debate
In 1975, a young Cruz Bustamante joined a student group at Fresno State College that
advocated bold moves to empower Mexican-Americans. Nearly 30 years later, with
Bustamante a candidate for governor, he has come under fire from critics who say the
organization agitated for a separate Chicano homeland in the United States....
Critics, including immigration officials, have pointed to language in MEChA documents that
calls for the liberation of the Southwest. The plan -- written at the National Chicano Youth
Conference in 1969, a month before MEChA was created -- calls for Mexican-Americans to
reclaim or liberate Aztlan, the mythical lands of their birth.
Associated Press
Friday, September 5, 2003
Bustamante defends ties to student group
Amid the political storm of California's recall, legislation that would allow an estimated 2 million illegal immigrants to obtain driver licenses cleared the state Senate and was sent to Gov. Gray Davis yesterday.
The Democratic governor had vetoed two tougher measures during his first term. But he has promised to sign the latest bill, which could give him a critical boost with Latino voters before the Oct. 7 recall election.
"I am just hopeful the legislation will reach my desk so that I can allow people who are working hard and contributing to our economy the opportunity to drive," Davis said late last week.
The San Diego Union-Tribune
Thursday, September 4, 2003
Senate OKs driver licenses for immigrants
The gold card of California society is a driver's license. It is the basic identity card that can be used for everything from writing checks at the supermarket to casting a ballot on election day. That's why Gov. Gray Davis' pledge to sign a bill allowing illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses is so outrageous.
Approved this week by party-line votes in the Assembly and Senate, the Democratic measure is an egregious affront to America's immigration laws and an insult to the millions of legal California immigrants who respect those laws....
Davis vetoed two previous attempts by the Legislature to provide licenses to
illegals. On those occasions, he cited the danger that terrorists would obtain licenses and use them to gain legalized entry into American society, as occurred with some of the Sept. 11 hijackers. He said he would not sign the measure unless adequate anti-terrorist provisions were added. The bill headed for his desk contains no such protections.
Yet, in one of the most stunning reversals in California political history, Davis now promises he will sign the bill into law. The reason? Crass politics, nothing more.
Locked in a desperate battle to keep his job, Davis is pandering to Latino voters in the worst possible way....
Without these safeguards, virtually any illegal immigrant could walk into a DMV office and apply for a license. Under the federal motor-voter law, driver's license applications also contain space for voter registration. This bill, then, increases the risk that illegal immigrants will register to vote fraudulently.
A San Diego Union-Tribune editorial
Thursday, September 4, 2003
Driver ID bill mocks immigration laws
The benefits in immigrating to California have been known to Mexican nationals for at least a decade, but California's taxpayers are only now realizing the true cost. By some estimates, one-third of all illegal immigrants to the U.S. reside in California. The draws: programs like
Medi-Cal, other state-based social programs, and a regulatory environment that is deliberately welcoming to the illegal immigrant. Though taxpayers have tried to end the steady flow of public money to illegal immigrants, politicians like Gov. Gray Davis, in poorly conceived efforts to curry the favor of yet one more interest group, have always stepped in to assure that the money continues to flow....
Los Angeles County is facing the closure of 16 hospitals and health care facilities because of looming insolvency. The problem is not that the facilities are underused. They are used too much, and because health care workers are not instructed -- some would say not permitted -- to inquire as to the immigration status of people seeking care, the facilities are saddled with millions in costs that are not reimbursable under the Medicaid program. Medicaid reimburses medical facilities only for emergency treatment of illegal aliens. Because no inquiry as to immigration status or even residency is ever made, medical services that are not reimbursable under Medicaid are regularly rendered. As a result, Los Angeles County incurred a $360 million healthcare deficit in fiscal 2002 alone....
Any responsible governor and legislature would have found a way to improve the program
to continue to deny benefits to illegal immigrants and other ineligible recipients. In all
likelihood, it would have saved the state from the $30 billion deficit it now faces. Gray Davis
wouldn't do it.
Fox News Online
Thursday , August 7, 2003
The California Problem
Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary
It turned out most ironic that when Barbara and I sat
down last night to watch the Democrat presidential candidates' first
debate (carried by Boston's PBS affiliate, WGBH TV-2) I set out snacks
of nacho chips and salsa to accompany the frozen Margarita I was
sipping. Little did I know that with the refreshments I was
providing the politically correct atmosphere for the upcoming debate.
