Sunday, December 19, 2010

Orrin and the Dream Act

Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) was an original sponsor of the DREAM Act, a bill to help some undocumented young people gain legal status through school or military service. In 2003, he referred to the deportation of students who grew up in the U.S. as a “tremendous loss to our society.” In 2007, he and fellow Utah Sen. Bob Bennett voted to add the act to the defense authorization bill — the same move Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid did yesterday.

In 2010, though, Hatch and Bennett’s votes were different.
“The American people want the government to secure our borders, create jobs and reduce the deficit.” Hatch said. “Instead, Senate leadership is insisting on ignoring the will of the people.

Why the turnaround? In July, “If they’ve lived good lives, if they’ve done good things, why would we penalize them and not let them at least go to school?”

But his spokeswoman, Antonia Ferrier, was careful at the time to point out that Hatch had not signed on to the current version of the DREAM Act. “He believes that we have to get tough on border security because the American people will have no faith in any immigration legislation until we do that,” she said in an email.

And The Republican leadership can't figure why they can't attract "the brown vote." Orrin just could not find the time to vote on the dream act, what a guy! I guess I if your parents carried you across the border at a young age and your willing to get shot at to gain citizenship it's just not enough for you republicans. Orrin born on base in the right zip code as Eric has said many times, they just can't see beyond themselves. What a selfish bunch of bastards!

3 comments:

Hags said...

Terry,

I know few people with a better heart than yours, and I appreciate and even support the underlying idea of establishing a path to citizenship for some illegals.

Here is my advice on how to achieve that goal: support actions that secure the borders. I absolutely, positively reject the notion that we are incapable of securing our borders. As a result, I interpret our failure to do so as a preference of those in charge to ignore the problem or to permit the continue flow of illegals.

I will actively support opposition to such bills as the Dream Act until the borders are secure. Once we secure the borders (that doesn't mean zero illegals, that means substantially fewer than now) I will actively support reasonable paths to citizenship.

I don't think iI am unique in my view. I think it is the view of many in Congress, enough so that a bill could be easily passed.

Bring resources home from Afghanistan and secure the borders with the available funds.

Cheers!

Hags

Baxter said...

There is a well founded lack of trust between the parties today. I don't blame Hags for wanting the border secured first, however, the "amnesty"/"paths to citizenship" protocol needs to be established by the same law. Only a fool would rely upon the promises or good faith of the Republicans to follow through.

First Part: Secure the border with specific, objective criteria of success; Second Part: After success, "path to citizenship" for all illegals currently in the States, including the requirement to fluently speak English. Those with criminal records need to be deported and should have no prospect to return. There are plenty of non-criminals that would like to work here.

Going forward, I advocate allowing a large number of immigrants every year. At least as many as have been entering illegally. Those with post-grad education or $1mm to invest go to the front of the line. Our policy needs to favor America and those already here. We will help make this the "Next American Century" if we import the brainpower and ambition of the best and brightest from around the world.

Jim G. said...

like the Liberal suspicion that any effort to limit abortions is actually a plot to make them all illegal, any effort to liberalize immigration will be viewed as a measure to have complete amnesty.