Proposed California Border Police Act, Revisited
I recently had the opportunity to hear Congressman Ed Royce speak. Although much of the discussion revolved around technological and financial issues, the California Border Police Act came up. I forgot that Royce was the state co-chair.
Well, it turns out that the Feds are hem-hawing about the whole thing:
Assemblyman Ray Haynes' proposal to create a state immigration police force to help patrol the border and enforce immigration laws statewide could meet resistance from the federal government and be disputed in the courts....
Haynes, R-Temecula, cites a 1996 provision of a law that allows state and local agencies to negotiate agreements with the federal government to enforce immigration laws. But federal officials say the law has never been applied to create officers strictly devoted to immigration, and they have no intention of doing so.
"We would not create a (memorandum of understanding) that created full-time immigration officers because we have full-time immigration officers," said Manny Van Pelt, a spokesman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which negotiates such agreements on behalf of the U.S. Attorney General's Office.
"The way it was meant to be used is as a tool to help officers in the street or in the jails, to help them do their day-to-day jobs in addition to their normal routine."
Haynes says he interprets the law 287(g) of the Immigration and Naturalization Act to mean states can step in and enforce immigration laws after technicalities are worked out with the government....
Meanwhile, experts disagree as to whether a plan for a separate state immigration police force would be constitutional or allowed.
State and local agencies have the inherent authority to enforce federal law, unless Congress specifically prevents them from doing so, said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Immigration Studies.
"Congress can and has pre-empted the states from enforcing other areas of law ... but immigration isn't one of them," Krikorian said.
Immigration attorney Carrye Washington of Ontario disagreed.
"It's the federal government that is properly trained to know the immigration laws, and any time state police groups decide they should regulate or do something to an immigrant, it seems they are doing something that is not constitutional," she said.
Whether states and localities have inherent authority to enforce civil immigration laws is an open question, said Marshall Fitz, associate director of advocacy for the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
The understanding prior to 2002 was that they do not, he said. In 2002, however, the Department of Justice issued a memo reversing that interpretation, but has never made that document public....
The North County Times opposes the initiative:
There are many reasons why California doesn't need a state force of border cops, and why you shouldn't sign those petitions.
As a rule, government by initiative is a poor way to run a state, and this initiative seems certain to invite legal challenges on constitutional grounds.
But even if Haynes' "California Border Police Act" made sense, we couldn't afford it.
With the state borrowing money hand over fist to subsidize today's expenses, now is not the time to be adding a new, expensive state agency whose mission is the essence of redundancy. The existing border patrol ---- renamed Immigration and Customs Enforcement but still underfunded ---- is appropriately federal, as are the immigration laws it's charged with enforcing.
Haynes' estimates of a force of 1,000 to 2,000 sworn officers costing between $200 million and $400 million each year sounds unrealistically cheap. The clout wielded by public safety unions can be easily observed in city, county and state budgets. Another bloated bureaucracy is exactly what this cash-strapped state doesn't need.
Haynes and other opponents of illegal immigration routinely cite the fiscal drain that undocumented immigrants place on California. They say the state spent $10 billion this year on such unwelcome guests, making a state border patrol cost-effective if it thins their ranks.
But the anti-immigration crowd also routinely denies the economic contributions those undocumented workers make to the state's fiscal health. Those contributions are most evident in our produce bins and flower vases; as many as two-thirds of California's agricultural workers are not citizens. It's worth considering the impact strict enforcement of citizenship requirements would have on the state's $28-billion-per-year agricultural industry weather....
Meanwhile, the Roseville Conservative blog quotes George Skelton:
[G]iven the federal government's dereliction of duty along the U.S.-Mexican border, this seems to be the only sensible alternative for Californians frustrated with rampant illegal immigration. And many are."It's the first question that comes up," says the legislator, Assemblyman Ray Haynes of Murrieta, referring to citizen meetings he holds in his district that covers western Riverside and northern San Diego counties. "Folks literally have illegals running through their backyards." (He's talking big backyards, as in ranches.)"About two years ago, things started heating up. It's now the hottest issue. The [state] budget, people can't understand. They understand illegal immigration. They see it." Mark Baldassare, pollster for the Public Policy Institute of California, agrees that Republican voters — the people Haynes talks to — have become increasingly upset about illegal immigration. "It is one of their top issues," he says, "even though for Californians as a whole, it ranks in the second tier, behind the economy and schools."
But also in that second tier of issues is budget deficits. And many Californians believe these problems are all related. Precise figures don't exist, but it's broadly estimated that California spends between $5 billion and $9 billion annually to educate, medically care for and imprison illegal immigrants.
There are roughly 2.6 million illegal immigrants living in California, according to a recent report by the Pew Hispanic Center in Washington, D.C.
Although many get dinged for federal Social Security taxes, it's not logical they're paying much in state and local taxes. They may get tapped through rents for some property taxes. But with low wages, it's doubtful they owe state income tax. And their meager discretionary income means they can't be buying a lot, so the sales tax they pay is minimal. Moreover, based on Pew research, illegal immigrants in California are sending at least $4.3 billion back to their native countries — primarily Mexico — rather than spending it here.
Liberals who close their eyes to illegal immigration point out that it benefits consumers by keeping down prices for vegetables and fruits and — they'd like us to believe — restaurant meals and hotel rooms. But it also depresses wages and benefits, and leads to exploitation of workers.
Evidence of that was found by the Pew center: Latinos — mostly new immigrants — accounted for 1 million of the 2.5 million American jobs created in 2004. But Latinos are the only major group of workers to have suffered a two-year decline in wages and now earn 5% less than two years ago.
This suggests, the center continued, "that they are competing with each other in the labor market to their own detriment."...
A state border patrol was suggested by a voter at a meeting in Temecula. "Why doesn't California just do it?" he asked Haynes.The assemblyman, surfing websites, found a 1996 federal act that allows states and counties to negotiate pacts with Washington, D.C., to help enforce immigration laws. No state has done it.
Haynes envisions a force of 1,500 to 3,000 officers, costing $200 million to $300 million a year. There now are about 1,700 federal officers on the California border, says Rep. Edward R. Royce (R-Fullerton), chairman of a House terrorism subcommittee who strongly supports Haynes' idea. Where does our deficit-ridden state get money for this?
"We need to bite the bullet and pay whatever we have to pay," Haynes says. "We don't need a tax increase. Revenue growth will more than pay…. "We conservatives believe government has one legitimate function — public safety. Protecting the border is public safety."...
Meanwhile, the illegal immigration war continues in Jersey. Not NEW Jersey...OLD Jersey:
More Romanians attempt entry
Another two Romanians have been caught at Jersey’s harbour trying to get into the UK.
A man claimed to be Lithuanian but eventually admitted he wasn’t and that he’d spent over £1000 on a fake passport.
A woman was caught with his real ID papers.
This incident brings the number of Romanians trying to get through the Channel Islands recently to eleven.
Immigration Manager David Nurse says the island plays a vital role in keeping illegal immigrants out of Britain.
Meanwhile, France is not tolerating stuff:
France announced new measures yesterday to clamp down on illegal immigration, including rules to stop arranged marriages, the rapid extension of “biometric” visas and an increase in the number of expulsions.
“When it comes to illegal immigration, the rule has to be firmness,” said Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin in an interview with Le Figaro newspaper.
The number of illegal immigrants currently in France is between 200,000 and 400,000, he said. Many of these are people who entered the country lawfully but have overstayed their visas....
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