Held in Alburquerque, it opened with an introduction
by New Mexico's governor, Bill Richardson, former Clinton administration
ambassador to the UN and Secretary of Energy. Along with the nation's
only Hispanic governor, the event was hosted by the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.
Ray Suarez of NewsHour with Jim Lehrer and Maria Elena Salinas of Univision were the
designated moderators.
Suarez and Salinas introduced a strange format. They
first asked each candidate a question in Spanish, then translated it
into English. Of course, the candidates responded only in English but
for a few memorized and butchered token phrases they couldn't wait to
toss out to the appreciative audience.
We wondered just who PBS thought was viewing this
debate. If it was necessary to ask their questions in Spanish then how
were Hispanics able to process the presidential candidates' Anglo
responses; did they understand only the questions, not comprehend the
answers? It was patronizing to Hispanics and annoying to the rest of us.
"NEW Mexico!" I griped in
frustration between sips of my Margarita, "It's one of the fifty
United States!"
"Watch your backside, Vicente Fox!" I
warned the president of Mexico while dipping a nacho, "It's not
just your opposition party (the PRI) that's out to get you. Sounds like
the Democrats here are after your job too!"
Now I'm not xenophobic ... at least not any more than the
next American in these troubled times of massive illegal immigration,
unemployment, expanding government entitlement spending, and homeland security
concerns ... but this entire scenario perplexed me. I mean, if you've
got to translate an American political debate then where's this country
going ... and how much longer before we arrive?
Then I recalled so many recent news reports and the
full weight landed.
According to another Copley News Service report
yesterday ("Latino power sets stage for Democrat hopefuls"):
At a June convention of Latino public officials from across the country,
New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson laid down a challenge:
"This next election we must demonstrate the power of our numbers," the nation's only
Hispanic governor said, "because some people are wondering: This great sleeping giant
– is it for real?"
Switching to Spanish, he declared: "We are for real!" ...
From 1970 to 2002, the Hispanic population grew 68 percent, reaching 37.4 million.
This year, the U.S. Census Bureau announced that Hispanics had become the nation's
largest minority group.
At the 1969 National Chicano Youth Conference
plans were laid for the "liberation of the Southwest ... for Mexican-Americans to reclaim or liberate Aztlan, the mythical lands of their birth."
About that same time the rest of us Americans were still debating President
Johnson's Vietnam war and Nixon was trying to get us out of it.
Apparently the Aztlan manifesto is quietly
succeeding. If its patient infiltration persists and the political pandering
continues, prepare to strike New from New Mexico. It appears we have
forgotten "Remember the Alamo!"
The upside to all this is, maybe we'll be able to
better control our borders when there are only 44 or 45 United States
remaining to protect.
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Chip
Ford |
CLT NEWS RELEASE
September 3, 2003
Sen. John Kerry and the federal deficit
Contact: Barbara Anderson - (508) 384-0100
If we must listen to Sen. John Kerry criticize President Bush
about the deficit during the campaign for president, then we should also be
reminded that it was his vote that killed the federal balanced budget
constitutional amendment that would help prevent deficits and control the
national debt.
Citizens for Limited Taxation worked with the National
Taxpayers Union on its Balanced Budget Amendment campaign throughout the1980s
and ‘90s.
We almost won in 1997. As with any proposed constitutional
amendment, a two-thirds majority vote is required in both the House and Senate
for it to succeed in the U.S. Congress.
The NTU got the vote in the House. The Senate vote, on March
6, 1997, was 66-34, one vote shy of the required two-thirds. That one vote was
Sen. John Kerry’s.
– 30 –
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The Boston Globe
Friday, September 5, 2003
Democrats rip Bush in 8-way debate
By Glen Johnson and Anne E. Kornblut, Globe Staff
ALBUQUERQUE -- Democratic presidential contenders, appearing in their first nationally televised debate, overwhelmingly denounced President Bush last night for his handling of the war in Iraq and economic policy. They avoided angry exchanges with one another, however, even as they tried to distinguish themselves in a crowded field.
In a dual-language event designed to appeal to Latino voters, the candidates paid particular attention to immigration issues and hazarded a few stilted phrases in Spanish, adding a slightly different dimension to an otherwise predictable discussion of foreign and domestic policies. One of the few notable disagreements among the eight participants was over free trade and job creation.
Two of the contenders, Representatives Dennis J. Kucinich of Ohio and Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri, blamed the North American Free Trade Agreement for chasing manufacturing jobs abroad -- a subject dear to many union workers who play a role in the Democratic primary.
But few sparks flew, despite predictions of a showdown between former Vermont governor Howard Dean and Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, the two closest rivals for front-runner status in fund-raising and the polls. Instead, Dean and Kerry -- as well as the other candidates onstage -- sought to outdo each other in their criticism of Bush, ridiculing and attacking the president as bungling the war effort, foreign policy, the economy, trade issues, and health care.
"This president is going to have to go back to the very people he humiliated -- our allies -- on the way into Iraq and hope they will now agree with us that we need their help," Dean said at the start of a half-hour segment that focused on Iraq and military policy.
"This president is a miserable failure," Gephardt said.
"It would be wonderful to have a president of the United States who could find the rest of the countries in this hemisphere," Kerry said.
The debate, broadcast from the campus of the University of New Mexico, appeared to do little to shift the political landscape and yielded almost no news from the eight contenders in attendance.
Only the Rev. Al Sharpton of New York, whose flight was affected by foul weather, did not appear.
It did, however, showcase the candidates together on national television for the first time more than a year before the final vote in the November 2004 contest -- adding new momentum to a Democratic primary race that has begun earlier than ever and is in full swing in more than a half-dozen states.
While fund-raising totals and polling results catapulted Dean ahead during the summer, other candidates maintained that voters have not begun paying attention until now, making the debate an important proving ground four months before the first primary contest. At least five more debates are scheduled in the months leading up to the Iowa caucuses.
"I really think it's a television debut for all ... of them," Kathleen Sullivan, chairwoman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party, said of the candidates last night. "The spotlight is on Governor Dean generally right now because he is the front-runner, but I think that it's really an introductory debate for everybody. Labor Day is behind us, and now people are really starting to pay attention."
On Iraq, Kerry did draw a distinction between his proposed resolution to the ongoing violence and that proposed by Senator Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut -- who would send in more US troops to maintain security. "I disagree with Joe Lieberman on this," Kerry said. "We should not send more American troops. That would be the worst thing. We do not want to have more Americanization. We do not want a greater sense of American occupation. We need to minimize that. And the way to do that is do everything possible, including sharing the power, to bring other countries in to take the burden."
Lieberman also took Dean to task several times, most pointedly over the issue of labor standards in nations with which the United States trades. Lieberman said Dean espoused something "which I found to be stunning, which is that he would not have bilateral trade agreements with any country that did not observe fully American standards."
"Now that would mean we'd break our trade agreements with Mexico, with Latin America, with most of the rest of the world. That would cost us millions of jobs," Lieberman said. "One out of every five jobs in America is tied up with trade. So if that ever happened, I'd say that the Bush recession would be followed by the Dean depression."
In fact, Dean did advocate higher standards, according to a column by Washington Post columnist Fred Hiatt last month. But last night, he interrupted Lieberman to clarify his stance. "We do have to have trade relations which rely on equality and labor standards throughout the world. It doesn't have to be American labor standards; it could be the International Labor Organization," Dean said.
Perhaps the harshest remark came after the debate, when Lieberman ridiculed Kerry's explanation for his vote in favor of a resolution authorizing military force in Iraq.
"I thought that John Kerry's statement in his announcement address -- that he voted for the resolution just to threaten Saddam Hussein -- was unbelievable. It was clearly an authorization for President Bush to use force against Saddam," Lieberman said. "I don't get it. He's been criticizing Howard Dean for lacking experience to lead America in the world today. It's true. It's not the best time to put a rookie in charge of our country's future. It hasn't been a good time to have a cowboy in charge of our future, but we also don't need a waffler in charge of our country's future."
But if the disagreements aired during the debate failed to highlight sharp differences between the campaigns, the evening did give the Democratic Party an opportunity to target those who will be key in the general election -- voters in New Mexico, an important battleground state, and Hispanics, who represent an increasing share of the electorate and who have been heavily wooed by Bush.
The debate was carried by Univision, the Spanish-language station that sponsored the event.
It was not quite a traditional debate: Instead of direct confrontation between the candidates, the forum allowed for a discussion of current affairs, controlled by a moderator.
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Associated Press
Friday, September 5, 2003
Bustamante defends ties to student group
By Chelsea J. Carter
SANTA ANA, Calif. -- In 1975, a young Cruz Bustamante joined a student group at Fresno State College that advocated bold moves to empower Mexican-Americans. Nearly 30 years later, with Bustamante a candidate for governor, he has come under fire from critics who say the organization agitated for a separate Chicano homeland in the United States.
State Senator Tom McClintock, a conservative Republican who is running for governor, recently likened the Chicano Student Movement of
Aztlan, also known as MEChA, to the Ku Klux Klan.
"It's like saying, 'Oh, I was a moderate member of the Klan,'" McClintock said last month on the San Diego radio station
KOGO. "It's incumbent on Cruz Bustamante to clearly and completely renounce the organization and its tactics and its views."
Bustamante, the lieutenant governor, is hardly the first public official to face questions about his youthful politics.
Bustamante, 50, has not backed away from the past.
"The students who are MEChA today are just like the students when I was there," he said. "Pretty much, they are trying to get an education. Most of the friends I went to school with are now either graduates from college or raising families."
Unlike other radical groups of the 1960s, such as the Black Panthers and the American Indian Movement, MEChA was never associated with violence. It supported Cesar Chavez and the farm workers movement, and its founding members received support from then presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy.
"Right before he was assassinated, he sat down with Chicano students who walked out of classes," said Susan Green, a Mexican-American studies professor and MEChA faculty adviser at California State University in Chico.
But the group also had a revolutionary spirit, embodied in one of its 1960s slogans, "For the race everything. For those outside the race, nothing."
Critics, including immigration officials, have pointed to language in MEChA documents that calls for the liberation of the Southwest. The plan -- written at the National Chicano Youth Conference in 1969, a month before MEChA was created -- calls for Mexican-Americans to reclaim or liberate
Aztlan, the mythical lands of their birth.
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The San Diego Union-Tribune
Thursday, September 4, 2003
Senate OKs driver licenses for immigrants
By Michael Gardner and James P. Sweeney
Copley News Service
SACRAMENTO – Amid the political storm of California's recall, legislation that would allow an estimated 2 million illegal immigrants to obtain driver licenses cleared the state Senate and was sent to Gov. Gray Davis yesterday.
The Democratic governor had vetoed two tougher measures during his first term. But he has promised to sign the latest bill, which could give him a critical boost with Latino voters before the Oct. 7 recall election.
"I am just hopeful the legislation will reach my desk so that I can allow people who are working hard and contributing to our economy the opportunity to drive," Davis said late last week.
The 23-15 vote was split along party lines and passed with Democratic support. The legislation, SB 60 by Sen. Gil
Cedillo, D-Los Angeles, had been approved by the Assembly a day earlier after closed-door negotiations over security standards and costs.
Lawmakers stripped out a high-tech fingerprint check and dropped plans to double license fees for all motorists to cover the costs.
Also absent are the criminal background checks that were in a bill that Davis vetoed last year.
Effective Jan. 1, the legislation would make California the third state that doesn't require proof of citizenship to obtain a license. The other states are Utah and New Mexico.
Illegal immigrants won't have to produce a Social Security number to get a license. Instead, they will have to provide a federal taxpayer identification number or another form of identification. They must also supply proof of California residency and provide fingerprints.
California issued driver licenses to illegal immigrants for 65 years until 1993, when state lawmakers repealed the privilege during a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment. "For 65 years, this is what worked for us," Cedillo said. "It was wrong for us to change the law."
Republicans accused Davis of pandering for Latino votes before the recall election. They chided him for surrendering on security precautions he specifically requested in veto messages that dispatched earlier bills.
"What's changed since this measure and previous measures like it were vetoed?" asked Sen. Dennis Hollingsworth, R-La Mesa. "Well, the background checks have been removed . . . and, oh by the way, there is a recall election."
Cedillo and other supporters portrayed the measure as a matter of public safety.
The state's large undocumented population should go though the same tests as other motorists, and a driver license is required to obtain auto insurance, they argued.
"If you don't have a driver's license in California, no matter how much you want to have auto insurance, you can't buy it," said Sen. Jackie
Speier, a San Francisco Bay Area Democrat whose husband was killed by an uninsured driver.
Critics invoked memories of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and warned that licenses have become important identification documents that can be easily obtained and misused.
State Sen. Tom McClintock, R-Thousand Oaks, a gubernatorial candidate in the recall election, said the state recognizes foreign driver licenses and that foreign nationals can obtain insurance in the home countries, with extended coverage for California.
"There is only one purpose for this bill, to place valid state identification documents in the hands of illegal immigrants, and the only reason for doing that is to make the enforcement of our immigration laws more difficult," McClintock said.
The other major recall candidates have split over the measure. Lt. Gov. Cruz
Bustamante, the Democratic front-runner, supports the bill. Actor Arnold Schwarzenegger, the leading Republican, opposes it.
Schwarzenegger vowed to lead a fight to repeal the law if he becomes governor.
"I am an immigrant . . . I am pro-immigrant," Schwarzenegger said in a statement. "But we should not invite fraud or undermine law enforcement. The federal government has expressed security concerns over this measure and in a time of heightened national security, we should not undermine our nation's immigration laws."
The vote was cheered by two dozen supporters, who had mounted an intense lobbying campaign in the final days of negotiations. But they also were distressed to hear Republicans equate them with the terrorists.
"We are not terrorists. We came here to work," said Concepcion Lopez of San Jose.
Two Democrats – Debra Bowen of Marina del Rey and Betty Karnette of Long Beach – abstained. Both had supported earlier versions with tighter security provisions.
"The issue is not the license for me," Bowen said. "It's a question of making certain that the identification is as secure as possible."
The Department of Motor Vehicles cross-checks only Social Security numbers, Bowen said. Under Cedillo's bill, that would allow a U.S. citizen to create a new identity and leave behind an arrest record or child-support order, she said.
Karnette said she believed the measure lacked security protections.
Late amendments erased provisions to require all motorists to renew licenses in person rather than by mail so the state could secure a new fingerprint.
In addition to Hollingsworth, Republican Bill Morrow of Oceanside voted no. Democrats Dede Alpert of Coronado and Denise Ducheny of San Diego supported the bill.
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The San Diego Union-Tribune
Thursday, September 4, 2003
Editorial
Driver ID bill mocks immigration laws
The gold card of California society is a driver's license. It is the basic identity card that can be used for everything from writing checks at the supermarket to casting a ballot on election day. That's why Gov. Gray Davis' pledge to sign a bill allowing illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses is so outrageous.
Approved this week by party-line votes in the Assembly and Senate, the Democratic measure is an egregious affront to America's immigration laws and an insult to the millions of legal California immigrants who respect those laws.
What's more, the legislation was stripped at the last minute of its anti-fraud and security safeguards in order to save money. Consequently, it creates the glaring potential for terrorists to gain a DMV stamp of approval after entering the country illegally.
For precisely this reason, Davis vetoed two previous attempts by the Legislature to provide licenses to illegals. On those occasions, he cited the danger that terrorists would obtain licenses and use them to gain legalized entry into American society, as occurred with some of the Sept. 11 hijackers. He said he would not sign the measure unless adequate anti-terrorist provisions were added. The bill headed for his desk contains no such protections.
Yet, in one of the most stunning reversals in California political history, Davis now promises he will sign the bill into law. The reason? Crass politics, nothing more.
Locked in a desperate battle to keep his job, Davis is pandering to Latino voters in the worst possible way. If he stands a chance of not being turned out of office in the Oct. 7 recall, he must appeal to every possible interest group. In the last gubernatorial balloting, Latinos accounted for about 10 percent of the electorate, and Davis presumes most now support granting licenses to the estimated 1.2 million illegal immigrants of driving age in the state.
Never mind that the bill is opposed by law enforcement groups because it no longer requires background checks of illegal aliens to determine whether they are fugitives from the law. Similarly, an earlier requirement for a high-tech fingerprint system known as biometrics to screen license applicants was dropped from the measure because of its high cost.
Without these safeguards, virtually any illegal immigrant could walk into a DMV office and apply for a license. Under the federal motor-voter law, driver's license applications also contain space for voter registration. This bill, then, increases the risk that illegal immigrants will register to vote fraudulently.
Before he was confronted with the recall, Davis made very compelling arguments against the bill he now promises to enact into law. The dangers he warned about earlier are as pressing as ever in the current bill. If he puts the interests of California and the nation above his own selfish political interests, he will veto this measure. But that would require more from Gray Davis than we have come to expect.
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Fox News Online
Thursday , August 7, 2003
The California Problem
By Matt Hayes
Lawyers in California tell me that running an immigration law practice there is both a blessing and a curse. It's a blessing because of the sheer volume of Mexican illegal immigrants flowing across the border who seek some form of legal immigration status.
But it's a curse because every practitioner knows that there is a much larger, untapped population of potential customers who will never seek the services of an immigration lawyer because they will never need them. As one friend told me: "In California, the distinction between having legal immigration status and no legal immigration status really is purely legal. There is no practical distinction at all."
The benefits in immigrating to California have been known to Mexican nationals for at least a decade, but California's taxpayers are only now realizing the true cost. By some estimates, one-third of all illegal immigrants to the U.S. reside in California. The draws: programs like
Medi-Cal, other state-based social programs, and a regulatory environment that is deliberately welcoming to the illegal immigrant. Though taxpayers have tried to end the steady flow of public money to illegal immigrants, politicians like Gov. Gray Davis, in poorly conceived efforts to curry the favor of yet one more interest group, have always stepped in to assure that the money continues to flow.
Proposition 187, a ballot measure passed by voters in 1994, denied public benefits to illegal aliens. The day after voters passed it, groups such as the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund sued and sought a permanent injunction against Proposition 187 becoming law. An injunction remains in effect, and though Davis said during his campaign that he would appeal, he steadfastly refused to do so once he was elected. There is now a pending measure that would make obtaining a California driver's license much easier for illegal immigrants. Prior to his election being recalled, Davis had said that if the measure made it to his desk, he would sign it.
Los Angeles County is facing the closure of 16 hospitals and health care facilities because of looming insolvency. The problem is not that the facilities are underused. They are used too much, and because health care workers are not instructed -- some would say not permitted -- to inquire as to the immigration status of people seeking care, the facilities are saddled with millions in costs that are not reimbursable under the Medicaid program. Medicaid reimburses medical facilities only for emergency treatment of illegal aliens. Because no inquiry as to immigration status or even residency is ever made, medical services that are not reimbursable under Medicaid are regularly rendered. As a result, Los Angeles County incurred a $360 million healthcare deficit in fiscal 2002 alone.
The Investigations Division of the California Department of Health Services operated two port of entry
Medi-Cal fraud detection programs; one called the Port of Entry Detection Program the other the California Airport Residency Review. Both were highly successful, but were shut down because they were attacked by immigrants' rights groups.
In order to justify closing the program down, the California state auditor did an "investigation" and ordered the programs shut down. It issued a report in April 1999 (coinciding with the crescendo of pressure from immigrants' rights groups) that claimed the program was no longer justified. Any responsible governor and legislature would have found a way to improve the program to continue to deny benefits to illegal immigrants and other ineligible recipients. In all likelihood, it would have saved the state from the $30 billion deficit it now faces. Gray Davis wouldn't do it.
"Anti-borders groups will characterize any attempt to point out the negative impact of massive immigration on California's teetering health care system as 'blaming immigrants.' But, in a world in which nearly five billion people live in countries poorer than Mexico, the fact simply must be faced that California cannot be the emergency room to the world," says Craig Nelson, director of the advocacy group Friends of Immigration Law Enforcement. "California taxpayers have the right to know how their health care tax dollars are being spent, who is getting that health care, and whether such provision violates any laws. At the very least, hospitals and other providers must begin gathering data on the immigration status of those accessing the system," Nelson says.
We can hope that Gov. Davis takes time to reflect on what brought him to a point at which he faces an historic recall election, but he probably won't. He has sold out California's taxpayers in a deliberate plan to remain in office by offending no one, except perhaps the 59 percent of Californians who voted for Proposition 187. The result is a record deficit and a popularity rating so low that many hardcore Democrats want him to leave office. Other states must look to California as an example of what happens to governors who refuse to address the problem of unchecked illegal immigration.
Matt Hayes began practicing immigration law shortly after graduating from Pace University School of Law in 1994, representing new immigrants in civil and criminal matters. He teaches at Berkeley College, and is author of The New Immigration Law and Practice, to be published in October.
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